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MenuIf you were to build a freelance marketplace for data scientists and data analysts, what kind of companies and projects would you target?
In other words, who has the greatest need for data scientists and data analysts and would be willing to hire people virtually? And what kind of projects do you think make sense in such a context?
Answers
It's unlikely that companies would look to outsource such a critical component and also it would be near impossible to create trust around 3rd parties accessing their data especially via an intermediary service.
There are three major challenges with the scenario you describe:
1) the data is usually not in a format that is ready to be chewed upon (less critical)
2) The data-science tasks are usually not well-defined by the people who need them (very critical)
3) The process tends to be iterative and not on-shot.
The only successful situations I'm aware of that is close to the one you describe is competitions/benchmarks where the task is crystal-clear and the data is ready-made (like the Netflix one or many others run in the research community and by the government).
In these competitions, issues (1) and (2) are addressed, and you may hire a person so that they can iterate on it and continue the work (issue 3).
In certain domains and projects there's less iteration needed, so if the problem to be solved is well-defined and data is well-prepared, it can be done successfully. I've been in several situations where I "ordered" a data-driven algorithm and plugged it in a live system.
I would copy Kaggle initially (80%) and innovate (20%). The key is to get to Product / Market Fit asap, then scale.
http://www.kaggle.com/
Andrew Chen ( https://clarity.fm/andrewchen ) goes over this nicely in his presentation Zero to Product Market / Fit
http://andrewchen.co/2013/10/14/zero-to-productmarket-fit-presentation/
So typically it would depend on the complexity of the project and how easily accessible is the data to determine the likelihood and possibility of outsourced data analysis.
For example, it is much easier to look at a ecommerce website and provide analysis than to go into a retail shop that has both online and offline data sources that needs to be analyzed.
As an web analyst, I tend to get projects to help identify opportunities and support marketing activities. There is limitations due to the amount of data available and it would usually need to be looked at on a case to case basis.
Big data can include data multiple departments (sales, accounting, operations) to something as simple as web analytics. For complex projects, you face issues such as security, accessibility, longer timelines and iterations which would probably mean an inhouse resources would make more sense.
Hope this helps. Be happy to hop on a call to address any additional issues.
Related Questions
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How important is it for a marketplace startup to drive enough demand (customers) for your supply (sellers) to make a full time living off of it?
It's very important. (first, read this article by Josh Breinlinger - http://acrowdedspace.com/post/47647912203/a-critical-but-ignored-metric-for-marketplaces) The way you achieve success in a marketplace is by driving liquidity for both your supply & demand. Demand-side Liquidity = When users come to your marketplace, they can achieve their goals. Supply-side Liquidity = When supply comes to your marketplace they can achieve their goals... which are almost always to make money. If you're making a large amount of your supply-side users a full-time income, then you're helping them achieve liquidity. Now it's not so black and white and it doesn't always have to be a "full-time income." It depends what their goals are. E.g., 1) At Airbnb, renters aren't looking to quit their day jobs and become landlords full-time... they're just look to earn a substantial amount of income to offset their rent, mortgage, etc. So in this case, I would probably goal on # of renters that earn >$500 / month... and (in the first 1-5 years) try to grow this number by 10-20% MoM... and maybe by just 5% once you're in the mid-high tens of millions in yearly revenue. 2) At Kickstarter, the goal of the supply-side is to get their project successfully funded. They don't care if the project creator is "full-time"... they just want to make sure they meet their funding goal. This is why they talk about their 44% project success rate all the time - http://www.kickstarter.com/help/stats 3) At Udemy, our instructors want a substantial amount of their income to be driven from their Udemy course earnings... so we look at how many instructors are earning >$2k / month.DT
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What support software do most marketplace startups use? Is it custom, or a SaaS product like Zendesk, Desk.com or Uservoice
Your support software should cater to your needs, depending on how your business operates. Fiver uses Vanilla forum and Zendesk. Thumbtack uses Zendesk. Not sure about AirBNB, their help center seems to be custom. Depending on how well funded your are, I would recommend starting with a free plan with one of the help desk SaaS products, or even using open source ticketing platform. Then, as your needs grow and you need integration with your marketplace, there's no reason you can't scale and migrate.VN
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What is the pros and cons of a marketplace website like houzz.com, zillow.com and trulia.com where users send mail to professional without logging in?
It really depends on your mission and from where you intend to drive revenues. Asking a guest to create an account and log in in order to send an email to your customers could be seen as a stumbling block. The more you can encourage visitors to reach out to your customers, the more your customers will have a great experience, On the other hand, you have to make sure you all the security measures in place so your customers do not get spammed through your site. Give me a call to discuss further. I offer a free initial call to first time clients. Use this link: https://clarity.fm/kevinmccarthy/FreeConsultKM
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Freemium v.s. free trial for a marketplace?
It depends on a number of factors but I'd boil it down to two key things to start: 1) What is your real cost to provide a free plan or trial? 2) Who exactly is your customer and what are they used to paying and who and how do they pay today? When you say "online workforce marketplace" it sounds as though you're placing virtual workers. If that's the case, or if you're paying for the supply side of the marketplace, the question is how much can you subsidize demand? Depending on where you're at in the process, I'd also question how much you can learn about the viability of your marketplace by offering a free version, assuming again, that free is actually a real cost to you. I was part of a SaaS project that started charging people for early access based mostly on just a good landing page (we clearly stated they were pre-paying) and were amazed at the response. I've also run a SaaS product that offered free trials and realized that the support costs and hand-holding and selling required to convert from free trial to paid wasn't worth it, this despite the product's significant average ARR. You might be better off providing a "more information" sign-up form (to capture more leads) and let them ask for a free trial while only showing your paid options. I've been amazed at the lead capture potential from a simple "have questions? Click here and we'll contact you" This is all the generalized advice I can offer based on the limited information I have, but happy to dive-in further if you'd like on a call.TW
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How to solve a chicken and egg problems for a marketplace like Uber? What is the best way to acquire demand side?
The best way to solve chicken and egg problems for marketplaces is to prove market need on each side independently first with a low-cost MVP-type test. Once you've proven the market on both sides with metrics it is much easier to leg in supply and demand with a strategic or enough funding to match a market on a local or niche level to ensure liquidity. For a deeper analysis, here is a post on medium that I wrote... http://bit.ly/1k2vYbY Also, feel free to schedule a call with me if you'd like to dig deeper.DK
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