Clarity_Conviction_CommitmentQ: Question for Olman, In light of questions on pricing yesterday, let me ask one that gets at the overall ...
vetting process for bringing deals to the Appsumo community.
How deep do you go to make sure a company is on solid footing?
There are questions about EngageForm in terms of development during the last few years (yes, the guy said they pivoted), a sparse roadmap, and the fact that their site is setting off security alarms for a lot of people.
Olman, do you ask to look at finances to make sure a company has a shot to be around for a while? The people who bought Epictions (?) last year got an email recently saying they were closing up shop.
I'm not being critical, I just would like to know the extent to which you and your team go to ensure these opportunities are as good as your awesome copywriters present them as.
Every deal is hyped and dripping with superlatives, but all of us know that some of that mustard falls off the hot dog in the Q & A that follows the pitch.
I'd be grateful for less hype and more thoughtful analysis in the approach.
Take care.
piotr_4screens
May 14, 2024A: Hi, Sumo-link. I know this question is for Olman but it refers to 4screens credibility as a business so to be transparent with all Sumo-lings let me address some issues that you mention.
Abut our history and ability to develop features I already answered on a similar question but I know that it's hard to read all threads when there is so much question so let me use that answer one more time so here is our history on timeline:
- In 2014 we started as a small software house that works on custom interactive project mainly for media companies
- We saw some patterns in our implementations for TV and idea for 4screens platform was born, the main purpose was to create a platform that will allow easily create Interactive engagement apps without coding.
- We created a prototype and pitch to investors, at the beginning of 2015 we received $600k from polish VC.
- In 2015 we develop platform that main purpose was to create Interactive engagement apps that work on any screen desktop, tablet and mobile ( android, ios ) - that's why name 4screens
I have 18 years experience in developing and maintaining software products so based on this experience platform was built as much modular as possible. It was set of tools: Engageform, Engagenow, Engagehub and on top 4screens Studio that allows to combine all elements of platform and create a mobile app, the whole platform was targeted mainly for TV companies minimum price was 1000$ per month. Very quickly we had all polish TV stations as our clients and power apps that had +50 000 concurrent users on Engagenow, but it was a very small market so we needed to go outside Poland with our sales but for this, we needed another round of financing, our investor didn't believe in that strategy and we fail with finding another one.
- At the beginning of 2017 we needed to pivot, so we decided to abandon big platform strategy and concentrate on our small tools that answer specific needs and change our target market from media to more broader marketing sector. Of course, that's required some code refactor and concentrate on a little different set of features.
- In the middle of 2017, we end up with 3 tools in the freemium model: Engageform, Engagenow, Engagehub
- In 2018 From this 3 tools only Engageform and Engagenow get global traction.
- In the middle of 2018 we decided to fully concentrate our efforts on this two tools that get traction
- In September of 2018, we are featured on Appsumo
So here you have the whole story, what you can see it's not what feature we added, as you can see we are very good at this :) I think more important is what features we needed abandon on our road to product-market fit Right now based on our traction we know what kind of set of features we need to add but also after our bumpy road we are big fan of KISS strategy ( Keep it Simple Stupid )
I don't know if this story answer on your question and doubts about our ability to deliver a product with full potential but I can ensure that we are ful
Verified purchaser
Hoping Olman decides to respond to this. Since I posed the question of vetting, an actual customer of this business has posted a review that advises all sumolings to stay away because of bad service and broken promises.
Again, let's have Appsumo step up and be transparent about the process of checking these companies out.
The majority of deals come from India and Eastern Europe, and I think we need to know more about them — at least more than we get in fancy sales pitches.
Sorry my answers reach comment limit :) so here is rest of the story:
I don't know if this story answer on your question and doubts about our ability to deliver a product with full potential but I can ensure that we are fully concerted on this two products that are featured on Appsumo.
There was also question about "security issue" I also address this so let me use my previous answer. After we receive information that 2 scanning malware engines mark as insecure ( even now we don't know why because our site is secure and don't have any suspicious scripts ) we start contact with them to resolve this issue. Finally we received information from Kaspersky:
"Thank you for sending a request to Kaspersky Lab! We have checked the link you sent us. It has been confirmed as a false positive. The link will be excluded from our anti-phishing databases."
From our site we do nothing on our site, so there was no any security issue. It called "false detection" by them. Sorry for the inconvenience but I can assure you that this is not a real security issue....I would called this simply bad luck :)
So, in summary, you see that platform working since end of 2015, despite bumpy times in middle 2017 when we need to pivot, main tools that was created still existing and we develop features that is right now concentraed on marketing usage ( our integrations with Zapier was introduced finally few days ago so here you have new feature ) Right now we have more than 15000 users ( we operate on freemium model ) and few hundreds paying customers. Maybe this is not established environment and it's risky to invest 49$ in tool that working since end of 2015 but you can try it test it, and if you not liked simply refund :)
Verified purchaser
Thank you, piotr. I appreciate your reply and telling your story.
My suggestion is to communicate further with the person who posted that they have had a bad experience with you and try to solve their problems.
As for giving your product(s) a try, I am still interested. The main attraction for me is EngageNow. I will continue to read questions and reviews, and then make my final decision.
As for the questions to Olman, I hope he will also answer. Believe me, I think i can speak for the majority of buyers in this community, it is not the selling price that is an issue......it is the time we invest to learn a product or system.
If the offer doesn't turn out as hoped, or changes after the fact (has happened), or the company ceases operation (just happened with Epictions), there is a potential large loss in time and effort that might be vaued at 100X or 1000X (or much more) the cost of the purchase.
Thanks again.
As you can see we try to be open and transparent despite hard questions. I answered on a thread that person and waiting for more info. Because right now I only know that it was 1 year ago and the problem was with an account. I don't know the nature of that problem and on what tool was. As I mentioned we also have a free tier where there are more than 15000 users, we try to solve all the problem and tickets that came in but we have also limited resources we try to do our best but I also know that it's impossible to make everyone happy
Hey Sumo-ling,
Thanks for your concern and sorry for the late reply as I didn't get a notification on this post.
We do a thorough analysis on every platform and usually takes 4-6 months for a company to get approved to come on AppSumo.
After the promotion, we work closely with our partners to check up on heath, see where we could help and ensure longevity.
As with any start-up, there isn't a formula the ensures 100% success - just ask any VC, but our process has made sure 99% of companies we've promoted have been successful long after the promotion. As always, products and deals should be purchased with the mentality that it could help your business grow right away and provide immediate value.
Keep growing!
Olman
Verified purchaser
Your story is very great. Why don't you tell it in a more prominent place? I only found it by chance and after buying.
If I was undecided I should have been able to read your story to buy.