In addition to Parkable, we also have updates from Team Flash, Sociolla, and Aspire

Australia’s parking app Parkable raises US$2.9M in Series A – Press Release

Australian parking app Parkable announced an NZ$4.6 million (US$2.9 million) Series A funding round led by New Zealander digital services company Spark.

The funding round also included the participation of investors such as Peter Beguely, Rowan Simpson, as well as existing investors and advisory board members Jason Kilgour and David Brain.

The funding will be used to increase Parkable’s leadership in New Zealand’s shared economy parking market, further develop its presence in Australia and China and explore new international markets.

Parkable is a sharing economy platform for car parking that allows companies and individuals to rent out their empty parking bays.

The startup has recently announced a joint venture in China. It has also acquired Brisbane-based parking solutions business Park Genie, which it has subsequently rebranded and integrated onto the Parkable platform.

Parkable is now operating in three Australian cities as well as in Shanghai.

Team Flash raises US$1.5M in seed funding round – e27

Singapore-based esports company Team Flash has secured an S$2,084,000 (US$1.5 million) seed funding round led by country-based family office Octava.

Founded in October 2017 by Terence Ting and Samson Oh, Team Flash is an e-sports franchise that empowers talented athletes to pursue a professional career in competitive gaming. It has invested in talent and infrastructure across Vietnam and Singapore.

The funding will be used mainly for international expansion, further grow its business in Vietnam, recruit e-sports players and content creators across the region, and also to focus on bringing in brand sponsorships and media partners.

The startup also plans to launch a dedicated merchandising arm later this year.

Also Read: Today’s top tech news, July 8: Investments into Australian startups Employment Hero, Jacobi

Beacon VC participated in Aspire’s US$32.5M Series A funding round – e27

Kasikornbank’s Beacon VC announced that it has participated in a US$32.5 million Series A funding round for Singapore-based fintech startup Aspire.

Beacon VC joins a pool of international investors, including Y Combinator, Mass-Mutual Ventures (MMV) Southeast Asia, Insignia Ventures Partners, Hummingbird Ventures, Silicon Valley’s Arc Labs, and Picus Capital.

KBank and Aspire aim to work together to digitise banking to small-and-medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and online merchants in Thailand.

Sociolla’s parent company gets US$40M Series D funding round – e27

Social Bella Indonesia, the parent company beauty e-commerce platform Sociolla, has secured US$40 million in Series D round of investment, co-led by EV Growth and Temasek.

New investors such as Singapore-based EDBI, Pavilion Capital, and Jungle Ventures also participated in the funding round.

The startup will use the funding to strengthen its human resources capabilities, with particular attention on technology-related functions.

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Image Credit: Parkable

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Some of the top tried and tested ways of increasing reach in the digital sphere

Being a new start-up in the industry is not easy. Managing budgets and finances, trying to reach deadlines every day and struggling to turn your dream into reality.

The digital age has made it considerably easier, now that almost everyone has access to the internet. Marketing is the core step in building a start-up successfully.

If marketing is done right, your start-up will flourish: it will make a name for itself in the world of new businesses.

Social media marketing 

Social media marketing is a rising trend for promoting products and services through major social media channels.

This type of marketing involves creating and sharing content on social media networks, like Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and Twitter, to achieve your social media marketing and branding goals.

Every start-up takes the first step by creating business profiles on these social media platforms. In digital marketing, presence on all major social media platforms is the primary step for startups to build brand trust and influence in the target market. 

A sound social media strategy for start-up involves setting goals, researching your audience, studying your competitors and creating content to market your services or products. 

Content marketing 

This brings us to content marketing. Content marketing is a strategic approach to modern digital marketing that is purely focused on creating, publishing, and distributing quality content for a targeted audience online.

Also Read: Modernising your ventures marketing tactics by understanding how to communicate effectively

This strategic approach focuses on building a base of potential clients and customers. 

Search engine optimisation (SEO) 

Search engine optimisation is a methodology involving strategies, techniques and tactics used to increase the number of visitors to a website.

It helps achieve the objective of a high-ranking placement in the search results page of a search engine (SERP), including Google, Bing, Yahoo and other search engines.

If your website ranks high in search results, then every time your potential customers search for keywords related to your products or services, it leaves them with the impression that you are a reputable company.

SEO is the mandatory part of advanced digital marketing plans for startups. 

