New Media Fanboy

With yesterday’s news that Social|Median was sold the start-up to German social network XING, CEO Jason Goldberg has cemented himself as the lead figure in what will surely be a case study in successfully developing, managing and exiting a Web 2.0 business. In whatever sequel there is to Sarah Lacy’s Once You’re Lucky, Twice You’re Good tome about the Valley’s phoenix-like rise out of the ashes of the dot-com bust (and there will be one) Social|Median deserves to be listed at the top of the success stories.

Launched a mere 8 months ago with very little funding Jason Goldberg put on a clinic of how to bring together the best of social marketing, online marketing, opportunistic entrepreneurship, public relations and sheer, unrelenting effort to drive his companies success. And, he was smart enough to see opportunity when it presented itself and put the company and himself in the best seat for success for the future.

What would a case study look like? Well much of it can be gleamed from Louis Gray’s post covering the past 8-months of the company’s existence. But here are just a few stand outs from my experience as an early adopter of the site.

A Case Study in Building a Web 2.0 Business:

• Communicate, communicate, communicate. Jason communicated daily with his users on a variety of levels.  He was actively emailing alpha and beta testers, introducing and asking for feedback from users on a regular basis.  This communication made his early adopters loyal and vested in the project.  It no doubt made the site better and also made users more willing to invest time in it and to talk about it.  When you know you’re part of something with a direct line to the CEO it goes along way in how you feel about the success or failure of the enterprise.
• Get out there. Jason was seemingly everywhere.  On FriendFeed, on Twitter, in the blogosphere, at all the right conferences.  He made Social|Median ubiquitous.  And the key?  It was consistent.  It didn’t come in fits and bursts.  Coverage and Jason’s involvement in the community was consistent, ongoing and ever-present.  Jason never let Social|Median fall out of view from anyone and this helped snowball the traffic and usage.
• Take Risks. Jason took risks.  Like asking for investors over Twitter.  While it raised some questions about the legality of doing so over Twitter it certainly put Social|Median front and center in the news sphere and left no question about Jason’s “whatever it takes” attitude to make Social|Median a success.
• Overshare. Too many startups these days say “we don’t disclose numbers” or “we don’t share this or that”.  Social}Median was exactly the opposite.  Jason was always proud to share their successes and growth without fear of how people might interpret and report on them.  He was always enthusiastic and proud of the site’s growth.  Even without millions of uniques he never felt ashamed to share how the site was doing.  I believe this openness got him more repsect with his users and with the bloggers and media covering the space.
• Iterate, Iterate, Iterate. Social|Median went from Alpha to Beta to fully-launched in 8-months.  The site underwent a redesign and tons of feautres and functionality were added and reworked along the way.  Jason asked people what they wanted, rolled out a feature to meet that need, asked if it worked, and improved it based on feedback.  Rather than holding back releases he rolled regularly and that growth, change and responsiveness built loyalty among users and made the product better than it could’ve been if the small Social|Median team jusst sat around a table and tried to do it themselves.  I’m sure Jason would say as much.
• Know your goals. Social|Median saw a solid exit and took it.  I’m sure Jason knew what he would be willing to consider and was prepared to see an offer objectively no matter when it came.  This allowed him to find an opportunity to achieve success for all of those involved in the project.

So while $7.5  million won’t make the cover of Fast Company, Social|Median should be an important reference point for all Web 2.0 entrepreneurs and should be used as a blueprint for successful entrepreneurship in this space, in this economy, at this time in the space’s evolution.

Congrats to Social|Median, you sure taught me something.