The Emerging Tech Startups We’re Having Our Gen Z Teams Stalk: Part 10

Quick Recap

Despite a dip last year in enterprise software spending, cloud-based enterprise app revenue will grow 6.8% this year, 15K+ startups rely on it as a core part of their business model, and almost 2K of those are unicorn-bound given their pre-seed and seed rounds (Thanks, Gartner).

There are a lot of words for these industry techs, all falling into or around “enterprise software” or, our favorite, “knowledge management.” What the increase in remote teams will result in is this: greater competition for individual experts and greater potential facing hiring managers. With geographical boundaries low (offsetting starkly with those physical boundaries in 2020), remote hires can come from anywhere. Hires no longer have to be the best for the job in the city or state, they have to be the best in the country or the world.

And while this is nothing new for overseas dev teams, out-of-timezone virtual assistants, young contractors and the like, it is new for the teams that have NEVER been 100% remote. Young people are used to this (think tail-end millennials, Zillennials, and Gen Z), but their managers, collaborators, and companies are not.

So Listen…

Listen, I’m not going to sit here in front of you as a writer at a brand naming agency and say, “There’s nothing more important than operational efficiency in your business or startup.” That’s predictable, tacky, and just plain untrue. Real importance lies in productization, product naming, and other category marketing and branding strategies. Not in the management software you have behind the scenes.

That said, we all know at one level or another the importance behind team happiness, productivity, communication, and how that can be made easier through enterprise software. And, not exaggerating this time, in light of challenges facing startups and enterprises alike, there’s never been a more crucial time to make sure your operations run smoothly, securely, and remotely when necessary (and remotely when preferred, turns out).

The Differentiator’s Plan in Startup Land

So in startup land, this leaves one category to especially stand out in: ease of adoption (how quickly and easily can your software help get them up, running, and increasing productivity?).

This week, between the growing enterprise software startup industry and the yet-to-end increase in remote operations and roles, ClickUp caught our attention. We found it an In-Between startup whose differentiator lies in that exact knowledge management we want, with (so far) the exact ease of adoption and breadth of usability we need. I’ve tried GDrive, Slack, Discord, Teams, Basecamp, and more, and I haven’t stuck with any of them, with any team. Suffice it to say I’m down to try something new like ClickUp. That should tell you something about current industry leaders.

We think these are one of the folks that’ll end up on top. Then, if they can stay in line with what the buying power wants in terms of CSR, workers’ freedom, and more, they’ll stay there. From there, their continued success may rely on what we said in the beginning (of this blog and of Rock Candy Media), the real importance lies in productization, product naming, and the business naming/ branding strategies they’ll employ. 

This is Part 10 of our Series “The Emerging Tech Startups Our Gen Z Teams Are Stalking.” We predict what will go right, what will go wrong, and what to do to make things happen across industries, using brand strategy tactics from a team that’s been helping establish, grow, and sell startups for more than a decade. Pick apart the other parts here. Pick our brains here.