Wantrepreneur Wednesday! - (September 05, 2018) Entrepreneur |
- Wantrepreneur Wednesday! - (September 05, 2018)
- What tools or services are you using and love?
- $100k in one year selling hot sauce
- I've Got Free Digital Marketing Advice For Your Start Up + Quick PR Hack
- Help with on-the-go payment processing
- Has anyone succeded from the failure method?
- School Market Fair Ideas!
- What is your favorite closing question(s) to use when interacting with a potential client?
- What are the best website builders for 1 to 1 transactions similar to Uber?
- Opinions on Yelp ads required
- Community Supreme Bot (CSB) Official Release (V3) (Free Open Source Tool for Copping Supreme)
- Need advice regarding actions and sticking to plan.
- Management Consultant Blogging My Day-to-Day: Chapter 1
- SMLLC using buildings on property question
- Hard time getting started
- Entrepreneurs Please Help
- PSA: flat rate credit card processing rates aren't always the cheapest
- I have a business idea, but not a degree yet
- Writer, in search of work as an editor.
- What are the most important tools for your business?
- Talk to me about what you love and hate about the CRM you use?
- Finally breaking even and things just got really complicated and stressful. Could use some advice!
- My company is a month from launch! Let’s make you some soundtracks!
- Bad idea to invest half my net worth into a business?
- Serious issues with import/export duties/fees, how do I learn about them so I stop getting crushed by unexpected costs?
| Wantrepreneur Wednesday! - (September 05, 2018) Posted: 05 Sep 2018 06:06 AM PDT Please use this thread to ask any wantrapreneur questions. We do this to not overflow the subreddit with wantrapreneur questions, so please try to limit the questions to this weekly thread. Since this thread can fill up quickly, consider sorting the comments by "new" (instead of "best" or "top") to see the newest posts. [link] [comments]  |
| What tools or services are you using and love? Posted: 05 Sep 2018 04:56 AM PDT Whether it be for social media marketing, task management, employee payroll.. whatever. What tools or services do you really love? [link] [comments]  |
| $100k in one year selling hot sauce Posted: 05 Sep 2018 07:02 AM PDT Hey everyone - this is Pat from Starter Story - where I do interviews with successful founders on how they got started. Today, I have an amazing interview with Theo Lee, founder of KPOP Foods. Their mission is about bringing people together and uplifting spirits through Korean food. This is such a great interview. I know it's long, but I really do think it's worth the read. Here are some of the stats:
--- Hello! Who are you and what are you working on?Hi, my name is Theo Lee and I'm the co-founder and CEO of KPOP Foods. Today, the brand and story behind a company is critical for success and sustainability as consumers are driven towards companies and products making an impact. KPOP Foods is a Korean food company inviting people to discover and enjoy Korean flavors through its food products. Our approach is to become the Red Bull of Korean food by bringing together mainstream culture, art, music, and food. My co-founder, Mike Kim, and I are both Korean Americans and launched KPOP Foods because we wanted to build a Korean food brand that people could resonate with and embrace. Our mission was and continues to be about bringing people together and uplifting spirits through Korean food and flavors. When we looked at the Korean food companies in the market, we couldn't find one that represented this spirit, so we decided to do it ourselves. Our first product is KPOP Sauce, a Korean chili sauce based on my grandma's 70-year old recipe using Korean chili paste (aka gochujang). We debuted KPOP Sauce through a successful Kickstarter campaign last year in April that funded within the first eight hours of our campaign. We received Kickstarter's stamp of approval as "A Project we Love" and were featured as "A Project of the Day" and ended the Kickstarter campaign with nearly $40,000 from over 1,200 backers. In April of this year, we launched our second product, KPOP Sea Snacks, a premium roasted and all-natural seaweed snack made here in the US. While still fairly new, KPOP Sea Snacks is already an Amazon's Choice product and was featured in FabFitFun (a women's quarterly subscription box) and Pinterest's limited-edition, specially co-branded box called the P100. Most recently, we announced our new Head of Product and Product Development, celebrity chef, Chris Oh. Chris is developing several new sauces that we intend to launch in November and is also opening his network for opportunities in marketing, content, and partnerships. We're really excited to have Chris onboard and to be working with him! Since September of last year, we've generated nearly $100,000 in revenue, primarily all online through our website and Amazon. Our products have earned the coveted Amazon's Choice badge because they are unique and well -reviewed. We've entered over 90 specialty stores throughout the west coast and are currently raising an investment round to expand our distribution into major retailers. What's your backstory and how did you come up with the idea?Growing up in Korean American families, we were fortunate to be surrounded by Korean food all the time. However, along with the food, an important principle that was instilled in us was the connection between Korean food and family, friends, and fun. Mike and I met at business school at UCLA Anderson where we would take large groups of friends to Koreatown in Los Angeles to enjoy Korean food. Along with enjoying the food, our friends embraced the Korean culture and the energetic atmosphere. This is what sparked the idea for KPOP Foods. We wanted to replicate the sensory and social experience our friends had at Korean BBQ and share it with the world! I think a really important concept, especially for when just starting out, is being comfortable with launching things quickly. The UCLA Anderson community played, and continues to play, a major role in KPOP Foods. We took the concept and business plan for KPOP Foods through UCLA Anderson's entrepreneurial classes and startup program called Business Creation Option, a field study option required for graduation. Prior to business school, Mike served