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Location:
2235 E. Flamingo Rd., Ste. 201 G,
Las Vegas, Nevada 89119,
United States
Founded in: 2007
Stage: 1.0 (formal launch)
Number of employees: 1-5
Profitable year: 2009
Short URL: vator.co/SmackCastercom-Your-Team-Sucks
Stage: 1.0 (formal launch)
Number of employees: 1-5
Profitable year: 2009
Short URL: vator.co/SmackCastercom-Your-Team-Sucks
Admins (1)
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Joe Halpin
Founder, SmackCaster.com
Followers (6)
SmackCaster.com
The teams you love...and love to hate!
Startup/business
Nevada, United States United States
http://www.smackcaster.com
Startup/business
Nevada, United States United States
http://www.smackcaster.com
Company description
SmackCaster is a video-based, social network that enables hardcore sports fans to create, upload, watch and share user-made videos about the teams and players they love—and love to hate.
The Problem
Sports fans everywhere have a unique opinion, but there aren’t any viable outlets for their voices to be heard:
* TV sports networks don’t invite public opinion and sports-talk radio strictly governs access to its airwaves
* Media companies know social video networks have value, but most try to be all things to all people
* Blogs are static and depend on the one-to-many structure of communication
* Newspaper and magazine stories turn stale hours after publication
The Solution
At SmackCaster.com, registered users can create and post videos, and respond directly (SmackBack) or indirectly to other posters via videos, text, email, or live chat. The barrier to entry is minimal: A built-in or external webcam or video camera connected to a computer, or movie-making software, or a cell phone with video capability. Creating and posting videos in simple: Upload allows posting of customized videos, and QuickSmack enables creating and posting videos through the site’s interface.
The Opportunity
SmackCaster is the logical social and technological next step to enable a global sports-worshipping fan-base to flaunt its knowledge, passion, and team colors 24/7, as they turn to technology to feed their craving for analysis, scores, rumors, opinions and chest-beating.
Team
The Team
The
founders created this site as an answer to a desire they themselves
felt: to share their passion and opinions about their favorite teams
and athletes with an extended online community. Work to date and early
reaction has deepened our belief and commitment to the concept. We feel
we have the key team members in place, with the relevant business
experience, to successfully execute our vision.
Business model
The Model
Revenue - Will be generated through: ads, promotions, affinity programs, platform licensing, contests, product sales, data mining and market research.
Advertising & Promotions - We will utilize current technology: pre- and post-roll, synchronous “pushed” ads, overlays, and embedded ads (text/rich media) in “Search” and the video frame. Advertisers will be charged for clicks and views/listens. Videos can be commercials, short-form video, and trailers. Promotions will be tailored for events, teams, leagues and marketers wanting to reach a pre-qualified local or national audience.
Target Audience – Sports-infatuated, predominantly male between 18-49, college educated with an average income $70,000+, already consumes sports news online and wants to share knowledge and opinions but doesn’t have a dedicated outlet that caters to their passion and who has been limited to yelling in bars and living rooms.
Compared to the general public, our audience is statistically more inclined to:
* Consume alcoholic beverages, particularly beer (8+/week)
* Purchase a new car/truck/SUV in the calendar year
* Buy an MP3 player, HDTV, DVD, and/or camera in the calendar year
* Go to bars/clubs for entertainment, eat fast food, dine out
* Invest in the stock market and use credit/debit cards ($450 monthly)
* Purchase a mobile phone device (average bill is $75/month)
* Travel domestically/internationally, rent a car for personal use
* Play video games >2x/week (spent $200+ on games in the past year)
Target Advertisers - National and regional/local advertisers, and traditional TV and radio. Ads can be synchronously pushed in our In-Game Live Chat environment, generating hard demographic information while encouraging fans back to real-time viewing (enabling ad stickiness that DVR bypasses). Prospects: Anheuser-Busch, Nissan, Orbitz, Chevrolet, Procter & Gamble, Cingular Wireless, Sprint Nextel, Coors, State Farm, Dell, Taco Bell, Miller Brewing, Toyota, Nike, Verizon, Frito Lay, Pepsi, Coca-Cola, McDonald’s, Burger King.
Revenue - Will be generated through: ads, promotions, affinity programs, platform licensing, contests, product sales, data mining and market research.
