New CRM Software Startup Promises to be Next Unicorn from St. Louis

4 Min Read

An extremely well-capitalized startup is taking aim at leading players in the customer relationship management software industry.

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Jonathan Allen

The St. Louis startup community already has several CRM software companies helping to build the local tech scene. The most well-known is Less Annoying CRM (LACRM).

In 2014, LACRM received an Arch Grant, and just last year the company was recognized as one of the St. Louis Business Journal’s Top Places to Work in St. Louis.

The company now employs approximately 27 people. Alex Haiman, Partner & Head of Business Development at Less Annoying CRM, is a leading advocate for building a strong downtown community by engaging millennial talent.

Now, a new entrant into the CRM market in St. Louis promises an aggressive growth strategy and is rumored to be extremely well-capitalized. The startup’s founder is bullish on achieving unicorn status.

“VC funding is through the roof. We’re talking millions — potential billions.” Buck Mackey, Founder, CEO and COO of More Annoying CRM reported to EQ.

EQ sat down with the entrepreneur for an extended interview on-camera to discuss his new venture, and his unorthodox go-to-market strategy.

Steal and Repurpose Good Ideas

“Every good idea is out there already. So what you have to do is steal from the good ones,” Mackey said.

Mackey’s More Annoying CRM strikes a sharp contrast with Less Annoying CRM, which built a respected underground brand by consciously shunning price raises, feature creep, and the invasive marketing strategies employed by other CRM software competitors.

Living up to their name — Less Annoying — continues to eschew almost all advertising and marketing tactics, choosing to rely on word of mouth instead. Mackey’s plan is to hijack their brand name by targeting related keywords like “annoying CRM” using Google AdWords.

“I would just put all that money into AdWords and I’ll take all the branded terms they got. Next thing you know, More Annoying CRM is on top.”

A Fully-Integrated CRM

Fundamental to More Annoying CRM’s platform concept is that sales tactics like sending thousands of emails or making hundreds of calls is a fundamentally inefficient way to become an influencer.

“You have to find other ways… Those traditional methods just don’t work anymore.” says Mackey.

More Annoying CRM’s customer-centric approach is Facebook notifications.

Utilizing the typical sales pipeline management tools common to all customer relationship management software, More Annoying CRM, goes the extra step of pinging your friends on social networks to let them know every time you do something in the interface.

“Your efficiencies are going to go through the roof. You’re going to look like you’re checking something every single moment of the day. How often can you say that you do that already?”

Speaking directly to the Silicon Valley investor mindset of developing products with a “viral coefficient” built natively into the user journey, More Annoying CRM’s core feature is to let everyone know you’re working – literally, all of the time.

“That’s what we embody at More Annoying CRM. You can show how much you care with very little effort. That’s what it’s all about. Maximize how much you care,” Mackey exhorted to EQ before correcting himself, “Maximize how much other people think you care.”

IoT Makes It More Than A CRM

“We’re going worldwide. Very quickly.” Mackey asserted. “You won’t need an alarm clock, when you got More Annoying CRM push notifications going.”

Behind the notification mechanic is the hope of attracting new users to the new CRM platform.

UPDATE 4/1 5pm CT: And certainly, Mackey’s MVP is pretty relentlessly targeting the STL startup ecosystem. It looks like his profile has already been throttled on Twitter in just hours of launching the beta early this morning.

“Marketing automation. That’s a buzzword. But yeah, we want everyone to know what you’re doing. At all times. And we’re hoping, in that, that people who aren’t even in business start using it.”

To attract early adopters and innovators, Mackey is planning dozens of hardware integrations saying, “we have to get back to our values.”

By that he indicates that to be a successful salesperson of the future, you have to look to the example set by successful salesmen in the past, who had the grit and tenacity to build a business with nothing more than a rotary phone and a rolodex.

Those are just some of the character traits Mackey is looking for in a team to build a More Annoying CRM.

“I know there’s some people out there… You wanna join Buck Mackey? You wanna make a million bucks? Come join me. We’re going to make it big. Believe in yourself,” Mackey said, “But believe in me first.”

Article Updated 4/2 6am: Response from Less Annoying CRM.

The Less Annoying team took to Twitter to respond to the breaking news.

Alex Haimann, Partner & Head of Business Development

Tyler King, Co-founder & CEO of Less Annoying CRM

Less Annoying’s Crisis Management PR Department

But seriously, friends, don’t sweat it too much. APRIL FOOLS!