Drew Wentzel

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Crowdsouring Logo Design

noreply@blogger.com (Drew) — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 23:44:00 +0000

The new logo design for webin4.com has been chosen and the new site design is well underway.

I was pretty suprised by the general calibre of the logo designs, out of the several hundred we received the majority of the entries were excellent.

Some where a bit amateurish but I would highly recommend using 99Designs to run a logo competition for something like this.

Logo Design for Webin4.com

noreply@blogger.com (Drew) — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 05:23:00 +0000

We are currently doing a rebranding and simplification of our webin4.com website and we are using 99 Designs to 'crowd source' the logo design.

See our entries so far for our logo design competition

This will be the third redo since the site started last year and we are using the feedback from customers to do so.

It's a long process to get a website like this right and properly off the ground.

The design finishes next week and we are really excited by the designs so far!

It's really hard both explaining what you want for a logo let alone choosing a logo from the designs. Generally for clients we just get given a logo and we design around it or for it, but having our own logo designed is a far more challenging experience.

Quoted in Business Technology Article

noreply@blogger.com (Drew) — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 14:30:00 +0000

A few months back I was quoted in a business article about Google and yahoos offer for 'free' credit towards online Ads and what I thought of this both from my own business and my clients.

I am strongly for online advertising on Google for many of our client's businesses.

For example one of our primary markets Florists have huge success in online advertising for their websites with Google Adwords and I strongly recommend these clients use these marketing channels.

Flowers have an immediacy need, someone needs to send flowers for an event, birthday, wedding, funeral etc they turn to Google type in 'flowers delivered sydney'.

This potential customer then has a very high likelihood of completing the transaction on the website provided the site looks good (works obviously) and the price is right.

The same thing with plumbers, electricians etc, people have a need specific right now need, and Search Engine Advertising is great for that.

But things like websites (that we sell) there is less of an immediate need, sure we do get clients from searching the web and doing web searches for eCommerce Packages etc, but when you have to bid 20 / 30 / 40 dollars a click through for some of the popular keywords you place some serious thought into how much the actual customer acquisition will cost you.

We have also had a multi faceted marketing strategy:

Advertising;
Referrals
Cold & warm calling;
Direct Marketing;
eMail Newsletters; and
Search Engine Optimisation.

If I was selling something with an immediacy need I would be more prone to using Paid Google Advertising, however I would not seriously consider using Yahoo for the same, as there is just not the same traffic from the site.

By the same token though if you are going after huge awareness and customer acquisition phase and you have cash flow, the PPC and Google Adwords will do wonders for your business.

Read the article here

Giving Away Free Stuff to Small Business

noreply@blogger.com (Drew) — Wed, 27 May 2009 01:19:00 +0000

One of the really interesting aspects of working with small business is their resistance to technology.

A recent blog entry I read suggested that this resistance is due to two factors:

The Upfront Costs
Inability to see the ROI on the costs

In the same article (which is American figures) it suggests that 70% of SMBs don't even have websites which is a truly sad indictment on SMBs in my opinion.

But I can see the point of the article, the high perceived cost of entry for a small business to get a website and the technical mumbo jumbo are huge barriers to actually getting a website.

The technology model that is suggested for small businesses is low cost of entry and higher subscription costs. We see it all the time in printers, where a brand new excellent colour laser printer may only cost $400, but the printer cartridges can cost up to $600 for a full set after the initial trial cartridges have been used.

In the software business this is in effect the Software As A Service SAAS model, where you use software online and pay virtually no up front cost only a subscription based on your usage.

We sell our services and products in effect as a SAAS, with Webin4.com being a truly virtual product, although we charge an upfront fee to get your website done but at a significant discount to the normal costs charged by bespoke designers.

The problem with technology for SMBs is it's complex, expensive and has for years over promised and under delivered.

Whilst I believe that a company without a website is truly archaic, even if the site is just a small group of pages with a mission statement and contact details. I can understand why small companies haven't taken the plunge yet.

Web 2.0 was all about democratizing the web and making it easier for people to contribute online and OWN the process.

I am not so sure about offering 'free' upfront websites with subscription costs, but it's an interesting model nonetheless.

Maybe in time I will change my mind though...

Tommorow is launch day of Webin4

noreply@blogger.com (Drew) — Mon, 11 May 2009 03:27:00 +0000

So tomorrow is the official launch of http://www.webin4.com.

I have started to do the media interviews and have scheduled the press releases for the morning.

