New niche search engine idea

How to go about it, what are the requirements, pitfalls, etc.

[Tapolyai]

I have a search engine idea that I think would fly.

I have the technology solved.
I have the financing solved (well, piggy is dieing tonight!)

How can I tell if this will fly?
How can I build relationships with other SEs, or is it even necessary to do so?
What other problems could arise while deploying this system?

Obviously I don't want to just blurt it out, what the idea is, but anyone have some reasonable ideas? Maybe I should "sell" it to GoogleGuy :)?

Please don't tell me to have a business plan. I work in venture industry now, it is still in the brainstorming phase...

[jomaxx]

Without knowing anything about it, the next logical steps would be to:
1. research all the current SE's/directories in that niche
2. determine if there is a pressing need for what you are proposing and if you can add significant value to what is already out there
3. start building and create a prototype

I don't see any pressing need (or likelihood) of building relationships with other search engines. The one exception you might look into when you're up and running is AskJeeves, who actively point users to specialty databases where appropriate.

[jeremy goodrich]

Get a patent, if it's that good, secure your intellectual property any way you can.

After that, build a prototype - and remember through all of this, the #1 problem facing any new search engine is getting the word out.

Not building it, but getting people to use it. Figure that out, and even 'half baked' SE ideas will work.

I'm not saying yours is, just saying that is the core problem with SE's, getting people to switch.

[cornwall]

>>How can I tell if this will fly?

In the end the only way you can tell is by trying it and seeing.

In conventional marketing they do extensive research on all aspects of the product and the advertising, and even then a blue chip company will be lucky if 1 new product in 10 actually makes the grade in the long term.

Like you I have an idea, my idea has been progress for 18 months now and is fairly substantial. Will it work? Time will tell.

[Brad]

What jomaxx said sums it up. Jeremy is also right - getting people to use it is the biggest challenge from there.

Best of luck to you too. I hope you succeed. :)

[Fischerlaender]

How can I build relationships with other SEs, or is it even necessary to do so?

If you're about to start a specialised search engine, then you could try to get envolved with major engines. If it's gonna be a general engine, you'd be a real competitor of them, so they won't be interested.

If your engine is something like a directory, you should try to optimize your category pages for the major engines. Here in germany we have an old directory, which noone really uses, but it ranks at place 15 among all engines and directories traffic-wise, because its pages are well-placed in the search engines.