The Problem
Productivity apps provide structure, but they let notifications, tasks, and information overload get in the way of creative thinking. Social media has valuable information, but it’s noisy and distracting. Most networks are designed to hijack our attention and show us more ads — not to help us find what we need.
Creative thinkers need a tool and a space where they can organize their ideas and make new things together.
The Solution
On Are.na, there are no ads, likes, or recommendations to get in your way. It’s a more mindful space where you can work through any project over time.
The Product
Save and organize images, documents, video, quotes, links, and more.
Arrange ideas visually in a distraction-free space
Connect other users’ content to your own collections
Share collections privately or build public collections with everyone
How it works
Traction
Quarterly connections made on Are.na:
We measure usage by the number of connections our members make. A connection is any new piece of content a user adds to the platform or links from one channel to another.
What people are saying
Business Model
Are.na relies on a freemium membership model. Free accounts are limited to 100 private pieces of content. More privacy for professional projects requires an upgrade:
Are.na Premium ($5 / month or $45 / year):
Over 6% of active users currently pay for Premium, translating to $10,000 of revenue in Q1 2018. Premium memberships already more than cover the cost of all site infrastructure.
Growth in Premium memberships is on track to generate over $40,000 in Q4 2018 . We project that revenue will grow to cover all current expenses and salaries by Q4 2018. A new business product launching in Q2 2018 will help us get there.
Market
A growing cohort of freelancers needs more effective ideation tools and wants more genuine interactions online. These are creative thinkers who require a lightweight tool for personal knowledge management.
Are.na is the only social network that connects you to other people without taking over your life. Engagement on Are.na means connecting information, not mindlessly “liking.” Are.na members spend 10 minutes per session on the platform — compared to 9.6 minutes for Reddit, 5.8 for Tumblr, 5 for Facebook, and 3 for Twitter according to Statista.
Total addressable market
15 million workers at the core of the U.S. “creative class” are our beta audience, and unlocking that group means we can address a global market of 230 million knowledge workers who don’t have the ideation tools they need.
Used by professionals at:
Used by students and educators at:
What's next
Are.na is launching a team product in Q2 2018 for small businesses and enterprise clients. Think Slack for your team’s ideas.
Business pricing and support will likely generate immediate revenue from those teams and facilitate sales to larger clients. There’s a built-in demand for team features among our members: 200+ accounts already use Are.na with other members of an organization.
Product roadmap:
Mission
As a mission-driven business, we’re choosing to crowdfund Are.na’s future so that we can grow in a way that lines up with our values. We won’t accept investments that will force us to compromise on our core beliefs, and we will never abuse the trust of our members by selling ads or personal data.
We believe that our members and like-minded people should be stakeholders in Are.na’s future. Equity crowdfunding will allow us to scale at a sustainable pace while making an ownership stake available to anyone who shares our vision.
Founders
We're building a new kind of platform for a more curious and collaborative Internet. Invest now to own an equity stake in Are.na.
Are.na needs to reach their minimum funding goal before
the deadline. If they don’t, all investments will be refunded.
Learn more
Crowd SAFE
·
Learn more
The Crowd SAFE is an agreement for future equity in the startup,
meaning that it can convert to equity in the future.
20%
If a trigger event for Are.na occurs, the discount provision
gives investors equity shares (or equal value in cash) at a reduced price.
Learn more.
$5,000,000
The maximum valuation at which your investment converts
into equity shares or cash.
Learn more.
$50,000 – $1,070,000
Are.na needs to raise
$50K
before the deadline. The maximum amount Are.na is willing
to raise is $1.07M.
Learn more
Form C
SEC.gov
Are.na feels like what the internet should have been.
As a psychologist and sometimes inventor, I find your concept both exciting, challenging and well worth $100 to see how well it works.
Having a well designed platform focused on creativity, research and collaboration without the distractions of ads and other egregious intrusions seems so intuitive. I'm excited about the promise of Are.na!
Are.na’s next hires will be a full-time developer, a business development and sales coordinator, and another designer. We’re conscious that Are.na is currently an all-male and primarily white team. As we build a community that represents a wide range of identities and perspectives, growing into a more diverse company is our first priority.
We built Are.na as a passion project in 2011 and maintained it as a small community for several years. Thanks to a small investment, we started working on Are.na as a full-time business in June 2017. Are.na’s pace of growth and product development reflects our level of engagement as a team: slow and steady expansion until last summer, exponential growth once it became a full-time endeavor.
Are.na addresses a more fundamental need than any task management or file organization tool. It doesn’t just neaten your digital life. As an environment for visual ideation and collaborative knowledge management, Are.na helps people actually learn, think, and create.
Are.na Premium members are primarily designers, developers, artists, students, and entrepreneurs. They use Are.na to conduct professional research, manage ideas and content, collaborate with teams, keep track of cultural trends, and connect with the community for leisure. 74% of Premium members use Are.na daily and over half use it to collaborate with others.
It’s understandable to worry about the future of a member-supported tool. But Are.na has already existed for seven years and we strive to build our company to exist for the long-term. Today it has enough paying members to ensure its stability and cover infrastructure costs long into the future. Unlike at any time in the past, more and more people are looking for the kind of refuge from predatory tech that Are.na provides.
An exchange token for Are.na’s ecosystem could work, but we’re committed to building a high quality product and a genuine community rather than a speculative marketplace. Our current focus is entirely on making the platform better for collaboration, so having an ICO wouldn’t be a serious option.
Yes. You'll receive a convertible note that can turn into shares in the future. This is a common instrument for investments in early stage companies.
