A3 – myEnglishAssistant
Hi everyone,
My venture pitch is for a language support app for smart phones. This project definitely pushed me outside my MET comfort zone, but I’m looking forward to this week hearing and reading about everyone else’s ideas.
Andrea
Here are my elevator pitch, and my venture pitch.
Posted in: Week 13: Venture Forum
Jim 5:50 pm on November 28, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Wow! Is that your voice or did you get a professional to record the narration? Seriously. Whatever voice that is, it is clear and professional. Anyway, your elevator pitch is one of the best I have seen so far. Concise. Calm. Professional. The message I took from the elevator pitch was that your product provides mobile support for English language learners. I suppose one possible route for improvement would be to try to work into your slides how this mobile support would look in schools. If this is an educational product, it needs to be usable on an iPod-like device by ELL students in classrooms. How would that look? Also, would you be taking advantage of image processing to assist with vocabulary? That is, for example, Google can search it’s image database using an image (not a word) so you might be able to develop a way for the app to recognize an object and then provide the word…. just an idea…
andrea 8:31 pm on November 28, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Hi Jim,
Haha, that’s my voice! Thank you for your great suggestions. I did forget to add stuff about using images, which is so important in language learning. I hadn’t thought of this as classroom product, but it would be good to look at the opportunities that offers. Thanks again!
Andrea
Juliana 8:20 pm on November 28, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
I too enjoyed your elevator pitch. I thought it was short, sweet and it would make me want to find out more about your venture. I also liked how you did your graphics in both your elevator pitch and the accompanying venture report you created.
I think my only criticism was that I wanted to know more about it. I would have liked to have seen some more details in your report. Specifically, I would have liked to have seen some ideas on cost-recovery and an approximate development time of your product. I did wonder if what you were offering for free was too little. I thought to generate interest may be a trial time offer would be good (ie. one month). That way people could get an idea of what the App could really do. Anyway, it’s just an idea.
Juliana.
andrea 8:33 pm on November 28, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Hi Juliana,
Great suggestions – thank you! I really like your temporary trial offer idea. That would be a much better ‘hook’.
Andrea
schiong 1:36 pm on November 29, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Hi Andrea,
Great presentation.
I can relate to your topic because I am a landed immigrant myself.
I am not sure if this is common knowledge but allow me to share it.
In the Philippines, one of the requirements of the Canadian Embassy (immigration) is that
we take TOEFL or IELTS or provide sufficient proof that we could speak and write in English language. I guess we are not your target market 🙂
I am surprise that the rule does not apply to other countries.
Going back to the venture …
I was intrigued with what you said, “When people learn new words, they can enter them in their
personal Word Web.”
The statement gave me the impression that the person learned new words somewhere else.
Would your apps be installed or web based?
If it is installed based, you might need to bring a developer who is familiar with Android, iOS, and other platforms. This might increase your costs. Not to mention … you might have to share your profit with Apple (if deployed for iPhone).
My first impression of “Remember Me” feature was it is an electronic version of a flash card. Is it ?
I could not find the Return of Investment part and how much shares would you give to the investors.
cheers,
Stephen
andrea 8:54 pm on December 1, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Hello Stephen,
Thanks for your review and suggestions! I should probably clarify my idea for the word web, which I think I neglected to fully explain in my pitch. The idea is that it’s a tool for people to enter the words they learn during conversation with friends, while looking something up, or potentially through their formal students. These are sort of people’s chosen *targets* for a given time-frame. If I were to revise the pitch, I’d definitely try to make that clear! Describing the reminder feature as an electronic flashcard is a good way to look at it.
I agree that numbers, dollars and ROI info are conspicuously absent from my pitch. These things intimidate me a bit, so I left it out… Reviewing other people’s pitches has really reinforced how important that is, however.
Thanks,
Andrea
Allie 5:51 pm on November 29, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Hi Andrea,
I agree that your voice is made for radio and I.am.jealous! 😉 I feel your EP has a great amount of information, and is really nicely presented. your concept is straightforward and intuitive, and I immediately think, yeah, people would buy that. I’m wondering about what kind of competition myEnglishAssistant faces (are Berlitz and other language companies on the appwagon yet?) and what the learning advantages are above phrasebooks and other language translation/learning technologies?
andrea 9:05 pm on December 1, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Hi Allie,
So maybe one day I’ll achieve my dream of being a CBC radio announcer!?! 😉
Great questions about the competition from the big language schools & course providers. (I really appreciated in your pitch that you clearly identified the competition.) There are some, and this would be tough competition. For example, Berlitz has a free one for students enrolled in their courses, as well as a paid one for those who aren’t. I hoped to differentiate myEnglishAssistant with the calendar and reminder features, but realize these are available through different tools. It’s an interesting challenge to combine existing tools and try to create unique value with the combination.
Thanks for your comments!
