StartupTalky

Tag: startup launch

  • Launching a Startup in Handicraft Market: Challenges & Solution

    This article is contributed by Mr. Meet Shah, Founder of Craftezy.

    Entrepreneurship as a concept has picked up pace over the years. The excitement and the pride associated with launching one’s venture and finally converting that dream into a reality is indeed indescribable!

    The effect of the pandemic on the Indian handicrafts sector –

    As much as the journey is a roller coaster ride, it is full of roadblocks as well. This is mainly witnessed in the handicrafts sector. Ever since the pandemic outbreak, the livelihood of artisans and the handicraft community has been impacted severely. The production hit the pause button, unsold inventory started piling up, and the demand for orders from the customers came to a halt. Businesses also faced a lack of capital with reinvesting and continuing the operations. To sum up, the community witnessed a dearth where the meager survival of artisans was in danger. In such a scenario, launching a startup in the handicraft community seems to be a daunting task.

    Roadblocks faced in the path of launching a startup

    The Indian handicraft segment is a highly unorganized market. Consequently, the gap between sellers and buyers remains prominent at the global level. One of the significant challenges an entrepreneur faces while launching a startup in this sector is bringing decorum to a chaotic market. Adding to it, the industry also envisions offering equal growth opportunities to both sellers and artisans, and this aim comes with its fair share of challenges.

    As most sellers hold a strong presence in the local markets and not the global marketplace, it’s a significant hurdle for them to help reach international audiences. Providing solutions for payments and keeping a check on the quality of the products is another major hurdle for the sector, which is primarily driven by exports and is addressed as an export-centric business. The authenticity of crafts and having a robust logistics model are other major road bumps faced by startups planning to enter the handicraft ecosystem.

    While the challenges disrupt the optimal functioning of the sector, they also come with a silver lining. They have eventually paved the way for the digitization of the handicraft sector. A segment that was always working with a brick-and-mortar model is now undergoing significant transformations. Realizing that to thrive through the troublesome situations and enjoy a competitive edge in the market, technology deployment is essential; the players have been focusing on introducing innovations and digital transformations in their operations.

    Digitization: The feasible solution and the dire need of the hour

    In an attempt to sail through the turbulent times induced by the pandemic, the sector is embracing digitization. The industry is hopeful that adopting technology will create employment opportunities and help businesses drive more significant revenues. The players are also focusing on leveraging the power of technology to bring convenience to the doorstep of their customers. While on the one hand, tech solutions have made payments smooth, quick, easy, and secure, on the other hand, the logistics and the marketing activities have also boosted exponentially, all thanks to technology!

    Digital deployment has enabled the handicraft ecosystem to tap the global markets, and the players have been able to engage and establish a customer base at the international levels. On the whole, with the tech revolution, the handicraft sector has been upscaling significantly and will help in easing out the journey for aspiring entrepreneurs to launch their startups in this domain. Technological disruption will also help streamline the unorganized sector into a structured one.

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    Craftezy, one of the leading B2B marketplaces, has successfully understood the pain points of the handicraft industry. Ranging from authenticity and credibility of the crafted masterpieces to ensuring equal compensation for the sellers and educating them about the crafts’ business models, the brand has designed its offerings to ensure the players have access to apt solutions for the problems faced by them. Understanding the needs of the buyers and the sellers and the diversely growing preferences of the customers, Craftezy leaves no stone unturned to come up with viable solutions that are suitable for all! Becoming an end-to-end solution for sellers and buyers implies ensuring the provision of a platform that would simplify and ease out the operations of businesses.

    Conclusion

    As much as ‘Vocal for local’ and ‘Make in India’ campaigns are boosting the handicrafts sector, there are various hindrances in the journey for startup launches. However, the answer to all the troubles is digitization and collaboration with the marketplaces! A recent report by IMARC Group points out this trend and states that the Indian handicrafts market is projected to witness significant growth in the times ahead, primarily due to the surge in the e-commerce industry.

    Ensuring that the entire process of buying, selling, and delivering is fool-proof and error-free is one of the most appropriate ways to gain consumer trust. This would eventually lead to customer loyalty and increased revenues. Furthermore, providing marketing support to an otherwise un-exposed form of business would help small enterprises to tap the international market. This is the reason why marketplaces are rendering a helping hand in providing solutions. They are giving relevant opportunities to aspiring entrepreneurs and are helping them mark their presence in the market. These platforms take care of the entire buying and selling processes, transactions, along with end-to-end operations in a seamless, safe and secure manner.

