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Andreea Mihalcea is a dynamic young founder from Romania. Her and her team are building a new product called Startup Kit. I loved her insights into how and why people buy software products.
Show Notes
Andreea Mihalcea is a dynamic young founder from Romania. Her and her team are building a new product called Startup Kit. I loved her insights into how and why people buy software products. Startup Kit is targeting an interesting problem: managers and CTOs who need to get a handle on what products their team is using and paying for.
Notable quotes
“When you’re working on a team, you have to make sure that your tools play nice with other team’s tools” – Andreea Mihalcea
Show notes
Note from Justin
This interview is a smaller segment of a full-interview with Andreea, available on Product People Club. Go to productpeople.club, and sign up for the waiting list. Screenshots are up now!
Want to help the show? If you could go to iTunes leave a nice review that would be superb. Also: if you’re listening on Stitcher, please leave a review on there!
Creators and Guests
What is Product People?
A podcast focused on great products and the people who make them
Alright. Alright. Alright. Alright. Product people show time.
Speaker 1:It's Justin Jackson here. Happy Thursday, everybody. Sorry the episode is out late. I've been moving offices, moving into a new coworking space, and it's been it's been busy. But somehow I managed to get this episode out and a lot of it is because I met this young gal from Romania named Andrea and her and her co founders are working on startupkit.io and I just love their story and thought that we should talk to them.
Speaker 1:So had Andrea on Skype, and we talked about building StartupKit. They have some really, really neat ideas. If you listen about halfway through the episode, that's where we start to talk about how they're really going to start saving, teams time and digging into the pain that a lot of managers and CTOs have. Before we get into the episode, I wanna call out some great iTunes reviews. You can review the show too.
Speaker 1:Just go to iTunes, search for product people, leave us a nice review, I and might read it on the show. Mister Cave from The United States says, this podcast captures a very candid side of product building straight from the founders themselves. I just haven't heard anything else like it. So thanks, Mr. Cave.
Speaker 1:When you leave a review for the show, it really helps other people find it. So again, go to iTunes, search for Product People. Just do it right now, get it over with, leave a nice review, and help this show spread all around the world. Enough jibber jabbering for me. Let's get into the interview.
Speaker 1:Hey. It's Justin Jackson here, and I'm with Andrea Mihelcha. Did I say that right, Andrea?
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:Perfect. She's in Romania, and she is working on a new company called Startup Kit, startupkit.io. Hey, Andrea. How's it going?
Speaker 2:Hi, Justine. Very good.
Speaker 1:Perfect. Now
Speaker 2:Excited to be here.
Speaker 1:Well, I'm excited to have you. This is you're the first guest from Romania. Now tell us a little bit about StartUpKit. What is it, and who's it for?
Speaker 2:So StartUpKit, we're helping entrepreneurs discover the best tools for them, and also to build better workflows to improve the way they're doing stuff and how the way the and how they're doing it. And we we do this by building an artificial intelligence. We call it we call it CLEAR, to help them discover the tool for them at the right time.
Speaker 1:So tell me a little bit more about that. What does it mean the right tool at the right time?
Speaker 2:So this means that we we've designed several start stages for startups. So we have bootstrapping startups. Have also we have I want to start. So those who plan to start a startup. Then we have growing startups and profitable startups.
Speaker 2:So depending on the stage you are, a tool is better for you or not. For instance, I can give an example. If you're just starting up, so you're a bootstrapping startup and you want to do sales, you probably have heard a lot of Salesforce. Probably they're the most popular sales tools around. But sales is pretty expensive and it's pretty complex.
Speaker 2:So maybe this is not the best choice for you. Maybe it's better to choose a more simple tool, a simpler tool like straight, which is like straight, it's in your inbox and you can do your job and and follow the funnel there. So we'll say we'll we'll recommend you use tech instead of Salesforce if you're already using or I don't know. But this will be our recommendation. Interesting.
Speaker 2:Just one simple example.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And and what other kinds of pains are you seeing around, you know, companies that are looking for good tools? Have you seen some other things as you're because right now, you're just you're in beta right now. Right?
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Actually, we're in private beta, so a handful of people have access to the platform.
Speaker 1:Okay. And so what kinds of other things have you observed as you're doing all this research? What are the other kind of obstacles people have when they're choosing tools? Cause this will be interesting to folks in our audience that are building tools as well. So what have you seen so far?
Speaker 2:So one would be like it's a time consuming activity. So people they realize or or they say, yeah, I need to find a tool to track my customers. And they start usually they start with a Google search. And they start searching and they go from link to link. They keep reading forums, reviews, and it's very difficult to take a decision.
Speaker 2:Because it's not an experience tailored to them. It's so much information, you have to spend so much time, but in the end you have to take a decision and you don't have like the whole year to decide on that. It's a very small matter in in when you build a startup.
