A Ring That Keeps You Safe – AOTK 146

Roy Morejon:

Welcome to Art of the Kickstart, your source for crowdfunding campaign success. I’m your host Roy Morejon, President of Command Partners, the top full-service crowdfunding marketing agency in the world. We have helped raise over $70,000,000 for our clients since 2010. Each week I’ll interview a crowdfunding success story, an inspirational entrepreneur, or a business expert in order to help take your startup to the next level with crowdfunding. Art of the Kickstart is honored to be sponsored by the Gadget Flow, a product discovery platform that helps you discover, save, and buy awesome products. The Gadget Flow is the ultimate buyer’s guide for cool luxury gadgets and creative gifts. To learn more, visit thegadgetflow.com. Now let’s get on with the show.

Welcome to another edition of Art of the Kickstart. Today I’m joined by Kathy Roma with Nimb. Kathy, thank you so much for joining us.

Kathy Roma:

Thank you for having me.

Roy Morejon:

Kathy, tell me about this smart ring that keeps you safe and sound. I know there’s quite a back story to it so please tell our listeners.

Kathy Roma:

Actually we call it the system. It’s not only the ring, it’s the device and the application. We call it a crowdsource security system. We want to equip people with the perfect tool to arrange themselves and help those in trouble. Sometimes we face emergency situations and we want to call for help. Our system is the perfect instrument for doing it quick to get this help as soon as possible.

Roy Morejon:

The story came out of when you were attacked on your own. You’re obviously hoping to make the world a safer place. How long ago did that happen in terms of the development of the product now

Kathy Roma:

Founders have been working on this project for 2 years already. I joined it 3 months ago. When I heard about the project, I remembered how I was attacked. It was sixteen years ago. I lived in a nice neighborhood and it was like 10AM. I was going to live another boring day in the office and then everything interrupted by a stranger. I was severely injured. I got 9 injuries and barely made it to the hospital. I recalled this and told my story and said that I definitely want to bring to the table all my skills and everything I can do to make the world a safer place and to keep other people away from us. I should experience to help individuals lead safer lives. That was my motivation.

We received tremendous feedback from our customers and from people all over the world. They understand the concept. They give us their warmest support. This life is unpredictable and if you are prepared and you know that someone has your back, someone always will come and help you, this warm feeling means a lot to me and to all the people. We’re moving forward to making the world a bit safer for everyone.

Roy Morejon:

As a father of 2 girls, I’m definitely appreciative of products like this where I know that they potentially will be safe wherever they are when they grow up. In terms of the team, you mentioned you came onboard about 3 months ago. What is the rest of the team and what’s their makeup?

Kathy Roma:

Our CEO and our Marketing Director, Leo Bereschansky and Nick Marshansky, they’ve been friends for years. They know each other since the school. They made a lot of projects together. They have solid entrepreneurial experience. They started Nimb after an unfortunate event, as well, when a friend of Leo was caught in the situation arguing with her obsessive ex-partner for an hour and calling for help. He held her hands so she couldn’t make a call on the phone or use other self-defense devices. 2 years ago the guys decided that there is definitely a niche for such a device and the technology was already developed enough to support this idea to catch up with this need. They came up with the ring. The ring is the only form allowing you to send an alert to your loved ones or to your friends and relatives, to alert the authorities with just one touch of the thumb even if both of your hands are somehow resisted or immobilized. If you’re caught in the situation where you can’t move, it’s still possible to send an alert.

Roy Morejon:

Truly incredible technology. How long, in terms of the prototyping products, what you’re working with … You guys have continued to make each iteration better and better. What’s been the process there in terms of product development?

Kathy Roma:

All right. Technology first. We wanted to be sure that it’s reliable and it performs perfectly because our promise is strong. We say that our technology saves lives. From one side we were working really hard to test the technology to make sure that it performs in any stressful situation, that the signal is stable, that the button is concealed, and everything works nicely. From the other hand, we really wanted to make this not only something useful and smart but beautiful, something people would wear every day like an accessory, like jewelry, and enjoy having something like that on their hand because this is very close to the personal style. I know myself how, sometimes, something you need, something useful, contradicts your style or doesn’t fit exactly to the event and to the situation. We made lots of prototypes, making sure that the ring is not only functional but it’s comfortable, it’s nice. Finally we managed to merge those 2 objectives and, according to the feedback, we got a lot of messages and emails where people say, “And additional thank you for making the ring such a beauty.” We’re happy we managed to do that.

