How to Scale: Use common themes.....like sex or disliking your job!

I just finished reading the book "I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell" and have to say it was unbelievably funny. Sexist beyond belief (from some people's perspective) and very frat boy oriented, but still. Let's call it "Man-Lit" (see "Chick Lit"). This was a book I actually was laughing out loud to when on the plane. My colleague was getting a kick out of this as he was sitting next to me, seeing me break out in laughter (my inner frat boy kept trying to get out). But, this is not meant to be a book review.

The point is that it's unbelievable how this book came to be. Tucker Max (that really is his name) started a website where he basically chronicled all his sexual escapades. The guy is an outright player (admittedly so) and basically ended up having his site help him to find women whom he could bed (plus, along the way getting sued). When you actually read the stories you cringe at some of his experiences. Pretty disgusting some of the things he gets into. Had I known what the book is about, I probably wouldn't have bought it (on second thought, I would have). Yet, I simply saw it at Borders, prominently displayed amongst other bestsellers and was looking for something to read on the plane......the back page synopsis intrigued me. The catch here is that it's basically a book which copies his online stories and pastes them together into one book. No real advertising was done for it.....it simply was funny enough that word of mouth let it spread (plus the title sure is catchy). This at the same time drove traffic to his site, further driving word-of-mouth for the book. Not only once was he on NYT's bestseller list, but twice (the second time without any special PR). What's the point? Well, this reminded me of how "4 Hour Workweek" spread like wildfire. Further, there's a ton of books out there now trying to follow the same path, but only some really work, taking advantage of hard-copy and the Internet to such an extent and fulfilling basic desires of the general public.

What's this mean for the Babbling VC? Well, probably not much! It's basically a reminder of what sells. If you can get an audience based on common themes such as sex (which as a business case we won't fund) or hating your job (which we might), your audience will be huge. Your typical high school or college aged kid is driven be the urge to hook up. The post-college-age employee often hates his or her job. Nail either of these themes and you have a loyal audience, more than happy to tell their friends about you. Both of these camps tend to be bored out of their minds more often than not. How can you take advantage of this? Well, figure out a way to combine age-old desires with new technology and market it. Not that many ideas like this are fund-able for a VC (well HotOrNot is a perfect example of one that would have been) but you sure can be creative about finding a way to market yourself, or a book, a product, etc. And to really stretch it a bit, sites like MySpace or Facebook are intrinsically driving dating (and you can call it social networking as much as you like). Finally, how many sites have thrived as people were sitting in their office, hating their job and surfing the web? If you really think about it, there is so much more which can be done using the net and fulfilling basic needs. I often wonder whether we aren't thinking too hard at times as investors, missing major opportunities sitting in front of our noses. I sure am glad though that I often pick up books like this and get a reality check!