Belgrade, Dublin, Istambul, Vienna
When you launch startup and brand new project, besides the market research, you need feedback from the biggest IT communities. You need proof from users, but you need proof that your business idea is worth of investments. That's why we decided to apply for several most famous It events, WebSummit, WebitCongress , Pioneers Festival.
Applying for the WebSummit was like "ok let's try, we don't have nothing to loose". What I liked the most is the simplicity of the application process. I have left the basic info about me and the startup, and very soon I received an Alpha call interview invitation. From that moment whole Ekipa.me team was in some sort of rush. Ok, we need good pitch, no, we need excellent elevator pitch. We need to explain our business idea within the 30 seconds?! And we did. Soon, after the Alpha call we received confirmation that Ekipa.me is selected in Alpha program of WebSummit.
The next big surprise for us was our entrance in the semi-final of the Global Webit Congress Founders Games. If I thought for a second that selection in Alpha program of WebSummit happened by chance, Webit semi-final sounded like confirmation that we are doing right thing. And that's why is important for startups to always search for the community feedback. When you receive the second invitation from the biggest IT event, you start immediately improving everything. We redesigned web site, made sign-up form, created social networks, created complete plan how to test the market, to find out if users and business are interested to use our service. For less than one week, we produced more than 20 documents. This is the power of entrepreneurial spirit. You are empowered to be creative for yourself, for your startup, you are thinking about the strategy 24/7 day, by day and nothing is not impossible. And what we needed to do in order to attract users.
The third big surprise was invitation from another tech festival, Pioneers, to apply and try to pass their selection. And yes, we applied and will hopefully pass the jury selection.
Three biggest tech festivals are in front of us. Investors and competitors are waiting for us to jump into the pool. We expect to exchange experience with other startups, to enter the A-selection and to find an investor who recognizes potential in our business idea.
