
Show HN: Homeroom, a new edtech startup – any advice appreciated - anishdhar
http://www.homeroom.me
======
anishdhar
My two friends and I recently started an edtech started called Homeroom (it's
live at homeroom.me) to promote collaboration and discussion in the classroom.
It's a free online website that acts as a forum for students and teachers to
answer each others' questions and discuss classroom content. We launched about
three days ago and we've gotten about 900 total users including students just
in a few schools we've reached out too in the bay area.

Does anyone have any advice on how to best reach out to teachers in other
districts? We've been cold emailing teachers for now and seem to have a hit or
miss with them. When we get a chance to explain ourselves teachers are really
interested and we can usually get them to sign up with a class. Any advice
would be much appreciated! More detailed info can be found at
[https://angel.co/homeroom](https://angel.co/homeroom).

~~~
superuser2
Your product sounds like Piazza. My computer science department uses it
extensively - combination Q&A, announcements, and a sort of ticketing system
for the TAs. It's a great tool. It's a powerful and innovative place to take
fairly standard web application technology.

Why should I use your product instead of Piazza?

If you believe you can beat Piazza, then figuring out how Piazza got its
marketshare might be a good place to start. I gather they have decent
penetration in the higher ed market.

~~~
abhishek776
Thanks a lot for the feedback. My name is Abhishek Fatehpuria and I'm also a
cofounder with Homeroom.

Theres a couple reasons why we think we're better than piazza.

1) Our discussion software yields higher quality discussion by having a more
steady stream and well organized posts. 2) We're releasing more features which
enables even more collaboration and discussion. Piazza only goes as far as
posts and answers. We are going to do a lot more very soon. 3) Our target
market right now has actually been the K12 market. We find that the softwares
in that space right now are not that good and its incredibly fragmented.

That being said, I use piazza in school and I love it, and we know its pretty
entrenched already in the higher-ed not K12 market.

Please let us know if you have more questions/feedback

------
superasn
I think this text should be on the homepage: "Homeroom creates a secure
environment for students and teachers to bring intellectual discussions from
class and other parts of their educational experiences to the web. "

------
zercool
The first thing you show is a signup page. Why would I sign up if I find no
value in the site?

"Where the world comes to learn"

If it's a forum, learn from stackoverflow, reddit, 4chan, etc: give everyone
your content, and if people find value and want to contribute, they'll sign
up.

~~~
notduncansmith
Yeah, I was pretty fuzzy on what exactly the software is/does.

A video would be awesome. I would understand them wanting to provide some
layer of security for students/teachers by not allowing open access, but a
demo area or even some screenshots would solve the "What am I signing up for?"
problem.

~~~
anishdhar
true, thanks for the feedback! I agree it is hard to understand the product
simply from looking at the first page, we have an about page at
[http://www.homeroom.me/about](http://www.homeroom.me/about) and screenshots
at [https://angel.co/homeroom](https://angel.co/homeroom), but we'll
definitely create some sort of video or demo where we can show teachers how
exactly the website is used.

------
kaeawc
I worked for a collaborative ed-tech startup from 2012-2013. Happy to talk
about it / give advice, my email is in my profile.

