After sharing Arvind’s experiences with OrderMonger, we have our next-in-the-series interview with Nithya, one of the two co-founders of Muziboo, an Indian startup which is an online music community targeting audiophiles who love to listen and create music.
The way Muziboo generated a community around a startup did impress me ever since I met the duo at proto. I always wondered how? Answering my question, I found Nithya to be brave at her humble thought,
We believe that in this age of web ‘Customer service is marketing’ We believe in keeping our existing users happy and letting them spread our service.
We had some real good answers from Muziboo;
Can I have a few words about Muziboo and its founders before we move on?
Muziboo is a platform which allows users to share, discuss and find an audience for their creative audios. The audios can be anything from music and mimicry to speeches and interviews.
Muziboo was founded by myself(Nithya) and Prateek Dayal. Both of us were working in a company in the embedded space before deciding to quit and carry on with Muziboo full-time. Muziboo is entirely coded-up single handedly by Prateek as he is the only tech person. I take care of all the community activities.
How did you come up with this idea and perhaps such a catchy name for your service?
The idea came up when we were talking to a friend over chat about him starting his own website to put up his music videos. Prateek thought adding a community dimension to it with lots of people coming together to share their works would be a good idea. Thus was started Muziboo.
We came up with the name Muziboo pretty fast. We wanted some name which didn’t carry any meaning but has a global appeal.
What were the other names you thought of and why did you settle with this one?
This name was the first and we settled for it as it fit our requirement of not carrying any meaning.
Who are the current team members apart from you both at Muziboo and what are their roles?
It’s just the two of us
So, is Muziboo a kind of last.fm of India? How do you react to such questions?
Muziboo has no commercial content. In that sense it cannot be compared to Last.fm. And also we do not consider ourselves an India specific service. A chunk of our traffic comes from the US, Europe and other SE Asian countries.
How do you brand/market yourselves in this competitive niche? With this I mean to index last.fm.
We do not have dedicated marketing or branding efforts. The users who like our service evangelize about Muziboo.
What is the top-revenue model you would advice today for a web based music service?
We are too small to advice anybody. But all we would say is for founders to think of revenue models before starting any kind of web-service.
What procedures do you use to evangelize yourselves in the social web and to generate a community around your start up?
We believe that in this age of web ‘Customer service is marketing’ We believe in keeping our existing users happy and letting them spread our service.
What offers do you provide to a pro-user vis-a-vis a free user, other than unlimited downloads & higher bit rate? What is the current ratio of free paid users of Muziboo?
Pro users, as you pointed out, have unlimited music and photo upload and high bit-rate streaming options. Also they have the option to re-upload their file without losing comments or ratings and also the ability to privately share their songs.
Do you have international user too or you’re a proud Indian start up catering the national music enthusiasts?
We have as many international users as we have Indian. We believe that music is not something to be discriminated on grounds of geography.
Would you like to comment on the plagiarism over the Internet and the strictness of copyright?
Piracy is something the world has learnt to live with. Music is perceived as free-commodity over net. It’s tough to change the mind-set by making stricter copy-right laws. So the world will eventually come up with innovative ways to monetize the free commodity.
Can you share the top-3 learning experiences with Muziboo?
- Trying to make a living out of your own idea isn’t as simple or cool as it sounds. Needs lots of patience and perseverance. We have achieved quite a bit of these virtues.
- We can identify a fake entrepreneur/organization from a real one! We no longer waste time with the fakers in the name of partnership or exchanging ideas.
- Founders need real sharp focus and a decent vision for their service. It is easy to get carried away with lots of inputs from different sources.
What are the next steps for your start up as of now? Any new services, products coming up from your store?
We have a few product mile-stones. But it would be sometime before they are released. We are constantly working on usability and interaction though.
What’s the biggest surprise you’ve had in the business recently?
Nothing in particular.
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{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Heyyyy….glad you guys covered this…have been a fan for quite some time…however, I would really like to know how many people working for them now and how big they have gone….
Hi Rizwan
Thanks for the comment. We are glad you like Muziboo! We have seen some good growth in the last quarter and hope to maintain it. We are still two people team bootstrapping Muziboo
You can read more about what we are upto on our blog http://www.Muziboo.com/blog