Pay-per-click marketing (Google adwords)

PPC stands for pay-per-click advertisement, a mode of internet marketing, in which advertisers are paid a sum of money each time one of their ads is clicked.

This marketing strategy helps you generate quick revenue and drive targeted traffic by placing main keywords on Google Ads area.

However, pay-per-click marketing works best as a short campaign, usually spanning a few months.

The advertiser should analyse the effectiveness of each campaign and then adjust keywords, placement, and budget allocation to capitalise upon the data from previous campaigns.

Influencer marketing 

The growing trend on social media revolves around influencers. Bloggers, YouTubers and Instagrammers- influencers are sprouting up from all avenues, each with thousands of followers. Ads they post will reach a global audience. 

Also Read: How do you grow your startup? Take some advice from 4 experts in digital marketing

It is a bit affordable as compared to other paid marketing strategies.

This type of marketing uses word-of-mouth as an aspect to help you in building a trusted brand, Customers trust the authenticity, so they get engaged if you are a brand

Web analytics

Web analytics is a must-have tool for digital marketers who collect, analyse, measure and report website data for understanding and optimising web pages.

If you own a business website then connecting with the web analytics tool can give you a broader picture of your website visitors, their devices, time spent on your site, web browser they are using, regional data and search queries related to your business, etc.

 The analysis of Internet data and user information through various means is referred to as Web Analytics. It is employed as a way of fully understanding pertinent trends and rendering Web usage efficacious. 

Digital advertising  

Digital advertising is the promotion of your business on the internet. It is the usage of this unique platform as a basis for promotional work. Think of the websites as billboards, carrying Ads of your business. 

In digital advertising, you can utilise different promotional advertisements strategies and deliver business messages through website and search engine paid adverts, emails, social media channels (paid and organic) banner ads, mobile app ads and affiliate programs and other marketing channels available in the digital media space.

Optimising for voice search

Usability has been significantly advanced in this modern age. More and more people are emerging and making it easier for you to use our phones. Voice search technology is an excellent step for improving user experience.

Digital marketing requires precision and fool-proof strategy. Due to the introduction of the Google Hummingbird update, voice search has become more widely enhanced and intelligent.

The results are much more intricate as the algorithm digs up ‘hidden’ or contextual data from the voice and displays it on the screen. 

Optimising for video search

Nobody likes to see a page full of black and white text, without any visual aids. Pictures and videos make the website seems more attractive to the audience.

Adding videos to the site also makes the start-up achieve a more significant market, growing the business two-fold. Start by renaming the video to the pertinent keywords and add keywords in your video description as well.

Also Read: Meme marketing isn’t a joke its an A-1 strategy, especially in Asia

So, if you already have videos on YouTube or other video search engines then optimise them with relevant description, titles and keywords to get maximum benefit for your new business. Good video optimisation is the backbone of modern digital marketing strategy. 

Chatbots and more content!

People talk to customer service for more details about the product or any queries they might have. It is not possible to hire so many people right at the beginning of a start-up, as funding is low.

The initial investment does not allow the person to pay salaries for employees, so chatbots are the perfect solution. 

Remember a pop-up text message that appears on the corner of a website, asking basic questions like “How was your day?” or specific ones like, “Which section of the magazine do you enjoy reading the most?”.

These chatbots make your site more interactive. However, don’t underestimate the power of content. Your start-up can only flourish when you have quality content. Don’t stress about the number of blogs you post per day; quality is far more critical than quantity.  

Conclusion

Building a successful startup is an uphill battle. You have to fight against fierce competition in the business world of today.

However, by selecting the proven digital marketing strategies, you can stand out from the crowd.

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Image Credit: Campaign Creators

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To what extent has having a social message in dating helped Bumble?

Having a business with a social message can have a great impact on society. As brands influence customer psychology, to have customers associate with your social cause is a massive win not just for the business but for the world. Companies like Lokai, We Wood and Skyline Socks to name a few are built around giving back to the society. But while these companies give back, to what extent are they effective in growing in terms of scalability?

Bumble was launched in 2014 by business mogul Whitney Wolfe Herd following her sexual harassment lawsuit against Justin Mateen, former co-founder of Tinder, whom she had dated on and off. 

As it turns out, the then 24-year-old female entrepreneur was not just fired from Tinder for being too young and “female” but also harassed through comments, emails and text messages post-breakup.

This was a bold move for Whitney, who decided to create Bumble, a dating app that allows women to make the first move with male users. 

