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Process thread: Subscription website

Busch_Jager

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-Received final logos
-Worked on building another spider to scrape a related website
 

Busch_Jager

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-wrote another spider for a different website to add to my data I think I need about 4 more to have enough sources for my minimum viable product
-I realized I was approaching it wrong doing one spider at a time, now I have every spider template made so when I have a problem on one I can ask a question on a forum and while I am waiting I can just work on a different spider considerably increasing my efficiency.
 

100k

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Good on ya.

Though it might have made more sense not to waste time programming and coding.

Just do the work manually and PROVE there's a demand for the product and service, prove people are willing to pay $50/month to get access to the scraped info.

And just scrape the info/data manually or with scrapebox and post it on your website.

Once you've proven there's a demand for it, then you could hire a programmer or do the programming yourself (If you're a coder).

Other than that, good on ya. Keep at it.
 
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Busch_Jager

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Good on ya.

Though it might have made more sense not to waste time programming and coding.

Just do the work manually and PROVE there's a demand for the product and service, prove people are willing to pay $50/month to get access to the scraped info.

And just scrape the info/data manually or with scrapebox and post it on your website.

Once you've proven there's a demand for it, then you could hire a programmer or do the programming yourself (If you're a coder).

Other than that, good on ya. Keep at it.
I am very positive people are willing to pay for it because they already do and at a rate a lot more than $50/month. Just not in my country. Up until recently, this method was not possible due to regulations in the U.S. I have a lot of people I know and acquaintances interested in the product. I don't want to give up what I am working on in online forums because I don't want to give anyone the chance to catch up.

I would be very skeptical if there was no historical data of this product but it's already been proven people are willing to pay for it. The data is very time-sensitive and therefore cannot be manually scraped and the websites the data comes from are quite complex and dynamic and I think it would be difficult to get around this without a custom-coded solution. Unfortunately, there really isn't a quick way to push the product out due to the coding involved to get to the minimum viable product. I don't have tens of thousands of dollars to hire programmers so I guess I have to do it myself but I am pretty confident it will pay off. If it doesn't my web scraping skills are improving so much and I already have other website ideas using scraped data that I know I will find success somewhere if I keep at it.
 

Busch_Jager

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-Added another spider to scrape a website to add data to the database.
-At this point, I have 10/16 spiders made to scrape the websites I need for my minimum viable product.

Steps once I complete writing the spiders:
1. Finish the data cleaning pipeline which shouldn't take long
2. Design front end of the website
3. Find a proxy service to implement so my spiders never get IP blocked
4. Upload spiders to scraping hub
5. A free trial run with potential customers to fix any bugs before releasing the product to the public
6. Open the website to the public and test different advertising/SEO methods
7.Collect $$$
 
Last edited:

Busch_Jager

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-Was able to finish every other spider but one. Some of the websites share the same API making scraping super easy.
-Once I finish this last spider I am going to go through and confirm the functionality of each spider before moving on to cleaning all the data which should be pretty easy.
 

dario

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I think I understood what's your product. Let's just say that it'll guarantee to your subscribers a small profit everyday.
Of course I'm not disclosing it to anyone to protect your business. BUT
I really would limit the number of subscribers and also raise the price.
The reason is that as soon as you add customers, the profit they get becomes smaller and smaller.
(Also you raise the risk to acquire a member who just resell the profitable data.)
 

Busch_Jager

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I think I understood what's your product. Let's just say that it'll guarantee to your subscribers a small profit everyday.
Of course I'm not disclosing it to anyone to protect your business. BUT
I really would limit the number of subscribers and also raise the price.
The reason is that as soon as you add customers, the profit they get becomes smaller and smaller.
(Also you raise the risk to acquire a member who just resell the profitable data.)
Perhaps. I wouldn't say the profits get smaller with more people but it is possible somewhat. If my ultimate goal is a large sellout wouldn't the lower subscriber business model limit my ultimate goal?
 