in the U.S. Army and I came from a finance and banking background so neither of us had any real experience in food nor marketing. Our classmates, professors, and other members of faculty were instrumental in advising and helping us during our Kickstarter campaign, which launched during our final quarter at business school, and connecting us to potential investors, advisors, and food industry professionals. If you'd like to learn more, I've actually written a LinkedIn post about UCLA Anderson's role in KPOP Foods. The Kickstarter campaign was key in validating our idea and giving us the confidence to pursue KPOP Foods full-time. But even before Kickstarter, we did hours of research, talking to CEOs and founders of other successful Kickstarter campaigns, running focus groups to test our brand story and variations of KPOP Sauce, and picking people's brains on ideas for our Kickstarter video. We also found a way to create samples by buying little bento box soy sauce containers shaped like pigs and filling them up with KPOP Sauce to send to our friends and people interested across the nation. The samples were great as we were able to send them in the mail, keeping costs low as we paid for everything ourselves with our savings and credit cards. This was also helpful in getting the awareness of our Kickstarter campaign out to people. As MBA students, we had significant student loans and were presented with opportunities to work at great companies, but thanks to our Kickstarter campaign, we were able to raise an initial investment round, allowing us to pay ourselves a minimum salary to cover rent, loan payments, and basic living expenses. This was our chance to build something on our own and work for something that we truly loved so we dove right in. Describe the process of designing, prototyping, and manufacturing the product.Getting the ingredients right The reason we started with KPOP Sauce was because one of the key ingredients, gochujang (Korean chili paste), is a staple ingredient in Korean cuisine. Additionally, my grandma used to send me bottles of her gochujang sauce and my friends absolutely loved it, putting it on their eggs, grilled chicken, burgers, hot dogs, noodles, rice, and more. Given the versatility, we thought it was the right product to start with – a flavorful sauce that people could incorporate onto foods they already eat. Along with that, gochujang can be difficult to use given its thicker texture (think peanut butter), so the sauce made it much easier to use or cook with. We used my grandma's recipe as a base and began tweaking things based on feedback. The most controversial ingredient turned out to be sesame oil – some people really liked it, others didn't. When we removed the sesame oil, people still liked the sauce, so we took it out. Packaging & Design We also had to figure out the packaging, namely the bottle, cap, and label. Based on research and our focus groups, we wanted to be in a plastic bottle, so we went online and looked for as many different bottles as possible and asked people for their thoughts. We also used these bottles during the focus groups to test usability and to see which one people naturally gravitated towards. For label design, we found a designer, who I previously worked with at a previous startup, to help mock up some label designs. We gave him our story, ideas, and mock images to use as a style reference. We eventually narrowed the label designs down to two options and received feedback from friends and people. We also posted the designs to social media and received a ton of engagement and comments through that as well. Next, we had to find a manufacturer, or co-packer, to make our sauce at scale. I remember calling 15 to 20 different manufacturers and not getting anywhere, especially since we didn't know how much we wanted to produce (time is literally money for manufacturers and since we hadn't started our Kickstarter campaign, we didn't know how much we needed to make in our first run). Finally, a co-packer we ended up working with, was nice enough to explain the process and offered to help. We learned that the first step was to find a food scientist to scale our recipe as things can quickly change when going from making small batches to hundreds of gallons. The food scientist would also help us with testing for shelf stability, analyzing the sauce for nutritional information, and submitting our application for the license to manufacture in California, otherwise known as a S-Letter. The person who explained the process to us sent over a list of potential food scientists - we were fortunate to find a food scientist through a friend of my uncle's. I had several calls with the food scientist and met with him to make sure it was a good fit and he turned out to be great, explaining to us certain issues and basic concepts. Finding suppliers While the food scientist focused on the product, we shifted our focus towards finding suppliers, namely for packaging (bottles and caps) and key ingredients. We were fortunate to find a packaging supplier that was also able to assist with warehousing as the minimum order quantities for the bottles and caps were well above our first production run. Furthermore, we were able to negotiate a structure such that we only paid for the bottles and caps delivered to our manufacturer. This saved us a ton of money as the minimum order quantities for our caps was 25,000, yet we only needed 6,000 for our first run. Alongside packaging, we also sourced a quality ingredient supplier that turned out to be in the same area as our manufacturer, keeping the transportation costs low. After several months, we received our S-Letter and were ready to do our first production run for approximately 6,000 bottles. We've since completed 4 more production runs for KPOP Sauce, each time making small tweaks to the recipe as we're always looking to improve. Chris is now working on developing several new sauces and we've already begun the development process and excited to launch the new products later this year. Describe the process of launching the business.Before launching our Kickstarter campaign, we made sure to have our website and social media accounts up and running. We bought the domain for kpopfoods.com through godaddy.com for less than $20 a year and used Shopify to build our