#PNgrowth – The first of the next 100 companies are here!

So here we are with the next batch of 25 companies who have made it to the #PNgrowth program. We had actually said that we would be announcing the last 100 in one go, but we’ve decided not to, so to give each of these amazing companies their place in the sun.

We will be announcing the rest of the companies in this week, keeping only the last 25 up our sleeves, which will arrive in the next week.

So here we go, and congratulations to those who’ve made it!

25-founders-collage-5th batch

Amarnath Shankar of TastySpots
Amit Mishra of InterviewMocha
Raghavendra Singh of Intellileap Solutions
Sanjoe Jose of TalView
Saurabh Arora of Airwoot
Sesadri Krishnan of Trip 38
Ishwar Sundararaman of Furdo
Srivatsan Laxman of Scribler
Manoj Agarwal of Giftxoxo
Krishnan RV of Waybeo
Johny Jose of Playlyfe
Bhaskar Krishnamoorthy of Cavintek
Utkarsh Apoorva of Clusto
Amit Mahensaria of Impartus
Sumit Goswami of Xploree
Chandrasekhar O of ProductDossier
Salil Agarwal of Queryhome
Sachin Bhatia of InsideSalesBox
Kartik Mohla of Masteroapp
Remesh Kurupath of Netvarth
Rajiv Mukherjee of IncubateHub
Arvind Krishnan of Swymit
Rangarajan S of Immilife
Gopal Kulkarni of Resumefox
Anand Prabhu of Infilect

Why the Internet won’t remain neutral forever

netneutralityThe telecom companies don’t want a neutral Internet. They built the pipes and hooked them up to your phones. They also sell you broadband fiber at Rs 800-Rs2000 per month. And they hate to see you spending more time on messenger and chat apps which are getting better by the day. Unlike Gtalk and those of its ilk, today’s apps are on phones, untethered from the computer and therefore as personal as it gets. Their quality? Almost as good as a voice call. And that’s where the trouble lies.

And therefore why should they remain a silent observer to their voice and sms revenue being eaten away by Jan Koum’s Whatsapp, Larry Page’s Hangout or Skype which was built in Estonia. Apple’s Facetime is probalby the best of the lot but platform restricted hence does not create as much noise (hint: @Apple … please release #Facetime for Android and join this war!)

Dave Mcclure’s recent defense of the valuation of Unicorns reinforces the case for modern Internet businesses that are poised to disrupt the Fortune 500s. The prospect of the large telcos being uprooted by these Internet businesses is very very real and has not been more threatening than it is now. Because the telcos have now started to either resist the enemy or have started sleeping with it. Either way, they cannot ignore the enemy.

But we do need the Airtel’s and Vodafone’s to own those pipes that will carry those meek software signals. We can’t disrupt those pipes if we want our software to disrupt the world. Those who own the pipes will keep inventing new experiments aimed at spoiling the party. Someday, one of these experiments will succeed. Whether it’s Airtel’s net neutrality gambit, or the recent Airtel One which for now allows free trials, or the Airtel Zero which allows Startups to pay for giving free access to their users. Once public memory has receded and Airtel Zero gains acceptance, they may get emboldened and even sign on a free Facebook and free Youtube. Time will tell. It’s just another way of having differential tariffs without charging the user upfont.

If Airtel had succeeded in differential pricing for Whatsapp like services, you and I would be paying for that usage. Fortunately for consumers, that move got scuttled. In its Airtel Zero play, the content providers are paying Airtel to allow we the junta to use it gratis. Ultimately in both these experiments Airtel is the one that wins, with someone putting cash in the bank. If differential pricing does come in some day, no prizes for guessing whether Hike messenger would be subject to similar restrictions, and certainly none for guessing the fate of Jio Chat if Airtel had their way. This really brings me back to my hypothesis that in this case Airtel (and its counterparts) will have their cake and eat it too. Eventually. Unless another Startup chooses to become a data-only Telco with a eat-as-much-as-you-can data pack.

Lets look at another scenario where email transforms and becomes as good as chat. What would be the difference between instant messaging (as in real time chat), vs a scenario where everyone is on gmail and messages are delivered instantly to each person on the Gmail network. Google could actually do that since then it doesn’t need to depend on asynchronous smtp protocols for Gmail-to-Gmail delivery.

If Google were to try this, the day would not be far off when they would re-invent Gmail (since Gtalk is dead) to be more spontaneous, more Whatsapp like and less of a pre-planned hideout like Hangouts. You must have guessed by now where this argument is leading to. If you and I were to end up paying for Whatsapp and Skype chat, we may soon end up paying for Gmail. Sure, the telcos only want to charge for voice usage on these networks for now. That’s how it usually starts and then you start expanding your argument to ring-fence more and more unsuspecting folks into the playing field which you own and where you make the rules.

