It is rare to find a company offering such a game-changing disruptive equation, even in the context of giants like Google, Yahoo and Microsoft.
These are the words of Morton Meyerson, the man who just led ChaCha’s $10 million Series B round of financing.
What is ChaCha? It’s a new search engine that lets users ask questions to a real person, called a search guide, via a chat interface. The search guide then returns results that are supposed to be more relevant than what Google, Yahoo and others provide.
The problem, as we’ve noted, that most people who go to the site are just screwing around (one ex search guide said 90% of the traffic is pranksters). And as you can see from the image, the search guides aren’t particularly knowledgeable about the web. In this case, the search guide answered a query about a UK version of Digg with “What is Digg?”
The fact is, ChaCha is a bad idea that has been poorly executed. In a sea of dumb startup ideas, ChaCha stands apart as more awful than just about all of the rest. And that didn’t change with today’s funding news. They simply went from being a bad startup, to a well funded bad startup.
As an aside, we have a long standing thread in the TechCrunch Forums where users are encouraged to post their most ridiculous ChaCha search experiences.
Update: Wow. That’s a fugly Comscore traffic chart. 24 million page views/month in January, down to 2 million in October. The good news is that it can’t possibly go much lower because it is not possible to have less than zero page views. Solid investment, Morton:
Good idea on their part to require user registration for guide search. That should keep many “pranksters” out.
damn.
Spikes probably due to a few million dollars of advertising spent. And they stole Coca Cola’s logo.
I cant make this stuff up, I just jumped on ChaCha with this
Status: Stacy has connected to help you with your search on a site that explains how to raise $10m in VC like ChaCha?. Please wait while your guide searches for your results.
Stacy: Welcome to ChaCha!
Stacy: Please be more specific as to what you’re looking for on this topic.
You: thanks, I’m looking for a site that explains how to raise $10m in vc like chacha?
(2 minutes later)
You: any luck?
Stacy: not yet
(4 minutes later)
You: no good?
You: ahh..see one now, thx
The one result was http://www.ventureworthy.com/. One result, 4 minutes. WTF!
This is funny, all they needed to do was to submit your question to say google or yahoo or microsoft in the background and serve up the answers.
oopps i just reviewed chacha proprietary technology
Michael, it’s quite entertaining to watch you you tear a crappy company a new one. You should write more stories like this, it’s a lot more interesting than Facebook
absolutely solid post — glad someone is calling out a bad idea that gets taken too far…
I do think that the future of the web is going to be in leveraging the value of things like social search (not sure if Mahalo is just it - just yet, but it’s the right track) and collaborative information organization (like Wikipedia) — also, sites like http://www.allthat.com/ have a lot of potential in their persistent search functions. Throwing a dog a $10 million bone and telling it to go fetch is just bad business.
MikeW, I thought they stole it from the mexican chain restaurant Chi Chi’s
Check it out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chi-Chi’s
You tell me.
Ha - btw - I wonder how much they pay their “search guides” — if it’s paying them by the hour, that might explain the dumb questions and the amount of time it takes =)
Duncan - I’m glad that, while we disagree on trivial things like Yahoo/China, we come together for the important things in life, like shredding ChaCha.
@Duncan Riley: To be fair, that’s a bit of a ridiculous search query. I wouldn’t expect much from Google just typing it in.
That said, ChaCha hasn’t really made much of an impact on the way people search at all. Google/Yahoo/Microsoft still dominate with simple text-based queries that are answered by computers.
This is an unbelievably dumb idea. I asked them two easy questions that come up on wikipedia as the first search result and they couldn’t get that.
Where are these people based? I asked my chacha guide and she said Midwest.
SUCH A DUMB IDEA.
http://www.urbandictionary.com.....erm=chacha
Interesting to see what UD has to say about the name too.
Chacha becomes a social networking site for ballroom dancers. Can you teach me how to ChaCha?
So, just had a chat with two operators. The first one didn’t know who Morton Meyerson was, so my joke on her, had me, well, crying. In a bad way. The way you cry when you watch the special olympics.
The second operator got the joke right away, and then spend the next 20 (I kid you not, 20) minutes chatting me up. No agent call limits? Better pony up another 10m by the time I’m done ‘using’ their agents.