website. In the beginning, we focused on building our social media accounts, mainly Instagram and Facebook. We used our website for credibility and a way to share our story while offering samples to promote our Kickstarter campaign. After fulfilling all of our Kickstarter orders on-time in August, we were ready to begin selling nationally through our website in September. We picked up a number of re-orders from our Kickstarter campaign in the first couple of weeks and also began testing Facebook and Google ads. In the beginning, we struggled to get conversions, leading to a higher customer acquisition cost than initially expected, however we learned a lot about our user flow and funnel. We've gone through countless iterations of our website to improve the UI/UX. In October, we entered Amazon through "Fulfillment By Amazon" (FBA) and this was when things really began to take off. We were fortunate to pick up a number of five-star reviews immediately from customers and Kickstarter backers, allowing us to become an "Amazon's Choice" product within the first week. We soon became the #1 new selling chili sauce on Amazon for the next three consecutive months. Since launch, what has worked to attract and retain customers?As we started to see high levels of conversions on Amazon, sometimes as high as 30%, we began changing our digital marketing strategy. Retargeting We were able to get clicks to our website at a very low cost per click, and thanks to some PR initiatives, SEO optimization, and content development (both video and blog articles), we were able to increase sessions to our website to 150 to 200 a day. We would then retarget our website visitors with Facebook ads, driving them to Amazon and continued to see high conversions. As we began talking to other CEOs and CMOs of food startups selling online, they mentioned that they were using the same strategy. The one downside to this strategy is that you can't collect customers' email addresses through Amazon - inhibiting your ability to retarget. While we've grown our Instagram account to over 10,000 followers, we've been using Instagram as a tool to partner with Korean restaurants and reach out to influencers we'd like to work with. We haven't seen a significant amount of conversions from campaigns with Instagram influencers, however these partnerships have been successful in growing our following, driving traffic to our website, and providing creative assets for our e-mails, website, and ads. YouTube We've had success partnering with YouTube influencers, but it's taken a lot of time, effort, and luck. When we first started cold e-mailing influencers, we didn't get many responses. If you've ever had experience selling anything, you know it's a numbers game and that was true here, but we really lucked out when Greg Mrvich, of Ballistic BBQ (230K+ subscibers), got back to us. He also resided in Southern California and was empathetic to our struggles as a newly minted startup. It also helped that Greg was a huge fan of Korean food. We sent him some samples of our sauce and the rest is history. He creates these amazing, mouth-watering videos featuring culinary BBQ masterpieces and we can't thank him enough for his help! Partnerships Along with YouTube influencers, we've been able to partner with other companies, such as subscription boxes leveraging our success on Kickstarter, online sales, earned media, and prior relationships. We use past partnerships as credibility to fuel the next one giving other parties multiple reasons to collaborate with us. We are honest in our communications, prompt in our responses, and detailed in our work. We use every success as a stepping stone to reach up and find better opportunities. We've partnered with subscription boxes such as Bespoke Post and BBQ Box, and each partnership has led to increased website traffic and new customers. Our latest partnership for KPOP Sea Snacks was with women's quarterly subscription box, FabFitFun, and Pinterest in their limited-edition, specially co-branded box called the P100, a box reflecting Pinterest's top trends for 2018. Partnerships like these can help in multiple ways from generating direct sales, increasing brand exposure, to acquiring a new group of potential customers. We see large influxes of website visitors at the onset of announcements and steady traffic for the duration of a partnership. We are generally able to cater to these new audience by creating unique landing pages or offering special discounts only offered to them. So how did we source these kickass deals? Apart from what I mentioned above about using accomplishments to get one deal, and then using that deal to source another, it comes down to goodwill and building relationships. Here's an example: Our Kickstarter success can be attributed to what we learned by reaching out to the founders of other successful campaigns. We paid that collaborative, sharing mentality forward by talking to anyone that reached out to us for Kickstarter advice or business advice in general. Months after helping one such person, that individual connected us to one of her friends, working at an amazing brand that just so happened to be looking for amazing Korean-inspired products. And voila! Relationships matter and have led to some of our biggest achievements. No matter how busy we are, I think we can all agree that we can spare 20 minutes out of a day to talk to someone or help someone out. Help other people out without expect anything in return Lastly, a new initiative that we've been focused on is email marketing. Through a platform called Dojo Mojo, we've been able to partner with companies to run giveaway campaigns and through just three campaigns, we've been able to grow our e-mail list by over 500%. While email marketing has always been great way to keep in touch with our initial customer groups to drive repeat purchases, gathering new emails is essential to widening our top sales funnel and increasing revenues. There are so many different objectives a company can hit with e-mail marketing (e.g., web traffic, referrals, conversions, education, etc.). The greatest part of e-mail marketing is that it is extremely cost efficient and targeted – we don't spend on advertising and we get prime placement in the mailbox of our would-be and existing customers. Specialty Retail Stores