The photos will run you around $195/mo for every asset Evox owns (not just what you see on Auto Swatch). They have 360 views, videos, etc etc.

Are you based in Singapore? Or was the domain just to match your last name?

"I have no idea who I would talk to about something like this (without connections there)."

Really though? Just email a few people in each place using LinkedIn with titles like "Business Development" or "Corporate Development". In 2 seconds this guy looks promising:

http://linkd.in/wOV6ze

You can probably guess their email addresses or use google to ferret out the pattern. Lead411.com is actually useful to save you time, but their customer support sucks when you decide you want to cancel that account.

If you search for them in LinkedIn and their name turns up "Private", use google to find bits of their linkedin profile. Coming to linkedin from a google search gives up all the "private" data.

Be bold. I've emailed complete strangers everywhere and have gotten meetings. I have a habit of emailing whoever I want. Mark Cuban. Marc Benioff. Howard Schultz. And I get meetings.

The most important part of reaching out to folks is to follow up. I can't believe how many times I've had to send two or three notes to the same person. Yes, you can become a nuisance. Try to do it nicely. There is a way to accomplish this without coming off as an automated spammer. I've heard from multiple people I've emailed 3 times, that they are glad I followed up with them, because they simply get too busy to remember to make an entry for me in a calendar. Even if you hear from someone and then they blow you off (e.g. don't make it to the conference call, etc.) Keep following up!

Thanks!

- Make the subject and context of your email, "I could really use your advice". Ask these contacts for help and advice on what they would do in this situation. A guy at cars.com might know that they won't buy this site, but knows someone at XYZ that would be worth talking to.

- Use any and all networks/groups of folks you can think of at LinkedIn. E.g. Find people who went to your same school that work at cars.com. No matter if you have ever met them. Mention the alma mater. It helps.

The back-end is Django. Should easily be Heroku-able if you offload the assets to S3.

I challenge you, as I have challenged these people in the past, if it has "that much" potential than why not continue to do it yourself?

I am sure if you saw an opportunity to make a lot of money, you could get past the idea of working with investors, and media folks. Shit if you made enough money you could just hire someone to handle it.

Thoughts?

Jonathan

I simply don't have my heart in it, anymore. That's why I'm selling. I have other projects that I'd like to focus on, and this project has become basically stagnant for the past year. This is the type of project that can't become stagnant - halfway through the year people want data on the next year's vehicles, and that takes time.

The amount of money that Auto Swatch can generate depends on the amount of time you put into development, and money you put into marketing and advertising. I'm the only developer, and I'm burnt out, and I know nothing about marketing / advertising, and have no more cash to put into those details.

We tried a few different business models but were never able to make any of them work.

If that is the primary reason you are interested in selling though, I would start thinking: how could you re-position the site to be successful? Just to throw out some ideas, instead of researching cars, could it be for recruiters to research programmer candidates? Or could it be for scrap-bookers to research and purchase scrap booking materials. Or could it be for gardeners to research and purchase plants? Or could it be for homeowners to research and purchase snow blowers? Etc...

With the current site, you are trying to get revenue outside of where the transaction is made. While this is possible, it is ALWAYS easier to make money at the point the transaction is made.

I agree about the revenue-at-transaction thing. The problem with cars is, well, no one buys cars online (though that may be changing relatively soon).

Saw your site when it first launched and really loved the look and feel of it. Just curious about the numbers for the site - i.e. maintenance costs, monthly visitors, etc. How much would you value the site?

I'm sad to see that you're at the point of shutting it down but I hope it's provided you with a learning experience that drives you toward success.

We were around 100-200 uniques daily before we pulled the site a few weeks ago.

Maintenance costs are about $250/mo - photos + basic linode server.

I definitely agree that there's a lot of potential with the site - especially since your maintenance costs are only for server and photos. Once the data is in there, it doesn't really have to change much either right?

For example: Identify possible buyers: The large players, Edmunds, AutoTrader, etc; Large dealerships - they might want this for their own inventory, it seems like it could be easily adapted for a dealership. Concentrate on finding dealerships in large metro areas. They sell millions of dollars worth of cars. Places like the tri-state area, virginia/dc/maryland, LA, Seattle, Texas, etc. Get a list, find some emails, put it together. Car companies: email them all. They might want to buy your software to showcase their stuff. Its very clean, and they can adapt it. Email the ones out of America too. China, India, Europe;

Identify the people in the organization who will buy. Spend a day researching them, put as many emails down as you can find. Be clear about what you're selling, and how it might be useful to that organization. Get a spiel together for emailing car companies, dealerships, etc. Show how it can be adapted to their needs. Every email you get, its like raising your price. Go after this selling thing like you went after building your website. With gusto.

Hold an auction on a certain date, and ask that bids be submitted.

Don't worry about the lawyers for now, they'll get involved when a buyer is actually interested. Until then they stay out the picture. So lawyer involvement is a good sign you've piqued some interest.

Like nick says, this does have a lot of potential to people who have time to invest.

Nice job! (to everyone who were involved with it)

1) The auto market is huge, and the players are huge. Competing with Edmunds, Cars.com, Auto Trader, is extremely difficult. Word of mouth only gets you so far. You need a marketing budget, and you can't stop building. Auto Swatch was only ever a side project for us, and that spells failure.

2) Our sub-project within Auto Swatch, the dealership management software, was impossible to sell to dealers, even though we were cheaper than their system (usually http://carsforsale.com). They didn't want to spend any more time online than they have to, and they actually resented the fact that they needed to get their inventories onto Cars.com, Auto Trader, or the internet in general. Dealerships make money when people walk into the building, not when people shop around online for the best price. So when we said to dealers "we have a better online inventory manager for you, and we're cheaper", they said "we don't care if it's better, and it's already cheap enough with our current provider".

In 1519, Captain Hernán Cortés and his army set out on one of the greatest conquests in the history of the world. Cortés was going to accomplish his goals no matter the consequences, despite being up against incredible odds. When he arrived near Veracruz with 500 soldiers, a dozen horses and a few cannons, the first thing he did was burn his ships so there could be no retreat. He told his men “You can either fight or you can die”. Returning to Spain was not an option anymore. By burning his ships, he not only cut off his only means of retreat, but also made his soldiers fight harder. They were all fully committed to the cause.

(I love this story)

Seriously don't give up now, failure is only the beginning of future success.

We've been on this project for over a year. We've tried multiple business models, strategies, etc. We know where we went wrong, and we know what it needs to make it successful. But we don't have the time, energy, or money to do it.

We've always been a huge fan of CarWoo and thought it'd be a neat partnership with them.