The experience of the creator Avito.ru Jonas Nordlander.

When the owners bought my company eBay, online auction Tradera, they made me an offer to work at it the same for two years. I worked there a year and decided to leave. I was offered bonuses, guarantees, and finally said that if I break off the contract, we can do a similar project in Russia and Indonesia – where there is no eBay. I signed all the commitments and resigned.

I have never occurred to him to come to Russia. But that all changed after a call from Yuri Milner DST. He found out that I sold my auction and retired from eBay. He offered me a “rule” one of his projects. So I’m at the end of 2006 was in Russia. We negotiated with him and Gregory Finger, I also met with Dmitry Grishin, who now owns Mail.ru Group. Milner offered a very good job, but I wanted to do a joint venture in which I would like to invite your friends, the Swedish partner. Milner, I was interested only in the quality of management, without foreign investment. I declined the offer.

But went I was not in vain. Something changed in me after this trip. I learned that in Russia the sea of ​​opportunities – Internet market is not mastered by more than 40%. If we compare, in Moscow alone the same population as in the whole of Sweden, where I worked before.

On his return to Stockholm, I began to think about creating a site ads. Proposed project by Swedish investors, but then they had something to do without me, and in terms of their interests in Russia, the company was not included. At the same time, I met with Philip Engelbert. Then he just invested in an investment company that bought the Yellow Pages. My business plan came to his heart, and since then we work as partners. Then I moved to Russia.

In this project, a key success factor was to achieve a balance between a sufficient number of buyers and sellers, where each, having come to the site, gets Zachepa he came here. How can this be achieved?

Find a new niche in the market

Analyze the situation on the market demand study, try to understand what’s missing people, and you look what you get is better than others. For such projects, unwritten law is valid, as there did not invest money if the other visitors, more and easier to sell your product, everyone will go there.

In the U.S. there is Craigslist, a resource with free ads. He has been in existence since the nineties, and enjoys the people’s love. Its owners do not spend anything on marketing. Still there is eBay, which also has a website with ads. This is a multibillion company, they have virtually unlimited funding, they spend billions on advertising campaigns, but nothing changes – Craigslist adds and eBay each year is falling.

Therefore, eBay and goes to buying ready-made market leaders, which was my Tradera, – they are worth less than the creation of a similar site from scratch and its not cheap promotion.

Invest in advertising

One of the most expensive processes in business is marketing, but at the start of the project alone. But if we are able to take a leading position in its market segment, to stay there will not be difficult.

For us, the circumstances were very good way – we first conducted an advertising campaign in early 2010. No one has the money, the crisis is not the hot season, and here we got a lot of time on TV for very little money. This is an isolated incident fantastic luck. Within two months the number of unique visitors have doubled – from three to six million.

Do not rush a lot of money

Plan to profit, but do not chase after her. During the crisis, to invest in our company no one wanted. Our investors have allocated funds for the marketing campaign, but after that it ceased to cooperate with us. In any negotiations with venture and investment companies, we immediately warned that at this stage we do not advertise and do not take money from the visitors.

As we came to this decision – a whole year to work in zero? The owners of the majority of Russian resources, short-sighted. They do not see long-term prospects. They want as quickly as possible to get money. You come to the site, and then some banners. Our objective was to create a site that appeals to everyone. There is a rule that always works: “Invite the client to the site only once – next time he comes himself.” We tried hard to show that our resource – especially for people, for the convenience of their purchases and sales.

Such an approach is not troubled investors. According to the results roadshow we were able to bring the company $ 30 million, which is certainly a very large sum for the company, which has no speed. They were able to understand that satisfied customers then bring much more profit. And no one is lost. My forecast revenue last year, managed to beat ten-fold in just six months.

See larger

In the work on site we have taken the approach retailers. When you come to the supermarket for bread and milk, you must buy something else, and not a commodity, addition that was needed. Effective marketing trap – essential commodities are at the far end of the hall, and many more will have to search.

By accessing our website, people can immediately see ads not sorted on the main page, they get to novelty (newest first). Incredibly, unplanned purchases – it is 70% of transactions. More than two-thirds! Our paid services are working, as in the supermarket: the payment is for the placement of ads for some time above the rest, in the case of the supermarket – at the very entrance of the.

Such services are needed for urgent sale – for example, small puppies that will soon go up in less “liquid” dogs. Even for a small period of placement in the top of the chances of finding a buyer is seriously increasing, it’s all because of the very high attendance. In the day Avito.ru located about 180 000 new ads. At the busiest time of publishing several ads in the second. So now that we are in the top ten most visited sites on the Russian-speaking Internet, more than half of revenue comes from our services as we start working with advertisements.

Listen to the customer

I live in Russia for five years, and I can say with confidence that the service is rarely ideal. But nevertheless, everyone loves a good service. For many businesses view customer – the last thing they care about the business and only business. Only problem is that their business stays just on the clients.

If our experts see the bad reviews on the network Avito, it immediately subject to the proceedings. So we promptly identify their mistakes and improve each time. And do not deny their blunders, it is better to confess and correct operation. If, however, from our side there was no error, we try to explain to the client situation. And it works. Very dissatisfied users are more loyal customers than those who initially had been loyal.

Do not lose your optimism

My main interest has always been in the process that leads to success. I often remind myself that when I agreed to sell Tradera. It was really cool – to sell you a product created by one of the most influential players in the market. But here, at the point of success when you have money, there is serious work that will ensure your life, you suddenly feel a void. You lose all the excitement. Well, that is to drop everything and go to Russia – another country where you do not know the language or the people around you learn is by doing. And all this with only one purpose – to create.

If you’re going to start a business, you need to keep such a foolish optimism. Those who know everything, all the account may be “stuck” on the stage, taking into account all possible scenarios. So it is not taking action.

For a long time we did not put its activities on the show. While competitors were engaged in advertising, we worked on and improved quality of service your project. Now it is obvious that we have something to tell you – on the day of Avito.ru placed to one hundred thousand ads. And we can tell you how we did it.