Joseph Colangelo | Steven Swan

November 2012

Short, Valuable Messages

COMPANY PURPOSE

Gramicon gives online messages real value, helping people cut through the noise and clutter of their inbound messages and earn the attention of anyone.

PROBLEMOnline messages have no inherent value, so it’s hard to

get attention from non-acquaintances

 

Communicate Privately to Friend ✓   ✓    

Communicate with a Stranger   ✓   ✓ ✔

Publish Public Communication   ✓ ✓    

Mass Communication with a Group ✓ ✓ ✓   ✔

Demonstrate Value of Message       ✓ ✔

Incentivize a Reply         ✔

Add value to messages,Incentivize reading and responding

SOLUTION

Sender attaches a virtual currency

to a message

Recipient previews

message and decides to claim

or discard

Recipient replies to message, Sender gives

feedback rating based on response

Market mechanism: Sender has to decide how much to spend on recipient’s attention

Recipient determines if reading and responding is worth the attached price

Lets senders determine relative quality of recipient's responses

E-mail made messages free

Now there’s a missing market: the valuable message

Online MessagesOnline MessagesTraditional MessagesTraditional Messages

Telegrams: brief & urgent

Mail: private & personal

Overnight: private & valuable

Twitter & Facebook: brief, urgent, non-private

Email: private and personal

When everything is free, how do you demonstrate value??

HISTORICAL CONTEXT

WHY NOW?Many have identified the problem• Mike Arrington wrote about email overload on TechCrunch in 2008• Paul Graham wrote an essay about solving email overload in March of

2012, called it a “frighteningly ambitious […] billion dollar idea”• Pranav Dharma wrote a blog post in July 2012 that posited a hypothetical

solution very similar to Gramicon’s business model

Other platforms have approached the solution• Sanebox, OtherInbox help filter emails• Centmail, Attn.me tried a “paid-email” solution• LinkedIn’s InMail uses a value-based message in a narrow sense,

doesn’t pass value to recipient

GRAMICON WILL BE A LEAN FIRST MOVER – SPEED IS CRUCIAL

MARKET SIZE

- 100,000,000 200,000,000 300,000,000 400,000,000 500,000,000 600,000,000 700,000,000 800,000,000 900,000,000 $-

$2,000,000,000

$4,000,000,000

$6,000,000,000

$8,000,000,000

$10,000,000,000

$12,000,000,000

Facebook845M users

5B rev

Twitter510M users259M rev

Bitcoin50k users

$100M “rev”

Zynga257M users306M rev

Ebay100M users10.5B rev

Groupon33M users3.9B rev

Users

Ann

ual R

even

ue

Virtual Currency

Social Network

Marketplace

with greater growth capacity

with stronger monetization

with lower transaction costsis a

DEVELOPMENT ROADMAP

Q2 2012• Messaging system• Attach credits• Inbox auto-sorted• Create replies

Q3 2012• Reviews• Ratings• Mailers• Stripe (Payments)• Email Confirmation• Front end redesign

Q4 2012• Charities• Auto-donations• Charity badges• User Profiles

Q4 2012• Mass messaging• Intro Video• Blog• Personnel Blurbs

Q1 2013• Professional redesign• Open API• Metrics• Charts

Q2+ 2013• Site-wide redesign• Professional rebranding

BUSINESS MODELGramicon sells virtual credits

Uses Gramicon occasionallyDoesn’t pay for creditsBuilds a reputation

Willing to pay for quality impressions to selected demographics

Wants to connect with new peopleEnjoys increasing his rankingWill pay for credits

Mass

Marketer

Active User

Casual User

DISTRIBUTION MODEL

Gramicon gains critical mass by incentivizing popular people to promote their profiles to fans

Sponsored Tweets

Black Sheep Media Group

Individual Celebrities

Access to over 100 million fansPay flat fee for celebrities to join and share profiles

Arianna Garande, Paris Hilton, over 40 other celebritiesPay CEO $0.25 per credit

$0.30 per credit if twitter profile includes Gramicon profile$0.10 per credit otherwise

Charities Charities promote profiles to increase credit revenue

Channel Details

Christi Lukasiak@DanceMomChristiFollowers: 217,602

CASE STUDY

“Wanna Talk? Message me on Gramicon.com and I will personally reply! Gramicon: Sponsored Conversations http://spon.tw/t1yENA”

Tweet

Response

1279 clicks

211 messages sent

3 purchases

412 new members

Customer Acquisition Cost: $1.08

U.C. BerkeleyUnited States Navy

TroopSwap.comBooz Allen Hamilton

EXECUTIVE TEAM

West PointUnited States ArmyWharton MBA ’14

Steve SwanJoe Colangelo

FINANCIALS

• Gramicon’s only accounting asset is its cash on hand: $ 4,000• Gramicon has no liabilities• Gramicon is wholly owned by three equity partners, with the CEO in majority

• Gramicon has been operating since 1 August 2012• Initial capitalization was $13,000 from equity sales to partners• No significant revenues to date (less than $30 during live beta testing)• Expenses to date:

• $ 6,000 towards product development • $ 2,000 towards business development• $ 1,000 towards general and administrative

BALANCE

INCOME AND CASH FLOW

Our approach is lean, and our results have been been efficient.