Read on Twitter
@localeai' s 15 months SaaS journey & how we didn’t build a product until 6 months~
A thread
But, before that:
We’re excited to announce our upcoming public launch! If you want to try the product now, pls DM.
We’ve come a long way after 15 mon & 1000 hrs of persisting!
A thread
But, before that:
We’re excited to announce our upcoming public launch! If you want to try the product now, pls DM.
We’ve come a long way after 15 mon & 1000 hrs of persisting!
1/10 The Idea: It all started with a personal problem.
Working on projects involving geolocation previously, we had to build lots of internal tools.
We saw:
Companies collecting huge amt of lat/longs BUT
not having the right tools to use this data in operational decisions.
Working on projects involving geolocation previously, we had to build lots of internal tools.
We saw:
Companies collecting huge amt of lat/longs BUT
not having the right tools to use this data in operational decisions.
2/10 First round of validation: ~50 companies.
Found out that~
Internal tools were:
1. Needed eng bandwidth to update
2. Painful to maintain
3. Didn’t give localized, real-time insights
Business users keep waiting for dashboards for engg. sprints & metrics from analyst teams
Found out that~
Internal tools were:
1. Needed eng bandwidth to update
2. Painful to maintain
3. Didn’t give localized, real-time insights
Business users keep waiting for dashboards for engg. sprints & metrics from analyst teams
3/10 Premise:
“Getting insights on ground operations for city/ ops teams should be as simple as getting insights on websites for marketers.”
To customize decisions based on how areas behave.
We packed our bags, quit jobs to move to a new city. @localeai was born in March'19.
“Getting insights on ground operations for city/ ops teams should be as simple as getting insights on websites for marketers.”
To customize decisions based on how areas behave.
We packed our bags, quit jobs to move to a new city. @localeai was born in March'19.
4/10 MVP -> PoCs:
Rishabh hooked together our first MVP (a prototype in 3 days).
We demoed that to get some PoCs with top delivery startups in India.
Countless hrs. in their offices + 16 In-depth interviews gave us our:
1. Pain points
2. ICP
3. Solution
4. Positioning
Rishabh hooked together our first MVP (a prototype in 3 days).
We demoed that to get some PoCs with top delivery startups in India.
Countless hrs. in their offices + 16 In-depth interviews gave us our:
1. Pain points
2. ICP
3. Solution
4. Positioning
5/10 Fundraising: With these answers, we needed to start building the product now.
For the product, we needed engineers
For engineers, we needed $$$
For $$$, we needed to raise
Fundraise is a complete sine wave on its own. We finally closed our pre-seed from Better Capital!
For the product, we needed engineers
For engineers, we needed $$$
For $$$, we needed to raise
Fundraise is a complete sine wave on its own. We finally closed our pre-seed from Better Capital!
6/10: Now what?
We always wanted to be a product-led company:
Try Locale, get the feel, decide value.
We underestimated the complexity in building data pipelines at large scale, high freq & combining data from:
1. marketing events
2. supply pings
3. order transactions
We always wanted to be a product-led company:
Try Locale, get the feel, decide value.
We underestimated the complexity in building data pipelines at large scale, high freq & combining data from:
1. marketing events
2. supply pings
3. order transactions
7/10 Postponing 1st launch~
V1 ready after 4 months. But,
After deploying it for India’s largest micromobility co, users didn’t know
“which metrics to create” & “what to measure”.
Part of it was bad UX!
We realized we needed to make the process of getting insights simpler!
V1 ready after 4 months. But,
After deploying it for India’s largest micromobility co, users didn’t know
“which metrics to create” & “what to measure”.
Part of it was bad UX!
We realized we needed to make the process of getting insights simpler!
8/10 v2’s philosophy:
Help users make decisions by showing the right metrics.
We picked our target industries -> wrote top decisions -> mapped each decision to top metrics.
Different decisions required diff visualizations + diff metrics.
v2 was so actionable & insightful!
Help users make decisions by showing the right metrics.
We picked our target industries -> wrote top decisions -> mapped each decision to top metrics.
Different decisions required diff visualizations + diff metrics.
v2 was so actionable & insightful!
9/10 Validating v2:
I started our cold outreach & doing demos of v2 while the team got down to building!
Lockdown helped us do ~70 demos in 2.5 months.
We got lots of nice feedback & rejections.
Now, we’ve engineered some solutions into the product to combat those rejections
I started our cold outreach & doing demos of v2 while the team got down to building!
Lockdown helped us do ~70 demos in 2.5 months.
We got lots of nice feedback & rejections.
Now, we’ve engineered some solutions into the product to combat those rejections
10/10 The Grand Launch: We are finally ready to present @localeai to the world.
Product launch is like a marriage proposal:
You want a positive response + you’re scared of failure + nervous about everything else.
Product's not perfect but I’m proud of how it turned out
Product launch is like a marriage proposal:
You want a positive response + you’re scared of failure + nervous about everything else.
Product's not perfect but I’m proud of how it turned out
P.S. DM to get early access and until then, keep making good art!
If you want to go on a ride with the entire story and how it all started, go here:
https://medium.com/locale-ai/how-we-didnt-build-a-product-until-6-months-in-our-saas-journey-dbc893ae16ae
Suggestion: Have some
by your side and enjoy!
If you want to go on a ride with the entire story and how it all started, go here:
https://medium.com/locale-ai/how-we-didnt-build-a-product-until-6-months-in-our-saas-journey-dbc893ae16ae
Suggestion: Have some
by your side and enjoy!
P.P.S. I wrote another thread on my fundraising experiences here: https://twitter.com/aditi1002/status/1263877481355870208