This hypothesis, by the way, is not just about cost. It’s as much about content. If you are forced to play in someone else’s playing field, not only do you have to pay the rates they charge, you are also restricted to playing (or watching) the games they want you to. Free services given on preferential basis (e.g., free Facebook but no free Google) will eventually thrust the Facebook world view on you. One that is not unbiased, not empirical and certainly not a view that’s shared by all. Imagine being left out of access to unbiased news, grassroots journalism, views of specific political parties and certain critics of those who control this free service.

I don’t really fancy letting these seeds to be sown today and neither should you. Else, my dear friend… the Internet won’t remain neutral forever.

P.S. — edited on 13/Apr… if you want to really make a difference, voice your opinion on the savetheinternet site — click here.

3 ways in which Brand Positioning influences us silently

MANHATTAN (3)I’ve usually been averse to buying premium branded apparel. For the simple reason that I could always find equally good clothing which isn’t necessarily a Lacoste or a Tommy, and which is as elegant and durable as that venerable brand.

Garments is a very competitive industry. You are spoilt for choice and there are more brands to choose from for every category than the number of hours in a day. Which is probably the reason you can get a good deal if you shop around enough. In a market where product differentiation is reduced to sticking a label on the shirt, it becomes very easy to ignore the pull of a brand and look for value instead.

#1 Discoverability

My bias towards ignoring a brand took a hit when I went shopping for a set of tyres. Now this is an industry with less than 10 brands. And they are not bought based on the label stuck on them. It was difficult to believe that the Continental, Bridgestone and Yokohoma brands (I left out Michelin on purpose), were slowly but surely getting an edge in the replacement market over time tested Indian brands. The first battle they’ve won over others, is the sheer reach. They are present overwhelmingly in front of you, wherever you go. Most purchase decisions are made by engaging with brands that are easily discoverable. It is only a handful of customers that does serious market research in the quest of finding every product they can lay their hands on before choosing amongst them.

#2 Value proposition (what can I do for you)

What each brand told me was a story. Continental said its new technology, Bridgestone said wide acceptance / long term player, and Yokohoma claimed high performance. In this milieu, I could barely hear what Apollo / MRF / Ceat were trying to say. I came away with the distinct impression that they have confined themselves to being manufacturers of OEM supplies and Truck tyres! Both of these segments do not require them to position their brand to the consumer.

I made my choice, and it was on the basis of brand positioning. No prizes for guessing which way I leaned.

#3 Believability

It’s easy to promise the moon and every seller would like to believe their brand is God. In the courtroom of the consumer however, decisions are swift and ex-party. Which means, you do not get a second chance to be heard. This is where believability or trustworthiness comes in. In my case, it was the dealer who swore by the product I bought. Do we convey trust either directly or through media or through our sales touchpoints? If not, then you are seriously under exploiting your brand’s potential.

Indian Software

This is precisely the problem that plagues software from India. To this day, we are immersed into selling our products by feature and rarely take an emotional position in the consumer’s mind. A brand connects with the buyer at an emotional level. If we want to be world class, saying how good we are will not help. How we can transform the life of the buyer, is what matters. And that is where branding and positioning comes in.

Emportant HR Software

I then thought about what we stand for as a brand. Emportant has a deeply committed team, founders with deep roots in product software and the HR software industry and yes, we’re also new-age and high-tech. So what do we stand for? Our effort will be do bring forth our Brand value to you in the coming months. Brand should also be a truthful reflection of the company ethos. We’d like to be perceived as trustworthy, caring and progressive. We’d like to be quoted as being versatile and easy to adopt. You can help us in this journey. Just write back and tell us what you think about Emportant and be part of shaping our story (click here to share comments). Because we believe that in our story, the best is yet to be told.

The ‘Desi’-fication of Indian startups

Desification is an invented acronym of course. It doesn’t exist in the dictionary. Or in lexicon. Nevertheless, it most aptly describes the phenomenon of a technology companies culturally adapting to the local mindset. In this case, local as in ‘Desi’, derived from the word ‘Desh’ which literally means Nation.

It’s not uncommon for successful Silicon Valley startup ideas to be replicated in India. They even meet a similar level of success in the local economy. And thus you had all the travel sites after the success of Expedia. You also got the payment gateways, the online ticket booking sites, the Classifieds, “Yet Another Craigslist” sites, feeble attempts at INdianized Webmail (in.com anyone?), and more. Everyone and his uncle just wanted to take a slice of American Pizza, add some Indian toppings, ‘rename’ it Indian Pizza and serve it hot and fresh!

For the technologically well heeled, they got sites to help manage and boost your Twitter followers, Whatsapp wannabes and many such.

