
Lessons Learned Going from Zero to $30k/Month in a Year - joshdance
http://groovehq.com/blog/first-year
======
patmcc
You know, I skimmed the article and liked it, and thought "hey, I'll check out
GrooveHQ.com, see what their deal is" since I haven't heard of them before.

And I get to a page where the only way to learn more is to watch a video.
Instant turnoff. I'm in a quiet place, I don't want to make noise or plug my
headphones in just to have any idea what it is you actually do. Please
consider that people might want to read something about you on your signup
page.

~~~
bbwharris
I've said this before, but they wouldn't do it if it didn't work. Just google
"video engagement vs. text engagement". It really does increase conversions
and alleviates a lot of confusion. It doesn't excuse the need for descriptive
text, but rather complements any online offering. Seeing is believing.

I agree with this sentiment, I too avoid video, but it is a very easily
digestible format for a lot of people. Think about Leap Motion, would it have
nearly been as interesting without the impressive video showing you why it's
interesting?

~~~
Ruska
That's their choice, obviously. I hate being forced to watch a video, and when
I land on a page that only has video content I leave.

~~~
bbwharris
I used to do that too. Now I squash my overwhelming desire to leave and I give
it a shot. Almost everytime, I leave with a much better understanding of the
product.

~~~
teddyh
But are you better for it, or have you just spent more time of your life
watching what are, essentially, ads?

~~~
bbwharris
I honestly think I am getting a quicker understanding than skimming a bunch of
text and letting my brain fill in the rest. So sure, I'm better for having
taken the time.

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alexbardas
Great post, really made me take a deeper look into the product.

I wasn't disturbed by the short video which explains most / all the features,
but I can see the need of also having them as separate web pages (also useful
for SEO).

My main concern is that there is no free version at all, even for smaller
teams / startups (1-2 members) and I don't know if it's possible to import
data from other customer support SAAS.

~~~
alexmturnbull
Glad you enjoyed the post! re: free version-We have a 14 day free trial and
are always willing to work with other startups on price. Ping me at
alex@groovehq.com and we chat more...

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basicallydan
I've had a quick read, and I think this is a pretty comprehensive post and I
suspect it'll be useful in the future. Especially inclusion of "a bunch of
other posts to read on various blogs in a spreadsheet" \- that's awesome.

Another thing that's awesome: "There's no magic bullet".

Thanks for a good read.

~~~
alexmturnbull
Glad you liked it! That spreadsheet was my favorite easter egg :)

~~~
gknoy
I especially liked the way you frankly talked about the fears that we all
have, and then gave concrete resources, more than most might easily find.
Thank you!

------
ateevchopra
_There’s no way to make smart decisions with that sort of self-doubt.

Fortunately, it can be overcome. There are so many entrepreneurs who are
smarter, more experienced and more successful than I am. Much of their wisdom
is available for free on the internet.'_

This is exactly why now startups straight out out college are getting
successful. Students, who are mature enough have an ocean of knowledge and
experience on their click. I can understand that experience can only be
gained, but a wise is one who learn from others mistakes. You can not commit
all the mistakes in your single life.

Earlier people used to avoid funding to fresh entrepreneurs, but today
"unexperienced" ones can easily "evolve" and become immune to some common
traps startups experience. That is why it is said that if you really want to
change the world, read and read a lot.

[http://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/oct/15/neil-gaiman-
fut...](http://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/oct/15/neil-gaiman-future-
libraries-reading-daydreaming)

------
chrismorgan
FYI: in the sentence "Simplifying our onboarding quadrupaled our completion
rate" (one of the images), "quadrupled" is misspelled.

~~~
alexmturnbull
good call, definitely gotta fix that one. Thanks for the heads up :)

------
taude
Funny, we're already recycling tech company names. Any one remember the cool
group collaboration tool (until MSFT bought them) called Groove[1]?

I think the former Groove inspired a lot of what became Web 2.0 productivity
tools. It was definitely at the forefront of such.

[1]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groove_Networks](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groove_Networks)

Edit: I should add, good article

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closedatbracket
I went to the main blog page, but completely missed the link to this article.
Instead I was looking at the iconic images as the table of contents, looking
for the latest article. The "intro" of this article didnt look like a link to
a longer article, and there was no underlined link to click, so I didn't try
to click it. May be a use ability issue?

------
codyod
Thank you for sharing. This has given me good ideas to follow through as I try
to build up my product. How much resources (capital wise + hours) did you
expend? You say in earlier post, 250K bootstrap fund. What percentage on this
particular effort?

------
benlarcey
Interesting you're spending at least 10% of monthly revenue on BounceExchange.
Does it provide ROI? The product looks great but the pricing is another
matter!

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kostyk
was there initial funding or everything bootstrapped?

~~~
alexmturnbull
Self-funded with 250k.

------
exo_duz
Thanks for sharing. I believe the experiences you have learnt can help me
along my way building my own startup.

------
dain
No Doctype on this page:
[http://www.groovehq.com/users/sign_in](http://www.groovehq.com/users/sign_in)

If this is rails, just add the doctype to the layout you are using for devise
sessions. Easy to overlook. Not smart to be missing in production.

~~~
IbJacked
Shouldn't be an issue, a doctype declaration is optional in html5. Are you
aware of anything not working correctly without it?

------
briankim
Thank you for sharing!

~~~
alexmturnbull
Glad you liked it!

------
rfnslyr
Fantastic series of articles. I like that you included strategies you've used
and actually uploaded documents for the public to see. Keeping it real is the
only way to go.

I'm tired of articles written by someone hard working, trying to abstract all
their efforts into a certain few points relevant to really their own situation
only. The most you get out of these is an ooh or ahh. These types of articles
are unintentionally predatory to wannabe entrepreneurs, which in reality, only
serve to boost _your_ revenue and traffic.

I want to hear specific conversations you've had, email exchanges, social
strategies you've used, things you've read that have literally _changed your
life and perspective_. Give us a peek into your mind and how it works. Not one
off points you thought of on an evening and decided to make a blog post. Spend
a month, two months, three months, a half year gathering data, and make a post
full of integrity with defined goals in mind. Outline a path you took, tell us
where you went wrong and why.

Looking forward to more in this series.

OP what do you recommend as reading material? Any books/authors that helped
you?

~~~
probablyfiction
Too often on HN, a "How My Company Did X" post doesn't include how Company
actually performed X. They're typically generalized stories about platitudes.
Kudos to Groove for following through with a concrete series of steps they
performed that helped them accomplish their goal.

~~~
alexmturnbull
Thanks! We promised to bare it all :)

~~~
diminish
How many extra customers would being number 1 on HN bring? Would love to hear
if you ve got such a number.

~~~
alexmturnbull
Post coming up very soon about that affect :)

~~~
shovel
Looking forward to it.

There are a lot of well-intentioned opinions here but it'll be interesting to
see if there's any correlation with your real-world data and conversions.

I -for one- am really interested in following your growth but I'm not in the
market for a support service (yet). I'm not your customer, why would you care
what I think about your UX and whether or not you should have a video lander?

