The last week was spent testing our hypotheses out as well as speaking to people in the industry. The thing about gift-giving that we learned from both our and others’ experiences is that it is incredibly diverse. As such, there are so many areas and variations to cover. We are definitely set on taking on the problems that arise from gift-giving because it’s a fun, meaningful and widespread problem to solve and now we’re exploring exactly which areas to tackle.
How we’ll end up choosing them would be based on something like this:
NO. OF PEOPLE W PROBLEM x SEVERITY x EASE OF IMPLEMENTATION
MVPs, Tested Out
- “I Need Help Getting A Present”
Based on last week’s test, we receiveed 3/80 real entries.
It somewhat validates the hypotheses that people need help with getting presents. - “Fill In Your Wishlist”
From those entries, we sent out the link for the receivers to fill the wishlist out through giftonteam@gmail.com
None of them filled it up and we suspect that this is largely due to people not trusting (or even receiving) the email and it could be awkward.
We talked to one of them after and he initially thought it was a prank from this friends. Clearly, trust for the platform is an important factor. - “Full Process — Wishlists, Sharing a Gift”
Two friends has their birthdays coming up and they were having a Fountain Hopping + BBQ party to celebrate the occasion and since they are really nice people, we thought this would be a perfect time to test our ideas out.
a) Wishlists
We first sent the same link to have their wishlists filled up. We messaged each of them personally through Facebook messenger, as friends. One thought I was showing him our idea and didn’t realise it was for himself and the other filled it up quickly and even almost forgot that he did so. People would fill in the wishlists, especially with some urges from their friend.
b) Sharing The Gift
Next, we created a Facebook chat with those who were invited/going to the event asking if any of them wanted to share the cost of the gift. More precisely, a gift that the birthday boys indicated they wanted.
This was the response we got:
While all of us have only known each other for a short while, the responses were immediate and it validated the hypothesis that people are really willing to share the cost of the gift. No one else even mentioned anything about it but the moment someone proposed it and by default become the “organiser”, many people are willing to be a part of it. We also noticed that this could be true especially since there was going to be an event around it. It was also important to note that most of the people in the chat didn’t know this was part of our startup, so it was pretty much organic.
c) Getting The Gift + Special Touches
We got the gifts and included some extras, like a photo where we spelled out “Happy Birthday” since our friend had a drone. For another, a personalised gift certificate cum birthday card (as one wanted tickets for events in the Valley) was done up by another friend who likes DIY. We waived her contribution to the total cost for her time spent on it.
d) Collecting $$
It’s one thing for people to say that they will like to contribute and another to have cash and actually pay for it. We settled this by going around inconspicuously before the party started to ask if people wanted to share the cost of the gift and estimated it to be $10 in total. No one said no, although one said she’d like to pay for only the guy she knew better. The process would definitely have been easier through Venmo or Facebook’s new feature of sending money to friends, but it didn’t work for international credit cards. We collected slightly more than enough to cover the costs and we hadn’t even approached everyone there. Many startups don’t generate revenue nor profits but this proved that we could easily get both and the profits are definitely going in to building this even further.
e) Their Reaction
This is the moment why we’re so interested in gift-giving. We interrupted the party with a chorus of Happy Birthday and The surprise, elation and appreciation that appears on their faces is priceless and it’s always nice to have been a part of that. Surprise is definitely one of the most valuable aspect of giving presents and while they did put up a wishlist, it could have been any of those items and the gift came with something extra and it was also a present from a bunch of friends.
This MVP definitely validated several hypotheses and our eventual product could be a virtual version of the process, with features that make it convenient.
Real World Validation
After numerous cold emails, LinkedIn requests and InMail, we finally got to talk to 2 people who have worked in this industry. For privacy purposes, we’ll omit the actual conversation and only include our reactions and thoughts after the conversation
- Karma, acquired by Facebook
Brief introduction:
Karma was a online gifting startup that got acquired by Facebook in 2012. Back then, Facebook was looking for means to generate revenue and gifts was a possible channel. Ads were deemed as more successful so Gifts were phased out. It’s worth noting that their focus was extremely dfiferent from ours.
Thoughts, Things Worth Noting:
- Focus on the “Giver” and them receiving their “Thanks”
- Surprise element is valuable
- Market is wide, but users are not necessarily reccurring
- Gift-giving culture is not as popular as we thought in the US, especially compared to many countries in Europe. We hypothesise that this is due to the Effort + Cost + Lack of Convenience in getting a gift and that it could be rectified. We’re still sticking to the US Millennial Market to be our first users as they’re more inclined to try out new apps and products. - Elfster
Brief introduction:
Elfster started as a product that the founder created to solve his own problem of doing Secret Santa. He created it in a few days about 12 years ago and it’s been growing organically (by word-of-mouth) and exponentially with about 3 million users. They’re not even on it full-time and are a profitable company. Their primary goal was never to just make money, but rather instill a greater sense of generosity in society where they direct their profits to charity partners.
Thoughts, Things Worth Noting:
- Their primary revenue stream comes from Amazon Affiliate program, which is something that fits well with our ideas
- The possibilities in the gift-giving domain are so wide. While their platform offers features similar to the ones we were thinking of, their purpose varies greatly from ours. They’re more concerned with one-on-one gifting of presents in a community, in a social group while we’re more interested in the process of getting a great present for someone and that process involves the efforts of a group of people and talking to her allowed us to better distinguish our “vision”.
Continue Validating + Deciding
We’re about to start working on our third MVP and are about to talk to the CEOs of GiftStarters and Wish.com, probably one of the key startups in this space.
In the meantime, we’re also deliberating over certain specific areas, while considering these three factors
NO. OF PEOPLE W PROBLEM x SEVERITY x EASE OF IMPLEMENTATION
- How focussed should we be?
- A platform to create Wishlists, for people to spend time on? Should it include options to share gifts?