  • Startup Guide: How can fashion startups build strong brands?

    This article is contributed by Karam Suri, Founder of Dusk Attire.

    The digital age is a widely used term across the globe for quite a long time now. Be it, toddlers or elders, everyone is hooked to social media and digital platforms for their personal reasons. Be it business or entertainment, digital platforms have something for everyone. From starting a home-based baking business to launching an online fashion brand to just watching your favorite shows, these platforms cater to everyone’s needs.

    Every time someone steps into the business world, they have a bigger picture in mind and strive day in and day out to make their dreams a reality. Something as trivial as essentials to luxury items, everything is attached to a brand name. Such is the influence of these brand names on our minds that it becomes unsettling if we don’t get the items from our desired brands.

    There are thousands of fashion brands in India, some selling similar products whereas others have created a niche for themselves. The competition is so high that some brands disappear into thin air, and some stand the test of time and go on for generations. Everyone starts from small. A small establishment in a busy market, a small counter in a flea market, a small home-run business, or a small brand launch operating only online. Each individual(s) starts from somewhere and how well are they able to market their brand is what the success of the brand depends on.

    Fashion startups start small, catering to their known circle in the initial stage. Gradually, word of mouth helps and they either launch their brand online or locally and nationally at various fleas and exhibitions. Moving on, if the finances allow, they might be opening a stand-alone store or putting up their outfits at multi-designer stores. In order to do all these things, marketing plays a huge role.

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    Building a brand requires marketing as much as passion and dedication to rise above just being a startup. Social media is the place to be if you want things to go viral. It will help you create the right kind of buzz to tap into the target audience. There are numerous ways to leverage the power of social media to your benefit. Marketing gimmicks depend on how creatively enabled a person is. There is truly no end to this. The basic idea like making a brand page and posting about the brand and outfits on the feed and stories worked for everyone initially. It still works as your customers have to be updated with what the new launches are, what the brand is doing if there is anything out of the box happening with the brand, or just a regular update of what’s taking place on a day to day basis. Another thing that helps fashion startups turn themselves into a brand is investing in influencer marketing.

    Influencer marketing is the way forward if you want to rise from the ground level, reach a wider mass and turn yourself into a brand. In Layman’s terms, you get a known or popular face on board to market your brand’s product(s), they reach out to their followers by putting it up on their stories, or social media feed or endorse the brand as a whole and influence their followers. This helps in tapping onto a larger mass and increasing the clientele. It automatically drives up the sales and eventually, the brand starts getting famous. A short-term influencer marketing plan has the possibility of running into a long-term commitment if the brand sees desired results. The shift change of an influencer marketer to being a brand ambassador can be beneficial to both the brand and influencer. The possibilities are endless, it is all about the action plan and how well you can execute it.

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    Speaking about fashion startups rising to being brands, Karam Suri, Co-Founder of Dusk Attire, says, “Today’s generation is extremely conscious about what they are buying. Trendy and versatile outfits are usually the popular choice as they can be worn at various occasions. Elegance is the word everyone is focused on. Be it party wear or loungewear, people want to pick the best of everything. When the demand is clear, brands should step up and cater to them in the best possible way. It is true that influencer marketing is essential and it is definitely the way forward, as the customers connect to the known faces faster than a random marketing advertisement.”

    Karam Suri further says, “At Dusk Attire we aim to fulfill everyone’s wishes of owning trendy loungewear. This pandemic gave us a huge lesson in comfortable clothing too. We aim to cater to the same demand and stay true to the name, all our collections are apt for the street to sheets whilst keeping excellent craftsmanship and comfort as a priority.

    No business is run on a 100% success module. The risk is always high, but the determination to keep pushing yourself towards the goal of establishing your startup as a brand is what makes the difference. Numerous marketing tools are at your disposal, use them wisely, and see how things start falling in place. As much as age-old techniques of word of mouth marketing and advertisements help, in today’s time investing in proper marketing options like celebrity gifting, influencer marketing, and social media marketing, to name a few will help equally. And once your audience connects with the brand, it becomes a responsibility to maintain that bond and make sure you are the first choice for your customers.

    Draw inspiration from the brands whose names are synonyms to the products. Yes, you read that write. Such is the impact of a strong brand like Cadbury that today nine out of ten people who go to local shops to buy chocolates, directly say Cadbury when in reality they might want some other chocolate. This is when you know you have established yourself as a brand and etched an image in people’s minds when the name of the brand becomes the product’s name.

