Minimum Inc.

Could you share any statistics or metrics from this engagement?

We now have a great product, which launched in 2012. We have had two pivots and now have a successful company with a good product-market fit.

We launched just.me at a DEMO Mobile conference. In and of itself, this was an achievement, as that is an extremely difficult event at which to launch a product. The media audience saw it as an outstanding step forward, from a design point of view. Apple used our app in their roadshows, teaching other developers how they should design for iOS. It became a standard of the time in terms of very good design. This spilled over into acceptance so, within 3 months, we had reached half a million downloads across 220 countries. We became the social networking leader in many of those countries.

While this may sound successful, we're based in Silicon Valley, so the bar for success on a social media app is in the range of around 10 million downloads. Just.me did well, but it fell short of what I'd have wanted it to do in order to become sustainable, so we pivoted to a new app, Chance. This app is still available in the app stores, and it receives many downloads every day. It revolves around anonymous chats with strangers. The next pivot is our current app, chat.center, which allows businesses to chat immediately and directly with their customers.

How did Minimum perform from a project management standpoint?

It was a very good process with Alex as our anchor and manager.

What distinguishes Minimum from other providers?

Their UI/UX and design skills are outstanding. Futhermore, there is a huge difference between a person who can make a design and one who can understand product goals. When working with an external team, the individuals are the most important factor. I've worked with two members of Minimum, which have been world class. For example, one of their members was part of the team used by Steve Jobs to launch the first iPad.

I truly worked together with Minimum, iterating and learning from them. They aren't simply designers, but are capable of participating in long-term product strategy. 

In hindsight, are there areas in which they could improve or things you might do differently?

There could be some improvement in the technical architecture prior to back-end coding.

How happy are you with the results of their work so far?

Oh, I’m quite happy with the results so far.

Is there anything that you would consider special or unique about Komarov Mobile when compared to other providers you’ve worked with?

Their work is very thorough and detailed oriented. There are certain projects that are more conducive to their capabilities. When clients can take their time and desire maximum detail, that’s when they ought to enlist the Komarov team. They work independently very well and require very little micromanagement. They’re so professionally unique. They put such great focus into understanding the user.

Do you think there are areas that Komarov Mobile could improve upon?

Perhaps there is one thing: they should cultivate more empathy for the developers and not only the end users. For example, creating instructions that are easier for developers to follow, which isn’t necessarily a series of beautiful pictures, but having the requirement in every detail. That’s something I asked them to do because not only do we need to create beautiful designs, we also have to make them executable.

That’s where we have a lot of expertise, and we are more aware of which items should be included or not. They might provide a quote for something, and we’re expecting that would cover the entire UI and UX. However, we later found out, "Oh, we [Komarov] weren’t considering the application icons." That would normally be included in the designer’s work. It would have helped if they were more explicit with their work deliverables, but that’s all.