Simple Answer From Seth, Meebo Developer
Several posts ago, I’m talking about Meebo and how I feel pessimistic about it. I have sent an email to Seth (one of the founder) about what will they do next especially after they have received a VC funding. Well, here’s his reply along with my (simple) questions. Again, thank you Seth for answering my email(s) ;-).
So, a simple question for me (and of course I will release this on my weblog, so no sensitive information please :-P), what and where will you take meebo actually?Â
First we want to make meebo a really great IM client, and we’re not quite there yet. There are lots of features, like sound, that we still have to do. Then, we want to leverage the fact that we’re web-native IM and have a really sticky site (people keep it open for hours) to deliver other great value to users.
And with the VC funding on the verge of reality (or is it already poured?), the site must make money, right? How are you planning to monetize the site? By displaying obstrusive ads on your clean site (because I think that’s your competitive advantage compared to other similiar services)?
We will likely experiment with ads, but yes, agreed that doing so in a garish way would detract from the user experience. So it’s encumbent on us to find ways of testing advertising that actually ads value. We have a bunch of ideas here, but they all have to be tested and we need to see what users like the most. Â Just like we have built the product by user demand, we’ll build revenue streams by user and market demand.
I’d say that we’re a bit of a ways off from actually experimenting with advertising. We first need to build a great product, and can experiment a bit later with ads. If we don’t have volume because the service isn’t useful for our users, ads will be irrelevant anyhow!