A specialty sauce distributor reached out to us after the completion of our Kickstarter campaign and we've been working with them to get our products into their network of specialty stores nationwide. These stores we're placed in are generally independent grocers (think mom-and-pop shops), but our experience has taught us much about selling in retail as we look towards expanding distribution. It's one thing to get into a retailer and another to ensure your products are selling in that retailer. Sell-thru in a store can depend on, but are not limited to the following: customer demographics, store location, product price points, promotions/discounts, and sampling. Our success in these stores have served as validation that we must expand our distribution in order to scale and take our company to the next level. How are you doing today and what does the future look like?Since September of last year, we've generated nearly $100,000 in revenue, primarily all online through our website and Amazon (about a 50/50 split in revenue by channel). We are currently in the middle of fundraising to expand our distribution outlets, develop new products, and hire new talent. Since February of this year, we've entered over 90 specialty stores throughout the nation and are now receiving interest from distributors and larger retail chains. We're also partnering with restaurants and coffee shops, such as Everytable and The Hive in Los Angeles. As mentioned previously, e-mail marketing has been showing promising signs. That's the name of the game for startups. It's a bunch of testing and finding out what's working and what's not. We now have a list of over 10,000 subscribers. We're constantly A/B testing variables such as day, time, content, subject line, and so on to improve our open and click rates. In product development, Chris is focused on launching 3-4 new variations of KPOP Sauce in the 4th quarter of this year. We're also looking into developing 2-3 new flavors of KPOP Sea Snacks to launch at the beginning of 2019. It's been exciting getting sneak peaks at the recipes in development and we can't wait to share them with everyone! For e-commerce, we target a gross margin north of 33% - the higher the better. This is absolutely necessary if we plan on expanding distribution to physical stores. Online, we don't get as many sales as we would if we were in multiple grocery stores, so an extra $0.75 per order, goes a long way. Secondly, our margins include shipping expenses that we incur as we provide free shipping for all our products (shipping is quite costly especially if you have heavy or bulky product!). Our online price for our products minus shipping expenses will generally set the suggested retail price (SRP) for our physical retailers. Traditionally, one could follow the 1/3 rule to expand distribution into physical retail stores. That is, 33% margin for you (the manufacturer), your distributor, and the end retailer. Today's retail landscape is rapidly changing, and many distributors and retailers are requiring higher margins as they're facing competition at an unprecedented level. While it'd be great to be able to do direct deals with retailers, until we have a suite of products or our own distribution network (hopefully one day), we must partner with distributors to scale. With the increase in distribution and launch of new products, our revenues are projected to grow quickly in the coming months and we're working on ensuring that we're operationally prepared. We also have a lot of plans for upcoming partnerships, content, and experiential marketing events. We're not just talk. We're out to prove we're not your average food brand. We're going to revolutionize the way people view and taste food in the consumer-packaged goods (CPG) space. Our vision is to be the premier Korean food company for America – that KPOP products be in every pantry across the nation. To get there, KPOP Foods will need to be the Red Bull of Korean food by bringing together mainstream culture, art, music, and food. Through starting the business, have you learned anything particularly helpful or advantageous?Cultivate a great team It's tough to go about it alone. Find a partner and build a team. I think one thing that truly helps is finding a great co-founder to work with. I'm incredibly lucky to have Mike as my co-founder and there is absolutely no way in possible I could imagine KPOP Foods being where it is today without him. While we are both very different in so many ways, the one thing that we share is a strong work ethic. We push each other to continuing fighting and overcoming setbacks and obstacles and having someone there with you is a huge relief. There have been so many times where I was tied up and had to leave things off with Mike and knowing that he'll take care of everything is paramount. Launch quickly Secondly, I think a really important concept, especially for when just starting out, is being comfortable with launching things quickly. Early on, it's hard to get everything perfect and you have to become comfortable with things being launching that may not be 100% perfect or may not be what you had initially envisioned. If you're constantly waiting for your product or service to be perfect, odds are by the time you're completely satisfied with it, you've exhausted your resources and missed out on the timing of your opportunity. Fail quick, learn quick. Reflect Lastly, I realize that at the early stages of building a company, this is very hard to do, but you should always try to find time to reflect on things to think of how you can improve or do something better. It's very hard to find time to do this, but I think it's very important for a number of reasons – you may realize that worrying about something wasn't worth your time at all or didn't have an impact on the business or you may find that if you had something slightly differently, there could have been a lot of new added value. This is also something good to do with your team as they're also likely in the middle of many different things and receiving their feedback and points of view may help you down the road as well. What platform/tools do you use for your business?After researching the various platforms businesses use for e-commerce, we found that Shopify was the best choice due to its convenience in