How Taskeo Succeeded Through User-first Mentality

An Interview with Agnieszka Kasperek of Taskeo

Agnieszka Kasperek is the CMO of Taskeo. Taskeo is the ultimate project management and automation tool that makes your job done quickly, efficiently, straightforward and streamlined. Taskeo is designed to improve the way your team works. It is a fully-equipped toolkit packed with everything you need to skyrocket your productivity.

Do you want to grow your business? Is it time to rethink the way you market and deliver experiences?

Agnieszka shares her entrepreneurial journey and explains Taskeo's marketing activities that yield them with the best return. She also provided insights into team productivity that they've discovered through Taskeo. She shares ways to make changes that lead to growth and reveal the keys to valuable innovation.

Agnieszka shares Taskeo best practices: Questions and Answers

What is Taskeo and how was your entrepreneurial journey so far?

Taskeo has started off as a project management platform and up to this point, managing tasks is still its core function. Our outlook on the tool has changed ever since its creation, ideas have evolved and we grew together with Taskeo. However, helping people work better is and will always be our focus.

All these changes actually describe our entrepreneurial journey best. Today, Taskeo is much different from what it was in the beginning. Even if its main purpose remains the same, it works a little differently and it also expands.

Let me explain: there are many tools out there creators of which keep working in the very same, very specific spectrums and develop functions based on these spectrums. For example, different project management platforms add more functionalities that basically solve the same problem but in a different way. That’s their growth pattern.

Taskeo’s journey is a little different because we aim to expand in different directions. We want to add features that you wouldn’t normally look for in a task management tool even though it’s useful for them to be there.

That’s why if you compare Taskeo “then” and “now”, you’ll see a significant difference. You’ll see that instead of adding another function that helps you assign tasks to your people, we develop functions that serve completely different purposes.

I’ll put it this way to help you visualize it: in the very beginning, Taskeo had basic functions such as recurring tasks and built-in time tracking, but now you can also use it to manage your appointments and - in the future - your customer relations.

Most startups fail because they can't find product-market fit. With Taskeo being in business for over 3 years and counting, how have you succeeded where others have not? What have been the main challenges along the way, and how did you overcome them?

I believe it’s all about the user-first mentality we’ve got. We manage to build a platform that is well-received because of two main things that we do.

I, as Taskeo’s marketer, spend a lot of time online and I use this time to ask people what they think about our product. I reach out to communities, groups and forums asking for feedback. Every single time we launch a new feature, I ask our social followers to stop by and have a look at it. I also think this is something you’ve got to be very careful with - don’t spam and don’t annoy people. It’s important that you pick the right time, place and form for your feedback requests.

There’s also what our founder, Kamil, does. He’s going above and beyond to learn about the problems our customers have. There’s hardly a month when he doesn’t talk to someone or connect to people who agree to share their issues and describe the ideal tool they’d use to solve them. I honestly believe that’s the key to understanding what our product-market fit is and I can’t possibly imagine developing Taskeo without feedback that we get from Kamil’s market research.

This kind of research is a challenge in itself whether you’re doing it online or offline because you’ve got know who you’re reaching out to. You can’t just bother random people, you need to go after those who can provide real value. This has a lot to do with mastering your ideal customer personas and lead generation pattern.

What is Taskeo's unique value proposition that sets it apart from its competitors?

Project management is such a crowded space that it’s really hard to impress people in this niche. I’ll be honest with you that our UVP changed several times as we discovered it simply wasn’t good enough to set us apart from others.

With Taskeo, we’ve started off as project management, we tried to cater to remote employees only, but we realized it was a miss. Along the way, we tried this and that until we realized there are plenty of people who are tired of collecting apps to manage their businesses. There are many wonderful apps that equip you with task management tools. But what if you need to schedule appointments? What if you need a CRM app? What if you need to track time you spend working? Most of the platforms out there don’t provide all these solutions. And if they do, the price point is hard to get over or the system grows to be incredibly complicated.

