Have a fitness tracker? Then you'll have an idea of how Denver-based startup Yaguara functions in the e-commerce space. Namely, measuring and managing growth.
Yaguara Founder Jonathan Smalley elaborated.
“We think about it a lot as coaching for your team, same as a fitness tracker," he said. "If you have an Apple watch and it tells you to take a brisk 17 minute walk to hit your calorie goal for the day, [you take that walk]."
That's what Yaguara aims to do for businesses. It works like this: Companies can create growth goals on Yaguara's online platform. It then provides users the tasks needed to achieve these goals, tracking their data in real time to make sure they are getting tasks done on deadline — just like that Fitbit on your wrist tracks your step goals.
Users also have a choice of "goal template" when making an account on Yaguara; think options like, "Q4 sales growth" or "increasing social media presence." Once a template is selected, users can link up the data analytic tools they already use such as Google Analytics, MailChimp and Stripe. Yaguara will then use this data and formulate a plan for clients, and from there provide not only a visualization of the goal, but also a daily update on progress — with helpful suggestions if need be.
Smalley said most users should be able to set up their account in about 15 minutes. The platform operates on a monthly subscription service with costs starting at $250 per month.
“We did want there to be a lower, more accessible subscription that even smaller companies could get started with,” Smalley said. “A huge pitfall in starting an early stage company is not setting and tracking the right metrics early on.”
He added that the idea behind Yaguara came in part from his background working with decision support tools in the medical field. These tools used data to help doctors make smarter decisions faster. Seeing the devices in action inspired him to create something similar, but for businesses.
The finished product is something unique, said Yaguara’s director of growth and product marketing J.D. Crabtree. It isn't just a product management service or a data visualization service, but a combination of both.
The result?
“It's called growth management,” Crabtree said. “A lot of people are used to project management tools, task management — [used] to assign things to people ... but it’s not tied to real-time data and the things that people actually make decisions on.”
That's where Yaguara comes in.
While it currently in its beta stage, Yaguara has more than 130 companies using the service, from startups to larger enterprises. Crabtree said many of these companies have been repeat customers and set multiple goals for their organizations through Yaguara.
Company size aside, Yaguara currently focuses exclusively on e-commerce businesses. Smalley said that decision came from the company initially having too broad a scope and realizing they needed to focus their energies to be the most successful. Eventually, leadership decided to lean into the e-commerce industry because it is a fast growing market of about 10 percent each year.
However, there are plans to launch outside of this market niche. The Yaguara team is currently finishing up its first seed round of funding, which will help the company expand out of e-commerce into other areas, which Smalley said the company is headed for in late 2018 or Q1 2019.
