Building great products can only be done when you fully immerse yourself in the challenges your customers and market face. The route to big success is as plain as it is hard; understand your customers.

So, before writing a single line of code, first, invest heavily in market research and take the time to know your customers by starting conversations about their needs and challenges.

We started this journey with Obeyo at the beginning of the year and talked to more than 100 potential customers. Today, we’re co-creating the Obeyo software with an exclusive group of launching customers and plan to ship a beta version to our launching customer base by the end of this year.

To deliver on Obeyo’s mission, we’ve expanded the development team to five (welcome Ruslan, Mina and Jonas!) and continued our hiring spree to complete the team. Next to product development, we also focused on marketing as we’re planning on expanding the launching customer program soon and recorded our first podcast series.

It’s really amazing to see the team and product taking shape and things getting clearer every day. Earlier this week, we added a brand new features page to the Obeyo website, and we made our small but mighty product roadmap public.

Join us for our next founding moment

We're ready to do it all over again! We are organising one final Ideator event this year! To our friends in PropTech and real estate, we're looking for founders and market experts who want to be part of our next validation cycle. Block your calendar on Wednesday 24th of November and register via builders.studio/ideator to claim your seat (only a few spots left!).

News from our universe 🪐

• The team keeps on growing! Please meet Pim Baljon and Ninke Hensbergen, joining our core studio growth team.

• We got spooky and scary at our Halloween-themed Friday drinks last week.

• Our director of product, Robbert van Geldrop facilitated a course on Business Modelling, teaching a group of 70+ students from all around the globe about the importance of a viable business model when exploring new ideas.⁠

• Michael Steinmann shared some of his core insights at the Dutch Startup Conference 2021 on building a software product during the pandemic and pivoting into niches to find product-market fit.

• The Obeyo team is starting something new. Let us introduce you to RoofTalks; a newsletter and podcast at the intersection of shared living, community, and technology.

• Did you miss us at Startupnight Berlin? The recording of our talk about the ongoing rise of startup studios and their potential as a promising investment opportunity is now available on YouTube!

• Want to stay in the loop of the latest trends and insights about influencer marketing? Subscribe to the new Influentials newsletter!

What we’re following 👀

• Fascinated by product-led growth, here are five misconceptions and tactics on community-led growth.

• Our very own Sharon Klaver shares how learning by doing shaped her career in tech.

• The future of rented housing feels good, according to M&G Investments, and we couldn't agree more!

• Michael Steinmann pins down how to create the perfect (shared) living experience in this first of two-part series.

Come build with us 🧑‍💻

• Customer Success Specialist at Obeyo

• Business Developer at Obeyo

• React Native Developer at Obeyo

• ReactJS Developer at Obeyo

• Senior Full Stack Developer at Obeyo

• Growth Marketing trainee at Builders

• Venture Analyst intern at Builders

• Sales Development Representative at Influentials

• React Developer at Influentials

As a final reminder for our friends in real estate, if you're planning on joining our Ideator unconference later this month, please claim your seat sooner than later as we only have a few spots left.

Hope to see you there!

Michael van Lier

Managing Director at Builders