On July 13, 2010, SocialGrow President Marsh Sutherland and Chief Marketing Officer Ken Herron pitched SocialGrow as part of round two of the 2010 MassChallenge Startup Competition at Fan Pier Boston.
The slides have been annotated to include the talking points used for each slide.
Learn more about Microsoft BizSpark SocialGrow and the SocialGrow software application at http://socialgrow.com, and keep up with the latest social media best practices by following SocialGrow on Twitter at http://twitter.com/socialgrow.
SocialGrow Round Two Pitch Slides - 2010 MassChallenge Global Startup Competition
1. As presented to the MC judges on July 13, 2010
Photo Credit: Kyle Psaty
2. Note: Our talking
points for each slide
will be on the virtual
SocialGrow Inc.
yellow stickies.
Our judges were: John
Mutkoski, Harjinder
Sandhu, and James
Woodward.
The easiest way to grow your online connections
Round 2 Judging
Marsh Sutherland, President and Co-Founder
Ken Herron, Chief Marketing Officer and Co-Founder
July 13, 2010
3. According to HubSpot just last month, 253 million people in North America, and
1.7 billion people worldwide, use the internet on a daily basis. Of these, over
60 million in the U.S., and over 500 million worldwide, use social networks on a
daily basis.
For the businesses in the U.S who are increasingly using social networks to
engage with these 60 million-plus people -- SocialGrowʼs target customers -- it
is currently slow, tedious...a royal pain for them to grow their online
connections.
What if...there was an easy-to-use, web-based application -- for businesses
and organizations of all sizes -- which automated the process of inviting their
target customers to connect with them on their different social networks?
We have done just that.
Over 60 million people in the U.S. actively
use social networksSource: HubSpot June 2010.
(that’s over 500 million people globally)
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4. We have developed a SaaS application in
asp.net (C# and AJAX), hosted by
Microsoft partner Hostway, and using
Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2 for our
database.
As Exchange checks users' calendars to
pull out potential time slots for meetings,
we check users' e-mails to pull out potential
connections for social networking.
We present our users with a list of their
"Potential Connections". This enables
We make it easy. them to easily choose with whom they want
to connect, on which of their different social
networks, with which invitation text, and
how they want to categorize the
connection.
Through a patent-pending digital
identification engine (SocialGrow's core IP),
we are currently the *only* company with
software automating the social network
invitation process from within a user's
workflow.
We anticipate fast-follower competitors to
include companies like: Xobni, Spokeo,
Gist, Rapleaf, MyLife, Flowtown, Facebook,
Twitter, LinkedIn, Microsoft, and Google.
1. Let us check your e-mails.
2. Accept your “Potential Connections”.
3. Grow your social network connections.
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5. We have all heard the saying that companies should "eat their own cooking". We have eaten our own cooking to successfully grow SocialGrow's social
network connections to accelerate our product development, customer service, marketing, and public relations.
How? We created a group on LinkedIn specifically for our Alpha release users. This not only enables all of us -- leadership, development, and marketing -- to
know who our users are, but allows us to personally engage with them, and makes us accessible and accountable to them real-time to build *their* product.
We have also grown active communities on third-party social networks including Facebook, Flickr, YouTube, and others.
With almost 25,000 followers, our Twitter audience is our most viral, and therefore our most valuable social media asset asset to date.
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6. SocialGrow makes it easy for all of our
users, regardless of size, resources, or
skills, to grow their social network
connections.
Our early adopters have been the hyper-
networked B2C sales and marketing
users who use social networking for their
lead generation. We make them more
money, faster.
We make businesses Starting at just $12.99 a month,
SocialGrow's revenues will come primarily
from subscription and affiliate (referral)
fees. Subscription fees will begin with the
more money, faster. 3Q10 Beta release. An affiliate
agreement has already been signed with
Xing, and agreements are pending with
Tagged, Affluence, and Fruster. Tertiary
sources of revenue will include OEM
licensing fees and advertising.
The MassChallenge prize money will be
used to accelerate Beta release
development, marketing for paid
subscribers, and filing for utility patent
applications.
Subscription Fees
Affiliate (Referral) Fees
OEM Licensing Fees and Advertising
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7. From day one last July, we have recruited the diverse, experienced technology, marketing, and business talent we need to execute.
Each one of our three principals has been matched with a seasoned startup advisor from their respective discipline:
- President Marsh Sutherland, formerly of deNovis, Akibia, and KPMG, is advised by Mike Troiano (President of Holland-Mark Digital)
- CMO Ken Herron, former CMO of the worldʼs second stickiest social network (Online Buddies), is advised by Dean Harris (former CMO of Vonage and Kayak)
- CTO Charbel Elkhoury, formerly of Greenfield Online,Trimble Mobile Solutions, Siebel Systems, is advised by Raju Matta (TripAdvisorʼs Senior Director of Engineering)
Advisor: Mike Troiano, President of Holland-Mark Digital
President Marsh Sutherland (JD/MBA/BA)
Advisor: Dean Harris, Former CMO of Vonage and Kayak
CMO Ken Herron (MMP/MBA/BA)
Advisor: Raju Matta, TripAdvisor’s Sr. Dir. of Engineering
CTO Charbel Elkhoury (PhD/MBA/BS)
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8. Marketers EASY to build their online audiences
EASY to find, connect with, and engage
Businesses
their customers on social networks
SocialGrow makes it EASY
for marketers, businesses,
and social networks:
For marketers -- SocialGrow
makes it EASY, fast, and
Social cheap to build their online
EASY to grow their members audiences.
Networks For businesses -- SocialGrow
makes it EASY to find,
connect with, and engage
their target customers on
social networks.
For social networks
themselves -- SocialGrow
makes it EASY, fast, and
Mass-
cheap to grow their members.
EASY to make SocialGrow a And for the MassChallenge
Challenge judges -- SocialGrow makes
MassChallenge finalist! it EASY to make us a finalist!
Judges
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