The experience of Nect

As assignment at SAE institute, we had to create our own company plan, from the seed stage
to a profitable business.

It all started with an idea.

After finding out about our new assignment, Me, Matija and Pete decided to hang out and
discuss a possible collaboration.The meeting went well, and I also got to know Pete.
We grabbed a Spezi and started chatting about what would we like to see from our business,
the “What/Why?”.
At the end of the meeting, we decided that our niche would be software development and that
would require the vision of multiple departments, so we waited for the next class to recruit
more people.
After the class, our team consisted of Me, Matija, Pete, Daniel and Alec.
We agreed that meeting online is the most convenient solution and that we can meet after the
classes, for around an hour.We created a WhatsApp group, a Discord server and a Miro board.

Our first task was choosing the business idea and after an online brainstorming session, we
had to choose between an app that teaches the user how to DJ or the algorithmic matching
app for mentors, deciding to go with the second option.
We ended up with Mentorama, the Tinder for mentors.

Filing up the Business Model Canvas (three times) helped us have a better (more realistic)
understanding of what our app is, what it needs to function and for who are we making it.
As Pete was the coordinator of our group, he pitched the idea in the BA Class and after
obtaining the green light from the supervisor, we went ahead with the feasibility test.
That’s when we first had to separate our work and think about different parts of our project,
finding out how big is our company, what financial, legal and conceptual issues might occur.

In general, our tasks were spit equally. After the classes, we used to meet for around an hour
and present our research, brainstorm and decide what would be or tasks for next meeting.
Our meetings were curated by Pete, and they were based on presenting and discussing the
ideas researched at home, with everyone asking questions and sharing ideas regarding the
topic.
Each one of us got two topics to research on, agreeing to discuss it together in the next class.

We did the SWOT Analysis to find out our strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats, how
they affect us and how we can react to them.
The Smart Analysis made us aware of our goals and how can we achieve them in the future.
We soon found out that we are talking about a million-dollar company, but also that
mentorship might be a bad focus, at least in the beginning.

We realized that monetizing our app can be a big problem, especially with mentoring,
because after connecting the users, they can collaborate outside the platform, reducing the
service fee collected by us.

One stage of our planning was finding ways of actually making the app, researching potential
collaborators or services that might be useful for our growth. We settled on what our
company requires in order to function, and had the task of making lists of companies we can
work with.

After researching, we found out that the best place to register your company is your own city,
especially when we are located in Berlin, which is one of the most popular startup cities in
Europe.

In terms of financing Nect, we found ways to access public funds, start up incubator hubs and
to contact investors, but we also found out that 98% of startups that apply for private funding
get rejected.

We found companies that specialize in app development, who can help us in our app
development and maintenance stage.
We also discovered work spaces in Berlin, how much would they cost, what gear does our
personnel require and how many people we need to actually have working in an office.
During our research, we looked for our direct competitors and analyzed their company
structure, marketing tactics or how can they affect us in our growth.
We had as home task to analyze the exact service our competitors provide and their cost of
operation. We also took a look at what is their target audience and which advertising methods
our competitors use.

During one of our meetings we created our company’s organizational chart, that settles our
internal and external departments, that makes me the Co-CEO and the chief of the social
media marketing and content creation departments.

We also created a growth chart for the next three years, decided the ownership percentage of
each one of us and also the salaries we will have in the first years.

We chose our task in the group depending on our interests, focusing on elements that suit our
SAE course, making sense in our personal development.
I was the one in charge of creating the video content for our project.
During one of the meetings, I had a short preproduction talk with my colleagues, agreeing on
what should the video be and how can we show our message best.
After we got our script, the first video we’ve done was made in an afternoon with Matija and
Daniel.
The video was meant to show the story of Matija, a guitar player who can’t find
anyone who wants to join his band. The app represents the solution to Matija’s problem,
helping him meet Daniel, a great vocalist. The video also shows basic functionality of the
app, helping the viewer get a better understanding of what this is all about.

We also took a look at similar websites’ EULA, for having a better understanding of what it
is and what it covers when creating one.
One recent discussion we’ve had was creating the Eula through the use of an app or through
the help of an attorney. We decided that the use of an attorney will be much safer for us and
that we can’t trust third party apps.

We also discussed a lot about Vampr, an app that algorithmically matches musicians, but we decided
that the difference between us and them is that we focus on multiple arts, not just
music.