This addresses the problem of creepy texting and downright dangerous harassment, which are the major reasons why a lot of people have always been sceptical about online dating.

The launch of this app was a powerful social statement globally, where it sent off a strong message about women empowerment, encouraging women to make bolder choices in not just dating, but in business and life!

This also led to a lot of celebrities to come out in support of the app, including popular Kardashian – Jenner mom Kris Jenner, actor, producer and filmmaker Priyanka Chopra; and supermodel and entrepreneur Karlie Kloss, to name a few. 

Everything seemed perfect for the brand, but then why did Tinder still manage to retain itself as the crowd favourite? 

More convenient

If you are one of the millions who have downloaded Tinder, you will notice that it is much easier and quicker to sign up on the platform and get going.

All it asks for is a short bio and your music preferences which are generally synced from your Spotify playlist. 

In comparison, Bumble asks you to answer a series of questions and build a more detailed profile, which can sometimes feel like a matrimonial page. For example, it asks you questions about liking dogs, smoking, drinking etc.

This can be because Bumble widely markets itself as an app for relationships, while Tinder is sometimes seen as an app for hookups (although, it is used for relationships as well).

Sexist

While I am all in for a dating app with an empowering concept, the sexist nature of the app, which only allows women to pick who they want to speak with can potentially carve down the entire niche of the market, making it more attractive to women. Male users can sometimes feel alienated by this system.

Although is a great social message, it may not be very good in terms of acquiring users. 

Tinder, on the other hand, has no such barriers and freely allows male and female users to swipe and make the first move regardless of gender.

Logo

Tinder’s logo is that of a red and white flame which represents passion. While the red flame is perfect for a dating app since it signifies the fieriness of new relationships. This is also more attractive to millennials and college students.

Bumble’s logo is yellow in colour with the image of a beehive signifying a queen bee and the busy nature of people.

 In a statement, Wolfe also said “But then we thought about it. Wait a second — Bumble—like the bee society. There’s a queen bee, the woman is in charge, and it’s a really respectful community. It’s all about the queen bee and everyone working together. It was very serendipitous.”

The yellow colour is more often associated with positivity and joy, which somehow cannot be related to the idea of dating strangers — realistically speaking.

While there are people who have experienced happy endings on dating apps, most of them are usually looking for casual relationships.

In terms of logo and aesthetics, Tinder comes out as the clear winner.

More features

Given the open nature of Tinder, the app has been successful in branching out to many fun and innovative features revolving around dating. For example, Tinder allows you to swipe on people from other countries while Bumble doesn’t.

However, Bumble has managed to create a reputation of safety and trust around it so much that it recently launched the Bumble Bizz platform which allows people to network professionally through the app. 

Only the feature is not in terms of dating.

Power is only there where there are users.

For an app like Bumble to give power to women users where there are lesser users compared to Tinder sounds odd.

One of the best examples to shed more light on this point is Bumble’s recent launch in India. India is one of the world’s most highly populated countries. But it is also a country which is considered unsafe for women.

Bringing in Bumble’s feature would be more than perfect, but just when that happens, Tinder decides to introduce a new feature in India, called “My Move”, which is similar to Bumble’s feature where it lets women make the first move.

On top of that Tinder has confirmed that it would begin to test a new feature that will allow women to choose when to start a conversation, rather than have it as a default setting like Bumble.

Being the current more popular app in India, Tinder has clearly kept up with trends and keeping an eagle eye on competition has proven to be beneficial for the company.

Conclusion

In conclusion, the point is that while Bumble sends off a great message, users care more about the convenience, easiness of the process — and this leads to increased usage and signups as there are more people to swipe on. 

This can be an important lesson for businesses that, it is not just important to have a socially responsible message but also a scalable, user-friendly business model.

And even though Bumble sends out an important message of feminism and women empowerment, Tinder sends off an even greater message – Equality.

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Businesses need to create different environments with a different balance of security and convenience for different processes

The boundaries between the personal and the worker are blurring more and more. People often spend more time in the office than at home.

At the same time, about a quarter of employees work remotely. We believe that in the modern world the perfect balance between life and work is generally unattainable.

Due to the growth in digital data, there is no longer a clear separation of which tasks to perform at work and which at home.

In both personal and professional life, we rely heavily on social networks, email, digital documents, and shared folders. As our recent study showed, chaos reigns in the management of corporate records and credentials.

Death balance between work and personal life

Working from nine to five is not so bad.

