“Experience has been our mentor”, Chika And Chidi Of PicRate.Me (Formerly Lagbook)

Recently, owners of Nigeria leading social network, University of Lagos undergraduate - Chidi and Chika Nwanogwu recently changed the name of their platform to PicRate.Me.

LAGBook was originally created on the 17^th of April, 2010 to  serve as an exclusive network for their university. Today, the network has grown outside the campus range, accounting for more than a million users so far.

In this interview, the twins  talk about the management of their new brand, PicRate.Me, what they hope to achieve with the new project, their passion for what they do and more....

Excerpt:

LAGbook recently changed its name to PicRate.Me; what was the
reason for this?

When we started LAGbook some three years ago, our mission was to
provide a platform that helps students of University of Lagos to
unwind, connect with one another, and share their daily experience on
campus, and the name 'Lagbook' was just perfect. Subsequently, we
started expanding beyond the walls of the University, and our mission
changed. We expanded to the Nigerian market, and the name 'Lagbook'
was found wanting, and unable to depict our new mission. We didn't
want to change the name because of our previous success and growing
popularity. We believed it's like starting all over again, so we
decided to reinvent the name 'Lagbook'.

The reinvention was simple; we capitalized the letters; l, a, and g,
giving us 'LAGbook'. LAGbook was a backronym for the words 'Ladies And
Gentlemen book', and this fitted exactly to our mission to expand the
social experience of the youth demographic (18-30) around the world.
Since domain names do not permit uppercase, there was no need for a
reflection in our domain name. We didn't have a problem in growing
virally since 'LAGbook' and 'Lagbook' are verbally communicated in the
same exact way.

Recently, we wanted to add 'picture rating' to our mission. This made
us a social network for meeting new people and rating pictures. After
reaching the milestone of a million registered members, we wanted to
cover more grounds internationally, and penetrate a wider area. This
could lead to a possible lawsuit from Facebook, so we decided it was
time to change the name, and 'PicRate' was a good option.

Unfortunately, to realise the mission of PicRate, we had to move to a
new hosting service, and an instant migration of all data on LAGbook
to the new host wasn't feasible, so we had to send a message to all
our registered members about the name change, and that they should all
register to the new site. The signup has been encouraging, and PicRate
is fast growing than we imagined.

Is there still a correlation between LAGbook’s mission and PickRate.Me?

LAGbook was born out of our curiosity to know what faculty a girl we
(the founders) saw on the campus of University of Lagos. Then, we were
freshers. My twin and I argued on what faculty a girl we saw on campus
may belong to. I (Chika) said she was a science student because she
was standing next to a hall of residence close to the Faculty of
Science. My twin (Chidi) said she wasn't because she was way too
fashionable and beautiful to have any interest in Science. My twin
proposed we create a social platform like MySpace, Facebook, and the
rest, where students of our University will sign up for with a valid
matriculation number. The idea was to grow a popular campus social
network where all students with an active social life will sign up to,
and we hoped the girl will sign up for an account too, and that way,
she could tell us what faculty she belonged to, since the answer was
required upon signup. Fortunately, she did sign up after eight weeks
of run, and I was right about her being a science student.

So yes, there's a correlation between the mission of both brands. PicRate
still nurtures the mission we had at LAGbook, which is to create a
virtual community for meeting new people everyday. Social discovery is
still a part of PicRate's mission. The difference between both brands
is that PicRate has an additional mission,  which is rating the picture
of your friends, and tell them how hot you think they're. At LAGbook,
the largest activity our members engaged in is the sharing of
pictures, liking and commenting on pictures shared by friends. PicRate
is just taking this activity to the next level, which is giving them
the best from what they like the most.

 Does your Mimiboard deal with Umutu continue with PicRate.Me?

The Mimiboard deal doesn't continue with PicRate but it will with our
newest brand Available.fm

After the change of LAGbook to PicRate, and the change of web host as
well, we received a lot of mails from registered members especially
via other social networks expressing how much they do not find the
change pleasing. Many said they missed their LAGbook friends, photos,
videos, and other contents on the social network, and they want it
back. So, my twin and I are working in partnership with an American
social groupware platform GROU.PS to restore and revive the old
LAGbook under a new brand name called Available.fm

Available.fm is LAGbook; same content, same registered members, same
everything. The only difference is the brand name. When we are through
with the restoration, LAGbook users can login without signing up for a
new account since it is the same social network. They will find their friend circle intact, and their photos, videos, and other share
contents available on the network just as they did on LAGbook, and so
will they find the contents of their friends too.

This means that our partnership with Mimiboard will continue with the
brand Available.fm

Available.fm will be a social network for people available for
friendship or a relationship, which is the same as LAGbook's mission,
but with an online dating fusion.

