Abstrakt in 2021
Abstract, as a noun, is defined by the dictionary as a summary of specific points, generally taken from a scientific paper.
Abstract, as it relates to artwork, is the general expression of ideas using colors and lines without attempting to create a realistic picture.
I have always believed that sales is equal parts science, and art.
The genesis of the name of our company has just as much to do with the above, as it does with the end product or result that is produced following a call that is deployed using Frameworks and Recommended Responses.
The post call Abstrakt is the summary of everything important that happened on that call or demo. What we never realized, and only can comprehend now looking back is how much science and art went into building Abstrakt.
Art is the expression and/or application of human creative skill and imagination.
How we built Abstrakt
When we realize that seven different coding languages, 37 different processes, six different algorithms, and a handful of other amazing things happen all in less than one second, the only thing I can lean on when someone asks “how did you build this?” is by answering “amazing creativity and imagination!”
We applied the science of how technology works with profound creativity and as our VP of Engineering would say “Blissful ignorance – the book had never been written, so we had to write it ourselves. The only way to do that was by being creative.”
Looking back at the year we definitely rode the startup rollercoaster of emotion.
There is no doubt about that. We landed our first customers well before we were ready for them. We pushed out the product well before we really knew if it would work (and most of the time it didn’t).
We struggled through the realization that our customers would break Abstrakt in ways we never thought possible.
We iterated, tested, broke, built, and deployed new features and bug fixes faster than I ever thought possible.
There was one day where I think our dev team pushed out 12 new product builds in the course of 24 hours.
Raising money
We raised our Pre-Seed round of funding, we hired our first full-time employees to start 2022, we closed our first multi-year deal, we closed our first publicly traded customer, passed our first (and second) intense security review, we broke the product a bunch more times, launched our first paid advertising campaign (which failed miserably) and generated a handful of inbound leads.
2021 was a year filled with ideas, expectations, hopes, dreams, visions for the future, sleepless nights, painstaking conversations where emotions ran high, and stressful meetings but ultimately a year that got us to where we are today!
We still don’t really know how the market is going to define us, or what category on G2 are we going to be put in… maybe Real-Time Call Coaching will become its own thing one day?
Or maybe the natural evolution of products will pull us into Conversational Intelligence Software as other players adapt and grow?
These are all exciting things for us to figure out!
We have full-time employees (crazy and terrifying to say out loud), we have customers who love the product (dare say raving fans?).
Above all, we have excitement, hope, and an amazing vision for the future of what we are going to be able to do for our customers in 2022 and beyond!