(Orange County Register, The (CA) (KRT) Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge) SANTA ANA, Calif. _ Startup YouMail has a gee-whiz application in a market abounding in gee whizzes.

Its founders hope to move beyond fad to must-have status. That means standing out in a crowded market without billion-dollar ad budgets.

Few have heard of YouMail. It just launched its beta test at the end of September. And the company has just spun off from Zeacom Inc., a company that specializes in software for call centers.

YouMail allows cell-phone users to replace their standard voice mail with a unique message for each caller. If your boss calls, she hears, "Hello, Ms. Smith, I'm busy making money for the company, but I'll call you right back." If your golfing buddy calls, he hears, "Brian, our tee time is 7 a.m. Saturday."

If that were all YouMail offered, it would be in the class of ringbacks, which replace the ring a caller hears with a recorded message until the phone is answered or regular voice mail picks up.

That's not a bad market. Americans alone spend $300 million to $400 million on ringbacks and distinct ring tones, YouMail's chief executive, David Key, said.

But YouMail, which is based in Irvine, Calif., strives to move to the next level by improving cell-phone voice messaging with a growing array of services to manage, save and share messages both by phone and computer e-mail.

Those ambitions, and the goal of raising millions of dollars from equity investors, depend on multiple levels of marketing research, Key said.

"YouMail is a consumer product reaching a new market, so we spend a huge amount of time assessing customers," he said. "Our initial target is Gen Y (people age 16 to 26), but then the market will tell us what's next."

Key, who is also chairman of Zeacom, is no novice to startup ventures. He was the second employee at FileNet, a Costa Mesa software company recently acquired by IBM (News - Alert), and chief executive of FieldCentrix, an Irvine software company for which he raised $36.8 million in venture capital.

Here are some of the ways he and the marketing vice president, Ken Brickley, are collecting market research without spending a lot of money:

They brought a bunch of Generation Y cell-phone owners together, paid them $100, fed them pizza and asked what they thought of YouMail.

"Eighty percent loved it," Key said.

Such gatherings are great for gauging initial enthusiasm for a product or service that tells a company whether to move forward, tinker with the idea or scrap it, Key said. But details, such as what they would pay, are often unreliable.

YouMail has groups of MBA students at UCLA and UC Irvine doing quantifiable surveys to gather more research about such details, Brickley said.

The company tested YouMail with about 100 relatives and friends since July.

"With a consumer product, it's vital that they get what you do, and everyone gets it right away," Key said. "Then we get feedback how to make it better because usability is key."

On Sept. 26, YouMail started offering free trials to the public at its Web site, www.youmail.com. Users give some information about themselves so YouMail can do even more market research about who is using the service, how it's being passed along and how to improve the application.

YouMail has gotten good Internet buzz. A recent Google (News - Alert) search found 47,000 references.

The company can track how users hear about YouMail and how usage is spreading geographically and by demographics _ called viral marketing. So far, 40 percent of the users are younger than 26, 40 percent are 27 to 39, and the rest are older.

Key and Brickley also use the sign-up information to contact users to solicit suggestions and feedback.

Also, "we're tracking whether people tire of it," Key said. "That's why we're continually adding innovations. We want to get to the place that people won't let us take it away."

While use is currently free, in January, YouMail will try a couple of revenue models. Customers will be able to choose to get the application free if they listen to brief commercials when checking their voice-mail messages. Or they can pay a monthly subscription fee, probably around $5.

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Company: YouMail

Address: 2485 McCabe Way, Irvine, Calif. 92614

Phone: 800-374-0013

Web site: www.youmail.com

Parent company: Zeacom Inc., creator of contact management applications, founded in New Zealand in 1995.

Type of business: Suite of cell-phone voice-mail applications including custom messages for each caller and the ability to save or forward voice mail by e-mail.

Officers: David Key, chief executive; Kenneth Brickley, vice president of marketing.

Purpose: A separate company is better able to raise venture capital, also to grow without taking resources and focus from parent company.

Fundraising plans: Raise $1 million in equity investment in December and then $5 million to $6 million in 2007.

More information: Hear a podcast interview with David Key by Tech Coast Angels OC President Frank Peters at www.thefrankpetersshow.com.

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(c) 2007, The Orange County Register (Santa Ana, Calif.).

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PHOTO (from MCT Photo Service, 202-383-6099): wrk-yourbiz

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Copyright 2006 The Orange County Register