What makes a good voice tech startup?
Gravity exists. Truth matters. So what makes your voice tech startup different?
To borrow loosely on what renowned professor Peter Drucker once said, “the purpose of a [voice tech] company is, has been, and always will be to create a customer. Therefore the only thing a [voice tech] company should focus on is innovation and marketing.”
What makes voice tech investing different are the same things that make it exactly the same as any other tech startup investment — just with opacity cranked up to level 10. Startups have to solve problems that matter and find customers willing to pay.
So what’s a voice tech startup to do? Instead of rehashing startup 101s that an infinitesimal number of places on the web already do a good job of pontificating on, let’s talk about voice tech specifically.
Investors like VoicePunch have to sort through a bottomless supply of companies competing for funding. Here are a few of the questions we like to ask voice tech companies to help us separate the wheat from the chaff.
Ask yourself:
- But for voice, would your startup exist?
Many startups in voice tech create solutions that leverage voice as an extension of what they are on other platforms. See above — “not every generation invented sex, but the Internet made created novel new pathways to the home.” - Can your voice tech startup be successful if it takes a lot longer than you planned for consumers/corporation to really embrace your product? How committed are you and your team?
- Disrupting terra firma? How does your voice solution disrupt the status quo, and whose lunch are you going to eat when you are successful?
- Does the team you have or the team you are building have the vision, motivation, and perseverance needed for success?
- Solution — If your product or service is in the market, has it received positive customer feedback?
If you feel like you have a pretty good handle on how you would answer these questions for your startup, please reach out. We are excited to meet you!
Originally published at voicepunch.vc.