I did my first media interview today and I really need a lot more practice on this whole media thing!

But I am eternally grateful for all the hand holding and help from my friend Gabriel who has helped shape and target the official media launch.

You will be able to read the press release after 8:30 AM tomorrow morning on http://www.webin4.com/blog/

I am really very excited about this!

The Webin4.com product has been a concept in my mind for a very long time indeed and it's now a reality and an amazing site!

I really have to thank everyone involved in the development it has just been such an amazing experience.

Based on the number of clients that are already buying the product and their feedback it truly is a revolutionary web solution for small to medium business wanting a professional website at an affordable price in just 4 easy steps.

Upgrade of My website to a Webin4.com website

noreply@blogger.com (Drew) — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 22:44:00 +0000

I have upgraded my website to use one of our popular products, Webin4.com - Websites in 4 Easy steps.

Webin4.com is a very exciting online product which merges the gap for micro business and small businesses to purchase professional websites that are customised to their needs at an affordable price.

For as little as $495 companies can choose a layout from our library and they are then guided through a process to tell us how they would like their site to be customised.

They can choose almost any of the templates and we will change the:

Colour Scheme;

Images;

Navigation;

Logos etc; and we will even uplaod their basic content for them.

This means that the end product often looks nothing like the base template and the business gets a professional website along with our very easy to use Content Management Tool Sliced Bread, all for an affordable price.

Webin4.com was created to fill the market need with professional SEO friendly websites that are affordable for businesses without having pay for a designer and developer.

We are finding that as new micro businesses start up, they really need a website that has all the bells and whistles, but they simply do not have the budget to have something built from absolute scratch.

My website for example is this template:

I liked the basic layout and the main image in the banner, but I didn't like the orange colour of the menu. So we changed it to a green whch I think works much better.

I didn't need Testimonials on the right hand side either so we just got rid of them.

The focus of my site is my blog, so we placed the blog on the front page and I can update my blog from within Sliced Bread, which means I no longer have to use the blogger interface, but I still use www.blogger.com as my blog engine.

Timing and Delivery

The site was converted and set up in less than one day, which is about the average time it takes to set up a www.webin4.com website.

Webin4.com is not a DIY Website Builder

When customers purchase a webin4.com website they are not buying a DIY Website Builder, they are buying a fully functional website that is set up for them with all the features available through Sliced Bread Content Management.

Website builders do not create websites that are easy to use, nor do they allow people to easily manage their website in the future.

The Market Experience

It's interesting that one of our largest growth markets is personal websites where people want a website just like this with a blog, biography or CV and a way to protect their name online.

It's becoming increasingly important to not only own your name as a domain name, but publish content to the web that is professionally savvy. Otherwise when people Google you they may only find fragmented information.

We will be launching a special 'Protect Your Brand' marketing offer soon which will give you:

Your own Domain Name * Subject to Availability

A Professional Webin4.com website

A Blogger.com blog account that you can post to from Sliced Bread;

Sliced Bread Content Management Tool so you can grow your website as you see fit; and

Twelve months free hosting!

All for $495! Thats a saving of almost $240 for the first year. It's a fantastic offer at a totally affordable price!

Monetising Support for Existing Clients

noreply@blogger.com (Drew) — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 22:25:00 +0000

Last year I posed the question of how to monetise support for clients who we are not hosting and who we have no established support contract.

Through this blog, I was contacted by a local business owner who had a novel approach to the problem.

They provided Information Technology Consulting clients and they asked their ad hoc clients to purchase Support Credits in advance. Then when the clients needed something done their support credits would be debited.

So after some careful thought we have implemented a similar solution for these clients and we built an online payment page and support logging system.

For use most support queries take between 10 - 15 minutes to resolve so we decided that we would charge in minimum fifteen minute increments.

At first I think clients were a bit affronted when we told them that they would have to buy support credits, but in the first couple of weeks we started to see more and more credits being purchased.

Now about about four months into the Support Credit System we have seen an interesting outcome.

For a lot of smaller clients they not only buy support credits for 'support' and general enquiries, they also think about what extra enhancements they would like on their websites and applications and pre-pay to have these done.

It's a win win for us and the clients, we get paid in advance by credit card, the clients can log in and view their support credit balance and we can easily track the support requirements.

AND we are making more money because for the small tasks that would be too time consuming to invoice and do it's all automated.

When the client purchases a support credit they are automatically sent a Tax Receipt so we don't have to, and we can easily import the financial information into our finance package for our accounting purposes.

