I like that it looks like a circular and has the deals front and center.
The one thing I had a problem with is when I got there I wanted a header/tagline or about page explaining what you do and how you do it. I'm sure most will know, but it still seems like a basic must that it be explicit especially since you're new.
This was a good summary of RedBeacon. They are bright guys, and work extremely hard. They had the same TC traffic bump and have been working to gain traction in the cities they have launched in. Looks like they are starting to go in the right direction.
http://siteanalytics.compete.com/redbeacon.com/
Where they fall short IMHO is that the existing market is being satisfied (personal referrals, yelp, yellow pages, craisglist, angie's list, service magic, etc.) and their offering is not compelling enough (at least now) to customers/service providers for them to switch conventions. If they want to succeed they will need to hire an armada of sales people to compete with their rivals one customer at a time.
They have done an A job in getting press, but frankly they have all the press they need. Not sure how much runway they have left, but I'd like to see them focus more on getting local traction instead of all the ego boosting press.
Yes, I do have an idea. And it is largely do to their user growth. This growth is not sustainable and will start to taper in 6-12 months. Facebook clearly is making money from ads (I'm not discounting this). It's been estimated at somewhere in the $400-600MM range. Of that Microsoft and their own ads make up the bulk of that. That is starting to dwindle and they are going to be headed in the direction of virtual goods a la Tencent. My point is that social media sites like Ning, Facebook, and Twitter are figuring out that free is not a business. Ning is just the first to admit it.
Free is not a business model. Within 12-18 months expect Facebook and Twitter to go the same route. Their burn rate is starting to catch up to them and Twitter's search deals will shrink.
Nice list, but most of these are low hanging fruit and are already saturated with established players. The riches are still in the niches.
Example: instead of losing weight, I'd focus on helping people gain weight. It's a much smaller market, but there are lots of skinny guys wanting to gain weight in a healthy way (me included).
I'd look at what JustAnswers.com is doing. They seem like a good fit in terms of what you're trying to accomplish with building a marketplace for translation.
Good job. I like the space and your site brings real value to everyone coming to the table.
URL is solid.
I know it's early on, but I'd like to see some examples or sample translations somewhere. And when you can get some press and testimonials it will make the site feel more trusted.
I'd also consider adding some type of image(s) on the homepage. It's missing a human element and at the end of the day it will be someone translating this stuff so I'd recommend adding translator user photos on the frontpage.
Of course male professors answer females at a higher response rate. Those in the academia world rarely have hot wives. Professors get married later in life (this has to do with them having no lives outside of the lab). They then have to settle for less than what they want so they marry an intelligent woman who is in that 4-6.5 range on a scale from 1-10. And when young melissamiller comes emailing, she serves as a welcome distraction to grading papers. Stop making this out to be a big deal.
The success of StackOverflow was built on the backs of smart programmers who don't say anything unless they have something good to say. I've been to a few of the other StackExchange sites and the communities were not the same. Mostly the blind leading the blind.
StackExchange 2.0 is a weak attempt at still trying to replicate the unreplicateable (I know this is probably not a word). It will fail because few of these "new" sites will not pass muster during the beta phase.