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Busch_Jager

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On an unrelated note found out my company hired someone for the position I was to be promoted into in a couple of months. There is already someone in that position that is objectively completely incompetent but has a really impressive academic resume and seniority so they manage to hold on somehow, over me taking that position. I thought I was at a cool company that actually cared about my proven abilities but whatever. I am going to focus even harder on making this work. Sick of just working to make other people rich.
 

dario

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Perhaps. I wouldn't say the profits get smaller with more people but it is possible somewhat. If my ultimate goal is a large sellout wouldn't the lower subscriber business model limit my ultimate goal?
You can make it a long lasting business if your customers are happy
But If the members, using the info you provide, have all the same behavior they probably get banned very soon
I would round the data you provide them. Or even randomize a little for each member.
The ROI for them is slightly lower, but they aren't using all the same exact value. And don t lose their accounts.
 

Busch_Jager

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You can make it a long lasting business if your customers are happy
But If the members, using the info you provide, have all the same behavior they probably get banned very soon
I would round the data you provide them. Or even randomize a little for each member.
The ROI for them is slightly lower, but they aren't using all the same exact value. And don t lose their accounts.
That's actually really smart thanks for the suggestion man.
 
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Busch_Jager

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7/3/2020 and 7/4/2020
-Technically all of my spiders work now I am just doing some TLC on anything I went skimpy on to ensure each one works the same way as the next.
-I created guidelines that I want each spider I created and future spiders to follow so each is outputting the same data in the same format
-Reorganized Asana so now I have a clear vision of tasks I need to do. If I am trying to get an answer on a forum before I can complete one task I can just go to another in the meantime so I am not wasting any time.
- I figure by the end of the week I will have all spiders in perfect shape so I can start importing them into scraping hub and find a proxy service. Once this is done the coding side is pretty much finished I just need to design the website.
 

Busch_Jager

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7/5/2020
-Cleaned up all spiders and made sure they all follow the standards I made. Waiting on a single StackOverflow answer to fix one thing and then all my spiders are ready to go. Which is really exciting I am finally finished with that.
 

Busch_Jager

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7/6/2020 and 7/7/2020
-Successfully deployed spiders on scrapinghub.
-Creating another script to compare all of the items and upload them to SQL database
 
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Busch_Jager

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What I did up to now:
-Spiders are straightened out and I found a proxy service and implemented other measures for preventing my spiders from getting banned
-Going to work on cleaning up the data now then I should be good to go from a data standpoint, then on to the website
 

Busch_Jager

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-What appears to be a trivial problem matching up similar data from different websites is actually quite complex. For example, it is hard for a computer to understand that AAPL is referring to Apple if you can't pre-generate lists that tell it that AAPL is Apple. I am working with different libraries but it is a difficult problem to solve. I have been working on it for the past few days.
 
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dario

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-What appears to be a trivial problem matching up similar data from different websites is actually quite complex. For example, it is hard for a computer to understand that AAPL is referring to Apple if you can't pre-generate lists that tell it that AAPL is Apple. I am working with different libraries but it is a difficult problem to solve. I have been working on it for the past few days.

Did you already search on programmableweb.com for (existing but unofficial/undisclosed APIs) for the websites you're querying? Maybe you can find out at least one identifier for the many items you're comparing which is common across the platforms?
 

Busch_Jager

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Did you already search on programmableweb.com for (existing but unofficial/undisclosed APIs) for the websites you're querying? Maybe you can find out at least one identifier for the many items you're comparing which is common across the platforms?
I just checked it out and they are not in there but I pretty much figured out the APIs using Chrome Dev tools by myself so I am good there. A couple of the websites share the same API but most do not and those are the comparisons I am talking about. But thanks for the suggestion!
 

Busch_Jager

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Hey, any update? How go things?
I am still alive!

Here is what I have done since:
My code and spiders are workingly flawlessly.

