Hello! What’s your background, and what are you working on?

I have a PhD in using Behavioral Science for interactive design and marketing.  With this, I was able to develop a personality test tool called SPEAR Personality. Ultimately, it helps you understand yourself better by providing analysis tools so you can compare how you are similar or different from people in your life.

What motivated you to get started?

I was initially working to measure people’s hormone and neurotransmitter levels through personality differences. This got me curious to find a way to design a more accurate personality test than what was available. Most tools in the market were designed based on broad psychological principles. 

What many people don’t know is that 40 to 50 percent of our personality is based on genetics. There’s so much more to our personality than psychological principles. After years of research and development, my colleagues and I were finally able to develop our own tools. 

What went into building the initial product?

Before we started this project, we spent several years in research collaborations with different scientists focused on applied behavioral science. When we started to look more into on personality, the hardest part of the project was developing our psychometric tools, which were targeting neural substrates. We also struggled to make the concepts easy for users to understand. After the tedious work of designing our tools, testing them with individuals and groups, and continuous revising and testing. Soon after, we launched the SPEAR Personality. The technology part was easy, but it was the building and testing the psychological parts that was the real work.  

How have you attracted users?

We have been focused on testing and improving the product, so we have not done much marketing yet. We’re planning the big launch when we roll out our next iteration of the system and our personality handbook. 

What’s your business model?

We provide individuals with insight to help them develop personally, and we provide organizations with behavioral insight to help them improve their relations among staff and customers.

What are your goals for the future?

What are the biggest challenges you’ve faced and obstacles you’ve overcome? If you had to start over, what would you do differently?

Our biggest challenge was shortage of capital. If I were to start over, I would start by attracting some investors to support the process and expenses. However, we’re almost through bootstrapping with no baggage. 

Have you found anything particularly helpful or advantageous?

We have realized that meeting people face-to-face is the best way to collect feedback. Online data is good, but nothing can compare to what you can get from actual conversations.

What’s your advice for other startups?

Build a product you love and find customers who love it too.

Where can we go to learn more?

Learn more at: https://www.spearpersonality.com/