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Hi everyone. I just wanted to create a thread about a startup that I am currently founding together with my wife and a friend in the mentoring field. https://www.manatee-mentor.com Our basic idea was to make an app that matches mentors with mentees and to provide tools to nurture these mentoring relationships. We have created an app that launches today for the public and we have recruited over 100 volunteer mentors that are willing to give back. Mostly because they themself got mentored at some point in their career. We have recruited a team of interns from around the world that are currently helping us with everything from app development, marketing to blockchain and AI research. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mJcgCBp1f_4&t=1s Some innovative things we are working on is the AI framework to match mentors and mentees . We have created a virtual currency called "Mana"" that you can earn by being active on the site and provide mentoring. We will have a paid mentoring path as well in the future where people with more coaching background or specialist skills can sell sessions and trainings. Life coaches, nutritionists ect. We are not wanting or trying to become a medial device . I am creating this thread because we are right now live on the android app store in our BETA release. We are going to eventually also launch for IOS and web but figured its better to have the beta release in just one form. Everything we have done so far is purely done for free and we basically have 0 budget and are just bootstrapping it. We are not looking for investors and are not selling equity but if we become big and it turns out that everything works, who knows. Please download the app and let me know what you think. If you have any questions post them and I will answer. MRLOLAST fucked around with this message at 19:03 on Mar 30, 2021 |
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Mar 30, 2021 12:27
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1000 invites for people who had signed up for the news letter sent out. Going to stress test our CTO as much as the system  So do you agree that great mentoring should be accessible for anyone and not hidden behind a paywall or for the select few?
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Mar 30, 2021 16:08
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your website isn't loading friend
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Mar 30, 2021 18:23
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TropicalCoke posted:your website isn't loading friend Thanks friend! Spell check didn't do me any favors there. It should be working now.
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Mar 30, 2021 19:04
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People have generally been kind with the feedback so far, saying that they like the app and the design. Some have complained about it being hard to navigate menus and to create profiles. [https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.swiss.manatee_app If you have android please download and try it but bear in mind that it still in Beta. We are coming out with an IOS version eventually but since we are doing a Beta it best just to keep it to one platform. And the fact that none of us have a Mac. MRLOLAST fucked around with this message at 18:09 on Mar 31, 2021 |
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Mar 31, 2021 18:06
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Any cool ideas on how to attract more users as mentees ? We have plenty of great people wanting to pass on their knowledge and you can be both at the same time on the platform. MRLOLAST fucked around with this message at 09:02 on Apr 1, 2021 |
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Mar 31, 2021 20:38
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It is a very inspiring startup since we have volunteers mentors that are managers from Google, MIT, Amazon , Airbus and so on. So successful people that are feeling that they can give something back mostly because they themself once had a mentor that helped them. And now they have pledged to give a few hours every month to mentoring others to reach their goals. We have also been in contact with several NGOs in low and middle income in order to promote the app and they are enthusiastic. One unforeseen issue with that which we are working on solving is that the users there have lovely data plans, so our fist mission is to get partners in telecom in Africa that can give our users preferential or free surfing minutes.
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Apr 1, 2021 09:02
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MRLOLAST posted:Any cool ideas on how to attract more users as mentees ? Tell us about those users. Who are mentees and where do they hang out? Also is this for any kind of mentoring or is a certain type focused on like career mentoring? Also wanted to share this: http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html EDIT: Theres a lot of people who could use some good 1:1 time from people for career stuff in the resume and negotiation threads. Maybe see if people there will realize they need someone to EDIT2: Also some site feedback. Kudos on make a very clear call to action on the main page. Its clear what you want me to do is download this app. A thing I think you could improve: your home page has a lot of words. I bet you could get your main point across better by having fewer points and using way fewer words. CarForumPoster fucked around with this message at 04:19 on Apr 2, 2021 |
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Apr 2, 2021 04:11
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Thank you very much for the feedback. We did some persona mapping and surveys before we started and it basically came down to this. 80% of the people would be willing to be mentored or mentor someone, 60% where willing to pay if they got the right one. Mentoring could be anyone willing to develop skills and in need of guidance. It can be in any sector or business that we have people that can match and from any country. We want to making mentoring equitable so if you don't have the means to pay you can contribute to the site and earn mana, this mana you can the spend on mentoring. If you are a life-coach, dietian or have some skills that you think you should get paid for then you can sell those skills on the platform. Right now everything is free and open and nothing is implemented from the paid service. The free mentoring will be our core function but once everything is working hunky dory we will start with paid mentoring and b2b mentoring packages. MRLOLAST fucked around with this message at 08:38 on Apr 2, 2021 |
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Apr 2, 2021 08:31
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We sat down and hammered this out as well. https://www.manatee-mentor.com/payitforward If I manage to fulfill it I will gladly accept the nobel price I medicine. It's definitely something to work on towards once easter is over
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Apr 3, 2021 18:48
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Updated launch video for the Beta version for Android. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cb7zIBKUghE&t=5s Some of our users in the U.S are getting an error where the screen keeps on spinning/ loading after they enter their details. If someone has this error can you report it in this thread? It seems only to affect US users weirdly enough.