-Completed all code.
-I implemented cloud logging throughout the code to quickly debug any errors as the script runs.
-I uploaded my code on an automated service and now it runs twice a day, I use the logs to debug any errors so now my code gets better and more robust almost every day.

What I am doing now:
-Finish designing the website.
-Let my friends do a trial run for free to get feedback.

Things I likely need to do more research on:
-Marketing. I truly beleive I have a solid product it's just getting the word out there! I actively use MJ's advice in one of his books now where he says something like"The best book is the one that solves the problem right in front of you. " I used to read a bunch of pointless self help books now I just read the ones that solve my immediate problems. It looks like I need a good digital marketing one.
 

Busch_Jager

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Very, very, very close to being done. Maybe 15 more hours of hard work to have a fully functional website.

I went on two weeks of PTO and couldn't use a laptop so that hurt my progress for sure.
 

Johnny boy

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If you have no sales you have no evidence this is a good idea since you are unwilling to pre-sell, create a minimum viable product, or run ads to something that isn't ready yet, or even get feedback on the site.

In a business sense, you are trying to walk 10 dogs without leashes, trying to dig sand with a butter knife, trying to type with your nose, or whatever analogy describes inefficient and likely futile actions.

You need to get sales. You need to get people to give a F*ck. You need attention. You need feedback from actual customers. You need subscribers.

Imagine you want to date some girl. Would you plan out your life together, plan out the first 15 dates, plan out every little detail and spend a year doing this all before you even go ask her out to see if she's interested? That's what you're doing right now. Instead, you should ask them out FIRST. Because if there is no interest, you're absolutely wasting your time.

Get some sales. Get some subscribers. Get some attention. Get an audience. Run some ads.

I'm starting a subscription website as well. Its my 2nd business. My primary business pays the bills.

Guess how I'm starting it?

A $50 theme, repurposed to fit my needs.

Buying a directory list of contacts for $79

Sending out an ad campaign to thousands of people.

IF it works, I'll pursue it. If nobody gives a F*ck and I realize it was not an idea that people cared about, I would scrap it.

You are going to be much too deep into this thing to turn back without having some serious emotional trauma since you're investing so much into something with 0 market validation.
 
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Busch_Jager

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If you have no sales you have no evidence this is a good idea since you are unwilling to pre-sell, create a minimum viable product, or run ads to something that isn't ready yet, or even get feedback on the site.

In a business sense, you are trying to walk 10 dogs without leashes, trying to dig sand with a butter knife, trying to type with your nose, or whatever analogy describes inefficient and likely futile actions.

You need to get sales. You need to get people to give a f*ck. You need attention. You need feedback from actual customers. You need subscribers.

Imagine you want to date some girl. Would you plan out your life together, plan out the first 15 dates, plan out every little detail and spend a year doing this all before you even go ask her out to see if she's interested? That's what you're doing right now. Instead, you should ask them out FIRST. Because if there is no interest, you're absolutely wasting your time.

Get some sales. Get some subscribers. Get some attention. Get an audience. Run some ads.

I'm starting a subscription website as well. Its my 2nd business. My primary business pays the bills.

Guess how I'm starting it?

A $50 theme, repurposed to fit my needs.

Buying a directory list of contacts for $79

Sending out an ad campaign to thousands of people.

IF it works, I'll pursue it. If nobody gives a f*ck and I realize it was not an idea that people cared about, I would scrap it.

You are going to be much too deep into this thing to turn back without having some serious emotional trauma since you're investing so much into something with 0 market validation.

Thanks for the advice.

While I do agree with what you are saying, the website I am creating is already a proven concept. It wasn't possible to create this website in the U.S. until recently due to regulation changes. I have confirmed interest in the related online forums as well as people I know that are interested in this space.

People with the money already pay coders to do this personally but their is no public means to access this information. If you don't have tens of thousands of dollars to have someone code this for you you are out of luck. I am making it accessible at a much lower price point. Without explaining the product I agree 100% it seems like I may be wasting my time.