  • How to Launch Your MVP in the Market the Right Way?

    The idea of launching an MVP has erupted significantly in recent years, it’s a standard procedure both for entrepreneurs and formed tech giants. However, like most ideas that become popular, there’s a lot of misconception.

    So let us start from the basics.

    What is MVP?
    Things You Should Know Before Creating MVP
    How to Launch MVP?
    Examples of MVP Launch
    Advantages of MVP Launch

    What is MVP?

    The MVP is the edition of a fresh model that enables your group to gather the most authenticated knowledge about consumers with the minimum effort. It is a tiny product with three essential aspects:

    • It is either used or purchased by folks.
    • It is simple to use.
    • Using the resources at our disposal, we could send it as we want it.

    Things You Should Know Before Creating MVP

    To create an effective MVP, you must first identify the purpose.

    User Section

    A team of members sharing related attributes. It is critical to determine who the merchandise is for, and who this isn’t for. A popular brand blunder is to try impressing all and risk appealing none.

    Issue

    Don’t try to solve all of your issues in one go; instead, tackle them one at a time. It’ll assist you in focusing on one primary problem that irritates clients the most. Once you’ve resolved that issue for people, you could move on to more issues.

    Workaround

    After you’ve settled on the issue, you would like to fix, you may come up with more creative solutions. It is critical to narrow down to a viable solution. Focus on the appropriate alternative and what it’ll involve then you can get input rapidly without wasting a lot of money.

    Limited User Interface

    This implies that your MVP must be sellable and usable. You must determine and draw a line between an item that can be utilized and an item that folks will use. Test on your own and with your group to determine what is suitable for rollout.

    How to Launch MVP?

    Thorough Analysis

    Before you begin, you must recognize the issue and its quick fix. You’ll respond to a series of queries, including:

    • What issue is your MVP supposed to fix?
    • What types of customers will be ready to buy?
    • What are the currently available solutions?

    Recognise and Prioritize Elements

    This part focuses on the elements you are including in your item. You must create your product edition and outline the elements you want in it. After that, you must prioritize them. At this point, you’re probably to have one key focus element that communicates the product’s essence.

    Tactic Selection

    You should determine what type of MVP you’ll use. It could be a no-product, item replica, or a single-feature MVP. Your decision must be built on the concept that needs to be authenticated as well as the tools accessible.

    Identifying Critical Success Factors

    Before you begin developing your MVP, you must decide how you’ll assess it. Create a list of implementable measures and success factors that you’ll monitor.

    Create a Storyboard

    It’s a necessary step to list your attributes and create the product roadmap. It is made up of four main parts: an aim, actions, user stories, and tasks. It’s a useful tool for identifying the benefits and drawbacks of your product.

    Launch MVP

    It’s time to put your MVP out and get some input from your first users. Focus on keeping track of the critical factors when evaluating the success of your MVP. The primary goal is to assess your product with actual humans. Even if it failed, it’s a good indication that you should manoeuvre and concentrate on fixing various types of user problems.

    Examples of MVP Launch

    Following are the types explained by using examples.

    User-facing Workaround

    Consider Zappos. The pioneer hoped to see if consumers purchase boots without first trying them on. It wasn’t possible to shop online back then. He merely shot the boots he planned to sell, and if a buyer placed an online order, he’d go purchase the boots from the shop and dispatch them, which worked well.

    Targeted User Section

    Consider Tinder. The app was created because you feel at ease approaching people if you realize they would like you to. Because social media sites primarily linked you with folks you already knew, a gap existed in exploring someone else.

    Its app stepped in to fill the void and calm the mind. They’ve got an opt-in system that shows you another party is willing to talk to you and, in most cases, the geographical area is close by, making you feel completely safe.

    Key Issues and Use Instances

    Consider Airbnb. San Francisco hosted an excellent design summit. The group planned to give inexpensive lodging during this situation and uploaded the information online. So they focused on a key issue and use the instance: “San Francisco summit invitees.”

    They hoped to find a solution that was tailored to that particular use case. Shortly, three guests expressed interest in spending for this bare-bones service. This backed up the business overview that prospective buyers would be ready to pay to reside at another’s house instead of a hotel.

    Streamlined Features

    Consider Spotify. Previously, the music business was experiencing challenges. Because of file-sharing websites, some folks paid for songs. Two Swedes recognize that this will never work.

