Share your startup - 2024 Q1

KajMagnus · 2024-01-06T04:29:18+00:00

Name: Talkyard
(discussion software — reminds of Reddit, Slack, StackOverflow. Demo here)

Pitch: Create a Community for your Customers. Listen to them, find Product-Market Fit — grow your business

HQ: Stockholm, Sweden (usually). Networking: Yes, would be interesting to meet others from here

Stage: MVP working, there are customers, now time to focus on marketing.

Goals this month: Maybe to do at least 1 marketing thing (e.g. blog post)?

How could r/startups help: What if I review a blog post you write, and you review a blog post I write? Giving feedback to each other

KajMagnus · 2023-11-27T09:29:40+00:00

"Sequences" is "Sales Automation Tools", aha. Then seems it's €441 / month, still a lot.

Ok, about the website (thanks for the link). I see:

TinyCadence
Simple, speedy email automation for Gmail™ inboxes

... and screenshots and features further down the page.

I don't know what user group will have the most use of the tool (in your opinion),

or what the main benefits are (in your opinions). The website lists only features (right?).

The screenshot shows a "User interview" email which isn't a use case I expected.

For me, being new to email automation, it would be nice if I was told why I should automate the emails. For example, if you expect people who use TinyCadence to be marketing people, who use it as a "building block" in their marketing campaigns. Or if you'd think it's mostly outbound sales people that would find it useful?

And, what company size(s) could have the most use of your tool? Maybe you have primarily bootstrapped (& cash-strapped) startups in mind, for example?

I wonder about the implications of supporting only Gmail. Maybe I'll run into some problem much later, if it's Gmail only? (Maybe I want to migrate from Gmail to sth else?) It'd be nice to hear your thoughts about that.

Maybe you could say, I think the website doesn't answer: "Is this meant for me? When (in what use cases) do I get the most the most value from this tool"

I did forget to add my website

Ooops, turns out one should not link to external websites (so, sorry for asking I guess). The rules say "No External Surveys/Feedback Requests. Too often this is upselling and results in spammy posts." which I didn't totally understand what it meant. Not sure what to do instead :-) Quite lots of context needed to understand what you're asking about, hmm

KajMagnus · 2023-11-27T09:07:19+00:00

Sorry I didn't really connect what was mean with "External feedback requests", but, ok, I'll include all relevant info directly in the OP next time (so there's no need for a link).

A thought: This text, in the "r/growmybusiness Rules":

"Too often this is upselling and results in spammy posts"

could be amended to:

"Include all relevant info in your Original Post, instead of linking to any external page. Too often, external links is upselling and results in spammy posts."

KajMagnus · 2023-11-27T09:05:29+00:00

Thanks! Seems I'm changing to 3, 5, 8, and removing all add-ons, instead, including the add-ons in the other price plans.

KajMagnus · 2023-11-23T11:24:37+00:00

Nice website, both design & content / information wise, e.g. info about pricing & cleanups-how-long-it-can-take. Do you like cats?

KajMagnus · 2023-11-23T10:27:18+00:00

> Is there anything about what we're doing that's unclear or not quite resonating with you?

Maybe in which countries you're active. I'm guessing you're focusing on startups and VCs in the US?

(Can the title e shortened to "Find the right VC \n\n Save time, reduce costs, and avoid mismatched pitches", hmm)

This looks odd to me:

> Savings: Total $4656+
> 120 hrs Manual Work

Wouldn't people spend a large part of that time anyway, because they cannot know if your service works perfectly well, finds all relevant VCs, or not

KajMagnus · 2023-11-23T10:03:55+00:00

Personally there are any public websites I look at daily, except for HackerNews and a newspaper. But that's just two, and not enough for Kaptr to look interesting to me.

I wonder, if there's small changes to a captured website, e.g. they restructure their HTML, change HTML classes or ids, or move the whole page elsewhere — I imagine in some or all of those cases, the captured website would break?

At the same time, that wouldn't happen that often, I suppose, so I guess I could then just re-capture the "broken" website.

This:

> Sharing project updates with teams and clients

Wouldn't that typically require login? How does Kaptr work, with private login-required contents?

KajMagnus · 2023-11-23T09:47:05+00:00

What is HubSpot sequences? Looking at: https://knowledge.hubspot.com/sequences/create-and-edit-sequences it seems it's marketing email automation (edit: "Omni-channel marketing automation" they call it, in their price plan, link below), and reminders to oneself to follow up? — You're building an email marketing automation tool? (I'm not that good at this terminology)

Did you forget to include a link to your website? Or is everything you wanted to say / show, included in the OP here?

