NetWork Kansas, a non-profit and expert in business plan contests and entrepreneurship fairs, built VentureDash — a web-based SaaS application for running business competitions. As product designer, I led research, ideation, and creation of the platform and brand.

A Case for Codifying Processes

NetWork Kansas runs hundreds of business competitions across Kansas. Until recently, they used a no-code database tool to organize them. When that software couldn’t keep up with growth, they asked our team for a custom solution.

After a few meetings and some competitive research, I saw an opportunity for NetWork Kansas to offer this custom solution to a wider audience. By leaning on their experience facilitating business competitions, they could turn their process into a self-serve SaaS platform. This would allow them to scale their existing program while establishing new revenue streams.

Uncovering Painpoints & Needs

I kicked off the project by conducting a series of interviews. This was critical to understand the “NetWork Kansas way” of running business competitions. We also discussed painpoints with existing software tools (both in the tools they were using and in other products on the market).

I developed several artifacts throughout – project goals, a product roadmap/backlog, feature value statements, user flows, and information architecture diagrams. These documents clarified the plan for NetWork Kansas and gave them confidence in the solution. Our development team used them to get the context they needed to build the platform.

A Brand to Build Upon

The solution grew from an internal tool to a product for customers nationwide. Internally coined as “The ECMS” (short for Entrepreneurship Competition Management System), it needed to look, feel, and sound official to set it apart from existing options on the market.

I led NetWork Kansas through several branding exercises to develop a name and brand identity. Together, we created VentureDash – “The best way to run a business competition.” Hiring a marketing agency for this new product was not an option for NetWork Kansas, so I delivered a set of templates and guidelines that would empower their small in-house team to implement and grow the brand over time.

A Lean Design System

Our single product team at Moonbase Labs was made up of two developers and a single designer. While a design system can help multiple product teams move quickly across a large organization, a full-blown system would have been overkill. But we still needed to move quickly.

I created a small-but-mighty set of components so the team could build fast. This “Lean Design System” kept the VentureDash UI consistent and high quality without slowing us down.

Feature-Rich Functionality

VentureDash is a simple tool anyone can use to run a business competition. Standardized scoring, ready-made templates, dynamic landing pages, and a step-by-step timeline make it plug-and-play. Thanks to NetWork Kansas’s years of first-hand experience baked into the product, it takes no background in running entrepreneurship events to get started.

For advanced users, we added features to create series of competitions with shared formats and custom templates. Stripe payment processing lets hosts charge participants at any level. Universities, entrepreneurship ecosystems, and NetWork Kansas themselves use VentureDash to encourage entrepreneurship and fuel startup activity at scale.

“How the heck do we run this?”

Managing a powerful SaaS platform like VentureDash takes resources. When we delivered the product, I helped to set up a marketing site, Stripe payments, a help center, user community, and analytics. By onboarding NetWork Kansas to these tools, I made sure they could maintain the platform.

The Results

In VentureDash's first year, 140+ competitions onboarded over 2,000 participants. Kansas State University, West Virginia University, and Boise State University used it to host business college entrepreneurship competitions. NetWork Kansas’s own annual competition series hit a record of 898 student competitors from 46 Kansas communities. These numbers are especially impressive given the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020–2021; in fact, VentureDash helped organizations take their business competitions virtual when they needed it most.