You can as well discard everything you think you know about Fullgap, because the entire product reveal will make you feel like you knew nothing, and to be honest, we all don’t know anything yet. Before now, I just knew Fullgap as a company Victor and Bolaji were building, and I was excited about it because everyone else was excited about it.
Then I learned it is meant to be for creative freelancers, to help make the ease of doing business better, and I was like, uh-huh, okay. But today, I go to witness the system that is Fullgap in person, I strongly feel the team has not been straightforward with us, because what they have promised is less than one percent of what is to be offered.
I’m rarely ever excited about companies or startups like this, but the issue Fullgap is not just another company, it’s a solution to the problem freelancers didn’t even know they had. Bolaji and I were having a conversation, and he was explaining how we become so accustomed to certain work processes, that we forget how tedious it is and don’t even think it can be better optimized for a more friendly experience.
In the words of Bolaji, a Co-founder at Fullgap;
The way we imagine the future is people needing only two things for their work. The tool they create with, and Fullgap. Nothing else. For a designer on a Monday morning… Figma and Fullgap, that’s all. Simple life, everything running smooth.
The optimization of these overlooked tedious experiences freelancers go through (that they don’t even know about and has become a part of the ‘huzzle’) is what Fullgap has done. Fullgap will literally lift the administrative work of engaging a client from the introductory call to order delivery, making you who you really are; a creative freelancer.
The Design
As a designer, this was the first thing that caught my attention about Fullgap’s product. I immediately mentioned to Bolaji how it was ‘giving’ less is more. One thing the team managed to do is to get rid of a lot of ‘extra designs’ that can be considered excesses but still managed to keep the design aesthetically pleasing and downright functional.
And that is the juice of a well-designed product.
Another aspect of the product I must commend the design team on is the interactions of the design. Tho subtle, interactions go a long way in engaging users while they make use of your product. And this is something the design team was able to do, certain actions, and flow, even I consider boring was bought to life by design interactions, and I believe this is something that will make the product stand out to the users.
Systems can become overwhelming is what Victor said in a tweet, and simplifying these systems is something that was put into play in the design of Fullgap. The ease of use of the product and seamless flow of the users’ journey is going to increase the productivity and general output of freelancers.
Client Onboarding
Setting up a base for a client every time a new project comes can be a tedious experience. From the introductory calls to collating details, designing a notion board, or Jira, setting up the communication of email, invoicing, and drafting a contract. Even typing these has become exhausting, only to remember that the actual creative work is yet to start.
Fullgap simplifies this entire journey in a simple five-step process. Organizing all necessary information for you in one place and automating the rest of the process. It’s even easier if you are onboarding an existing client.
Victor, another Co-founder at Fullgap provided some context to what Fullgap is intended to achieve;
Fullgap is going to turn what has appeared to be an inherent weakness for many creative people into a strength. It’s like when I met Bolaji and we started FourthCanvas, great things happened because that was literally creativity meeting structure. That effect is what we are scaling up here, for millions of people
Communication? Fullgap integrates the most used communication tool at the moment and collates all your conversations with your client -no matter where they took place- into a single communication thread. This way, you don’t have to keep jumping between WhatsApp, Emails, and Messenger whenever you need to reference an exchange.
How they managed to pull this off, I don’t know.
Invoicing and contracting, which usually serves as a headache for most freelancers are automatically handled by Fullgap. With necessary legal agreements, terms, and conditions, with the option to edit it, your client is provided with a simple contract drafted by a team of legal practitioners and tenable in a court of law.
Project Tracking
Fullgap’s product makes your project tracking easy. Be it a milestone, the milestone deliverables, to the individual tasks that make up a deliverable. You can easily set, and track all these. Set due dates, and assign priority to each one. And the beautiful thing is, your client is notified every time progress is made.
Think of ClickUp, Asana, Jira, Trello, or the best alternatives to these, now Imagine the power of all these tools simplified into a single process, what you’ve just imagined is Fullgap.
And if you are fond of losing track of time and missing deadlines and deliverables, Fullgap keeps a constant reminder in your face, because you won’t get paid if you don’t deliver.
Getting Paid
Talking about getting paid. this has to be the most exciting feature of the product for me, not just because it’s about money, but how easily customizable the process is. It simply mirrors the manual process of setting your payment plan, but this time automates it for you.
With Fullgap, you can choose to receive upfront, get paid in installments, by milestone delivery, or at the end of the project. An invoice with all the payment details and links is automatically generated and sent to your client. Constant reminders are sent out to your clients whenever payments are due or overdue.
A payment API is integrated into the product that allows you to receive payment from wherever your client is based in the world. Peradventure you get paid outside the product, you can manually input the payment detail into your client dashboard so no payment is left untracked.
You are provided with virtual account numbers in several currencies. You can decide on your default payment currency, convert it to a local currency, and withdraw it to your local bank account at the best exchange rate. You get to see the basic transaction history. An overview of payments received, payments due, and payments not yet processed.
Business Overview
The first interface you are presented with when you log into your dashboard is a simple overview and status update of your work across all your clients. You can easily see your deliverable timeline and identify tasks that need immediate attention and the ones that could wait a little while.
You also get a summary of your financial status, balance, and expected income. Easy access to your notification board and recent messages. You also have a side navigation bar that gives you direct access to every other feature of the product.
With the product dashboard overview, you get to see where your freelance business is at a glance.
Conclusion
I think enough has been said, and this is one of those situations where you have to experience the product to see for yourself.
The product launch is to hold on the 21st of April, and I hear there might be a launch party, but before, you can join the waitlist here; Join Fullgap Waitlist if you haven’t.
