While i sit throughout an AirBnb I rented for your month of August (using a failing AC in the Texas Summer) I figured it will be fun to execute a mental check of start-up life along with the transition thus far. Always good when you’re sweating from sitting 🙂 Having grown our company significantly the business enterprise aspect is beginning to feel “normal.” If that’s plausible. My co-founder Marissa would say we’re out of your “storming” phase now in the “normalization” phase individuals fresh. I now use her Westpoint terminology during my common speech, confusing friends by using these terms as Sitrep, bluf as well as MFIC. I’ll let her enlighten everyone about the definitions. In my opinion, normalizing the c’s helps us show we have momentum, synergy and our folks (and internal technology) are common aligned along with the pace is obtaining bigtime. Perfect things.
Over the posts I’ve commented on website, CRE culture, investment plus much more. On this page I wish to focus on customers and ways to hear them.
Whenever we first launched beta and began collecting feedback, the response was overwhelming from the initial users. “Change this,” “I don’t under this wording here,” “consider adding X,” “is there a map button for that?” (DOH!). To those with tech startup experience I’m sure that’s nothing new. I first, having only a humble CRE broker’s background, was quite surprised/impressed because when everybody is prepared to present you with their help with this mission. What’s the mission again? Help smaller businesses make better lease decisions.
Early on, I felt compelled to push most our website and assumptions from a pure real estate perspective. I knew we might strengthen the existing tech in the industry, and we’re an advert real estate product, right? Sure, we’re free and anonymous and all that good stuff but we provide a platform that is certainly CRE based to our users. Our core assumptions and product architecture/functions were steeped in the real estate problem-solving mindset. Even as we grew together together, we became less and less dependent on these assumptions plus much more plus much more engaged by the feedback from the users and people in the field. This assumption quickly changed, we’re not really a real estate product, we’re a company product. How did look for that out?
We asked.
Our caboodling team has gone out daily hand-collecting reviews in Houston and I’m humbled by their efforts. They’re helping us seed system with real, verified feedback from business decision makers. It’s a crucial and foundational objective of ours to get these experiences. However, I’m amazed at the response we’re getting from retailers, tenants, smaller businesses after they hear our mission, try system and know very well what we’re exactly about. It’s not unusual for our caboodlers to spend half an hour on one review (that the collection part takes about A minute FYI) as the small business community is just so hungry to be heard. This is a group that’s putting their livelihoods at risk, daily, to produce their business grow in addition to their personal lives more enriched through their dreams. It’s about damn time someone sat down and heard them.
So that’s what we’ve been doing. Not simply coding/testing/building/caboodling and trending hard towards our full release throughout the following month or so (SUPER excited to demonstrate everybody) but flat out interviewing, listening and studying under our core customers. I’ve found out that simply because your product or service is free of charge doesn’t mean it automatically drops some inherent barrier to entry. Products must solve real-world problems for real-world people. This full release I do think encompasses that mantra. We will share it soon.
Even as we grow our company all of us have a role to learn only at Tenavox. Mine is heavily steeped in product, real estate and methodology. That doesn’t mean we don’t wear fifty other hats too, from fundraising (which never stops haha) to data science, startups are best at exposing whom you are under time limits. All of us (and particularly the founders) do whatever it takes to go the ball forward. People inquire about what sort of transition from CRE to Startup in tech is going, as long as they dive right in too making use of their idea? I smile and enquire of this: Can you handle the load on this deadline, the following sprint, sales projections, recruiting, feedback, testing, adjustments, operations, payroll and much more. When you elect to go for it and build something that matters you in turn become far more responsible. How? Well ideas are just about worth nothing, roughly I’ve learned 😉 It’s all in the execution along with the team…along with the culture. A robust culture is the foundation to get a strong company.
Turning ideas into reality, together.
For those who have a thought, it’s just yours, you’re only to blame for cultivating the minds themselves. Once you begin a company (from a thought) you’re to blame for the investors, (usually friends and family and families hard-earned money), you’re to blame for your people, their efforts in addition to their goals, you’re to blame for your business’s growth, and moving the vision forward daily…most of all you’re to blame for yourself. There is no automatic paycheck or salary to acquire to get up and hitting that work-day hard, so pick something you have love for. I guess that’s what I’ve learned most. Never underestimate the amount arrange it is to take up a business, never underestimate how difficult some days might be, the load is from the charts along with the stakes couldn’t be higher. However if you have love for what you’re doing, if you believe in your mission plus your culture plus your team? This can be the best damn thing you’ll do your entire life.
No-one seriously knows where our path will lead. Startups of their very natures are risky ventures. We’ve made educated assumptions and so are just beginning to test them in a live environment, time, our efforts along with the market will dictate some individuals success. I recognize this, our culture will dictate the way you lead and just how we work together as people…and that is something I’m satisfied with.
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I’d never knock those who don’t need to start their particular business, it’s not even close to basic and oftentimes personal considerations don’t so it can have. If you do? Speak to your customers, listen and learn. They are going to inform you what they want to find out and enhance your thinking, in every area of your product or service. There exists a new mantra now, “Built for Tenants, with Tenants,” and we trust that. I know what we’re doing only at Tenavox is among the most rewarding professional connection with my life, and that’s worth just from the stress, risk and fervour we’re pouring into it daily. It’s funny, if we started off I wasn’t sure exactly how to frame the pain points from the small company owner…Now? Problems in later life them because we live them. Plus a wise someone once said, “there’s no replacement experience.”
There were an excellent team building events last weekend in Austin too! As a result of #escapegame #Galvanize and #Laketravis for hosting us!
Stay tuned for more for our full release throughout 2-3 weeks and thank you for reading my ramblings remember.
Go ahead and comment below or require a run at many of the other articles I’ve written chronicling my transition from broker to co-founder.
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