2013-12-30 18 2013: Year in Review
date: 2013-12-30 18:55:42+00:00
(A reflection by the founder of Kiva Logic. Not too serious.)
It’s hard to believe we’ve already flown through 2013 and are just moments away from the big one-four. 2013 was a great year for Kiva Logic, and before we get started here, we want to give a big shout out to our clients:
THANKS AND WE LOVE YOU!
We really do have the best clients in the world and it’s an absolute pleasure to work with such an amazing group of people that are all helping to change the world, one community at a time, one delivery at a time. It’s an honor to be able to help in this mission, and we’re continually humbled by it. Thanks guys and gals, you are nothing but amazing.
We Grew. A lot.
Here are a couple highlights:
Our client list doubled
Our software is now processing over $100,000 in orders per week.
We launched our new website & blog
Opened and grew our knowledge base and help desk: support.kivalogic.com
Launched a status page (status.kivalogic.com)
We migrated all hosting and infrastructure to VMFarms
Converted all design templates to responsive design
Our software is used from coast to coast !!
Site uptime for Q4 is 99.999%
We maintained a 100% client retention rate
In 2013 the amount of companies that use the Kiva Logic software doubled. We were excited in 2012 when we kept gaining traction and growing, but to continue that in 2013 and exceed our growth percentage in 2012 both in weekly orders processed and companies serviced is fantastic.
We have started branching out to other industries as well that can use our software, not just organic produce delivery companies. Companies in all different arenas have reached out to us, including organic cloth diaper services, medicinal services, gourmet meal services, grocery shopping services, conventional produce delivery services, and more.
Running a software company is usually a high-octane day-to-day sprint that rarely allows for time to sit back and reflect on what went right and what went wrong. We’re always looking towards the future, but it’s important to look back and learn. Running a business isn’t a step 1, 2, 3 job and definitely isn’t a 9-5pm job either. It’s a labor of love and passion, and the motivation to always provide the best possible service to our clients is always enough to keep the RPMs going full bore.
Kiva Logic Top 5 Duds of 2013
Here's what didn't go so well, or went a little differently than planned…
5. Two Factor Authentication.
With more and more companies adopting two-factor authentication to login to accounts with sensitive data, we launched a feature to allow admin users to use two-factor authentication when logging in to their account using services provided by Authy.
The system works great, but it wasn’t until after it was live that we realized- no one asked for this. Not a single client! Adoption rates have been low (next to zero), and this taught us that although we may think a feature is ‘killer’ and ‘really cool’, it doesn’t mean that anyone else will think it.
Time and time again, we’ve discovered that our clients tell us what they need through our many channels of communication, and if we think we have a ‘killer’ new idea, we bounce it around the delivery-sphere first to see what reaction we get. This has saved us tons of time and prevented us from using resources to build features that no one wants or needs.
4. The Driver App (alpha)
A fantastic idea, that just didn’t prove usable in the field. The driver app allows drivers to log in from any smartphone to a special section of the admin side and see the stops on their route, and gives turn by turn directions. It works brilliantly if you have a high speed connection, but in reality, it was a flop.
When you’re actually on the go delivering boxes, weak networks and slow data speeds turned the app into a ball of molasses as it tried to get real-time up to date driving directions, and was just too frustrating to use. We’ve revamped it though, thoroughly field tested, and will be rolling the next version out soon.
3. Why won’t you use the help desk?!
We love our clients, and they have direct access to our personal email addresses and even our cell phone numbers. This is great because it allows for very easy communication for our customers, but it does make our ‘support channel’ more of a ‘support 10 lane highway’.
We re-launched our help desk and adoption rates have slowly increased. One thing that has helped in transitioning support emails away from personal email addresses to a company-wide support email address is simply creating tickets out of emails and replying through the help desk.
It’s a little thing, but it has helped us start to build metrics on email response time and track how many support requests we get per week. This has helped us see where problem areas may lie (do we get lots of the same type of support request?) and is important for planning for the future as we continue to grow and expand.
2. NOT moving to VMFarms sooner.
This one doesn't really belong on the list, but seriously- the moment we finished our migration of our servers and infrastructure to VMFarms we knew it should've been done a long, long time ago. They are truly devops gurus and it has been a pleasure working with them, not to mention they’ve decreased our page load times by 35% on average. We could not be happier with our new infrastructure, thanks VMFarms! Glad we finally found you.
1. This List.
Seriously, this list is making my brain hurt. We really can't complain, 2013 was a fantastic year. Let’s move on!
Hi 2014. Nice to meet you.
We’re excited. Really excited. 2013 has been great to us, and 2014 is going to be an even bigger year for Kiva Logic. We have some exciting features and updates planned, and we have big plans to help our clients grow even more.
This time next year, we’ll be writing to tell you how we have gone international, how we’re amazed that we have double in size again(!), and how we still have the best clients in the universe.
Cheers to 2013 and we hope you have a safe and happy New Year,
**-Wayne Pierson
**Founder, Kiva Logic