Wazoku is a new UK-based idea management services company that helps companies to capture, discuss and evaluate employee ideas. Wazoku is targeted at SMBs or departments within larger enterprises and is already working with customers, including telco Muzicall, Huddle and Italian consultancy Synistema.
Wazoku is a cloud-based Software as a Service (SaaS) where users submit ideas, which are then shared with others in the company who have the chance to vote on, comment, provide feedback and develop the ideas further. Ideas can be ‘bottom-up’, direct from an employee and unsolicited, or ‘top-down’, where a senior employee requests ideas on a specified topic.
“A truly great idea will be realised more often than not but sometimes ideas need encouragement, feedback and discussion before they evolve into something worthwhile,” said Simon Hill, Wazoku CEO and Co-founder. “Wazoku takes the traditional company ‘suggestion box’ online, adding social and sharing tools to help develop ideas and ensure those good ideas find the right people and decision-makers within an organisation.”
When a user submits an idea they are able to request exactly who gets to provide feedback and vote on that idea. Those requested to do so will receive notification via email. Certain roles within the business carry more influence than others and opinion is weighted via algorithms to ensure that each idea gets its chance to reach the decision-makers within a business.
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“Innovation is so important now for businesses to maintain market position and to be seen as a leader in their industry,” continued Simon Hill. “There is creativity and ideas within most businesses but the tools for capturing and developing them have either been too costly for SMBs or simply not that effective. Bigger businesses have been using idea management for several years now so why shouldn’t SMBs realise the benefits too?”
“Idea management will be a huge technology growth area over the next few years as companies seek to gain competitive advantage via innovation,” said Andy McLoughlin, Co-founder of Huddle. “The European market has been crying out for a company to meet that demand and as soon as I first used the product I felt Wazoku could be that company. It already has an international customer base and has the people and technology to be the next UK start-up success story.”
Wazoku is pure SaaS so set up can be done within minutes of an order being placed. Users access a company URL and can register in seconds, especially for businesses on the Google apps platform, who can sign in using their Google ID through Wazoku’s integration with this platform for authentification.
The user interface is very straight forward and there is a partnership with Zendesk for the community helpdesk, as well as an online support and ticketing centre with FAQs, training videos and community forum support. New customers also have access to the Wazoku launch programme, where they receive support with end-user demos, customisation of Wazoku and anything else they need to get up and running.
“You can’t put a price on creativity and good ideas but Wazoku is the most cost-effective solution available, offering strong ROI as well as being easy to set-up and use,” concluded Simon Hill. “We use the highest quality web security to ensure a company’s ideas stay private and secure and believe we have a compelling product to take to market and meet our ambitious growth plans.”