Roy Morejon:

Absolutely. It’s definitely a beautiful item. In terms of the campaign, what did the prep work go into in terms of launching on Kickstarter?

Kathy Roma:

We run a brief pre-launch campaign on our Facebook just to test the concept. We received tremendous results so we were pretty much confident about the response of potential users. We definitely saw that there is a need, there is a demand for that. We saw people from different countries saying that, “This would be great,” and, “thank you,” and, “I’ll definitely have one.” That was one part of the job. Another one is that we just moved to New York. All our team relocated themselves. This was quite an adventure. We have to deal with lots of things: moving, doing papers, having some legal duties. It’s startup. It’s not the big organization with hundreds of employees when you can just distribute tasks and enjoy results. We were doing lots of things by ourselves. That was a thrilling, exciting new experience. We had to go through this because it makes us wiser, more experienced, tighter as a team. We learn to help each other every day doing business so we understand that feeling when someone is always there for help, someone is always ready to take some burden from your shoulders and do something for you.

Roy Morejon:

Right. In all transparency for our listeners, Command Partners has been helping the Nimb team with their campaign. Right now we’re only a couple days in. We’ve already hit our funding goal within the first day. Tell me, from your teams perspective, what have been some of the biggest surprises from the campaign thus far?

Kathy Roma:

It’s our first crowdfunding campaign. Everything is a surprise for us. We were very excited to hit the goal just for 18 hours. We hoped that it would be the case but wasn’t sure. When it turned into reality, we were really happy. It was in the middle of the night in New York. We were exhausted and falling to sleep but still found a minute to call each other and to celebrate. Just to be clear, half of our team is in San Francisco. They’re introducing the project to investors, to the Professional Society in Silicon Valley. The communication part of the team is in New York. [inaudible 00:11:03] to be most efficient, to maximize our chances to do the work properly. We still are receiving a lot of letters with thank yous and with questions but we expected a lot more.

Thanks to Command Partners and their professional team, we managed to make a very clear page and informational materials so people understand us. They know what we are doing. They understand what the product is, it’s advantages. Mostly we receive thank yous and some minor questions, maybe about shipment to different places. We’re not overwhelmed with questions about performance, functions, about what it’s for and who it’s for. Thank you very much. We are very happy to have you as part of our professional team.

Roy Morejon:

Absolutely. It’s our pleasure. It’s been a great experience. Obviously, taking you through the process that we’ve done to make the campaign successful within the first day. We’re still trending at over a million dollars. That’s our hope, to have you as another one of our million dollar campaigns.

Kathy Roma:

You’re instigating our hopes here, you know. That’s very ambitious goal but we hope to do everything in our power to reach it.

Roy Morejon:

Ours as well. What advice would you give to someone who’s looking to crowdfund potentially another personal safety or security product?

Kathy Roma:

I still think that we’re quite newcomers to give advice and not experts. Probably after the tenth campaign we will be better positioned to give advice. Probably something you should definitely do is to be very open with your partners and with everyone you [inaudible 00:13:16] on the way to it. There’s a lot of help from the platform itself, from Kickstarter, from their integrity team. We met people who already ran successful campaigns. We talked over the phone or just met and talked for hours, discussing every detail. Everything is important. You have to be very active and operational in 3D reality when you have to do a lot of things. Talk to people. Talk to your friends. Talk to someone who’s already done that. See what you can in your situation. Never think that it’s already good enough. Try to make it better every second til the campaign starts. We made thousands of alternations in that way, information materials, press kits, photos, graphic materials, media. Try to make it better and better and better to the last second. Try to be the best version of you and never lose time and everything will be just fine.

Roy Morejon:

I like the advice, Kathy. That gets us into our launch round where I rapid fire questions at you. Are you ready?

