Tuesday, May 6, 2008

plentyoffish out there?

So thanks to an insightful conversation yesterday with Ronnie Apteker, founder of Internet Solutions who has lots of interesting information to share, not least of which is internet related, I learnt today about a site called plentyoffish.com. It’s a simple astoundingly successful business model which made its founder Markus Frind, a billionaire. And the man hasn’t even left his apartment! Now I reckon that has to be one of the coolest jobs in the world, the one where you can be truly "virtual" and never have to get out of your pajama’s before lunchtime - if you don’t want to. He has the added benefit of dealing with really interesting content, not boring widgets or anything, but real live human stuff. I mean if you’re vaguely voyeuristic then what could be more amusing than looking at the desire of a wide range of people from all over the world looking to find a date, true love or even a husband and wife and not necessarily in any order or altogether either. And of course if you’re one of them then better still, because he gets 1.1 billion pageviews every month and 45 million visitors so your chances of success are pretty high. According to www, up until recently Markus Frind ran his business single handedly, with only the help of his girlfriend and other voluntary moderators. The success of plentyoffish proves again the power of the Internet not just as an advertising channel to market, but as an accelerator of small business globally. In this case a simple idea, tapped into a flush market - one in eight couples in the US who married last year, dated online. Ah well, I got to get out of my pajama’s now and get to my corporate job.

7 comments:

Unknown said...

Thanks for the tip Gisele! I'm fishing where the fish are but there are no bites, not tonight anyway. Great blog. Keep it up -- Hoosen

gisele wa said...

Hey Hoosen, you're reading my blog. well now I am really under pressure. About the fish, you have to be patient fishing, it takes a while before you catch anything.

gisele wa said...

Hey Hoosen, you're reading my blog. well now I am really under pressure. About the fish, you have to be patient fishing, it takes a while before you catch anything.

gisele wa said...

Hey Hoosen, you're reading my blog. well now I am really under pressure. About the fish, you have to be patient fishing, it takes a while before you catch anything.

Unknown said...

I hear you
I hear you
I hear you!!

Unknown said...

G: When are we going to see banknotes with a barcode on them?
Regards to my pilot friend. He must remember to set Full Flaps on take off. And don't forget to drop the landing gear.

gisele wa said...

Hoosen, yes, I had a problem there with the repeated message. Honestly I wasnt trying to get my hits up, I was losing my 3g signal and it kept falling over and everytime sent the message. Banknotes with a barcode. Now there is an idea... Not sure the fica regulations will allow it but there is definitely stuff going down with simcards and banking for sure. re the pilot, yes, dont worry he has all three of us checking on him every minute we are up and down there..