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Santa Cruz Local

Developing a market and viability study for new idea

Santa Cruz Local examines the viability of a Spanish-language product

The challenge

Santa Cruz Local founder Kara Meyberg Guzman has achieved success converting readers of her local nonprofit news site to engaged members. Her team envisioned building a new product – a Spanish language version of Santa Cruz Local that would appeal to the region’s Spanish-speaking and Latinx audiences. But brainstorming the idea was the easy part. How much would it cost to build an MVP, and could they afford it? How many donors would they need to attract to make the product viable, and how long was their runway? What other revenue streams beyond reader dollars should they pursue in order to launch the product?

“My Biggest Takeaway From The Lab Was That I Learned How To Think About Approaching New Revenue Streams. I Learned How To Size The Opportunity, Reduce Risk And Form A Strategic Budget. I'M A Much Savvier Ceo Than I Was Six Months Ago, Thanks To My Startups Lab Coaching.”

Kara Meyberg Guzman
Founder, Santa Cruz Local

The results

The Startups Lab introduced Kara to new templates and tools that allowed her to take budget planning into her own hands and determine how much money Santa Cruz Local needed to launch the Spanish-language news product. Coach Scott Rosenfield helped Kara and her team create a revenue strategy around Spanish-language advertisers. The team built a prospect list of Spanish-language businesses and community organizations before curating and pricing the available ad inventory. Kara also built a pitch deck to introduce the product to new potential funders.

Spending the time up front to scope the product, determine cost and create a revenue plan lessened the anxiety Kara had around bringing such an important initiative to market. She is currently raising sponsorship revenue and seeking funding to hire a product manager and launch a Spanish-language pilot site in 2023.

Successes:

Learned how to evaluate viability and market size for new products

Created launch plan for new Spanish-language product

Built a sponsorship strategy to ensure the product is revenue-positive

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