EARLY-STAGE FOUNDERS: USE A.I. to BUILD YOUR TECHNOLOGY AND LAUNCH YOUR startup IN RECORD TIME. NO INVESTORS REQUIRED.
JOIN THE GROWING LIST OF SUCCESSFUL Startups that USE VERTICAL to DELIVER their TECH AND GO TO MARKET.
OneGreek
BEFORE: NO TECHNOLOGY YET. THEIR ONLY ENGINEER JUST QUIT.
AFTER: A new Mobile APP + 330k users. a SUCCESSFUL exit 1 year later.
AND IT TOOK JUST $8k and 3 months to LAUNCH.
An invitation-only social network for fraternities and sororities that launched in 2015, OneGreek grew from 150 to 330,000 users in just nine months, making it the fastest-growing social network ever built, after Instagram.
We helped them build their technology stack for just $8000, and the company went from bootstrapped startup to acquisition in under 18 months.
OneGreek was acquired by GroupThreads in September 2016.
Audivity
BEFORE: A YOUNG non -tEchnical FOUNDER LAUNCHING A NEW VENTURE.
AFTER: AN SF-BASED STARTUP. A NEW WAY OF CREATING PODCASTS. AND A successful exit.
ALL BUILT USING VERTICAL FROM DAY 1.
In 2018, the Audivity team formed with a mission to build an entirely new type of SaaS technology: start with any written web content and then transform it into podcasts and high-quality narratives in as little as two hours.
To do that, they needed to deliver new tech platforms that included automated scripting, voice-overs, editing, publishing, and analytics so creators and publishers could get higher engagement and revenue from their existing content.
We helped Audivity with the foundation for building this new multi-platform technology, and 18 months later, they had a successful exit.
WELGO
BEFORE: A VISION FOR A NEW TYPE OF HOSPITALITY STARTUP.
AFTER: $0 to $1.5M in ARR in just 18 months. OVER 60 PROPERTIES WORLDWIDE.
AND ALL LAUNCHED ON EXISTING SAAS TEchNOLOGY for almost no cost.
A new hospitality-based venture with properties in the US and the Middle East, Welgo specializes in Airbnb arbitrage at scale— renting low and Airbnb’ing high. So no need to purchase properties to turn them into investments with high returns.
We helped take them from $0 to $500K in ARR in their first five months, starting with the business concept, leveraging existing tech platforms to scale quickly, and requiring less than $10k to launch.
LOOK
BEFoRE: FRESH COLLEGE GRADS. No TECH OR STARTUP EXPERIENCE.
AFTER: A NEW SV STARTUP LAUNCHED. WITH HARDWARE. FIRMWARE. SOFTWARE.
ALL MAPPED OUT in JUST 3 MONTHS. AND BOOTSTRApPED To launch.
Go For Vertical was introduced to the Look team as they were coming straight out of college at UArizona. They had already laid out the business plan for their unique platform for social virtual reality, but like many startups, they still had the challenge of delivering their technology.
We trained and guided their young lead engineer to use Vertical and successfully laid out the architecture not just for their mobile app but for the hardware for their new VR recording device, the firmware running on it, the datastore for the VR recordings, and the backend for their new platform, or five unique tech platforms altogether.
Soon afterward, Look relocated to Silicon Valley, and their platform was launched successfully in 2016.
Clearly
BEFORE: FOUR skin experts with no tech experience.
AFTER: A SLICK TABLET-BASED APP FOR <$10K. AND NEW REVENUE IN JUST TWO MONTHS.
THEY CREATED A COMPLETELY NEW WAY TO ENGAGE AND CONVERT THEIR AUDIENCE.
Clearly is the brainchild of three local skin docs and their practice manager, who all knew there had to be a better way of engaging their patients and helping them get even better skin.
So a new tablet-based app was born that did precisely that. Combining a simple online quiz with some AI-like analysis, the Clearly platform became another channel to help dermatology practices like theirs scale and grow their business.
And we showed them how to get there.
DISHLIST
BEFORE: A NON-TECHNICAL FOUNDER WITH LOCAL DOMAIN EXPERTISE.
AFTER: A NEW prototype WITH a 43% user conversion rate.
ALL DONE FOR $1400. AND IN JUST ONE MONTH.
