7 ms·

NReduce online demo day: live and public

51 points by DanielKehoe 14y ago

DanielKehoe 14y ago
Interesting. Founders of 8 companies doing online Q&A simultaneously. Viewers ask questions which get tweeted out with a #nReduceDemoDay hashtag. You can see all the activity by using your Twitter client to search for #nReduceDemoDay: https://twitter.com/#!/search/?q=nReduceDemoDay https://twitter.com/#!/search/?q=nReduceDemoDay
- DanielKehoe 14y ago
  I don't like the simultaneous Q&A. I wanted to watch all the teams. It's an 8 ring circus. Of course, I don't like going to conferences that offer multiple tracks, either.
  - vadimoss 14y ago
    @DanielKehoe I think nReduce just needs to figure out how investors can switch quickly between startup windows and get into the right moment of conversation. If there are 8 startups in a bundle, does investor really want to talk/listen to all of them? An ability to skip startups that are not relevant because of their market niche or their stage is actually a great advantage and will help to focus on those that might be more relevant. I think parallel mode is more productive and active. In linear mode some folks may get bored. nReduce needs to play with timing and notification features that will make it rock. E.g. investor submits questions to 3 startups out of 8 and gets notified when startup reached the question in a queue - this will save time and efforts and make the process more interactive
  - DanielKehoe 14y ago
    Just saw this on Twitter: @jolieodell: "Best demo day EVER. I wish all incubators were this respectful of startups/investors press folks' time" Clearly the simultaneous Q&A had appeal. See Jolie O'Dell's VentureBeat article: http://venturebeat.com/2012/09/05/nreduce-demo-day/ http://venturebeat.com/2012/09/05/nreduce-demo-day/
makmanalp 14y ago
Off topic: If any nreduce people are reading this: I've signed up on your site but my registration got stuck after the phase where you submit a youtube introduction. I've e-mailed Joe Mellin, who'd emailed us about finishing registration, to no avail. Any assistance would be appreciated. Cheers! :) edit: Thanks a ton, guys!
- stingrae 14y ago
  I will make sure he sees it. raemond@nreduce.com
- adthrelfall 14y ago
  They've been building the product as they go, in fact they are a team on nReduce themselves. Give them a prod tomorrow after the demo day, they're normally quite responsive.
- joemellin 14y ago
  hey sorry about that! can you email me again?
michaelbuckbee 14y ago
NReduce has been really interesting and done a good job of trying for something different than YCombinator. In many ways it's much more of a complement to traditional startup incubators than a competitor. Of the startups that I partnered with since June, about 15% have gone on to geographically located accelerators, a few have been acquired/hired for their product, a few have launched and not really gone anywhere and about half never got as far as launching a product. Personally, I've gotten a huge amount of constructive feedback and a good handful of solid beta testers for my project.
- railsjedi 14y ago
  Completely agree, it should be emphasized that nReduce isn't trying to compete with existing accelerators. I think it's actually a great first step for companies to get to the point where they can join one (since the good ones tend to require serious traction just to get in). Personally the best thing our team got out of being an nReduce participant is the weekly checkins. Having 12 video checkins that document our progress has been really useful for showing investors the amount of progress our team can make week by week. We intend to continue this habit throughout the life of the company.
- StavrosK 14y ago
  I joined in the hopes of getting feedback, but so far the site has just been broken. I can't figure out how to interact with startups, what each video is, uploading is broken, and the founders haven't been very responsive. I hope things will get fixed, but the experience hasn't been great so far.
  - michaelbuckbee 14y ago
    I'm sorry to hear it has been so rough, it is very much a situation where the founders have been working on the train as it is running down the tracks. There have definitely been issues, but in general, the team has done a good job of addressing them. I'm quite sure that right now they are overwhelmed with demo day and that once the dust settles for that things will get straightened out shortly.
ngrichyj4 14y ago
The only drawback is, there isn't alot of buzz going for it in the media. When it picks up, things will significantly pick up, time will tell.
- joemellin 14y ago
  Yeah we have been focusing on providing value for our users. Will be making more of a public presence in the fall. I like building sleepers :)
adrianhoward 14y ago
(Disclaimer - I recently became an nReduce mentor, but wasn't involved with mentoring any of the companies in the batch that were in the demo day. Watching the demo day has basically been my first interaction with the organisation since filling in my profile form and replying to a few emails.) On the format: * Despite all the niggles below - this was an interesting event and experiment. I'm looking forward to what they do in the future. * A surprising number of companies didn't have a demo or a live site with anything more than a sign up form. The nReduce folk have since tweeted that they were going to have demo videos but ran out of time, they'll be around next month. * I didn't like the format very much. You could jump between companies live rather than seeing them in sequence, but didn't get the context for what had happened already so I imagine there were lots of repeat questions... and you missed the context when you came into the conversation late. I'd be interested whether they later release the feeds so folk can see the stuff they missed. A linear presentation would be better IMHO. * Technical problems with the live feed in a couple of times. Also seemed to be some technical problems with some companies seeing questions from audience. * Bugs in question voting/promotion system seemed to cause some questions to be skipped (ironically the ones that people had voted up as interesting :-) * Question ordering based on network-reach of asker/promoters seemed over-complex. On the presentations: * Lack of demos kinda sucked. * Felt like a lot of the people needed more coaching on how to pitch and how to answer questions. Lots of N minute answers that should have been 30s answers. Lots of fuzzy answers that should have been crystal clear. On the companies (basically copy and pasted from my post-demoday #bluntreview tweets :-) * .@ApptivGames Intrigued to see if this attracts folk who don't have intrinsic motivation for exercise - like me [pitch = using exercise tracking to get virtual points for games online - http://www.apptivgames.com/ http://www.apptivgames.com/ ] * Edocr - Problem and solution not clear to me. You have customers so something there - needs clarity [pitch = something to do with documents and social media http://www.edocr.com/ http://www.edocr.com/] * Rentini - You have a working product! Result :) Don't find the USP terribly convincing though [pitch = holiday home finding via activities http://www.rentini.com/ http://www.rentini.com/] * .@getsuavely - You sound really creepy. Possibly coz I'm old and think you meet people in bars goshdarnit :-) [pitch = dating via social peer recommendation http://www.suave.ly/ http://www.suave.ly/ - whole "wingman" and "validated single" language was real turn off for me... but I'm an old geezer who hasn't been single for 17 odd years now] * Cloudable.me - The product pitch made sense. Sounds like something I might use. Want demo, not sign up form. [pitch = collect what your social media folk tweet/like and organise that shit for you http://cloudable.me http://cloudable.me - unfortunately while I was there the founders don't appear to have been able to see their questions] * .@Meldium - Clear pitch, pain point & solution. Last two companies I worked at would pay for your product. Win! [pitch == centralised management/admin of saas users/services for your organisation. I have experienced this pain in spades. I would buy this at any company with more than six people in it.] * .@dwelleeinc - Like idea, but pitch lacks clarity. Want a demo not a sign up form. [pitch == crowd sourced finding of apartments... but still not sure how exactly it works dwellee.com] I didn't have time to go ask the last company, Recollect, any annoying questions :-)
Kilimanjaro 14y ago
Hey guys, I like what you're doing. Here is some unsolicited advice: create a startup news magazine like HN. That's it. Will read it from day one. HN vs NR. Endless fights, endless clicks, endless promotion for your startups. We all win at the end.

