Post on 25-Jan-2015
description
Learn Skills From the People in Your Community!
SkillSesh
The Problem
1. Education is increasingly skill oriented, while tutoring is stuck in academia.
2. Conventional tutoring platforms are walled gardens, take 40% of teacher pay.
3. No simple way exists to quickly become or find a local skill tutor.
Solution
A marketplace where anyone can sell their knowledge.
Save $Less overhead and an open market means less expensive tutoring.
Make $Diversifying the tutoring market opens it up to millions of people.
Build Community
By learning from the people around you.
Market Validation
17.2% of the U.S. workforce is underemployed, desiring work that utilizes their talent (Gallup).
-8,000 Craigslist postings under “Lessons” per week in NYC.
-The U.S. tutoring market is $11 billion in academics alone (Forbes).
Product
Simply search a skill (geolocation based), find a tutor, book a session.
FB, G+, LinkedIn to verify identity. Create a profile, create your first session, and you’re good to go in under 5 minutes.
Payouts via Venmo is expedient and requires only an email address.
Revenue Model
At launch, taking 10%* commission on every session booked. We lower the barrier to entry dramatically, to create many more transactions than the status quo market. Our user data and external research indicate than an average tutoring session would be between 25-40$, with more specialized skills going for more.
Long term, we are looking at “freemium” models, only charging pro users.
*Lowest % in tutoring.
CompetitionAffordableExpensive
(on both sides)
High Barrier
Low Barrier SkillSesh
Competitive Advantages
● Lowest friction for all parties.
● Highest diversity of skills means largest viral, market potential.
● Part of the dominant paradigm shift: Direct P2P.
● Lowest comission, lowest overhead.
Marketing Strategy
1. Current(Beta): Craigslist, Backpages, Reddit
2. Launch: Flyering services on college campuses, User self promo, local partnerships (several already established)
3. Long Term: College Ambassadors, Street teams, University partnerships
Why Us?
We ARE the demographic. We know what it’s like to tutor non-traditional skills and also have our peers teach us.
We’re outgoing. We will do the footwork necessary to build a community around SkillSesh. We will find the connections we need.
We’re renaissance men. Self taught in programming, design, marketing, and startup methodology, we are primed to learn whatever skills necessary for the success of SkillSesh.
-Benoit Barberousse and John Connor
Current Stage
Over 600 teachers sign ups in less than 2 months. Over 400 in Portland, our launch market.
We are currently Beta-testing with a small batch of teachers, as we finish a few features.
We will launch by November 1st.
We are Looking for Seed Funding
With a stacked teacher base, we need funding for marketing in order to “prime the pump” and ensure early user interaction.
20k would ensure we can bring SkillSesh out of Private Beta and to the world.
ConclusionThe P2P economy is booming.
P2P skill teaching is an inevitability of market efficiency. Someone will do this.
The first team to establish this space will be best positioned. We are that team.
SkillSesh