Quarantine is not for business! Ukrainian startup on how to stay in service during a pandemic

19.06.2020

The founder of a young but interesting and promising Ukrainian startup ApiX-Drive, Igor Shamin, shared his experience of overcoming difficulties and developing a business during the coronavirus pandemic.

Tell about your startup for those of our readers who are not familiar with it yet.

ApiX-Drive – is an online application connector. We in the team like to give a comparison with the designer, in which various systems act as cubes. The user takes them and builds exactly the structure that he needs. Want to quickly establish a connection between your CRM system, instant messenger, online chat and Google Sheets? This can be done in 15 minutes, without resorting to the services of developers and without delving into technical difficulties. At the same time, the number of connected systems can be changed arbitrarily at any time, adapting to a variety of requirements.

For example, you are the owner of an online store where you sell products for children. You have a site built using one of the popular CMS, you place products on several marketplaces, and keep order records in spreadsheets. You also decided to use IP-telephony, and also send letters and SMS to clients. Customers receive goods through the postal service. That is, you use a large set of different tools, each of which is important. The only problem is that they are all fragmented, you can’t do without automation.

And so you decided to use a CRM system. The choice is large, there are also for goods, and just accounting, blue, red, functional and not very. You got acquainted with the question and opted for one of the popular systems. But the problem is that you need a solution that can skillfully interact with all the tools listed above. And here problems arise – it’s hard to find a system that can interact with exactly what you need. Let’s say you hire a developer who will set up all the required connections for you. But it’s expensive. In addition, it is also possible that in a year you will want for some reason to change the previously selected CRM or some other of the tools. Again the same difficulties with integrations.

Using our service, you get everything together and at once. The principle is that in the ApiX-Drive service integrations are prepared in advance and they are already available for you to configure. The user only needs to select from the list the system from where he wants to receive data, indicate which system and what data needs to be transferred. Then enable auto-update and just get all the necessary information in automatic mode.

The coronavirus pandemic and the quarantine caused by it were a shock to many companies. And how was it in your case?

Well, a shock is probably too strong a word, but the situation was completely incomprehensible. Only on March 5 we celebrated the birthday of our system, which turned one year old, and we’re extremely optimistic. And then quarantine and the difficulties caused by it followed. I think, like many companies, not only in our country, but throughout the world, we have gone through a difficult period of uncertainty. For several difficult weeks, our main task was to survive and not lose the already existing team. But as time has shown, ApiX-Drive proved to be resistant to such tests.

Did quarantine have a big impact on your business?

Honestly, we expected much worse. Yes, we had to close the office and switch to the remote mode, we had to completely revise our plans and goals. But the work did not stop even for a day. We continued to add new integrations, expand existing capabilities. As a result, in April and May we connected more than 30 new systems and continue to work actively in this direction.

And big plans for the remaining half of the year?

Very big. Recently, we conducted a survey, the results of which showed that our users are most interested in integrations with chatbots, CRM systems confidently took the second place. It is in these areas that we plan to continue our activities. To date, the service has already implemented more than 150 integrations and they all work together.

Even before the pandemic, we presented a new direction – importing expenses from various advertising sources into Google Analytics. Due to the difficulties encountered, we have not yet launched it. But we plan to do this in the very near future, in June. As soon as everything is ready, we will tell you more about it.

We are currently working on a number of new features that will be of interest to various categories of users and which we will talk about a little later, after launch. In fact, there are really a lot of plans!

What do you think is the main secret of ApiX-Drive stability?

Pandemics and economic crises come and go, and business is always looking for ways to grow. And, regardless of the size of the company and the scope of activity, it will need a simple and convenient tool that allows you to quickly build the necessary ecosystem, which can then be easily controlled. – This is another approach to the automation of business processes that is in high demand in the market.

What do you see as the main advantage of ApiX-Drive?

We have always believed and continue to believe that the main advantage of our system is its ease of use. It was on the convenience for the average user that we made the main emphasis from the very first days of the ApiX-Drive. The goal was to create a product that can be used by a person who is far from the world of IT-technologies. It all comes down to literally a few clicks of the mouse.

At the same time, we strive to constantly develop the activities of the support service and help system. We announce a new integration not when the work of the programmers is completed, but when the help on it is also ready. By the way, in the future we plan to experiment with a variety of help formats, including creating educational videos, interactive materials, etc.

Our goal is to make integrations as simple as possible. For the user, this should not be more difficult than turning on the TV using the remote control.

What would you recommend to other owners of new startups?

The main thing that I would advise to give priority attention to is the team. You can have a great idea and a great project. But if there are no people who are interested, then there will be no success. I understand that the words about a “friendly team” already cause a smile, because all companies write about themselves in such advertisements for employment. But in fact, it is very important when people are interested in working together, it is interesting to reach ever new heights. The team should be united, the people entering it should not just go to work, but love what they do. It is not easy to pick up such a team. But if you can do this, then you are not afraid of any difficulties.

And as our experience of recent months has shown, a friendly and well-knowing team is always an opportunity to quickly rebuild, take on new tracks and get out of a crisis with minimal losses, or even without them.