The one thing they all used effectively is the artificial trade barriers that prevent a global business from setting foot in India. Travel is inherently local and the Indian travel trade makes it difficult for a foreign company with overseas offices, to sell tickets for domestic travel. Hence the emergence of strong Travel plays. Ditto for E-commerce, which requires you to have a local warehouse and local billing to avoid forex fees and customs duties. You think Classified are any different? Not really, because you need to soak in every inch of the local culture to really understand what kind of Classified categories work, and how people advertise and consume Classified ads.

Take Quikr. Their latest punchline is squarely aimed at the Desi speaking millions (… “No fikar, Bech Quikr”, loosely translated as No worries, Sell faster). Completely Hindi punchline, delivered with unfailing regularity over every TV and Radio.

Or take OLX. “Photo khench, Olx pe Bech” (approximates to Click a photo and sell on Olx instantly). It often takes a humorous dig at attempts to sell absurd things. The hint is that almost anything can be sold. These hints are very very Indian, and you wouldn’t understand if you didn’t dig the local culture.

These success aren’t born out of nowhere. They are the result of innumerable iterations. If you’re like me, you’d have seen many an avatar of online commerce in India and how their positioning has changed over time. If there is some startup that is trying to sell to an Indian audience without tickling the local funny bone, they probably aren’t selling that well. This has been true for B2C businesses so far. It’s a different world in B2B from where I come. However, I suspect this frontier won’t be a distant one for them for very long!

Join us in hosting the Minister for IT – Bengaluru, 1st July

At the forefront of progress is change. iSPIRT continues to drive the process of change to Transform India as a Product Nation, using the engines of private initiative, policy and programs like Playbook Round Table and PNCamp. iSPIRT’s policy initiatives involve active dialogue with Government.

Conclave for India as the Product Nation

As part of this initiative, iSPIRT is hosting  the “Conclave for India as Product Nation #1″, an open dialogue between the Product industry and our Ministry for IT.

Welcome Sh. Ravi Shanker Prasad

iSPIRT lives and breathes (software) Products and Products only. It’s think-tank has passionately engaged with the Ministry of IT to advocate recognition of the Software Product industry in its own right. We welcome the Hon’ble Minister for IT Shri Ravi Shankar Prasad, to meet the Industry folks and experience our Industry in person, first hand.

 

You already know iSPIRT is an open-source movement. This means everyone can contribute, and each contribution is recognized. It is each such contribution that makes the open-source movement go from strength to strength. In keeping with this philosophy, you are warmly invited to participate in the Conclave with the Minister. iSPIRT Founder Circle members, Product Circle members, Fellows, Mavens and Saarthis are all welcome to attend. It’s your industry, our industry, so be there!

Prior confirmation is required… so do RSVP here to help us make adequate arrangements.

Agenda:

    • Introduction
    • Showcase of Disruptive product initiatives in India
    • Interaction session with the Product industry

Venue:

Hotel Le Meridien, 3pm – 6pm
Sankey Road, Bengaluru
Registration : 2.00pm

Do come in early. Doors close at 2.45pm.

90 minutes at #PNCamp and the PR Engine cheatcode is yours

“There’s an empty slide in your deck reading user acquisition, which follows the slide showing hockey stick adoption. We’ll grow virally! Three words that fill up the slide nicely. Relying on virality as a standalone source of user acquisition is fatally flawed to begin with.”

That’s Sangeet Paul Choudary at his usual best. He probably said that a hundred times over, yet Startups continue to falter when it comes to understanding user growth and PR. The two are distinct, but underlying is a common trait, that about being remarkable. Have you extracted the remarkable ideas from your product and turned it into a PR opportunity? Or you think you are remarkable and still don’t get noticed?

Meet Sangeet Paul at PNCamp.in as he dissects the PR and Virality code step by step. It’s 90 minutes of pure adrenaline rush as you realize what can now be in your reach.

The awesome #PNCamp volunteer team

Putting up #PNCamp has not been easy. And the task is only half-done. Volunteering is like an open-source movement. You learn a lot, give back, and lean upon all your co-volunteers to make things happen. There is no institution behind it, no big brother, no event manager, no marketing agency. Just volunteer passion.

It’s the same energy that put up India’s defining product events in the past.

So who are these folks? Lets get behind the scenes…

The Chief Directors… we call them Program Curators

Bala Parthasarthy is program curator and is putting together awesome sessions for Scale Hacking. He is also allowed some free time to run his own venture ! We promise him a lot more free time after PNCamp is over.

Pallav Nadhani is a scale hacking legend and he is program curator for the Discovery Hacking track. His quick fire responses and ability to dissect any situation is only one of his amazing traits. He’s walked the Discovery Hacking trail and has a story or two for you.

Chief Cheerleaders

Our Volunteer efforts would not be complete without the active support of our Product ecosystem stalwarts. Folks like Vijay AnandRashmi RanjanKesavaDoraiArpit and many of you who have readily helped to reach out.

