Balsamiq Blog

Balsamiq Roadmap for 2009

by Peldi Guilizzoni. January 3rd, 2009 under Company / Business — 12 Comments

This is part two of a two-part post about what happened in 2008 and my plans for 2009.

So 2008 was great, no, it was beyond great. I quit my job, moved to Italy and started Balsamiq Studios LLC, my first company. It went very well.

Perhaps I should be more cautious, but I have a feeling 2009 will be even better. Here’s why.

Lots and Lots To Do

I am looking at my TODO list and I have 12, yes twelve projects listed which should keep me busy for the year, and then some!

The name of the game is “Integration”

Most of my big projects for 2009 have to do with integrating Mockups in your preferred way to work.

• I have 4 more server-side integrations of Mockups planned (with more possible), just like the Confluence, JIRA and XWiki plugin versions I shipped in 2008. Each of these has the potential to increase my revenue another 20-30%.
• I am working on a hosted version of Mockups – yes, I am no longer afraid of going SaaS, and lots of people have been asking for this. You’ll be able to work on your mockups online, share them with others and get feedback on them, all from your browser (or from Mockups for Desktop), all for a monthly or yearly fee.
• I want to build the hosted version in a way that can be sold as an enterprise, behind-the-firewall application. And sell it.
• I am working on 3 or more “web connectors”, i.e. ways to load and save your data on the web from Mockups for Desktop.

I wish I could tell you what products I am integrating Mockups with but I’ll keep them as surprises, I don’t want to jynx myself!

I am thrilled about each of these projects, as making great pieces of software talk to each other is something I love doing (there’s something magical about it, that’s why I make Web Office Plugins after all). I will likely contract out part of the development work for some of these, and some platform providers have even offered to help me with development in order to make the project happen. Very exciting.

Client Side Enhancements

Everyone knows that linking mockups together is the last big missing feature of Mockups. I have started a GetSatisfaction thread about it just the other day, but I am itching to start implementing it (I think I’ll do a phased approach, a little bit at the time), so stay tuned here or on Twitter for updates. It’s coming, soon.

Other big client-side enhancements I have planned for 2009 are, in no particular order:

• double-clicking on groups to “dive into them” and edit their contents
• adding support for “UI packs” such as iPhone, mobile and social media UI control packs.
• adding a light-weight Rich Text Editor for the Paragraph and Label controls (for bold, italic, bullets, etc within the same control)

On top of that, there will always be bug fixes and little enhancements here and there…I am releasing every Sunday morning these days so keep updating!

More “Community Features”

I just love the little (ok, not so little) community that has formed around the Balsamiq GetSatisfaction forums in the last 6 months. Your feedback keeps me going every day and makes the product as good as it can be. I haven’t worked on a feature that didn’t come from a customer request since the day before I launched in June. It’s wonderful to know that people will put what I’m working on to use immediately, and that it will make them more productive and ultimately happier.

The collaboration with InspireUX (look in the Help menu for the “I need inspiration” link) is also one of my favorite features. I always read one of Catriona’s quotes at the beginning of a long Mockups session, it gets me fired up and pushes me to do my best.

In 2009, I want to help nurture the Mockups users community with the following:

• a Balsamiq Mockups Community Server (BMCS) – this will be a wiki with Mockups installed on it for people to share common UI components and design patterns that they created with Mockups. Think “Login Page” or “Registration Page” or a simple error message dialog. I am working with some customers on this and plan to launch it at the end of January. In the future I want the Desktop version and the hosted version (and all other versions actually) to integrate with BMCS so that you’ll be able to import pre-made mockups directly from them.
• I plan on retweeting any good UX-related tweets I come across. If you know of someone I should follow to help me with this service, let me know!
• I plan on blogging about any user experience that blows me away, like Dropbox, Posterous, PivotalTracker, StackOverflow, PrintWhatYouLike.com and others.
• I plan on publishing interviews to customers whose jobs have been changed by Mockups, so that you’ll be able to learn their workflows and experiences.
• I just talked to Mariah, and we decided that starting today, in addition to giving free licenses away to do-gooders, non-profits etc, we will also donate licenses to any high-school class that asks for it.  We just ask the teacher to email us the name of their school and class and the number of students in the class, and Mariah will send them all a license.

