smeepe launch – why I’ve been so quiet lately.
April 22nd, 2009
written by Danielle Grossi
I’ve not only been pretty quiet on twitter lately, but also in general. Although I do indeed have a lot to share, the preparation and launching of our latest project has taken over my life for about the last six months to a year.
The project I’m referring to is smeepe. smeepe is officially in beta, was launched on April 8th, 2009. smeepe is used to match users to the most suitable vendors they need for their project, worldwide (starting in US, UK, Germany, Switzerland).
We came up with the idea for smeepe by recognizing challenges in our daily business at our sister company, expacklyMondo. Sonya and I founded expacklyMondo back in January 2007. expacklyMondo helps customers plan the event they actually want to plan themselves. As we continued to work together, fusing my almost 10 years of IT background with Sonya’s almost 13 years of event management experience, we came up with a solution to a problem we face literally almost every day: where do we find vendors for our projects and how do we know they are of GOOD QUALITY and suit OUR needs? Since Sonya’s been in the event business for a long time, she’s faced this problem much longer than I have. All I did was notice that something like this could be fixed with the help of a software solution, since, coming from IT/software development, doing things manually more than once is a pain, especially when you know it can be automated.
I sketched out the idea for Sonya back in November 2007 and she said, “I’ve been wanting to have something like this for years. I just didn’t know it was possible!” And I said, “with software, we can make just about everything possible.” And from that day on, smeepe was born. We began development almost a year later and here we are, ready for spring with our beta.
Original smeepe Sketch
What can smeepe do?
Well, for vendors, smeepe is a great platform to market yourself. You can fill out a profile, similar to a bunch of other sites. But here, users can contact you directly, rate you, and comment on your services. This helps new users feel more comfortable with their choice if they can read about experiences from previous customers. For users, you can search for various vendors in multiple locations, then view, contact, rate, comment, save, or forward the vendor listing.
Honestly, there are a ton of sites and portals out there where you can search for vendors or freelancers. But,
- how many of those sites are free? We had lengthy discussions with our team and finally came to the conclusion to keep is simple smeepe (the new K.I.S.S.). Member accounts are free and vendor accounts will cost much less than a plain old phone book listing. And to sweeten the pot, we’ve decided to give the first 5,000 vendors a year subscription free!
- how many of those sites show you all vendor information including contact information, ratings, and reviews without forcing users to register?
- how many give you commission-free referrals? We don’t track how many customers you vendors get through smeepe and slam you with a commission charge. We’ll just charge a yearly flat subscription fee, that’s it.
- how many of those sites display their search results only by rankings and ratings versus how much advertising money the vendors pay? Vendors can’t pay us anything to bump up their listing, period. The better your profile and service, the higher up you’ll appear on the search results, getting you more clicks and hopefully more customers.
Those are just the basics. There is definitely a lot more to come at smeepe that’s already in development, but we need your feedback so we can come out with the features now that you need most!
Right now, event and IT/Social Media vendors can register at smeepe. We are, however, continuing to expand to other industries, countries, and languages. If you have any suggestions which industry should come next, let us know!
In closing, I want to take a moment to express my gratitude. This project has demanded a great deal of time and energy from me and our entire team. I know this is going to sound like I’m at the Oscar’s here, but it’s important to me that everyone in my life knows how grateful I am!
First, I want to thank our developers, Mark & his team for the fantastic work they’ve done. They’ve been able to implement so much so quickly. Craig, thank you for your continuous technology guidance and advice, this has helped us more than you know! Artur, Nadine, and Michele, thank you for all your hard work on getting our brand developed, marketing strategy in place, and PR plan going. I’ve learned a ton from you three! Thank you to the twitter community for your feedback and helpful suggestions!
There are two people I’d like to thank, however they’d prefer to stay anonymous. You know who you are, without you, this couldn’t have been possible at all. We’ve learned a great deal from both of you and look forward to many more years of business together.
My family and friends. Thank you so much for supporting me through this. I know I haven’t been very responsive lately because of the gargantuan workload, and just want to express my gratitude for your understanding. Thank you also for all your tips and helpful feedback!
Sonya, my business partner and very good friend, thank you for everything. I certainly could not have co-founded and developed smeepe without you. I think we make a great team and couldn’t have asked for a better partner!
And last but certainly not least, thank you to my husband, Toni. Thank you for supporting me in all of this and being understanding of the time and energy this project has demanded from me (and also for not being annoyed with my addiction to my Blackberry!). I could not have done any of this without you.
Tags: event vendors, launch, smeepe launch, social media vendors, twitter
Posted in smeepe launch | Comments (5)
April 22nd, 2009 at 2:59 pm
Hi my love,
Good luck for your launch of Smeepe, although I’m aware of you energy, power and professional skills, I have no doubt about the success of smeepe . Rock the web Baby
Looking forward for our first gig through Smeepe
Love you . . .
April 22nd, 2009 at 3:28 pm
This may sound cheezy but Im proud of you! I think thats so amazing what you are doing!! I am happy that you have done so well for yourself!! :0)
April 22nd, 2009 at 3:55 pm
This is fantastic!! I really love what you are doing. I will certainly get the word out and use this as a medium for the services I would like to provide.
April 23rd, 2009 at 12:23 am
Congratulations. The site looks great. I wish you the best of luck and success.
Give me a call or email, I have some ideas I would like to throw your way. skype
April 24th, 2009 at 7:21 pm
Danielle, You never cease to amaze me. Your ambition and drive is second to none. I know smeep will be successful! You go girl!!!!!!!!!!!!!