Toronto-based QuickTapSurvey, which has been developing B2B survey apps since 2010, managed to snag two wins in a global competition for consumer and business apps.
At the Tabby/Mobby Awards for business, which celebrate the best tablet and smartphone productivity apps respectively, QuickTapSurvey became the first Canadian company to win an Android award for best phone app for in-the-field and data collection. It also managed to win best iPhone app for in-the-field and data collection.
“We’ve done everything we can in the last five years to nurture a culture of innovation and push ourselves beyond our limits,” said company co-founder, Ravin Shah. “There were times we thought we wouldn’t make it, yet here we are.”
Shah credits the company’s strategy of hiring young tech talent as part of its success—citing computer science programs at the University of Waterloo as a significant source of talent.
In 2013, back when QuickTapSurvey was TabbleDabble, the company nearly shut down after failing to make a profit while running the business out of Shah’s parents’ basement. After signing GoodLife Fitness as its first major client, luck for the company started to turn around. With the Tabby/Mobby win, QuickTapSurvey finds itself in good company, as past winners of the awards include Disney, The New Yorker, and Adobe.
Currently, QuickTapSurvey the highest-rated survey app in the Apple App Store.
“We immediately recognized the value of the QuickTapSurvey app for mobile data collection and surveys,” said the Tabby/Mobby Awards judging panel. “The app is beautifully designed, structured with the end user in mind, and we were especially impressed by the SurveyMonkey integration.”
As a fully bootstrapped startup that hasn’t relied on venture capital funding, Shah credits the company’s strategy of hiring young tech talent as part of its success—citing computer science programs at the University of Waterloo as a significant source of talent. Co-founders Shah and Tishan Mills are former University of Waterloo computer science classmates.
While QuickTapSurvey made significant wins, other Canadians in the competition included Vancouver-based cloud accounting company Kashoo, which took a Mobby Award for best small business tool for iPhone, while Bombardier’s Challenger 650 platform took home the Tabby win for iPad sales. The Vancouver-based Control app and Toronto-based TouchBistro were also finalists.