FP ENTREPRENEUR: SPROUTER Goodhiresare goodbusiness, … · Name Infogr.am Website infogr.am/...
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FINANCIAL POST FP ENTREPRENEUR: SPROUTER Expert answers to startup questions. Connecting entrepreneurs with the advice they need on Sprouter.com TOOL OF THE WEEK: Company Name Grasshopper Website grasshopper.com Description Grasshopper lets you run your business using cellphones. Register a toll-free or local number, and then assign extensions to your employees’ cellphones. Users can call in, select an extension, and be immediately connected to your staff. Grasshopper features an online dash- board to manage numbers, call for- warding and voicemail. Hopping from place to place? Run your business via cellphones ClearFit founder Ben Baldwin always knew entrepreneur- ship was the right fit for him. “I’ve never really fit into the way other people think/act and I have a real problem with authority,” he said. Baldwin created ClearFit, a software product that enables businesses to hire based on cultural fit and experience, from a passion to help entre- preneurs tackle the hiring process. “My background is in building software for For- tune 500 companies, to help them predict hiring success. I worked with companies such as GlaxoSmithKline all across the U.S., Brazil, Russia,” he said. “But my true passion was in helping other entre- preneurs — and their biggest challenge [aside from cash- flow] is hiring. “Small businesses in North America spend $60-billion every year on job postings, recruiters, employee refer- ral strategies and recruiting software — but hiring is still broken: turnover and reten- tion haven’t improved in more than 30 years.” Baldwin said figuring out how to surround himself with the right people was his big- gest lesson as an entrepreneur. “ At first, it may feel like letting go, but then you realize that if you’ve done a good enough job hiring, you’re actually in far more control because they’re better than you at what they’re doing. They are the ultimate business driver and they’re also what frees you to focus on the stuff you’re best at, and they’re best at.” Hiring the right people seems to have paid off for To- ronto-based ClearFit, which has hit a milestone with 4,000 businesses using its product. “It shows how our message is resonating … especially in verticals like construction, franchise, retail, restaurants, financial services and tech/ startups.” There is no shortage of soft- ware products to help with hiring — RoundPegg and Taleo include applicant screening — but Baldwin said his solution, unlike theirs, is not designed for the HR community. “ ClearFit was built for business owners and hiring managers. These are typically people who would prefer to delegate hiring because it’s a task that’s such a pain — but it’s absolutely mission-critical. We’re empowering our users to take back hiring.” Another strategy used by ClearFit is to partner with large companies in the small busi- ness space, including Intuit and Staples. The key to build- ing and maintaining strong partnerships, Baldwin said, is picking partners carefully and making sure they get your full attention. “Once you know you’re on the same page, help partners sell their product, not yours. You’ll be invaluable to them. Pay them more than what they deserve — cannibalize their attention by becoming indis- pensable to them.” Baldwin’s biggest piece of advice is not to do it alone. “Get a co-founder, so you don’t go crazy. Otherwise, you’ll grow a beard and end up like Tom Hanks in Castaway.” Recently, ClearFit landed its first Fortune 500 customer, and Baldwin said commitment to its product likely helped. “We did one thing really well — better than the competition. We demonstrated this in a pi- lot and they just kept buying more and more from us. We’re really good at making good on our promises.” Which may be the reason for Baldwin’s optimism about the future: “We’re on our way to building a billion-dollar business. The $60-billion North American SMB hiring market is massive, so we’re focusing hard on our verti- cals,” he said. Sprouter.com Good hires are good business, founder finds IN MORE CONTROL A skanyearly-stagestart- up who its competi- tors are and it should have several names at hand, with at least one well-known brand among them. It’s com- mon for the media, investors, and even users to compare startups to these household names, leading to the “it’s this for that” elevator pitch. There are countless examples: Bran- chOut is LinkedIn for Face- book users; Zappos is Amazon for shoes; and the list goes on. Being compared to an in- dustry leader isn’t a bad thing if it gives people context for what a business does. Since startups are often explor- ing new territory, compar- ing themselves to companies consumers know and trust can provide instant recogni- tion — as long as it’s a posi- tive association. Take the “ Craigslist for weddings,” Toronto-based company SmartBrideBou- tique.com. Andrea Lown real- ized after planning her own wedding just how expensive they could be. She was only engaged for five months, which made it difficult to find a wedding dress, which often need to be ordered up to a year in advance to allow for custom orders, shipping and alterations. “Shops were literally turn- ing away my money as I tried to jam it in their hands in re- turn for a dress off the rack,” Lown said in an interview. “Eventually I turned to eBay and Craigslist.” A friend of hers had just purchased a dress from a Toronto bride for her wedding using Craigslist and saved more than $2,000, and didn’t have to worry about short time lines. It was after searching Craigslist that she realized the limitations to finding a used dress online. There was often information missing in post- ings, pictures weren’t always available, or when they were they weren’t high quality. That’s when she decided to build a destination for brides buying and selling used wed- ding gowns. She launched the company in 2008, right when brides affected by the reces- sion were looking for wallet- friendly alternatives. Lown said describing SmartBride as ‘Craigslist for weddings’ was her “short and snappy” elevator pitch right out of the gate. “It told people exactly what we did in under three seconds, leaving us time to explain how we were different and better,” she said. She said it helped people understand the concept im- mediately, with allowed them to answer their other ques- tions. One of those questions is whether people actually buy and sell wedding dresses online, and the company found that 75% of Canadian women surveyed were inter- ested in buying a once-worn wedding dress for various reasons. While comparisons of- fer immediate recognition, sometimes they carry nega- tive connotations associated with the larger brand. Lown said that when people as- sociated SmartBride with Craigslist, they often associ- ated buying a used wedding dress with the typical experi- ence of Craigslist (which she calls “poor”), which is exactly what they set out to improve. With over 60,000 brides visiting the SmartBride every month, Lown is increasingly looking to serve both private sellers and boutiques who sell discounted and sample items. The company might be immediately recognizable as the “Craigslist for weddings,” but it’s creating a brand that’s uniquely its own. Financial Post Erin Bury is managing editor at BetaKit, an emerging tech publication launched by Sprouter.com. If you have emerging tech news get in touch at [email protected]. Search for ‘the dress’ led to online niche SmartBride is ‘Craigslist for weddings’ E RIN B URY Startup Spotlight MATTHEW SHERWOOD FOR NATIONAL POST From left, StartupNorth’s Jonas Brandon chats with Ben Baldwin, of Clearfit, Chris Eben, of The Working Group, and Kirk Simpson, co-founder and CEO of Wave Accounting, during the Sprout Up event on Tuesday, May 22. Last Tuesday, more than 300 entrepreneurs gathered at The Courthouse in Toronto for Sprout Up, an event or- ganized by Sprouter to bring together the local startup community. The event series has gained notoriety in the tech world for featuring star- tup demos from up-and-com- ing local companies, as well as bringing in speakers from around the world. Past startup demos have included Tiny- Hippos, which was acquired by RIM, and Backtype, which was bought by Twitter. This month’s demos were Cream. hr, mi Lifemap and Uberflip. The event was attended by a diverse group of new entre- preneurs, successful business leaders, investors and media. Up and coming startup found- ers such as Flixel’s Phil Le- blanc and 500px founder Oleg Gutsol could be seen sharing ideas with veteran entrepre- neurs, including Idee founder Leila Boujnane and Home- stars’ Brian Sharwood. Canada’s investment com- munity was also well repre- sented, with members from Mantella Ventures, Klass Capital and Loewen & Part- ners sharing business stories alongside previous Sprout Up presenters such as Tradyo’s Gideon Hayden, and Second- Menu’s Ben Roberts. The most talked about as- pect of Sprout Up events are the guest speakers, and past editions have included entre- preneur Gary Vaynerchuk and sought-after investors like Tony Conrad and Charlie O’Donnell. This month’s speaker was entrepreneur and celebrated marketing guru Sean Ellis, who is cred- ited with bringing success- ful companies like Dropbox and LogMeIn to market. Ellis shared his advice on achieving product / market fit and was applauded for giving candid, actionable ideas to the crowd. The three startups that pre- sented on Tuesday are all in- novators in their space. Cream. hr provides applicant screen- ing through advanced person- ality testing; mi Lifemap helps families build timelines