

Test your Startup idea, Quick and Cheap. No coding needed. - emoray13
http://www.lookaft.com/teststartup/

======
nostromo
"Due to demand we have had to introduce a waiting list..."

Wait, so did you actually build this? Or is this just an example of you
testing your startup idea without coding it?

edit: oh man, did you steal that dashboard from Voziq?
<http://www.voziq.com/social-media-monitoring-tools/> I don't know if this is
hustling (good) or shady (bad).

edit 2: odd that someone else used that exact same picture for a testimonial,
but gave the guy a different name and title:
<http://www.fusebill.com/legal/terms.aspx>

For what it's worth, HN is very good about giving early pre-MVP feedback --
there's no need for deception.

~~~
emoray13
Hi nostromo, I've currently got the product to MVP stage and I've around 25
paying customers at the moment.

It does need further work and polish, but everyone that is using the app has
given great feedback that it's a really useful tool.

~~~
jc4p
Are you going to respond to the stolen pictures or fake names on your landing
page?

~~~
emoray13
Hi jc4p, sorry for the slow reply I was just having lunch (a pizza and an
episode of 24 no less!). I borrowed the image of the dashboard as LookAfts is
still a work in progress. I guess I could link an image here for the HNers
though.

The other image and title came from one of our users. I've emailed him to see
what the deal is.

------
sudonim
What's up with the quote on that page from "John Hobbs" (guessing it's fake)
using a picture of Bryan Person (<http://twitter.com/bryanperson>)? The pic is
also hosted by Unbounce's s3 account it seems:

[http://unbouncepages-
com.s3.amazonaws.com/www.lookaft.com/te...](http://unbouncepages-
com.s3.amazonaws.com/www.lookaft.com/teststartup/bvd8o5-bryan-
person-1_4jkobhx9fmbbqk8w.jpg)

Isn't this product essentially supposed to compete with unbounce?

edit: I'm guessing that it's because the other option on google image search
for "person" don't look that genuine.
[https://www.google.com/search?num=10&hl=en&authuser=...](https://www.google.com/search?num=10&hl=en&authuser=0&site=imghp&tbm=isch&source=hp&biw=1486&bih=1222&q=person&oq=person&gs_l=img.3..0l10.1270.1863.0.2061.6.5.0.1.1.0.103.318.4j1.5.0...0.0...1ac.1.ZBSPvuX-
tQ0)

------
nlh
I think testing / experimenting with ideas is critical - Google (and others)
taught us that it works. I think vetting a new business idea before investing
time & money into it is also wise - nobody wants to waste their time and
money.

But I'm left with an uneasy feeling when folks take the "tease" approach that
this is advocating (and, currently, using).

* Here's an idea!

* Here's why it's great!

* Sign up now!

* Ohhhhh sorry -- not actually available. Give us your email though (and thanks for the conversion data point).

I know for me, it feels dishonest. There's no harm actually done - you haven't
truly "baited and switched", but you've baited and not delivered, and I think
that makes a poor first impression. It sets a tone of dishonesty with your
earliest (potential) customers.

I don't know the answer - I wish I did. I understand that if you change the
messaging ("Let us know if this sounds good" vs. "Sign up now!") you distort
your experimental conversion data, but I think it's worth considering the cost
of presenting a poor first impression vs. running the test.

Perhaps there's a middle ground?

~~~
emoray13
Hi Nlh, that is a great point and it's something I have wrestled with myself.

I haven't come to a conclusion other than it's physically not really doing
anyone any harm and if one stunning start up comes of it that changes the
world for the better, then it has to be worth it.

You are letting the visitor know before they drop you their email that you're
not ready for them and so you aren't deceiving them.

~~~
tylerlh
"You are letting the visitor know before they drop you their email that you're
not ready for them and so you aren't deceiving them."

This is not true. Your product states that "Due to demand we have had to
introduce a waiting list... Because of the of demand we have had, due to the
success of Entrepreneurs, Inventors and Business People using LookAft, we need
to add you to a queue to get going."

The above statement is very different than "Our product isn't ready yet, but
if you're interested you can sign up here...", and is rather deceptive. It
makes me think you have a functioning product and an already active user base
when that simply isn't the truth.

All this isn't to discourage your efforts, but maybe to get you to rethink the
way you approach your potential customers. Keep at it, but first and foremost
-- be honest.

------
joelg87
Very cool to see this pop up. I think a hosted service for validating an idea
could be very useful for many, especially the non-technical founders who could
then get some better validated traction to share with a potential technical
co-founder.

Great to see Buffer has been an inspiration. If anyone is interested, the
screenshot comes from this post with the full details of how I used this
method to go from idea to paying customers in 7 weeks:
[http://blog.bufferapp.com/idea-to-paying-customers-
in-7-week...](http://blog.bufferapp.com/idea-to-paying-customers-in-7-weeks-
how-we-did-it)

~~~
emoray13
Ah ha just the person! I am in fact a non technical 'founder' and your post
was the inspiration that lead me to create LookAft after faffing about for too
long creating my own testing pages.

