“Our first challenge was to come up with a product that will be frictionless for both the consumers and retailers.”

Tangiblee reinvents the online shopping experience with a visual and tactile experience, which increases conversions and reduces returns.

BusinessInterviews.com: How did you come with the concept behind Tangiblee?

Eliad: I was looking to buy my wife earrings for her birthday, and did it online. I found the experience overall was very disappointing and ended up getting something very different from what I expected. I wanted a small and delicate earring, but got a gigantic set of earrings one that happened to arrive just one day before her birthday. I had to leave work in the middle of the day, drive to the mall and buy new earrings that I could see and feel in reality. It was a frustrating experience but that very day, I felt firsthand a pain point that I knew could be solved with the right technology. We developed Tangiblee, a robust product imaging solution that reveals sizing with context and scale. It makes shopping a more immersive, tactile and successful.

BusinessInterviews.com: Can you talk about the process from first having the idea to actually getting it to market? What were some of the challenges that you faced and how did you overcome them?

Eliad: Our first challenge was to come up with a product that will be frictionless for both the consumers and retailers. We wanted our customers to have a simple user experience that will not require them to “work” hard in order to get value from product. As for the retailers, we strove to create a product that will be easy to implement.

We managed to design our product so it uses retailer’s existing data and doesn’t require an API for integration. Tangiblee handles all the backend processing and it’s as simple as adding in one line of code.

We managed to develop a unique man-machine solution, which enables us to process more than 10,000 new items a day. The product is simple and user friendly, which enables any customer to use it.

BusinessInterviews.com: How have you managed to gain an impressive amount of traction in a short period of time?

Eliad: Our sales strategy is comprised of three pillars:

1. We designed Tangiblee to sell itself, thanks to the “Powered by Tangiblee” label that appears at the bottom of the tool. It is part of every deployment we do. That’s exactly how One King’s Lane found us. Their strategy team was doing competitive research, saw our logo and signed up for a pilot.
2. Just as our entire approach is about putting retailers’ products in context, our sales process does the same for our product: for our initial call with every prospect, we prepare a live demo in less than 10 minutes, showing them Tangiblee’s potential in the context of their own website, with their own products.
3. We’ve also partnered with Signal.co to distribute Tangiblee and with just one click, any of Signal’s 50,000 e-commerce sites can install Tangiblee.

Also, as part of our sales process, we A/B test every implementation with new retailer. This way we clearly prove the value of our product and can iterate the product throughout the pilot.

BusinessInterviews.com: Can you share some of the advantages you’ve experienced from being part of the Techstars Chicago startup accelerator program?

Eliad: Techstars Chicago provided the best mentoring we could possibly ask for – especially Amanda Lannert who brought in her team to help us build our sales strategy. We were also coached by Suzan Silver and Suzanne Muchin who helped us in the process of re-branding.

And of course the endless support Techstars Chicago MDs Troy Henikoff and Steve Farsht who put in so many hours helping us accelerate our business and getting ready for Demo Day at the end of the program. Pitching to 500 potential investors is an opportunity that we wouldn’t have had without Techstars Chicago.

BusinessInterviews.com: What’s been the best business related advice that you’ve been given?

Eliad: We got so many pieces of good advice, it’s hard to pick! I think there is a saying that accumulates all the tips we learned through the summer: “There isn’t a problem in the business, that can’t be solved with more sales.”

BusinessInterviews.com: If I could grant you one business related wish right now, what would you ask for?

Eliad: I would like to have the top sales people to join our growing sales team. And yes we’re hiring :)