Topic: [HAVELOCK] Dealcoin Official Thread - page 8. (Read 14577 times)

Hello freedomno1, we don't have a mascot yet
DealCoin will be using various online as well as offline channels to advertise its services. Please understand that I cannot divulge the details of our marketing strategy or execution plan on a public forum. You will find more info on the IPO prospectus available at http://www.dealco.in/havelock

Hi BitHub,
Thanks for the comment.
IMO the IPO offers a great opportunity for members of the bitcoin community and of our site to benefit from DealCoin's future success.

The primary purpose of that long rant I posted was to see how you'd respond, really - it was more to gauge your professionalism in a response, and to see if those (relatively simple) questions had been thought through before you brought this to market; it was only a secondary goal to get actual answers. A lot of recent IPOs seem to be rather hastily thrown together with a good idea but very shallow implementation plans; this was my attempt to flush you out if this was the case here. I'm rather pleased with your response, it does a lot for your credibility in my mind. Thanks.

Hello Pale Phoenix,

You are correct this is a seed stage investment, I am fully aware that the term IPO is traditionally associated to a later stage 'exit' type of offering but for most of bitcoin startups listing on Havelock or other exchanges IPO rounds are basically seed-stage fund raises. I agree I could have done some private funding and gone public later. But the IPO also gives DealCoin exposure to the bitcoin community, such as in this thread which greatly helps me in explaining Dealcoin. Re. later funding, Dealcoin is part of Seedcoin, a bitcoin startup virtual incubator in which I am involved and I intend to get some funds and other services via Seedcoin for the development of Dealcoin.

An interesting IPO for the amount of risk and growth potential.

What is your execution strategy?
Such as your ad campaign: The way you will address your target market and how you will penetrate that market and raise your brand awareness as well as what differentiates you from the competition.
Examples: Banners, advertisement's, youtube videos, mascots, business cards, reputation system etc.

I dont know i actually think its a pretty decent valuation, compared other clowns giving themselves 11 million, 20 million dollar valuations. 150k ish isn't tooo bad. 40% going to share holders is nice.

Thanks pankkake

I don't think Havelock is any less reputable than any other exchange. They seem to be quite responsive and are building a nice portfolio.

I haven't gotten too far into the details of this IPO, but I'm surprised at the size of the float. Wouldn't DealCoin be better off self funding, or raising 500BTC privately, and going public once there's a viable business with revenue?

This really seems like more of a seed stage investment, and to compete, aren't you going to need far more capital later on?

Hello igba, thanks for your comment. I do speak 3 languages. 3.25 if i count my basic knowledge of Mandarin
I believe the people at Havelock are a very serious and professional team.
There has not been any horror story out of Havelock thanks to their due diligence and strict selection process.

As a trader I have dealt with Havelock for over a year now and have had excellent service from them. I have never had a problem getting BTC in or out. DDOS can happen to any site. Havelock has a very well designed interface and I have never had an issue executing trades. They keep most of the BTC in a cold wallet and thus have limited their customers exposure to theft should someone breech the hot wallet. I highly recommend setting up an account with Havelock, it is fast and easy. IMHO Havelock is just as trustworthy as the other BTC Stock Exchanges and has had many successful IPO's to date.

We at Havelock are striving to offer the highest quality companies for bitcoin investors and I believe our reputation and trust in the community matches that.  We perform due diligence on our listed companies which exceeds any other exchange and do not allow just anyone to list, which sets us apart.  As for the DDOS attacks, we were down intermittently during those two days but every site is susceptible to a degree as illustrated by fact that BTCTC was down a few days ago themselves due to DDOS attacks.  Thanks for your interest in our latest listing.

OK, I didn't realize that it's more than the localbitcoins model, but that actually raises even more questions...

If you're going to pitch this as an online alternative to the large exchanges, then you're going to have a HUGE trust issue to overcome. Not your trust, mind you, but the trust that buyers and sellers have with each other, and that's not always easily overcome with a trust/reputation rating. When bitcoin started, almost all transactions were either between people who knew each other or via small online traders that tried to make a reputation for themselves through volume and good service. Eventually, people got burned (or scared) enough by theft that they wanted to start meeting in person to overcome the problem with trusting anonymous folks online, and localbitcoins was born as a method for finding those local people (who had largely used sites like Craigslist to find each other - this still happens quite often, btw.) This was not a perfect setup either, so the market started to demand large exchanges to provide easy, fast, and trustworthy providers as opposed to the small, independant anonymous dealers online, and the major exchanges started popping up, providing exactly that. Today, due to the regulatory crackdowns on the larger exchanges, you're now offering this service as some sort of hybrid that allows buyers and sellers to more easily meet each other, either online or in person, without the overhang of regulation. A good idea on the surface, but that negates the single biggest draws that the major exchanges have: the speed of a transaction, and reliable trustworthiness over many millions of dollars' worth of transactions. It's no different from an individual trust perspective than meeting face to face, but at least with an in-person meeting you have the knowledge that you have a lot greater control over the transaction (you can get up and walk away if you feel uneasy.)

So really what you're proposing is more akin to a specialized Craigslist (or eBay, not really sure how you're going to present the data) to help bitcoin buyers and sellers match up with each other, who can then choose to meet up in person or not depending on their mutual needs. Fine - if you can brand it well enough somehow, you've got a fighting chance at success just from volume, which is what my original post was really getting at. But it isn't a novel solution, really, and reintroduces some of the problems already mitigated by other existing transaction methods.