So we go for something in between: we give our customers all they need to manage their business while keeping it affordable and simple. You shouldn’t have to manage ten apps to get your company under control and this is the problem we solve.

Taskeo is for people who can’t be bothered with collecting one app per task.

What strategies did you pursue to find your first initial customers? In recent marketing efforts, where have you seen the best return?

I think that from the beginning the best results we’ve ever got were always from cooperating with someone. Communities, offline and online, are priceless.

I think we’ve got our first significant number of early adopters when we appeared on BetaList in our first months online. The next year, there was a Slush event that brought about similar results.

Ever since, our best moments were always connected to working with an external partner. For example, when had a launch on some listing, launched an LTD or partnered up with someone for guest posts or some other type of cooperation.

I think that if you’re a bootstrapped startup with little to no marketing budget, you should just focus all your efforts on being where the crowd is and making as many connections as you can.

Taskeo was built to make teams more productive. What insights into team productivity have you discovered through Taskeo and the customers that use your service?

I think the biggest lesson is that productivity varies so much from one team to another. It’s really unpredictable how our customers will react to our product.

Many times we have talked to people who were asking about Taskeo because they “outgrew” their current tool or because it was “not flexible enough” or “didn’t really offer much”. And when we asked them what is their tool, it often turned out to be one of these highly-popular apps that are said to offer everything.

Of course, it doesn’t mean that these tools are horrible. It just means that people are so different that you can’t ever predict whether this or that productivity tool will be right fit for them. Some will pick Taskeo. Some will pick some other app. And some will stick to spreadsheets for the rest of their lives because that’s how they work most effectively.

There isn’t one good way to be productive. You just got to find the right people for your team, get the right tool and build the right workflow.

What is your long-term vision for Taskeo and how are you achieving this?

I wouldn’t want to disclose too much yet but we’re currently working on improving our product-market fit. This will be connected to narrowing our niche and adding valuable functions that will cater to a very specific group of users. This is currently a work in progress and our long-term vision revolves around that for the next months or even years.

Beside that, we stick with what we’ve built so far. Last year, we promised our users additional modules that will complement the project management core. One of them - the appointment scheduling module - is out already. We’re busy adding CRM and email marketing features.

Or perhaps I should put the simple way: we’re going to go out there, ask people what will make their work easier, and then we’re going to build it for them.

Takeaways

Taskeo User-first Mentality: Knowing the importance of feedback

Reaching out to communities, groups and forums to ask what they think is important to achieve product launch success. While doing these, it is important to pick the right time, place and form for your feedback request.

When you launch a new product or feature, you have to ask your social followers to stop by and have a look at it. Talk to your consumers and connect to people who agree to share their issues and describe the ideal tool they would like to use to solve them.

You have to go above and beyond to learn about the needs of your customers and provide solutions and value to the table. The key to understanding what your product-market is the feedback that you get from the market research.

Collaborating with communities, both offline and online

Collaborating with an external partner is one of the best marketing efforts to see a great return. Connecting to people both offline and online is priceless.

For bootstrapped startups with little or no marketing budget, Agnieszka recommends focusing all efforts on being where the crowd is and making as many connections as you can.

Finding the right people, get the right tool and build the right workflow.

Productivity varies from one team to another. Every business is different and you can’t ever predict whether this or that productivity tool will be right fit for them.

There isn’t one good way to be productive. You just have to find the right people for your team, get the right tool and build the right workflow.

Conclusion

Taskeo can help your organization work better and smarter. It's team's user-first mentality is one of their edges and what sets them apart from their competitors. Collecting first-hand feedback, knowing their customers' needs and providing genuine solutions is what ultimately helped them succeed.

Taskeo has grown and is now working differently compared to when they've started. However, helping people work better is and will always be their focus. They are consistently working on improving their product-market fit by connecting to the right people, asking them what will make their work easier, and building it for them.

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