About orderbird
Orderbird enables hospitality businesses to replace their existing cash registers with a system that runs on iOS mobile devices. They provide engagement with consumers by pushing out real-time data, including opening hours, and waiting time. For new businesses, they provide a starter pack preconfigured with iOS mobile devices. It’s a great solution for eliminating traditional cash registers and streamlining the most basic process of payment for restaurants.
About orderbird’s Early Coworking Days
Jakob and his partners Sebastian and Patrick began orderbird as a side venture, but it quickly became evident that it should become much more than supplementary project. While they weren’t sure what the outcome would be, they chose to begin their business in Betahaus because a professional environment alongside other companies at a similar stage was preferable to working from home. With seed investor money, they moved into Betahaus right away, securing a little office that was already fully serviced from Day One.
With support from the Betahaus founders, they were able to gain access to investors and journalists, helping carry and propagate their brand name. The vibrant social component was 80-percent wonderful, but 20-percent distracting. Sometimes, they found it hard to hone-in on actual work in such a dynamic environment. By the time orderbird reached eight employees, they realized it was time to grow into a new space, so that they could have separate rooms for their sales and development teams.
Several offices and 40 more employees later, Jakob remains in close contact with his Betahaus roots, and offers the following advice to other companies looking to grow:
Processes are Paramount
“If you want to expand well and grow fast, you must work at the very beginning on the processes and make sure you are scalable from the outset. Every process must be scalable, because growth is simply not possible unless processes are in order.”
Superpeople in Sales
“Orderbird was, of course, initially technology driven, and now we’ve become sales driven. You must have the absolute best person in charge of sales. She or he has to be deep in the details of every step of the pitch and sales process. The sales process must also be scalable, with a solid knowledge of what your inbound and outbound rates are, knowing your sales cycle from the inside out. If you are a first-time founder, I strongly advise getting an experienced consultant or coach to help you become competitive faster. Rather than learning everything yourself by making stupid mistakes, a seasoned veteran can help you build KPIs and processes, which makes the difference between 20 versus 200 closed deals per week.”
Be a Beautiful Brand
“We have focused immensely on brand building and public relations, so for both clients and consumers the brand is well liked and known. Two years later, we now benefit from great inbound partners, investors and customers, as we always gave a hard push on the brand building side. Winning awards was also an important way to gain credibility in the industry and with partners, and it was a good decision to represent ourselves at tradeshows to further belief in our brand.”
Abigail works in communications and marketing for ezeep and spends her free time working as a freelance journalist. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, National Public Radio and Glamor Magazine.
