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How a simple comment on Hacker News made me quit my job and launch a startup
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- eaxitect 16y agoI've found it very inspirational and informative...
- mindcrime 16y agoThat is one awesome story, congrats! I was especially struck by some of the stuff you said about product/market fit. To me, this bit is pure gold: We started engaging with our prospects on what they were currently using and what problems they were facing. In many cases people were telling us clearly what they really wanted to see in their customer support software. Yeah, that's the key, right? Actually engaging with the customers and finding out what problem they're really trying to solve. This cuts to the core of sgblank's Customer Development stuff and the whole Lean Startup movement. We were surprised to see that a lot of what customers wanted were their core problems solved and not some fancy features of supporting customers from their Facebook wall or converting tweets into customer support tickets. While we understand that these are definitely the way of the future, many many customers do not need this today. Heh, perfect example of how us techies can get caught upin the fancy, glitzy, "cool" stuff and maybe not realize that customers are not so concerned about that, as they are getting work done. Really, really good reminder to focus on the customer's needs! Another important learning for us was that customers did not want to be dealing with separate invoices for their helpdesk, their contact management software, for their customer feedback forums and customer satisfaction surveys. The SMB customer wants one invoice and as much functionality as possible in the customer relationship management solution. That's gold too... It reminds me that sometimes the "problem" isn't so much a technical problem, as a structural problem with the existing business arrangements. Wanting one invoice instead of 3 or 4 is a wonderful example of a problem an entrepreneur can solve, and it doesn't have anything to do with product features or technology. Reading this is like having a glass of cold water thrown in your face (well, for some of us!) We also identified underserved market segments (companies with multi-brand support requirements) and segments which were getting priced out because the current solutions were expensive. So we reprioritized our feature set to what we thought is the ideal product/market fit for us. This means that things like Twitter and Facebook integration can wait. But things like multiple support emails or support for SLAs and Business hours are in. Very inspiring. Thanks for sharing such details about your experience. I think a lot of people can learn something useful from your experience. You've certainly given me some thoughts to chew on.
- vibhavs 16y agoThe name is a little too close to ZenDesk, isn't it? Especially since the two companies are in the same market.
- vibhavs 16y agoWhy downvote? I feel the comparison is inevitable.
- MatthewPhillips 16y agoCongratulations! Makes me want to do the same thing.
- chime 16y agoZoho is most probably the best known tech startup from India that isn't in the typical call-center or medical transcription business. As key Zoho employees go on to build in their own companies, this could bring SV/YC culture in India where success does not mean finding a big check-writer from US but rather building products that users from around the world can use and buy. Keep up the good work FreshDesk.
- kirpekar 16y agoCongratulations and nice write-up! Can I ask how the startup is doing financially?
- girishm 16y agoWe are in private beta so the money is yet to flow in:)
- victorantos 16y agois it worth it?
- guylhem 16y agoBeautiful story. The way you listed to the market, built the right product in the right moment - just perfect. One think caught my eye: $160 for your office space?? From what I've seen on http://blog.freshdesk.com/freshdesk-gets-a-fresh-office http://blog.freshdesk.com/freshdesk-gets-a-fresh-office it looks very decent. Your burn rate is also quite good. How easy is it for a non indian to start a company in India?
- orenmazor 16y agoI took away the same thing. Thats a fantastic burn rate. especially compared to a [hardware] startup I worked at that had a burn rate that'll make your eyes water.
- girishm 16y agoOk. One thing regarding the office space. The place we got was a 700 sq ft rectangle that looked like a run down warehouse. We spent approx 3k for the paint,flooring and cubicles. It is in an upcoming suburb. A similar space in a prime locality will cost at least 5x the price.
- karolist 16y agoVery inspirational story. May I ask what software was used to make the "Fresh Office" video? Looks polished.
- girishm 16y agoJust the simple iPhoto slideshow on Mac and screenflow for screen capture
- statictype 16y agoIs this in Chennai? Whereabout in Chennai?
