Sometimes apart from my main gig and my blog – I am not always sure what my role is in the startup scene. I don’t have time to actively attend lots of things and I usually am probably too busy to actively mentor but I do try when I can. However I do a good job of remembering people, I try to add everyone to my Linkedin so I can keep track of them and I usually remember what people are doing.

So lately the role I think I have been playing is connecting folks. It may not be super glamorous and there may be nothing in it for me but I think that is okay. Too many times people always want something out of doing something for others but I enjoy the giving – I think life and career are full of karma like moments. I am pretty sure I got to where I am today by the people I know and the things I was able to do. Maybe had I thought about karma even more I would have come even farther. Tough to say.

My point is though we can call help each other by connecting folks who need something to folks who might be able to help. Through the connection maybe someone progresses further than they would have without the connection. Sure – maybe there is tech to solve this problem but I think the human touch makes it more fun. Of course my intro might be via email but that’s okay.

Recently I was rewarded for my connection actions by meeting someone at MediaCorp who was asking about the startup scene for a segment they were working on for live TV.  I decided to email all the folks that I thought this person should talk to. This lead to me being invited onto the segment – which I was surprised but grateful for. Of course then I wore my Daring Fireball shirt which lead to a gruber tweet. So the whole circle was perfect. I gave and I received more than I gave. Karma.

The SEA startup scene is small but growing. We will compete with other startup locales but we can beat them all handily if each and everyone of us plays the role of a giving connector when it makes sense. Connecting all the dots will helps us all succeed.

At the Fucking Cool Brunch there was a gentlemen there, the mixologist from the bar at 28 Hong Kong Street, who discussed the notion of hospitality. I found it fascinating since generally this is an overlooked topic in the tech industry. What I mean by this is how we treat our users or customers. I call them customers usually cause my goal is to extract revenue while serving them – rather than a user. Who uses. 😉

I stole this line from Wiki:

However, it still involves showing respect for one’s guests, providing for their needs, and treating them as equals.

There is so much in that line.

Respect – how many times have you been talked down to or berated by a customer support person? Remember that feeling next time you interact with one of your customers.

Provide – Customers have needs. The goal is to provide for them – sure you may not be able to and some of the needs may be silly but the idea is to try where it fits with your product goals.

Treat as equal – this kind of is like the first line – respect but the idea is to get off your tech high-horse and treat your customer as you would expect to be treated.

So given this I find customer support to be a really BIG deal. You work hard to get a customer – it is cheaper to keep them then to buy a new one. Fact.

I have some friends who have newsletter all about techies and customer support – check it out here :: https://twitter.com/TechSupport4Dev/

At Spuul, for now, I still handle most of the customer emails. It keeps me close to the product and the customer’s use of the product.

Generally all the support comes in via email, different channels, and I try to personally respond to all of them. Sometimes they are lengthy replies, sometimes they are check this FAQ and other times they are canned replies since the answer is quite simple. Typing out all of these replies can take too much time – sure shortcuts and textexpander would help but I have something better now – Dispatch. Made by one of the dudes who also makes the Spuul App .

• I can make snippets and quickly reply to emails
• I can take emails and save them off to evernote
• I can use an email to quickly start an asana task
• Animations are useful and the app is just pretty
• I can go back and forth from the email and the preview while I type my reply.
• It works and the whole idea of using my email client as a router to other things is growing on me

App is a 1.0 and obviously will evolve.

Email is not dead folks but only cause of some great innovation by independent  devs.

Customers service is any startup’s secret weapon – now you have a better tool to add to your arsenal.

Next post I will talk about Echelon, getting on TV and gruber.

laterz!

I attended the Fucking Cool Brunch yesterday and was gently reminded of how far the scene has come in Singapore – events, quality of people, the interesting performance art, food, drinks and of course the tech. Being a techy I have to monitor this but as I have said before I think Singapore as an HQ for Global Companies keeps looking better and better. Yes – there are issues. Series A, employments visas, spaces to work and so on but I hope they will all be overcome as Singapore keeps evolving the model and marching on.

