After months of discussion and consideration, we’ve finally come up with a new product name for Dex: NetworkHippo.
Why NetworkHippo?
First, it was important to us to incorporate the idea of “networks” in the name of the product. The ability to manage your network and realize opportunities to “monetize” that network is really the core of our product. Many other products in this segment focus on “CRM”, but we really think this is a dying term that is too constrictive and falls short of the real need / opportunity.
And hippos are awesome. They’re big. They’re powerful. Considering their size, they’re extremely versatile and equally at home in the water and land. They’re prominent – they stand out in a crowd. They’re popular among other jungle animals, and they’re smart – but not in the “I take my self too serious” way like monkeys.
Oh yeah, and they swim with crocodiles(!).
We think that this name really represents a “breath of fresh air” in a pretty stuffy segment.
We’re really excited about the new name and the many new features we’ve been working on for our “version 1″ launch in a couple of weeks. After lots of great feedback, and dozens of targeted usability tests, we’ve made some considerable improvements that I think you’ll love.
What do you think?
When I logged into Dex this morning, it reminded me to contact a past colleague and potential business lead that I haven’t spoken to since mid-December. That call turned into a $25,000 consulting engagement for Mercury Grove.
Dex uses several indicators to remind you when to follow up with someone.
As most of you know, Dex, our professional and small business CRM software, has a really smart built-in relationship algorithm that evaluates how well you know someone and potential business opportunities and reminds you to stay in contact with them. We knew it was smart, but today it proved it’s worth when I contacted an old colleague who had asked us for advice in December on rebuilding his company’s corporate website. We exchanged a few emails and calls and it looked like there might be a business opportunity for Mercury Grove, but in the end he decided to work with another company.
This morning, as a result of the “business poke” from Dex, I called to ask how the project was going. It turns out the project isn’t going that well, and they’d really like some expert advice on how to get it back on track and develop a much more aggressive strategy. That call turned into a decent size engagement for us, and will likely lead to much more development and hosting services.
I’m normally really good at following-up with people on a regular basis, but we’ve been so busy lately with the Dex launch and client work, that I haven’t been able to keep up with people as well as I’d like.
Thanks to Dex, the timing of the call was perfect and we’ve got a great new client!
Last week we were in Philadelphia at Indy Hall – a fantastic co-working space in the historic district of the city. We met a lot of great people there including Alex Hillman, Johnny Nines, Bill Jones, and had a great conversation about personal CRM, how to track “introductions”, and the importance of transparency for companies with their customer databases.
Indy Hall really embodies the spirit of the growing business lifestyle of coworking: the people there are outgoing, engaged, open to new ideas, and hard-core DIY. It was great to have the opportunity to meet everyone and be able to demo dex.
Below is the video:
Last week we were in New York City meeting with the gang at New Work City – a great co-working facility in Manhattan. We had a great time and Dex was well received by the whole gang. We tried to broadcast the meeting over the web, but the sound was pretty poor, which was unfortunate.
Check out the video below:
Thursday night we were in Montreal at Station C for the Dex roadtrip. Station C is a beautiful co-working facility in Montreal with a really nice vibe. Patrick Tanguay was an awesome host and we had a great group of people from the local startup scene including Tien Nguyen, Matthew Stotland from the Yellow Bird Project (pretty cool!), and Adrian Ghizaru.
We had a great discussion about how “creepy” some companies can be with CRM systems and how we hope that a more social and “open” network would prevent companies from using CRM systems to creep out customers. It was a great discussion that I hope to continue in future cities with other startups.
Thanks for the great reception in Montreal, and I hope to see Patrick and the gang back in Ottawa sometime soon!
Here’s the video:
Wednesday night we were in Ottawa presenting Dex to local startups and we had a great discussion about opportunities in the CRM space. The room at the Code Factory was fantastic, and I really appreciated having Andrew Milne – the Dex designer – out to hear some of the feedback and participate in the discusion.
It was a great event and a lot of fun.
Check out the video below:
We were in Toronto on Tuesday for the first stop in our cross-country Dex roadtrip. It was a great time getting to meet the local startup scene, and the venue at the Centre for Social Innovation was just amazing!
I’m really glad that we’re doing this roadtrip and getting the opportunity to connect with local startups and small businesses to talk to them about their challenges in the CRM space and show them a completely different way to approach relationship management.
(Much) more to come!
Earlier this morning we launched Dex with a formal press release and emails to everyone who signed up to be part of the beta program (if you didn’t get one, please contact me!).
We’re hoping to get some great feedback from everyone so that we can improve dex over the next few months. If you haven’t tried dex out yet, and didnt get an email check it out here.
We hit the road tomorrow for a meetup in Toronto, then back here in Ottawa tomorrow night, and Montreal on Thursday. If you’re in any of those towns and interested in joining us to talk startups and hear more about the dex story, please signup by clicking on the city names above. We’ll be posting ongoing pics and videos from the world (northeast americas) tour throughout the next couple of weeks!
Thanks to everyone for your ongoing support and collaboration – you’ve been awesome.
Shirts will soon be on their way (in time for spring), and we’re still chewing on new names…
We’re days away from launching dex in public beta and the team is very excited.
This has been such a great, collaborative journey that we decided the best way to tell people about dex was to go tell people about dex. So we’re packing up our best suits, dressing dex up really nice, and taking her on the road to tell people about our development experience, show them the final result (beta), and hopefully get a lot of great feedback that we can jam into the first release!
Here is our schedule:
We’re really excited about meeting other entrepreneurs and startups in these cities, to share ideas and swap stories. If you can make it, let us know in the comments.
We’ll be sure to take lots of pics and blog from the road.
Start proactively managing your network and see results immediately!