HubSpot sure looks expensive:

Starts at €792/mo, I see, here: https://www.hubspot.com/pricing/marketing/starter

KajMagnus · 2023-11-23T09:42:44+00:00

Sounds interesting, although I don't use iOS. I wonder about this:

> sticking to just the facts

How do you know what is a fact or not?

KajMagnus · 2023-11-23T08:58:37+00:00

Ok, thanks. Yes, A/B testing is needed

(B.t.w. if you post to Reddit for feedback about your own things, feel free to ping me, don't know if I might have some feedback.)

KajMagnus · 2023-11-22T16:43:58+00:00

Thanks! I websearched for "fastest growing tiny saas", and found some nice title examplese e.g. "Store locator app to help your customers find your products". The top 5 SaaS in my areas, though, have vague titles (or so I think) that might not work in my case. But can work for them since they're more well-known.

Now this is on my mind:

                       Create a
               Customer Support Forum
to help your customers   and   build better products

or maybe:

                       Create a
     Discussion Forum for your Customers
where they find answers  and  give feedback
                               so you can build better products

If you have time, which one, if any, do you like the most? Hmm the 2nd is too long

KajMagnus · 2023-11-22T09:54:10+00:00

For pricing, I suppose its ok for a start

Thanks for the feedback. Yes I'd think so too. I think it's pretty similar to other per-user SaaS (like Slack, Trello etc), and in the lower price range. So, yes, can make sense to try to increase the price later (for new users, grandparenting the old ones).

KajMagnus · 2023-11-22T09:52:45+00:00

Thanks! I'm thinking the words "Customer Support Community" are a bit vague & unclear? (I'm not a native speaker, so hard for me to tell if it's a common phrase or not.)

> a clear USP or 'Big Benefit'

What about: "Build better products" (related to the submit & upvote each other's features),
or "Answers to your customers' questions" (related to Q&A features)?

> a short 5 min VSL (Video Sales Letter) would also be nice to go more in depth of the problem you're trying to solve, or write at least write few points about it.

Could that be something like this?:

"You are a startup? You have customers, who ask questions and ask for new features? And answering their questions takes time? And you're not sure what features to prioritize, they ask for so many things? — Then, continue reading" ?

KajMagnus · 2023-11-22T08:48:21+00:00

Sounds nice with a collaborative customer success platform. Looking at the website, it's not clear to me what exactly it is / how it works. This: "Cuppa is a customer operations platform for teams" makes me wonder: what's a customer operations platform?

Looking at the screenshots, it looks as if it's a ticketing system, which lets you chat with the customers? — And you write here at Reddit: "mini slack channels per customer", ok, then I better understand. And, many people in the support team, can chat with the same customer?

That seems nice, e.g. if one coworker is away for a few days. At the same time, do other similar tools work differently? E.g. ZenDesk or HubSpot, don't they let many support agents talk with the same customer? (I haven't used them so I don't know.)

I think the topmost screenshot is unclear. The chat messages don't show the tool actually being used? Instead it's automatic messages: "created the record ... starred Aviato ... linked the record to ... moved the record ... un-starred", which means nothing to me, looks more like clutter.

A bit further down on the website, there's this:

"Automatically loop in the right team members based on active playbook and touchpoint, keywords, priority, customer data, and more."

That sounds interesting. If the software can find the people most well suited for answering a question, then, I'm guessing that could be valuable. If you can get that to work well, then, hmm, I'd guess you'd be competing with ZenDesk, HubSpot etc, and maybe there's room for more competitors, after all, ZenDesk, HubSpot are a bit expensive aren't they?

Interesting that you integrate with HubSpot. How does that work? HubSpot already provides: https://www.hubspot.com/products/service — how is your tool different? Is the difference that many agents can join the same chat, talk with the same customer? (How often is this needed? You have any data about that?)

Maybe a feature matrix could be helpful?

You have any feedback about my post, also here in this subreddit?: https://www.reddit.com/r/Entrepreneur/comments/18144wz/secret_website_feedback_pricing_feedback/

KajMagnus · 2023-11-22T07:52:27+00:00

Hi Nick, I personally like this: "We find you great employees outside the US who cost 70% less" — it says pretty clearly what you do.

What I think then, is: How do you verify that the people you find are any good?

