Hyper-Local: Not A Behavioral Disease

Can we please pick better buzzwords? Come on Silicon Valley.

When I hear the word hyper-local in Silicon Valley, I lock my door and avoid humanity, fearing that I’ll soon fall victim to some kind of outbreak.

Hyper-local sounds like a behaviorial disease, or a classification the World Health Organization invented while making plans to eradicate smallpox.

The technology industry insists on creating jargon for simple concepts to sound smart and raise money.

When a company claims that they are hyper-local, it just means that they want to connect neighborhoods in new ways.

The most exciting companies of the next 20 years will focus on connecting neighborhoods and introducing you to people who will help you live a better life.

Why should I know my neighbors?

I live on 18th and Dolores Street in San Francisco, in an apartment complex that has 7 units.

I have lived in this apartment complex for 8 months and I have not spent more than 30 seconds speaking with any of my neighbors.

I am a very social person outside of my apartment complex, but I never had a great reason to spend time getting to know them.

How many of you actually know your neighbors?

Forget about the people who live on your block. I’m talking about the people who live in your building.

Do you know where they work? Do you know what they studied in college? Do you know what they love to do in their free time?

Perhaps the guy upstairs who just broke up with his girlfriend and just started listening to Pearl Jam again works at Google.

You guys could be great friends. You could do laundry together.You could build products together in your free time.

Who is trying to solve this problem?

The technology industry wants to create a hyper-local lifestyle for you -and someone is going to create a $50 billion company when they figure it out.

One of the most exciting companies in the space is Nextdoor, billed as the “private social network for your neighborhood.”

The challenge for NextDoor, and every other company in the local space (including Zaarly), will always be early adoption rates.

On Nextdoor, there are less than 2699 registered neighbors in the major neighborhoods surrounding the Mission District.

Compare this to Facebook, where a simple search for “friends of friends who live near Dolores Park” yields thousands of neighbors - and allows me to sort results by gender, employer, and school.

How useful is a ‘neighborhood network’ if your neighbors have not yet adopted the network? The answer is simple. It’s not.

So what if Facebook placed more emphasis on meeting your neighbors - starting with the people in your apartment complex?

Would that make startups like Nextdoor irrelevant?

I hope not. I love new companies entering the local space and believe there is room for many companies to succeed.

Now if you will excuse me, I think it’s finally time to meet my neighbors.