Clients Archive

Two DeveloperTown Companies in the PowderKeg Startup Bowl

Posted October 11th, 2012

After sorting through piles of applications from dozens of fantastic startups, we (the PowderKeg team) finally managed to narrow down the pool to 12 startups that will be competing for the $15,000 prize package (a combination of cash and services).

Many of the startups that made the top 12 are part of fantastic organizations around the United States like DeveloperTown.

Diagnotes- DeveloperTown

In an effort to eliminate the problems associated with effective communication and care during on-call medical encounters, Diagnotes has developed an integrated software solution that provides critical information, secure communication and convenient documentation for healthcare providers via their smartphones, focusing initially on on-call physicians and the 50-100 million such patient encounters conducted annually in the US.

Diagnotes is a DeveloperTown project. See more about Diagnotes and our relationship in a future blog post!

 

Adproval- DeveloperTown

Adproval is a service that streamlines the process of direct ad sales for small and medium bloggers while allowing them to maintain relationships with their advertisers. Working with an approved advertiser lets bloggers use their voice – by means of product reviews, featured posts, etc. – to back them as a sponsor, making ad space on that blog more valuable.

DeveloperTown built the initial Adproval platform (then DoubleStitch) and connected Matthew with his current developer Bob Mattax and designer Peter Lockhart.

 

 

FoundOps- Purdue Research Park

FoundOPS is developing an operations platform to help small field service operate more efficiently by gamifying carbon savings. In one, easy to use cloud based system, they’ve incorporated GPS technician tracking, drag and drop dispatching, and intuitive customer service management.

 

 

Modulus- The Brandery

Modulus helps developers spend less time configuring servers and more time building products. Modulus does this by providing a complete platform that companies can use to host and scale their internet-based applications. We add to that an integrated database and file storage solution, and wrap everything under a powerful statistics engine.

Not only is Modulus a part of The Brandery, but the founders are Rose-Hulman graduates and have put together several meetings/presentations about Node.js to share with entrepreneurs around Indianapolis.

 

 

Team Mash- Sproutbox

TeamMash is a daily email for sports fanatics. Every day, their editors scour the web for the best sports content. Each morning, they email you a mashup of what happened with your favorite teams in the past 24 hours. It even contains links to hand-picked articles from around the web.

After receiving my first email from them yesterday (about the Packers, of course) it’s easy to understand why they’re a Sproutbox company.

 

There are also several startups around Indianapolis that we have ties with that will be competing!

Visit Apps

Visit Apps empowers Convention & Visitors Bureaus (CVBs = tourism agencies) to harness the mobile channel to deeply engage their visitors. Visit Apps has built a proprietary platform that allows any CVB – from the quaintest of towns to a bustling metropolis – to have their own mobile app. Visit Apps is a SaaS startup in the explosively growing mobile sector (available in iPad, iPhone and Android devices).

Squarejive
Squarejive is a free mobile application that recommends things to do nearby. The app is built upon a mosaic design that allows users to seamlessly find and share events across Facebook, Twitter, SMS Text, and Email. With Yelp integration, the app also includes business profiles for over 400 venues in Indianapolis.

Lesson.ly
Lesson.ly is a teaching and learning marketplace. It’s like iTunes, but with lessons and courses instead of songs and albums. It is “the simplest way to learn” and is currently in beta-testing.

PetBookings
PetBookings.com is the first and only website to offer instant and confirmed online reservations to the $3.5 billion professional pet care industry. They are launching v2.0 of their website platform Friday October 5, 2012 and are armed with some remarkable test data going to market.

CoatChex
CoatChex is focused on bringing innovation and value through today’s technology to an industry that hasn’t been touched in decades. The patent-pending process optimizes coat check-in and retrieval functions and reduces the risks that are commonly associated with checking coats, making it the hassle-free solution to running a secure, profitable, and efficient coat check station.

 

Finally, we’re excited to see and learn more about these out-of-town startups!

Lisnr
Lisnr aims to change the way that consumers experience audio by turning what has historically been a passive experience into an interactive engagement platform. Lisnr is an app that allows music or any other audio medium to passively trigger consumer interactions, direct to their mobile device, during a consumer’s listening experience.

Bonfyre
Bonfyres are private groups created around events where you can share chats and photos. All of these shared photos become part of group photostreams, called Memories, and are accessible only to others at that bonfyre. Simple event planning, private real-time sharing and collective group photos in one app, just like it should be.

 

If you’re interested in learning more about the PowderKeg, please click the keg and get ready to light the fuse on October 17th!

Use the discount “FRIENDSOFDT” to get $100 off of registration!

Posted in Clients, Events, IndyStartupScene | No Comments »

Innovation Showcase: What to Expect if you are a DT Townie, Tenant, or Client

Posted July 5th, 2012

As the Innovation Showcase draws closer, there are people associated with DeveloperTown that may be wondering how the Innovation Showcase will affect them. If you are a DT Townie, Tenant, or Client, the Innovation Showcase will have some impact on the days surrounding the event itself.

