How Avenue grows

Door-to-door demos on an iPhone made prospects think it was an app, not something embedded on their website. An early staff member suggested iPads so prospects could see it embedded on a website in their own branding. They switched to iPads and printed brochures explaining what the product was.

Got initial traction by going door to door and showing the widget in person to local businesses. Pitch framed around the problem they have ('You can't get sales outside of hours. This fixes that.'). Businesses were open to trying something shown in person by a real person. Businesses that had no use for it sometimes referred them to a friend's business where it would fit. Tom's advice: it is intimidating at first, but the blunt in-person feedback is exactly what you want.

When door knocking, they didn't skip any business (music studios, electrician repair shops, anything open). Trades kept responding better and showing interest; they are direct with feedback and won't pay for something that doesn't pay for itself, which suited the goal of tangible results and long-term clients. The product was then adapted to trades' needs.

After the MVP proved feasibility, went all in: hired a lead designer, a head (back-end) developer and a front-end developer while at zero revenue. Paid for them with income from his 10-year-old marketing agency, which still had 70+ clients paying for website hosting and needed little attention, while transitioning out of the agency.

With no connections to bigger clients, they did the hard work of signing smaller businesses door to door first. Being visible at many local businesses made larger prospects trust them.

Non-technical founder had a developer friend build an MVP in February 2025 to check the widget could be embedded naturally into a client's website. Once the layout came to life, he committed fully and hired a team.

Through a partnership with Google, each client gets a 'book online' button on their Google Business Profile (Google reservations). Clicking it opens the client's branded form; if customers exit, they are sent to the client's website where the widget is also embedded, so all inquiries land in one place.