 LAGbook prides itself as Africa’s fastest growing social network; with the name-change at this stage of the business, don’t you think it could affect the business?

No, it will not affect the business. This is because we made sure that
all our registered members received a message about the name change,
and the change has been widely communicated verbally to others.
Everybody who used LAGbook should have heard of the name change thus
making the new brand name PicRate as popular as LAGbook. It's more
like a musician who changes name; it wouldn't affect his popularity.
The domain name of LAGbook points to PicRate so the growth was
unaffected. PicRate will grow as fast as LAGbook.

 What has been the challenges posed by these new development and how has the activity on the site grown since the launch?

The challenge posed was the migration of all users login data so that
they will not have to register for a new account on PicRate, and
unfortunately, that wasn't feasible. So users have to re-register,
which is uncool in an ideal situation. Though, a wonderful percentage
of users have re-registered for an account on the new site, which is
encouraging.

The activity has grown by over 200%. People find picture rating fun
just as they find playing video games fun. Girls share loads of
pictures just to get rated by boys, and receive lovely comments too,
and it's fun watching people use and appreciate something you built.

 What is the deal with Baazar Media Pte Ltd?
That's the name of the new company that is in charge of PicRate.

Users pay to get themselves featured on Lagbook, is it also the same on the new platform?

No, they do not. On PicRate, there is currently no feature that
suggest friends, but if that feature is introducing in the future,
there's a possibility that users will have to pay to get their
profiles featured. It has been a wonderful source of monetization in
the past.

What are the challenges experienced since the inception (with LAGbook) and how have you been able to tackle these challenges?

My twin and I are not only good programmers but we are better
marketers. We're more of businessmen than programmers, so growing
LAGbook virally didn't pose a challenge. The only challenge we had was
turning our fast growing social network into lots of money. We had a
popular social network but we didn't have much profit. Though we
reached profitability after two years of run, the profit margin was
just narrow. Currently, we're looking at not only growing a popular
social network but also growing a popular social business.

What have you learnt since you created the business?

We've learnt a lot, and the leading lesson is that passion is a
greater fuel to success than the love for money.

Critics have said that you model your site after Facebook, what have you got to say about that?

The basic idea was to create a Facebook for Africa, and we wanted a
social network that is easy-to-use, and not difficult to understand
like Twitter. We figured out that if we positioned everything at the
same position they are on Facebook, people will not find it hard to
access, and that helped increase our user activity by a great deal.

 You created this business during your first year in school; how do you combine schooling and management of the site?

Being a student entrepreneur was uneasy for my twin and I. We often
missed classes in order to have time to sit in front of our laptops
and grow LAGbook. Thanks to our excellent performance at self
education, my twin and I will often photocopy our colleague's
notebook, read it up, sit for exams, and excel. That's how we got
through University.

What chance(s) does your business have to grow as big as Facebook?

We're over a million now, and we add thousands of new members everyday. Facebook is a billion. Growing as big as Facebook isn't
impossible, but it will be challenging; definitely will be.

What is that unique attribute that stands Lagbook out of all other
social network?

We're a social network without boundaries. We want to expand the
online social experience of our growing users without limits. We give
them the power to meet new people everyday, forge a great friendship
which may last for life and lead to positive synergy.

 What major deal has your company snagged in recent time?

We've worked with multinational companies like Etisalat and
Blackberry, to mention a few.

Source of income for the website?
Advertising.

What’s presently your staff strength?

At LAGbook, we had a staff strength of just 5 after downsizing from
25. The new company has a larger staff strength, but at Available.fm,
it's just my twin and I, and some techies at GROU.PS

What motivates you?

We were born motivated. We're the type of people that wants to try out
something every-time.

 Who are your mentors and how have they motivate you?

Mentor? We don't have any mentors at the moment. We simply learn from
our mistakes. Experience has been our mentor.

Advise to upcoming Techpreneurs. What should they look out for and
hold on to?

My advice is simple; dream like a beast, and chase your dream like a
possessed demon. When you come across obstacles, crush them down, and
if they prove difficult, bend around them. Make sure you're always on
the move.

Future plans concerning the business?
Keeping growing and expanding.

Any other information you did like to share with us?

Failure is in the head; if you don't think it, you don't see it, and
if you don't see it, you don't feel it. Make sure you think positive
at all times. Don't think about what can possibly go wrong. Think
about what can possibly go right. Make mistakes and learn, take
adventures and experience. Never live your life in a box because the
only time a man should live in a box is when he's dead, and since
you're reading this, you aren't, so live a little.

That's the philosophy that keeps us going.