Andrea
Keisha Edwards-Hamilton 7:34 pm on November 29, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Hi Andrea,
Very good elevator pitch. It provides a good overview of your venture . It identifies the problems, the solution and your target market which is also very good. Your pitch quickly caught my attention and persuaded me to pay attention to your venture. It was convincing and made me want to learn more. I really would love to see how your venture works.
Keisha
andrea 9:07 pm on December 1, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Hello Keisha,
Thank you for your comments, and I too would be curious to see how it works. 🙂 There are still so many questions to answer, and the process of creating the pitches has been very enlightening.
Andrea
bcourey 3:16 pm on November 30, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Hi Andrea,
I agree that you have a great voice for narration! It gives you a very professional presence in your pitch. You have targeted a market that is in great need of a product such as yours. ELL students (and adults as well) have very specific needs for language acquisition and you have designed a product that could well fill that need.
I work and live in an area with very few ELL students – very little immigration in my part of the province so I am not as aware of what other products are available as competition, but your ideas of just-in-time learning and personal organizational tools seem like unique solutions to their everyday challenges. You have conducted very detailed research about your market and you seem to have a good handle on the competitive products.
You give options for the consumer – free for the basic service, low cost for additional features – this is very reasonable as the free version still gives good service. I’m not as sure about your request for investment, or the potential return on that investment, but I am wondering if you are offering a not-for-profit venture?
Overall, I really enjoyed your presentations and would be very interested in promoting your idea further.
Brenda
andrea 9:15 pm on December 1, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Hi Brenda,
I appreciate your kind comments – thank you. You mentioned the potential ROI and request for investment. I really didn’t address these, in part because I wasn’t sure what that looks like. My plan hadn’t been to develop a not-for-profit venture, as much as I’d like to be able to do that, because of the cost to develop quality apps. I appreciate the importance of this kind of information in successful pitches however, and have added this to my “do differently next time”list. 🙂
Cheers, Andrea
Jim 8:05 pm on November 30, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Hi again Andrea,
I wanted to delve deeper into your Venture Pitch and provide some feedback in the form of a brief EVA analysis. As a potential investor, I am looking in your venture pitch for a variety of information:
Entrepreneur confidence:
I chose to review your Venture Pitch because I appreciated the professionalism of your elevator pitch and assumed it would extend into your venture pitch as well. I was not disappointed. Both pitches came is a very professional package. This is important and adds to my confidence that you will be successful. Also, the fact that you are not only a teacher of ESL students, and a second language learner yourself, gives me greater confidence that you have first-hand experience for all perspectives. You mention a partner who has development experience. I would also like to see someone with solid business and sales experience who knows the minute facets of marketing and selling a product such as yours.
Good product that will be in demand:
I think you product idea has promise for many reasons not the least of which is the fact that a smartphone is becoming the device that almost everyone owns around the world. Everyone has one so why not develop apps such as yours. I also think the features that you have imagined are very smart. For example, the apps would know that the user wants to book a bus trip and provides the context specific vocabulary needed to communicate during this task. Entering and storing user words and information makes this context possible. The more information entered, the more personal it is, and the more the app can contextualize the vocabulary and other support features for the user.
How big is the potential client base:
I think that if you are able to develop and market your product successfully for English language learners, there is no reason why your product could not be retooled for any language learners. This would include a very large number of end users. I think you provide some very good stats on the market size and potential. I think you limit your venture pitch by talking a lot about Canada English as a second language learners stats… your product could be used even more in other countries on smartphones of users who intend to visit, work or study in English speaking countries.
Can the product compete successfully on the market:
Here is my major worry with your idea. There are so many competing apps on the market. After an extremely quick search I found all of these apps: 24/7 Tutor Lite, Arabic pod 101 (pocket Arabic), Hiragana Lite, Touchcards, 7 Jours, CherokeeLite, Michel Thomas Method, ChineseBiz, ChinesePod, iPronunciation and , ranslation, German FlashCards Lite(Declan Software), MemWords- Memorize Words- In Spanish, Gengo Lite Flashcard, AccellaStudy Essentials by AccelaStudy, Kana Lite, Prometoys Limited-Word of the Day, LangLearner LLC, Kana Tap, iReview Flashcards, Babbel Mobile, Word Power Lite, Japanese Phrases FREE (TheJapanesePage.com), and Study Arcade. None of these that I could see allows the user to enter information or contextualize the language support. But the real question is how are you going to be able to communicate your app’s features through all of this “app static” in the market? I think you will be able to compete in the market if you can deliver on the apps features and successfully battle through all of the other language apps and show why yours is so much better!
Are you honest about challenges:
I was hoping to see a strengths and weaknesses self-reflection in your Venture Pitch but I did not see one. This was my primary tool for talking about whether the entrepreneur is being realistic about the venture.
Investment risk?
