Blocks has a bite of the Apple and a taste of LinkedIn and Facebook.

Blocks was chosen as a part of the AIMIA/Austrade digital trade mission to New York and San Francisco this month.

By Paul

Blocks™ was chosen as a part of the AIMIA/Austrade digital trade mission to New York and San Francisco this month.

The idea of the mission was to give Australian technologies with a commitment to US expansion a good look at the US market, and to introduce us to a network of prospective clients to help us on our way. It was also a chance to ‘get bloodied up’ as Austrade puts it, or in other words, get a taste of dealing in a highly competitive market with it’s own way of doing business.

The trip consisted of a number of days in NY pitching a 4 minute, 6 slide presentation of your product or service initially to ‘friendlies’ that have some allegiance to Australia or Austrade, and then as the days went on, to tougher panels of digital experts. Day three in NY consisted of a panel presentation in the morning followed by ‘the big pitch’ to a room of 100+ interested parties to create a networking opportunity for meetings in the following days and months.

It’s confronting enough to talk in front of 100+ people let alone pitching your idea to the most competitive, and most would agree technically mature, market in the world. The good news was Blocks received strong support in both the existing technology and our planned direction in the coming years.

San Francisco was a completely different vibe. Our 1st presentation was the ‘elevator pitch’ which needed to be concise, engaging and effective, a requirement we all initially all struggled with. We then went on a road tour of Silicon Valley ’selling our wares’ first to Lightspeed Venture Partners, a VC company on the infamous SandHill road, home of ‘.dom’ venture Capital. This was a great opportunity to ask what VC’s look for, the process and expectations. It’s also something I’m glad I had done before the day where I will actually be raising capital.

Although 2 & 3 were interchangeable, it seems the consistent theme is.
1. Market [1 billion USD+]
2. Exit [$150 Mill +]
3. Management [able to manage expansion]
4. Product [disruptive and industry changing]

From there it was off to the Googleplex to meet Linkedin and then Facebook which surprisingly was really more an opportunity to sell them on us and not the other way around, but great to see where we can utilise the future focus of these Social Media channels with Blocks. After a day of pitching we ended up at an Australian network function run by Advance were we had to, well pitch.

I have to say that after selling our wares ‘US style’ for 2 weeks all of the 7 companies represented had a slick, to the point and engaging presentation. I’m not sure the succinct and almost aggressive nature would be received in OZ but I have gained a lot from the experience. There is no doubt there is opportunity for Blocks in the US although it would require Blocks to have a full time presence there. Can we get used to hamburgers and fries? Time will tell.

Special thanks to all those that gave us the time to both create opportunity and bypass the many pitfalls of ‘crossing the paddock’.

Particular thanks to;
Iain Hunter: HS Dominion
Alan Burgess: Euro RSCG
Ryan Junee
Jeremy Liew: Lightspeed Venture Partners
Rob Petty: ex Kit Digital now Sport 195