The new app concept? Tinder for food. Swipe right if you like a dish and want to try it, and swipe left if you don’t. Add in some unique dishes from local restaurants and thousands of foodies who love to eat out, and you have the beginning of a new app.
The Dishlist prototype was developed in a few weeks at a cost of $1400, and it quickly became a clear success: 245 users signed up to try it, and 43% converted by swiping and liking at least 15 dishes, plus provide their contact information to get future releases.
Melior USA
BEFORE: AN URGENT NEED FOR PPE IN RESPONSE TO THE coVID-19 CRISIS.
AFTER: A NEW SUPPLY CHAIN AND A B2C platform to deliver it.
ALL LAUNCHED AT NO COST. IN JUST TWO MONTHS.
Protect Everyone. That’s the motto of Melior USA, a new social impact venture that Go For Vertical launched in May of 2020 in response to the COVID-19 crisis.
When it became clear that there would not be enough PPE like N95 masks for frontline healthcare workers here, we began working on a plan to bring KN95 masks made overseas to the US to help alleviate the shortage.
So we launched Melior USA, creating a new front end for a supply chain that delivered more than 1M masks to front-line medical workers in the first months of the pandemic.
IF YOU’RE STRUGGLING to get your startup off the grounD…
Digital agencies want to charge you $50k, $100k, or even $150k to build your app.
You can’t secure funding to build your technology.
You can’t find a technical co-founder.
You keep getting rejected by “elite” accelerator programs.
You’ve blown through way too much cash and haven’t even launched yet.
you’re in the right place.
You can launch your startup in just three months using AI to building your technology and go to market.
The challenge is that most founders won’t have any how to do this, since delivering tech traditionally depends on raising substantial funding and then hiring expensive engineers.
We are the only accelerator program that solves this problem for early-stage startups and non-technical founders.
BEHIND GO FOR VERTICAL. HERE’S OUR STORY.
CEO & FOUNDER Edward Cruz
Before moving back to Tucson, AZ, where I grew up, I already had a long and successful career in the tech industry, 15 years in San Francisco, from 1990 to 2005, and then 10 more in Austin, from 2005 to 2015.
So you might be asking, what tech guy in his right mind moves from SF to Austin to Tucson? Believe me, I was asking the same thing…
But some choices explain themselves after the fact. Because in 2015, something remarkable happened in my hometown: a successful tech startup launched, and I helped make it happen.
It all started when I was introduced to the young founders of OneGreek, Sam Garst and Gavin Glatting, two fraternity brothers and graduates of the University of Arizona, who had a vision to create a new app targeting the Greek college market.
They were the first startup to use Vertical and launched for just $8k and in three months, then went on to attract over 330,000 users in 9 months, and to have a successful exit in less than one year.
That’s when I knew I was on to something special here. Since then I’ve helped dozens of startups in Tucson and nationwide do the same, with some equally remarkable results.
Now we’re bringing what we do to an even larger audience with the new, online version of our Vertical technology accelerator.
Along the way, we’ve taken a lot of inspiration from PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel and his book Zero to One. Here’s what he wrote in the preface:
“Vertical progress means doing new things — going from 0 to 1. Vertical progress is hard to imagine because it requires something nobody else has done.”
It’s the same thing I did when I helped these iconic America and international brands create new complex technologies. Now, I do it for new startups, ecosystems, and even more enterprise organization, just like yours.
This is how YOU CAN DO IT TOO
SKIP THE INVESTORS.
(tHaT’S A real STARTUP SUPERPOWER.)
THE Old Way: CHASE AFTER FUNDING
It’s the great conundrum of launching a startup: you need funding to build your technology and launch your venture, but you need your product and traction to attract investors… This is where almost all founders get stuck, trying (and failing) to line up funding.
OLD RESULTS
It’s almost impossible for early-stage founders to find funding. Even if your idea is great, it doesn’t mean that someone will open up their checkbook for you.
NEW WAY: SKIP FUNDING ALTOGETHER
It’s possible for startups to develop technology and go to market with no investors. Using a hyper-lean approach, early-stage founders, even non-technical ones, can deliver their technology in just three months without seeking any external funding.
NEW RESULTS
Hyper-lean startups can develop prototypes of their technology for around $2500, and full versions of it for less than $10k, a fraction of what it would cost otherwise.