The Chief Camper

Sharad Sharma, the person who started it all. He has the most amazing vision for Indian software products, and carries this mission with zeal. He unashamedly says he can’t do it alone, so he turbo charges unsuspecting folks like me and we end up being volunteers. Willing volunteers. We get so badly infected by the Sharad virus that we start encouraging others to become volunteers.

The Chief Choreographer

The one man army who’s known as M Thiyagarajan during the day and Chhota Rajan by night. Ok, that’s stretching it but Rajan is one person who’s easily our one man army. Rajan leads the design of the PNCamp. Rajan’s ability to design a program, think objectively and pull resources to make it happen, is unparalleled.

The Chief Distributor

That’s me, Sandeep Todi, reaching out to all you folks with the audience curation team comprising Aditya, Harrshada, Nakul, Sai, Seema and Vijay.  I’m a very responsible person. So for anything that’s going wrong, you can hold me responsible. I enjoy putting fresh ideas and trying the unknown stuff and thinking on my feet. Sometimes these fresh ideas are purely experimental. Sometimes they’re not even half baked. So things go wrong and I look for the villain in our movie so I can blame it on somebody. Trouble is, there’s no villain, only heroes 🙂

The Chief Everything

That’s Avinash Raghava, who is one of guys most well versed with the Indian product ecosystem. Always willing to help, create connects and push for doing things that have never been done before, like the hugely popular Product Nation Round Tables. You name any one part of doing PNCamp that he hasn’t helped with, and I’ll buy you a beer.

The Chief Controller

Dilip T Ittyera, now in his firth startup and previously with a large IT firm, brings you all the goodies. If your Registration didn’t go smoothly, go ahead and blame him. If the arrangements at the venue aren’t up to snuff, you know whom to catch. Be forewarned, he’s one tough guy. If the PNCamp is happening, it’s because he and Avinash went all out to seek support of our sponsors.

The Chief Curators… these are the folks who’ve primarily been responsible for all the chaos. After all, you can’t make a movie without Chaos…

Meet Aditya Bhelande, our Editor. He does more than work on products. He helps people build products. Just as he’s helping to build PNCamp. He’s one of the rare breed who will do anything if he’s convinced about it, and sees it through. Most of us would falter half-way. Many of you will hear from him, the “hand-curtation” is really his editing magic.

Harrshada Deshpande is the Music Director and one of our newest volunteers. If there’s anything beautiful about our movie, its the music she’s produced. Have you seen our awesome website yet? There’s more… the kind of stuff you’re going to see in the coming weeks is entirely her creation. She works on US time, but out of Bangalore, and NOT for US customers. No kidding. Have a call with her at 9pm IST and she’ll come back with a complete set of ideas and mock ups by 9am next day. Awesome!

Nakul Saxena is the Actor-Director-Producer at large. A dependable all rounder, he can act, he can direct and he can even produce. He’s the kind of person who wants to transform from one role to another and does it so fluidly that we find him everywhere all at once!

Sairam is our Scriptwriter. He’s someone all of us turn to. His ability to put together thoughts and communication in a way that is meaningful, impactful and passion-full, is his own undoing. Because if you do something really well, you are destined to do more and more of it 🙂

Sameer Agarwal, the Stuntman. He’s the visionary and the guy who can hypnotize you even on the phone. His vision, design sense and whacky ideas are unmatched in the whole team. It’s what makes us tick. Sameer can jump better than Jeetu, talk better than Big B and dance better than Mithun. So what if these are heroes from the 90s?

Seema Joshi is our Chief Psychiatrist. She can fix all of us mad folks in one stroke. After an hour of meandering discussions, trust her to distil that into objectives and action points. We would be nowhere on a number of things were it not for her extreme clarity and focus on what we need delivered.

Vijay Sharma is Chief Marketeer. the powerhouse that’s probably the combined Klout of all of us. Actually, I’ve never met him but I promise I’ll be able to recognize him within 5 seconds. He’s one of the fastest on the ball and can turn any idea into a plan within that 5 seconds. That’s how I would recognize him!

Each of us has bitten off more than we can chew. Seriously. We’ve got day jobs and companies to run. That should not deter you from talking to us. Click on any of our Linkedin profiles or Twitter handles to reach out.

 

22nd #PlaybookRT – Solving a customer’s problem in a way your competitor is not doing, is the most memorable thing for your customer or partner.

The Pune Round Table on Lean Sales (26 Oct 2013) could not have had product leaders with personalities as different as Kailash Katkar @QuickHeal and Pallav Nadhani @FusionCharts. In this difference lay the magic. The magic at this Round Table was in full force. Thank you Kailash for hosting us all.

Round Tables are not about story telling. It’s about getting to know specific challenges of the group and correlating that with real experiences of other folks, especially the leaders who have experienced similar problems first hand. However, this Round Table would not be complete without some inspiration from the growth trajectory of Quickheal and Fusioncharts.