Note: Though many DT townies will be helping with the Innovation Showcase, this event won’t put any projects behind or negatively impact clients.

On Wednesday:

On Wednesday afternoon, DeveloperTown will begin to set up the space. During this time, houses will be moved, interrupting power and access to workspace. Townies may be helping move the houses instead of working on their current projects.

Tenants in the main DeveloperTown space will have limited access to their houses while the space is being reorganized. Tenants in the other parts of the building (the Speak Easy, Tinderbox, etc) will be working on arranging their spaces in preparation for the Showcase.

Clients will still be able to contact members of their team, but there might be a short delay in response.

On Thursday:

Many DT townies will be present at the showcase, helping with the event, participating in discussions, or even making connections for their own ventures. Others may be working from other locations to ensure that their projects remain on track.

Tenants will have limited access to their spaces and will most likely be without power. However, they do get tickets to the Innovation Showcase, should they choose to attend. If you are a DT Tenant that is planning on attending that doesn’t already have a ticket, please let Mike Coffey know by this Friday afternoon (tomorrow) so that he can arrange one for you.

Clients will have limited access to both the building and their team. For specific details about your project, please contact a member of your DT team.

On Friday:

Friday morning will consist of finishing some cleanup while setting spaces back up. By the afternoon, operations at DeveloperTown for all townies, tenants, and clients should return to normal!

 

Next Post: What to Expect if You’re an Entrepreneur Attending the Innovation Showcase for the First Time by Matt De Leon

Posted in Clients, Events, IndyStartupScene | No Comments »

Things you know but never thought of…

Posted May 8th, 2012


Customers. We all work everyday to gain new ones, retain current ones and hopefully gain knowledge from them on how to make our products better to fit their needs.  Once we take this simplistic concept and actually execute on it, we then look to how we present our product to the consumers. We learn that there is a difference between feature and benefits. We learn that a feature that might be meaningless to the end user could provide entrée to multiple benefits that either make their lives easier or happier or both.  In order to make that happen, we need to define our customers. We need to know our market and how we can provide what that market needs/wants better than anyone else.

Today, I want to talk about who your customer really is. (I will tell you right now that this discussion is aimed at all companies that have employees.) When I ask this next question it can sometimes feel like a trick question or a trap. The reality is that it’s meant to make you think: to possibly shift how you might view your customer, or even better, shift your understanding of who your customer really is.  So here is the question, “Who is your primary customer?” Wikipedia defines a customer as

“A customer is the recipient of a good, service, product, or idea, obtained from a seller, vendor, or supplier for a monetary or other valuable consideration.”

I agree with this definition and want to ask you again, “Who is your primary customer?” if you are like most, you will be thinking about who might be paying you the most or who might be taking most of your time. Today, I want to challenge you with the concept that your EMPLOYEES are your number one customer. Now, I guarantee you this will cause some debate but here is my personal view, one that I gained from not looking at my employees as my number one customer.  Every time you hire a new employee you are looking for a target personality, someone that fits you your need, but the one being hired is also looking for something that fits them and their needs. So let’s think about this. The one that you are about to hire is about to be “the recipient of a good, service, product, or idea (vision), obtained from a seller, vender, or supplier for a monetary OR other valuable consideration.” The OTHER in this statement is simply their time, their valuable life: a limited commodity that can not be given back. Honestly, I don’t think either side really thinks about work this way, but they should.

Now that we understand that those that you hire are purchasing what you offer with their life, their time! Let me ask you this, what product do you offer? Have you ever thought about productizing your values, mission, vision and comp plan? If not you leave yourself open of have employees with expectations that they define because you haven’t. We all know what happens when we have clients with unrealistic expectations… if never turns out good! So what do we do with this?

Define your Product:
Take your mission, vision, values and comp plan and present it to your future hire as a product with a clearly defined feature list resulting with benefits.

Value your customers:
Highlight what makes your services better than any other provider out there!

Get feedback from your customers:
Freaking listen to your employees!

Refine your product:
If your product is the same it was five years ago, I would argue you’re not listening and you’re not progressing

I guarantee that those that establish this mindset and set their employees as their primary focus will find that their secondary client (the paying ones) will be taken care of very nicely.

For those of you that are employees right now and reading this, thinking this is your anthem… understand that there will be a post coming just for you! You’re not off the hook just yet! Until then, let’s discuss!

PS: If you would like to know what the picture has to do with this post, ask me in the comments.

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Posted in Clients, How we work | 6 Comments »

“The Rise From The Middle” Why Indianapolis is the place to be… Even over California!

