Bizmeet.me’s Ida Pandur: We Want to Make Our App Simple, Intuitive and Sexy!
Editor’s note: Since writing this article, Bizmeet.Me has ceased to operate. This post remains as part of their legacy. However, you can read our story about a similar .MEr here.
Being a businesswoman in mainly man’s world is a tough job. However, Ida Pandur has no problem with it. Settled in Zagreb, she is a force to be reckoned with and she is only 26. With academic background in business economics/marketing, and professional experience in digital marketing and management, she is also in the process of launching her first app, Bizmeet.me. But let’s see what Ida has to say.
As a founder, what gave you the idea for the Bizmeet.me?
I was sitting over a beer with some friends of mine and we were discussing traveling. Then business travels. And then it hit me how business travelers mostly take trips alone and how cool it would be to have a simple service to find other people close by, with similar business interests. And the idea spread to local environment and conferences as well. It is great to meet and network easily at a conference, and avoid those awkward situations of approaching somebody randomly without even knowing who that person is. Also,another option of Bizmeet.me is to meet some interesting people from your own city and open new business deals and opportunities.
How did you gather your team?
I was very lucky to get in contact with 2 very experienced professionals who liked the idea of Bizmeet.me and joined in. Our creative director Dario has over 11 years of experience in digital marketing and his own digital design company Manifest media. His vision of design has brought Bizmeet out on a visual surface in the most beautiful way. Filip is our main product guy with 7 years of experience in digital project management and startups. He will be in charge of making Bizmeet.me work and grow smoothly all around, together with our CTO, whose spot we are in the process of filling in. We have full time jobs, but we are all in love with the startup scene and that’s why we are dedicating our afterwork hours to Bizmeet.me and its development. We truly believe it is a service that can make a difference in business networking and create new business opportunities online and offline.
What separates Bizmeet.me from the rest of the social apps?
It’s built mobile first (desktop version will come later), because most of the users we would like to reach are connecting online via smartphones or tablets. The biggest focus was on a design and user experience. Our main goal with this app was to make it very simple, make it intuitive and make it sexy. Dario Krznar, our designer, has done an amazing job with that. Apple is our big role model here. We have cut out all the extra features and focused on the core – find a bizmeet or drop an invite so others can find you, contact and meet. There are a lots of business meetings app and sites but no one has quite cracked the code to enable this thing completely. We will try to do it.
Bizmeet.me recently won both Start Trek and Idea Pitch startup competitions. In what way did that help you to move Bizmeet.me idea further?
It gave us a good sign that we are creating something that users really need. We’ve gotten a lots of PR and positive feedback about this and we are continuing to develop it further. Just few days ago, I pitched it for Deutche Telekom’s WARP program in their hub:raum accelerator in Krakow and we won. I’m happy and proud and looking forward to going there with the team and working with awesome mentors there. We are very eager to learn what experts think about Bizmeet.me’s true potential. Users who tried mockup said that this is what they need and what they would totally use, so our goal is now to launch it in a shortest possible time and test the market with a live service. We already have ideas for phase 2 with gamification development methods but let’s see how phase 1 goes.
Are there any other ideas and plans for the future?
I’ve been working, maybe even better to say living, digital marketing professionally for the last 4 years. This is something I feel passionate about because I see how it changes the way businesses and customers went from one way communication via ads, to two way collaboration and creation. I see how we make things more transparent and that’s a particular reason why I plan to run this even further. I’m in a process of creating my own digital marketing consulting agency which is also launching in a few weeks. My plan is to do what I love with people who love and know this area of business and to develop successful stories, both with Bizmeet.me and with our agency’s clients.
In what time we can expect Bizmeet.me to launch?
In a matter of 3-4 weeks the app should be out. Until then feel free to request your early invite at Bizmeet.me and as soon as it comes out, you will be the first one to know. We are looking forward to your reader’s feedback.