51 points by DanielKehoe 14y ago

Interesting. Founders of 8 companies doing online Q&A simultaneously. Viewers ask questions which get tweeted out with a #nReduceDemoDay hashtag. You can see all the activity by using your Twitter client to search for #nReduceDemoDay: https://twitter.com/#!/search/?q=nReduceDemoDay https://twitter.com/#!/search/?q=nReduceDemoDay

DanielKehoe 14y ago
I don't like the simultaneous Q&A. I wanted to watch all the teams. It's an 8 ring circus. Of course, I don't like going to conferences that offer multiple tracks, either.
- vadimoss 14y ago
  @DanielKehoe I think nReduce just needs to figure out how investors can switch quickly between startup windows and get into the right moment of conversation. If there are 8 startups in a bundle, does investor really want to talk/listen to all of them? An ability to skip startups that are not relevant because of their market niche or their stage is actually a great advantage and will help to focus on those that might be more relevant. I think parallel mode is more productive and active. In linear mode some folks may get bored. nReduce needs to play with timing and notification features that will make it rock. E.g. investor submits questions to 3 startups out of 8 and gets notified when startup reached the question in a queue - this will save time and efforts and make the process more interactive
- DanielKehoe 14y ago
  Just saw this on Twitter: @jolieodell: "Best demo day EVER. I wish all incubators were this respectful of startups/investors press folks' time" Clearly the simultaneous Q&A had appeal. See Jolie O'Dell's VentureBeat article: http://venturebeat.com/2012/09/05/nreduce-demo-day/ http://venturebeat.com/2012/09/05/nreduce-demo-day/

makmanalp 14y ago

Off topic: If any nreduce people are reading this: I've signed up on your site but my registration got stuck after the phase where you submit a youtube introduction. I've e-mailed Joe Mellin, who'd emailed us about finishing registration, to no avail. Any assistance would be appreciated. Cheers! :) edit: Thanks a ton, guys!

stingrae 14y ago
I will make sure he sees it. raemond@nreduce.com
adthrelfall 14y ago
They've been building the product as they go, in fact they are a team on nReduce themselves. Give them a prod tomorrow after the demo day, they're normally quite responsive.
joemellin 14y ago
hey sorry about that! can you email me again?

