As part of a goal to build up my passion presence I am going to give my thoughts on up and coming Start-Ups that I find awesome. I mostly find them through friends and blogs but if you have any suggestions I’d love to hear about them.

After getting turned on to Whistle by a socialite of a friend and growing up as a dog owner it seemed appropriate that I take a look at the company that launched June 5th. My initial thoughts are very positive. Whistle is laying the ground work for our dogs lives to become much more data driven and social. 

First Impression

Whistle’s opening page has a beautifully laid out web design that greets with you plenty of dogs. Parallax scrolling guides you down the page to show you what they are all about. The message is clear without reading a word, “this device is for your best friend.” As you keep going down the page and your interest spikes you’ll see all of the features that Whistle has. Simple graphics allow your mind to envision your dogs life with this piece of tech. First impression? Whistle is a legit product who’s timing could not have been more perfect to enter the market.

Website/App Design

Like I said before Whistle’s website tells you everything you need to know with beautifully spaced out flow. High quality pictures show dogs and their owners living lavishly and bonding over Whistle.

The mobile app gives you every chance to love your dog. Through the app you can take pictures, share stories, track the health progress of your dog, and organize the K9’s information. All of this data will even make grandma a believer. The clips of its use in the product demo video are awesome. Swiping through the display you’ll find all of the different dashboards that show you metrics and pictures about your dog. My favorite features so far are being able to check out the activity of your dog while you’re at the office and the “timeline” feature to check out your pups life events. 

Your Dog Is More Social Than You

Whistle is basically bringing you and your dogs relationship into the 21st century. Now you can strap a piece of tech to your dog and track what it is doing through all hours of the day. Part one: **With this information owners can make more informed decisions about the activities and health of their hound.**Part two: Whistle is making your dog more social.  At first I thought that no one could possibly want to update what their dog is doing all the time. Then I thought about all the instagram and twitter updates I get about dogs and their owners. In reality a lot of people want to share the love. What will be really interesting to see is how people use this “timeline” feature to track and share their dogs life over a long period of time.

A differentiation point for Whistle is the emphasis that is placed on the relationship between you and your dog. Other companies, like Tagg, focus mainly on location services and don’t effectively give life to their message. Comparing these two companies is a prime example about what a good marketing team can do for you. I want you to take a look at the websites of Whistle and Tagg and tell me which one you think does a better job at branding. I agree. 

PS.Don’t get pissed when Buster checks in at the Robinson’s house more than yours on foursquare. Little Buster is going to get a lot more social and doesn’t even know it yet.

Other Thoughts/Suggestions

• $100 price tag - Initially thought it was a little steep but pet owners are crazy about their pets. Not only that but everyone needs ideas for presents.
• Awesome idea of having the actual device detach from the collar for charging. Simple to charge. One suggestion (and I have no health/science backing at all): Have a wireless charging pad that goes under the mat/pillow that your dog usually sleeps on. Charges while he/she sleeps and no need to ever worry about it. Finally with the collar, make sure that the Whistle necklace can have dog tags that hang from it.
• **Suggestion -**I could see people talking about Whistle at dog parks. How cool would it be if multiple dogs at the dog park were wearing Whistle and you could track when your dog was in the vicinity(playing) with other dogs. You could see who your dogs best friends were and track when they got to meet up with them on the timeline feature.
• **Suggestion -**Right now it looks like you can pair one phone with one dog. I know that multiple people will want to track one dog or even multiple people will want to track multiple dogs. I suggest that many different users be able to track different dogs and the “owner” can allow read/write/edit access to these other spectators.
• **Thoughts -**1. It is very important to maximize the sharing possibilities for users to broadcast what is going on with their pets. Non-users need to see how much fun they are having with Whistle. 2. It is equally important that a “doggie network” gets created in which users can compare and contrast the activities between the dogs and the dogs friends. It’ll be awesome to see who is in a dogs network by detecting which other Whistle devices are near it the most. “Doggie Networks?”….

I’d love to hear your thoughts and have a conversation about what you think about Whistle. Reach out! @gregkamradt

June 6th, 2013 12:11am Profiled