Blog
Dec 22

New York Fellows Fall 2014 Project Summaries

This fall, current InSITE Fellows completed projects for a wide range of startups in New York City.  Here is a list of them along with summaries of what the teams completed:

Jack Erwin
An innovative lifestyle brand targeting the large, growing men’s shoe & accessories industry

The InSITE team helped Jack Erwin think through their overall retail build-out strategy. In particular, the InSITE team helped the founders identify attractive areas of growth as they consider further brick-and-mortar development. In addition, the team has added value by refining the operational strategy of such showrooms, with specific guidance on the customer experience, sales team dynamics, and managerial oversight.

Likeable Local
Social media automation software for small and medium businesses

The InSITE team helped Likeable Local in two key areas: pitch deck and business development. Likeable Local offers social media automation software to small and medium businesses, and so far has had most success among Dentists and Jewelers. In preparation for Connect and efforts to raise Series A funding, the team helped Likeable Local Founder, Dave Kerpen, revamp his pitch. Additionally, the business development project focused on identifying new SMB verticals Likeable should expand to, as well as determining the most appropriate vertical and horizontal partners Likeable should consider teaming up with in order to maximize their chances of success within these new verticals.

Miner
Location-based mobile shopping

The InSITE team leveraged internal developer talents to helped Miner create a strategy for implementing a social graph, which is a personalization engine that helps match product selection to each user.   Additionally, the team added a lot of value by conducting thorough analysis and creating a list of suitable APIs with associated technical requirements, properties and fees that would allow Miner to pull in data from large content providers to Miner’s database.  InSITE was also able to help Miner fine tune its pitch deck for future funding.

Bandwagon
A ridesharing service for cars and taxis

The InSITE team organized around two main themes to build value for Bandwagon – helping to create a sales funnel and process, and building a visual tool to demonstrate cost and carbon savings for a new potential client.

One Financial
Mobile banking for underbanked

The InSITE team project focused on optimizing customer acquisition upon the One Financial product launch this coming February. The team conducted socioeconomic analysis and identified target customers and optimal geographical zones or customer engagement.  The team also interviewed sales professionals across a myriad of industries and synthesized best sales force practices and strategies.  Finally, the team recommended a sales force structure and operational strategy to maximize customer acquisition.

Admittedly
Admissions help for high school students

The InSITE team helped Admittedly strategize along a number of fronts; primarily user acquisition, user retention, and marketing segmentation. As Admittedly seeks Series A funding, it’s trying to ensure that the product is capable of attracting/retaining users, so the InSITE team provided a lot of feedback on the UX of the product. The team also helped the company develop their financial modeling.

Bowery
Making web development easier by completing time-intensive, repetitive tasks for developers

The InSITE team project focused on product pricing and positioning, and more broadly, business model development. This included analysis of freemium business models and exploration of various target customer segments.  The team conducted new feature analysis for Bowery, to include pricing, positioning, branding, and marketing.  InSITE also worked on customer development and feedback with the founder.

Button
An acquisition, activation, and engagement toolset that fosters higher lifetime values and creates more efficient methods of acquiring consumers for companies in the on-demand economy

The InSITE team developed an event platform and website for companies in the on-demand economy. The team interviewed a variety of companies across the on-demand economy (from Uber to Seamless/GrubHub to Glamsquad) to understand their greatest challenges and needs. They then developed a flagship annual event to bring together 500+ key stakeholders in the on-demand economy including entrepreneurs, companies, government agencies and service providers. The team simultaneously built a website, which will eventually be located at theondemandeconomy.org that highlights news, event information, job postings, and a directory of on-demand economy companies.

Stowaway
Direct to Consumer Cosmetic Brand

The InSITE team project identified key product expansion opportunities in the color cosmetics space and executed competitive pricing analysis to identify best product price points for Stowaway.  The team created customer acquisition and partnership strategies, and identified three vendors that fit with Stowaway’s budget, interface, and brand values.  Additionally, the team created an inventory management system, a flexible financial projection model, and performed sensitivity analysis on key outputs of Stowaway’s financial model.

1MM (formerly Awaretech)
Wearables to reduce worker back injuries

The InSITE team originally focused on properly defining 1MM’s market to augment their pitch for the Verizon Powerful Answers competition. This work formed the basis for addressing questions regarding market scope and pricing. Further analysis and field work in these areas lead the team to provide concrete suggestions for improving 1MM’s product strategy.

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