of their personal milestones; and Uberflip turns PDF files into interactive, online experiences. For more information on future events, follow the Sprout Up Meetup page at meetup.com/sproutupto STARTUPS MINGLE AT MONTHLY MEETING ROBERT VOS / AFP / GETTY IMAGES FILES Women wearing their wedding dresses enjoy a dip in the ocean at Scheveningen, Netherlands, copying a U.S. phenomenon called “Trash the Dress.” Many women are choosing, instead, to sell their dresses on sites such as SmartBride. HOT STARTUPS Name Infogr.am Website infogr.am/ Location Riga, Latvia Founders Uldis Leiterts, Raimonds Kaže Description Infogr.am lets you create colourful, inter- active infographics quickly & easily. Choose a design from their pre-built templates, add your data via several import options, and share your info- graphic through social media, or embed it into your site. Name Zimride Website zimride.com/ Location San Francisco Founders Logan Green, John Zimmer Description Zimride helps you find rideshare and carpool opportunities within your community. Focusing on col- lege, university, and corpor- ate communities, Zimride is building a network of users to help you find friends, class- mates, and coworkers going the same way you are. Name Circle Website discovercircle.com/ Location Palo Alto, Calif. Founders Evan Reas Description Circle helps you find who’s around you. Using the location of your mobile device, Circle alerts you when friends are nearby, and helps you discover new networks based on where you are. Avail- able for iPhone and Android devices, Circle also features privacy controls to limit who can contact you. Name Hachi Website gohachi.com Location San Ramon, Calif. Founders Rachna Singh Description Hachi helps you connect with people via the smartest route possible. Mak- ing use of your social network and email connections, Hachi finds the best path to connect with someone outside of your network using the people and connections you already know and trust. FP6 financialpost.com Δ NATIONAL POST, MONDAY, MAY 28, 2012
Transcript of FP ENTREPRENEUR: SPROUTER Goodhiresare goodbusiness, … · Name Infogr.am Website infogr.am/...
F I N A N C I A L P O S T
F P E N T R E P R E N E U R : S P R O U T E R
Expert answers to startup
questions. Connecting
entrepreneurs with the advice
they need on Sprouter.com
T O O L O F T H E W E E K :
Company Name GrasshopperWebsite grasshopper.comDescription Grasshopper lets yourun your business using cellphones.Register a toll-free or local number,and then assign extensions to your
employees’ cellphones. Users cancall in, select an extension, and beimmediately connected to your staff.Grasshopper features an online dash-board to manage numbers, call for-warding and voicemail.
Hopping fromplace to place?
Run your businessvia cellphones
ClearFit founder Ben Baldwinalways knew entrepreneur-ship was the right fit for him.“I’ve never really fit into theway other people think/actand I have a real problem withauthority,” he said.
Baldwin created ClearFit, asoftware product that enablesbusinesses to hire based oncultural fit and experience,from a passion to help entre-preneurs tackle the hiringprocess. “My background isin building software for For-
tune 500 companies, to helpthem predict hiring success.I worked with companiessuch as GlaxoSmithKline allacross the U.S., Brazil, Russia,”he said. “But my true passionwas in helping other entre-preneurs — and their biggestchallenge [aside from cash-flow] is hiring.
“Small businesses in NorthAmerica spend $60-billionevery year on job postings,recruiters, employee refer-ral strategies and recruitingsoftware — but hiring is stillbroken: turnover and reten-tion haven’t improved in morethan 30 years.”
Baldwin said figuring outhow to surround himself withthe right people was his big-gest lesson as an entrepreneur.“At first, it may feel like lettinggo, but then you realize that ifyou’ve done a good enough jobhiring, you’re actually in farmore control because they’rebetter than you at what they’redoing. They are the ultimatebusiness driver and they’realso what frees you to focuson the stuff you’re best at, andthey’re best at.”
Hiring the right peopleseems to have paid off for To-ronto-based ClearFit, whichhas hit a milestone with 4,000businesses using its product.“It shows how our messageis resonating … especially inverticals like construction,franchise, retail, restaurants,financial services and tech/startups.”
There is no shortage of soft-ware products to help withhiring — RoundPegg and Taleoinclude applicant screening —but Baldwin said his solution,unlike theirs, is not designedfor the HR community.
“ClearFit was built forbusiness owners and hiringmanagers. These are typicallypeople who would prefer todelegate hiring because it’s atask that’s such a pain — butit’s absolutely mission-critical.We’re empowering our usersto take back hiring.”
