Oodle Blog

It's All About Love-In not Lock-in

Participating on the Net today requires a new mantra.  You need to focus on Love-in not Lock-in:

• Love-in is about delighting a user such that they choose to come back.  It’s about exceeding expectations.  A poster my high school friend had in her room jumps to mind: “If you love something set it free.  If it comes back to you it’s yours.  If not, it was never meant to be.” ( I think there was a unicorn on that poster).
• Lock-in is about keeping users on your site.  In MBA-lingo, it’s about introducing switching costs. 

Google is all about love-in.  They want you to jump off the site as quickly as possible and when you’re ready, they hope you come back.  Lock-in is part of the portal mindset and as such, Yahoo still struggles with it.  The new MyYahoo (which rocks) shows that this is changing but to totally embrace love-in, they’d let me pick my favorite search engine.

Open markets require a love-in mindset.  Retailers, by aggressively working with search engines, acknowledge a consumers’ desire for choice.  Their mission is to find ways to delight users such that they choose to come back, perhaps next time directly to their site.  Vertical search engines also need to embrace love-in by quickly and impartially delivering users to the right retailer.  We must understand our role as a first-stop and not attempt to act like a destination site.

Open Market for Classifieds

When we set out to build Oodle, we had a specific vision about the role we wanted to play in the market.  We thought we could fill an important hole in the classifieds industry by helping buyers.   We also wanted to create a business model that was complementary to existing classified businesses (that represent sellers, landlords, employers, etc.).   As such, we made an early decision not take listings.

As we’ve walked down this path, we seem to have wandered into a larger industry trend. Vertical search engines appear playing a role in a new online topology –- something I’ve begun to call open markets.  Open markets are made up of online retailers loosely bound together by one or more vertical search engines.  The vertical search engines act as a first stop, quickly guiding consumers to the right product at the right retailer.   

For years, Shopping.com, Bizrate and Froogle have been creating such a topology within ecommerce.  Even Amazon, which had been pursuing a walled garden strategy, adopted more of an open-market model.  Recently, however, this open market approach began to spread.  New players like Kayak and SideStep are helping to shape an open market in the travel industry, as are Topix.Net and Technorati with news, and most recently Oodle with local classified listings.

Why now?   First, consumers increasingly want their online experience guided by search.  At the recently Kelsey Group conference, a whole session detailed how search has become the integral component of a consumer’s “product purchasing process” for not only buying the item, but for informing the consideration process.

Second, businesses now embrace search.  Lightweight business models, in the form of affiliate programs and content syndication, now exist to wire open markets.    Several years ago, eBay fought off efforts to have a search engine crawl their content.  Now you can access eBay listings through an API if you participate in their affiliate program.   The world has changed.

Why did we create Oodle? To give buyers (like ourselves) a break.

I’m a big fan of online classifieds.   If I buy something new, I feel like I overpaid.  In the last month, I've used classifieds to find a bunch of almost-new stuff at great prices: a kayak, kayak gear, and a roof rack for my car.  I've also adopted two wonderful kittens.

About a year ago, I began using online classifieds to furnish a small hut I had built up in the mountains (I had wanted to learn how to use power tools and my wife wouldn’t let me practice on our house).   I found great deals in a variety of places (Craigslist, the newspaper, eBay) but the process was way too time consuming.   

As a buyer, I had three basic wishes that ended up helping to shape Oodle:

1.  See all the listings in one place.  This would help me not only find the right listing but also get a better sense for market pricing (which in comparison to new consumer goods is hard to assess) . 

2.  Quickly find exactly what I'm looking for.   I’ve come to expect a great search experience when buying online.  When I know what I want, I want to be able to quickly narrow down to only the most relevant listings (and not sort through and have to open hundreds of potential matches).

3.  Stay on top of new listings as they pop up.  Classifieds tend to involve "moment in time" inventory (e.g., job opening, used car, apartment) that are available for a short period and when someone takes them, they’re gone.  I want to be notified when things I'm looking for get listed.

We also had a secondary intent in creating Oodle -- to make it easier to give locally.  Too many things that could be helpful to local charities and community organizations end up sitting in closets & garages.  Too many volunteering positions go unfilled.    We wanted to promote these "listings" in Oodle and help direct more resources back to our community.  For example, in Chicago we’re currently showcasing the Glass Slipper Project that is helping to turn old bridesmaid dresses into prom dresses for underprivileged kids.  We’re just getting started but hopefully we can provide a great resource for when you are cleaning out your garage or have some extra time on the weekend.   

Over the last year, we’ve come up with other ideas on how to make classifieds better that you’ll be seeing soon.  Please let us know how we’re doing and if you have ideas on things you’d like to see, drop us a note!