We are also looking to expand the system to all of our clients including the ones who host through us. So we will be differentiating between general support enquiries and enhancements and updates to sites.

For example if a client calls or emails to ask how to do something on their site that's normal support which is included with the hosting fee.

However if they call in to ask us to make an enhancement to the site, or add in new functionality, rather then going through a whole invoicing process, we can tell them an estimate of the number of credits to do the task and then get them to purchase the credits.

To address the needs of clients for different levels of support and in recognition that sometimes a client may need immediate help or outside normal business hours support we have three zones for the credits:

Normal Business Hours - 1 Credit = 1 Hour
Between 7-8:30 AM and 5:30 - 7PM - 1 Hour = 1.5 Credits
All other times are 1 hour = 3 Credits.

It also has had the effect that clients no longer call on a Saturday or Sunday to ask us to some menial task, because in effect a 15 minute support call for something can cost 1 Credit.

Overall it's been amazing solution to a problem that could have had a really serious impact on the business, and because it's all published and available online through our website we can be slightly removed from the actual 'hard sell' process and let the clients themselves decided whether they do actually want what they are asking for.

Read about our suport credits on our website

Comments on Voip

noreply@blogger.com (Drew) — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 22:46:00 +0000

In a previous post I discussed the research I did for a VOIP PBX and deciding on the Linksys SPA 9000.

At first I was going to purchase and install the system myself, it looked relatively straight forward and easy.

But after a false start where I ordered the hardware from an online store and then had a hell of a time actually getting my order delivered I did some more reviews and got some quotes for the hardware and installation.

For the three phones plus the actual SPA 9000 I was going to spend about $800 on the hardware, but in the end after speak to Mark at BlueWolf I decided to spend the extra money and have them both configure and provide the solution.

I am very glad that I did choose the option of having someone else configure the system, it took them hours of work to set it up and I can only imagine how long it would take if I had done it instead.

We were originally going to use IInet for our voip, as we use IInet for our Internet access and I wanted to reduce the number of providers.

But after a series of false starts with the technical issues we changed to a company called comvergence for the VOIP.

The phone system has been in for a few months now and I am very happy with the solution. Mark at Bluewolf was a bit concerned that our ADSL modem would not be able to handle both the normal Internet and Voice traffic, but so far we have been fine.

The reduction in cost has been quite dramatic, our outgoing call charges have reduced to about $50 a month although our inbound 1300 number has gone up due to our increased incoming calls from interstate clients.

The only one problem we have is with voicemail and unanswered calls, but this is because I did not buy the extra module for internal voicemail.

If a call is unanswered at the moment it goes to our message bank externally which then emails me the voicemail.

There is an additional Linksys device that we can add in to the network that will allow us to have voicemail internally and I think in the next few months I will add this in.

Although the cost of the system went from $800 to almost $1700 the cost has certainly been worth it. From the obvious benefit of having a proper phone system where we can transfer calls internally etc it's fantastic, and the reduction in call costs has been superb.

Overall the system should pay for itself within about 8 months which is outstanding.

I would also certainly recommend Bluewolf if you are looking for a similar solution.

http://www.bluewolf.com.au/

How fast should you respond to a ales enquiry?

noreply@blogger.com (Drew) — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 23:53:00 +0000

I am a stickler for getting service when I request it.

I am also a stickler for answering sales enquiries as quickly as I receive them. After all if someone is asking to spend money and they want to know how much it will cost, half the sales process is already done!

I had an amazingly stupid non sales experience with another company just then.

I requested a quote for the IP PBX I was interested in four weeks ago.

Granted it has been Christmas and New Years in between, but I sent the email weeks before everyone went on their Christmas break.

I just had a sales rep call me to give me the price FOUR WEEKS LATE!

Sheesh talk about bad sales processes!

VOIP PBX solutions for small business

noreply@blogger.com (Drew) — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 16:30:00 +0000

In the last years I have moved office twice and over the life of my business I have had four formal offices not including working from home for the first couple of years.

In my first office I outfitted it with a PABX solution with 6 extensions and 3 rotary lines.

The solution cost about $3500 to install and was way over my needs at the time. In fact we never used all the extensions nor the features.

In my next two offices I decided to be sensible and only install the lines I needed and the phones I needed so I had one line in for voice and one line in for fax / Internet. It's expensive enough paying for all the line rentals alone.