    So their initial plan was to make a free streaming app and monetize it through advertisements. How did it fare against rivals? The pioneers noticed that most startups were putting their money into fancy sites and apps before even putting their concepts to the test.

    Spotify’s team tried something new. They developed a minimum viable product in the form of a computer app with one central aspect: song streaming. Later, they gave the choice for people to pay a monthly fee in exchange for an ad-free interaction and other attributes, and this journey enabled them to test their concept while maintaining their costs low.

    Advantages of MVP Launch

    Resources Savings

    By incorporating MVP, you can find a balance between supplying core aspects and remaining cost-effective. It also allows for the handover of a user-friendly item in a particular timeframe and is simple to execute.

    Understand Your Crowd

    It enables you to discover more about your customers’ perceptions of the item, allowing you to design and optimize what you could handle about it.

    Enhance Progressively and Stepwise

    MVP is critical in assisting you to create a basic edition that includes the key aspects and reveals it to the consumer to gather input and optimize it. It helps you organize your muddled thoughts and frame them in an orderly fashion.

    Conclusion

    Starting your MVP Inception point must no longer be as daunting. It doesn’t have to be flawless! To create it, follow the instructions and tactics outlined. It is a method that allows startups to learn a lot about their customers by using a viable prototype without wasting precious time and money.

    Thank you for your time.

    FAQs

    How to launch the MVP of a startup?

    Conduct Market Research, Conduct Customer Research, Create A Product Roadmap, Conduct User Testing, and launch the product.

    What is the MVP approach?

    MVP is launching a minimum viable product to gather the feedback of the consumers to build a much better product.

    What should an MVP look like?

    An MVP should be small, fast and cheap and should not create a negative impact.

  • Inexpensive Ways To Launch a Product

    Are there any prerequisites for launching a product with a lot of booms? A lot of money and a big team during the launch will not give a kick-start to your start-up, it’s an illusion. You might have witnessed that sometimes celebrities/politicians accompany the writers on launch day and are unable to sell more than thousand copies. But at the same time, many young writers use inexpensive ways of marketing and advertise their piece of work and at times win awards. The the creative methods of popularizing along with the quality of the product makes it successful.

    Here we have listed down few inexpensive ways to launch a product or service.

    Social Media
    Giving Value for Free
    Giveaways
    Using Crowd Funding
    Promotion through Influencers
    Viral Marketing
    Video Marketing

    Cost-effective Ways To Launch A Product

    Social Media

    Social Media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn has evolved over the years. There is no limit of success because the target audience of a businesses is already there. Even some of the platforms like Instagram, Facebook has allowed businesses to sell their products directly to the audience by using some features. For E.g. you can use the shoppable post feature of Instagram to tag your product links which will help the user to buy products directly from your online store.

    While Social Media platforms play a major role in grabbing customers, blogs articles are the ‘unsung heroes’ for success. Write in detail about your firm and products, become a guest writer in popular blogs, collaborate, get featured in top-notch online publications, attend trade shows and seminars, make videos, use different channels, basically, connect with bloggers to get you featured on different blogs.

    Giving value for free

    It might seem like a pain to do things for free, but this can add incredible value to your product in the long run. the publicity and critics you get is invaluable.

    When people pay for something, it gives those people a sense of accomplishment, pride, and ownership, meaning they’ll value the goods or services more and complain less.

    Want to build a community? So, approach businesses who have an established community and ask how can you help them. This can be by offering something valuable which exposes you and what you have to offer to their big audience. This is a great way to build relationships. If you’ve got no budget, you need relationships.

    Why should you do something for free? With the help of this strategy, you can gather email address and other data about the user. Later, this data can be used for marketing or building your brand.

    Online Giveaways

    Giveaways can be an easy marketing strategy to promote your product launch, and in a relatively short amount of time. Everyone loves gifts; giveaways tend to generate quite a large amount of responses. While giveaways have their drawback of attracting people with little interest in the company, the strategy itself is one with immense potential.

    For example, you can create your sweepstakes with clear objectives and requirements, where you choose a winner randomly without any fee.

    Using Crowdfunding

    Crowdfunding is an innovative way to provide a modest amount of funding to young entrepreneurs and technology professionals needing an early stage or seed capital for start-up companies. Which may spur entrepreneurship and ultimately assist in boosting the growth of the real economy.

    A company raising funds through online crowdfunding platforms or websites and offers equity or debt interests in its business to investors who make small contributions, through a crowdfunding platform or social media. Usually, funding is sought online based on future projections rather than a viable business model in operation which increases the risk of failures and therefore a loss to the investors.

