It’s tough for a startup to stand out; tougher still in the most dynamic tech investment community outside Silicon Valley.
Of course, savvy founders know what to do when the going gets tough, and Adeel Vanthaliwala is no exception.
When Adeel – who likes to say, “As in, ‘Let’s make a deal, Adeel’” – pitched Incentivibe to potential investors during HYPERDRIVE’s recent New York visit, he didn’t just say his piece and step aside. He sweetened the pitch with a business-card draw for $400 in Broadway show tickets, paid for out of his own pocket.
The raffle not only gave him and co-founder Abdul-Basit Munda an excuse to personally connect with everyone in the room as they went around with a collection bowl, but to demonstrate what Incentivibe does: Enable small businesses to give away big prizes.
It was a fitting display of New York chutzpah that put smiles on the faces of about 75 venture capitalists, entrepreneurs and others who had gathered at the stately, official Park Avenue residence of John Prato, Canada’s Consul General in New York.
It was also instructive on the importance of differentiating to leave a lasting impression in a hyperactive startup space like New York.
We caught up with Adeel to ask him about the surprise raffle and what he learned from it.
Q – When and how did you come up with the idea to hold a raffle during the Consul General’s reception?
A – In terms of how long we’d been cooking up the idea, it was ever since we found out we were going to be in New York.
We knew there had to be some way to get more and more contacts, and we knew there was only going to be two of us, so it wouldn’t be possible to get to know all of them and get all their contact information.
So we thought, ‘Okay, well there’s got to be some way.’ We said, ‘Okay, we are in the business of incentivizing businesses to motivate their customers; to do something for them.’ Essentially, we’re in the business of doing giveaways, so we thought, ‘Let’s get ourselves across as a group that actually believes in what they’re doing, first and foremost, because it is our product, and second, get us those cards and contacts and solve the problem that we’re not going to be around to meet everybody.’
I think it was two weeks before New York that we thought about this idea. We asked, ‘What are the people like in New York?’ and we did a bunch of research and found, of course, that Broadway is one of the most likely activities people like to engage in.
It sounded right for the audience. Giving away iPads and these kinds of things wouldn’t have been a good idea, because most of that audience probably already had one, given that they’re pretty wealthy and tech-rich. But Broadway had that sort of posh appeal to it, so I said, ‘Let’s give that away; it caters to New York.’
Q – You’ve pitched many times now, but what did it feel like to step up and take the floor at the Consul General’s official residence?
A – I was just a bit nervous in the beginning, not knowing how large the crowd was going to be and who was going to be there, and with the fact that it was the residence of the Consul General.
But, you know, it’s just like with any other presentation; when I got up there I got into my element and did the presentation, and it was pretty good.
What helped was that the audience was very respectful and they were listening. That’s something you don’t often hear about pitching in New York. What you hear from people is that others often times aren’t listening or paying attention, and the challenge with that is that when you’re presenting, and you see that unfolding in front of you, it’s a bit more of a distraction or a nerve-wracking thing, because you’re wondering, ‘Are they not listening because I didn’t connect with them, or am I goofing up, or what’s going on?’
But the audience there was very respectful; they were listening and I saw that they were nodding and engaging with me, and they were laughing and so forth, so that helped even more.
Q – Maybe that’s the secret weapon, having a pitch session at the Consul General’s home, where it’s more respectful and people are automatically going to be more attentive.
A – And the fact that it’s small in space keeps everybody close together, also, and if you’re not paying attention, you could stand out quite easily. People don’t want to stand out as if they’re not interested, so that potentially helped.
Q – After you pitched, you then had to go around the room with a bowl to collect everyone’s business cards for the raffle. How did that go?
A – Yes, and that’s the second thing. Our thought was, how do we get the cards, and how do we break the ice and get them to engage with us without interrupting conversations; without seeming like we’re trying to push ourselves into a conversation?
That’s a pretty awkward thing that takes place at every event that we’ve been to, so we thought this would be a great way to continue to grab attention, really, in a way that’s beneficial for them. So now I’m reaching out and saying, ‘Hey, I don’t mean to disturb you, but if you haven’t put your card in…’, and it starts a small conversation, and that leads you get to know a bit more about the person and what the idea is, and it helps.
Whereas, in the other situation, you kind of just stand around and say ‘How are you?’, or wait for somebody else to finish their conversation, and you just feel awkward.
This was a great, great conversation starter. We got the cards, we got the contacts and we got the attention.
Q – What kind of people were listed on those business cards?
A – We’ve got some venture capitalists, we’ve got some entrepreneur advisors, we’ve got some lawyers, we’ve got some partner contacts that we were looking for.
Q – What was the reaction from the people as you went around the room collecting their cards?
A – They were really excited; it was like, ‘Oh that’s pretty cool’ or ‘that’s neat.’ Any time you give somebody a chance to win something that they don’t have to do anything for, it’s always an exciting time, and you could see the excitement; everybody wanted to participate.
Everybody was putting their cards in, and if they didn’t have a card, they put their name tags in so that they could participate.
One lady came and said it was incredibly creative of us to do this, to exemplify or demonstrate our business by actually bringing it to them, through the giveaway that we held at the Consul General’s house.
Q – Would you say it was a success, then?
A – Oh yes, absolutely. The amount of attention we got, the positive energy that we were able to generate because of it, the contacts that we generated and the fact that we were able to demonstrate how giveaways do, in fact, motivate people to do whatever it is that a business wants them to do, was very powerful.
Q – What did you learn about New York that you didn’t know before the trip?
A – I didn’t know the New York tech scene was that rich, active and fast. So, to go there and see it first-hand, anywhere from the hotel lobby – where I met quite a few entrepreneurs and made contacts while they were working on their projects – to meeting some other entrepreneurs and hearing from them how the New York scene has transformed, to learning from the team representing the Consul General, talking about how more deals are being made in New York than in San Francisco, and how they have some very big-name companies in New York, that was just eye-opening.
While that was happening, I was sitting there telling myself, ‘I don’t necessarily have to worry about having to travel down to San Francisco; if I want to raise funds, I can actually do it very easily here as well, because of how big the scene is.’
Also, what I liked was that the investors were open to investing in Toronto, because they felt that Toronto is as close as Chicago, so it’s not that far. That’s good to know, because they weren’t bringing up that whole country difference; they were looking at it as, ‘Well, you’re only an hour away and Chicago’s only an hour away, what’s the difference here? We’re more than happy to invest.’
Q – Anything else you’d like to add?
A – One thing people may want to know when the next HYPERDRIVE cohort comes around is that New York was an excellent opportunity for us to basically just practise and work on our pitch.
It was a kind of in-the-moment kind of scenario, where we really met people who could be investing in us, so that really pushed us to take a look at our pitch in a much, much deeper and differentiated way.
I should mention one thing we learned in New York, which I think a lot of people may not realize: That New York is all about big, big, big, big, big.
So, we actually completely revamped our pitch to bring home that message, and we were surprised that, when we were doing this pitch and practising the pitch to make it bigger, how much we learned about our own product and how big it can truly be, which we hadn’t thought about.
That process of trying to make your pitch sound like it is, in fact, something really big, will actually be quite beneficial for our business.
