⚡ How this Real Estate Start-Up used a ‘By any Means Necessary’ Approach to Getting their First Customers

Morning Innovators ⚡ In less than 5 minutes, we’ll cover…

🏡 How this start-up eliminates the stress from home buying and selling
🧑‍🎤 How tapping into a pop superstar’s audience helped this brand go viral
🧠 A great tool to help you understand your users and reduce churn
🥳 The best funding opportunities, events and jobs in the start-up world
📰 The biggest news stories in the start-up world

✨ Last weeks most clicked link was this link to Forum VC’s pre-seed fund.

Happy hustling,
Rich & Gary

🎤 Events/Opportunities

💷 Win up to £25,000 in equity free cash, with the Santander X UK Awards. Applications close on the 16th July.

💸 Applications for the Ascend Programme have been extended to the 8th July 2024!🚀This is an exclusive opportunity designed to empower women and non-binary leaders of growth-stage businesses that require funding to scale.

📢 Calling all women with a new business or business idea looking for support to launch and grow! Applications are open for SETsquared’s fully-funded Enterprising Women 4.0 business support programme. Apply by 31 July for access to mentoring, expert business advice, workshops and their extensive network.

🦅 Today is your last chance to apply for the 2024 Barclays Entrepreneur Awards. Nominations close at 23:59.

↗️ Bethnal Green Ventures is an early-stage Tech for Good accelerator that provides £30K in funding for early-stage founders.

1️⃣ OneTech offers 12-week programmes for underrepresented founders, providing access to expert consulting and a robust network, though they do not provide direct funding.

💼 Job opportunities

🪙 Growth Product Manager, GiveMatch
👀 Product Manager, Lutra Health
🧮 Software Engineer, Ember

🌳 Climate risk start-up Climate X raises $18m Series A to expand to the US. Sifted

🦄 No-Code Start-up Creatio Hits Unicorn Status After $200M Raise. Crunchbase News

🤧 Dust grabs another $16 million for its enterprise AI assistants connected to internal data. TechCrunch

🗣️ Google Translate adds support for 110 languages, representing 614 million speakers. TechCrunch

🏠 EverKnock: Revolutionising Home Buying and Selling

EverKnock has emerged as a beacon of innovation in the real estate industry, addressing the notorious complexities and stress associated with buying and selling homes. Did you know that buying a home is considered one of life's most stressful events, particularly for first time buyers, with 1 in 3 sales collapsing before completion! One of the biggest challenges is having to juggle multiple service providers, often without the right guidance or support.

EverKnock is a concierge designed to take the stress out of buying and selling a home. With an impressive fusion of human expertise, artificial intelligence, and automation, EverKnock functions like a personal project manager for your move, simplifying communications and consolidating necessary services into a seamless journey.

Early Customer Acquisition: From Social Outreach to Valuable Feedback

EverKnock's initial strategy to attract users was admittedly unstructured, focusing on gaining at least 100 users within the first 4 weeks using any means necessary. This included leveraging personal networks and social media, particularly LinkedIn, which proved to be a goldmine for connecting with potential users. The team's approach capitalised on the universal relevance of home-moving, engaging people at social gatherings and through online interactions. This broad out-reach method helped gather crucial initial feedback, highlighting the necessity for a more structured growth strategy.

Strategic Shift: Partnering with Estate Agents

Learning from the early iterations of their app, EverKnock pivoted to a more sustainable growth model by partnering with estate agents. This move significantly lowered customer acquisition costs and enhanced service value for agents burdened by the administrative overhead of updating multiple stakeholders. This partnership model not only provided EverKnock with a steady stream of users but also embedded it deeper within the real estate ecosystem, particularly strengthening its presence in South Wales.

Funding the Vision: From Angel Investors to Venture Capital

EverKnock’s journey through funding began with angel investments, spearheaded by a close-knit network that believed deeply in the founders and their vision to simplify the home-buying process. The initial funding rounds were personal, with contributions from friends and extended connections, including an estate agent who recognised the potential impact of EverKnock’s solution. This early support was crucial and led to further opportunities, such as participation in the Geovation programme, which provided not only funding but invaluable exposure and networking opportunities.

Currently, EverKnock is in the process of securing a larger investment round led by a prominent London-based VC, underscoring the growing confidence in its market potential and business model.

Lessons Learned and Looking Forward

Reflecting on their journey, the co-founders acknowledge the intense demands of fundraising but also the critical learning and validation that came with it. They emphasise the importance of maintaining balance, celebrating small victories, and learning from every setback. If they were to start over, there is little they would change, as each challenge and misstep provided essential lessons that shaped their path forward.

We saw last week how fruitful it can be to jump on the topic that everyone is talking about. This week, same theme, but with absolutely 0 budget.

Waitrose have well and truly jumped on the Swifty hype train whilst putting their Canva account to good use. They’ve picked up hundreds of thousands of interactions by cleverly placing their products within lyrics to Taylor Swift’s songs, as you can see on the graphic above.

This costs absolutely nothing, and can engage a huge fanbase like the Swiftys. How can you use your product to tap into fanbases you’re not heavily involved in yet?

Each week we highlight our favourite tools - either something we’ve been using in our businesses, or tools that our innovator community have recommended.

June is a customer analytics tool designed for B2B SaaS companies. It offers ready-made reports on key metrics like activation, retention, active users, and churn risk. Integrating seamlessly with CRMs and other tools, June provides actionable insights to help businesses understand user behavior and reduce churn. The platform is easy to set up, requiring minimal configuration, and supports data compliance with SOC-2 and GDPR standards.

Next week we’ll be highlighting another awesome start-up (if you want us to feature you, drop us a message), as well as sharing all the usuals including funding opportunities, Start-Up news, plus plenty of awesome tips, tricks and tools.

P.S. Connect with us on LinkedIn…