    You can use a social media platform like Facebook for your crowdfunding campaign. But you can’t raise funding using your existing network. You have to build a community of people who can raise fund and also interested in new ideas. You can create a Facebook Page for your crowdfunding campaign, it will help you to reach more and more new people.

    Some of the other Crowdfunding platforms you can look at are:

    • Milaap
    • Crowdera
    • BitGiving
    • Catapooolt

    Promotion through Influencers

    If you are a new brand and launching product for the first time then you might not have reach to a large audience. Influencers have a big audience, fans and followers who trust them. This is like a trust-based campaign. You need to build and maintain relationships with influencers offering them special discounts, holiday trips, cash prizes etc. The best thing about it is, influencers can give quick reviews to products as they get an immediate response on any endorsement and recommendations from their audience.

    Viral Marketing

    Anything that spreads like a virus, person to person easily is called Viral Marketing. This is used in social media where sharing is possible on social media.

    In many cases, a user uploads content that receives a huge response and shares and it goes viral within a short period. This can be planned to run a successful viral marketing campaign.

    Making videos on trending topics or on an unrelated niche, waiting for the right time to post and drive some traffic through paid ads. are few ways you can make the maximum impact for the campaign. But make sure that the content won’t backfire at you, in viral marketing, users are the pilots and they have the power to do anything with that content.

    Also read: How to make your Video go Viral

    Video Marketing

    Nowadays people prefer video content more than text content. Video marketing simply means that you are branding your product through videos. You don’t need a high budget for making videos. Start from your mobile camera and try to make interactive videos that can explain about your product appropriately. You can also make “How-To” videos of your products and upload them on YouTube so that you will be able to generate a lot of traffic to your product.

    YouTube is the second largest search engine after Google and the best thing is it’s is free for everyone. You can take advantage of this new era and keep updating yourself and the way you operate a business with time.

    Conclusion

    All these ways of launching a product will save your money but make sure you are ready to invest your time. These are few tips from a never-ending list.

    Checkout our website StartupTalky for more information related to marketing, start-ups, interviews and much more.

  • Things to Know Before Starting up in the Food Industry

    This article is contributed by Megha Rawal, Founder of Mezmo Candy.

    The present-day food industry is the result of food startups and companies which popped up in the ’90s. Quite a few multinational companies started around the same time which is now a famous brand and go-to option for people of all age groups alike across the globe. What is it that made them famous? What is it that we as a better technologically equipped generation are not able to understand? What was the success mantra which is still working for them?

    There’s one answer to all these questions. What separated the MNCs from the startups is that they provided cost-efficient solutions and constantly evolved/improvised their products with the changing needs and mindset of the 21st-century consumer. This is exactly what made them a popular household name and helped them flourish in domestic and international markets. Venturing into a food industry is always a good idea because this business will never be saturated. We all love food and we need to eat to survive.

    What you are offering to your customers is what makes the difference for your brand. If you are providing a specific food item, you will be catering to a niche audience, if you have general food products, your quality, quantity, and price factor come into the picture to decide the success graph. Generally speaking, niche products are less price-sensitive than general mass-market products.

    You need a passion for food and hospitality when you decide to venture into this sector. Along with this, marketing is the tool you have to exfoliate to your advantage. There are numerous things that set you apart from your competitors, how well you leverage them for your benefit is what decides the success or failure of your brand.

    Speaking about the same, Megha Rawal, founder of Mezmo Candy says, “First and foremost, make a business plan. Weighing out the pros and cons of entering a new business is the vital step. Give ample thought to your customer value proposition (CVP). What are the profit areas and what can be risky, what will connect with the audience, and what will face hesitant acceptance, how much time will the licensing and paperwork take, literally everything has to go in the plan along with a strong backup plan. Having another plan is smart work as you are ready with options if the first one doesn’t work out. Calculate the timeframe for the return on your investment and proceed accordingly”.

    Market research is very important, especially if your product is niche. For B2C products, conduct a survey over a minimum of 150 people belonging to mixed groups. Depending on the result of the survey your CVP may need modifications.

    Begin trials of your product, rope in open-minded chefs and food technologists who are willing to experiment and give life to your product. Tasting sessions can commence with your friends, family, and connoisseurs of taste. You will have to go through numerous rounds of trials till you perfect your products. Lock in the items which you think will definitely work. They are called safe bets as it appeals to one and all. Add a few items which will please a selected crowd and a few options for the people who love trying something new. If you want to be in the D2C space, having a good shelf life is very important.