Kathy Roma:

I am.

Roy Morejon:

What inspired you to be an entrepreneur?

Kathy Roma:

My story. My personal experience. I never thought I would be an entrepreneur. I worked in corporate sector for years. I have solid professional experience. I considered myself to be consults until the rest of my life. Then I met guys and they inspired me. I recalled my story and decided to take this risk to make something significant to change the world. I know everyone is changing the world nowadays. I’m just another girl to join this movement.

Roy Morejon:

If you could meet with any entrepreneur throughout history, who would you want to meet with

Kathy Roma:

I don’t know. I would definitely have breakfast with Elon Musk, is this doing something really, really terrific. I’m anticipating to see the Hyperloop or something from the future I couldn’t even imagine when I was a kid.

Roy Morejon:

What would be your first question for Elon?

Kathy Roma:

Probably wouldn’t be a question. Just the statement of admiration. I’d probably ask how to fight fears, how to believe in your ideas, how to be confident, how to keep this fire burning.

Roy Morejon:

Indeed. What business book or life book or any book, what’s on your nightstand right now?

Kathy Roma:

It’s actually The Major Film Theories. I’m into movies very much. I like watching, I like writing screens. Back then I participated in a couple of projects as a screenwriter. Yeah, I like film theories. I like telling stories and engage people with ideas. This is the book. It was pretty much untouched for 3 weeks already because it was very problematic to find time for reading.

Roy Morejon:

Yeah. There’s tough to find time when a crowdfunding campaign is imminent while you’re launching.

Kathy Roma:

Exactly. I hope to get back to it when we hit the million.

Roy Morejon:

I might find time to read a book too, then, as well. Where do you see yourself in 5 years, Kathy

Kathy Roma:

Going back to my story, I never see myself so far because I know that every day’s important and every day brings some changes. I would never say that I’ll be here in New York talking to you about my entrepreneurial experience. It seemed impossible to me in my universe half a year ago. I really hope that I’ll be in the place in the world which is more friendly and safer and kinder to any one of us.

Roy Morejon:

I like that. Last question of fire round. What do you think the future of crowdfunding looks like

Kathy Roma:

Bright. Crowdfunding is such a fundamental thing when actually people come to you with their experiences, money, ideas to help you do something, to help you change not only industries and areas but change the way people live their everyday lives. It’s always hard to find resources and financial system is not that perfect. Sometimes the development of new instruments is slower than we want. Turn to people and they will help. Crowdsourcing is in our DNA. I believe in it and I hope to see lots, lots of projects realized and turned into reality through the crowdfunding instruments.

Roy Morejon:

As do I, Kathy. Listen, you’ve been awesome on the show. You’ve been inspirational. Please give our listeners your pitch. Tell us what you’re all about, where people should go, and why they should go buy a Nimb device.

Kathy Roma:

Just go to Kickstarter to the technology section, find our page, and back this project because this is not only something cool but very important for people. We want to make the world a safer place. We hope for your contribution. We will be really grateful if you support us on this mission and promise to deliver, promise to keep everything we say about the technology. Hope to see you there.

Roy Morejon:

Kathy, you’ve been great. Thank you so much. Listeners, thank you again for tuning in. Please remember to visit artkick.wpengine.com for all of the show notes, links to the campaign and everything we’ve talked about, including the project and a full transcript. Kathy, thank you again for joining us.

Kathy Roma:

Thank you. The pleasure was all mine.

Roy Morejon:

Thanks for tuning in to another episode of Art of the Kickstart, the show about building a better business, world, and life with crowdfunding. If you’ve enjoyed today’s episode, be sure to visit artkick.wpengine.com and tell us about it. There you’ll find additional information about past episodes in our Kickstarter Guide to Crushing It. If you’ve loved this episode, leave us a review at artkick.wpengine.com/itunes. It helps more inventors and entrepreneurs find the show and helps us get better guests on here to help build your business. If you need a more hands-on crowdfunding strategy, please feel free to request a quote on commandpartners.com. Thanks again for tuning in. We’ll see you soon.