We’re kicking something off today at SoleSavy that’s membership focused so bare with me for the long post.
I’ve seen members asking questions like “What comes next for us?” “how do things get better?” “what are you building?” “how do we stop bots?” “how do we make sneakers more accessible?” and so forth. All very valid questions. The membership has stayed the same for the most part since day 1.
TLDR;
- The year to date, things have been slow but we’re going to move quickly from here
- The members only marketplace with no fees and buy/trade/sell and profiles is coming in October
- How do we stop bots is a long game that I am going to work on silently
- The Drop monitor in the SoleSavy app is coming next week
- We need your help with what to build and work on next, Lawrence will touch on that soon.
- I’m dedicated to turning your SoleSavy membership into a feature rich technology offering alongside the wonderful community we have today
Like I mentioned a few weeks back….
as of Feb 1st we were a team of 10. Now we’re a team of 37 and growing. We have a core foundation of the team in place across all departments including 3 engineers and soon to be 4. The biggest challenge for me this year around making the membership better has been ramping up to the team and specifically hiring in product and engineering roles. It’s incredibly competitive and we are working hard to find more talent. We’re turning a corner right now with more applicants and interest in these key roles since our announcement last week, More people are taking us seriously and also know there is job security in going from an established tech company to little ol’ SoleSavy.
That’s what brings me today.
I have instructed our Director of Engineering (shout out to Rish!) that we are full steam ahead on building a world class engineering and product team for SoleSavy. My goal is to work in month long sprints and launch impact making features towards your membership every single month. What those features are is part of what we need your help for.
The Big Feature – Marketplace
I’ve signed off on the marketplace build. For us to go live on Android and iOS at the same time it will be a cool $500,000 USD to get off the ground. As outlined before, this marketplace is members only (to start at least) and the core parts of it are your ability to buy/sell/trade sneakers and also have a rich profile to show your collection and who you are as a sneakerhead. The plan is to launch an early beta in September and then the open the beta up to all members in October to build and improve from there. This marketplace will come with NO fees and will not cost you anything to use outside of standard 3% credit card fee for transaction. This will come with your membership and we will not change your membership price. This is a small thank you for your early and continued support. There is a lot more to discuss around this and we will do that next week as we form a group of members to provide feedback through out the process. Stay tuned!
How do we stop bots?
After the hate we got last week I’m treading carefully about how much I want to say about this. Basically, I have two things in the works we are exploring that could have an industry wide impact to make the consumer experience better online. I’m going to do this in silence until we are ready to show it to the world. Until then, trust me that I am putting the resources towards this. It may take another year but I’ll share what I can when the time is right!
Smaller Feature – Drop Monitor in the SoleSavy App
Customized keyword based monitor notifications are coming to the SoleSavy app as early as next week. I will likely follow up today with a beta test link for iOS users to try it early and provide feedback. An Android version will also launch properly. So far in my testing it has been amazing. Documentation and videos on how to use this are coming!
Well what else is coming?
This is where we need your help. I know you have many ideas so I want to hear them. Lawrence will follow up shortly with info on our feature virtual suggestion box and how to use it. I’ve heard how you want an assist system, a member rating system and so forth. We can do all of that, I just want to know what do you value the most and then we will prioritize it into our product road map.
I am focused on turning us from a low code company to a technology powerhouse that makes your membership incredibly feature rich. We are half way through 2021 and I refuse to go into 2022 without having made significant progress on the tech front.
Thank you for your support as always. SoleSavy wont let you down!