The “dial a dealmaker” service launched by a native of Moncton, N.B. has completed 10,000 phone calls since opening its lines at the beginning of the year, the firm announced today.
Clarity, which splits its base of operations between Moncton and San Francisco, calls itself “a better way to give and get advice” and uses a traditional technology to do so – the telephone. Founder and CEO Dan Martell started the over-the-phone entrepreneurial advice service because he personally feels that’s the best way to receive advice. The service launched in beta mode in January, and opened to customers outside of New Brunswick at the end of January.
The service allows its members to schedule business calls through a Web-based system or mobile app. Users can also connect with “professional members” who charge for their time on the phone, used to give mentorship advice.
Clarity connects entrepreneurs with professional advisors, for a fee.
The 10,000 calls completed since then have come from 42 different countries, according to Clarity. The U.S., U.K., and Canada are the top three geographies where calls are connected.
Clarity has been growing faster than expected, Martell says. In an age where more time is spent connecting digitally than in person or on the phone, he’s not surprised that a phone scheduling service has proven popular.
Ninety per cent of calls start with an entrepreneur thinking of one question but then realizing it was the wrong question to ask in the first place, Martell says. You can’t get that sort of result with an exchange on Twitter.
“Most people don’t know what to ask,” he says. “They just know ‘hey my business isn’t doing well.’”
Clarity’s announced some new features for its members today. That includes an expanded profile page that shows how many calls an advisor has taken, how long a user can expect to wait to speak with that advisor, and the average length of the calls the advisor has taken. Users can now search advisors currently available to take calls by subject matter areas. An inbox feature adds text messaging capability so advisors can coordinate a time and ask questions ahead of a call.
The new features might expand Clarity beyond its original status as a pure phone call connector – but it’s not becoming another social network, Martell says. The features were added to solve problems around advisor discovery and call coordination.
Advisors can now be searched by area of expertise.
“There’s enough social networks out there,” he says.
The firm is on track to grow 30 per cent month over month, Martell says. He’s completed 450 of the calls himself.
Although 10,000 calls have been placed, that’s just a drop in the pond when compared against Clarity’s own goals. Its stated goal is to impact 1 billion people “in a positive way” by 2022. But that doesn’t mean completing a billion phone calls, Martell explains.
“We’re really focused on helping entrepreneurs,” he says. “Since they get up every morning and want to change the world. They’ll help us positively affect 1 billion people.”
Brian Jackson is the Editor at ITBusiness.ca. E-mail him at [email protected], follow him on Twitter, connect on Google+, read his blog, and check out the IT Business Facebook Page. 