Another strategy used byClearFit is to partner with largecompanies in the small busi-ness space, including Intuitand Staples. The key to build-ing and maintaining strongpartnerships, Baldwin said, ispicking partners carefully andmaking sure they get your fullattention.
“Once you know you’re onthe same page, help partnerssell their product, not yours.You’ll be invaluable to them.Pay them more than what theydeserve — cannibalize theirattention by becoming indis-pensable to them.”
Baldwin’s biggest piece ofadvice is not to do it alone.“Get a co-founder, so you don’tgo crazy. Otherwise, you’ llgrow a beard and end up likeTom Hanks in Castaway.”
Recently, ClearFit landedits first Fortune 500 customer,andBaldwinsaidcommitmentto its product likely helped.“We did one thing really well— better than the competition.We demonstrated this in a pi-lot and they just kept buyingmore and more from us. We’rereally good at making good onour promises.”
Which may be the reasonfor Baldwin’s optimism aboutthe future: “We’re on our wayto building a billion-dollarbusiness. The $60-billionNorth American SMB hiringmarket is massive, so we’refocusing hard on our verti-cals,” he said.
Sprouter.com
Good hires aregood business,founder finds
IN MORE CONTROL
A skanyearly-stagestart-up who its competi-tors are and it should
have several names at hand,with at least one well-knownbrand among them. It’s com-mon for the media, investors,and even users to comparestartups to these householdnames, leading to the “it’s thisfor that” elevator pitch. Thereare countless examples: Bran-chOut is LinkedIn for Face-book users; Zappos is Amazonfor shoes; and the list goes on.
Being compared to an in-dustry leader isn’t a bad thingif it gives people context forwhat a business does. Sincestartups are often explor-ing new territory, compar-ing themselves to companiesconsumers know and trustcan provide instant recogni-tion — as long as it’s a posi-tive association.
Take the “Craigslist forweddings,” Toronto-basedcompany SmartBrideBou-tique.com. Andrea Lown real-ized after planning her ownwedding just how expensivethey could be. She was onlyengaged for five months,which made it difficult tofind a wedding dress, whichoften need to be ordered upto a year in advance to allowfor custom orders, shippingand alterations.
“Shops were literally turn-ing away my money as I triedto jam it in their hands in re-turn for a dress off the rack,”Lown said in an interview.“Eventually I turned to eBayand Craigslist.” A friend ofhers had just purchased adress from a Toronto bride forher wedding using Craigslistand saved more than $2,000,and didn’t have to worryabout short time lines.
It was after searchingCraigslist that she realized thelimitations to finding a useddress online. There was ofteninformation missing in post-ings, pictures weren’t alwaysavailable, or when they werethey weren’t high quality.That’s when she decided tobuild a destination for bridesbuying and selling used wed-ding gowns. She launched thecompany in 2008, right whenbrides affected by the reces-sion were looking for wallet-friendly alternatives.
Lown said describingSmartBride as ‘Craigslist forweddings’ was her “short and
snappy” elevator pitch rightout of the gate. “It told peopleexactly what we did in underthree seconds, leaving ustime to explain how we weredifferent and better,” she said.She said it helped peopleunderstand the concept im-mediately, with allowed themto answer their other ques-tions.
One of those questions iswhether people actually buyand sell wedding dressesonline, and the companyfound that 75% of Canadianwomen surveyed were inter-ested in buying a once-wornwedding dress for variousreasons.
While comparisons of-fer immediate recognition,sometimes they carry nega-tive connotations associatedwith the larger brand. Lownsaid that when people as-sociated SmartBride withCraigslist, they often associ-ated buying a used weddingdress with the typical experi-ence of Craigslist (which shecalls “poor”), which is exactlywhat they set out to improve.
With over 60,000 bridesvisiting the SmartBride everymonth, Lown is increasinglylooking to serve both privatesellers and boutiques whosell discounted and sampleitems. The company might beimmediately recognizable asthe “Craigslist for weddings,”but it’s creating a brand that’suniquely its own.
Financial Post
Erin Bury is managing editorat BetaKit, an emerging tech
publication launched bySprouter.com. If you have
emerging tech news get in touchat [email protected].