Speaker 1:Exactly. You've you've you gotta squash that problem quick.
Speaker 2:Yes. And moreover, let's say you took the decision. You chose I don't know. You chose mixed panel. But most some or very many entrepreneurs we've talked to told us that they always have that back feeling that if there is something better on the market, which I don't know of.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And they have a like a constant fear that there is something better they couldn't find or if maybe something better will just launch a month after they took their decision. Yeah. So we want to solve these pains. So you you are sure that you got the right tools for you when you had when you needed them.
Speaker 2:And also that you don't have to spend so much time on doing this. So the first have this process for looking for tools because we don't we think that is not a one time thing. It's something that you should you should have a process and to make sure that you're always using the best tools and like to review them. So the first step will be to discover and collect tools, which will take you like, I don't know, a matter of minutes, even less. Then after from that list, you'll collect those tool that are or are of interest for you.
Speaker 2:You consider that are worth your attention. And you go to the second step where you test it. So there you'll get more information, more like reviews, ratings, who else is using that tool. Why is good? So you'll get a handful of information to make you take a decision.
Speaker 2:You'll get to, like, check the website of the toolmaker and then to decide, yes, this is good for me, I'm going to try it and start using it or no, it's not good for me.
Speaker 1:That's great. I've actually noticed that even with the because I'm friends with Ryan Hoover and when he started Product Hunt, initially, I thought, I don't really need another thing, you know, recommending products or ranking things. But now that I've logged in every day, there are times where I go something clicks in my head and it's like, I've been looking for a solution for this for months and it's right here. So, yeah, I I think there's definitely something to that.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Yeah. Definitely. And so So we think that product hunt is somehow complementary to us. So you need that some people are great and love that hunt.
Speaker 2:Love to check-in every day and see if there is something for them today or not. So they love that.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:But we What we want to achieve is to give To push things further. And for those who are want to see just things for them. So I don't want to hunt for things. I just want the right things to be delivered to me and to be pushed to me. And this is it.
Speaker 2:So I want to spend like ten minutes a day and this is it. I don't want to spend or spend time this.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. You know, there's different I was thinking about something the other day and I'm wondering if you've seen this too. I I think I wonder not I think. I wonder if a lot of people choose tools depending on what kind of motivates them personally and let me give you an example.
Speaker 1:So one thing that motivates me is I'm an extrovert, so relationships are really important to me. I'm motivated by relationships. And I was thinking about a lot of the tools I really like. So sprint.ly was a tool that I loved for a long time. Basecamp was a tool that I loved for a long time.
Speaker 1:I still love these tools too. They're they're amazing tools. What's another one that I've really used quite a bit? Product Hunt is another example. So here's, you know, these tools and I was thinking about why do I like them so much?
Speaker 1:And part of it is in each case, I had a significant kind of relational encounter with somebody at the company or somebody that used the product. And that's why I was interested in especially your social recommendation kind of piece. Because for me, knowing if my friend is using a product and likes it is very important signal. Whereas, you know, I have another friend who is very is motivated by, you know, technical perfectionism And he's the reasons he chooses a product are different. He'll, like, look at something and say, how well was this designed?
Speaker 1:How well was this implemented? He'll check out the API. You know, how good is the API? So it's interesting, you know, people have different reasons they choose products. Have have you seen that too?
Speaker 2:Yeah. For instance, I don't remember the the two products the someone was talking was telling me about. But he told me something like, yeah. The other product maybe could be better. Maybe it's better.
Speaker 2:But I prefer this one because I like the founder. Oh, I I remember. It's about Treehouse. Yeah. So he was telling me about Treehouse and another website that teaches you to code.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And he was like, I love the founder and I love that they are working four days a week, and I love their philosophy, so I prefer using their platform.
Speaker 1:Isn't that interesting? And and Ryan Carson, he's the founder of TreeHouse. He's a great example of that. He built up a lot of social capital and I can see that people are inspired by his story. They're inspired by how he's running his business.
Speaker 1:They like him as a person. He was, you know, he was running conferences for a long time in the web industry. So he has a lot of people that just enjoy him as a person. And I can see that. You know the other person I see this happening with is Marco Arment who did Instapaper and Outcast is his new podcast app.
Speaker 1:A lot of people, when I ask them, you know, why'd you choose that for your podcast app? They'll say, well, I follow Marco. I like his podcast. You know, It's interesting, isn't it? Whereas other people you would say, you know, would you choose this application based on the founder?
Speaker 1:And they would be like, no way. You know, like yeah. And they're looking at those other things.
Speaker 2:I think most of the people are influenced, even if they are aware of this or not, they are influenced by the people who are building or are involved with the product. Mhmm. Of course, this depends the degree, but I think for most of the people this is a valid thing to say, that they are influenced by this. Yeah. And for instance, Nathan Cotney of Draft and now of Highrise Yeah.