website design, product setup/integration, and fulfillment. We utilize the native shipping tools on Shopify that include discounted shipping labels. As a CPG company that deals with a lot of inventory, Shopify's backend could adequately support. We've had no issues thus far. Within Shopify, we use the app, Shogun, for frontend design. For example, we can use it to change the layout of our landing pages or products pages, and even affect how our pages look on mobile vs. desktop. It took some time to master, but it's pretty user-friendly and is much more affordable than hiring full-time web developers. I like their snippet function that allows us to save formatted designs that we can easily access and use at another time. We use Sumo, another Shopify app, to generate our pop-ups for e-mail lead capture. I like the app because it's intuitive to use and easily allows us to run A/B tests to see what kind of offers, content, or copy language performs the best. We can run different pop-ups on specific pages, control when a visitor sees these forms, and what happens when a visitor submits his or her e-mail. Google Analytics (GA) is a must for e-commerce store owners. It's free to use and comprehensively tracks nearly everything we need to know about our website visitors and the actions they take on site. These visitors are all potential customers. By identifying and optimizing their pathways, we can increase sales and conversions. For example, if our homepage has the highest bounce rate (percentage of visits in which a visitor leaves our website without browsing any other page) we know we can examine the source of the traffic or our homepage design/messaging to affect the bounce rate. Lowering the bounce rate means that visitors are spending more time on our website, which increases the likelihood of conversion. This is just one example of the myriad of uses of GA. If you're interested in learning more, Google provides a lot of free online classes on GA. It is truly a powerful tool worth investing in. What have been the most influential books, podcasts, or other resources?One book that I really enjoyed was "Power to People: The Inside Story of AES and the Globalization of Electricity". This book focused on several topics, but the founders' focus on culture and empowering employees to make decisions is something I hope to drive forward at KPOP Foods. I want to say that most of you reading this right now have already read "How to Win Friends & Influence People" by Dale Carnegie. But in the off chance, you haven't, you should. It applies to every aspect of life, not just business. I'm amazed at how, even 80+ years since it was first written, the principles still apply. If a person would try to adhere to any of the principles mentioned in this book, it would positively impact his or her relationships with friends, colleagues, and significant others. Finally, we'd be remiss if we didn't thank UCLA Anderson and the UCLA Anderson Venture Accelerator for all the support they've given us these past 18 months. They provided us a beautiful, collaborative working space to build our company, access to industry professionals and investors, and a chance to work alongside some amazing companies like Alcatera, Habit Nest, and Textpert just to name a few. These relationships have been invaluable and have helped us move rapidly while avoiding costly mistakes. Advice for other entrepreneurs who want to get started or are just starting out?Entrepreneurship is not for the faint hearted. You'll need grit and passion – and a whole lot of it. Creating a successful business requires massive amounts of action, perseverance, and conviction. It's not something you can build in one, two, or even three years. It's a long-term battle filled with many sacrifices and tribulations. Pursuing the path of entrepreneurship will most likely be the most difficult thing you've ever done in your life. This isn't to dissuade any of you. Because while starting your own business may be the most difficult feat you've ever attempted, stay true to your course, your dream, and it'll also be your most rewarding accomplishment. Are you looking to hire for certain positions right now?Yes, we're looking for a VP of Marketing or Marketing Associate to join our team full-time. The person would oversee paid marketing (Facebook, Amazon, and Google Ads), email marketing, social media, brand partnerships, website, and public relations. Additionally, this person would also have an opportunity to get involved in product design and content development We are also always looking for interns interested in finance, accounting, data analytics, and marketing. If you're interested in working in a startup or becoming an entrepreneur, it's a great opportunity to get experience. It's a fast-paced and challenging environment where you'll learn tremendously and see the results of your actions on a daily basis. Where can we go to learn more?[Email](mailto:yummy@kpopfoods.com) --- Liked this story? I've done nearly 100 interviews with similar founders at StarterStory.com. [link] [comments]  |
| I've Got Free Digital Marketing Advice For Your Start Up + Quick PR Hack Posted: 05 Sep 2018 09:43 AM PDT Hey /r/Entrepreneur, I'm a Digital Marketer that's worked with a lot of start ups. I'm even creating my own right now. My team and I have been involved on global campaigns for some of the biggest companies in the world, like Toyota and Mercedes, and we're now turning to create our own start ups and give advice to other start ups. Why Free Though?I'll be straight, We're in a bit of a roadblock on my start up, and I need to get my creative juices flowing by giving advice to other founders. You can ask me about - Social Media Marketing - PR - Gamification - SEO - Google Ads - Website Dev - CRO - Email Marketing - Copywriting - Production Anything else! Quick Hack!PR Work is HARD, but I've found a (relatively) uncommon way to get my client's content in front of the right people. All you need to do is have a Twitter Ads account, run a campaign with your kick-ass content targeting reporters Twitter handles that you want to get in front of, and wait! It helps to have brand monitoring software as well, but I've found this to be a very effective strategy to get content out there and build trust with reporters. [link] [comments]  |