Search for ‘the dress’led to online niche
SmartBrideis ‘Craigslist
for weddings’
E R I N B U R YStartup Spotlight
MATTHEW SHERWOOD FOR NATIONAL POST
From left, StartupNorth’s Jonas Brandon chats with Ben Baldwin, of Clearfit, Chris Eben, of The Working Group, andKirk Simpson, co-founder and CEO of Wave Accounting, during the Sprout Up event on Tuesday, May 22.
Last Tuesday, more than 300entrepreneurs gathered atThe Courthouse in Torontofor Sprout Up, an event or-ganized by Sprouter to bringtogether the local startupcommunity. The event serieshas gained notoriety in thetech world for featuring star-tup demos from up-and-com-ing local companies, as wellas bringing in speakers fromaround the world. Past startupdemos have included Tiny-Hippos, which was acquiredby RIM, and Backtype, whichwas bought by Twitter. Thismonth’s demos were Cream.hr, mi Lifemap and Uberflip.
The event was attended bya diverse group of new entre-preneurs, successful businessleaders, investors and media.Up and coming startup found-ers such as Flixel’s Phil Le-blanc and 500px founder OlegGutsol could be seen sharingideas with veteran entrepre-neurs, including Idee founderLeila Boujnane and Home-stars’ Brian Sharwood.
Canada’s investment com-munity was also well repre-sented, with members fromMantella Ventures, KlassCapital and Loewen & Part-ners sharing business storiesalongside previous Sprout Uppresenters such as Tradyo’sGideon Hayden, and Second-Menu’s Ben Roberts.
The most talked about as-pect of Sprout Up events arethe guest speakers, and pasteditions have included entre-preneur Gary Vaynerchukand sought-after investorslike Tony Conrad and CharlieO’Donnell . This month’sspeaker was entrepreneurand celebrated marketingguru Sean Ellis, who is cred-ited with bringing success-ful companies like Dropboxand LogMeIn to market. Ellisshared his advice on achievingproduct / market fit and wasapplauded for giving candid,actionable ideas to the crowd.
The three startups that pre-sented on Tuesday are all in-novators in their space. Cream.hr provides applicant screen-ing through advanced person-ality testing; mi Lifemap helpsfamilies build timelines oftheir personal milestones; andUberflip turns PDF files intointeractive, online experiences.
For more informationon future events, follow theSprout Up Meetup page at
meetup.com/sproutupto
STARTUPSMINGLE ATMONTHLYMEETING
ROBERT VOS / AFP / GETTY IMAGES FILES
Women wearing their wedding dresses enjoy a dip in the ocean at Scheveningen,Netherlands, copying a U.S. phenomenon called “Trash the Dress.” Many women
are choosing, instead, to sell their dresses on sites such as SmartBride.
H O TS T A R T U P S
Name Infogr.amWebsite infogr.am/Location Riga, LatviaFounders Uldis Leiterts,Raimonds Ka�eDescription Infogr.am letsyou create colourful, inter-active infographics quickly &easily. Choose a design fromtheir pre-built templates, addyour data via several importoptions, and share your info-graphic through social media,or embed it into your site.
Name ZimrideWebsite zimride.com/Location San FranciscoFounders Logan Green, JohnZimmerDescription Zimride helpsyou find rideshare and carpoolopportunities within yourcommunity. Focusing on col-lege, university, and corpor-ate communities, Zimride isbuilding a network of usersto help you find friends, class-mates, and coworkers goingthe same way you are.
Name CircleWebsite discovercircle.com/Location Palo Alto, Calif.Founders Evan ReasDescription Circle helps youfind who’s around you. Usingthe location of your mobiledevice, Circle alerts you whenfriends are nearby, and helpsyou discover new networksbased on where you are. Avail-able for iPhone and Androiddevices, Circle also featuresprivacy controls to limit whocan contact you.
Name HachiWebsite gohachi.comLocation San Ramon, Calif.Founders Rachna SinghDescription Hachi helps youconnect with people via thesmartest route possible. Mak-ing use of your social networkand email connections, Hachifinds the best path to connectwith someone outside of yournetwork using the people andconnections you already knowand trust.
FP6 financialpost.com � NATIONAL POST, MONDAY, MAY 28, 2012