The Telemarketers all used Skype for their outgoing calls and for a while we trialled SkypeIn numbers (local numbers that are routed to your Skype Account). But we found the quality of the service to be significantly lacking in quality. We also found that in an open plan office answering calls on your computer was counterproductive to getting work done.

Now as I have grown and I have more people working for me and we are on the phone more I have a much more complex telecommunications need.

At the moment we only have two lines, but they are single lines, we can't transfer between lines and we can't put people on hold.

We use a couple of disparate systems for telecommunications too. We used to use an external voicemail to email solution for the primary line. So when the line was busy or not answered a virtual answering machine would answer the line and then email me the call as an audio file.

Then in the last month we have been trialling a Live Operator Solution where an actual person in a call Centre answers the call and depending on the enquiry sends us an email with the call details or answers their basic questions on products, directs them to one of our websites and then emails us the details.

We also use a Virtual fax machine where our incoming faxes are actually sent to us as an email. So far I have never set up properly the email to fax solution on our network, but this is a priority for this month.

All these solutions are not expensive, but they are not overly cheap.

We generally spend all up between $400 - $600 a month on telecommunications excluding web services and access, so reducing this cost by a few hundred dollars a month will be a good starting point.

Of all these solutions the only one I am keen on keeping external to the business is the External Live Operator. The others I want to bring in house in an integrated telecommunications solution

In analysing my needs I stripped it back to a basic need for a telephone system with:

Multiple Lines in and Out;

Low Cost Calls to outbound numbers;

A single main line in for my 1300 Number;

Direct lines and phone numbers for individual staff members;

Voicemail for those lines;

Virtual faxing both in an out;

Physical fax machine for those times when a virtual fax is not appropriate;

Transfer calls between extensions;

Call Holding;

Future IVR (where the initial call is answered by a machine and then routed IE If you would like support press 1 etc);

Ability to route calls to external locations (sales people and telemarketers sometime want to work off site);

Initially 4 lines but expandable easily up to 16 lines.

So there are a lot of requirements I need and there is one big requirement to reduce costs and support the growth of the business.

Trying to research the VOIP PBX solutions out there is a task in itself, and even for a highly technical person there is just so much confusion.

In the end after hours and hours of research I have settled on an all Linksys solution set which provides everything I need in a couple of simple boxes and should be simple to install.

It's all kept together by a Linksys PBX SPA 9000 which acts as the PBX along with a couple of VOIP telephones a new router and a couple of VOIP lines through IINet.

The hardware will all arrive this week and the setup will start next week.

The hardware is cosing less than $800 and I am really keen to discover just how well the solution will work.

Doing the ROI on the money, I discovered I could save immediately about $200 a month on the various services we have not to mention the call costs which in some cases will be reduced to almost nil!

Not all of the above requirements are fulfilled straight away, but I wanted to install all of this in steps and get used to it first.

So once it's installed I will discuss the process involved in installing it and how it all works together.

How do you give support to clients?

noreply@blogger.com (Drew) — Mon, 29 Dec 2008 18:00:00 +0000

I am in a mix of a business, on the one hand I am a software company that develops and sells a software application for the web.

On the other hand I am a services company that provides a professional services, whether that be design of websites, design of online applications or advice.

Up until a year ago we did not provide web hosting for our clients, always preferring for someone else to do this for us.

But as we grew we realised that if something went wrong with their email or website, we are the first port of call not the Web Host.

So from about the beginning of 2008 we mandated that all clients had to host through us. It's good for us we have a regular income and if something does go wrong with the web hosting platform we get it fixed.

And it's fantastic for the client because they get the great service from us which is sometimes what they need.

Now this brings me onto my question, for a lot of our past clients, they are not on our web hosting platform and we have no ongoing financial contract with them.

I have a few clients from up to five years ago where their websites are still fantastic, they can manage and update the content themselves and they have no intention of re-designing their website because it works for them.

But on a semi regular basis these clients will call me and ask me to help with something. That something could be helping them set up a new email address, editing a particularly complex HTML page.

In most cases I can't charge for this stuff even though it eats up my time. Sometimes I push back and suggest that for what the client wants they will have to pay.

But I was accused by one client of not caring about the small business client, which is absurd since we sell to small business. But the conundrum I have is how do I cost effectively support clients who we have NO financial interest in from years ago who need a couple of minutes every now and then.

If they are on our hosting and support platform they are paying us to provide support, but if we completed the client years ago, and don't host them, then every minute we spend we are not getting paid.