Speaker 2:Is a great example. He I had an interview with him and he told me that he's built an audience and now that audience is following him.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So whatever he builds, his people are with him.
Speaker 1:Exactly. Exactly. Cool. So so what's the next step for StartupKit? What are you going to be doing next?
Speaker 1:What are your next steps for, you know, building this product out?
Speaker 2:Right now, we are on private beta, but and only, like, 40 people have access to the platform. And we're preparing stuff to give access like to 100 or 200 more. Yep. So to see the response on a on a larger scale.
Speaker 1:Cool.
Speaker 2:Than until now.
Speaker 1:So you're gonna roll it out to a few more people?
Speaker 2:I will send invites to the basic mostly for those who tweeted about us because there were, like, hundreds of people tweeting about us. And now and they're waiting for their invites.
Speaker 1:Gotcha. So if people wanna get into the beta, they just have to tweet about you a lot?
Speaker 2:Yeah. Right now, we have a very simple landing page. We admit we should add more details to it, but we've been busy with with actually building the product. Yep. And so you you either get an a VIP invite from us or you pay of $50 to get instant access, or you tweet to get on the fast lane, meaning that you'll get an invite sooner than those who did nothing of this.
Speaker 1:Cool. And are are people paying so far? Are are some people paying? Really?
Speaker 2:Yeah. Actually, they're paying.
Speaker 1:Wow. So you've you are you're validating this as something that people will pay for.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Actually, we don't plan to ask entrepreneurs who are looking for tools to pay for this. So actually, they're paying to have early access, and they're paying for a free product because this will be free.
Speaker 1:Wow. So they're so excited about it. They're willing to pay for what they know will be Yeah. A free
Speaker 2:Because this is a big pain. Yeah. Finding the tool finding those tools who will who will not feel like more work for you to do.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. You know, I could see this for sure. You know, I talk to a lot of CTOs, and tools choosing tools is hard.
Speaker 1:You've gotta champion it in your team. You've gotta go through all these steps. And there's a lot riding on that. If you make a bad choice
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:Then you're gonna never hear the end of it. And I I don't think people realize you know, people that are building tools, they don't realize how much of a risk it is for the peep for the person that is championing that tool to the team. Like, they're risking everything, their reputation, they're risking maybe even their job, they're risking whatever that tool is supposed to do. So if the tool is supposed to, you know, whatever, run automated tests and the tests don't run, then they're in trouble. Right?
Speaker 2:Pretty much. It depends on the company and on the culture. But if we if we talk about teams, there there are more even more problems than at an individual level. For instance, when you're working in a team, somehow you have to make sure that your tools play nice with your teammates. Yeah.
Speaker 2:It's so this is a feature that will soon introduce, like giving you the ability to to add your team and to invite your team to start up kit. So we take into consideration also their tools, what they are using, so to make sure that everything is playing nice together.
Speaker 1:Interesting. And
Speaker 2:also to give you the possibility to manage tools, like, when when the team is very small, like two, three, five people, it's easy. But when the team gets bigger, the number of tools gets bigger. Yeah. And at at some point, if you ask someone, especially the CEO, he is the most interested into that. If he asks, what tools is your startup using?
Speaker 2:Probably he wants to know too much about this. And also he won't know what tools he's paying for. Yeah. And sometimes there are some tools who the team stopped using, but they are still paying for that because of whatever reasons. But they're still paying.
Speaker 2:So we want to solve this and to give them the possibility to see all the tools that the company is using, what are they paying to manage payments, and to manage, also users from our interface, so to simplify all these tool stuff and to and to make their life easier.
Speaker 1:Andrea, this is huge. This is huge.
Speaker 2:Yeah. We know.
Speaker 1:I'm just telling you, this is really, really big problem. Because even on a team you know, I've been on teams that were 15 people and just to keep track of what everyone's using, keep tracking of what do we already have access to, what do we already have licenses for, what do we already have seats on. Okay. Now John left, but John was administering you know, he had five products on his company credit card. And are we still paying for those?
Speaker 1:And I think anyone that's run a company, even if you're just doing it by yourself, you know, like, sometimes, like, months down the road, you'll go, I'm still paying for this product. I've been paying a $100 a month for this and I haven't used it. $500 is gone, you know? Yeah. So that's a huge thing.
Speaker 1:You can save companies money just by letting them know what they're paying for right now.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Just to give them an overview and to make things easier to manage.
Speaker 1:Oh, my goodness. When's that gonna be ready?