Entrepreneurial Discoveries:

Kailash Katkar, QuickHeal:

Kailash started off as a calculator repair engineer, and later was the only one in Pune who could fix broken ledger posting machines. The seeds of Quickheal were sown when they gave away virus prevention software for free. For him, the approach of always being close to the customer’s problem led to one solution (product) after another. Kailash was never a sales guy and when traditional channels refused to carry his ‘Indian’ product, he offered it to computer repair shops and the rest of his distribution story is history.

He realized that even an STD call to Pune was a large enough friction for channel partners to call them at Pune. Meeting with customers and partners helped establish local sales offices, a centralized helpdesk call center, even local feet on the street for support and much more.

Lesson#1: he always pushed his product as a service (we will clean it for you) and demonstrated value, rather than trying to push a box.

Lesson #2: always remained close to the customer, designed service organization around what customers wanted. Today, commands a price edge over security products from MNCs, and now selling in 50 countries.

Lesson #3: solving a customer’s problem in a way your competitor is not doing, is the most memorable thing for your customer or partner

Pallav Nadhani, Fusion Charts:

Pallav’s journey as told was equally mesmerizing. You had to see how starkly different his approach was from that of Kailash. He went for low touch sales, mass marketing, and the direct online route. This worked because his target was an educated customer and they used content marketing to the hilt.

Fusioncharts moved from a developer focus to a corporate IT department focus. This is the typical customer discovery process that any young startup goes through. Theirs is a classic tale of using LinkedIn, online forums, data visualization experts etc to talk about them and promote the brand.

So fierecely were they branding driven that they even changed the name of the product when doing a new major version. The Obama administration and many such examples did not just help them, they used it to their advantage, and relentlessly.

Fusioncharts started giving away source code to build trust, and even contributed to open source. Yet they never played the ‘cheaper product’ game and even commanded price premiums. Of course, to do this you have to position the value of things like source code, support etc and do the ugly duckling design. More importantly, you need to keep experimenting with price to find the sweet spot.

Kailash & PallavLesson #1: Pricing is a competitive weapon. Higher price is not a disadvantage and don’t let sales people tell you that. (Compare with QuickHeal, today sells some versions at a higher price than MNC products).

Lesson #2: Consciously went after higher value customers (corporate IT) who could be relied upon for assured recurring revenue.

Lesson #3: If you price well you can share decent margins and build a good product. Use different prices for different markets if the situation demands, and always try to sell a customer the highest possible version they may need. There’s always scope to reduce the price paid by offering lesser.

Common threads:

Sell to retail or Enterprise:

  • Start selling to retail customers, gain credibility and then move to Enterprise.
  • Enterprise customers would have less churn and provide opportunities to cross-sell other products as well as to other teams in the same enterprise.
  • Many retail customers / channels eventually move to enterprise so you can sow the seeds for larger deals even when you work the retail market.
  • Create several SKUs, the idea being to let the customer find the price level / functionality level that works for them (I’m not paying extra for something I don’t need).
  • Create sales teams for each type of customer (Fusioncharts – for selling to Enterprise, selling to Developer. Similarly at Quickheal, separate teams sell to Enterprise, Retail and Online). This helps the team align to the sales process for that market and talk the language effectively. Quickheal has separate teams for renewals.
  • Created a sales bible (Fusioncharts) which was the rule book for all sales folks. This helped in establishing a credible sales process and limiting discounts to the extent allowed by company policy.

IMG_2589

Branding and PR:

  • Always do your own PR. Keep it so simple that the common person (your mother?) can understand.
  • Your PR should either inspire people or make them angry (agitatated?). It’s no use otherwise.
  • Build relationships with the press, constantly pitch to them and help them with information in general. Ask them what they’re working on and if you can help. They’ll be happy to get any help and will remember when you need them.

 

Sales and Marketing:

  • Use automation tool for customer communication (Infusionsoft / Marketo / Salesforce)
  • Smaller channel partners are preferred (Quickheal) as they have personal relationships and quick on payments. Large partners usually try to dictate terms and tardy on payments. Fusioncharts has used a similar strategy of tying up with smaller channel partners in overseas countries.
  • Maintaining relationships with channel partners is extremely important as they carry a high emotional quotient. Wish them on the festivals which are important in their country. Talk to them, meet them.
  • If necessary, tweak your product or do something special for that market. This generates huge buy-in from the channel partner as they see your commitment.

IMG_2590

Among other things, the specific issues got discussed around:

  • Closure strategies
  • Market awareness
  • New geographies
  • Building / ramping sales team
  • India as a market
  • Funnel management
  • DIY or DIFM
  • Customer Engagement
  • Influencer marketing
  • Building your Service Organisation
  • Leveraging customers
  • Positioning

 

Each of the above is probably a session in itself and the experience sharing was the easiest way to get insights into how these are situations and not problems.

