A3: LanguageBuddy App Venture Pitch

FEEDBACK: I really enjoyed the fact that you combined your passion for travel and teaching into this app. I've never been to anything like meetup but I do think that the GPS aspect is very convenient. With a subscription, will the advertisements disappear or were you only going to have advertisements as you start up? I think your website was well done - organized and clean. I'd like to know if there is opportunity to meet in groups. I would have some reservation about meeting someone new without getting to know someone a little first. Maybe your apps has a chat like feature to see if you would be a good conversational match?

Review: I think this app would be amazing for traveling. I liked your pitch and how you should the prospective investor that you could indeed make money. Also, by having a partnership with Backbone it creates more legitimacy for the venture. The question I have is do you think it would be used outside of traveling or for new immigrants?

Review: Ashley your idea of language buddy is super. In your elevator pitch you seem confident. Your analytic arguments were factual, concise, and confidently expressed. My only big concern with your venture pitch is that as you mentioned it will be a free product, therefore motivations of the investor community will be a challenge.

FEEDBACK: This is a novel idea that actually might even work in large metropolitan areas. Your venture pitch could have used another medium than Weebly to more effectively illustrate how GPS language exchange would take place. I appreciate the market research you conducted on travel, but it is incomplete. What languages are in the highest demand to learn? Where are people most likely to learn another language? Why are you using Canada as your only focal point when there are bigger and more diverse language learning markets in Asia and South America? I like this idea. I could have used an app while in Japan teaching English to make some extra coin on the side. There are other non-GPS competitors like Teacher7.com that you should be aware of because the essentially facilitate the same sort of random language exchange. Of course, these competitors have their flaws and a mobile app if this kind could exploit those gaps in the language learning market, but your venture does not really explain any strategies to maintain its niche in the market.

FEEDBACK: You did a good job explaining your idea and venture rationale behind. I believe in appeal of your idea and product and monetizing potential through advertising, though you did not clearly specify which kinds of advertising would naturally fit and work within your app. Over advertising may simply repel serious people/potential buyers and customers, which is a case and the biggest problem of the mobile app development industry. You may consider in-app-purchase of advanced features, and give people a choice, not bombard them with advertisements. I see usefulness of your buddy app for language learners and travelers who find themselves in need to communicate with people who speak their languages, and who would readily pay a few bucks for fully functioning version. That is your chance, together with meaningful advertising that may appeal helpful to people, to launch this venture and make it profitable. On the ask side, the amount you ask is too small, why did not you project the development in a few phases and ask at least 100K and offer 30% of your company. That would be more appealing to investors, otherwise they think why don't you take $20k a line of credit and take off. I hope that these suggestions are helpful to you to better prepare your venture for take off. Regards, Milorad.

Feedback: On initial viewing of your Elevator pitch, I thought you had an interesting idea, but that your presentation was flat and lacked passion. The pitch is over the one minute limit and tries to do too much. After delving further in to your venture analysis, I am not convinced that your application identifies a gap in the market. It is interesting to that you mentioned that this is not a ‘dating’ app on your home page as I can easily see this app being appropriated for this use. With Google hangouts, it is very easy to meet people online in a safe environment and carry on conversations without putting yourself at risk of meeting a stranger, which makes the idea of using GPS to locate people a little scary. However, I could see this being a great advertising opportunity. Your pitch should be aimed at businesses wishing to advertise on your app and less at app users, which would be second tier marketing. I think if you reworked this pitch from the perspective of attracting advertising dollars you might have a stronger presentation.

REVIEW - Wow! I have to say I LOVE this concept. I think I love it because I am in the same area as you technology and language, and speak four fluently. I am actually thinking that this is exactly what we need, however I have some reservations about this, because there are language exchange groups that people attend for language practice. The thing about linguistic and cultural groups is that there is often a sense of elitism with certain groups who are native in that language and would abstain from practicing with others. I should mention that the best type of language learning is within the immersion environment itself, but not an hour a day or even six hours a day. The only reservation about this application I have is whether people will actually meet up for language exchange on demand. On the fly meet-ups are hard to organize with strangers and this is seen in the world of online dating, etc. Why would people meet on the fly for this purpose? I am getting the idea that you are planning to make the money based on business advertising models. This is definitely smart planning, and I am sure coffee shops would love the extra business. It has potential for growth considering all the GPS based apps out there, but this is the first I have seen with an educational purpose. The difficulty in marketing apps such as these is that people are really not interested in meeting others for language exchange as much as they are hunting for a significant other, as silly as it sounds. It might be great to have an option to create groups on there for language exchange instead of person-to-person contact; for instance the option to manage and create friend conversation circles would be great, so that you could text everyone in the circle to meet up. Pesky ads are a nuisance for some, so an upgrade to get rid of the ads would be a great idea. Will coffee shops go for this and pay to host their content on your app, that’s a difficult question to answer, but I think it’s a great idea considering low start-up costs. I think you should do it! Thanks!

Hi Ashley, I loved the elevator pitch. It is good that you put your picture. I also think the idea is great. You exceeded the 1 min limit though. I like the statistics and how you clearly explained what do you expect from the investor. The venture pitch highlighted the problem in a very clear manner. The statistics show how large of a market there is for this app. The marketing plan needs to be a digital one rather than being an offline marketing plan (My suggestion). For competition I suggest you check an app called: lextTalk. I like the business model but I think you need more than 20k USD in investment. You have expenses for cloud computing specially when you start getting traffic on the app. You need to pay developers a salary and you definitely need a marketing expense. I recommend asking for 200,000.00 USD and offer the investor 30%-40%. I do not recommend mentioning how much is the company worth at this stage. A venture Investor wants to take a risk and he will estimate the worth of the company from his own perspective. I love the Buddy-branded apps - StudyBuddy, CoffeeBuddy, BikingBuddy, MovieBuddy, etc. This can be the differentiator of your app. I would do the coffeebuddy app first and move from there. You also can make money on selling the statistics gathered from your app. Many organizations are willing to pay for such resources.

Feedback Hi Ashley, I liked you elevator pitch. I thought that you spoke clearly, intelligently and with passion. This is an interesting venture, especially when I saw your graphic about all of the foreign language speakers in Canada. I wonder why you are avoiding the larger coffee chains. A large chain might be a valuable partner in a venture like this. James.