startups

People are the key!


KeepSolid Sign a cross-platform eSignature solution

Please introduce yourself and your startup KeepSolid Sign to our readers!
My name is Vasiliy Ivanov and I’m CEO at KeepSolid. We develop security and productivity solutions both for personal and business needs and are mostly known for our KeepSolid VPN Unlimited service which already has over 10 million users worldwide.

One of our recent releases is an eSigning app KeepSolid Sign. It’s a cross-platform eSignature solution that enables businesses to go paperless in a convenient and secure way. The app allows users to sign and get documents signed in minutes, initiate and close deals while on-the-go, and overall increase productivity. And we’re really excited this month with the upcoming update we’ll become the first eSignature app available on Apple Watch!

How did you get the idea to KeepSolid Sign?
Before the launch of KeepSolid Sign, we had already released a few quite successful products, including our VPN service. When these products became self-sufficient, I began to look for new challenges for our company and new areas where we could change and improve the established practices and enhance technologies.

One of the ideas was an electronic signature. On the one hand, it kept up with an established tendency for reducing paper use and saving forests. Off the other side, governments of many countries only began to discuss the legitimacy of the digital signature.

On the whole, the perspectives were interesting and the competition was much lower than that for KeepSolid VPN Unlimited, so we took up this project.

How difficult was the start and what challenges you had to overcome?
Once we came up with the idea, we quickly analyzed the market and realized that the number of players was not so great there. But some of them were giants so for a startup like ours it was nearly impossible to put up a fight without any investment. We chose a strategy of a user-friendly product with functionality to let users achieve expected results in the fastest possible way. We decided clear monetization model should be our advantage too.

And, of course, the management. As a young startup, we’ve got through the training in team management, experienced all the types of interpersonal relationships, and learned what team involvement really is on practice. During this time we’ve been forced to reshuffle the team twice, picking up those specialists who were interested in making a great product and who strove for the result.

Who is your target audience?
For KeepSolid Sign our main focus is currently on solopreneurs and small to medium size businesses that need to sign documents or collect signatures frequently like daily, weekly, sometimes even offline or when they travel and simply don’t have internet access – it makes sense for them to have a dedicated product to solve this task on their favorite device and thus pay for it monthly or even annually.

What is the USP of your startup?
So far, our UTS is not a technological innovation. The purpose of KeepSolid Sign first version is to fulfill our company mission for the relevant market segment. For many centuries, people wrote their signatures by hand. However, now, even though digital technology has appeared, the complexity of signing and delivering the documents still persists.

We aim to change this situation, as the work with contracts and signatures is just a tool needed for businessmen to achieve their goals.

Comparing to other alternatives, we offer a few subscription plans and provide full functionality for each one, and the price varies of senders quantity, not the features. So there are no limits to the number of documents you need to send for signature.

Can you describe a typical workday of you?
My working day starts with checking KPI of all the company’s activities: from general for our market to our internal performance. This data gives a lot of information about the success of our activity, and for me, it’s a source of conclusions, ideas or suggestions which I further discuss with my team. Then, I usually have 2-5 meetings on corporate concerns. After that, if enough time, I try to pay attention to the key employees and those ones who show great results.

I try to devote 2-5 hours a week to my own learning through books, articles, videos. There I find many useful solutions for the current issues and new ideas for the development of our company or products.

Since we are not yet an established company with clear rules of work and a conveyor type of corporate culture, I often find myself sucked up into operating activities. I do my best to resist it and consider this to be a signal of bad processes.

Where do you see yourself and your startup KeepSolid Sign in five years?
We seek to occupy a significant market share where KeepSolid Sign will be an important link in the performance of business tasks. It seems to me the present process of signing documents will not stay for long, as it is only the first stage of transition from paper to bytes for humanity.

In the future, it will make no sense to put your scribbles on the document if there are other new ways of identifying the person and verifying the authenticity of the document.

What 3 tips would you give other Start-up founders on the way?
Remember that you start your project to solve a very specific problem or create something new, so set a goal and turn it into a strategy.
People are the key. Even if you are a very technical startup, nothing will last long for your without people being the core of your development. Choose only those who want and seek to move together with the company, who are proactive and ambitious.
Stop looking for investors at last! Make a project with your own money instead. This will essentially raise your responsibility as well as your abilities.

More information you will find here

Thank you Vasiliy Ivanov for the Interview

Statements of the author and the interviewee do not necessarily represent the editors and the publisher opinion again.





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