Both Fusioncharts and Quickheal are hugely successful in their own areas, even though each have completely different markets and selling strategies. The amazing part was when :

–       Pallav remarked that he’s learnt a lot from Kailash’s method of being in touch with customers every single day and being out there in front of them.

–       Kailash appreciated the way Fusioncharts has leveraged content marketing and driving a successful marketing team through his vision

The other folks around this round table were Avinash Sethi (Sapience), Ulhas Ambergaonkar (Mauris), Vishwas Mahajan (TiE Pune), Anup Taparia (TouchMagix), Satish Kamat (JBT), Sandeep Todi {me} (Emportant HR) Varoon Rajani (Blazeclan), Dilip Ittyera (Aikon Labs), Sagar Apte (CarIQ), Aditya Bhelande (Yukta), Sagar Bedmutha (Optinno), Girish (Shunya), Arnab Chaurhuri (Xcess), Avinash Raghava (iSPIRT Product Nation), Sarang Lakare (IntouchApp), Ranjeet Nair (Germin8), Pallav (Fusioncharts), Kailash Katkar (Quickheal)

What India needs is a bootcamp for existing Product folks

PNSummit just pivoted. But only in name. And it was to reflect the true nature of what this first-ever bootcamp for product folks is all about.

Many ProductNation friends asked why it was called a Summit because…  hey, it is not a conference. Its more intense than a conference and much more meaningful for a product startup. This led to the pivot and thus was born #PNCamp – the bootcamp for product entrepreneurs by iSPIRT, cooked in the ProductNation kitchen.

With the new name we wanted to share with you new insights into #PNCamp…

There’s 4 Masala packed sessions on the Discovery Hacking day (Dec 4) for young startups. You’ll stay with the same group of 20-25 folks all day, across all sessions and get to know and help each other in depth. Now does that sound interesting?

Selling in India and selling to the world – baked oven fresh for you and served on the Scale Hacking Day (Dec 5). There are group sessions and in between several informal sessions or quick bites’.  The groups sessions are the “a la carte” for a software startup – conceptualized and cooked with your taste in mind.

There’s food for B2C folks and B2B folks. For 1 year old Startups. And for 3 year olds. All slow cooked the way it should be. Hand curated sessions, every single one. This is what the volunteers are doing, and being product folks themselves they understand this intricately.

Does all this talk about food make you hungry for more?

  • See the Slideshare deck below for a more detailed overview of #PNCamp
  • Attend a PNCamp Q&A webinar and meet one of our volunteers online – click here
  • Directly apply for PNCamp here.

Wait, there’s more… the icing on the cake at #PNCamp awaits. That icing is the hand curated peer group we’re creating for you and one that you’d love to work with during the #PNCamp, and even after.

P.S. : you can choose which of the days (Discovery Hacking OR Scale Hacking) is suitable for you, depending the stage you are and the traction at your Startup. We kind of want to ensure that the folks in your room have similar stage of challenges as you do. So some filtering will happen. It’s for the common good so we’re sure you won’t mind. The volunteers are product folks like you, putting in a lot of effort to make this vision a reality.

 

Customer discovery meets Indiana Jones at #PNSummit

If you haven’t made up your mind whether you should be at PNSummit, then you’re probably thinking too hard.

It’s not a Conference.

It’s not a Conference.

Yes, I said that twice.

It’s brought to you by iSPIRT ProductNation. And a team of selfless volunteers who want to give back. These guys have regular companies to run. And day jobs. Putting together #PNSummit is back breaking work. But they enjoy it. Ask anyone of them if you think this is hyperbole.

Product companies at different stages have different needs. #PNSummit is styled like a bootcamp. Only, it focuses on the underserved entrepreneur. Is that you? If you’re between 9 months to 18 months old you’re probably searching for a lot of answers. But we don’t have any. All we have is a method. It’s a secret sauce that’s going to be revealed at #PNSummit Customer Discovery Hacking Day on December 4th. This sauce is cooked by Pallav and his team of cohort leaders who will take you through an entire day of… ok let me stop here.

I don’t want to spoil the fun. Not yet. This is for believers. We’re not taking in everyone who applies. It’s selective, based on your current profile. Even if you don’t make it, you’re probably very good at your trade so we’re not being a judge here. Our goal is to have similar minded people in the room, who want to learn and are eager to share. In many ways Discovery Hacking is also about discovering yourself. It’s like Indiana Jones, who never fails to surprise even himself.

Meet us in Pune this December. Only a 100 will make it, so think later, act now. You can apply here.

Sandeep Todi

Co-founder of a software product and a #PNSummit Volunteer

First B2B Bootcamp for product startups – last day to apply

The last date to apply for this bootcamp has been extended to 16th August especially for Product Nation subscribers.