WHAT MAKES IT POSSIBLE
Finding your Northstar. And then going for it. The truth is that there is a very limited range of outcomes with your startup and technology that will be successful for your users. We’ll teach you how to figure that out and then follow the most efficient path to get there.
Avoiding wasteful iterations. 95% of startups are going to go with some form of agile. And that’s fine if you’re well-funded and have the luxury to iterate indefinitely and figure things out. Otherwise, this is an approach that will fail most early-stage startups. Getting it right the first time is a far better way to go here — and how you will be able to deliver your technology as efficiently as possible.
Putting the right people in charge of your technology. (This means you.) This is one of the most critical pieces of the puzzle. You are the founder of your startup, and you need to take ownership of the product you are going to build and deliver to your audience and not depend on costly engineers or designers.
QUESTION AND ANSWERS
How do you keep startup costs so low? The short answer is by being hyper-efficient. But the real answer is right there above: find your Northstar and head directly for it. Don’t iterate trying to figure things out. And don’t depend on expensive “experts” to deliver your technology — you can do it yourself.
What’s your track record with this approach? None of our startups have required funding to develop their technology and go to market. And, in our first three traditional cohorts of 20+ startups, we’ve had two exits.
2. DELIVER YOUR FIRST REAl TECH.
(AND IN JUST three MONTHS.)
Old Way: BUILD AN MVP
This is standard operating procedure for most startups: building a Minimum Viable Product as a first release. Sounds like a good plan, right? You’ll decide, usually by committee, what needs to be in it. Hopefully, you’ll get it right, because…
OLD RESULTS
You’ll still spend a 100k minimum to do it. Only then to discover if you’ve built the right thing or not. The answer is usually, unfortunately, not. Which leads to cost overruns and the need to go back and try again (and again).
NEW WAY: USE AI
AI-powered MVPs represent an innovative approach to product development and technology releases. By leveraging AI's predictive capabilities, instead of trying to cater to every potential need of your audience, you can pinpoint the one key feature that matters most to them.
NEW RESULTS
This provide all sorts of efficiencies over traditional MVPs. Not only do they take just a fraction of the cost, but they can be delivered in rapid sprints, which means more and better early validation of your startup concept.
WHAT MAKES IT POSSIBLE
Deep discovery. Most startups build, validate, and then iterate to get things right. Our simple premise of validating first, then building, works much better. Why? Because most startups spend hundreds of thousands of dollars just so they can validate. This is an incredibly wasteful, costly, and unnecessary approach. We’ll teach you how to avoid it altogether by doing deep discovery first, finding the Northstar for your technology and product, and then aiming exactly for that.
Modeling your technology. This is another part of our secret sauce. We’ll teach you how to craft clear, concise, and complete blueprints and roadmaps for your technology and build strategic prototypes from them using the latest AI technologies.
How to find (and work) with the right engineering team. It’s hard to find good help, even with the plethora of development services and agencies that are out there. We’ll show you how to find the good ones.
QUESTION AND ANSWERS
I’m non-technical. Can I really do this? Don’t I need a technical co-founder? No. With our approach, you won’t need anyone technical on your team. Instead, we’ll teach you how to master developing technology yourself and working with the technical and design resources you need to deliver it.
Do you provide the engineers? We are not an agency or development firm, so no — but we will help you find optimal resources for you to work with.
3. GET YOUR FIRST SALES.
(THAT’s THE REAL DEAL HERE.)
Old Way: DO CUSTOMer INTERVIEWS
Sales are probably the last thing on most founders' minds, but the reality is that sales are what make the business world go round, and you are going to have to achieve sales if you are going to have a viable startup, not just a concept that sounds great.
OLD RESULTS
Having abstract conversations about a product or service you plan to offer someday will not get you anywhere with your audience—so good luck with that.
NEW WAY: SELL WITH AI
By leveraging AI-powered tools and capabilities, founders can gain a deeper understanding of their customers and create a more engaging and satisfying customer experience that will ultimately drive sales for their startups.
NEW RESULTS
Incorporating AI into the sales process is a smart way for founders to differentiate their businesses, gain a competitive edge, and achieve growth.