It doesn't sound like much but if ten clients a week call in with small seemingly insignificant questions and each spend ten minutes on the phone, that's 100 minutes a week which is a huge chunk of time when we already work such long hours.

Yes sure we can potentially upgrade the client in a few years time, but that long tail approach does not help us in the short term.

It's a difficult question and I am yet to actually answer the question.

As often as I can I push back to other staff to provide the support of clients so I can concentrate on building the business.

But it does not answer the underlying question, how does my company get paid for this kind of support?

The balance between servicing clients and managing your time

noreply@blogger.com (Drew) — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 19:00:00 +0000

I have a lot of long term clients who have been with my company for several years.

Some are extremely small clients who I do a small discrete project every six months or so, whilst some are on contracts where we are paid a retainer for a specific service and support.

As my business has matured I have put more processes and procedures in place. One of the key aspects of my business strategy is that I have always treated my business as a BIG business.

That means time sheets, processes to follow, published Commercial Terms, contracts for Time & Materials projects and a clear understanding of how I allocate my time.

This also means that every minute of my time is precious to me as I am either charging out to a client, working on a strategic project or doing something that is building my business.

The problem with being a small business person and being 'available' on the telephone and in person is that some clients do take more time then others.

http://www.perrymarshall.com/perrys-greed/

Perry Marshall talks about this in a recent blog entry when he recounted an incident where after a workshop (where he was paid), a participant asked him to lunch so he could pick his brain.

Perry responded that sure he would have lunch, but he would charge his normal hourly wage.

This seemed to really incense the guy and he wrote a rather rude email to Perry.

This got me really thinking about this issue, because I have the same issue sometimes.

There are clients who are very well meaning and lovely, but the value of their projects now and in the future is quit low if none for me or my business.

Sure you could argue that they could refer a million dollar deal on to me, but the chances are very slim.

They want to chew through some stuff with me, and if I let it happen it can take many hours out of my week.

It is a really fine balance between managing your time effectively and essentially giving your time away fro free.

Let's be honest, if a client has a potential 20 thousand dollar project coming up I am going to give them more time than the client who spent 1000 bucks with us two years ago and is not planning on spending any money with us in the future.

The balance I have to seek is how I keep all my clients past and present happy, while managing my time effectively.

I do this by these days not answering the office phone line, and I don't give my mobile phone number out. And when my mobile does ring during the day I let someone else answer it.

My preferred method of communication is email for these sorts of clients and issues. I can skim though the email for the important stuff, respond with a couple of word answers on non important stuff or just say thanks received on stuff I need to know but don't need to really engage someone with.

Bottom line is that I am building a large scale business and my time and my staff's time is valuable.

I may not be a lawyer and charge in 5 minute increments but I do charge in 15 minute blocks for Time & Material Projects.

You know when I was a really small business I could afford to give all clients equal time, but now that I have grown if people want my time it has to have a cost effective payout for me and my business.

How do you manage this?

The True Cost

noreply@blogger.com (Drew) — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 20:30:00 +0000

The environment is probably one of the hottest topics AFTER the financial crisis.

But even though we working about the environment and talk about it endlessly, as a country we still do not DO as much as we talk.

Australian's still have a fascination and desire for their own house on their own block of land. The fastest growing areas in New South Wales are in the outer suburbs and are dominated by the McMansions.

A McMansion often denotes a home with a larger footprint than a median home, an
indistinct architectural style similar to others nearby, and is often located in
a newer, larger subdivision or replaces an existing, smaller structure in an older neighborhood. Wiki

It's this very specific push for McMansions on their own blocks which is actually costing the country more both economically and environmentally.

A new study suggests that per 1000 new homes the government actually indirectly subsidises the houses by $85Million dollars more than similar dwellings in a medium density area closer to the CBD.

Yes that's 85 Million dollars.

But that's really only the indirect costs and does not take into count the millions, no billions that these massive houses in outer suburbs will indirectly and directly cost over the the next 50 years.

Australia is in the midst of many crisis's, water we know about, but the energy crisis will soon be here too.

These huge houses costs a bomb energy wise because in the main they are not built to be energy efficient. They use air conditioning for cooling, they are not designed for the Australian Climate (even though their builders would disagree) and they are made to the lowest common cost.

This all sums up to their need for significant power for heating, cooling, lighting and living. Yes you can reduce the energy consumption by using energy efficient appliances and light fittings, but it's far harder to retrofit a McMansion to have overhanging eaves to prevent direct sun in summer, or improve natural air flow etc.