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    It’s best to keep your costs low and aim for a lean start-up. Moving on, creating your brand positioning and story is very important. So outsource it to the best because it is very important to make a powerful first impression of your product.   Your packaging has to be very attractive to pull prospective clients towards trying your product. Market it the right way and see how the word spreads.

    With a bad experience, you not only lose one customer, but a series of them as word of mouth creates a huge impact. Their experience will be shared with their friends and just like that, you will lose out on a chunk of potential customers.

    Knowing your competition is something you have to do before you even start contemplating any other possibilities. Identifying your few key strengths and reiterating those will create a brand recall. What you can do better than your peers’ matters when you are calculating the success rate. What is profitable for them might not necessarily be profitable for you and the determination of the same is a part of being an entrepreneur.

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    No one has had it easy and neither will you. The time will test you, demand a lot more than you could ever imagine you are capable of, take you to a point where you would feel completely saturated and feel like giving up, but in that exact moment, if you manage to keep your calm and be level-headed and pivot,  that’s the battle half won. Passion and perseverance are two things that need to be in abundance in an entrepreneur’s life. Consistency, concentration, and cooperation are the 3Cs of success that you will have to embrace. The key is to manage your lows and bounce back to keep that fire burning inside you. Going might get tough, and the fire will mellow down, but don’t forget that embers are enough to ignite a fire again.

  • Top 7 Ways to Create a Buzz around your Startup

    Remember back in the days of the year 2017. When fidget spinners were new in the market, they took it by storm. Starting right from the kids to the adults’ everyone bought them, spinning and playing with them for hours.

    It does not matter if our parents or the gen Z would not approve, but the craze among the people was such that we did introduce them to those who did not approve. Nevertheless, and said to them, “Here, you should try this”

    Fidget Spinners were available everywhere right from the top websites to be locally available at cheaper rates in the market. Manufacturers made them in bundles, be it original or its copy in all sizes and customized. The focus here is that they were sold and people bought them; the buzz was to an extent that brothers refused to tie the Rakhi’s that their sisters got for them and insisted that they tie what was called back then fidget spinner Rakhi. So, Lets look 7 ways to create a buzz around your startup.

    Why Creating Buzz around your Startups is Important?
    How to Create a Buzz around your Startup?
    FAQ

    Why Creating Buzz around your Startups is Important?

    Launching anything in today’s world is tough with technology and so many marketing strategies. Right from e-mail marketing to affiliate marketing, it is difficult to hold people’s attention as the new researchers give insight that the maximum attention span of people has been reduced to five seconds.

    So, is it enough to when you start a startup or business, be it selling a service or a product to be only launched, letting people know and then forget about it?

    In today’s world, it is equally important to create a buzz around it! Because it not only gets people talking about it, but in the infinite numbers of brands already established out there, it makes the consumers recognize and distinguish your product or service as well as retains your customers, not allowing them to go to your competitors and establishing loyalist consumers.

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    How to Create a Buzz around your Startup?

    Build a brand

    What makes you distinguish a Mercedes from a Jaguar?

    As you come to think of it, both the brands sell cars and belong to the same industry. Before aiming to create a buzz around your newly launched startup, your consumers should be able to recognize your brand and distinguish it from the other available competitors in the market.

    What can you do?

    • Create your brands’ name
    • Categorize it, what will it sell? Where? How? To which category does your startup belong? Is your startup going to sell premium goods or services?
    • Have a distinguished logo
    • A good brand color scheme based on the persona of your brand
    • A catchy tagline that your audience will remember

    Take risks, get back up, and have a backup plan

    Being an entrepreneur is showing up every day, being mentally strong, and being able to look for opportunities and solutions to problems. An entrepreneur thinks out of the box, but it also involves risk. A new idea about a product or a service can be brilliant and work wonders or might just bring your startup crumbling down.

    A situation like this will feel challenging, but that does not mean you run away from it. You can take your time off to think over how to tackle the problem in the best way possible, a plan B.

    While launching something new you will face such challenges, but if you already devise a backup plan it will save you time, hassle and make you understand how to do everything better the next time.

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    Use influencer marketing

    Did you ever end up going to a restaurant? Because this restaurant was suggested to you by a friend, and they tell you how good the cuisine and ambiance was. The same is the way influencer marketing works.

