Yigit Erol’s Fidsy is a simple data intelligence platform for businesses. You ask questions, and its smart assistant responds. With the resulting info, businesses can clearly understand the highs and lows of their customer journey – and attract and retain business.
Today, Erol tells Maddyness about coming from a family of mathematicians, the impact of receiving £10,000 of infrastructure credits from OVHcloud, and how to manage that all-important cofounder relationship.
Give us your elevator pitch (in 280 characters or less)
We believe that business intelligence should be fast, simple, and conversational. That’s why we developed Fidsy, a conversational smart assistant that empowers teams and leaders with instant access to insightful, actionable data. Data should speak your language, not the other way around.
What is your favourite thing about being a founder?
First and foremost, I see my founder role as that of a problem solver. All my family are mathematicians, so I grew up solving both simple and complex problems. To tell you the truth, it sort of became a habit. When I encountered problems in everyday life, I was compelled to fix them. So, to me, if the problem is challenging and important, it can easily turn into an idea for a startup.
Starting a new project from scratch is always exciting. I think that it’s similar to painting. You start with a blank canvas and you try to create something unique. However, there is one big difference; the starting point for a new project is usually an existing problem, and the drive is to create a solution for it. I think that’s the part that excites me most, solving a major problem and making something easier for other people.
You are currently on the OVHcloud Startup Program, can you tell us about your experience and the support you have received?
We were connected to the OVHcloud Startup Program through Empact Ventures. It was around the time when we were developing the MVP and trying to identify the right technology for the problem.
To our surprise, just two short days after we applied to join the program, we were accepted by OVHcloud and we immediately received £10,000 infrastructure credits. For startups, especially pre-seed startups, every single penny counts. This support felt like a traditional cash investment to us. It was a huge boost.
We managed to move our servers to OVHcloud’s infrastructure with ease. We immediately started to explore its offerings to find the right technology for the problem. As a data startup, we can be quite network-heavy compared to other solutions. One of the biggest benefits of OVHcloud, compared to other cloud infrastructure providers, is that they don’t charge for network usage. This meant that our bills would be predictable and no end-of-month surprises.
Aside from all the infrastructure perks, OVHcloud were very, very helpful. The one-to-one support and guidance made us feel like we were joining a family.
How fast and effective is Fidsy in comparison with an analyst/team of analysts?
Whether you’re a corporation or SME, to make the right strategic decisions and run your business successfully you will be asking a lot of questions. You need answers and you need reliable insights, and you need them fast. With so many different data streams these days, having all of them in front of you can be more confusing than illuminating. You still rely on other people to process the data and interpret it, too. This could be your IT department, your analysts, the marketing team, or even your accountant. For every additional person in the chain, the process begins to slow down. Before long it comes to a grinding halt, and it’s days before you get the answers you desperately need. Then you start the process all over again.
Fidsy eliminates all these problems. Simply put, Fidsy understands you. You ask your data questions in simple language then Fidsy fetches the right data, analyses it, and answers you. This can be done through typing or speech, using smart devices like Google Assistant or Alexa. Going straight to the source like this eliminates the need for human interaction and repetition, saving you significant time.
When I say Fidsy understands you, I quite literally mean it. Because we’ve built it with AI and NLP, Fidsy gets your needs, both on a personal and departmental level, adapting and improving over time to deliver insights tailored just for you.
Why is it important for startups to take analytics seriously?
As a startup, you have limited resources. You’d be lucky to have a decent customer base and you simply cannot afford to lose any of them. So, understanding your customers is vital. Customer experience happens in real-time, so you need to know how they’re interacting with your business. Are they having a good experience? If not, you need to act quickly to support them and turn things around.
Analytics is important because it enables you to connect the dots on a customer’s journey and identify customer signals. It also helps you understand each touchpoint along the way. Analytics is a solid starting point for customer success, and it’s one of the most powerful tools businesses have to turn those signals into insights, and then action.