4th Berlin Service Design Drinks took place at innovation consultancy Dark Horse’s beautiful office space. A short input talk gave an overview on how service design can be applied by start-up companies — and service designers can provide value for their young business. A follow-up exercise made one tool that’s being used more tangible. Afterwards there was plenty of time for conversations and drinks.

1. Service
Design
Drinks
DA R K H O R S E / O C TO B E R 9 , 2 0 1 3
Service Design
for Start-ups

2. Overview
Why?
What?
How?
Exercise

3. Martin
User Experience,
Nokia
Katrin
PhD Candidate,
University of
Potsdam
Who are we?
Olga
Business
Consultant
Manuel
Freelance
Service
Designer

4. The internet economy in Berlin
has a higher economic
performance than the
construction industry.
Why? R E L E VA N C E
Every 20 hours a new start-up
is founded in Berlin.
— I B B B e r l i n 2 0 1 3

5. What? D E F I N I T I O N
— W I K I P E D I A
‘Start-Up’
“A start-up [...] is a company, a partnership
or temporary organization designed to
search for a repeatable and scalable business
model. These companies,[...] are in a phase of
development and research for markets.”

6. What? D E F I N I T I O N
“ A 'start-up' is a company that is confused about
who its customers are,
what its product is,
— Q U O R A
Top-rated answer for ‘Start-Up’
how to make money.”

7. What? D E F I N I T I O N
“ A 'startup' is a company that is confused about
who its customers are,
what its product is,
— Q U O R A
Top-rated answer for ‘Start-Up’
how to make money.”
Value proposition
User needs
Business Model

8. What? D E F I N I T I O N
— Q U O R A
Top-rated answer for ‘Start-Up’
“ As soon as it figures out all 3 things, it ceases to
be a startup and then becomes a real business.”

9. How can service design help?
Value proposition
User needs
Business model
• User Research
• Personas
• User Journeys
• Prototyping
• Business Model Canvas
• Service Blueprint

10. Why & How?
We asked a few start-ups about
service design & how they use it

11. The start-ups
talent-pool that
matches people and
companies based
on cultural fit
visual real-time
collaboration tool
cycle-tracking
mobile app for
women

12. How do you define service design?
1.

13. “I consider Service Design to define how our
product really works. It‘s not just about [...]
features.
It‘s about integration of features and behaviour
of those within a higher context [...].”
— M A R T I N G U E T H E R
Spacedeck

14. “[...] being honest, we think it is one of
several attempts to formalise the language
surrounding the most basic design goal. [...]
It can be called many things [...] but at the
end of the day we consider it to be mainly
empathy and responsible design.”
— CO N O R D E L A H U N T Y
Somewhere

15. “I think the problem is most businesses
are stuck in Pixeled Service Design,
instead of just Service Design. [...]
You realize how constraining Digital is if you
start thinking about what types of services can
be provided by… human beings, bicycles,
shopping carts, stairs, trees, lakes, blue skies.”
— M I K E L AV I G N E
Clue

16. Why is service design important for
your start-up?
2.

17. “[...] As a Start-up it is very important to think
about your product as a service.”
— M A R T I N G U E T H E R
Spacedeck

18. “[...] At the beginning it helps us to plot and
plan the spaces we want to play in and the
behaviours we need to support; later it helps us
to identify the areas where we are not doing
a good enough job as well as some tactics on
how to approach solving them. ”
— CO N O R D E L A H U N T Y
Somewhere

19. “We're designing a very personal service for
women to understand what's going on in their
bodies each month. We can't possibly do that well
without keeping a very open mind about how
best to do that, both digital and non-digital.”
— M I K E L AV I G N E
Clue

20. What are the most important design
tools in your company?
3.

21. “The people using our service are the biggest
source of inspiration for our service. In this case,
in-depth conversations, open ears, and
open minds are the most important tools.”
— M I K E L AV I G N E
Clue

22. “Personas, Mock-Ups, Click-Prototypes [...]”
— M A R T I N G U E T H E R
Spacedeck

23. “Definitely pen and lots of paper - and
talking to people. Thinking of the service in
terms of a journey that a real life human will
go through, etc. We aren't really formal, we just
grab bits and pieces as we go and use the ones
that work for us.”
— CO N O R
Somewhere HQ

24. Exercise
Let‘s use a
typical start-up
tool today

25. Elevator pitch
Be right on the spot. Pitch your idea
in 30 seconds to a potential investor.

26. Elevator pitch A S A CO M PA R I S O N
“ Salonmeister is like Qype for hairdressers.”
“ tame is like google for twitter.”
Define your start-up by comparing it to an
established, well-known service.
“ Bloomydays is like a pizza delivery for flowers.”

27. Elevator pitch A S A S U M M A RY
Articulate a concise summary of your fav service.
For
TARGET
CUSTOMER
CUSTOMER
NEED
SERVICE
NAME
MARKET
CATEGORY
who
in
that
Unlike
the service
is a
ONE KEY
BENEFIT
COMPE-
TITION
LOCATION
(STREET)
.
.
UNIQUE
DIFFEREN-
TIATOR
a foodie & chef at home
has way too little time
Kochhaus supermarket
Berlin & Hamburg
offers pre-compiled recipes
Kaisers, Perfetto or Proviant
offers all ingredients
in 1 single shop w/o need running thru the city

28. Take-away

29. Learnings
They are pragmatic about the tools and use
what works for them
Start-ups apply service design differently
Service design is highly relevant for
start-ups
Icons: Olyn LeRoy, Dmitry Baranovskiy / The Noun Project

30. See you at
the X-mas
party
servicedesignberlin.de
@SD_Berlin
fb.com/servicedesignberlin