TiE-IQ Bootcamp is a no contract and free  60-day bootcamp where the participating startups will have an opportunity to create products, launch companies and walk away with their spoils and a lot of learning.

This first edition of the TiE-IQ Bootcamp is restricted to B2B technology product startups. It builds up on the successful bootcamp conducted by IQ earlier this year. Selected startups will walk in to the TiE-IQ Bootcamp with just a minimum viable product (MVP) and take back the following :

  1. Mentorship and Workshops by entrepreneurs leading successful startups to help you.
    • Refine and finish the minimal viable product (MVP) into a ready to buy product
    • Market your product
    • Get the first few customers
  2. Peer Learning
    • Learn from some of the best startup brains developing B2B products alongside.
  3. Working Space for two months in the heart of Mumbai.
  4. Software credits with some of the bootcamp partners
  5. Interaction with some of the best brains in the venture investment world.
  6. Demo Day: Your chance to pitch to investors in Mumbai  (and Bangalore – to be confirmed)

Who should Apply?

  • Enterprising (co-)founders and technology enthusiasts who want to build disruptive technology products or services for the Indian or global market.
  • Teams with 2-3 members that are capable to design, code and release a beta version of their product to market & sell it.

How to Apply?

To apply, visit this page for more details on eligibility criteria, and how to apply. The last date is extended to 16th August exclusively for Product Nation subscribers. For updates follow the twitter hashtag #TieBootCamp.

 

6th iSPIRT Playbook RoundTable: Challenges in building a global software product company from India

In the continuing series of Round Tables product veterans Samir Palnitkar, ShopSocially and Jatin Parekh, AirTight Networks took the participants through a journey of discovery about why they want to go global and taking a critical look at the challenges they must overcome.

It takes a guy like Samir to lay the foundation for such a Round Table, having stoked the discussion with his experience and adding fuel by way of eliciting ideas and experiences of others. There’s no quick formula but the session did throw up some easy mantras to achieve those Global ambitions…

Some interesting takeaways from this session :

TEAM:

–       Hiring for overseas is always a challenge and you can’t be careful enough

–       Get a co-founder with a sufficiently high stake in the game, and one who is ready to adapt to the call of the hour.

–       If you know the person from earlier, nothing like it

–       Stay away from expensive consultants and retainers. Find someone who will take less cash (and therefore has had a prior successful exit / financially secure)

–       Write down the issues, objectives, compensation, way things are done, who does what, 5 year vision, etc. These discussions need to happen 

Experiences of those present:

–       One of the RT participant founders even camped in the US for 3 months to find the right guy, interviewing over 15 persons identified through various contacts. They evaluated trust, skill and cultural fit before deciding.

–       Most people do not want to be the lone member of startup in the US because all decision making would happen in India. One of them had a member already selling remotely so were thinking of moving that person to US.

–       If there are 3-4 co founders, there is enough mental bandwidth to get one person to US for 6 months to set things up.

–       Get partners to sell for you, they front end and sift thru the leads. May be encourage one of the partners to join you, as did one entrepreneur who had a good partner in E&Y front ending and finally robbed E&Y to get his co-founder !

–       In a nutshell, don’t compromise on this first hire. 

PREPARED TO TAKE THE FLIGHT ?

–       Start selling globally only if you can fund the sales cost for at least a year

–       It’s ok to do some services revenue to generate some cash. But this is also the biggest pitfall, if you end up doing too much customization that cripples you later. 

Key considerations:

–       You have to learn how to sell if you don’t already. Thumb rule is – if you can’t sell your product, nobody can.

–       You should have a sufficient funnel and regular flow of enquiry / conversion / sales and cash flows. Ok that’s a lot to ask but then that’s what it needs !

–       Prepare the Sales play book. A new person cannot invent the playbook to sell in US for you. 

PRODUCT MANAGEMENT

–       Do you want to keep Product Management close to the customer or close to the R&D team?

–       Typical challenges in this are the ability to be aligned. Clear internal communication is crucial in motivating the team for the higher purpose

–       Delivery teams are usually in India, however you need to deal with the challenges of motivating team from a distance and account for cultural differences

The practical Product Manager:

–       Understanding the higher purpose and communicating it again and again is very important. If engineers are in the same office as sales guys then its easy, motivation happens. But if teams are physically separated then you have to build the channel to keep that communication going.

–       Communicate back to sales what problems engineering is facing.

–       Product Manager must have a regular travel plan and must meet customers if working at a distance from the market. This is crucial to get the alignment early on.

–       The PM cannot be note taker, taking customer requirements and giving it back verbatim to engineering to build. He must understand, negotiate and make intelligent distinction between features and requirements.

–       Priorities should be clearly published in writing.

–       Engineers should have the freedom to think and push back on features, but within boundaries. That’s when they can understand the purpose vs just coding.

–       Engineers must have first hand communication with customers, go for customer meetings, handle support calls etc.

