Show HN: Dealora – What we learned starting up
In June 2013, my wife and I decided to start a business together. We brought in 2 close friends of ours to help with sales and dev. The following month, launched a landing page [2] by sending out 2000 postcards to local businesses. We did see a small bump in traffic for the first few days but email sign ups for the pre-launch was disappointing. Cold-calling and Adwords - major disappointment. We met with a few local businesses in person but with little to show, we couldn't even get a handful to sign up for the launch.
The data showed little interest. We shouldn't move forward. Somewhat defeated, we pushed forward anyway. The opposite of what a start up should do.
Months later, we launch. No more cold-calling or reaching out by email. We're meeting face-to-face, sitting down with the business owners, being hands-on with on-boarding -- They appreciate the attentiveness. We're now getting sign ups daily but operating at a loss. Not a failure or success, but a slow start. The next few months will be the hardest in a crowded market.
My big takeaways learned:
- Not being able to validate your idea doesn't may not mean the idea isn't good, it could be you aren't conveying it in a meaningful way. We didn't.
- Know the language you need to use when pitching. We used technical terms to pitch something to potential customers who are normally not very technical.
- Cold-calling restaurants is bad idea.
- Building the product is not the hard part, its selling it.
- You can sell your product by listening first. Business owners love to talk about their business. If you listen closely, you can find ways for your product to solve their needs.
Would be really helpful to get feedback from the HN community on things we can improve and experiences others have had selling to SMB.
[1] https://dealora.com/
[2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6012998