WHAT MAKES IT POSSIBLE
Building on your successful product. Now that you’ve built the first version of your technology and validated that it genuinely delivers value to your audience, your job making sales just got a lot easier. You’ll have stories to tell, successful use cases, and a factual basis for showing why your customers should buy your product or service.
Getting early adopters on board. Sure there may be a massive market for your technology, but you won’t be able to reach it if you can’t get your first users and customers on board.
Having those sales conversations. It takes a combination of both listening and speaking to turn a lead into a closed deal.
Asking for their business. When the time is right, ask them to pay and become paying customers.
QUESTION AND ANSWERS
I’ve never sold anything. Is that OK? The truth is that you have to start somewhere, and this is precisely where we want to get you going, with a great product to share with your audience. You’ll start with conversations and take it from there.
Do you provide the sales people? No, we don’t have a dedicated sales team to help your startup with sales — but we will help you learn the fundamentals so that you will learn how to begin ramping up your sales process, and sales team.
4. DISCOVER YOUR FIRST MARKETING CHANNEL.
(FOR SCALE AND GROWTH. YOU’LL NEED THAT TOO.)
Old Way: SPEND A FORTUNE ON ADS
After paying for costly engineers, this is where many startups continue blowing through cash: trying to attract an audience through paid inbound marketing on social media. It’s as much art as science, and chances are you will go through numerous iterations on this.
OLD RESULTS
You’ll spend hundreds if not thousands of dollars per week trying to figure out how to reach your audience. And even if you find them, chances are it won’t have good unit economics, or in other words, will cost too much.
NEW WAY: DISCOVER YOUR REAL REACH
AI-powered marketing can help startups gain a deeper understanding of their audience's behavior and preferences, enabling them to craft highly personalized and effective marketing campaigns in record time and at very low cost.
NEW RESULTS
Building on our success with product and sales, you can hone in on the language, messaging, branding, and channels that will get you on the right track to find out where your audience is, and how to convert them.
WHAT MAKES IT POSSIBLE
Messaging. We can’t underscore enough the value of messaging your audience. Everything from having a beautiful brand, simple, compelling messages that matter to them, and the social proof that you can help them.
Finding the right channel. Your audience is out there. We’ll help you figure out where and how you can reach them at scale.
Building a simple pipeline. You’ve probably heard of landing pages, but not like ours. We’ll have a strategic approach that will help early adopters come on board and help launch your sales.
QUESTION AND ANSWERS
What if I’ve never done marketing? That’s totally fine — we’ll give you the resources you need to get started and get traction.
Do you provide direct marketing support? In our teaching a man how to fish approach, we’ll train and help you learn how to do it yourself.
5. GO TO MARKET.
(YOU’RE REALLY READY NOW.)
Old Way: Try to find pmf
This is where almost all startups continue to fail even after they’ve launched: struggling to find product-market fit and having a never-ending battle to raise funds, build technology and connect with their audience.
OLD RESULTS
You’ll spend $100k minimum on building your product, only to struggle to find product-market fit. Plus, you’ll have a never-ending battle to raise funds so you can re-launch your technology after you fail to go to market.
NEW WAY: BUILD ON YOUR SUCCESS
If you’ve built your first product, closed your first sales, and discovered your first channel for scale and growth, then you’ve just proven your startup concept is for real. And that provides you with some amazing possibilities.
NEW RESULTS
Demonstrate what you’ve achieved to angel investors and VCs to get funding. Or apply to top-tier, highly competitive accelerators, and have a real shot at getting in. The sky’s the limit.
WHAT MAKES IT POSSIBLE
Developing technology. Even if you are non-technical or a first-time founder, you can do this without investors.
Selling your product. Just having something real (and valuable) to sell to your audience puts you light years ahead of other startups.
Discovering channels to reach your audience. This is critical to growing and scaling your business. We’ll show you how.
QUESTION AND ANSWERS
This seems like a lot. Can I learn it all in your program? Our program is very fast paced, but also focuses on efficiency, to the point of being hyper-efficient. If you are willing and able to learn and work, we’ll show you how.
What’s your track record with this approach? In three traditional cohorts, we’ve helped over twenty five startups, and had two successful exits (so far). Check out our case studies to see what we mean.
JUST FOLLOW THESE STEPS:
BE HYPER-LEAN AND USE A.I. to DEVELOP NEW TECHNOLOGY. GET YOUR FIRST CUSTOMERS. DISCOVER CHANNELS FOR SCALE AND GROWTH.