–       When hiring engineers, set the expectation upfront that you have to do everything, and even learn outside your core competence. A Startup cannot afford to have people rigid within their own area. 

MARKETING

–       The biggest conundrum is in expectation mismatch, US teams being very “look” orinted and India teams being “fact” oriented

–       Interpretation of specs is usually different for each team, and quality of collateral needs to be extremely high to appeal to a US audience

–       The simple approach is to keep everything that requires a “handshake”, in the US and to teach India teams to be perfectionists.

–       If you need to get copywriting, don’t even think of getting it done in India. The lingo, the flow has to be completely American – leave that to an American.

–       Use a professional UX design shop if you need to

–       Use professional agencies for PR, like PRWEB, etc. 

SALES

–       Necessarily should be close to the customer. If the product requires a handshake, then you definitely need a US team member.

–       At the very least you need someone to stay up at night and receive calls

–       Prospecting via Linkedin, using polls and doing cold calling from India are usually successful approaches 

Sales and Marketing in the US is a big discussion in itself. A lot was left to be discussed, perhaps deserving an entire session devoted to selling in the US market. Another day, another Round Table then. 

ProductNation is the Go-To destination for many a successful software product. There are several amongst us who have tasted success in the global market. Do share your experience right here.

Customer support lessons from the Yellow Tire Company

It’s quite a matter of pride for the Dabbawalas of Mumbai to be counted right up there in the performance toppers chart. With efficiency metrics that any manager would die for, I got the urge to look at another parallel hallmark which has been able to achieve customer delight in a quintessentially Indian way – thriving on chaos yet with a quiet air of dependability. 

There would hardly be a person who has not noticed ads of the Yellow Tire Company. It’s those innocuous looking yellow rings hanging on a tree promising help to the stranded motorist with a flat tyre! I may be forgiven for calling them the YT Company but that’s only because they have taken customer service to levels which most companies strive to beat. They’re omnipresent and so willing to help we’ve almost taken them for granted. I like to think of those yellow rings as smiley faces, always available to pump a little joy into your tyres, no matter what the time. The symbol of this promise of ‘odd-hours’ service is their mobile number painted in bold colors, saying “don’t hesitate to call me”! 

Support is always one of those thorny bushes that grows in all directions and becomes difficult for a Startup to tame. We’ve often seen support teams either bending backwards to please, or being so stiff they earn themselves an agitated customer. With the predisposition to meet SLAs and ill-designed performance indices, there’s little inclination to think of preventive actions. So the quest for support excellence is sacrificed at the altar of daily efficiency. 

Even when a Startup is relentlessly driving towards product launch and go to market strategies, its not too hard to get started with smart strategies that insure high levels of customer satisfaction. In our company we introduced ticketing systems, support policies and standard operating procedures even before we had our 10th customer. Yet, customers (and our support team) kept preferring email and phone conversations to quickly resolve issues. To top this, the customers who got used to phone and email support were the most reluctant to adopt systems when we introduced them. 

Here are a few observations from our journey may be of some use in yours: 

  • Introduce the primary support conversation tool as a part of your product, not as an afterthought.
  • Cajole, convince, convert users to a support platform and monitor it regularly. Once a week is good for a startup founder to make it stay the course.
  • Lead by example – your team will treat customers as well as they see you doing. This is perhaps more effective then ‘telling’ them do’s and don’ts.
  • You have your fair share of early adopters whom you’ve personally given support at some time. Convince them that they’d get better and more consistent support if they use the Helpdesk instead of calling you. I can promise you this works!
  • Create pre-cooked solutions that address common problems. Smart cooks keep the ingredients ready and are better prepared to meet their diner’s expectations.
  • Don’t just pre-cook – actively encourage consumption by guiding users actively to seek out the solutions knowledge base. You can do this by including random guide tips in your Helpdesk email footers with a link to the knowledge base, linking it prominently from your website, your application menu and so on.
  • Integrate customer guidebooks into the product so they have help at hand when they need it the most.
  • Solicit customer feedback through periodic surveys. Customers want to feel their opinions are valued and will forgive a lot of mistakes if we just listen. And when listening, its good to take their suggestions as constructive criticism. It’s free advice, and valuable.
  • And lastly, coming back to the Yellow Tire Company strategy… tell them they can get after hours support for any super-critical problem. They’ll love you for it and the effort to deliver this is far less than the value of the accolades that follow. If you’re in B2B like us, remember that your customer’s business ops depend on your software and 10pm is no excuse to not talk to them. 

You’ll grow eventually into a larger team, provide 24×7 support and have managers in every function to analyze and improve. Customers are and always remain your most valuable asset and for a Startup the leverage on this asset is even greater. Give them the Yellow Tire treatment and they’ll watch out for you! 

What have been your experiences in staffing your customer support as a startup ? Would love to hear about your challenges and victories.