Zaarly IS the next big thing to come from SXSW interactive. Local Deals that you ask for.

Cabby on 24/03/2011 - 17:00
Last edited 27/03/2011 - 09:22 by 2 other users

The team from Buzz Masheen are on their way back from SXSW Interactive and all the talk is about the new way to do deals which is Zaarly. Previous years next big things from SXSW are Twitter and Foursquare so it has pretty good pedigree.

Similar to this site's "Find me a Bargain" forum, Zaarly lets you post what you are looking for, how much you want to pay and how far you are willing to travel to get it. It uses geo location technology to alert everyone in that range who can take up the offer if they can fill it for the price on offer.

They way it is described by Readwriteweb is: "Zaarly aims to tap into the vast potential to buy and sell things that, until now, haven't explicitly had a market. It's a little bit eBay and a little bit Craigslist, but it's mobile, real-time, and location-based. It's also based on buying and selling experiences, in a way, more than simply goods and services - things we all value very differently.

Imagine, for example, that you're at a basketball game, but you want to see if you can get better seats or you didn't get reservations at some exclusive restaurant and you want to get in now. Zaarly lets you announce your willingness to shell out money - you name your price - for someone who can get the seats for you. Zaarly then facilitates the exchange" Hello scalpers!

Anyhoo if you hadn't heard about it yet - thought I would put it out there to this group who appreciate all things Bargain. It will be a year or so before it hits Oz probably. You can check it out yourself by looking at their web: http://www.zaarly.com

Mod: Please note that the link above is the direct link to the site. Add /yhrpj to the URL to give the poster a referral.

General Discussion

Comments

  • issh on 24/03/2011 - 17:34

    i heard about another business that does exactly that

    the owner is now a multi-millionaire
    he opens a site where the buyers are able to choose what price they are willing to pay, and then the seller just has to accept the offer

    Thanks for the heads up, just signed up!

  • scotty on 24/03/2011 - 17:56

    Hi Cabby! Thanks for the head up. Are you part of it? Would you be able to answer how soon will they be in Australia? The technology itself is actually not hard to replicate. So if they don't want to be get squatted (like Groupon did), they might want to register their interests in Oz ASAP. Otherwise I can already seen dozens or so copycats coming out from nowhere…

    • Cabby on 24/03/2011 - 19:13

      No I'm nothing to do with it but they had the buzz going on in Austin. They also won the award at LA start up week for most likely to succeed. It is headed by Bo Fishback who was head of the Kauffman Foundation so he knows his way around start ups. Funny thing about that whole scene is they think Global means the 51 States. They don't even think of Europe let alone Australia so if you can get the technology happening to replicate here - go for it I reckon.

      • scotty on 24/03/2011 - 19:46

        Personally… No thanks. Being the middle man between merchants and customers will get you a lot of criticism. Just see the group buy forums :)

        The business model can be relatively replicated. It's just a matter of being first, executing and market penetration (which are a lot harder than the technology itself).

        Good luck… to whichever Australian contenders :)

  • zhenjie on 25/03/2011 - 00:19

    We've had this concept 10 years from OCAU bulk buying. Scored some good deals during that time. Nothing as commercial as this sort of proposal though. Its definitely a great idea to put to market.

  • pauly on 25/03/2011 - 00:57

    I guess this concept is very similar to 'want to buy' listings, which have existed for quite some time around the interwebs. But perhaps the only thing that makes it the 'next big thing' is the integration of geo-tagging. Will be interesting to see how this pans out.

    And by the way Cabby, is that your referral link?

    • Cabby on 25/03/2011 - 08:24

      Yep my referral link. Google Zaarly to get there without clicking the link if referral offends.

      • zhenjie on 25/03/2011 - 12:12

        Dodgy…
        please read the rules about referral links on this forum.

      • pauly on 26/03/2011 - 19:35

        Google Zaarly to get there without clicking the link if referral offends.

        Thanks, I've added the direct link as an option in your original post above.

      • [Deactivated] on 27/03/2011 - 09:15

        Pauly - you are too nice. After being asked if its a referral link, cabby should have provided the direct link.

        Telling us to "google" it doesn't cut it. You know the site, you could have easily provided the link, you broke the rules (maybe unintentionally) but you should have gone out of your way to fix it.

        So text now modified so that someone needs to add the referral part to the link, similar sort of effort that they would have had to do, following your response, if they originally wanted to go to the site without the referral link.

  • AK85 on 25/11/2011 - 14:41

    Same concept of collaborative consumption as www.kodocity.com in Australia…

  • jamespack on 09/11/2012 - 11:59

    I'd also love to see this kind of site come to Australia. Been searching for something like it for some time and all I can come up with is

    gumtree.com.au
    craigslist.com.au
    and some new site called youdoitlist.com.au

    Gumtree is more for selling stuff and hardly anyone uses craigslist here in Oz. Youdoitlist hasn't launched yet but it looks ok. i registered on their site and they reckon they'll launch in November. Could be good. Thoughts?

    • scotty on 09/11/2012 - 12:28

      Job postings — wouldn't that be similar to AirTasker which has already been around since early this year?

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