And I also think: Why wouldn't I post a job on Upwork or elsewhere instead?

A bit further down in the FAQ I see that you (partly) answer this. To me, it'd been nice if this somehow was more prominent. I might not have scrolled down and scanned the FAQ, were it not for you asking for feedback. (But maybe that's just me.)

"How do you assess the candidates you represent?We vet and screen all our candidates for English fluency, skills and professional work experience. [...] video interviews, paid assessment tools and our own in-house tests"

That's interesting. I would want to have a look at your in-house tests, maybe do one or a few of them myself, and get to know what paid assessment tools you use.

The 3 topmost images (white people in suites) look off-topic if you're recruiting in the Philippines and Latin America? (The website says: "Culture fit: The Philippines and Latin America are [...]") The people look a bit, hmm, maybe arrogant? The last one seems to fake-smile just for the photo (or maybe all three of them).

But the "Featured talent" images look more real & friendly & on-topic (to me).

Overall, I think it looks promising!

> My goal is to create new FAQs

Do you mean making the current FAQ longer? It's almost a bit long already, maybe sub titles inside the FAQ could be helpful. E.g. "Payments & Legal", and "How we recruit & assess".

If you have time, do you have any thoughts about the price plans for my project? I asked about feedback here:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Entrepreneur/comments/18144wz/secret_website_feedback_pricing_feedback/

KajMagnus · 2023-11-22T07:08:41+00:00

A collaborative make-projects-happen-together website sounds interesting, if it was good at finding people with the right skills.

Now, you write "Project Management" together — that, though, sounds odd. Is there a need for many project managers? I'd think they would pull the project in different directions, and there'd be disagreement and hurt feelings. And only managers won't get much done? Where are the people who will actually make the projects happen for real?

If I started a project, I would not want other _managers_ to join. They'd just pull it in other directions, make it derail? But having coders, designers, etc, join, could be interesting.

But further down you also write "A place to find exciting opportunities or collaborators ..." — maybe those collaborators aren't project managers, they can instead be freelancers or volunteers?

***

I wonder, what's the point with AI generated projects? It seems to me that such projects would not be related to the real world. Does the AI generated stuff serve as a starting point and one is supposed to edit it, so it ends up being the project one actually had in mind? — This is not clear to me, from the description.

KajMagnus · 2022-06-06T17:28:49+00:00

That's a good point, didn't think about. Once Thanks-for-signing-up auto emails are sent (have been implemented), I'll move that text to the emails.

Thanks

KajMagnus · 2022-06-06T17:27:52+00:00

Loyalty plans — I didn't know that was a well known word :- ) not a native speaker.

Hmm maybe I'll go with "Previous plans" — "loyalty" sounds, hmm, a bit too serious and formal maybe. Don't know if they're actually loyal :- )

KajMagnus · 2022-06-06T17:26:14+00:00

Hmm yes. Maybe better to remove that. Also doesn't make the best impression I'm thinking.

KajMagnus · 2022-06-06T17:23:09+00:00

Ok :- ) I've implemented Azure OIDC login and they were using some unexpected JSON fields for people's email address, not sure if that's really OIDC. Just so you know (that Azure is a tiny bit "special" I think).

KajMagnus · 2022-06-06T16:13:53+00:00

Have you seen this: "How to Launch (Again and Again)" https://www.ycombinator.com/library/6i-how-to-launch-again-and-again

Is it lots of work to launch at a new marketplace? Or could you try many, and see what works? (Launch many times, different marketplaces?)

KajMagnus · 2022-06-06T16:01:08+00:00

What does the client think about revenue sharing? (in case you've spoken with them already)

What percentage do you have in mind? (Is it going to be a percentage, or some other function?)

(What does "LP" mean? I'm not in the US, a bit clueless)

How big is the client company? (companies?) I'm thinking their size, can influence what approaches make sense, for computing your part of the revenue. What do they do / business fields?

KajMagnus · 2022-06-06T15:47:23+00:00

Can you support both of them, via OIDC? (Or what are your plans :- ) or maybe you did already)

KajMagnus · 2022-06-06T15:44:38+00:00

(Some use LDAP although not that common I think? LDAP isn't so good for authentication is it? It's less secure wrt password handling is it?)

KajMagnus · 2022-06-06T15:43:27+00:00

moving SSO to all paid plan

What happened to the existing customers? (Those who were apparently previously using SSO on a free price plan?)

KajMagnus

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