On stage at SXSW 2018

And what we should have told

On Dec 17th we received a mail that we were selected as SXSW Finalist of The Sport and Performance Data Category. SXSW! That’s short for South by South West, one of the largest music and tech festivals in the world, hosted by the city of Austin, Texas. A lot of celebs be are coming to the event, like Elon Musk showed up, with Ashton Kutcher and Gary Vaynerchuk. Just great news to receive just before the holidays.

Amongst four other companies, DashTag was selected for the alternate vision to approach team sports, and soccer in general. The way we present data to amateur soccer players was crucial in the decision to select us for the 2 minutes Accelerator Pitch at the beginning of March 2018.

Knowing we were selected — we had to keep the news under the radar until mid-February — felt great. Especially as we chose the US as our primary market, we couldn’t wish for a bigger stage than this. So man, you could imagine we were stoked. We felt confident that we could win the contest, googled our competitors, did our homework. You could say we already wrote our thank you speech.

But — spoiler alert — we didn’t win. As I wrote on our social channels: “As a sports company we hate to lose, but it happened. We didn’t win the SXSW Pitch contest. And it feels exactly how it feels like to lose”. But after the deception had sunk in a little, we realized it wás awesome to be on stage at SXSW, it wás great to take part in one of the biggest festivals in the US and yes, it wás a great learning for team DashTag. And that’s where this blog is about: the story we should have told on the SXSW stage.

Get the pitch right

The preparation for the SXSW pitch is an ongoing process that lasts until the very last minute: the story line, the deck, the words, the 2-minute timing, the Q&A. It’s a time-consuming team effort, at least for us.

Scripting, editing and pitching, again and again, until the pitch has the right information, tone of voice and energy in combination with the slides that enforces the story. We had the timer running in the AirBnB’s kitchen where we stayed in Austin, we tested words like longevity, GenZ and ego-stroke, hey, we even rehearsed the flipping of the slides.

Our SXSW pitch was tailored to the audience and the judges, with a before and after situation: Why only professional players have the cool stats, the podium to shine? Why not the average 17-year-old soccer player that also wants to be in the spotlight, and have his or her own stats? We told that our solution, the Dash to generate the stats is catered for GenZ. With a huge market and a great team!

Epco’s pitch was great, perfect within the 2 minutes, with a very smooth Q&A session with direct and short answers only Epco can give. We had a live stream of the pitch and the jury just loved our proposition.

But we didn’t win.

We couldn’t hold the cup at the end of the tournament. At the announcement ceremony, a huge audience was present, with amongst them Prince Constantijn van Oranje. But DashTag was not the company that was called on stage to receive the check and had the moment of fame.

The why

So what happened? Did the winner had a better product? Did they use better words, catchier phrases, or did they do it ‘the American’ style? Maybe, but it doesn’t really matter. We had to do better, smarter, and: be more honest. We didn’t convince our audience our why enough (yep, that’s Simon Sinek’s why).

Our audience and the judges wanted to know the real DashTag. Who is DashTag and what is it we stand for? Where do we fit in this sport and technology world?

DashTag is more than just the next startup with a new cool wearable for soccer. We do more. Way more. DashTag at the core is that we believe athletes in today’s world are in control of their own path in their sport. To have immediate access to their personal information and stats, to decide who can see it, and who doesn’t. To experience their full potential they feel and might know, but can’t reveal to the world.

In 2015, we made the decision to give up all our steady jobs and income to work on this, day in and out. Together with great people who also believe this can happen: inspiring people who work at, with or for DashTag.

What we should have told

So, what we actually should have told in our pitch in the Austin Hilton Conference room, is that core value. Yes, things change, sports have changed, soccer is changing. Our audience, the market is a totally different one than it was five years ago. We know that a 17-year-old player reacts totally different than a 25-year-old, let alone a 41-year-old. We know and we’ll always react on that, and make the necessary changes to reach our users even better. But our core value didn’t change from our first idea since we started.

Our pitch should not only be about our perfectly designed Dash, how smooth it syncs with your smartphone, the cool FIFA-like stats you have for the first time in history, or how big the addressable market is. DashTag is not the next wearable company, that’s trying to make a cheaper, faster or better-colored gadget for team sports. Nope.

Our pitch, our story, the DashTag story is about young players dreams and ambition. What we have is a new way to experience sport, a movement for athletes to shine, to be seen, no matter what level, age or skillset. It honors the dedicated young athlete with his or her golden dreams, without limits, without someone else says what to do or how to do.

I don’t know why we didn’t say it on stage. Maybe we were all so caught up in the moment, zooming in on so many details, that we lost our overview, I don’t know. But it happened, and we learned. Now I know that we should have told our why. And we just might have won.