LaunchKC Application Advice From One Of Last Year’s Judges

About the author: Weston Bergmann is the Lead Investor of BetaBlox, a for-equity business incubator in Kansas City. BetaBlox has helped over 100 startups get off the ground in the last four years.

I was a judge for LaunchKC’s inaugural cohort of companies; everything from the first stages of online application reviews, to on-stage finalist Q&A, to the stress inducing last several minutes of heated debate amongst colleagues. There was a handful of things that I saw from that side of the table that I’d like to share with you. Hopefully theses suggestions will help your startup standout from the crowd, and get you chosen to pitch in the finals.

Your Video Is Important, But Not How You Think

In my personal opinion, the most important variable in the the online application process is your video. With as many applications as there are to read through, it’s just human nature that the judges will use the video as a crutch. More data can be gleaned about your opportunity per second in a video then through any other medium. The reason: while you’re explaining the intricacies of your startup, you’re also showing off your prowess as an entrepreneur – something that is difficult to see in the written form.

That said, I want to emphasize that you don’t need some crazily well produced video that costs thousands of dollars and many hours of prep and production. We ask for the video because it’s very helpful for us to get a better idea of who you are as an entrepreneur, not to spend your valuable time and capital. BUT, I also suggest your startup should try a little harder than just sitting in front of your computer’s camera and talking for a couple minutes. By doing so, you’d literally be doing the bare minimum – which isn’t a good way to standout in the pile. I suggest a nice healthy balance between the bare minimum and going way over the top. Show off your team, your software, your product, where you’re currently working, etc. The video shouldn’t be perfect – it should give us a snapshot of what you’re all about.

One Foot Needs To Be Rooted In Early Traction, The Other Pointed Towards Massive Scale

I’m a startup investor. I look for teams that are solving big problems in highly scalable ways. But I also look for teams that are taking the first steps towards those goals in not-so-scalable ways, in an effort to get some early traction. Paul Graham refers to this as “building things that don’t scale.” At the onset of your business, if you spend months writing code so as to ‘build for scale’, before you’ve even proven what parts actually need to be scaled, you’re improperly prioritizing your builds. What I look for are people that want to go big, and have a good garn guess as to how they’re going to get big, but are starting small in seemingly insignificant ways in an effort to prove their value to a few early customers at first.

In other words, if you don’t have some grand vision for the company – this is not the right competition for you. But if all you have is this grand vision, and a truly unbelievable (not meant as a compliment) first couple of steps – your application will be looked upon with too much skepticism. Grand vision is awesome, but falling flat on your face and never getting off the ground would be embarrassing for everyone.

Emphasize Your Differentiator More

The judges are smart people; so spending too much time explaining how your product/service works would be wasteful. Assume we’ll get it quicker than the average bunch. Instead, I would spend more time emphasizing what makes you different than what is currently available in the market.

This doesn’t necessarily mean the “product” is different from the competition, it could also mean the business model that powers the product is different. For example, Uber’s product is still just a ride for people without a car. That’s theoretically the same product that taxis have selling for decades. Instead, they’re differentiator and secret sauce is their model.

Show Off Your ‘Wow Factor’

Part of the LaunchKC’s motivation in doing all of this is not just to help you, but also take Kansas City as a startup ecosystem to the next level. One of the ways they do this is by showing off will the winners on a national stage. Thus, you as an individual will be representing our fine city. So when we’re reading through applications, we’re looking for people that would make great representatives of Kansas City. People that have a certain ‘wow factor’ about them that is hard to describe. People that make others want to do business in and with Kansas City. Don’t be afraid to show off your personality, and don’t hide your inner nerd in the closet. We love weird; we love different; we love diversity; we love people that we would personally want to do business with.

There you have it. I wish you all good luck, and look forward to seeing you at TechWeek!