At the Brunch I met someone from MediaCorp and we had a nice healthy discussion around Singapore, the tech scene and the possible future landscape. Of course I can quickly digress and focus on the negatives but there is a reason I am in Singapore. I chose it. I value the residency capability, the rule of law, the infrastructure and the burgeoning scene. I feel that although there might be better better places to live or what some perceive as better markets – my gut says Singapore will come out on top of the SEA heap and become a place where one could setup, build and exit a global startup. I can’t prove this, yet, but it’s how I feel.

Apart from all of this the activity right now is high and the quality is good.

We have a conference/event scene that is always improving :: http://reddotrubyconf.com , http://e27.co/echelon/ , http://blinkbl-nk.com – I am sure there are examples of others but these are the ones I am into.

Then there is just all the periphery activity that is slowly evolving that is cementing the Startup Scene in Singapore:

Isaac penned a great Startup FAQ here :: http://sgentrepreneurs.com/2013/05/16/singapore-startup-faq/

Although I am not a huge Rocket fan you can’t ignore the activity they are bringing :: http://sgentrepreneurs.com/2013/05/22/zalora-reveals-massive-usd-100m-round-in-vote-of-confidence-for-fash-e-commerce-in-asia/

GOAP SEA :: http://500.co/2013/03/13/this-summers-biggest-blockbuster-geeks-on-a-plane-southeast-asia/

The new 500 Durians Fund :: http://www.zdnet.com/500-startups-launches-10m-500-durians-fund-for-southeast-asia-7000016104/

The success of JFDI :: http://insidethenoodlebowl.com/singapores-jfdi-asia-puts-southeast-asias-accelerators-on-the-map – looking forward to demo night tomorrow night. I will try to live tweet my reactions. 😉

In general the mainstream tech press, written by a local, is waking up to the size and opportunity in SEA :: http://thenextweb.com/asia/2013/01/03/2013-in-southeast-asia/

Yes – still waiting for new Series A entrants who will set up shop in Singapore but I think it will come.

Been in Singapore for over 3 years and in Asia for about 13 years. The current activity is unprecedented – and I don’t think it is a bubble. It is just the natural progression of the tech world waking up to how big SEA is. It isn’t easy to operate here but I think it is worth it. My personal goal is to show that one can build a big global business right here in Singapore. So lately I am focused on doing just that while doing my best to stay plugged in.

Going to be a busy week!

I won’t get into how jealous I am of Jon being on svbtle, very stoked for you Jon, but your latest post, http://insidethenoodlebowl.com/the-four-big-issues-for-southeast-asias-startup-ecosystem, got me thinking a bit. I agree with pretty much all of it so this is not really a rebuttal but to add some more color to point #3.

3. Lack of big firm presence: Founders invariably gain experience and ideas from working for big firms or other startups, that’s much harder when the few major players that are in the region – eg Google – hire sales and marketing staff rather than technical teams. Few from Silicon Valley would come back to Asia to start a company – though that could change in the future.

I may be asking to much on this thread in general but one of the things that I am not too impressed about with all the local big firms is their local technical support/escalation path for startups seeking assistance in Southeast Asia. I won’t name names when it comes to shaming since it won’t do me any good but I will state that Amazon or AWS is absolutely fantastic and tops in my book. In the world of startups – spuul is just a minnow but yet AWS is so responsive and extremely helpful. They check in on us regularly and bring many a good technical talent by our office to help us further our capabilities. Love the support and the technical talent in the region working for AWS continues to get more impressive.

We have had good luck with Apple as well when it comes to developer support but it could just be that we have a good line to them via one of our devs. I am not sure that everyone else gets the same support.

Google has also been helpful but it usually takes a lot of persistence and it is mostly cause I know a lot of folks there.

I think for the region to really take off the various big companies must offer a lot more product/technical support in the region hopefully from people who are in the region or at least a nearby time zone. Most of the companies continue to support from the valley and apart from conferences, dev events and evangelism – there is not a steady stream of information and local support.

I hope it changes for the benefit of the region.