Personalized service: Meet YesBoss, your personal virtual assistant that will respond to all of your texted requests, whenever and wherever." border="0" height="341" width="511">Personalized service: Meet YesBoss, your personal virtual assistant that will respond to all of your texted requests, whenever and wherever.Time management is no walk in the park. Time often seems to exhaust itself before we do the same. So, do we need more time? Some might nod, but others might look in another direction and find a solution.
These others happen to be four millennials who found a way to help us walk in the park with time, because for them, âyour time matters.â
Since creating time is an impossible solution, three Indonesian youths and one German created a tech startup that allows its users to use time efficiently with assistance: Meet YesBoss, your personal virtual assistant that will respond to your every texted request whenever and wherever.
Users can request anything via a simple text, served with speedy replies and helpful services. Whatâs more, there are no extra fees associated with the text. Whatever you normally pay your cellphone provider to send a text message is all you have to pay to use YesBoss. However, as may be obvious, if users were to request, for instance, food, they are charged for it.
âWe want to be [the usersâ] personal timesaver,â said Irzan Raditya, CEO and one of the four founders of YesBoss. âWe want to allocate the clientsâ time so they can spend more time with their loved ones, for the more important things in life.â
Wahyu Wrehasnaya, Chris Franke, Reynir Fauzan and Irzan, inspired by the conversational commerce pioneer Magic in the United States, came up with the idea of YesBoss in Berlin where they studied together.
They then decided to bring the business to Indonesia, a place that could potentially spur the businessâ growth because its people âlove to be servedâ, Irzan told The Jakarta Post.
They established YesBossâ product and IT team in Berlin in the cityâs advanced tech landscape, but execute its operational and customer services in Indonesia, where it is available nationwide.
Since its launch on June 2, 2015, YesBoss has reached 8,258 users in the country and is growing fast, validating Irzanâs assumption that Indonesians love service.
With thousands of users, the most popular requests are for culinary tips and food deliveries; the second most popular request is for booking a flight.
On its website, YesBoss categorizes requests into nine common lifestyle aspects such as travel, entertainment, health and shopping. Even so, partnering with varied e-commerce and city couriers, users have the freedom to ask for whatever they want, as long as it follows the law; but if clients request something illegal, it will be transformed into a legal request.
âWe canât say we canât execute a clientâs request,â explained Wahyu. âOnce, a client ordered a monkey. But since itâs an illegal request, we just said, âwe have an idea for you, we can get you a really great monkey doll.ââ
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span class="inline inline-center">Personalized service: Meet YesBoss, your personal virtual assistant that will respond to all of your texted requests, whenever and wherever.
Time management is no walk in the park. Time often seems to exhaust itself before we do the same. So, do we need more time? Some might nod, but others might look in another direction and find a solution.
These others happen to be four millennials who found a way to help us walk in the park with time, because for them, 'your time matters.'
Since creating time is an impossible solution, three Indonesian youths and one German created a tech startup that allows its users to use time efficiently with assistance: Meet YesBoss, your personal virtual assistant that will respond to your every texted request whenever and wherever.
Users can request anything via a simple text, served with speedy replies and helpful services. What's more, there are no extra fees associated with the text. Whatever you normally pay your cellphone provider to send a text message is all you have to pay to use YesBoss. However, as may be obvious, if users were to request, for instance, food, they are charged for it.
'We want to be [the users'] personal timesaver,' said Irzan Raditya, CEO and one of the four founders of YesBoss. 'We want to allocate the clients' time so they can spend more time with their loved ones, for the more important things in life.'
Wahyu Wrehasnaya, Chris Franke, Reynir Fauzan and Irzan, inspired by the conversational commerce pioneer Magic in the United States, came up with the idea of YesBoss in Berlin where they studied together.
They then decided to bring the business to Indonesia, a place that could potentially spur the business' growth because its people 'love to be served', Irzan told The Jakarta Post.
They established YesBoss' product and IT team in Berlin in the city's advanced tech landscape, but execute its operational and customer services in Indonesia, where it is available nationwide.
Since its launch on June 2, 2015, YesBoss has reached 8,258 users in the country and is growing fast, validating Irzan's assumption that Indonesians love service.
With thousands of users, the most popular requests are for culinary tips and food deliveries; the second most popular request is for booking a flight.
On its website, YesBoss categorizes requests into nine common lifestyle aspects such as travel, entertainment, health and shopping. Even so, partnering with varied e-commerce and city couriers, users have the freedom to ask for whatever they want, as long as it follows the law; but if clients request something illegal, it will be transformed into a legal request.
'We can't say we can't execute a client's request,' explained Wahyu. 'Once, a client ordered a monkey. But since it's an illegal request, we just said, 'we have an idea for you, we can get you a really great monkey doll.''
Better relationships: A customers texts her YessBoss client service representative (CSR) to get information on Ant-Man screenings.(JP/Sekar K Tandjung)
Irzan also mentioned that users have asked for equally strange favors like personalized nicknames, calling their assistant Iron Man's Jarvis or asking to be called sayang, which means darling. Some users have even picked up the habit of engaging in casual conversations with their assistant.
For most, this seems like an asymmetrical relationship as a boss and an assistant are usually thought of as having a hierarchical relationship. For YesBoss, this type of relationship is the epitome of personalization ' it is what YesBoss defines to be a true personal virtual assistant.
With trivial questions, personal conversation, as well as unusual requests, YesBoss' client service representatives (CSRs), those who respond to the clients' texted requests, gather such information on their clients to enhance the personalization of their services.
Like any other customer service, the more it is customized, the more it sells. Keeping their clients happy and satisfied is an integral part of YesBoss' operation.
As personalization is on YesBoss' list of challenges, tariff appropriation is another. YesBoss' national exposure has made itself known in Bandung, Surabaya and even Makassar, but as most of the startup's users live in Jakarta.
Finding the most convenient partners, relevant fees and building the database for each of the archipelago's regions has thus become something else to overcome.
Nevertheless, expansion seems to be its current goal as it plans to advance YesBoss' services into a smartphone application, widen its market to Singapore in the upcoming month and offer paid premium services that will allow users to call their personal assistant.
'Our competing strategy lies in growing fast and growing big,' said Irzan. 'It's better to fail fast, break fast and measure and re-do the method again; but right now our main focus is looking for investment.'
Currently in its invitation-only phase, YesBoss is caught with having to limit the amount of invitations to give out. It currently has 1,015 pending early access requests while having only 952 left to provide, according to its website.
YesBoss ultimately needs more time to develop into becoming the company it wants to be. With big goals and a target of 10,000 users, it may need to have its own virtual personal assistant. 'We have a long goal. We're [still] in the small phase. What's good is that we have validated our assumption [and that] there's a demand for YesBoss.'
Services at your fingertips: Various services can be accessed just by texting a message to one's client service representative (CSR).
' The writer is an intern at The Jakarta Post.
' Photos courtesy of YessBoss