Improving On-Line Conversations With LiveFyre
Business: LiveFyre; www.livefyre.com
Mission: To inspire and facilitate conversation about what’s going on in the world right now.
The Start: Incorporated in April 2009. Left our full-time jobs in July. Launched the site December 7, 2009
Revenues: We have two main streams of revenue: advertising and licensing. Mini Cooper signed on as our premiere launch sponsor so we were able to launch with revenue in place. Since then we’ve been focused on developing our second stream – licensing our technology to online communities who are looking for a better way to hold conversation on their sites.
Initial Investment: Bootstrapping. Looking to raise our first round of funding in the coming months.
Broke Even: Not yet
Where: San Francisco, CA
Your name, email, phone: Henry Arlander, henry@livefyre.com, 415-577-7325
Babson Affiliation: Undergrad ‘05
Employees: 5 (CEO/Co-founder, COO/Co-founder, and three engineers)
Founder’s Past: Advertising. Prior to LiveFyre, I was an account manager on the Sprint account at Goodby, Silverstein and Partners (Adweek’s agency of the decade). Before that I worked on the Four Seasons Hotels campaign and Buzzed Driving is Drunk Driving public service campaign at Mullen Advertising.
How The Idea Began: My friend Jordan and I came up with the idea for LiveFyre over dinner one night. We were talking about Twitter and how it’s great for spreading information, but that it doesn’t really support back and forth conversation very well. So we came up with LiveFyre- a website that inspires and facilitates real-time conversation about what’s going on in the world right now. Breaking news, current events, live sporting events, you name it.
Favorite Thing about the Business: My favorite thing about the business is that we’ve been able realize our vision…to see our idea become a reality. There’s nothing cooler.
Worst Thing About the Business: While they helped me get through college, I never thought I’d be eating Ramen noodles again!
Biggest Challenge: Wearing multiple hats. My co-founder and I handle design, legal, PR, product, HR, project management, copywriting, accounting, finance, marketing and more. It’s a lot for two people to handle but at least it’s never dull.
Lesson Learned: Don’t be afraid to talk about your idea. A lot of start-ups are scared to share their idea for fear of having it stolen. We were no different. However once we got over that and started sharing it with people in the tech community, potential investors, potential advisors, etc. it opened a lot of doors for us.