I would consider this a risky venture to invest in simply because I am not convinced that end users would get a very strong sense that this product is set far above all of the other products. I feel more convinced of that after reading the pitch but I am not quite sure how quickly you could get people buy in. I do like the free version idea but I would not limit it in any way except for time. I would allow it for 2 weeks. I think a free app for two weeks is a reasonable amount of time to “evaluate” the app. It would also simplify the process. Download. Use. Pay after two weeks. Or not. So I think you have a great product idea but I worry about how you would sell it.
andrea 9:25 pm on December 1, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Hello Jim,
Huge thanks for your thorough review and feedback!
“But the real question is how are you going to be able to communicate your app’s features through all of this “app static” in the market?” Agreed — this is a huge challenge! There are so many language apps out there, and the market is pretty crowded. Communicating the difference to buyers would be a challenge.
To add to that, I agree that a team member with business and marketing acumen would be critical to this venture. Thanks for that point, because it really highlights the importance of presenting a team that inspires confidence with their ability to overcome any challenges.
Your suggestion regarding a time-limited trial is also an excellent idea. It’s a far more effective tool to help people ‘experience the difference,’ so to speak.
Thanks again!
Andrea
verenanz 11:27 pm on November 30, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Andrea!
What a great product. I would use it in my ESL classes as a tool for “theme based learning”…I don’t know if I would be able to afford the $20.00 version…but I like the idea that you would have a range of options. Your venture pitch is extremely well written – extremely easy to understand – almost written like an advertisement. I really liked the idea. Sorry I couldn’t see the pitch – in China…
Verena:)
andrea 9:27 pm on December 1, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Hello Verena,
Thanks for your feedback. Hope you’re having a great time in China!
Andrea
Allie 6:37 pm on December 1, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Hi Andrea, I enjoying reviewing and analysing your Venture Pitch.
The overall presentation format is fantastic, and I’m enjoying getting a better sense of the product. I think it has a world of potential – I can certainly see my English Assistant being in use. Something we haven’t really explored in this course are technologies that are developed and then purchased by larger companies (my boyfriend’s friend builds and sells startups a lot). My hunch is that the best prognosis for MyEnglishAssistant may be that the app ultimately gets purchased by Berlitz, Rosetta Stone or another larger language learning organization because the market in overall language learning is so saturated, as you indicate. In my research, I found that app development is between $60-100K (Forrester; can access this through UBC library. Go to subject research guides > business > management > new business development.) I would imagine that once the technology is assembled, it would be fairly easy to translate into new language versions.
I have a few ideas and suggestions that may be helpful in taking this Pitch to the next level:
-I’m wondering if you can perhaps include more on the demand on the part of language learners for language apps, and for personalized learning. What do language learners perceive as their needs?
– I think it would be helpful to provide richer demographic information on language learners? Based on my own experiences in Vancouver there are language learners at all income levels, but it seems that a lot of the students at the language schools are pretty affluent. I think that myEnglishAssistant could be beneficial to all, but require separate marketing strategies (maybe for lower income users, target social service organizations that provide language instruction and support for newcomers?)
– I’m wondering if you could provide a more detailed overview of the competition, given that it is quite vast and diverse? What are the top apps? Are there common consumer/review complaints? How does this app correspond to other language learning programs – does it complement them? From an education perspective, I’m wondering what theories or evidence-based models of 2nd language education you’re drawing on, or might further draw on in your app development?
andrea 9:38 pm on December 1, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Hello Allie,
Thank you for your thoughtful review and great recommendations. Your suggestion to understand and explain the market – both customers and competition – more fully were well taken. That’s something I’ve appreciated in a number of the other pitches. Researching the competition would be an interesting but intense process, involving lots of sampling, as I imagine you did during your research. While I tried a few different apps, to run with this idea I would need to have an even more intimate knowledge of the competition.
You also make an interesting point about small ventures being acquired by bigger fish. This isn’t something I’d considered for my pitch or others, but it’s probably quite a likely future for lots of tech start-ups. (I’d be curious to hear from David on this, and what this means for the future of the original product and team.)
Thanks again for your constructive comments!
Andrea
themusicwoman 8:21 pm on December 3, 2011 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Dear Andrea,
Wow. Great voice 🙂 Your elevator pitch made me want to know more.
I really like your venture pitch. Your idea is one that really makes sense. As an investor, that’s what I’m looking for. I can see a use for this application immediately. Your idea is also one that is feasible. Again, a plus for an investor. Like the CEO profile. Here is where I might perhaps be wary as an investor as both the product and yourself have yet to be “tested”. As for for your marketability: I love the idea of getting into the schools. That’s where you hooked me. I like the idea of targeting that very lucrative market. As a choir teacher of many international students, as much as I’d like them off their cell phones, perhaps they could use this app to learn that I want them to sing, not text on their phones 🙂
The biggest impediment to your venture would be competition. However, as you’ve priced it right, I think it could do well. I would need more information on what is out there already and how your product would fare against those.
Thanks for letting me get in my two cents worth 🙂
Michelle