When you start your business, it’s always very important to have lots of contacts, for several reasons. You get to talk with other startups and hear from their experiences. This might help avoiding mistakes, others already made. You can learn from your peers. Another very important group of contacts are (potential) customers. Talking to people, you think might be interested in the service/product you’re offering, will get you your first clients. They get to know who you are and what you do. If they like it, they buy it. Especially in the beginning, when every single customer has great value, a personal relationship is essential for the well-being of your sales. Other important contacts are those from the investing sector. Maybe some time after you started your business, you need funding. The question arises: where to find relevant contacts?
Great resources are forums and networking platforms. An Italian networking platform especially designed to help Italian startups establish connections with other startups, spin-offs, investors, universities, institutions, incubators, research centers, science and technological parks, and companies is Startupbusiness. The platform helps to “stimulate and support relationships, matching, deals, share of information among the main actors of the innovation ecosystem”. Currently there are almost 2,000 members in the community. The mission of the platform is to create and offer a business web-lounge,where business owners can easily know what is going on in the Italian ecosystem. Startuppers have the opportunity to get to know relevant investors of their business sector or to meet other entrepreneurs engaged in helpful projects. Founders have also the chance to be chosen to participate in speed-dating or so-called pitching events to get to know relevant people and company represantatives.
We’re happy to announce a partnership with Startupbusiness as of now. Users, registering on twago through a recommendation from Startupbusiness will receive a free user-verification and NDA-functionality at no cost for projects being posted until September 1, 2010.
These two features offer great benefits for users. User verification is designed to increase trust between the awarding company and the service provider, because twago employees will check relevant documents of the buyer in order to increase security, like business registrations and certificates. NDA-functionality (NDA = non disclosure agreement) is especially interesting for companies looking to develop something completely new, which no third party is entitled to know about. Service providers must agree to the NDA before a contract can be signed. In this way, start-ups can keep their creative ideas confidential.
We’ll keep you updated on future developments of the partnership and more special offers.