THAT’s how YOU CAN LAUNCH YOUR STARTUP IN JUST 3 MONTHS.
NO INVESTORS REQUIRED.
SO Here are YOUR optionS
TRY TO GET FUNDING. BUT IT’S NEARLY IMPOSSIBLE FOR EARLY-STAGE STARTUPS AND FIRST-TIME FOUNDERS.
To get funded, you'll need to spend months or years building and iterating to create a solution that might appeal to investors, and just that can cost 100s of thousands of dollars.
APPLY TO “ELITE” ACCELERATOR PROGRAMS. BUT THEY’RE even HARDER TO GET INTO THAN THE IVY LEAGUE.
To get into an accelerator, you’ll need to spend weeks working on each application, only to face the reality that many of them have just a less than one percent admission rate.
USE A.I. TO DELIVER YOUR TECH. GET YOUR FIRST SALES. AND DISCOVER YOUR FIRST CHANNEL FOR SCALE AND GROWTH.
ALL WITH NO INVESTORS. AND IN JUST threE months. here in the vertical accelerator.
EARLY-STAGE STARTUPS AND NON-TECHNICAL FOUNDERS:
THIS IS FOR YOU.
vertical CASE STUDIES: THE EXITS
One Greek. $8K AND 3 MONTHS TO LAUNCH. 330K USERS AND AN EXIT In ONE YEAR.
The OneGreek Cinderella story started in May 2015, when founders Sam Garst and Gavin Glatting, two fraternity brothers and graduates of the University of Arizona, decided to double down on their vision to create a new app targeting the Greek college market.
With limited bootstrap funding and a need to use their resources wisely, they engaged Go For Vertical to help them create their technology.
Three months and $8000 later, they had built and launched the first private social network for the fraternity and sorority system in the US.
These driven founders then scaled the platform to over 300k users in 9 months, joined the Capital Factory accelerator in Austin, TX, and were acquired just three months later, precisely the type of amazing outcome that every startup aims for.
While we can’t take credit beyond training these first-time founders in Vertical, their use of its strategic product development and unique ability to deliver technology releases with hyper-efficient resource utilization was the catalyst that launched their run to the top.
Here’s what happens when you work with us.
You can forget about needing technical co-founders or investors.
You will learn how to deliver your technology and go to market in just three months.
You will be able to validate your startup business concept with a real product, your first sales, and your first marketing channel.
You will avoid costly missteps like hiring expensive engineers first and then figuring out how to launch.
You will be able to get rid of your high-rate, bill-by-the-hour digital agency.
You will get sh*t (stuff) done.
You will feel empowered, confident, and motivated.
HERE’S YOUR GUIDE TO THE
VERTICAL accelerator PROGRAMS
basecamp
Vertical starts with you here at the beginning, in our first accelerator program, BASECAMP. It’s where you’ll get the 30-thousand foot view of our process, all while learning new foundational building blocks, like systems thinking, mind mapping, and mastering features.
CLIMB
Then in our flagship CLIMB program, we’ll show you how to use A.I. to quickly deliver the first version of your technology and launch your venture with that critical foundation in place. It starts with building a strategic prototype then testing and validating it with your target audience. If you’re successful, then you’ll be able to get your first customers and sales, and discover your first marketing channel for scale and growth, all without technical co-founders or investors.
SUMMIT
Finally, in our masterclass program SUMMIT, we work with more advanced startups that have already launched but are struggling with their technology, marketing, or sales. It’s a widespread problem and how most early-stage startups fail —it’s impossible to grow and scale when these three things aren’t working. So in SUMMIT, we use A.I. to optimize these critical business processes and get your startup ready to grow as a sustainable business, to have an exit by micro-acquisition, or to be well-positioned for venture capital.
THIS IS WHAT YOU GET WHEN YOU JOIN THE VERTICAL ACCELERATOR.
ON-DEMAND LEARNING
We get you through the accelerator as fast as you can go.
You’ll get access to our exclusive online accelerator program sessions available around the clock 24x7x365. It’s structured into fast, easy-to-learn sessions that you can work into your busy schedule.
GROUP WORK SESSIONS
We provide direct access to the answers you need.