    Celebrity endorses, influencers on social media make it easy for the consumers to trust your brand because a person who recommends it to you and gives the reviews is someone who already the consumers know and trust.

    Tailor your Brand strategy

    Deciding on the brand strategy that goes together with your target audience is synonyms with Sherlocking.

    But the dynamics of your audience keep changing; a strategy will work for a certain platform but won’t work for another one. Mix and match.

    • Tailor a strategy according to your brand’s needs.
    • Find where your consumers are?
    • And where are you comfortable as a brand to have a presence?

    Be it multi-branding, co-branding, or any other brand strategy that you use. Try till you get the best results most efficiently.

    Know your Target Audience. Focus on the problems

    People are looking for solutions and mind you, they are looking for the best for themselves. Most of the adverts use this appeal in their ad campaigns and it works. Research and collect data about your target audience and their psychographics.

    • Who are they?
    • Why do they use your product?
    • What are their demographics, psychographics?
    • What do they expect from you?
    • How can you solve their problems in the best possible ways?

    Eventually, your consumers are the kings, serve them right, serve them best. They are the key to solving your puzzle.

    Innovate your Product

    What if your startup sells just what everyone else in the market is? You will then end up allowing your consumers to go and buy from the competitor’s brand.

    Take you are selling a packet of chips. Will that be sufficient for all consumer segments that exist in your market? Every consumer is different, and their wants, needs will be different.

    A variety in the flavor, size, shape of the chips or the packaging can make a difference. New things appeal to people and if it sounds convincing enough, they do try it.

    A normal rubber band is okay. But a flexible, sustainable product made from eco-friendly raw material that can be used for various purposes, along with adjustable buckles made from recycled plastic.

    Well, that sounds like a plan! Do not stick to one thing; try different ideas, work on what suits your consumers best, and be innovative, people like different things.

    Ad campaigns

    A good ad campaign can work wonders. Be the campaign giving a social message or making the world a better place. Acting towards a good cause, giving back to society also helps to steer your startup.

    Top Ad Jingles of all time – A powerful marketing tool
    Do you remember your last ads jingle? Many people tend to remember ad jingle more than the ad. So, lets look at the Top Ad Jingles of all time.
    StartupTalkyPratyusha Srivastava

    FAQ

    How to create a buzz around your startup?

    Tailor you brand strategy, Use influencer marketing, and Understand you target audience. These are some of the ways to create a buzz around your startup.

    Why creating a buzz around your startup is important?

    Creating a buzz around your startup is important because its differentiates you from your competitors.

    What is the best day to launch a business?

    Tuesday is considered as the best day to launch a startup or business, as consumers are too focused on Mondays.

  • How to Launch your SaaS Business?

    Launching a SaaS business takes a lot of hard work and determination. Many entrepreneurs feel that it is about getting the product out the door. Unless you’re an experienced entrepreneur, this approach can be quite disappointing. You launch your SaaS product and hope to get a few signups every day. Days turn into weeks, and you don’t find anyone coming. Why? Because your product is only part of the puzzle. There are quite a few things to sort out before you take your product to market.

    Here are 9 things to take care of before you launch a SaaS business.

    Validate business idea early

    You don’t want to end up spending thousands of dollars to realize it’s just you and your best friend using the app you’ve built. Reach out to relevant communities on social media, forums, put together a survey and ask as many people as you can. Make sure there are people who not only need your product, but are also ready to pay money for it.

    Chanty business idea validation survey
    Chanty business idea validation survey

    Also read:

    Learn about your target market

    Getting to know your buyer persona is extremely important while running a business. Never stop learning about your target audience as their needs evolve and so should your product. When you are just starting out, put a survey with several questions to find out the biggest pain point. Apart from doing a survey, make sure you communicate with your potential clients directly. The more you talk to your customers, the better (and faster) market fit you’ll get.

    Have customer onboarding

    No matter how simple your SaaS product, you need to have an automated process to onboard new users to your app. This will make it easier for people to use your product and quickly turn them into paying customers. At the minimum, it should allow users to sign up and sign in, display a welcome screen and give a quick product tour of your top 3 features that help them get started. Don’t walk them through all the features as it will only confuse them. You can use free plugins like Intro.js to provide a step-by-step guide to your application. Also, have automated lifecycle emails (after signup, after activation, end of trial).

    For example, Slack has an awesome new user onboarding which uses a combination of tooltips, animations, static screens, and in-app examples.