| Help with on-the-go payment processing Posted: 05 Sep 2018 07:40 AM PDT Hey everyone, The small business I manage recently launched a new website that sells a niche product (knives) and we are running into a TON of issues with payment processing. We are attending trade shows to both make sales and advertise our site, and when we started we had signed up with Square. This was fantastic as we had integrated square with our site, but also for using their wireless chip readers, credit card swipe, and mobile pay devices. They looked clean and professional and were super easy to use. Fast forward to a few shows later and we get notified that Square has shut us down. Apparently they will not do business with companies that sell knives!? I'm trying to find alternatives but I can't find anyone that has the look and quality of the Square hardware. Are there any known alternatives who will accept us? It amazes me that companies turn away customers for reasons like this! Thank you! [link] [comments]  |
| Has anyone succeded from the failure method? Posted: 05 Sep 2018 07:14 AM PDT With failure method I mean, jumping in the water and the learning how to swim and adjust accordingly. Not literally of course, but for example learning a skill you can sell to businesses (e.g. marketing, SEO and so on) for a few months and then trying to sell it. At first you would need to know how to get meetings, when that's down, you would need close clients and that would happen through learning from failures and mistakes which would be inevitable but also welcome to gain experience and learn from them. I hope you understand what I mean. I was wondering if anyone has succeeded in a similar way? Because I'm 18, this is my last year at school and I am ready to go out there and fail, I don't want to go the old and traditional route. In my mind as I have imagined it, success would come sooner or later, because you can't fail forever, can you? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 05 Sep 2018 11:30 AM PDT Hey, My school is having a market fair for all the students in the business course. Basically we have about $200 between 4 people to create a stand to sell things in the common area of the high school. I would love to hear what kind of snacks/ items you would sell in you were in my shoes. Thanks a lot [link] [comments]  |
| What is your favorite closing question(s) to use when interacting with a potential client? Posted: 05 Sep 2018 09:36 AM PDT |
| What are the best website builders for 1 to 1 transactions similar to Uber? Posted: 05 Sep 2018 01:21 PM PDT I am specifically looking for a website builder that will allow someone to post a service for an event and once that has been paid for, the job ad is removed. The buyer can only make one purchase per event as well as the seller only being able to sell their service to one person per event. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 05 Sep 2018 12:43 PM PDT So I just got around to placing my company name and info on several business directories the other day and received a call from a Yelp representative around one day after. He gave me a 40 minute long sales pitch, first intorducing me to the site's features but then went on to plug Yelp ads and giving me stats on how effective they are. I totally get that on some sites, being on the unpaid list renders you a speck of sand on the ocean floor but has anyone found clients and success with ads on Yelp? I realize that Yelp tends to be meant for local business. I live in a town that is notoriously cheap and risk averse and noticed that only one other related company here has a paid ad. Do people think it would be worth the money? If not, could anyone recommend some other high success rate sites for ads? [link] [comments]  |
| Community Supreme Bot (CSB) Official Release (V3) (Free Open Source Tool for Copping Supreme) Posted: 05 Sep 2018 12:24 PM PDT What is CSB? CSB or Community Supreme Bot is a project that has been in development for nearly a year now. Previously known as FESBSC, CSB is a completely free open source bot to cop clothing items from Supreme. Evidently, a market for Supreme bots has developed within the Supreme Community. This market has become saturated with bots that seldom work at prices exceeding hundreds of dollars. The CSB project is an attempt to remove these huge paywalls, allowing all members of the Supreme community a fair chance in copping the items they want without any extra burdens on their wallet. This being said, CSB is still in development and success will never be 100% guaranteed. However, we are constantly working on the bot in order to raise the success rate with ambitious yet capable plans for the future involving new tech which has never been utilised within this field. Currently CSB is being developed by a two man team: me – Tom, also known as HA6Bots and Daniel commonly referred to as Danielyc on forums. We have been working very hard throughout the summer to create a stable and functioning bot in preparation for the fall/winter season 2018. This being said, we are proud to release CSB V3.0. Again, we emphasise that the bot is a work in progress and success is not guaranteed. By downloading and using this tool, you as an individual are responsible for the output whether you successfully purchase your item or not. We accept no responsibility for any mishaps that may occur. Download: CSB V3.0 Windows: http://csb.center/CSB.html CSB V3.0 Mac: http://csb.center/CSB-MAC.html Chromedriver: http://chromedriver.chromium.org/downloads FAQ How do I use CSB? We have written up a detailed set of instructions which can be found at csb.center. Included in the download is readme which also contains these instructions. Are my payment details safe? Yes. The bot itself (the python scripts) does not connect to any servers. The tool itself is completely client side, payment details (if chosen) are kept on your personal device in an encrypted .cnf file located within your CSB folder directory. The user has the option of saving payment and billing details when prompted to. Again, I repeat this is stored in an encrypted .cnf file which is only accessible via your personal password. Alternatively, the user does not have to save these details and can use the program as normal. The source code is on GitHub at r/https://github.com/danielyc/csb and can be analysed for complete transparency. How was CSB made? CSB is made with python. We utilise several libraries in order to make the bot functional. Selenium is used with chromedriver to replicate user interactions with the Supreme website. We use PyQt5 for the UIs. We are planning to replace Selenium and the chromedriver in the near future with our own custom library which will utilise Image recognition technology. Why is CSB free? There are several reasons why the CSB project is free:
