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Today Staffjoy (YC Fellowship 1) is launching a new version of our scheduling application. We started by focusing on bringing big company scheduling technology

Today Staffjoy (YC Fellowship 1) is launching a new version of our scheduling application. We started by focusing on bringing big company scheduling technology to small businesses. We found some early success with on-demand startups and call centers. Yet, we had trouble crossing the chasm. We stepped back earlier this year to focus on why so many businesses still run on pen and paper. We found that offline scheduling was a symptom of deeper communication issues. Staffjoy V2 is a ground-up rewrite that focuses on sharing work schedules in less time. We do this by sending workers their schedules over text message. When there are changes, we send the latest schedule to affected workers. We optimized our architecture for messaging, and we plan to expand beyond SMS soon. You can read about it here: https://blog.staffjoy.com/staffjoys-v2-architecture-9d2fcb4015fd https://blog.staffjoy.com/staffjoys-v2-architecture-9d2fcb40... We chose to focus on text messages after doing extensive user studies in the service industry. We found that many workers lacked email addresses, and operated on prepaid phones. Managers would text them photos of the schedule because it was the best way to reach them. So, we automated this process. Moving forward, we will focus on improving the core scheduling experience. We plan to use text messages to engage directly with employees and create flexibility. We also plan to integrate scheduling with other business tools. To do that, we plan to announce our first integration partners later this month. Finally, today we’re excited to announce a $1.2M seed round of funding, led by Caffeinated Capital (detailed here: http://venturebeat.com/2017/01/10/staffjoy-raises-1-2-million-to-help-small-businesses-manage-workflow-scheduling/ http://venturebeat.com/2017/01/10/staffjoy-raises-1-2-millio... ) If you have any questions, I'm here to answer them!

martinald 10y ago
Well done Phillip. I think you should be commended for actually going back and finding the deeper reasons, rather than doing the usual throw more marketing $/hire expensive sales team. I think it's also great that you're building a product that is aimed at people who aren't quite as 'online' as the usual HN crowd, which make up a quite large %age of the population but are generally totally overlooked. The only problem with that is it is harder to reach these companies (for the very reason your product is interesting to them). I'm curious on what your marketing strategy would be to those kinds of companies?
- philip1209 10y ago
  We actually had some insights about reaching small businesses in our user studies too. Restaurants largely ignore their phone now - orders and reservations are online. They get bombarded with emails, which they ignore. However, they look to peers through google groups and facebook groups for recommendations. So, we started a content series called Breaktime where we highlight small businesses and the tools that make them succeed. Our goal is that the businesses we feature will share the content with their networks, which is our target market! We're using the articles and episodes to create rich content across our social channels, too, and we plan to feature more Staffjoy customers! Here's Breaktime: https://www.staffjoy.com/breaktime/ https://www.staffjoy.com/breaktime/
radicalbyte 10y ago
Have (or are) you implementing an automated conversational api? You want people to make changes easily and you don't want it to rely on a human on the other end being reliable. Seems tricky to build whilst optimizing for message number (SMS is expensive if you're poor) and usability (large % of users are poorly educated).
- philip1209 10y ago
  We haven't implemented a conversational UI yet. Messages are currently one-way. We'll be adding in voice support soon too so that you can call in and hear your schedule (even if you just hang up after when your "next shift" is). As we roll out two-way messages, I've been contemplating internationalization. Date formats are somewhat universal, but for things like shift swapping - I think that we could overcome a lot of usability issues by adding Spanish support quickly. Regarding cost and education - we also learned in user tests that we still need to support a print schedule. We're in the process of building that out. Our focus is on making structured, accurate scheduling data available to other systems (such as payroll). If that means that we need to focus on a printable view, that's fine :-)
  - napoleond 10y ago
    BTW, this might simplify the rollout of conversational UI: http://www.smsinbox.net http://www.smsinbox.net I built it last year. It has basic white-label support, but I'd be happy to work with you guys to integrate the UI more closely with what you already have. I'm working on a better landing page with screenshots; in the meantime here is a PDF with more info: http://www.blackchair.net/hubfs/SMS_Inbox.pdf http://www.blackchair.net/hubfs/SMS_Inbox.pdf
    - leesalminen 10y ago
      I'm so happy you posted this! I've wanted to add 2 way SMS to my product for a long while but it just hasn't made it to the top of the priorities list yet. I'll be digging into the beta :).
softawre 10y ago
Hey, I have been following you fairly closely from the sidelines. I work on similar software, though strictly in the call-center space. You can see our stuff here: https://help.mypurecloud.com/articles/navigate-schedule-editor/ https://help.mypurecloud.com/articles/navigate-schedule-edit... Our main feature is simulating a call-center to build the correct schedule. Do you offer any features like that, or do you plan to?

