Four startup hopefuls addressed a crowd of industry experts, venture capitalists and private investors at StartupCamp 6 on Thursday as part of ITEXPO (News - Alert) West in Austin. The founders of these communications startups pitched their business models to a panel of judges, in the hopes of securing investment funds that will help propel their businesses forward and expand their market presence.

Dave McLaughlin, CEO of video messaging business Vsnap, pitched his company’s business model to the panel and audience, and said that businesses are lacking more meaningful ways to connect with customers. Since email and text are usually impersonal, Vsnap has developed a way for businesses to send short video messages as a more personal alternative to email or text.

According to McLaughlin, customers are 33 to 41 percent more likely to take action when you reach them via Vsnap compared to email or text.

The central theme of McLaughlin’s pitch was personalization. He said a Vsnap feels more personal and more special than a text communication, and captures tone and emotion and enthusiasm and authenticity (and lots of other non-verbal communications) in a way that actually translates – which text and email can’t do.

“We think that businesses are trapped in text. In all those little interactions in the sales process and post purchase, businesses seem to be stick in email,” McLaughlin said. “Text doesn’t capture emotion and how we build trust and form feelings and shape our buying decisions. If you are not creating an emotional connection with the customer, you will experience churn.”

A Vsnap video is 60 seconds long and there’s nothing to download so businesses just need an Internet connection and a camera on their computer, smartphone or tablet.

“We give you an easy little system to record share and measure video messages as a more personal; more rich alternative to email or text,” McLaughlin said – hence the “Vsnap.”

He likened a Vsnap to the modern equivalent of a handwritten note – since it captures the tone and enthusiasm of the message – and is better than email or text because it’s measurable.

The Vsnap business model also sits on top of device adoption and mobile video consumption, customer-centric management and app ecosystem platforms, McLaughlin added.