{"id":338661,"date":"2017-04-19T00:20:05","date_gmt":"2017-04-18T16:20:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/techcrunch.com\/?p=1477934"},"modified":"2017-04-19T00:20:05","modified_gmt":"2017-04-18T16:20:05","slug":"milanote-bags-780k-seed-to-tool-up-its-evernote-for-creatives","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/milanote-bags-780k-seed-to-tool-up-its-evernote-for-creatives\/","title":{"rendered":"Milanote bags $780k seed to tool up its \u2018Evernote for creatives\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Creative types looking for software to help seed and spark\u00a0inspiration don\u2019t usually have to look too far. There are a fair few\u00a0options to play with \u2014 whether it\u2019s a\u00a0mainstream\u00a0visual sharing\u00a0platform like Pinterest<\/a> or a design-focused\u00a0moodboard-maker like Niice<\/a>. But\u00a0just as writers have a variety of workspace preferences, the needs of visual creatives\u00a0are hardly uniform. So the\u00a0Australian startup behind Milanote<\/a> reckons there\u2019s room for another approach\u00a0here.<\/p>\n

Milanote\u2019s\u00a0platform\u00a0feels part Evernote, part Pinterest \u2014 indeed, it describes itself as an \u201cEvernote for creatives\u201d \u2014 given it\u2019s offering users\u00a0digital spaces (\u201cboards\u201d) paired with a drag and drop interface that can be used to add and position photos and notes to create\u00a0visual moodboards or\u00a0display a grouping\u00a0of ideas. Its\u00a0boards are\u00a0also designed\u00a0for\u00a0storing (and\/or linking) to related assets \u2014 nesting assets within new boards\u00a0acting\u00a0like folders.<\/p>\n

Boards\u00a0can also be shared so groups can\u00a0collaborate and view updates across a project. And Milanote includes a to-do list feature. So, all in all, the platform feels like\u00a0more of a multipurpose tool than purely\u00a0a place for designers to play with visuals (though of course you can do that too). But you could also use it\u00a0to organize and keep on top of research, say, or to create a more visual checklist or chronicle of an event.<\/p>\n

The platform\u00a0actually started as an internal tool for the founders\u2019 other business (a UX agency<\/a>) but they decided to spin it out \u2014 launching Milanote in\u00a0February, and garnering some 35,000 users\u00a0thus far, according to CEO Ollie Campbell. At this point he says the tool is\u00a0being used by \u201cdesigners, writers, marketers and other creative professionals\u201d \u2014 working at\u00a0companies such as\u00a0Facebook, Apple, Uber, Dropbox, Google, Adobe, Sony and Nike.<\/p>\n

The team\u00a0has just closed a $780,000 seed round,\u00a0led by\u00a0by Simon Martin, the former CFO of MYOB<\/a>. This\u00a0will be spent on\u00a0expanding Milanote\u2019s\u00a0feature set to support what Campbell dubs \u201ckey creative tasks\u00a0[such as]\u00a0gathering inspiration from around the web\u201d (for that it has a \u201cPinterest style web clipper\u201d in the works), as well as on support for video embedding and for more file types.<\/p>\n

They are also planning to strengthen the\u00a0collaboration features \u2014 including by adding the ability for users to get feedback from clients, and to comment on updates.<\/p>\n

\u201cMilanote is a very \u2018horizontal\u201d tool (like Trello\/Evernote etc) so we have users from all different industries and roles. Construction workers, poets, artists, authors, game designers, you name it. We have users who are writing novels, planning sermons and organising art exhibitions. But our core target audience is what we call \u2018visual creative professionals\u2019,\u201d he says when asked who the core user is.<\/p>\n

\u201cCreativity is all about synthesising and combining different pieces of information into something new.\u00a0The problem lots of people face is that their creative work is spread across multiple tools and platforms \u2014 images in Pinterest, notes in Evernote, tasks in Trello, files in Dropbox, messages in Slack. This fragmentation makes it impossible to see the whole picture, which makes it harder to figure things out,\u201d Campbell\u00a0adds.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe key benefit of Milanote is having all of your creative work in one place. This lets you see connections between different pieces of information and trigger new ideas.\u201d<\/p>\n

Milanote is a freemium SaaS, so there\u2019s a free version with a cap on the number of notes, images or links that can be added to boards, with\u00a0unlimited storage unlocked at a price \u2014 pricing being dependent on whether it\u2019s\u00a0a sole user or a team.<\/p>\n

The core\u00a0push to get visual creatives centralizing more of their project work\u00a0within Milanote\u2019s\u00a0nested board structure\u00a0does of course amp up the potential storage requirements which plays into its\u00a0pricing structure. Though it remains to be seen how much demand there is from\u00a0visual creatives to do more of their \u201ccommunicating spatially\u201d, as the team puts it, vs using a series of digital tools at\u00a0different points of their creative workflow process \u2014 be it Slack for comms, Dropbox for hosting (and sharing) files, Pinterest for making and sharing moodboards, Google Docs for collaborating and so on.<\/p>\n

As with any job role that involves playing around with ideas, it\u2019s likely to be a case of \u2018horses for courses\u2019. But\u00a0Milanote reckons its platform can at least be a contender in the race to gobble up creatives\u2019 dollars.<\/p>\n