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CLOSEM

アップデート:3つの新製品を発売し、今年は資金調達を計画している方法(月商3万ドル)
月商 $30,000 · 創業者2人 · 従業員1人 · Clearwater, Florida, United States
Richard Miles and Laura Betterly(Founder, CLOSEM)· 創業 March 2020 · 記事掲載 — · closem.ai · 元の記事

同じ会社のほかの記事: アフリカから帰国し、年間20万ドル($200K)の営業自動化ソフトウェアを開発

何の商売か
誰が見込み客・顧客とのエンゲージメントや売上向上に課題を感じる中小企業の経営者・営業担当者(特に不動産、金融、住宅サービス、保険業)。デジタル疲れでメールやSMSが届きにくいと感じている層
何のためにデジタルメッセージが飽和状態の現代において、顧客・見込み客との接点を増やし、埋もれずに注目を集めたい。特に「コールドプロスペクト」(面識のない見込み客)との関係構築を効果的に行い、売上を向上させたい
何を買うかメール・SMSに加え「手書き風の郵便物」を自動で送る顧客フォローアップツール「CLOSEM」を月額49ドル(約7,350円)または99ドル(約14,850円)で利用する。その他、URL短縮・QRコード生成の「LINKEM」とスケジュール調整の「BOOKM」は年額89ドル(約13,350円)、見込み客リスト生成の「FINDM」は連絡先ダウンロードごとの従量課金

2020年3月創業の会社。創業者2名、従業員1名で、2022年時点の月商は3万ドル(約450万円)。自己資金のみで運営しており、広告宣伝費が限られているため、今年は資金調達を計画している。特定の集客方法は記事に明記されていない。

売値の出典: 記事の本文(2022年時点)(2026-10-13 取得)

As we’ve proven the viability of the platform and our business, we intend to go out for funding this year.

Hello again! Remind us who you are and what business you started.

I’m Richard Miles, the co-founder, and CEO of CLOSEM. We launched just over 2 years ago. After an appliance repair technician came to my house and fixed my oven (2 days before we hosted 20 people for Thanksgiving) and did a great job. While he could have sent me a text asking for a shoutout on Yelp, an email asking if I’d be a referral, or a postcard offering me a discount on other services…I never heard from him again. At that point, I decided to create a simple, easy-to-use tool that would automate follow-up. Easy enough for my appliance repair guy to use but sophisticated and powerful enough for experienced marketers as well. CLOSEM While there are a lot of follow-up and sales automation tools, our core product, CLOSEM, is a breakthrough by combining email and SMS with postal mail. Postal mail has proven to be a game-changer for so many. While today’s email inboxes are full, and it’s difficult to break through the barriers and noise, and people are experiencing SMS fatigue. That said, the postal mailbox is relatively empty, and it’s easy to convey a memorable message to your target. While the lifespan of an email is measured in seconds, the lifespan of postal mail is measured in days. It’s unexpected, outside the digital rabbit hole most marketers stay inside, and very, very “sticky.” We made sending what looks like a handwritten letter or postcard (and adding it to a campaign of emails and text messages) the same as typing an email or text, and our users can send a series of messages to individuals or groups with a single click.

Tell us about what you’ve been up to. Has the business been growing?

This is an exciting period for us. We’ve introduced 3 new products to create a dynamic ecosystem for businesspeople looking to increase engagement and sales. As we’ve proven the viability of the platform and our business, we intend to go out for funding this year. We released LINKEM in the summer. LINKEM is a completely standalone product but is also immediately integrated into CLOSEM. Users can turn long URLs into trackable short links and add dynamic QR codes to postal mail right from within the text editor. LINKEM users can create engaging mobile landing pages to turn their Instagram or TikTok bio link into an engaging marketing platform. LINKEM Users ask us if they can use CLOSEM for reaching out to cold prospects, and of course, the best way to break the ice with people that don’t know you aren’t via email. It’s by sending postal mail first and then following up with emails. At the same time, they say CLOSEM is good for following up with the leads and prospects they have, but they’d like to know if we also provided leads. People use many tools to scrape contact data off LinkedIn or Google, but these result in pretty poor information and can violate terms of service. FINDM On the other hand, some services provide curated lists of prospects. While these prospects come with much more complete contact and demographic information, they tend to require monthly or annual commitments. They can be pretty expensive, especially for our core user demographic. So we partnered with some of the largest data houses and created FINDM, where users can create an account for free, do as many searches as they like, and pay only for the contacts they download. FINDM has over 60M business prospects, many with LinkedIn profiles and 270 million consumer records updated monthly. BOOKM Most recently, we introduced BOOKM, a tool to make scheduling with customers and prospects easier. Like LINKEM, it is a completely standalone application that is tightly integrated into CLOSEM. While CLOSEM has built-in appointments and reminders, we didn’t have that external link where prospects could book appointments with users. We plan to dominate this small business sales segment and have priced our tools very competitively. LINKEM and BOOKM are only $89 / year, and FINDM is a pay-as-you-go solution. CLOSEM is either $49 or $99 / month, depending on the plan.

What have been your biggest challenges in the last year?

Our company is 100% bootstrapped, and a lack of investment capital has limited our ability to promote.

What have been your biggest lessons learned in the last year?

We’ve got to keep working to make our products even more compelling. Adding a really good developer to our team has been a worthwhile investment. At the same time, we must stay focused on our core business and only bite off what we can chew.

What’s in the plans for the upcoming year, and the next 5 years?

We will keep iterating and focus on ensuring our customers are happy and successful using our products. We also focus on specific niche markets and provide solutions that appeal to specific verticals like real estate, financial services, home services, and insurance. One area of expansion for us is in cart abandonment - -while there are tools that followup when someone does not complete an order, these are either email or text, sometimes email and text, but none of them can send a postcard with a picture of the product, along with a QR code that links back to the order page. As we’ve proven the viability of the platform and our business, we intend to go out for funding this year.

What’s the best thing you read in the last year?

A Knock at Midnight, A Story of Hope, Justice, and Freedom By: Brittany K. Barnett The best thing I’ve read this year has everything to do with persistence and achieving a vision. It will make you cry and cheer (and cry). The audiobook is also incredibly well-narrated.

Advice for other entrepreneurs who might be struggling to grow their business?

I used to think my advice was worth it.

Are you looking to hire for certain positions right now?

We’re going to be hiring sales and customer service reps in 2023.

Where can we go to learn more?

Website Facebook If you have any questions or comments, drop a comment below!