New business plan: social network for after-hours with chacha providing the live operators. Anyone in? I’ll put in $5.
@ Robin, i just did a search on google using Duncan’s request and got 10 responses in 0.44 seconds.
http://www.google.com/search?q.....=firefox-a
How did such an unknown site/service/se/company even get 24M pageviews a few months back? The only place I ever hear about ChaCha is right here at TC. Who uses them?
Another example how blindsided and reckless these ’self-proclaimed’ venture capitalists are! if only the first letter of the phrase was a reality
Solid post.
Now, if they replace human operators with a capable AI, we might have something.. but that requires actual development and technology rather than just tons of money.
#17 Otis - When they went public with a test run, you would fined pages and pages of threads on various forums of people entertaining themselves, just as Michael has in this post. haha
That would be the best guess for the traffic interest. the service is more of a game than search. instant chat with someone who tries to care
Can you guys digg into why they get financed?
Does anyone else see similarities between ChaCha and Mahalo?
I see similarities between TechCrunch and Uncov.
Sorry to toot my own horn, but these kinds of queries is what Yedda is all about. Instead of getting someone clueless to help you, you get a person that knows something about the subject.
If you really insist on getting real time answers from experts, you’ll probably have to pay for it on sites like Kasamba.
what a bad a job would it be to be a chacha operator. ugh
Lior - TRUE for the next six months, after which AOL will ruin your service.
My experience with Cha Cha is that I have spend 80% of the time trying to explain what I am looking for, and then 20% of the time filtering out results the specialist gave me and trying to find the information I need. It will be a great idea if the specialist is really special in the area you are searching for information.
This is such a laughably bad situation that I wonder if we’re going to see another Gizmondo-like embezzlement fiasco? Cha-Cha founders in crashed ferrari and handgun-ownership scandals next!
The people behind this project are not stupid but its just a bad idea.
I get great satisfaction from reading Indianapolis Newspapers who cover Cha Cha, and Scott Jones (CEO) in the most positive light. They are not subjective, and cover ridiculous aspects of the deal.
ChaCha has a muddled past and THANK GOD for blogs and new media for covering the real truth about this story.
Thanks Arrington!
A prime example of it’s not what you know, but who you know. That can lead to VC funding
I think the guides should work for free, and ChaCha should donate $5 to charity whenever someone asks a question.
Come to think of it - if Duncan is going to continue asking ChaCha questions for which Google probably won’t a matching phrase, couldn’t this be a new form of education? Let’s put kids on the end of the Guide Session interface, and they’ll know venture capital inside out after 15 years.
I can’t believe the level of investment for a caveman approach to search. Almost like investing in carrier pidgeon’s to send payments for on-line transactions. Bring on bubble 2.0
cha cha bites!
In Chinese, chacha means “pretty bad”
LOL
Status: Connecting …
Status: Looking for a guide …
Looking: …
Looking: …
Looking: …
Looking: …
Status: Lin has connected to help you with your search on girlfriend. Please wait while your guide searches for your results.
Lin: Welcome to ChaCha!
You: Hello, how can I find a girlfriend?
Lin: Hello! How can I help you regarding girlfriend?
You: And no, i don’t want to pay for a web site.
Lin: Looking for you now.
You: Thank you
Lin: You’re welcome!
Lin: Are these results sufficient?
You: No. It’s just paying web sites. I don’t want to pay for a woman.
Lin: Is there anything else on this topic I can find for you today?
You: Aren’t there more results?
Lin: Checking for you now.
Lin: For your convenience, these results will remain on the page after this session ends.
Lin: Thank you for searching with ChaCha! I am closing this session now. Have a great day!
You: Wait wait wait… i need your help! I really need a girlfriend.
Lin: Please RATE ME. Thanks for using ChaCha.
What are everyones thoughts on Mahalo.com?
Haha, I bet Cha Cha IPEOs.
If the idea is so bad, it will fail on it’s own. It doesn’t really need help from techcrunch.
Creating a startup is hard enough without the fear of public humiliation.
Chacha means dad’s bro in Urdu(Pakistani language)……hahahaha..
Worst. Idea. Ever. Period.