Buffer is awesome, keep up the good work on that. If you have any issues with
me using the image please let me know.

~~~
joelg87
Awesome to hear :-)

No issues at all, quite the opposite - I'm super happy it inspired this! Let
me know if I can ever help with anything, more than happy to jump on a Skype
call if it might be good. My email is in my profile ;)

~~~
emoray13
Cheers Joel. I will certainly take you up on this. I will drop you an email
shortly.

------
filip01
"Because of the of demand we have had, due to the success of Entrepreneurs,
Inventors and Business People using LookAft, we need to add you to a queue to
get going. "

I think it's fine that you make these things up but please word it another
way. As it is now, anyone can see that it's BS. Also, if you have 25 paying
customers, do you really need to make John Hobbs of Uni CRM up?

------
unreal37
Tim Ferriss advocated something like this in his book, The Four Hour Workweek.
He said he used to run Google Adwords campaigns for different book titles, and
see which one had the highest CTR.

I've often thought about that idea for business ideas. Spend $100 on a Google
Adwords campaign advertising your business in 2 or 3 different models, and see
which one has the most interest.

------
thetabyte
I'm sure this is one of the things you're least interested in, but there are
JPEG artefacts visible in your logo, pretty badly.

~~~
emoray13
Hi theta. I had to quickly resize the logo when I created the page. I will
take a look at it in a minute. Thank you for the feedback.

------
Avalaxy
"we need to add you to a que to get going." -> que = queue. Oh, and it would
be better if the logo would be clickable, now I can't return to the homepage
without using the back button of Chrome.

~~~
emoray13
Thank you for the heads up. I've updated the spelling and added a link to the
title.

~~~
verganileonardo
On the Sign Up page: "success of Entrepenures, Inventors and Business People"
-> success of Entrepreneurs, Inventors and Business People

~~~
emoray13
Hi Verg, thank you for that correction. I've updated it.

------
FreshCode
Haven't had time to try it, but how is this different from LaunchRock?
<http://www.launchrock.com/>

~~~
emoray13
Launch rock collects emails and that's about it. LookAft is all about tracking
'conversions' to see what % of visitors would likely sign up and use your
service.

It also includes a preliminary pricing page so you can test price points
(which is obviously important to see if a product vs customer acquisition
balance works out) by seeing how many people click through each price point
and give their emails.

Please let me know if you have any other questions.

------
hippo33
Love how you are testing this business idea in the same manner as advertised
with an Unbounce page and a call to action before coding it out. :)

~~~
emoray13
The app is coded (to MVP standard) and I've 25+ paying customers. I'm
struggling to keep up with demand and so I've had to go to an unbounce page to
support the traffic.

Obviously my priority is to keep the service running for the people who have
already applied.

~~~
juanbyrge
I tried building a similar app two years ago. It's a smaller market than you
probably realize. Moved onto bigger and better ( and profitable ) things. Good
effort tho.

~~~
emoray13
Thank you for the feedback Juan. I actually specialise in niche apps rather
than 'startups'. Perhaps I could ask for your email or twitter to drop you a
couple of questions?

------
hack_edu
Been a member for half a year now yet your first submission and all comments
are for your own product?

Classy.

------
anovikov
The whole idea sounds so much like fooling people i don't feel it is morally
justified.

~~~
joelg87
I can completely understand how it feels like fooling people, and I felt that
too when I thought to use this approach for Buffer.

I think a "ask for forgiveness rather than permission" mindset can be the most
beneficial here.

In my mind, there's no doubt that there is much more value in terms of
validation that you can obtain through using this method rather than telling
people up front that the product isn't ready yet (some people just love to try
new things, and that's much worse validation for whether the product will
work).

The key I found is communication. If you are very open and ask for feedback,
and if you have a two way conversation with the person after they give you
their email, then you can actually get them on your side even more since
you've had personal contact.

~~~
emoray13
The "ask for forgiveness rather than permission" is what is needed in all
aspects of life as far as I'm concerned. It's generally what I live by.

------
holgersindbaek
What exactly does this do? I have no idea!

~~~
emoray13
Hi Holgers - Thank you for your comment, this obviously means that I need to
do a better job selling how the service works!

Basically, you create a landing page for your product or service using a super
quick and easy template that we host. This page then links to a pricing page
and then when the visitor clicks get started they are redirected to a page
that allows them to add their email and receive an invite when the product /
service is ready.

What we do which is special, is take all data from the % of users that clicked
through and through what price point and show this information visually on
your dashboard so you can make an informed decision whether your startup idea
/ product is viable.

Please let me know if you have any other questions.

~~~
holgersindbaek
Arh ok. But I still have to promote my idea and all that right?

~~~
emoray13
Yes. But that can be done very quickly and easily using adwords to drive some
traffic over. It might be a small investment in cash, but you're likely to
come across your A* startup idea in days rather than months.

