Great timing, right?
Founding a new company is always a challenge, but it is 10x harder if you do it in the midst of COVID-19. We founded Dealtale mid-March. Immediately after, there was quarantine.
Everything became more challenging. Talking to customers, opening a bank account, and even meeting potential investors. We had to adjust and discover ways to keep going despite the unique position we were in.
Here are the 5 things that helped us in the process
After three months of working in stealth mode with COVID-19 in the background, we finally launched! There were bumps in the journey, and we’re sure there’d be more. But here are the five things that got us through the launch date.
1. Meet when possible
Our relationship with work drastically changed over the last few months. Work from home, staggered working hours, and office spaces not operating in full capacity.
Building a company and a product, we saw the importance of meeting regularly. Lucky for us, we were a small team. Besides dedicating specific work hours, the meetings kept us accountable, aligned, and in good spirits.
In the early stages of development, what did we do when we meet? Two important things.
First, we made sure our ideas solve a problem and we have a chance to penetrate our target market. Second, we made a plan including finances, business structure, permits, workflows, investor strategy, branding, and more.
2. Focus on the product
Once we had our initial ideas set, we proceeded to build our MVP or Minimum Viable Product.
What’s an MVP? It’s the most basic version of a product that has all features for the problem we’re trying to solve. We made sure our MVP addresses user goals and improves their lives.
Dealtale aims to breakdown data silos so marketing, sales, and customer success teams can have a single platform to analyze, optimize, and monitor all customer touchpoints.
So, we created an MVP that does just that—and definitely more as we set out to validate it.
3. Validate ideas
It’s time to find out if potential customers are willing to pay and investors are willing to invest in our product.
Validating our MVP was honestly one of the most stimulating stages. We were happy to hear what our early adopters had to say. Because then, we used that feedback to iterate our product to meet product-market fit.
How did we do that? We tapped into our connections. We talked to as many people as possible and listened to their user experience. Simultaneously, we looked at and learn from our competition.
Having competition means there’s a demand for our product. Doing this process helped us define our competitive edge and polish our value proposition.
At Dealtale, we had to tweak our messaging and direction twice. In the end, we zeroed in on Unified Marketing Analytics and Optimization.
4. Keep good spirit
Building a company is already difficult under normal conditions. With COVID-19, beyond social distancing and stay-at-home measures, there’s also the feeling of uncertainty.
Moreover, we’re aware that young companies are generally prone to failure. To avoid this, we assessed potential risks and made a plan to manage them. Overall, we kept our good spirits and never lost focus.
But the most important thing is, we believed in our product and the amazing things it can do for our target market. Working for big and small organizations, we know how data silos result in less productivity, inefficient processes, and wasted resources.
That’s why, with Dealtale, we’re addressing the biggest problem that prevents 9 out of 10 organizations from reaching their full digital potential.
5. Be frugal
Finally, bootstrapping a company means we need to manage our cashflows and be smart about money. We made sure we can cover ongoing expenses before turning a profit.
It’s like one of those (cliché but true) quotes that say, “Sacrifice today and enjoy the benefits tomorrow.” Obviously, we’re far from “tomorrow.” But what we’re going through now is definitely worth the cost and effort.
What’s next
Once we’ve got all of these done and dusted, here we are, days post-launch and feeling exhilarated. Right now, we’re focusing on building a solid team, onboarding new customers, and running our go-to-market strategy.
Exciting stuff ahead at Dealtale! We look forward to hitting new milestones as we grow our company and help more customers with our SaaS platform.
Have you tried Dealtale yet? It takes only 10 minutes to set up. We invite you to activate our ‘Free Forever’ plan and check it out for yourself. Go to: Activate Your Free Plan.