People, while the bad quality of their agents is unforgivable (but hopefully will be resolved) lets keep in mind that whoever reads TC is *by definition* not the target audience for this service, so evaluating them from our point of view is a bit harsh.
The target audience, IMHO, will be web-newbies, who are scared and clueless. Dont forget that in most countries a significant portion of the population is NOT online.
I could imagine good business for ChaCha by cooperating with all the ‘get started online now’ courses and seminars offered by Telcos to their new subscribers. And I think they deserve a chance, as this could be a valuable service to the world at large.
Provided, of course, that they do use that money to train their service agents properly….if not, to hell with them
1-2 chak chak cha…. sounds similar..??? huh… actually this is one of the service that google has always lacked, fianlly we have something which can give answers for direct questions rather than having answers based on keywords… its a great step towards innovation in the serch engine marketing… Regards
Status: Connecting …
Status: Looking for a guide …
Looking: …
Status: James has connected to help you with your search on when was chacha founded?. Please wait while your guide searches for your results.
James: Welcome to ChaCha!
James: hi
You: hi
James: Please wait a moment while I search for your results.
You: thanks
You: hello? still there? ( THAT WAS ABOUT WAITING FOR 1 MINUTE)
James: yes
(SINCE I THINK 1 MINUTE FOR SUCH AN EASY QUESTION IS 50 SEC TOO MUCH, I THEN DID IT MYSELF… AFTER 8 SEC:
You: maybe you should use google to be faster.. try — chacha “was founded in” —-… .second results gives the answer… you are really slow, james
James: sorry
You: i mean, how do you search?
You: you should know the founding date of the company that you currently work in by heart by the way..
James: ok
James: thanks
James: Is there anything else on this topic I can find for you today?
You: well, you didn´t even give me the answer to my first question
You: hello? did you hang up?
You: that wouldn´t be very polite..
James: Thank you for using ChaCha!
Status: Your ChaCha guide was James ID: 40274
Status: Session ended.
Wow. How does hell does a stupid idea like this get 10$ Million… What kind of investor looks at this and sees potential? They are just throwing their money away.
I bet this story has a lot to do with natural language query development.
in that case, it’s not the answer that is valuable but in fact it is the question asked.
the same story that was behind google answers (r.i.p.) and that currently values yahoo! answers and live.com q&a
but of course, you must be quite smart to understand that
“Solid investment, Morton:”
Tax shelter?
Wooza..
1. Morton Meyerson proved himself right. It -is- rare to find a company offering such a game-changing disruptive equation, even in the context of giants like Google, Yahoo and Microsoft.
2. If they’re smart, they’ll run with this, turn the lemon into lemonade, and make it a “fun & games” time-wasting service. You know, “What’s the funniest thing that ever happened to you on ChaCha?”
Joe
@ Arrington: I strongly disagree. The problem here is solely in the implementation–the idea is great. I think the mistake that you and most of the commenters in this thread make is evaluating this service solely from your own perspective without considering the wider market. ChaCha was never intended for “us”, the innovators, early adopters and tech savvy.
We don’t need anyone to help us search because we understand, almost instinctually, how to use a search engine in the most efficient manner. We are a tiny minority. What you need to consider is that most people–those who aren’t surfing TC, Valleywag, Uncov, Digg, Slashdot, and the rest all day–don’t. Go ask those people how they would search for information on a specific subject and I guarantee you that 9 times out of 10 you will find that they have no idea how to find what they’re looking for. My non-techy friends often refer to me as an “internet geek” because I can easily find the information that they cannot–using the same applications. I’m often shocked at their seeming ignorance, but remind myself that I am one, and they are the majority.
I remember a post here some time ago, about mobile company Jitterbug–who are targeting the senior demographic. I don’t remember who wrote the article, but they wrote a generally positive review and the comments followed suit. This is because Jitterbug clearly defined who they were targeting and therefore, prompted an objective response from the TC nation. ChaCha, whose service would clearly sell to the same tech illiterate audience as Jitterbug and for the same reasons, have not defined their target audience and as such received a SUBjective response. Therefore, this problem is one of implementation, not the idea itself.
Why does a company like this need $10million? And if a company like this can raise that much money on an idea like this there is hope for the rest of us. That reminds me, I need to go finish my investor deck…