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Apr 7, 2021 21:10
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I think you are much more likely to launch a successful product if you are targeting a specific niche rather than "anyone who has any skills at all". Suppose you targeted "optometrists who are starting their first independent business", say. The niche makes it easier to narrow your advertising and marketing, and is much more attractive to someone who has that specific problem. You could launch multiple niches, even, but it sounds like you want this to be all things to a general audience. That is a really, really hard marketing sell.
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Apr 7, 2021 21:31
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moana posted:I think you are much more likely to launch a successful product if you are targeting a specific niche rather than "anyone who has any skills at all". Suppose you targeted "optometrists who are starting their first independent business", say. The niche makes it easier to narrow your advertising and marketing, and is much more attractive to someone who has that specific problem. You could launch multiple niches, even, but it sounds like you want this to be all things to a general audience. That is a really, really hard marketing sell. Thanks for feedback. We do want to be "the general" mentoring platform in our free offer but we have more specialized offers geared towards let's say healthcare industry - support for mentoring of midwifes in low and middle income countries. I am working right now on a pitch/ program for mentoring of new starters at sales departments. I think almost any industry, organisation can benefit greatly from a well run , professional mentoring program. MRLOLAST fucked around with this message at 22:26 on Apr 7, 2021 |
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Apr 7, 2021 22:23
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moana posted:I think you are much more likely to launch a successful product if you are targeting a specific niche rather than "anyone who has any skills at all". Suppose you targeted "optometrists who are starting their first independent business", say. The niche makes it easier to narrow your advertising and marketing, and is much more attractive to someone who has that specific problem. You could launch multiple niches, even, but it sounds like you want this to be all things to a general audience. That is a really, really hard marketing sell. A million times this. There's a reason that everyone has their favorite variation of "if everyone is your customer, no one is your customer" Ironically, it's the first piece of advice MRLOLAST would likely get from a mentor. e: Because I'm worried that might be a little too curt -- you need to separate your mission (or the company you want to become) from your go-to-market. quote:geared towards let's say healthcare industry - support for mentoring of midwifes in low and middle income countries. quote:mentoring of new starters at sales departments Think of how much easier it is to build out a community like that and find some level of product market fit as opposed to "yeah, show up and we'll find you a mentor for whatever." If mentorship is the actual goal, put yourselves in a position to provide real, valuable mentorship as easily as possible. Then take what worked in the first community and try to replicate it in a second, third, etc. It's a very common growth pattern. Also: your website has 115 mentors listed and I (as a potential customer) have no idea what any of them do or what they might be able to mentor me on. Try splitting them into groups based on subject matter expertise then find people who are looking for that expertise in a mentor. Shrimpy fucked around with this message at 07:29 on Apr 8, 2021 |
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Apr 8, 2021 05:47
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Basically what we are doing is making 2 paths.. free mentoring through the app with AI matching . You can mentor and be a mentee at the same time and earn mana for doing so. The people on the website are our founding volunteer mentors- they are businesses leaders and others that have agreed to volunteer their time for free and mentor others. They have been mentored themselves and now want to give back. You find them by downloading the app and filling out your profile. Path 2 is more B2B, this is where you guys are on about the beach head market and that we should gear towards a specific customer set- we are doing it. But this is a more specialized solution - like white label. We are keeping these separate in the app and in our marketing/ pitching. And they will only intercede if we have a paid mentor ( mostly coaches) that you can buy mentoring from using mana or cash but that also works for us in the b2b offer. MRLOLAST fucked around with this message at 09:51 on Apr 8, 2021 |
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Apr 8, 2021 09:48
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You should really really really do YC's startup school program. I think it would massively increase the chance of success for products like this at the stage you're at. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVJ9ovLxrKM Honestly you're getting good advice so far IMO but it seems like the message behind the advice isn't really...getting there. Startup school would be a great thing to help focus on what's important to get going. And if you're successful with it, you can get into YC which will help your company have a cool $500k-$2M in the bank to get started with.
