Intuit Circle Program for startups
We are back again with another piece of interview. Previously, we have interviewed the founders of successful companies — Altizon and DeepTek. Through these interviews, the community is able to get a first-hand view of the GTM strategy of successful companies and learn from the experiences of their founders.
GTMDialogues would like to go beyond that. We would like to offer the right resources and networks so that you discover and engage with the right partners for your next phase of growth. To deliver on this promise, we have started to interview various corporates and channel partners. These corporates and channel partners, through their products and services, have built a long-standing relationship with a large set of businesses. They could be a gateway for B2b startups to acquire the volume of customers if they strike right engagement with such channel partners.
Intuit, a global financial platform company with products designed to empower consumers, self-employed, and small businesses to improve their financial lives, has graciously agreed to be part of the interview. Thanks to Archana Thangarajan and Ritwik Pandia championing this at Intuit and partnering with us on this initiative.
With 50 million customers across the world and a revenue of 6B+ USD, Intuit’s mission is to Power Prosperity Around the World. In the interview below, you will get to learn more about Intuit, their Intuit Circles Program specifically meant for startups, and how one can partner and engage with them — the whole package!
Enjoy reading!
1. To set up the context for our readers tell us a little bit about Intuit as an organization, its products, services, and scale of global operations?
Intuit is a company headquartered in Mountain View, California, USA. Our mission is to Power Prosperity Around the World. Our global products and platforms include TurboTax, QuickBooks, Mint and Turbo. These products are designed to empower consumers, self-employed, and small businesses to improve their financial lives — finding them more money with the least amount of work while giving them complete confidence in their actions and decisions. Our ecosystem of financial management solutions serves approximately 50 million customers worldwide.
2.Since when you are operational in India, how big is India operations and activities that you are involved in India?
Intuit India is a subsidiary of Intuit Inc. The India office is a Centre of Excellence for product development, technology & engineering innovation across Intuit products and services to help improve the financial lives of over 50 million global customers. We have been in India with our development centre for more than 15 years now and have been recognized as #1 in India’s Best Companies to Work For in 2020 by the Great Place to Work Institute.
3. We are very impressed with your Intuit Circles Program which is specifically meant for startups. Please tell our audience more about that?
Intuit Circles is Intuit’s first strategic startup ecosystem program, incepted at Intuit India in 2018. Our goal is to improve the survival rate and growth for small businesses by leveraging Intuit’s smart-tech and expertise of 35+ years serving small businesses globally. We do this by bringing together the combined power of our people, technology and the startup community.
We today have 2500 startups in the program. They are part of our global community of startups. We have recently launched a virtual community www.intuitcircles.com which can bring together the startups, ecosystem influencers and Intuit. In the past year, we have worked with 8 startups helping them integrate with QuickBooks Online, from the 350+ applications we received. 200+ entrepreneurs have been trained in design thinking through workshops and participation in all the leading startup events in the country
4. Under the Intuit Circle Program, what kind of startups you work with — stage, sector, geography, etc.?
Our community is open to all startups. For startups looking to collaborate with us, we are looking for solutions that can serve SMB pain points in areas adjacent to QuickBooks Online E.g: Lending, payroll, POS, etc. We are stage, sector, and geo agnostic.
5. What are the products that perform exceptionally well on your platform? Any specific product that Intuit is looking to partner and integrate with in the future?
Startups who have understood the customer pain point well-identified & validated that it is a big need for SMBs, and offer differentiated benefits and value have performed exceptionally well on our App Store. We are looking for innovative startups, with a proven track record of customer satisfaction. We are also keen on opening up new markets for startups, outside of India, via our App Store.
6. What value can a startup expect from Intuit Circle once it engages with you? What is the engagement model with startups like?
Intuit Circles provides the following to startups,
Enabling growth at scale: Help startups gain access to over 4.6 M QuickBooks Online customers around the world and grow at scale globally through API integrations.
Sharing our expertise: By connecting startups to Intuit experts who share knowledge on innovation principles and design thinking — CDI/D4D, and financial management, which serve in infusing confidence in our startup members to make smart decisions.
Creating a growth community: By bringing together startups and ecosystem influencers into the Intuit Circles community where they can network, engage, and grow with each other.
Startups interested to be a part of the community can do so for free, by joining here. Those who want to integrate with our platform for GTM opportunities can apply with more details under the collaborate section of the community. A team will evaluate the application and reach out to the startup for the next steps on integration.
7. How many startups do you have engaged with so far through the platform? Is the list of startups that are supported Public. If so, can you share the names?
We are a community of 2500+ startups. These startups can be found and connected with, via our community platform here. Eight startups have integrated with QuickBooks the past year from 350+ applications we received, and the list of these startups can be found here and founders like yourself can connect with them.
8. Can you pick one of the startups that you have supported and walk through the engagement with them and how much they have evolved since they engaged with you?
HR and payroll software startup Kredily is one of the startups who integrated with the QuickBooks platform and have seen success. We introduced their integration to QuickBooks Online users, which led to an uptick in Kredily’s connection with potential customers. As an initial gain, the HR and payroll software onboarded 70+ customers through Quickbooks in the first 4 weeks of launch.
Founder and CEO Devendra shares, “With Kredily in its early stages of figuring out the product-market fit, being part of the Intuit Circles community helps in getting thought leadership, networking and benefitting from fellow founders’ experiences.”
Here’s an account of how this winning partnership between Intuit Circles and Kredily unfolded.
The customer problem Kredily is going after
During his stint with a VC firm, Devendra witnessed how companies struggled with HR and payroll issues like collecting attendance data or updating leave info. Ironically, despite India having 140 million salaried employees, only 5 million of them are using some HR & Payroll software because each software came with a price tag.
“Most of the time, it was being done by the founder himself / herself instead of focusing on the business or on targets.” That’s where Kredily saw its opportunity to make a difference by launching a robust HR & Payroll Software suite that’s world class and affordable.
Partnership with Intuit Circles
Kredily’s clients were facing another problem — downloading data from Payroll Systems and manually inserting it to their Accounting Software were causing accuracy issues. To address this, the payroll software company joined hands with Intuit Circles by integrating with QuickBooks.
Today, says Devendra, “Our clients (can) effortlessly and accurately sync their payroll data with their financial books. With a single click, a company can post their Payroll Information from their Kredily Account to their QuickBooks account. A large number of our clients have received this integration with enthusiasm.”
9. What kind of commercials are involved between Intuit and startup for GTM support? If it’s okay to share.
There are no commercials involved for GTM support and being a part of the community.
10. How can one apply to be part of the platform? Is there a set of criteria or processes that the startups must follow? Please also share contact details of people our audience can possibly email or contact.
Startups can apply by logging in to our community here. Those who want to integrate with our platform for GTM opportunities can apply with more details under the collaborate section of the community. They can write to us at IntuitCirclesIN@intuit.com