If for some reason this was to tank (which I don't believe it will) I told myself I won't be too upset about it because I got 100x better at web scraping and thought of other business ideas I can apply this skill to.
 

Busch_Jager

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The website is live! Surefire Betting is a service that scrapes sportsbooks for betting arbitrage opportunities.

This is basically when there is a match that sportsbook 1 thinks team 1 will win and sportsbook 2 thinks team 2 will win their odds will reflect this and an arbitrage opportunity exists. You hedge your bets by placing money on team 1 with one sportsbook and team 2 with the other sportsbook for a guaranteed profit regardless of which team wins.

It is the only software of its kind in the U.S. Please take a look and let me know any thoughts or comments.

I believe the product is really good especially for the limited time low price I am offering it at now.

My challenge now is more on the advertising side where I am having a difficult time easily explaining what sports betting arbitrage is to potential customers.
 

Andy Black

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Busch_Jager

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I haven't updated this thread in a while, but I just got my first subscriber today!

What I have learned so far:
  • You have to have thick skin.
    • People don't care about your feelings. At first, this was a tough pill to swallow. Now I appreciate negative feedback. They are just spoonfeeding me things I need to improve on my website.
  • It's hard managing a business by myself.
    • I would love to spend all of my time just working on improving the website's technical side. But what's the point if I don't have any customers? Now I spend about 1/3 of the time improving my bots and 2/3 working on marketing tasks. Not to mention I also work a full-time job and have a wife.
  • Zapier is amazing.
    • Seriously, it added a ton of value to my site, but it's not cheap when you have many tasks.
  • The copy is super important.
    • I am not saying my copy now is great, but it is improving, and this is the area I focus on learning more about every day through reading.
  • I can't really use paid advertising.
    • Promoting gambling-related services in the U.S. is a pain. I can't use paid advertising on Google, Facebook, Instagram, basically anything. I can't even use a simple service like MailCheat(Chimp) because I am sending gambling-related emails. I think this could be a blessing in disguise if I work on creating a ton of content now to increase my Google keyword rankings. If I can lock down some of the keywords in this space, it will be tough for someone to come in and compete because you can't even do traditional paid advertising.
Things I am going to work on:
  • One blog post a week
  • Answering questions regularly on Quora.
  • Providing value on forums related to my product, not selling to them.
  • Robust notifications for my subscribers.
  • Automated email marketing drip campaigns
  • A/B testing
Goals:
  • Short Term Goals
    • 10 subscribers by March
  • Long Term Goals
    • 100 subscribers by the end of the year.
      • Yes, it doesn't seem like much, but I am about to change my pricing, and $60 a month * 100 subscribers = $72,000 a year, enough for me to quit my job and do this full-time.
Random Thoughts:
  • I have contemplated whether it would be worth it or not to have a partner in the business. It isn't easy to manage this myself, particularly on the marketing side I do not have a large amount of expertise. How would I even find someone to do this? How do I know they are putting in the same amount of effort as me? It seems like the best step to achieve the growth I know is possible, but I am very apprehensive about the idea.
 

Busch_Jager

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I just got my second subscriber one day after the first subscriber. I think the ball is going to start rolling. The first subscriber basically gave social proof in a subreddit directly targeting my niche. This is free advertising and exactly what I needed.

Up to $60/month in recurring revenue. I increased my cloud servers' speed with the extra $, which increased the speed I scrape profit opportunities by 5X. The more subscribers I get, the faster and better I can make the service.

I also just wrote my own script for my discord notification service instead of using Zapier at 1/23 of the cost of Zapier at even better speeds.

Feeling really motivated, waking up at 5 AM every day during the workweek to work on the technical side until I have to go to work at 8:30 AM, in addition to working on it at least 2 hours in the evening and my lunch break. Spending most of my time on the weekends working on it.
 

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