StartupLab by ADandPRLAB: The Ad Block Challenge

Me and my team, 6 Marks & a Penny, on this semester had the chance to attend the #StartupLab by #ADandPRLAB at Panteion University. On this lab we have been given three challenges to choose one and the one we accepted was the challenge of digital advertising in Ad blocking.

Mr. Eric Parks and Giannis Sorotos were our instructors, along with Mr Kapetanakis, in this challenge and gave us information about it. According to them, Ad blocking has cost in the advertising industry $22 Billion in 2015 alone, a number, that now,three years later has been raised. Year by year, the annoying Internet advertisements which cause “headache”, are leading people to download ad blocking apps on smartphones, computers and even on tablets.

The challenge was to come up with an idea of a startup solution that will untie the advertisers’ hands. Our idea was to make an app that connects on social media and will be the linking bond between the companies which want to be advertised and the people surfing on the Internet who are interested in each product. But how are we going to achieve that? First of all we cut down 60% of all ads and start filtering every of our users’ interest. In this way we aim to know about our users’ habits, save people from irrelevant advertisements and increase the sales of every company-client that we cooperate.

The very first thing we did, was to run a small survey about Adblocking, asking people about Internet advertisements, how familiar they are with ad blocking apps, if they use them and their opinion about some of our starting ideas. At the same time the survey was running, we made a research for our competitors, the existing ad blocking apps. Next, we framed our market, which are the companies which looking to attract new customers via Internet adverisement and people sick and tired of indifferent advertisements.

Our main aim as a startup is to gain funds from companies that want their product to be displayed to the right people, to the people who will not press the classic SKIP button and instantly ignore the advertisement. The advantage of our app it is that we want it to be adaptable for every platform (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram etc.), always up to date with new features and benefits for our clients and users adapted on their personal interest and needs. The main acqusition channels will be the most popular social media such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Youtube. What we would like to achieve is to have a continuous flow of new downloaders. The 20% of the downloads will be through cooperation with the above social channels and the Internet browsers ( Chrome, Mozzila, Safari). Our target is to establish a brand name that will be a viral and a necessity for Internet users, that will acquire downloaders on its own. Also, our app will be promoted on the Internet hoping to achieve the goal of 40% increase of new members through it and establishing a goal of 10% increase of our total monthly downloaders.

The work we have done for 3 months on this very professional and interesting project for us, first of all brought as all closer as a team and as personalities. The fact that at the end of the semester we had to present our work in front of people with huge success on our field and people who can give us a chance to promote our work was a really fascinating factor. It was very interesting to try and think an idea about a problem that concerns the biggest part of Internet users. We learned how to start building our own business model from ground zero and we were given the chance to work on our inspirations in a very professional frame.

Our next step is to try and work on the feedback that we took during the presentation at #ImpactHub, solve the problems that were pointed out and come up with some even better ideas. We wish to have the chance to work on our project with the guidance of our instructors in order to make the best out of it.

6 Marks & a Penny : (Kyriakos Varnavas, Socratis Pantelios, Basilis Filipakopoulos, Konstantinos Dragatsis, Vasw Antipa, eva fsk )

Special thanks to Betty Tsakarestou , Spiros and Katerina Vlassopoulou