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Apr 9, 2021 01:35
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MRLOLAST posted:Basically what we are doing is making 2 paths.. free mentoring through the app with AI matching . You can mentor and be a mentee at the same time and earn mana for doing so. The people on the website are our founding volunteer mentors- they are businesses leaders and others that have agreed to volunteer their time for free and mentor others. They have been mentored themselves and now want to give back. You find them by downloading the app and filling out your profile. I highly suggest you read up on building a two-sided marketplace because that's what you're actually trying to build. Not some weird split play where there's some part that's B2B and white labeled. CarForumPoster posted:You should really really really do YC's startup school program. I think it would massively increase the chance of success for products like this at the stage you're at. Seriously this. I'm not 100% familiar with Startup School, but there is at least a decades worth of content and best practices around building the exact kind of company OP wants to build and getting more exposure to that world would be incredibly helpful.
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Apr 9, 2021 06:19
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We have considered Y-Combinator but at the moment we are still bootstrapping it. Wy sell equity when you don't need to and so far things are moving a long quite nicely. In total our investment is around 500 bucks and 6 months work on evenings and weekends. To be honest the main concern at the moment is perfecting the UI and getting the IOS version working after that. For extra funding I have entered us in to a few start-up competitions and applied for some grants and if one of those comes through everything will be great. Once it's working and is in use I see no problem of selling it as a software to companies. I have spoken to several companies that have expressed their wishes to have a mentoring tool with AI matching. That is lightweight and can be easily adjusted for their needs. This does already exist though and there are HR applications that fulfill similar roles. We are not a consultancy that are starting mentor-ship programs for companies but I do for see them being a potential client of ours. Our core idea is still to make mentoring affordable, equitable and accessible for anyone from anywhere. A platform where you can be both a Mentor and a Mentee. Any B2B stuff we get in to is just to keep the lights on. MRLOLAST fucked around with this message at 09:45 on Apr 9, 2021 |
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Apr 9, 2021 09:29
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MRLOLAST posted:We have considered Y-Combinator but at the moment we are still bootstrapping it. Wy sell equity when you don't need to and so far things are moving a long quite nicely. In total our investment is around 500 bucks and 6 months work on evenings and weekends. To be honest the main concern at the moment is perfecting the UI and getting the IOS version working after that. For extra funding I have entered us in to a few start-up competitions and applied for some grants and if one of those comes through everything will be great. Once it's working and is in use I see no problem of selling it as a software to companies. You wont need to sell equity to do startup school. It’s a free mentorshipish program much like yours! YC is probably the most successful startup mentor ship program in the world by $ created and societal impact. I took our startup through YC a few years ago and have watched many friends startups grow or fizzle. Two sided marketplaces like yours are extremely difficult to start. Probably one of the hardest to turn into a society impacting thing. As your prob know, LinkedIn actually tried a mentor/mentee thing and killed it off. Supply side is usually where you go to first and it seems like that is going well. How about on the mentee side? What is your recurring usage KPI and how is that going from both sides? CarForumPoster fucked around with this message at 02:51 on Apr 11, 2021 |
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Apr 11, 2021 02:46
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OP, How’s it going?
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Jul 4, 2021 11:28
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It's going. Company is ongoing and we are working on version 2.0. There was some issues when the lead dev in India got covid and we lost some time and now we are going to take a bit of a break during the summer and start up again in August.
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Jul 4, 2021 15:36
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