I think as a society we have to seriously look at our environmental foot print and the government needs to discourage the outer suburb McMansion, OR find ways to significantly reduce the impact through shared co generation power plants for each new sub division, public Transport, better environmental building standards etc.

I think though that since public transport costs billions and realistically we are unlikely to stop McMansions we need to concentrate on other ways to reduce the impact.

Saving Money in Technology Costs in Business

noreply@blogger.com (Drew) — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 21:00:00 +0000

One of the larger costs of setting up a business is technology, by technology I mean computers, software, telephones, faxes and printers etc.

Computers and software can run to thousands and thousands of dollars and you can sometimes STILL not be sure that you are not getting ripped off.

In keeping our capital expenditure down and saving money we follow a few simple rules:

Software

We do not use Microsoft Office, instead we use Open Office which is a free MS Office equivalent from Sun microsystems.

It will still open and manage all the normal office files like Excel, Word and PowerPoint and it;s free.

Download Open Office Now!

Where we do need support for software or there is simply no equivalent we use the real thing, things like Adobe Acrobat, Photoshop etc there is simply no equivalent in our business and it's simply a tool of the trade.

Hardware

As a general rule we buy Desk top PCs (minus screens) on ebay for about 20% of the price of RRP. We do however store all our networked data on a series of external USB hard drives rather than on local hard drives on the machine.

We do however buy good quality computer monitors for our staff.

So a full desktop computer with high quality screen sets us back about $400 in total, and if one of the PCs does fail we can replace it within 24 hours with another PC and all of the data is on the network rather than the pc itself.

With notebook computers though we buy new and we buy the best available within the budget because notebook computers are subject to far much more breakages than desktop PCs.

The trick with a computer is not so much the speed but the memory. These days anything less than 2gb of RAM is insufficient to run most business applications.

Faxing

Although we do have a fax machine in the office we actually tend to use virtual faxes and virtual fax numbers.

So when a customer sends us a fax it is emailed as a PDF document. This means we reduce the cost of having a dedicated fax line and even if we are not in the office we can still get faxes.

We also send faxes electronically too just like sending an email.

We use http://www.ozefax.com as our virtual telco provider and we have found them excellent to deal with!

So there we have a few simple tips on saving money with technology!

Suggested eMail Newsletter The Coolhunter

noreply@blogger.com (Drew) — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 21:07:00 +0000

I am a voracious reader of news, whether it be traditional media, blogs or email newsletters. One of my favorite newsletters is The Cool Hunter, a round up of the coolest concepts, designs and ideas.

In this weeks newsletter they look at packaging and how it affects consumers. I have to say that some of the packaging concepts they have found are purely amazing!

So take a journey over to Cool Hunter and read through the archives and then if you like join their email newsletter.

Top Lessons Learnt when starting a business

noreply@blogger.com (Drew) — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 22:49:00 +0000

I Have run a small micro business for the better part of seven years now I think I am uniquely qualified to make comment on the top tips to know when starting a small business.

Before starting the business I was a successful consultant, had an undergraduate degree and was doing postgraduate study.

I had read umpteen small business books about managing and starting businesses and thought that I knew what was involved.

So here are my top lessons that I learnt when starting a business:

Building a Market and and getting sales will take three times as long as you think
When factoring in expenditure double if not triple what you think it will cost!
If seeking funding double what you think you need and divide by four what equity you are giving up for the funding
If you need office space, try sharing an office with an established business first and then move once you have grown
Don't start a business alone, go into business with someone else.
And of course the number one lesson of all is cash flow is the most important thing you can look after!

I had read every single on of these lessons in every small business book I had ever read, but until it was me who was starting the business I had never understood the lessons.

But I suppose that's why they are called LESSONS!.

About Drew Wentzel

noreply@blogger.com (Drew) — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 22:41:00 +0000

Welcome to my personal website, I am an Australian Small Business owner in the web services / software industry, based in Sydney Australia with clients all over the world. My company enflexion provides cost effective web solutions through a number of different brands and products.

The brands include:


Providing cost effective website solutions for all business.	Websites in 4 easy steps for micro businesses wanting to grow	A full ecommerce solution specifically built for florists to sell online	The worlds easiest, scalable and robust website Content Management Solution.

I have a degree in Information Sciences with multiple majors from the University of Technology Sydney. In addition to running my own business for 7 years I have held roles in a wide range of industries including:

Government;

Not For profit;

Consulting and Commerce.