- enjo 16y agoI'm not sure you have to go all the way to India for that. Here in Denver we had Downtown office space (about 1200 sq. ft.) for $500/month on a sublet. That's about $0.41/ft as compared to $0.21/ft for freshdesk. Sure it's about double, but they're within shouting distance of each other. Our four person team had a burn rate of about $12k/month at that point... again, about double but still really manageable. Given our access to capital in Boulder, it was a really nice situation all around.
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- wensing 16y agoOne word of caution--do not, I repeat do NOT, focus on price ("we are cheaper") as the main reason for people to use you. People who are "priced out" of other solutions still need to buy in to whatever you are doing, beyond price, or else you risk losing those customers to your competitors should your competitors offer a cheaper/simple plan. You're off to a great start (I just signed up for the beta), but make sure you do the hard work of selecting your target customer ("who will we NOT serve?") and don't preach price--preach superior experiences.
- jonnathanson 16y agoExactly. Or, if you do want to compete on price, make sure you're competing for the customer set who cares mostly about price. This is usually a less sophisticated and less needy customer base, which can be a good thing. But it's also a less stable customer base, and generally, you need that many more customers just to get to the same revenue potential as a handful of larger customers with a more expensive product. There are tradeoffs everywhere; just make sure you know which ones you're seeking and which ones you're consciously avoiding.
- melvinram 16y agoIn my experience, "the customer set who cares mostly about price" is almost always never the "less needy customer base." In my experience, the customers set who cares least about price are almost always the least needy customer base. Just my anecdotal experience.
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- jonnathanson 16y agoDepends on the category, really. Also, by "needy," I'm talking primarily about preferences for, or requirements of, feature richness. Really should have phrased it as "fewer (feature) needs" rather than "less needy."
- 16y ago
- mdolon 16y agoPretty inspiring, though I hope you add a live demo to your main site (maybe to handle support? :). I know as a potential customer, I'm hesitant to pay for anything I haven't seen and interacted with.
- girishm 16y agoWe have a live version in private beta. I plan to post it to HN for feedback as soon as we are ready for the public launch.
- maheshs 16y agoSome UI issue while mouse over SSL on Firefox 4 http://imgur.com/yktw8 http://imgur.com/yktw8
- heyitsnick 16y agoSame in chrome 10 windows 7
- girishm 16y agoThanks for letting us know. Will fix it soon.
- Straubiz 16y agoawesome story! Very inspiring
- daimyoyo 16y agoGreat post. Reading HN is better motivation than any cheesy book on the market. I love HN. :)
- luckystrike 16y agoNow we have a team of six people - (3 developers, 1 UI/UX designer, 1 QA / Customer support engineer and me as - the Product Manager / CEO) It would be great if you could throw some light on how you went about building this team and your hiring process. In my experience, it ain't easy here in India to find quality talent willing to work in an early stage startup whose product is still not out in the market. Did they come through the connections made during your Zoho stint? All the best for this venture!
- girishm 16y agoYes. That is one advantage that I had working at Zoho for nine years. Everyone in the team has worked with me at zoho. 3 of the 6 people had worked with me at Zoho and had moved on to other companies. They came back to work for Freshdesk as they believed in the ability of the team to ship products.
- luckystrike 16y agoGreat. I think it also helps that you were at a senior position in Zoho. Apart from the visibility and a large network, it probably makes it a little more convincing for people who are on the fence when it comes to joining such a venture.
- psyren 16y agoDoing this right now, have just submitted for YCS2011 :-)
- cpeterso 16y agoGreat focus on MVP and a lean team. Designing a usable service for outsourced "enterprisey" software is challenging because your customers (a company's HR dept, in this case?) are not your users (support desk employees and the company's own customers). These three sets of people will all have different feature requirements.
- evancaine 16y agoYour design looks great. You mentioned that getmefast did it and I had a look at their portfolio which isn't as strong in my opinion as your design and UI. Did you UI designer have to change what they came up with?
