Generate a 90-day cold-start playbook for {{marketplaceType}}: supply-side incentives, demand loops, and the exact sequence to avoid the chicken-egg trap.
You are a cold-start strategist for {{marketplaceType}} businesses.
Context:
- Business model: {{businessModel}}
- Target supply-side user: {{supplySideUser}}
- Target demand-side user: {{demandSideUser}}
- Geographic/vertical constraint: {{constraint}}
- Budget for incentives: {{budget}}
- Founder's unfair advantage: {{advantage}}
Design a 90-day cold-start strategy that answers:
1. **Which side do we prime first?** (supply or demand) Why? What's the asymmetry?
2. **What's the minimum viable incentive** to get the first 50 users on that side? (Be specific: cash, equity, access, status, data.)
3. **What's the trigger event** that tells us we're ready to onboard the second side? (e.g., "10 suppliers with 5+ completed transactions each")
4. **What's the exact sequence of weeks 1–12?** (Launches, feature releases, communication cadence, when to go public vs. invite-only.)
5. **What's the failure mode?** (e.g., "Suppliers show up but demand-side users ghost after first interaction.") How do we detect it by day 21?
6. **What's the one thing we should NOT do?** (Common cold-start mistake for {{marketplaceType}}.)
Output a week-by-week roadmap with specific metrics, user acquisition channels, and decision gates.Fill in the six placeholders with your actual business context. Run this against your co-founder or advisor—the prompt forces disagreement on which side to prime first, which is the real conversation you need to have before you spend money. Use the week-by-week output to set OKRs and calendar blocks for the next quarter. The failure mode section is your early warning system: set up a Slack alert or weekly metric review to catch the trap before you're 60 days in.
Business model: Freelance marketplace for video editors Supply-side user: Freelance video editors (global, remote) Demand-side user: Indie creators and small production companies Geographic/vertical constraint: English-speaking, TikTok/YouTube-first creators Budget for incentives: $15,000 Founder's unfair advantage: 10 years in video production, 500-person Slack community of editors
**Cold-Start Roadmap: Video Editor Marketplace** **Week 1–2: Prime the Supply Side** - Why: You have a 500-person community. Demand is harder to source at scale without supply credibility. - Incentive: Free premium tier for first 50 editors who complete profile + portfolio. No commission on first 3 jobs. - Channel: Direct outreach to your Slack community + 3 warm intros per editor. - Metric: 50 editors with 3+ portfolio pieces by end of week 2. **Week 3–4: Demand Seeding** - Trigger: 30 editors live with 2+ completed jobs (internal test jobs, if needed). - Outreach: Cold email to 200 creators you've identified + LinkedIn. Pitch: "Vetted editors, 48-hour turnaround, 20% cheaper than Fiverr." - Incentive: $50 credit for first job, no platform fee. - Metric: 15 creators sign up, 5 post a job. **Week 5–8: Flywheel Activation** - Launch: Public marketplace (invite-only link still live). - Sequence: 1 creator job posted → auto-match to 3 editors → editor accepts → job completes → creator review posted → editor visibility increases. - Metric: 80% job completion rate, 4.5+ avg rating. **Week 9–12: Scale Supply** - Failure mode: Editors accept jobs but ghost (common in freelance). Detect by day 21 if job acceptance-to-start rate drops below 70%. - Response: Add pre-job screening call (5 min) to filter serious editors. Introduce $10 deposit for job acceptance (refunded on completion). - Metric: 150 active editors, 30 active creators, $5k GMV. **What NOT to do:** Don't subsidize both sides equally. Don't launch public until you have 20+ editors with live portfolios. Don't chase creators before editors can deliver.