Posted May 1st, 2012

“Seriously?! You chose to move to Indy from California?” That is the first question I usually hear when I tell people that I did choose Indy over California just one month ago.

“Why!?” is the next question followed by

“Were you dropped on your head as a child?” which of course I answer with, “Yes, but that has nothing to do with it!”

To quickly explain, well that all depends on how fast you read, this is my story as to why I am here at DeveloperTown @DeveloperTown . (If you could care less of my story and just want to get to the facts of why I believe Indianapolis is by far the better place to be over California when it comes to the startup community, CLICK HERE)

Here we go…

I was born and raised in Napa Valley and I worked in the wine industry for a good amount of time.  Just so you know, I am game to talk wine with anyone that is a wino like me. I was raised around technology and was involved with some startups out of the Bay Area but never saw myself as an Entrepreneur. I loved people, leadership, process, and making things more efficient. If you were to ask me 10 years ago what my dream job was, it was being a camp director and surf instructor for the rest of my life… FYI, that didn’t happen.

About three years ago, I was provided the opportunity to raise money to purchase an account that I was managing from a company that I worked for and start a new company. Honestly, I had never raised money, I didn’t have aspirations of running a company, and I was a Communications major in college… enough said. I wrestled with this opportunity and realized that the biggest mistake I could make would be allowing fear to define my path in this life. With the support of many amazing people back in California and a supportive wife, I was able to raise $2.5m , acquire the account, and close the deal in less than 90 days. Over the next 45 days we went from 3 to 25 employees and within 10 months we grew to become a multi-million dollar company with offices in California and here in Indianapolis.  Last year I brought my family out to Indiana for what was supposed to be a 3-month stint and 14 months later I am still here!

I came to Indy to work with the office here and to better understand what this city had to offer. This is what I learned. Note that in the next couple paragraphs I am not name dropping but more giving shout outs to those that made the decision to choose Indy easier.

My family and I set our feet on Indiana soil three days before the epic ice storm of 2011. I have videos of using a hammer to clear the ice just to get into our offices! We wanted to go back home but I wasn’t going to let the weather deter me, I was interested in something more, interested in finding the TIPPING POINT. I had a strange feeling that Indy was gearing up to see a huge TIPPING POINT. (I will come back to this TIPPING POINT) So typically when I come to a new place I always want to know the people, the hearts of those people, and really see what drives the local community. One of the first people I met was a gentleman by the name of Greg Downey @greg_purim. Now Greg is a guy that you want on your side, one that could seriously hurt you if he wanted to, but he has a huge heart and a passion for startups,  a passion to connect people and a passion to help others succeed. Greg then started to introduce me to many people in Indy like Jeff Kirk of Bingham Greenebaum Doll LLP (who was a rock star for my company with a couple tough legal issues and has also introduced me to an amazing group of minds here in Indy), led me to Aaron Nelson @asnelson (who is an Indy native but is rocking it now at Google with Double Click), Michael Cloran @mecloran (a local rock star when it comes to innovative thinking) and last but not least Christopher Day and his brother Stephen, which if you don’t know the Days, your life is no where near where it could be on the fun scale of life.

Side Story: I get a text from Jeff Kirk and Chris Day asking if I would like to go “surfing”. As you can imagine I thought this was a joke and I was instantly home sick. But to my surprise, they were totally serious! So last summer these wonderful guys took myself, Chad Ashcraft, Matt Toyer, and Kelly Hendricks @blastkelly out to wake surf on Geist! Epic epic day, so good for my soul and just so you know both Matt Toyer and Kelly Hendricks are pros at wake surfing!

Through this group I was also introduced to a couple city officials and was given a great view of how the local government is really supporting the local businesses and especially startups. For those of you that don’t already know this, you are all freakin blessed! My local government in California basically kicks the small business out and provides very little support. All of this was a 45 day ride for me that brought me to the conclusion that Indy was where I needed to move my company… all of it. Now some of you might know that even if you are a CEO, it doesn’t mean you call all of the shots.  I pushed for about a year and as of a month ago the board decided to close the Indy office and move everything back to California.  The board wanted me to move back California. I can tell you a year ago this would have been a hard decision, but last month, it was a five minute decision that went like this, (in summary of course)

“Coffey we would like for you to come back to California”

My response, “Hold on one second… hey love (that’s my wife), they want to move everything back to California and for us to go back as well. I personally think Indy has the TIPPING POINT FACTOR and it’s time for us to place our stake in the ground here… you ok with me resigning and selling off my side of the company so we can stay here for a while?”

Wife’s response, “do you really believe this is the place?”

Me again, “YES!”

Wife, “then do it!”

Me again, “hey board, I will help you through this transition but I am staying here.”

