“Sales Is A Human Experience”: Atlanta-based startup Callbird Looks To Change How Companies Meet Their Customers

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The “request a demo” button is out and instant conversations are in, says the team behind Atlanta-based Callbird. 

The SaaS startup, which officially launched last week, is a live video platform that helps sales teams bridge the “enormous gap between website visitors and real conversations with prospects,” says co-founder Brad Mitchler.

Think of it as a platform that allows prospects to “knock” on the digital door of your website and be greeted by a team member who is ready to chat. 

“Over the years the online sales process has become so impersonal – humans and conversations have been replaced with AI chatbots and automated email cadences. There’s definitely a place for that stuff, but we absolutely know that at the end of the day, sales is a human experience,” Mitchler told Hypepotamus. “It’s about people connecting on a human level, understanding the prospects’ challenges, and presenting a holistic solution. So, Callbird aims to bring back face to face first interactions where they have completely disappeared.” 

Callbird looks to boost sales conversion and make sure prospects aren’t lost during the sales cycle. Instead of waiting for high intent customers to fill out an interest form on a company’s website, those customers can instantly hit a button and talk with a sales team right from the company’s website page.

 

Go To Market in the Sales Tech space

Product-led growth, a strategy in which a company’s features do the “selling,” is central to Callbird’s launch. The startup has made it easy for anyone to claim their personal Callbird page for free to improve the conversation flow with customers.

“Callbird Pages is simple – but somehow it’s the first of its kind. There are some amazing meeting platforms out there, but no one offers an open meeting room that can be accessed instantly by both parties, even if they’re complete strangers,” Mitchler added.

 

The startup is also rolling out Callbird Widget, which can be installed on a Shopify or WordPress site to more easily allow interactions with website visitors.  

While SaaS sales teams are a natural target audience for Callbird, the team believes there are an “enormous amount” of additional use cases for the platform, ranging from professor office hours to real estate open houses to attorney consultations. 

“I simply can’t wait to see all the ways people use Callbird,” Mitchler told Hypepotamus. 

 

Callbird’s Atlanta Roots

Mailchimp, Pardot, CallRail, Terminus, and Salesloft – and now younger companies like AdPipe, Voxie, and MessageGears – have put Georgia on the maps as a hub for  B2B SaaS, marketing, and sales tech talent. 

Callbird is hoping to “follow their lead” as it launches from its new office in Atlanta Tech Village. 

“There is such a great network here of folks that have been down a similar path and we can look to their success to guide us,” he added. 

Co-founders Brad Mitchler and Jack Richardson bring their own SaaS startup successes to the table. Mitchler was an early employee at the Atlanta-based supply chain management startup Demand Driven Technologies, while Richardson most recently founded the online video infrastructure platform called OnGenre. 

The two met last fall and after doing “a massive amount of market research on our own, reading, searching for similar or competitive solutions” and realizing they were onto a unique business opportunity, Mitchler said they started building out Callbird a few months ago.

 

What’s Next For Callbird 

Callbird has been bootstrapped to date, and Mitchler said that the team has “just scratched the surface” when it comes to the types of features Callbird can roll out. 

Beyond just providing the infrastructure for instant conversations, Mitchler added that Callbird will be adding features that “provide intel and value” to sales teams. 

“Imagine you’re a SaaS provider – and you can see who is on your website at any given time, what they are viewing, how long they’ve been on the site and what they’ve interacted with. What if you could see who they are? Or what company they are with? What if you get alerted if they are part of an open deal in your CRM system?,” Mitchler added. “Instead of waiting for them to click on our widget to instantly meet with you, what if you could pop out from the screen, and live stream your video to just this single visitor, inviting them to meet with you right then and there? That’s where Callbird is headed.”