ICOEXAMINER: The Experty ICO: Example of Where the Blockchain Can Encourage Smaller Business Models

In the three dozen or so ICOs that we have researched over the last two months, we have found that Blockchain start-ups generally fall into one of two categories:

• Those that seek to disrupt existing industries, exploiting the Blockchain’s properties of transparency and immutability that consequently bring revolutionary new improvements to traditional industry practices


• Those that seek to create entirely new industries that we are only now just beginning to imagine

When we came across the Experty proposition - a micro-consultancy platform - we found something that, strictly speaking, falls into neither category but, rather, is a hybrid of the two.

An explanation follows of the what that proposition is. Before we get into that, however, we will take note first of four specific weaknesses relating to traditional consultancy business models that Experty point out within their white paper:

1. Consultancy fees are often inflated


2. Consultancy business models are generally rigid


3. There is a wealth of knowledge out there that remains opaque and inaccessible


4. Traditional financial services serve up exorbitant transaction fees, particularly for transnational transactions - a barrier for any kind of global micro-consultancy industry

Reading through that Experty white-paper, you will now find that there is a team of ten developers based in Poland who have been operating within the field of bespoke software development for a number of years now and who have now conceived of a Blockchain-derived platform that sets out to tackle the issues outlined above.

If their proposition holds water - and conceptually it seems to do so, though really you should read the white-paper to judge for yourself - we may just have here an ICO that has identified a niche which makes for a perfect Blockchain fit and for which they are proposing a solution that will allow a specific business model to flourish.

Knocking Down The Entry Barriers to Micro-Consultancy

In relation to the first observation above, most of us know from personal experience that any consultation in any domain is generally charged by the hour - or the half-hour, if you are in luck. And it’s usually a tad expensive, particularly in those circumstances - which seems to be more often than not - where you didn’t really need that full hour.

Experty have conceived of a Voice IP-oriented platform for seeking out and scheduling micro-consultations - the client reaches out to the knowledge specialist and gets charged in relation to the length of the call he or she makes.

The provider, on the other hand, sets the per-minute tarif. Throw this in with a Blockchain model which also introduces borderless micro transaction fees, you now have the ability to set up a time-regulated business model for small consulting services.

LinkedOut

Where this gets really interesting, however, is that each knowledge provider who signs up to Experty will then be assigned his or her own unique URL which they can platform on any social network or website that directs anyone seeking out their knowledge to the service that they are providing

That link will bring you access to a dashboard of the consultant's profile where you can view their tarifs, their availability and reserve a slot. So that resolves problem number three in our list above - opacity.

And if you find yourself already embedded within a vibrant LinkedIn network, for example, then bingo - building your consultancy business has just been reduced to platforming your link on your profile page.

Third Party Fees Need Not Apply

That same URL, which hooks up the knowledge seeker to the knowledge provider either from the mobile app or from the desktop over Voice IP, will apply the actual fees on the fly in real time during the call itself as per the tarifs laid down by the consultant.

The advantage to the consultant is that, unlike within traditonal consultancy, there is no need to go chasing up the client for payment.

The advantage to the client, of course, is that he or she knows that they can themselves dictate how long the call will last, and therefore how much they will pay.

And the advantage to both is that, by building the solution on top of the Blockchain, everything gets transacted through a network which provides a borderless and frictionless payment service with negligible micro-fees, eliminating at the same time any need for third-parties that takes an over-sized slice of the transactional cake.

Neither the client nor the provider, of course, will be exposed to any of this - because the service will offer the ability for both to come aboard through means of traditional fiat. The platform will interact with the Blockchain in a manner that is totally transparent to everyone involved.

Opening Up New Avenues For Consultancy

That, then, seems to address problem number four from our list - excessive fees eliminating the profitability of micro-consultancy. The one we haven’t touched upon is number two on our list (rigid consultancy models) - and here, it seems, is where things can get creative.

If you suddenly have tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of people, now in a position to offer micro-consultancy / knowledge services that they were unable to offer previously because of the entry barriers outlined above, new possibilities emerge.

I am thinking here specifically of aggregation models - businesses which seek out the best consultants for each constituent subject of a a larger theme, and thus offering paying clients access to a range of subject expertise around that theme for a fraction of the cost of existing consultancy services.

MVP

The Experty product has been in development for a few months, long before any ICO pre-sale. That in itself was enough to pique our interest. This is where Experty are setting themselves apart from other ICOs - they are not simply selling a concept that currently has no form outside of a prettified piece of paper.

Their hard-cap is also a modest $10 million, falling in line with another one of our dictums here at ICO Examiner: the most promising ICOs, in our experience, have both modest caps and a significant portion of their budget set aside for market outreach.

Experty appear to be ticking these boxes so you may just want to keep a close eye on this one. They are as yet to confirm the dates of their upcoming ICO sale but we'll keep you posted.