As you can imagine, this was a huge step of faith for us and at that time I did not have a plan as to what we were going to do. As the story unfolded, on a Thursday night I let my contacts here know I was staying.  Friday morning Cloran asked me to come down to DeveloperTown to talk with him and some of the team (Shout out to Mike Kelly goes here).  One week later I decided to come on board and I will tell you that I could not be happier and from my vantage point, I could not be in a better position to be a part of the TIPPING POINT that will happen here in Indy.

So let’s talk about this TIPPING POINT. Here is what I see:

Growth in Mindshare deciding to stay – I can’t tell you why or how this happens but it’s one of those macro economic shifts that you can see when a generation leaves for the coasts, gains amazing experience, and then decides they want to come back home. If you look around this city you will be able to list names of people here that have done this and have started companies that are now attracting young minds to stay after college.

Deal Flow – because of the above, the amount of deals and extremely good ideas that I have seen here over the last year has convinced me that Indy has a huge potential to make a name for itself in not only measured marketing but also in tech. Simply go to a Verge event, follow Matt Hunkler @hunkler and you will see what I mean.

Desire for a shift or diversification in investments to happen – We are seeing more and more investors want to diversify their portfolio into the tech space but are looking for ways to verify the options. We have some great IPOs which will birth new young investors that understand this space. We need to keep both the ideas and the money HERE!

Cost of living – I must say that the quality of life due to this is amazing for someone coming from California. This is extremely attractive and Indy is proving that it’s a city that can be enjoyed. Once again, hats off to the local community and government.

Family Focused – Hands down one of the best places to raise a family.

In short here is the map that I see:

Due to Mindshare coming back we are seeing great IPOs take place which will infuse capital that can be used as startup fuel which will keep the mindshare needed to grow this city!

Now here are my concerns. Even though people are getting excited and these shifts are starting to take place we still need to find a way to fund companies in between the friends and family round and “A” round founding. This needs to happen quickly.

I do love seeing people like Chris Day trying to rally with individuals to do this. I love seeing new companies like LocalStake @localstake focusing on crowd sourcing. (By the way, the guys over at LocalStake are great guys and if you don’t know what crowd sourcing is… look it up now!) BUT I also am seeing some of your big VCs on the coasts start to focus on this level of investment in cities like Austin, Denver, Boston, Atlanta, and even Indy.

With that said, I believe that this city has what it takes to really be a hot hub for startups. I believe in DeveloperTown and the team that exists within these houses. I believe that both the startup entrepreneur and the investment community need a solid accelerator and development house like DeveloperTown that focuses on guiding startups through the pain of building a tech company from concept to market push. I believe in our local government and its support, which we just saw last week as Mayor Ballard spoke here on his view of 2012 for our city. I believe in all of us!

So as I was driving home last night, a great song by Jon McLaughlin @jonmclaughlin called Indiana came on my Pandora station. If you haven’t ever heard the song, it’s worth the $.99 but there is a line that simply says, …”It’s probably best I stay in Indiana”. Three weeks ago I said, it’s probably time I set my stake in Indiana. I will tell you that since I made that decision, I have not been more excited for this city.

Rise From The Middle!

*disclaimer – if I didn’t mention you and you know you have been influential in my life, don’t worry there will be more blogs! Seriously, Kyle @kyleplacy and Mason @jmasonhughes you will get love very soon in your own blog!:)

Coffey @coffeyhouse

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Posted in Clients, How we work, IndyStartupScene | 8 Comments »

One Startup Story: A Year of Deal Making

Posted January 20th, 2012

Robert Baer and Joel Curts started offering lunch deals at DailyLunchDeal.com in February of 2011. Their bootstrapped startup was lean and they both had full time jobs at (now, Indy’s most recent tech IPO) Angie’s List.

The first time I heard about their site I thought – “great, who needs another Groupon clone?” But as I got more familiar with their business — first as a customer, later as a fan and ultimately as venture coach helping them think through the myriad issues entrepreneurs face when launching a startup — I quickly came to appreciate their special sauce. Not only were “The Lunchmen” great salesmen, they had a laser focus on lunch deals combined with a tight geo target. This enabled them to focus their efforts on a couple of key metrics. Signing up restaurants. And signing up consumers. No strategery. No BS. Just start building the business. In fact, they signed up enough of both to attract the attention of a consolidator of daily deal businesses – Crusader Deals. And in true Lunchmen form, they acted decisively and closed the deal! Daily Lunch Deal is now part of Crusader Deals.

Working with Robert and Joel was a wonderful part of my 2011. Most of all, they are always upbeat and positive about things and impressed me the most their work ethic and knowledge of their customer base — two things any successful entrepreneur most possess.

Entrepreneurs can spend years looking for that special idea for a business. Many spend years operating and growing a business. Lots spend years trying to exit. These guys did it all in about a year! This is equal parts testament to their abilities as entrepreneurs and proof of their bankability as entrepreneurs in the future. Congrats guys! Now, what’s next?

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Posted in Clients | No Comments »

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