There is a popular programming mantra, that you can pick exactly two of the following: Good, Fast, or Cheap. You can't have all three - if it's good and fast, it's not cheap; if it's good and cheap, it's not fast, and if it's fast and cheap, it's not good. (Yes, it's variation of a false dichotomy if taken literally, but the general pattern is sound empirically.)

To paraphrase that saying for this situation, pick two of: Trustworthy, Fast, or Best price. If you want trustworthy and fast, as either a buyer or seller, you're not going to get your best price. If you want trustworthy and the best price, it's going to take a while to look through all the listings finding your perfect trading partner, by which time the price may have changed. If you want the best price immediately, you're going to have to take the first person available and roll the dice on their trustworthiness. Additionally, by decentralizing the exchange, you're inherently lowering both the trustworthiness (the sum of trust of all transactions on the site does not imply trustworthiness of the individual with the best price) and the speed at which the transactions can take place. Best price is always fluctuating, so you can sometimes get lucky on that, but you're still limiting the market (compared to what's already out there) in two of three basic criteria.

That brings us back to the idea of localbitcoins and their (largely) face-to-face model as the alternative. The market for face-to-face sales is still quite limited compared to the major exchanges, and it seems from your last post that your primary market will be those users. The only real advantage you appear to have, then, will be the tracking of trust/reputation, which is difficult at best due to subjectiveness. Again, great idea on the surface, but it's not going to be the driving criteria for all transactions.

As for the risk of mugging, I think you missed the point I was making: it's not about the safety of the transaction itself, it's about the choice the buyer or seller has to make regarding the method used for the transaction; again, weighing trustworthiness, price, and speed... for the in-person transaction, the decision on trustworthiness would include trust that you won't get murdered.

I know this was rather long-winded, sorry - but I do have a specific purpose in saying all of this.

This is a great idea, and I checked your resume on LinkedIn: JP Morgan, Sunguard, Bloomberg, and you speak 3 languages? Impressive. Why choose Havelock though instead of BTC-TC or BitFunder? They are more reputable IMHO due do their resiliency to DDOS attacks in the past. Havelock is based in Canada if I remember correctly- sure they look pretty and have a nice trading interface but the last time they were down it took them 2 WHOLE DAYS to recover. I think if you go with BTC-TC or BitFunder you are more likely to reach your goal because the trust is already there.

Hi xchrisxsays, I believe that well targeted online communication is the most cost effective way to reach potential users. You can understand I cannot give you too much details since that would be divulging my communication strategy to potential competitors in a public forum. I certainly hope localbitcoins' users will also try and adopt Dealcoin! Thank you for your advice, I hope competitors' dealers will find Dealcoin services and model attractive enough to come from their own volition.

I think I agree that the 150K is not a particularly aggressive valuation, given the current valuations in the space.

Other than that, you say you are partially spending the money on marketing. What channels of communication are you going to use to drive volume?

Another thought, is there anything stopping people that are currently using LocalBitcoins from using DealCoins as well? Maybe you should provide incentives to trusted dealers on LocalBitcoin to use DealCoin as well, so the business can start out with a solid reputation.

Hello radiumsoup,
Dealers and members can make the fiat transaction through other means than face-to-face. They may use any payment channels they agree on be it direct bank wire, paypal, etc.
The fact for Dealcoin not to be involved in these fiat transactions means much lesser risk of a regulatory clampdown which seems to be one of Mt.Gox main issues till now. Withdrawing USD on MtGox is not so easy at the moment...
Regarding the risk of mugging in face-to-face, we advise members to conduct their transactions in a bank lobby, preferably the bank of the seller where it will be safe, and convenient for the seller to have the notes checked while being deposited in their account.
Additionally DealCoin features a reputation system to help members deal with the most reliable dealers only.

Thank you for your comments on the expansion plan.
I understand you could find the business model to be validated but I hardly find a valuation @ $150k 'aggressive' these days specially for digital enterprises an $150k valuation is not what investors would consider 'aggressive'if you also consider the fact that I am giving away 40% of the company in the first listing with a 1% guaranteed monthly dividend…

LocalBitcoins has a head start I agree but the bitcoin economy is still at its early stage and frankly I believe there is room for more than one in-person exchange. By asking dealers to participate to the development of Dealcoin my objective is to provide more tools and more exposure and eventually make Dealcoin a better marketplace both for dealers and general members buying or selling bitcoin. Furthermore the membership fee is very low, under usd 2 / month and the blind bidding system should attract more people from the community wishing to get the best prices for the trades. 

The only incentive I see would be potential volume from marketing. But the number of people who are paranoid enough to require face-to-face meetings for fiat<->BTC transactions is small enough that I'm not sure the volume is there for any provider, be it Dealcoin or someone else. (I'm not saying the paranoid are the only users of localbitcoins, but let's face it - if you're going to buy regularly, and you're not paranoid, it's easier [and faster!] to get an account with an online seller like Gox or what have you than it would be to arrange a face-to-face meeting, drive there, and hope you don't get stood up - or worse, mugged.) I don't see that paradigm changing by any appreciable extent any time soon.

Thanks for the link. I do think your valuation is still very aggressive for something that essentially hasn't launched yet, but I do find your plans for expanding your business via augmenting services interesting - especially the VOIP & sms packages. It's a smart way of profiting off in-person transactions, the most difficult type of transaction to profit from.

In terms of convincing dealers to use your site, why would they use dealco.in over localbitcoins.com?  I think it will be difficult convincing dealers to use your service over localbitcoins, since localbitcoins already has more users (potential purchasers), and is free to use (no monthly fee).