    SaaS customer onboarding
    SaaS customer onboarding

    Relevant read:

    Get the tool kit ready

    There are certain software tools your team will need to operate. For example:

    • CRM to track your tasks
    • GitLab for coding, testing and deployment collaboration
    • Confluence for company wiki and meeting notes
    • G Suite for a corporate email, storage and documents collaboration
    • MailChimp, Mailgun and Amazon SES to send out emails to our customers
    • Team communication tool like Slack
    • InVision app for prototyping
    • Google Keyword Planner, Ahrefs, SEMrush, SimilarWeb for keyword, traffic and backlinks research
    • Google Analytics, Hotjar, Yandex Metrica for site analytics, heatmaps and more
    • Buzzsumo for content research
    • Canva, Hootsuite, TweetDeck, Manageflitter, Hashtagify to manage and design  social media accounts
    • LinkedIn Sales Navigator to outreach potential clients in LinkedIn

    Wow, I didn’t realize there were so many. You’ll probably have the kit of your own, however, this list should at least help you receive an approximate idea of what you’ll need. These are just examples of software that do the task, there are plenty of good alternatives for each one of them. So, choose accordingly.

    Don’t charge your customers initially

    When you launch a SaaS startup, it might be tempting to charge your customers. After all, paying customers are the best way to validate your product. Here’s why it’s not a good idea. If you need to charge your customers, you need to add a payment gateway such as Stripe or 2Checkout to your website, which will cost you integration time. You also need to apply for a bank account and run around for additional procedures such as incorporation. The whole process can take months and delay your launch unnecessarily.

    Instead, release your SaaS product as a beta version, and mention that it will be free during the beta period (3-4 months). This will give you enough time to validate your idea, as well as set up the payment module.

    Must read:

    Don’t forget the social media

    While social media is not the primary traffic source, it’s still important to keep your customers updated. Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook serve this purpose pretty well. Even if you don’t plan any social media activity yet, it’s still a good idea to reserve your brand name at all the major social platforms.

    Social Media
    Social Media

    Start a blog

    Content marketing is a big thing. If you choose to attract organic traffic with your articles, I advise you to write in-depth articles that bring value. This task can be given to freelance writers but sometimes their articles don’t reflect the personal experience, the passion for what you are doing, their words are not filled with excitement. Don’t expect instant results. Running a blog is a lot of time and effort. In fact, according to HubSpot, B2B companies that blog generate 67% more leads than the ones that don’t.

    Start a blog
    Start a blog

    Plan A Media Stunt

    Motivate those who already signed up to share your startup with their friends. You can offer an early access to those who invite a number of friends (usually 3-5) by providing a unique url to share. You can also move them up in a waiting queue of beta testers or offer other rewards your audience would be interested in.

    Earning press coverage requires being the subject of a news story. Avoid stunts that will ring as desperate or cynical and focus instead of events or actions closely related to your brand’s mission. Put the focus on the most newsworthy element of the SaaS itself and how it is relevant to conversations about current events

    Set up Analytics

    As you’ve seen, there are quite a few things you need to do, to get your SaaS product off the ground. However, they’ll be fruitless if you’re unable to measure, analyze and improve their performance. Luckily, Google provides two amazing free tools that will make your life easier.

    The first one is the Google Analytics (GA), that helps you analyze website traffic and understand user behavior. Add a piece of code to your website and GA will do the rest. It provides tons of informative reports out-of-the-box that help you understand the most visited pages, how much time people spend on your site, their location, device, browser and a lot more. You can even set up goals and events to track clicks. This will help you understand how users interact with your product and which features they use the most.

    The second one is the Google Tag Manager (GTM), designed to simplify both developers’ and marketers’ lives. Once you add the GTM code to your site, marketers can add or delete any further piece of marketing code such as Hotjar Analytics, or the Facebook Pixel on their own, without distracting developers.

    Once you start tracking the right metrics, you’ll know what to improve and see if your activities are moving the needle. It also allows you to set growth objectives and review your progress regularly. Here’s a sample Google Analytics dashboard that shows you detailed information about your website visitors

    Google analytics dashboard
    Google analytics dashboard

    Conclusion

    Starting a SaaS business is a formidable task, but if you implement it carefully, you will surely be able to launch a SaaS product that gains traction quickly. We hope the experience we’ve shared helps you during your SaaS product pre-launch. If you have any questions, feel free to reach us in the comments below. We’ll be happy to help. Meanwhile, good luck pre-launching your product!