- Candlemoat 16y agoYou lost me when you said you liked the idea of 99designs.
- themonk 16y agoCongrats Girish. Unrelated question: as of now your post is number one on hacker news, would you like to share what does it mean in term of traffic on your blog?
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- girishm 16y agoI will wait for one more day and then share some stats if people are interested in knowing about this.
- phillijw 16y agoYou can't win if you don't play.
- credo 16y agoCongratulations on the launch (and welcome to HN, since I see that your account is just 3 hours old :) That said, your post suggests that you acquired domain knowledge at Zendesk, then decided to use that knowledge to immediately and directly compete with Zendesk with price as your only differentiatior. I suspect that the folks at Zendesk aren't going to sue you on any non-compete or trade-secret agreements, but I'm curious to know if you think that your competition raises any ethical concerns or not. [edit] Thanks for the correction, Aditya and apologies Girish for reading the post too fast and confusing Zoho with Zendesk
- retube 16y agoIt's a great post. But I'm posting here to gripe: why oh why do so many blogs never have a direct link to their business front page? It's always to the blog front page. You see a blog article posted, interesting read, the next thing you want to do is visit the front page. grrrr.
- bhaile 16y agoInteresting you say that as that is one of my gripes about blogs on company websites.
- sushilchoudhari 16y agoAwesome story Girish, very inspiring and down to earth!Loved the simplicity and the way you approached product market fit! We as tecchies more often than not, deprioritize the part of finding out what the customer really wants. Thanks for sharing and Good Luck!
- stretchwithme 16y agoGlad to hear it. A great example of how sharing information, once again, helps people to take bold action.
- OmarIsmail 16y agoI have to say that your post on how to get a corporation in the US is fantastic. I'm sure there's a lot of information out there, and it's something many people have done before, but the fact that you laid it out extremely clearly and gave very relevant contact information is amazing. Really great stuff.
- joelhaasnoot 16y agoDefinitely good information to have. Lots of services and startups, especially those for payments, phones or other geographically constrained industries (which really need a good startup to disrupt them), never make it outside the US. However, from the comments I gather you need some sort of US SSN to be able to get the Braintree account? Any other "hickups" to non-US citizens? I ask because one day that might be the best solution for what I work on and expanding to the US.
- gopi 16y agoVery inspiring...Goodluck Girish!
- anand_21 16y agothanks for putting a inspirational example for Indian startups
- Nugem 16y agoThe word STARTUP is starting to SUCK the life out of me. It is now as bad as "epic" and "fail" with the word being used in 1/8th of every headline on HN. THANKS!!!!!!
- mtogo 16y agoYou are on a forum about startups.
- roadnottaken 16y agogreat story. FYI - the mouse-overs for the 'Premium' price plan are broken in both Chrome and Firefox for me (Win7). they get cut off at the edge of the white-border.
- mtogo 16y agoSaw the word "cloud", scrolled down, yep-- business guy.
- dedward 16y agoGood Luck..... I guess this sort of explains what's up with AdventNet and it's quirks too... all the good people left?
- girishm 16y agoDefinitely no. Zoho(AdventNet) was the best thing that happened to me in my (work) life. It's an amazing company with over 1200 employees with very smart engineers and a kick-ass product culture. I owe everything that I learned in Product Management to AdventNet. It's a huge playground for people who are not afraid to try new things. I used to tell my team members that working in Zoho is like getting an MBA on how to build a Product Business.
- RobertL 16y agoGO FOR IT!! Great decision.
- khsdf7 16y agoFrankly, this isn't very interesting. Some guy gets inspired to launch a startup, grows a company beyond the bare minimum, and we are supposed to swoon? Come back when you have 150 employees and the competition is begging for mercy. Then sing to us about the blood sweat and tears. People get inspired to launch startups all the time, and some of them become great businesses. Some of them fail miserably. Lets all do ourselves a favor and not praise effort before it bears fruit.
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]