We also have three weekly Zoom work sessions hosted by G4V CEO and Founder Ged Cruz. It’s where you can join your fellow accelerator members, ask questions and get answers in a supportive group setting.
REAL DOCUMENTATION
We provide the resources you need to get the job done.
Our sessions also have accompanying documentation covering all of the foundational knowledge and capabilities you will be learning. You can read it all online or download it as PDFs.
1-on-1 coaching
Learn even faster with direct training with our team.
Our curriculum and assignments give you everything you need to reach critical milestones and deliver your technology. And you can do it even faster with our direct, 1-on-1 coaching, customized to meet your goals.
PRACTICAL EXERCISES
It’s more than just knowledge: you’ll learn fundamental new skills.
Once you hit a critical mass on the learning side, we want you to put your new knowledge to work right away by building the Vertical scaffolding for your technology. We provide the tools and step-by-step guidance.
EXPERT FEEDBACK
Our team of Vertical Consultants is here to help you succeed.
As you complete your Vertical tasks, you can submit them to our team for expert review and feedback. We’ll get back to you within 24 hours (and usually the same day), so you can move forward quickly.
ARE YOU READY TO Go FOR VERTICAL?
here’s what YoU’ll learN IN JUST OUR FIRST ACCELERATOR PROGRAM:
SYSTEMS THINKING
This skill alone will become a major game-changer for how your team brainstorms and utilizes their deep domain expertise.
Value: $10k
MIND MAPPING
You’ll develop the exact blueprints you need to quickly and efficiently deliver high-value technology to your audience.
Value: $5k
MASTERING FEATURES
You’ll learn how Vertical provides the same benefit of having a dedicated business analyst on your team without the salaried price tag.
Value: $10k
It’s the equivalent of $25k in funding to launch your startup.
AND OUR BASECAMP PROGRAM IS COMPLETELY FREE.
THE VERTICAL technology ACCELERATOR. LET’S get you launched.
OUR THREE ACCELERATOR PROGRAMS. ONE-ON-ONE coaching. GROUP WORK SESSIONS. REAL DOCUMENTATION. PRACTICAL TASKS. EXPERT FEEDBACK.
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS.
Can I afford this? I don’t have any funding yet.
Yes! Our introductory BASECAMP program is entirely free of charge, and our flagship CLIMB program costs substantially less than other accelerator programs.
And it’s all specifically geared towards bootstrapping your startup to launch. Using Vertical, you can typically get strategic prototypes completed for < $2.5k and full app releases for as little as $10k.
Or you can have a technical co-founder on your team or learn no-code development and deliver your technology for at no cost. The latter isn’t required — it’s just another way to get your product to market, even with no funding.
How long DOES the vertical accelerator TAKE?
Our flagship CLIMB program has weekly sessions and goes for three months, with a very accelerated curriculum. Get ready to work hard and have things move fast. And our premier masterclass SUMMIT is a year-long immersive program for funded startups.
I’m a COMPLETELY non-technical founder. Will this STILL work for me?
Absolutely. Our accelerator program has been specifically designed with non-technical founders in mind.
Do I need a team or OTHER co-founders?
Not at all. The program works well with either solo founders, or teams. As a founder, it’s about training you and providing learning around key startup skills. If your team is on board, then likewise, plus it becomes part of the culture of your startup and how it approaches building tech and launching new ventures.
I’m already very busy. How much time WILL I need to dedicate TO THIS?
Our weekly CLIMB cohort sessions last around two hours. You can attend live or if you can’t make it for some reason, watch the recording of the live session afterwards. We recommend you attend in person every time to get the most out of the program. You can also join our weekly group work sessions to help accelerate your experience even further.
What’s Go For Vertical’s track record?
Since launching in 2015, we’ve helped more than two dozen startups in four cohorts, and of those, two have had successful exits (OneGreek and Audivity). That’s in addition to our roster of enterprise and social venture clients.
DOES GO FOR VERTICAL TAKE EQUITY?
In our BASECAMP and CLIMB programs we do not. The whole idea is for you to be able to launch your startup without external funding or investors, or giving up equity in your startup.
We’re still interesTED in securing funding. Can you help?
Successfully completing our program puts you in a much better position to secure funding. And we’re happy to help you work with investors or other accelerator programs to help you get there.