Blog archive for August, 2008

We’ve been laying low for a couple of days since the alpha launch, taking it easy and thinking about the next steps in PocketSmith’s progression. The feedback from our great alpha testers is rolling in, and from the initial comments alone we’re already taking in some valuable tips on our future direction!

More on that at the end of the week, when we can take stock of all the data. We haven’t yet told you how the TC50 Round 1 interview went!

So, Saturday morning, 10am(-ish), I went round to the office and woke the boys up – we’d all had a pretty long night (long week actually), so coffee was the first thing on the agenda. When we were sufficiently awake, we thought a bit about how we were going to handle the interview. We’d loosely figured that our 10-minute interview should consist of a 4-minute video, 2-minute chat and 4-minute live walkthrough of the application. Kinda.

Yes, absolutely, we were less-prepared than we should have been. Roll back to yesterday.

The Day Before

After we prepped the application, sorted out the last-minute bugs (see post below) and sent out the alpha launch email, we immediately set to task creating a screencast movie of our application. A screencast generally consists of a rehearsed (and preferably non-erratic) sequence of mouse movements and clicks across the application’s interface that is recorded by an application – in our case, the very capable Screenflow. This capture is then matched up with a voice-over narration.

So we scripted the thing, then made a couple of attempts at talking the user through a 4 minute 22 second video – with hilarious consequences. We were tired and delirious; there was screaming and hooting; James – who has a great radio voice by the way – made it to just after two minutes before degrading into something that sounded like blarghblahblargh. Blargh. Blaaarrrghhh. Followed by ape-like hoots in the background (that was us). Not good for a pitch.

Then James took a break, and I decided to give it a go. You won’t even want to know what I sound like by comparision. I briefly contemplated putting Francois on the mike, but then thought the better of having the evaluators swooning over his delicious Pepe Le Pew accent (”Le mew? Le purrrr! Mwa mwa mwa!”). 

With energy (and sobriety) running low, I prodded James and said, “Let’s give this thing the DVD commentary treatment” – which we did, and we think it works! There’s laughter, teasing and involvement from all three of us, and is much more entertaining than a staid 4-minute voiceover of the mouse-clicker’s actions.

At that point, completely exhausted, hi-5’s all around, we decided to call it a night.

Cue Saturday morning. An hour before the interview (scheduled for 11.45am), we were still looking up web-based powerpoint equivalents to beef up the presentation; 45 minutes before the interview, we decided to can the search and just ‘be ourselves’ (the de-facto strategy of many a last-minute presentation). After all, we would just be chatting to a couple of Techcrunch evaluators – no big deal, right?

I was in the kitchen pouring us coffee at 10.30am when my phone rang. I ran back into the office, picked up the phone and put it on speaker. On the line was Jason Krute, calling ahead to to ensure that our interview materials were set up. We opted for Skype as the connection seemed pretty poor – this turned out to be a great choice as the connection was crystal-clear, and all three of us could partake in conversation. So there we were, grinning confidently, ready to have some fun – until Jason says, “Okay, I’m going to put you on mute until your interview begins. Your evaluator is Jason Calacanis.”

Brix. Were. Shat.

Our interview with Calacanis

It was a giddy three minutes while we waited, pondering what the interview was going to be like. To be honest, I for one thought that we were going to get slaughtered. The man sees a ton and a half of startups on a daily basis, and is well-known for being opinionated. He famously stated, for example, that SEO was bullshit – in a keynote at an SEO conference with Danny Sullivan.

Our Skype conversation clicked back on, and Jason transferred us to Jason (yes, too many Jasons in one conversation), and the Mahalo logo popped up on the interface.

Jason Calacanis sounds much younger than you’d expect. And he’s terribly polite, too. He greeted us briefly, then told us that he had the link to our video, and was going to watch it. So – the three of us spent another four minutes on mute – partially thankful that we had our tequila-addled representatives from the night before doing our presenting for us, and partially cringing that perhaps, the tequila-addled representatives weren’t taking the TC50 application seriously enough.

Skype clicked back on, and Jason said, “So let me get this straight – PocketSmith is about expense tracking, am I right?”. And I corrected him: “Actually,” I said, “PocketSmith is about cashflow forecasting – it makes financial management accessible to people who are not necessarily financially literate.”

Then I went on to quickly run through the key points we’d noted half an hour earlier – the purpose of the product, how it was meant to achieve our goals, our target market and… “Yes, ok, I’ve got it”, he interrupted. “You don’t have to read me your entire business case, we’ve only got a few minutes and I want to give you some feedback.”

“It’s cashflow forecasting that doesn’t suck, right?” he said, and we quickly agreed. He then ran through a few of his notes summarising what he thought our application was about, which we thought was spot-on. Then, he gave us our feedback, which I’ll attempt to summarise.

“Your demo was okay,” he said, “but not amazing. It looks good, and you’ve made a good start, and I think you’re in the right space. But you need to have that wow factor for the audience. The sizzle.”

He went on to stress that while we had made a good start and that he enjoyed the video (!), we needed more innovation in order to increase our chances of making it to the final 50, and provided some suggestions: syncing with his iPhone and calendars; import of spending reports from banks; tips on savings. He then asked if we’d considered any of the above, to which we replied that the application had only been five weeks in development – however we did want to differentiate ourselves from the likes of Mint, who already do imports and financial advice very well.

He agreed, stating that the concept was simple, which was not a bad thing. And reiterated that Mint did after all win at last year’s Techcrunch conference, and that he thought that we were pretty much 10% of what Mint had to offer.

Our five minute chat with Jason Calacanis felt like much longer, and he made a concerted effort to keep us on-track and on-time (they have to be strict on the 10-minute timeframe), and he ended by telling us that while he couldn’t promise that we would see it through to Round 2, if we did, we should look into innovating more on the product. He finished up by telling us again that we’d made a very good start, and thought that PocketSmith would have been great for him back in ‘95-’97, when he really needed to manage his finances! 

Through the interview I was very tempted to drop a hint about how we’d heeded his ’saving money’ advice from his “17 Good Tips for Startups” post (given we were conducting the interview from a makeshift fibreboard table that James put together for me), but realised that it wasn’t advantageous for me to waste our precious time with adulation. Besides, my butt was firmly seated in a $45 plastic swivel chair, and not a $1200 Herman Miller Aeron. Which in hindsight, may have won me some commendation – damnit!

After thanking us (many times) for taking the time to submit an application (no, thank you!), we bid Jason Calacanis goodbye and hung up. Then stared wide-eyed at each other.

Summary

What can we say? We completely agree with Calacanis, and felt that his insights were – as with his initial summary – spot on. His assessment of our alpha is completely on-track with our development to date, his suggestions were on our list of considerations, and most importantly: he didn’t think that it sucked. While we wait to see if we’re pulled into Round 2, we’ll need to work on that innovation bit. 

We also came to realise that while Techcrunch is a great platform for launching a product, the fact remains that it still is a conference – and presentations at conferences tend to be noteworthy, like new and important discoveries, and things that generally push boundaries and challenge perceptions. PocketSmith doesn’t necessarily fall into these categories as we’re not looking to debut something with a wow factor for an audience. We’re committed to building a great product with high utility value – and these factors alone don’t necessarily translate into very exciting presentations!

Anyway, five weeks in, and we’ve built an alpha, released it to a close community of testers, and had direct feedback from one of Silicon Valley’s prominent tech entrepreneurs! Neat stuff!

What now from here? Well, we get back to work! The three of us have decided on the next little iteration that we’re going to add to PocketSmith while the feedback from the alpha continues to roll in. It’s going to be a cool one, and we’re looking forward to building it.