Congratulations to our teams, experts and mentors, the first module is completed! Four intensive and constructive workshops were held and the teams showed a great eagerness to learn. As part of the BioSense Accelerator we are working on creating the best learning environment. For this reason we have gathered top-notch experts and mentors who are providing comprehensive business. Throughout the program, teams will also have access to the scientific know-how provided by BioSense researchers.
The first module was dedicated to the customer development. Here is some feedback from our teams and their most valuable learning takeaways.
It’s the end of the first modul. In one sentence, could you tell us what customer development is and why it is essential to think about this when establishing a startup?
Farm FIT: Putting the customer first and trying to answer the following questions: who can be our buyer, how can we solve customers’ problems, have they already tried to find the solution to the problem we want to solve, are they willing to pay and how much…etc.
What are the most valuable learning takeaways for you after this first month?
Farm FIT team: We’ve gotten a better understanding of our customers, we did empathy mapping, tested our hypothesis and precisly defined our target group.
IoTartic: We could say there were two major learning takeways. Firstly, we have learned how to properly define phases of our project. Secondly, we implemented the experinece of our mentors and their adivce in our project.
How have you applied customer development to your startup?
AgriCams: In the first two weeks of the accelerator, we conducted nine interviews with our targeted customers. It was enough to disprove two out of five hypotheses we set about our product. Now we are redesigning both, the business model and the product, to get a better product/market fit. The next round of interviews is just around the corner.
EcoFert: The assignments related to the Empathy mapping and Customer journey map were very interesting to complete, since we’ve had to think about the main characteristics of our customers, as well as feelings, needs, problems. The most important thing that we’ve learned is that companies should maintain strong relationships with their customers in order to get their feedback and reassess business hypothesis. Therefore, our next step is to do research on our customers, so that we could develop a product that will satisfy their needs and awaken personal satisfaction.
IoTartic: In the current phase that our startup is in, it has been crucial to us to understand how to know who your customers are. Regarding that, we have started analyzing our potential clients in the microenvironment, testing and finding to whom our product is relevant.
How has your strategic thinking improved during the past month?
AgriCams:Since all founders of our startup are engineers, we are lacking a business perspective. We have the impression that by going through the process of customer development, especially interviews with targeted customers, we have learned much more than we would by just talking to the experts and engineers in the field of precision agriculture. It motivates us to see the product mainly from the customers’ perspective and less from an engineering point of view. It is also causing our business model and product design to better fit each other.
EcoFert team: One of the directions we want to go is to try to understand our customers better and consider their needs and market situation in order to incorporate those findings into product development and marketing strategy. That’s what we’ve realized during the first month. We’ve gotten important advice about pitch presentation and elevator pitch. During the fourth week, we’ve tried to establish some key points for our further activities, learned how to measure the outcomes and define timelines for our milestones.
What is the best advice you’ve gotten so far?
Eridu: Talk to your customers on daily bases. If you are running a business, you must always be in contact with your end users. Anything less than that is just a hobby. This simple advice is great, because it’s increasing chances of business success, and it keeps you focused on your business, not solely on your product.
AgriCams: Listen to customers and get advice from them!
What role did the mentors play during the past 4 weeks?
EcoFert: It was really an interesting experience to present our idea in a 15 minute-conversation during our first meeting with mentors from different backgrounds. We obtained an immediate feedback and they showed a lot of interest for the development of our idea. Experience they shared with us involving investors, market positioning and marketing strategies was definately useful and a good starting point before going to the market. Working with our mentor Darko Mandić was trully inspiring, and our current task is making a detailed plan and time frame for our further activities regarding product development. His great experience in business sector, as well as his interest in our idea and the core values we stand for, present a strong foundation to develop our collaboration.
IoTartic: Thanks to the mentors, we understood where the potential mistakes were, we realized what needed to be done in the next phase. Also, the good setup of the timeline could be helpful in the pitch presentation, etc.
Eridu: Provided mentorship during this accelerator is by far the most important part of this project. Mentors are dedicated, informed and their experience in different fields have helped us to better define our product and our company path.
Moving towards the next module that focused on MVP and prototyping, what are you expecting?
Farm Fit: As we are already a step away from our MVP, we want to test if our solution gives customers added value we want to promote and if it solves their problems.
Eridu: Since we are currently in this phase, we are looking forward towards meaningful insights that will help us define the scope of our MVP, so we don’t get sidetracked. Also, we are hoping to get training on prototyping our product.