michaelbuckbee 14y ago

NReduce has been really interesting and done a good job of trying for something different than YCombinator. In many ways it's much more of a complement to traditional startup incubators than a competitor. Of the startups that I partnered with since June, about 15% have gone on to geographically located accelerators, a few have been acquired/hired for their product, a few have launched and not really gone anywhere and about half never got as far as launching a product. Personally, I've gotten a huge amount of constructive feedback and a good handful of solid beta testers for my project.

railsjedi 14y ago
Completely agree, it should be emphasized that nReduce isn't trying to compete with existing accelerators. I think it's actually a great first step for companies to get to the point where they can join one (since the good ones tend to require serious traction just to get in). Personally the best thing our team got out of being an nReduce participant is the weekly checkins. Having 12 video checkins that document our progress has been really useful for showing investors the amount of progress our team can make week by week. We intend to continue this habit throughout the life of the company.
StavrosK 14y ago
I joined in the hopes of getting feedback, but so far the site has just been broken. I can't figure out how to interact with startups, what each video is, uploading is broken, and the founders haven't been very responsive. I hope things will get fixed, but the experience hasn't been great so far.
- michaelbuckbee 14y ago
  I'm sorry to hear it has been so rough, it is very much a situation where the founders have been working on the train as it is running down the tracks. There have definitely been issues, but in general, the team has done a good job of addressing them. I'm quite sure that right now they are overwhelmed with demo day and that once the dust settles for that things will get straightened out shortly.

ngrichyj4 14y ago

The only drawback is, there isn't alot of buzz going for it in the media. When it picks up, things will significantly pick up, time will tell.

joemellin 14y ago
Yeah we have been focusing on providing value for our users. Will be making more of a public presence in the fall. I like building sleepers :)

adrianhoward 14y ago

(Disclaimer - I recently became an nReduce mentor, but wasn't involved with mentoring any of the companies in the batch that were in the demo day. Watching the demo day has basically been my first interaction with the organisation since filling in my profile form and replying to a few emails.) On the format: * Despite all the niggles below - this was an interesting event and experiment. I'm looking forward to what they do in the future. * A surprising number of companies didn't have a demo or a live site with anything more than a sign up form. The nReduce folk have since tweeted that they were going to have demo videos but ran out of time, they'll be around next month. * I didn't like the format very much. You could jump between companies live rather than seeing them in sequence, but didn't get the context for what had happened already so I imagine there were lots of repeat questions... and you missed the context when you came into the conversation late. I'd be interested whether they later release the feeds so folk can see the stuff they missed. A linear presentation would be better IMHO. * Technical problems with the live feed in a couple of times. Also seemed to be some technical problems with some companies seeing questions from audience. * Bugs in question voting/promotion system seemed to cause some questions to be skipped (ironically the ones that people had voted up as interesting :-) * Question ordering based on network-reach of asker/promoters seemed over-complex. On the presentations: * Lack of demos kinda sucked. * Felt like a lot of the people needed more coaching on how to pitch and how to answer questions. Lots of N minute answers that should have been 30s answers. Lots of fuzzy answers that should have been crystal clear. On the companies (basically copy and pasted from my post-demoday #bluntreview tweets :-) * .@ApptivGames Intrigued to see if this attracts folk who don't have intrinsic motivation for exercise - like me [pitch = using exercise tracking to get virtual points for games online - http://www.apptivgames.com/ http://www.apptivgames.com/ ] * Edocr - Problem and solution not clear to me. You have customers so something there - needs clarity [pitch = something to do with documents and social media http://www.edocr.com/ http://www.edocr.com/] * Rentini - You have a working product! Result :) Don't find the USP terribly convincing though [pitch = holiday home finding via activities http://www.rentini.com/ http://www.rentini.com/] * .@getsuavely - You sound really creepy. Possibly coz I'm old and think you meet people in bars goshdarnit :-) [pitch = dating via social peer recommendation http://www.suave.ly/ http://www.suave.ly/ - whole "wingman" and "validated single" language was real turn off for me... but I'm an old geezer who hasn't been single for 17 odd years now] * Cloudable.me - The product pitch made sense. Sounds like something I might use. Want demo, not sign up form. [pitch = collect what your social media folk tweet/like and organise that shit for you http://cloudable.me http://cloudable.me - unfortunately while I was there the founders don't appear to have been able to see their questions] * .@Meldium - Clear pitch, pain point & solution. Last two companies I worked at would pay for your product. Win! [pitch == centralised management/admin of saas users/services for your organisation. I have experienced this pain in spades. I would buy this at any company with more than six people in it.] * .@dwelleeinc - Like idea, but pitch lacks clarity. Want a demo not a sign up form. [pitch == crowd sourced finding of apartments... but still not sure how exactly it works dwellee.com] I didn't have time to go ask the last company, Recollect, any annoying questions :-)

Kilimanjaro 14y ago

Hey guys, I like what you're doing. Here is some unsolicited advice: create a startup news magazine like HN. That's it. Will read it from day one. HN vs NR. Endless fights, endless clicks, endless promotion for your startups. We all win at the end.