Advertising & Promotions - We will utilize current technology: pre- and post-roll, synchronous “pushed” ads, overlays, and embedded ads (text/rich media) in “Search” and the video frame. Advertisers will be charged for clicks and views/listens. Videos can be commercials, short-form video, and trailers. Promotions will be tailored for events, teams, leagues and marketers wanting to reach a pre-qualified local or national audience.
Target Audience – Sports-infatuated, predominantly male between 18-49, college educated with an average income $70,000+, already consumes sports news online and wants to share knowledge and opinions but doesn’t have a dedicated outlet that caters to their passion and who has been limited to yelling in bars and living rooms.
Compared to the general public, our audience is statistically more inclined to:
* Consume alcoholic beverages, particularly beer (8+/week)
* Purchase a new car/truck/SUV in the calendar year
* Buy an MP3 player, HDTV, DVD, and/or camera in the calendar year
* Go to bars/clubs for entertainment, eat fast food, dine out
* Invest in the stock market and use credit/debit cards ($450 monthly)
* Purchase a mobile phone device (average bill is $75/month)
* Travel domestically/internationally, rent a car for personal use
* Play video games >2x/week (spent $200+ on games in the past year)
Target Advertisers - National and regional/local advertisers, and traditional TV and radio. Ads can be synchronously pushed in our In-Game Live Chat environment, generating hard demographic information while encouraging fans back to real-time viewing (enabling ad stickiness that DVR bypasses). Prospects: Anheuser-Busch, Nissan, Orbitz, Chevrolet, Procter & Gamble, Cingular Wireless, Sprint Nextel, Coors, State Farm, Dell, Taco Bell, Miller Brewing, Toyota, Nike, Verizon, Frito Lay, Pepsi, Coca-Cola, McDonald’s, Burger King.
Competitive advantage
Leverageable and
scalable - Our technology platform can be co-branded or licensed for
any sports-oriented site, and for other intellectually and emotionally
contentious fields like financial markets, politics, and celebrity. The
SmackCaster platform — and our community and user-generated content
feature set — is a combination of open source and custom-developed
technologies that can be licensed for private label deployments, much
like Amazon’s sales tools and Facebook’s open-source platform can be
leveraged by other parties. While we are niche-oriented at inception,
there is great potential for multiple revenue streams, and we will stay
agile to explore and attack new opportunities.
Our fundamental goals - Integrate the SmackCaster brand into the mainstream sports media mix, create a strategic marketing opportunity for our partners to reach a highly desirable, targeted, pre-qualified demographic, build a long-term relationship with our community (as any sports franchise does). Through interaction, recognition, promotion, and awards, the site will champion sports fans and drive the daily sports conversation.
The Execution
The opportunity for targeted marketing is significant: There are hundreds of daily sports events around the country (and world), with dedicated marketers trying to reach the fans that follow them. The key driver of our revenue strategy will be to maximize focused ads at every level: local, regional, and national. Initially we will drive visitors to the site via a multi-pronged viral marketing strategy, including the seeding of blogs and forums, and the creation of content designed to be picked up by larger media outlets and embedded on other sites. Early data suggests that as few as 1000 unique visitors per day would generate nearly 1 million pages view per month. The second phase will be to build our user base in major markets with multiple sports franchises and all-season interest: New York, Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, etc. As the number of visitors and brand name prominence increase, we will target expansion to include prominent national and regional advertisers.
Our fundamental goals - Integrate the SmackCaster brand into the mainstream sports media mix, create a strategic marketing opportunity for our partners to reach a highly desirable, targeted, pre-qualified demographic, build a long-term relationship with our community (as any sports franchise does). Through interaction, recognition, promotion, and awards, the site will champion sports fans and drive the daily sports conversation.
The Execution
The opportunity for targeted marketing is significant: There are hundreds of daily sports events around the country (and world), with dedicated marketers trying to reach the fans that follow them. The key driver of our revenue strategy will be to maximize focused ads at every level: local, regional, and national. Initially we will drive visitors to the site via a multi-pronged viral marketing strategy, including the seeding of blogs and forums, and the creation of content designed to be picked up by larger media outlets and embedded on other sites. Early data suggests that as few as 1000 unique visitors per day would generate nearly 1 million pages view per month. The second phase will be to build our user base in major markets with multiple sports franchises and all-season interest: New York, Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, etc. As the number of visitors and brand name prominence increase, we will target expansion to include prominent national and regional advertisers.