Speaker 2:We don't have a deadline for this. As you probably know, it's difficult to give deadlines. Like, you say, yeah, we'll have that ready in a month, but as you develop it, you find that, okay, maybe it will be one month and a half, maybe two. You never know. Or you just realize you'll get it done in two months, in two weeks.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So we don't give, like, we don't know when, but we're working on this definitely. Because a big problem, so everybody we we've talked to told us about this, like, oh, it's a huge problem for us.
Speaker 1:Yes. Yeah. That that right there is because I think a lot of people have tried to do app discovery before, and I think you're doing some interesting things in the app discovery space, especially with kind of the artificial intelligence and recommendation engine. But the the real big pain for managers is often they've got all this all these SaaS products on their credit card, and they have no idea what they're paying for. They have no and there might be 10 company credit cards out there, and they just have no idea what's being paid for and it can be thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars.
Speaker 1:And in some cases, you know, maybe one team is using let me try to think of something like something for testing like Team City and another team is using another product and they could be using the same product and you could be getting a discount, you know, based on number of seats, and they're just missing out on those opportunities.
Speaker 2:Yeah. When you have all these data in the same place, you we're sure that you'll see more ways to simplify things. Yeah. So we can suggest ways to simplify things, but you, your you by yourself, we're sure that you'll see because you have everything in one place, so it's easier to do everything to manage and to save time and to cut costs.
Speaker 1:Yeah. You know, one thing I've been thinking about lately and I'm sure you guys are thinking about this is especially when you're selling to managers, they might want to log in once and set everything up. But after that, the real value for managers is if you can proactively for example, if StartupKit could proactively man email me and say, did you here's your team report, you know, here's what everyone's using. Here's a few possible places where you could save money or here's a few possible places where, you know, you haven't used this product or, you know, the division that's spending the most money is over here. You know, those kind of emails I think I think a lot of us building tools get really enamored with the web app but there's a lot of potential to do a lot with just email, automated emails to people.
Speaker 1:Because if you're a manager and you've received something like that, then you can use that information right away. And it's almost like you're hiring in this case, it'd be hiring StartUpKit to be their, you know, their their
Speaker 2:Tool manager.
Speaker 1:Tool manager. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yes. So we'll have, like, two two main roles in a company. Like, we'll be a tool assistant for the team and also for the manager itself, or the CEO itself because he also uses some tools to do to get his job done. But also it would be like a tool manager, like, to basically, to to manage everything related to tools in your company.
Speaker 1:Cool. Now, Andrea, you're also doing some interesting content marketing right now. Maybe just explain what you're doing and where people can find out more about that.
Speaker 2:So I'm doing a series on entrepreneurs that we admire and on the tools they're using and how they're using them. So this way we want to discover workflows, their workflows. And by workflow, I mean a set of tools that they're using to get a job done. And we want to discover this, to share this because, of course, they are a source of inspiration both for us who are building a product or all the information they give us, we integrate into the product, but also to our readers, to our audience, because they can discover new tools, but most importantly, new ways to use tools or new ways to build a better workflow and to do something. Because when I'm talking to them, I'm not asking them only about tools, but also about their story.
Speaker 2:Because we think that your background and your story, your beliefs, your values, influence very much the tools you are going to choose, and how you use them, and what you use them for. So we want to give like a complete not necessarily complete, but a pretty full view of the tools someone is using and how he's using them. Until now, I've published the article about Joel of Buffer, native draft, and that's off Intercom. And I'm working on that of Paul Jarvis. And yours is next.
Speaker 2:Next.
Speaker 1:Awesome. Awesome.
Speaker 2:And also Sandy from Quip.
Speaker 1:Oh, cool. Well, Andrea, thanks so much for being on the show. I really enjoyed talking to you.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Thanks so much for having me.
Speaker 1:Now where can people find out more about StartupKit and everything else you're doing?
Speaker 2:So they can visit our website, startup.io. They can visit our Medium profile. So medium.com/startupkit. And also they can follow us on Twitter, startupkit.io.
Speaker 1:Perfect. Perfect. Thanks again, Andrea.
Speaker 2:Thanks again.
Speaker 1:So that was my conversation with Andrea. It it broke up a bit when she was talking about the website URL. I'll give that again. It's startupkit.io. On Medium, they are medium.com/startupkit.io.
Speaker 1:That's also their Twitter handle. And if you wanna follow Andrea on Twitter, she is a n d r e e a m I h. So if you wanna follow her on Twitter, please do. And be sure to thank her for being on the show and also share the show with your friends. If you wanna follow old me on Twitter, I'm at m y Justin.
Speaker 1:You can check out my email newsletter. I send something out for product people every Saturday morning. Justin jackson dot c a slash newsletter. And be sure to check out productpeople.club. I've been sending out invites for people who sign up for the waiting list, So go ahead, productpeople.club.
Speaker 1:See you next Thursday. Thanks for listening.