BUSINESS IDEA | STARTUP

Blood Test Tracker 🩸 

Bloody hell!

Available Domain: Hemogo.com

1. Problem/Opportunity❓

The Problem/Opportunity: We have a rule at Half Baked. Where excel files or PDFs being used for something, a SaaS opportunity exists. Which is why when we came across this tweet we got excited…

If you go to the comments on the tweet you’ll see that many people use excel or Google Sheets to track their blood work over time. Surely there has to be a better way? Well we think there is.

Market Size: The global blood testing market was valued at $82bn in 2022

2. Solution ✅

The Idea: An app which tracks and provides detailed insights into your blood work

How it Works:

• A user signs up to the app and provides details about themselves and some relevant medical information

• Once they receive blood test results they can either upload them to the app (on desktop) or take a picture of the results which are uploaded to the app (on mobile)

• OCR (Optical Character Recognition) is used to pull out the data, regardless of the format the blood work is received in. You can’t rely on APIs here since this blood work data won’t be available through APIs

• The data is aggregated and presented across different charts and tables, showing the user’s levels vs normal ranges and producing insights based on the data

Go-to-market: Start by working with people who get their blood work done regularly since they will become your power users

Business Model: Monthly Subscription fee

Startup Costs: If you can integrate with an off-the-shelf OCR product then the build here shouldn’t be too expensive, but if you have to build that from scratch that’s where you’ll need money and/or engineering talent

Competitors: There are some competitors in this space, like InsideTracker, but based on the tweet above no-one owns this market yet

3. How You’ll Get Rich 💰

Exit Strategy: Sell to a large blood testing company, like LetsGetChecked

Exit Multiple: Based on recent healthcare technology exits you could get 8-12x revenue on this

TOGETHER WITH ANALYTICA INVESTOR

Secure Access to Digital Assets

• Bridging traditional finance & blockchain.

• C$152.4M YTD revenue.

• Global ETP leader.

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DRUNK BUSINESS IDEA

Oreo Just the Cream

This isn’t really a business idea, more of a request.

Oreo. Make it happen.

You know we all want this.

JUST THE TIP

Trend 📈: Nut Milk Maker

Over the last few years nut milks like oat milk and almond milk have exploded in popularity. But many nut milks on the market have a problem. They’re full of additives, chemicals and preservatives. That’s why many people are starting to search for and buy machines to make their own nut milks at home, in offices or in coffee shops.

Business Ideas

• Nut Milk Office Kits: Sell nut milk creating machines and monthly subscription packages to offices

• Nut Milk Powder Blends: Create powdered nut milk blends combining different nut flavors to be used in nut milk machines

TOGETHER WITH BELAY

Accomplish More. Juggle Less.

When you love what you do, it can be easy to take on more — more tasks, more deadlines, more hours – but before you know it, you don’t have time to do what you loved in the beginning. Don’t just do more – do more of what you do best.

BELAY’s flexible staffing solutions leverage industry experience with AI systems to increase productivity without sacrificing quality. You can accomplish more and juggle less with our exceptional U.S.-based Virtual Assistants, Accounting Professionals, and Marketing Assistants. Learn how with our free ebook, Delegate to Elevate, and leave the more to BELAY.

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THE MONEYSHOT

Turning a Blog into a $115m Exit

Business doesn’t have to be complicated.

Take this founder who created a simple blog which led to a $115m exit.

This is his story.

Back in the mid 2000s Kevin Michaluk had an addiction, but unlike other addictions, it’s the reason for his success.

The Canadian studied commerce at the University of Manitoba and after graduating went to work for CanWest Global, one of Canada's largest media companies. And on his first day of work Kevin was given something that would change his life forever…a BlackBerry.

This was back in 2006 when the BlackBerry was the most cutting edge smartphone on the market. Remember that in 2006 the iPhone hadn’t even been invented yet. And Kevin was addicted to it. He used it for an alarm clock, slept with it, took it with him to the bathroom, got his typing speed up to 50+ words per minute on it. He was hooked.

He encouraged two of his friends (Kevin Hill, a journalist and James Falconer, a graphic designer) to get their own BlackBerries and soon they were hooked too. And one evening in a bar the three of them were tapping away on their phones, Kevin remarked that calling them Crackberries was much more fitting since they were so addictive. Which is when inspiration struck.

The trio decided to turn their addiction into something productive. A blog. But not just a blog. A site with reviews, hints, tricks and tips for all the BlackBerry users out there. They wanted to call it CrackBerry.com, but there was a slight issue. The domain was taken. So they tracked down the owner who demanded $15k for the domain name, which the trio were willing to pay for (with a little help from an investor friend).

They had founded CrackBerry.com.

The site officially launched in February 2007 and it launched at the perfect time, since a few months prior Webster’s Dictionary announced that CrackBerry was the 2006 New Word of the Year.

Pretty soon the website was bringing in thousands and then millions of page views per month.

In August 2007 they were acquired by Smartphone Experts, an online retailer of phone accessories, with the team staying on to run CrackBerry. But all of a sudden the team faced a huge problem. Steve Jobs.

With iPhone launching and other smartphones coming on the market the team knew that BlackBerries may not be the market leader forever. So they expanded in scope and created other blogs around other phones to reduce the risk, including iMore, Windows Central and Android Central.

The company rebranded to Mobile Nations and for the next few years they rode the mobile wave. From 2007 - 2011 traffic started dipping to their flagship CrackBerry blog, but the other sites made up for the decline.

They also shifted their business model. Previously they had earned revenue through selling accessories online, but they moved away from this to embrace an affiliate model. This meant their revenue and profitability exploded.

By 2018, Mobile Nations had caught the attention of two potential buyers who reached out unsolicited within weeks of each other with offers to purchase.

Mobile Nations was ultimately acquired by Future PLC, a major UK-based publisher, in March 2019 for $115m. If only all of us could make $115m from being addicted to our phones.

Ultimately though the key takeaway here is that sometimes innovation can be very simple. Kevin had a very simple idea that he executed at the right time, completely changing his life forever.

So don’t dismiss a business idea because it’s too simple. That simple idea could change your life too.

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