Will development be sustainable? Currently CSB is being developed by two people – me (Tom) and Daniel. I will be working full time very soon while Daniel will start university in early September. However this will not stop us from continuing development on the bot. Last year we both had school and still managed to push out the first two versions of the bot. At the moment, apart from time – monetary costs are low. We are planning to further the project with some servers and a website in the near future. We will always keep the bot free for everyone to use. We may at some point look into different avenues for monetization such as advertisements but we will never introduce any paywalls that undermine the functionality and idea behind CSB. How can I support the CSB project? Like mentioned before CSB will and always will be free. We will never ask for any money as CSB is a gift to the community. You can support us by telling your friends/fellow Supreme users about CSB and help spread the word that a free and trustworthy bot exists. If you really want to support the project you can donate to our PayPal at r/https://www.paypal.me/supportcsb. We also have a Bitcoin and Ethereum wallet: BTC 32U1WNf47UXcmDuMoJ7vezKd7UGRXmqPFP ETH 0xd445FC2b12B15A0FcA52153a75956bAb843bD03a. We appreciate any donations of any amount. We will also add your name to the donor list in the credits section of the bot unless you say otherwise. The money will help finance any costs involved with the bot such as domains, websites, servers etc. Will CSB completely automated? Is there anything I have to do manually? Currently for CSB V3.0 we have not reached full automation. While the bot will automatically find and add the item to the basket as well as filling out all the billing/shipping details, a google Captcha will appear at the end. This is the only process the user manually has to complete. Once the Captcha is completed the purchase will be completed. We are working hard to bypass the Captcha and already have some prototype concepts in production. Please read the instructions located at the bottom of this document for more information. Chrome and/or my antivirus blocked the file. Is the code malicious? Much to our frustration, CSB is being flagged by some antivirus software. The code is not malicious in anyway at all and can be viewed within the GitHub. Please add main.exe as an exception with your respective antivirus software and you should be able to run the program. What is the licencing for CSB? CSB operates under GNU AGPLv3. You are free to use the tool however you want - as long as it is compliant with the licence. What OS (Operating Systems) is CSB compatible with? As of now, windows 7 through 10 and MacOS Can I help with the production of CSB? At the moment we are not looking for any new members to join the team. Currently, the project is not big enough for multiple people to work on it without causing greater inconveniences. This being said, you can still help us by emailing us crash reports to info@csb.center or open bugreports on the github page. How can I get in contact with the CSB team? You can get in contact with us by emailing [info@csb.center](mailto:info@csb.center) If CSB worked as intended or you want to support the project, you can donate at https://www.paypal.me/supportcsb. Any amount is appreciated and we will add your name if you wish to the donor list which will be included on a later version Thanks! -HA6Bots and Danielyc [link] [comments]  |
| Need advice regarding actions and sticking to plan. Posted: 05 Sep 2018 12:19 PM PDT How you guys keep yourself motivated when there are no results after working in right direction? Also, how to get done things from yourself when in low phase? How to start taking actions? [link] [comments]  |
| Management Consultant Blogging My Day-to-Day: Chapter 1 Posted: 05 Sep 2018 12:11 PM PDT I have nothing to sell. I'm a consultant with the time and energy to write down what I'm doing as an entrepreneur. I used to do what I'm currently doing for a decent chunk less. I don't see myself providing different value now, except for that of more experience. But I am paid better because I changed how I talk about it. I didn't start by going through the route of Accenture, etc. I read a lot and kept trying to be that person. Here's where I've ended up. Three months ago, my contract IT project manager role fell to pieces 6 months early. My team folded into a larger one within the organization, and I didn't make nearly enough progress on relationships to be ready for the drop. I was fresh in the area after moving with my fianc̩ for her to advance in her career. All my useful contacts were in an industry not in my area, and remote work wasn't a thing. Not establishing myself within this new organization was a relatively large mistake, as it made the next months difficult. I found myself reaching out to businesses as a consultant alongside my regular market search. I wasn't sure what I'd do or charge, but I knew my analytics background and prior experience working with small businesses would at the least guide me along the way. I reached into two different industries, with mediocre success. After a few months of struggling (...and lawnmowing, flipping burgers, and eating bread for brlinner), I locked up full time projects with a business in my area. This blog is my story of bringing my analytics skillset to add value to that business. I first met Alex and Jenny at a meetup event for board games. They host a weekly Ticket to Ride session at their house. The turnout is one or two tables, and we play several games over a few hours. I flourish at this game, running a lot of algebra to maximize points and block my opponents wherever possible. I suspect a lot of my success against this group of people comes from my background in math. I