An ethical problem we discussed was what can we do with our colleague who didn’t show to
our meetings. He helped with some heavy research, but he didn’t show to many meetings,
which made us skeptical of his part of the group. In the end, I think he also contributed, but
his lack of motivation was discouraging for all of us.

We communicated with the use of Discord and WhatsApp, and we used Miro and Google
Sheets as canvases during our brainstorming sessions or for submitting our individual tasks
for the meetings.

I managed to collaborate well with my colleagues, I showed up to most of the meetings, did
my part of work whenever needed, and I suggested ideas whenever I had something to say.
I did my research on numerous official websites and forums, trying to find solutions suitable
for our problems, while making sure the information was right. I also spent some time
looking for affordable office spaces and how having people on site could affect us (instead of
working remote).

The pitch video was made while I was back home, without my access to many filmmaking
tools.
Matija, Pete and Daniel created a script about who we are, our intentions and calling
for action and I filmed myself reading it. While I’m not a good actor, we tried having a really
calm and confident attitude in front of the camera (as discussed in a previous meeting).

I am happy with how our company turned out, considering it a really nice draft/experience
that gave me the overall impression of how a million-dollar company would work and what
aspects and options to consider when planning my own future business.

I really agreed with how our team was structured, as it had expertise from various subjects,
programming, music, art and film. In the case of a real project, I’d try to include the same team
structure, as all our skills would be necessary in creating a platform such as Nect.
This way, even though us as team might be underpaid, with enough understanding and patience
from the team members, we could do a better overall job than hiring a barely professional coder or
filmmaker due to cost efficency, which would cost us money and in the end might not get us too
far.
The point that I’m trying to make is that I would try to do everything in house before we start
outsourcing, saving us money that we might later need.

In the process of research, I tried choosing the tasks and topics that I heard of before from my past
work experience as filmmaker and online business owner, while still double checking every fact
online.
For the task where we had to choose the country of registration, I don’t think that Germany is the
country to go for.
I would go for a country(state) with lower taxes than Germany, such as Wyoming or Delaware.

The registration costs can go from $150 to $400, and it’s pretty straightforward.
Sites such as firstbase.io are trustworthy ( I have also used their service before) and only require the
payment and a couple of signatures.

We haven’t discussed which bank would we use, but I would suggest Mercury, which is a popular
startup bank with little operating costs, switching later to a bank such as American Express, with
low fees and which also offers a cash back program.

For accounting, at least in the beginning, I would try to do the bookkeeping in house using apps
such as fresh books, which costs $15 a month for unlimited users.
At the same time, I would ask for the help of bookmate.com, a per month payment based
accounting service which also offers free consultations.
Their service is only required a month or two before the tax filings and can reduce the costs of
having a full time accountant in our company, at least in the beginning.

I am unsure of how we will actually be able to finance our project, at least the way we presented it
in the plan, as I consider that unless we are really lucky, no one will actually give us the funds just
based on an idea.
Instead, I would try to create a mock-up of the platform with the lowest cost possible, to prove our
concept. A mobile app and an algorithm seem quite tricky to make for the proof of concept stage,
but a website version can be created instead, alongside with either a dummy phone app and/or an
animation.
For connecting artists with clients or artists with artists there is a handy WordPress plug-in called
micro job engine that can be used for demonstration purposes.
The plug-in costs $80 and even though it’s a bit different from what we originally had in mind, I
think that our branding could still drive clients to our platform.

I agree with our marketing tactic, that we should have highly targeted ads, and I think that having a
filmmaker in the team would reduce the costs by a lot.
Usually ads that involve shootings
15 second ads are not too complicated to create, as experienced in our demo ad created during the
assignment.
Creating an ad was one of my tasks and even though I think that we could have done it better, in my
opinion it shows hope for future attempts. When I say we could have done it better I mean that we
could have delivered our message in a much faster and shorter manner.
A structure for a second version would be:
Shot of guitarist + shot of drummer = band, all in a split screen layout, including the mathematical
signs on the screen.
This way, we don’t miss out people with short attention span.
I think that in terms of marketing, we can create ad sets for each of the seven arts, each ad set with
3 or 4 different video ads, with a daily budget of $50.
I would start only with promoting our app through Facebook ads, expanding later to Google ads and
other platforms.
Even with the above mentioned, I still consider Nect a good learning process and I will continue
thinking about business ideas, especially in the digital/software niche.
Personally, I would create something similar, as a website like Fiverr, requiring less programming
skills, fewer personnel and less costs and I would also dig more into the E commerce type of business,
either with physical or digital products