Nevertheless, this approach is already outdated. Now it is welcome to linger a bit – for the sake of important meetings, meeting tight deadlines, and even corporate parties. Millions of people recycle to cope with their tasks.

Adapting to modern conditions, employees often mix work and personal life: they solve household issues at the workplace and vice versa – they finish work from home.

Also Read: The curious case of the cybersecurity skill gap

Many even have a removable set of clothes in the office. What is worse digital data? Access to the right information both from home and from work makes life easier.

There is a big problem with this desire for convenience: careless handling of corporate data.

Employees who store them on personal devices are not always able to ensure the security of this information unless they use VPN Chrome browser extensions. Easy access to data puts them at unnecessary risk. For a company, this can have serious consequences.

Companies must manage data

While employees are struggling with personal and corporate information, companies are racking their brains in questions like protecting growing volumes of data.

As our study showed, 80 per cent of employees do not even consider that restricting access to work letters, files and documents are their direct responsibility.

Personal and payment data, authorization codes – these are just a couple of examples of confidential information necessary for the effective work of the company.

Also Read: From meditating to delegating; how I manage work-life balance as a startup founder

Staff do not always safely store this information. Just 56 per cent of employees regularly delete obsolete letters, and only 34 per cent get rid of old files on hard drives.

Digital mess becomes an even more serious problem when information is stored in the cloud or public folders, where it is more difficult to control.

We add here the constant growth of data volumes, and now – managing corporate information is becoming extremely difficult. But it still needs to be protected from prying eyes!

For example, if an employee can accidentally stumble upon information about the salary of colleagues, a hacker can also find it.

To ensure secure data management, it is necessary to involve employees themselves in solving information security issues.

Only then can a new corporate culture be formed in which each participant will be responsible for data protection and help colleagues do the same.

Therefore, it is extremely important to train personnel in the basics of cybersecurity, communicating to people the significance of the problem and their role in solving it.

As a result, employees will learn to manage information more efficiently – both corporate and personal.

How to relieve the pressure?

It seems to us that the solution to the problem should not consist of reducing digital clutter per se. The catch is rather in insufficient personal responsibility and inability of people to choose and use different types of environments for different purposes.

We are all different. For example, older people are less willing to share their passwords than youth — especially those who are too young to be responsible for their actions.

It’s more convenient for some employees to work in an organized space, while others do more in the middle of a pile of papers or files (and this is not a mess, but just a different working environment).

You should not give up all efforts to install corporate applications on personal devices (which is difficult, and in some countries, it is completely impossible) or attempts to change people’s habits with the help of intimidation.

Also Read:  Ensure a balance between building your product and building the venture: Snapcart CEO

It’s even more important to explain to people the difference between the environments in which they communicate with other employees and the environments where it is possible to collaborate with third parties, whether they are contractors or personal acquaintances.

Everyone can clean up their home. However, a common “home” – an office workstation or a cloud solution – should be convenient and safe for everyone. Here you can not do without the universally accepted rules and understanding.

And, of course, someone must control how these rules are implemented so that the habits of employees do not harm the business and do not infringe on the interests of colleagues.

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Editor’s note: e27 publishes relevant guest contributions from the community. Share your honest opinions and expert knowledge by submitting your content here.

Join our e27 Telegram group here, or our e27 contributor Facebook page here.

Image Credit:Marten Bjork

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Victor Chua explains why he is so bullish on “female-focussed economics”

For more great episodes, subscribe to the e27 Podcast Network. 

This week’s special guest is Victor Chua, managing partner of Vynn Capital.  Victor was formally the Vice President of Investments for Gobi Partners and managed two Southeast Asia focused early-stage funds. Prior to that, he was with the venture capital arm of Malaysia’s Ministry of Finance, managing direct and indirect investments.

Some of his notable investments are Carsome, Travelio, Triip, Hermo, and Jirnexu. Victor has invested in over 20 companies in Southeast Asia, especially in Vietnam, Thailand, Singapore, Indonesia and Malaysia.

Also Read: Asia VC Cast with Simon Wu from Cathay Innovation

Together, we discuss why Victor is so bullish on “female-focussed economics” and why there’s so much more excitement in startups serving the female consumers. 

Also, he shares his insights on increasing trend in family offices & corporates making direct investments and why he believes it’s important to create more vehicles for corporates to bring complementary values for startups. 

Hope you guys enjoy this one!

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