I love watching people succeed, especially if I can learn something I can apply in my own life and share with you. That\u2019s why I\u2019m excited about what I learned from watching Slack\u2019s success this year.<\/p>\n\n
Slack<\/a> is a communications tool that enables natural and effective team collaboration. The company, started by Stewart Butterfield, the cofounder of Flickr, has been making news since going public earlier this year and is already worth more than a billion<\/em> dollars.<\/p>\n I first heard about Slack through my friend Pat Flynn<\/a>. We started using it here in June and it revolutionized our team communication and collaboration in less than a week.<\/p>\n It cut my incoming email by more than 80 percent<\/a> right off the bat. We now have sixteen team members working in four states and two countries on Slack, and I can\u2019t imagine how we functioned well without it.<\/p>\n Every product we develop, every launch we coordinate, every initiative we undertake now occurs in Slack. It\u2019s our virtual office space. We use it so much, it\u2019s also become a verb on our team\u2014as in, \u201cI\u2019ll Slack so-and-so about that such-and-such.\u201d<\/p>\n We are far from alone: The numbers I\u2019ve seen say a quarter of a million people use Slack\u2019s Web interface and desktop and mobile apps to send 200 million messages every month.<\/p>\n So what does it take to create a billion dollar idea?<\/p>\n From my personal experience with Slack, along with what I\u2019ve followed in the business press, I think there are three main success factors that can apply to any product or service.<\/p>\n Before Slack, our team communication was a hodgepodge of email, instant messaging, and texts. We could store our key files in Dropbox, but that meant yet another system everyone had to interact with. Slack takes all of that (and a lot more) and consolidates it into one simple app.<\/p>\n Butterfield identifies this as a key component of their success. \u201cWhen starting a new company, no one has thought that they need a system for internal communications,\u201d he said in an interview with Fortune<\/a>. Like us, they just string together a handful of systems and try to make it work.<\/p>\n But when a product comes along that (1) exposes the need and (2) answers it so perfectly you can\u2019t imagine making do without it, then you have the seed of a billion dollar idea.<\/p>\n For about a year we used BaseCamp, which was effective but cumbersome by comparison with Slack. As a result we had team members who were resistant to using it and other inefficiencies that were a hassle to work around.<\/p>\n Slack is a different animal. Across all of its interfaces, the Slack experience is so well designed and the functionality so intuitive, you hardly realize you\u2019re using a piece of software. The technology becomes nearly transparent.<\/p>\n It\u2019s more like you\u2019re in a big room with your teammates. You can have a main conversation about one thing, a side conversation about another, and share a hilarious video somewhere in-between. As long as you like who you\u2019re working with\u2014and we do\u2014it\u2019s a blast.<\/p>\nWhat Slack Did for My Team<\/h3>\n
A Billion Dollar Idea<\/h3>\n
1. It Answers a Real Need<\/h3>\n
2. It\u2019s Elegant, Intuitive, and Fun<\/h3>\n