Ask HN: Review my startup: Bill On Site
http://www.billonsite.com/
Bill On Site is a web-based invoicing system, with a unique twist: you can use Bill On Site on your mobile phone, enabling small business owners to send invoices to their customers while still on their client's site. All you need is a semi-recent phone – one with a web browser on it – and internet access on your phone.
This used to be my part-time gig, but then I was laid off and have used much of my time and severance since getting it to "release-ready" status. I just released it the first of this month, and I'd really appreciate any feedback.
21 comments
[ 2.8 ms ] story [ 58.2 ms ] threadI also did some market testing last December where I threw up a simple test page under what I was going to call the product: "Mobilliti". I ditched the name (seriously, look at all the i's and l's, it's completely unreadable), but kept the feedback. I spent $50 on Google Adwords, and got a several people who were interested enough to click through all the way to the "Sign up" button, and then fill in contact information about when the product would be available.
The idea started simple and has stayed simple - i.e. it hasn't changed much. "Web-based invoicing that you can use from your mobile phone."
I anticipate changes in the future, though, as people actually get a good look at the idea and how it turned out. I'm thankful that I have a fairly flexible framework (Kohana PHP) and design philosophy for what that happens.
i've also been told by my customers that a mobile interface would be great and generating invoices at a client's location would be useful, but i think the important thing is that it's just a feature of a bigger billing system. when they get back to their office, the normal web interface to the system still has all of the tools they need to work quickly.
do you see your product as being a company's only billing system where they do everything through a mobile interface or is it intended to be a small invoicing system that works in tandem with their existing billing system like quickbooks? i ask because your site is heavily pushing the mobile part without really detailing the rest of the system.
And no worries on being a competitor - there's tons of guys like us! FreshBooks, CurdBee, Ballpark, Ronin, The Invoice Machine, Cannybill - the list goes on. And Freshbooks has an iPhone interface, even.
This is - I'm told - good news. A large market with a fractured user base is a good place to enter, provided you can target a niche that nobody else has made their own... which is what I'm trying to do.
- The numbers for the basic and premium plans seem to fade into the background and are hard to read.
- The "Serious" name for the plan was a little off-putting for me. To me it implied that the other plans were for amateurs, which was even a bit more confusing since it is the middle plan. (I'm not really your target audience so take this advice with a grain of salt.)
And I have worked quite some time at coming up with names for the plans - it's hard! I have competitors with plans names like "Time Machine, Limousine, etc." and I wanted something a little more professional than that. But on the flip side, I wanted something better than the traditional "Bronze, Silver, Gold".
Also, there's the pricing advice that I keep hearing, that you have a premium option so that people buying your middle option feel good that they saved money, and you have a cheap option so that people buying your middle option feel good that they're not cheap.
I think the first and last tiers I have are good, but yeah, the middle one needs work.
home office
on the go
I'd love to fix it, but I can't see it in any of my configurations (Linux/Windows, Opera/Firefox/Chrome/IE.)
Using Safari 4.0.3 on Snow Leopard.
Paying invoices works largely like Etsy's integration with PayPal, too.