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I'm blown by how basic the site looks right now. This attitude of launching something which probably doesn't even do much yet is really hard for me to digest. A

by revorad 15y ago

I'm blown by how basic the site looks right now. This attitude of launching something which probably doesn't even do much yet is really hard for me to digest. Also, Justin's comment on keeping features to a minimum is interesting. Everyone always talks about it, but few manage to pull it off because you need the right features. Justin, can you comment on how you chose your feature set?

_pius 15y ago
[The site looks basic right now]. This [probably doesn't even do much yet]. The former doesn't imply the latter.
GraffitiTim 15y ago
In the case of Exec, one simple feature (submitting a task) lets you accomplish a huge number of different things.
justin 15y ago
One of my biggest problems using marketplaces is the cognitive overhead of figuring out the often complex process how I'm supposed to use the site. With Exec, I wanted to make something that was super simple and just works. Most of our challenge is actually figuring out how to inform users of what they can get done, because for most people outsourcing their errands is a new behavior to learn. We haven't created any features that weren't based on iterating to solve a real user problem that was being experienced during our trial. Our minimum viable product really was "minimum" -- everything including the the map / location tracking, iphone app for the Execs, etc came out of that process. The first version of Exec was literally single text area. We have done a ton of work on the backend to make sure that Execs pick up and do your jobs excellently -- a lot of that is transparent to the user. Lots of thought has gone into making that work well. If by "basic" you meant the site's design, then I fully admit that. We used Twitter Bootstrap, which is awesome. I'm not a great designer, but hopefully we can bring someone on soon that is excellent :) (Shameless plug, Exec is hiring a designer and senior engineer for our core team. Come help us build the future of work: https://iamexec.com/hiring https://iamexec.com/hiring)
- revorad 15y ago
  Thanks Justin. You're probably already tired with comparisons to Zaarly and Taskrabbit, but it looks to me like you are focusing on building a really high quality version of the same idea. Talk about focus!
geoffschmidt 15y ago
Don't confuse "simple" with "doesn't do much yet." Exec does plenty. It planned an awesome weekend biking trip for my girlfriend and I, found me a great-sounding (and surprisingly affordable) stereo amp for my bedroom sound system, got me a new iphone (after minimaxing all of the plan options based on my historical usage and international travel plans), researched all of my options for cloud photo storage and got me set up, found me the most styling archival-quality inventor's notebook ever, helped me box up stuff and move it to storage, stocked our office with drinks.. gosh, probably some other things I'm forgetting. All in about a week and and a half. It rocks. This was enough for Justin to sell me on offering a $100/month Exec credit to all of our employees (who am I kidding, I sold myself without any work whatsoever on their part.) So that quota-based, employer-pays billing system was the other thing they prioritized. Like Uber, the genius of Exec is precisely that it is one text box and one button. More stuff on the webpage would probably make it worse.

by revorad 15y ago

_pius 15y ago

[The site looks basic right now]. This [probably doesn't even do much yet]. The former doesn't imply the latter.

GraffitiTim 15y ago

In the case of Exec, one simple feature (submitting a task) lets you accomplish a huge number of different things.

justin 15y ago

One of my biggest problems using marketplaces is the cognitive overhead of figuring out the often complex process how I'm supposed to use the site. With Exec, I wanted to make something that was super simple and just works. Most of our challenge is actually figuring out how to inform users of what they can get done, because for most people outsourcing their errands is a new behavior to learn. We haven't created any features that weren't based on iterating to solve a real user problem that was being experienced during our trial. Our minimum viable product really was "minimum" -- everything including the the map / location tracking, iphone app for the Execs, etc came out of that process. The first version of Exec was literally single text area. We have done a ton of work on the backend to make sure that Execs pick up and do your jobs excellently -- a lot of that is transparent to the user. Lots of thought has gone into making that work well. If by "basic" you meant the site's design, then I fully admit that. We used Twitter Bootstrap, which is awesome. I'm not a great designer, but hopefully we can bring someone on soon that is excellent :) (Shameless plug, Exec is hiring a designer and senior engineer for our core team. Come help us build the future of work: https://iamexec.com/hiring https://iamexec.com/hiring)

revorad 15y ago
Thanks Justin. You're probably already tired with comparisons to Zaarly and Taskrabbit, but it looks to me like you are focusing on building a really high quality version of the same idea. Talk about focus!

geoffschmidt 15y ago

Don't confuse "simple" with "doesn't do much yet." Exec does plenty. It planned an awesome weekend biking trip for my girlfriend and I, found me a great-sounding (and surprisingly affordable) stereo amp for my bedroom sound system, got me a new iphone (after minimaxing all of the plan options based on my historical usage and international travel plans), researched all of my options for cloud photo storage and got me set up, found me the most styling archival-quality inventor's notebook ever, helped me box up stuff and move it to storage, stocked our office with drinks.. gosh, probably some other things I'm forgetting. All in about a week and and a half. It rocks. This was enough for Justin to sell me on offering a $100/month Exec credit to all of our employees (who am I kidding, I sold myself without any work whatsoever on their part.) So that quota-based, employer-pays billing system was the other thing they prioritized. Like Uber, the genius of Exec is precisely that it is one text box and one button. More stuff on the webpage would probably make it worse.