You may think that I want to do all of the above as a marketing scheme, but you’d be wrong. Community “features” are just as important as features built with code. Knowing that there’s a community of support behind a product is a wonderful feeling, and I want my customers to feel that from day one. Plus it’s pretty lonely over here, so really I want to do it just for my own benefit.

My Goals for 2009

My goals for the company are simple: keep existing customers happy. Make new customers, make them happy. Make all customers more productive. Provide top-notch experiences, both in the product and in any interaction with Balsamiq Studios. Stay transparent, stay human, stay green and socially conscious.

Financially, my goal for Balsamiq is to reach $400,000 in revenue, with a stretch goal of $500,000. It will be tough, but I think I can pull it off.

Personally, this will be another year of intense learning. I will have to go from “mr. Do-it-all” to be Balsamiq’s CEO, which will mean having employees, delegating, setting up relationships with resellers and partners, perhaps incorporate in Italy as well (yay for micro-multinationals!), and hopefully make some non-critical-but-very-formative mistakes. With all that I have planned for 2009, there’ll be plenty of opportunities for it.

Onward!

— 12 Comments

12 Responses to “Balsamiq Roadmap for 2009”

1. Jérôme Delacroix Says:
   January 3rd, 2009 at 10:40 am

   Congratulations for your 2009 goals ! I wish you all success, and beyond.

2. Catherine Rodriguez Says:
   January 3rd, 2009 at 2:33 pm

   All the best for 2009! It seems that you have been heading in the right direction taking the right steps and decisions.
   I look forward to maybe helping with the expansion of your company when ready to delegate or get more support!

3. David Says:
   January 3rd, 2009 at 6:05 pm

   Peldi – Congratulation on a fantastic 2008 and a promising roadmap for 2009. I appreciated the interactions we had over the past year and look forward to bouncing ideas off of you and helping with your products as you need.

4. Paul Carney Says:
   January 4th, 2009 at 9:12 am

   Peldi, in 2 succinct words: YOU ROCK! What a fantastic story and vision. Please let me know if you come across issues in which you need a fresh perspective. I would be more than happy to help.

   Paul

5. Catriona Cornett Says:
   January 4th, 2009 at 3:07 pm

   Peldi,
   Congrats on the great success in 2009! All the best to you in 2009. The collaboration with inspireUX has been successful for the both of us, and I greatly appreciate your kind words and for the link within Mockups. I hope to keep in touch to see how we can collaborate further!

   Best,
   Catriona
   http://www.inspireux.com

6. scott Says:
   January 4th, 2009 at 9:26 pm

   Peldi,
   Congrats on a great 2008. You’ve definitely inspired a lot of people!
   Hope all is well.
   - Scott

7. Ed Yourself Says:
   January 7th, 2009 at 5:37 am

   word.

   our roadmap for 2009 is spiced with your delicious balsamiq.
   new concepts. new mockups. now easy & efficient.

   mille grazie.

8. Krishna Says:
   January 12th, 2009 at 11:00 am

   Integration with colourlovers.com color palletes would be good, it gives us visually how the colors change the appearance.

   Thanks. I love your software and looking forward to buy someday soon.

9. Nazim Beltran Says:
   January 16th, 2009 at 3:15 am

   Dude…sounds like the Roadmap 2009 is right on track!
   Wishing the best for Balsamiq in the new year

10. Ncu Says:
    January 18th, 2009 at 6:49 pm

    $400.000 k?! that’s steep man! very steep! I wish you success in pulling it off tough!

11. Ncu Says:
    January 19th, 2009 at 1:58 am

    Wait, I just read you made 160k in 2008. 400k should not be an issue then!

12. Larry Cai Says:
    March 13th, 2009 at 12:29 am

    A nice plan for 2009, and wish your enjoy the “Do-it-all” life. Will be a easy job for 400k since so many excellent products you have in hand.

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