martinald 10y ago

Well done Phillip. I think you should be commended for actually going back and finding the deeper reasons, rather than doing the usual throw more marketing $/hire expensive sales team. I think it's also great that you're building a product that is aimed at people who aren't quite as 'online' as the usual HN crowd, which make up a quite large %age of the population but are generally totally overlooked. The only problem with that is it is harder to reach these companies (for the very reason your product is interesting to them). I'm curious on what your marketing strategy would be to those kinds of companies?

philip1209 10y ago
We actually had some insights about reaching small businesses in our user studies too. Restaurants largely ignore their phone now - orders and reservations are online. They get bombarded with emails, which they ignore. However, they look to peers through google groups and facebook groups for recommendations. So, we started a content series called Breaktime where we highlight small businesses and the tools that make them succeed. Our goal is that the businesses we feature will share the content with their networks, which is our target market! We're using the articles and episodes to create rich content across our social channels, too, and we plan to feature more Staffjoy customers! Here's Breaktime: https://www.staffjoy.com/breaktime/ https://www.staffjoy.com/breaktime/

radicalbyte 10y ago

Have (or are) you implementing an automated conversational api? You want people to make changes easily and you don't want it to rely on a human on the other end being reliable. Seems tricky to build whilst optimizing for message number (SMS is expensive if you're poor) and usability (large % of users are poorly educated).

philip1209 10y ago
We haven't implemented a conversational UI yet. Messages are currently one-way. We'll be adding in voice support soon too so that you can call in and hear your schedule (even if you just hang up after when your "next shift" is). As we roll out two-way messages, I've been contemplating internationalization. Date formats are somewhat universal, but for things like shift swapping - I think that we could overcome a lot of usability issues by adding Spanish support quickly. Regarding cost and education - we also learned in user tests that we still need to support a print schedule. We're in the process of building that out. Our focus is on making structured, accurate scheduling data available to other systems (such as payroll). If that means that we need to focus on a printable view, that's fine :-)
- napoleond 10y ago
  BTW, this might simplify the rollout of conversational UI: http://www.smsinbox.net http://www.smsinbox.net I built it last year. It has basic white-label support, but I'd be happy to work with you guys to integrate the UI more closely with what you already have. I'm working on a better landing page with screenshots; in the meantime here is a PDF with more info: http://www.blackchair.net/hubfs/SMS_Inbox.pdf http://www.blackchair.net/hubfs/SMS_Inbox.pdf
  - leesalminen 10y ago
    I'm so happy you posted this! I've wanted to add 2 way SMS to my product for a long while but it just hasn't made it to the top of the priorities list yet. I'll be digging into the beta :).

softawre 10y ago

Hey, I have been following you fairly closely from the sidelines. I work on similar software, though strictly in the call-center space. You can see our stuff here: https://help.mypurecloud.com/articles/navigate-schedule-editor/ https://help.mypurecloud.com/articles/navigate-schedule-edit... Our main feature is simulating a call-center to build the correct schedule. Do you offer any features like that, or do you plan to?