You have to pick a registrar before you've sold a thing
Domain, hosting, email, payments, analytics. A dozen options each, a different login each, and someone on a forum with a strong opinion about every one of them.
Founder support ยท Albany, New York
Launch the business. Keep the keys.
Situated Strategies is a founder support concierge. Olivia Mata sits down with someone launching their own thing, works out what it actually needs, and builds it with them, from the domain to the app store. When it runs, every login is yours.
Four stages of a launchPress a pin for what each one actually involves.
Where launches stall
Founders don't stall on the idea. They stall on the logins.
The registrar, the email host, the payment processor, the app store account. Each one is a decision, a form and a password, and none of them is the business.
Nobody asks how the orders actually come in
Agencies sell packages and freelancers build the brief. Nobody sits in the shop first to watch what happens when a customer walks up.
The password left with the last person
A surprising number of founders can't log in to their own website. When whoever set it up moves on, so does the password. If someone else holds the keys, you're renting your own business.
What working with Olivia looks like
Watch. Plan. Build.
The order matters. Nothing gets built until it's clear how your business already runs, and nothing gets handed over until you can run it yourself.
She watches you work before she touches anything
How an order comes in, who answers the phone, what gets written on the whiteboard. Her training is in ethnomethodology and conversation analysis, the study of how people get things done together in real time. It turns out to be exactly the right way to decide what software should do for you, and what it should leave alone.
She writes down what to build, and what not to
A roadmap of what to build now, what can wait and what you'll never need. Every deliverable is named up front, so nothing gets built halfway through just because it was possible.
She builds it and gives you every password
Every account is opened in your name and ends up in your hands, with a walkthrough so you can run it without calling Olivia.
The Watch step, on the page
What the first call sounds like.
Set the way conversation analysts set transcripts: numbered lines, pauses timed in seconds, overlaps marked. It plays as you scroll. The margin is what Olivia hears.
(0.4) a pause, in seconds · (.) a beat · [ talk overlapping · a cut-off word-
Illustrative. A composite of first calls, not a client, and nobody's actual words.
- 01FDRso the website's the main thing. I just need it up.
- 02OLIokay. (0.4) how does an order come in right now,
- 03like today, if someone wanted one.
She doesn't take "the website" as the problem. She asks for the record: what happens today, in detail.
- 04FDRthey text me. (.) or Instagram. mostly Instagram.
- 05OLIand then where does it go.
- 06FDR(1.2) my notes app? and I screenshot the- [the payment
- 07OLI[the payment. okay.
A 1.2 second pause before "my notes app." That pause is the business. The order book is a notes app and a camera roll, and nothing online knows about either.
- 08OLIso the first thing isn't the website. the first thing is
- 09one place the orders land that isn't your phone.
- 10FDRhuh. (0.6) yeah. yeah, okay.
The roadmap just wrote its own first line. The website comes third.
Three sizes, flat prices
Pick the amount of help you want.
Every tier starts by looking. They differ in how far Olivia carries the build before she hands it back.
Basic
A good look and a written plan
$250flat
For founders who know what they want to launch and need to know what it takes.
- A working session on how your business runs today
- A written roadmap: what the project should have, and what it could have
- Tool and account recommendations, with the reasons
- A plan you can hand to anyone, including Situated Strategies
Standard
The plan, plus a prototype you can click
$450flat
For founders who want to see it before they commit to it.
- Everything in Basic
- A working prototype of your website or app
- Marketing and brand strategy consulting
- A clear list of what it would take to finish
Premium
Built, set up and handed over
$800flat
For founders who want it done properly, then handed over.
- Everything in Standard
- Brand concept, website build and setup
- Domain, DNS, email and backend
- SEO and AI-search optimization
- Every account in your name, plus a handoff walkthrough
Her own launches
Olivia has launched six of her own.
Every product here was scoped, built, set up and shipped by the person you'd be working with, under Situated Strategies LLC. They're the practice runs for yours. Flip a card for what each one took.
Have Another Cherry
Live- Domain
- Site
- App
- Payments
- Store
- Support
- Source
Expense sharing for households that keep separate accounts.
What it took
Marketing site, web app, two app stores, subscription billing, support inbox, privacy and terms, analytics with consent. The first full launch, and the one most of the method was learned on.
Touchward
Live- Domain
- Site
- App
- Payments
- Store
- Support
- Source
A tap reward app with real haptics. Free, with one unlock.
What it took
Site, iPhone and Android apps, a one-time unlock, support and privacy pages, public source code under the MIT License. The small one, on purpose.
Making Moves
Shipping- Domain
- Site
- App
- Payments
- Store
- Support
- Source
Moving-kit dinnerware sold direct from Albany.
What it took
A shop with Stripe checkout, shipping and returns policy, product listings and photography, conversion tracking, and a real supply chain behind it.
Codaptable
Live- Domain
- Site
- App
- Payments
- Store
- Support
- Source
Practice hard conversations with the people you find hardest to talk to.
What it took
A web app with two AI characters, one who plays the other person and one who coaches your reply, plus the marketing site, sign-in, subscriptions, a support inbox and a sourced knowledge base behind every move. Practice, not therapy.
Oldie
In development- Domain
- Site
- App
- Payments
- Store
- Support
- Source
A care tracker for senior dogs.
What it took so far
The site, the care guides, the brand and the pricing plan are live. The app is in development for iPhone and Android. The best example of a roadmap done first.
Cartographer
Open source- Domain
- Site
- App
- Payments
- Store
- Support
- Source
Turns coding-agent session history into the story of a build.
What it took
A developer tool with a site, install scripts for three operating systems, documentation and a public repository. Proof that launching software is not only for consumer apps.
Who you'd be working with
Olivia S. Mata
Ph.D. candidate in Communication at the University at Albany, SUNY, where her research is in ethnomethodology and conversation analysis. By day she implements software for restaurants, which means putting new systems in front of busy people who have to get it right the first time. She founded Situated Strategies in Albany in October 2025 and has shipped six products of her own since.
Before you ask
The questions that come up on the first call.
Who picks the tools?
You do. Olivia brings the comparison, the reasons and the costs, and she has no stake in which one you choose. A choice you understand is the one you'll keep running after she's gone.
Why would a conversation analyst set up a business?
Because setups fail at the handoff, in the ten seconds where someone says "wait, which login was that?" Olivia is partway through a doctorate on moments like that, and spent twelve years in restaurants living them.
What happens after the handoff?
The accounts are in your name, the passwords are in your hands, and you've had the walkthrough. The point was always that you can run it without calling anyone, Olivia included.
Who shouldn't hire her?
Anyone who wants to be told their first idea was right. She looks at how the work actually happens before she recommends anything, and sometimes what she finds is inconvenient. She'll still tell you, kindly, and probably with a chart.
Start here
Tell Olivia what you're launching.
A short form, then a real conversation. Bring the idea in whatever state it's in. Nobody needs a pitch deck, and nothing is owed until you've seen a plan you like.