was an on and off regular of the group for a couple of months when Alex had to take a phone call at his turn. It sounded rough and Alex had to run immediately. We had someone else jump in his place, and the game continued. A month later, Alex and I met at a bar to discuss the kinds of problems their business faced, and my experiences solving some of them for others. Issues I was expecting to hear Рapathetic employees, no structure to data (and as a result, intuitive analysis at best), were clouded by an issue I wasn't expecting at all. They had too much work. The business was turning down a ton of work and they didn't have any idea how to expand with the demand. Over 12 hours and 4 additional meetings later, we had a contract drawn, scope and costs set, and I began work as Consulting Director of Operations for a 100-person company operating in multiple states. Seriously, I was flipping burgers so recently, that my final paycheck from that will drop in my account tomorrow. Week 1 I woke up on day 1 for some necessary team shopping. Because the business doesn't really have a local office, I would be working from home. I bought a desk, monitor and keyboard for my laptop. I met Alex to grab as much access as possible. Old employee books, log-ins for systems, contact lists. I didn't know exactly what information they had stored, but I knew it would be a mess. In the meantime, I dug around for deals on coffee. I had been spending $2.50 a day at McDonalds for two weeks at this point and needed to plug that leak. I found a Keurig Classic for $50 and a church selling donated expired cups at a huge discount. All in all, I paid $60 for 252 coffees. It's hard to tell exactly, but my total coffee bill came to roughly $125. By no means am I a coffee snob. I just want it to taste okay and cost me basically nothing. Once I run through those pods, I'll be using grounds in the cup. I got set up and started digging. The service that managed sales, customers, workflow, literally everything that wasn't outside communication with customers Рit was built 20 years ago. I can't speak to its place in the market back then, but it certainly wasn't being maintained, and any hold on the market would surely be lost if anyone in the industry wised up. Legacy data was going to be a rough pull. I understand language structure to an extent, but I was at a loss for how to efficiently collect the information into a consumable format. Daily work reports could be pulled as a javascript-generated image, and worked like a scrolling feed would generate, until the end. I couldn't find anything to extract the info from the page and thought about finding something to pull from a pdf. Saving the page wouldn't bring the whole page in no matter what I did. Screenshot software wouldn't work on the scroll no matter what kind of "scroll capture" feature I found. I tried manually typing some info, just to get an idea for the timeline. After 15 minutes, that was way out of the question. I had managed to complete half a day's sales, with 5 years to run through. Daily sales data analysis isn't happening. Luckily, monthly data generated in a different format, and I was able to pull everything over the next few days. Thankfully, we have a software shift coming in a few weeks and this will never be needed again. It doesn't surprise me that they can't tell me what % of revenue each customer represents, or how much money new work is worth, as they have gotten by without measuring for years. Now that I knew what my legacy analysis was going to look like, I moved on to my other responsibilities. Meetings were set with everyone in management. Regular management meetings were never this company's style, and the consequences of that were apparent. I didn't promise the moon, but I made it apparent that tracking was necessary to manage, and they were making attempts at neither. I've got one on one's with a big segment of our employees and I have a shadow session with our top employee in another section. I needed to hire people immediately, and I felt like the universities near me would be a good grab for the kind of people I wanted to fill the role. I printed materials and scattered them around the campuses. After completing that, I put several postings on Indeed. It wasn't long before I had over 100 candidates between the three roles. This was going to be a fun ride. It took the rest of the week to get the legacy sales data analyzed and presentable for the rest of the management team. All in all, we had over 30 slides and 50 graphics/tables explaining what the business has done. I fully expect most of this info to be a complete surprise to everyone. Right off the bat, I'll be able to better focus resources. We were looking at almost doubling the size of the business with the amount of work they had been offered and had turned down. This problem seems too good to be true. Our top customers have been steadily growing over the last several years, and our revenue per sale has gone up and down with the amount of work. It seems most of the high value work these customers can offer is already being taken. These customers have relationships that extend to other states that we do not yet operate. I intend to leverage this into more business. Plus, I've always wanted to see some of these cities. I'm free to blog this journey as part of my agreement. 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| SMLLC using buildings on property question Posted: 05 Sep 2018 11:35 AM PDT I have a couple barns that will be used solely for business purposes. The entire property (including house) is in my name (and wife). I've not been able to wrap my head around how this works for tax purposes - and am in the process of finding a CPA. So, can we expense out each month $ towards the mortgage and that's written off on taxes, or is it just a draw that we take, and apply towards mortgage, but we get taxed on as income? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 05 Sep 2018 11:02 AM PDT I've got an idea, and am building a prototype. The prototype isn't convincing yet, but the idea, I am convinced of. How do I start in a way that doesn't give away my interest in the idea? I have a masters in Computer Science, but there is much more needed here. I need technical assistance and don't have a background in small or any other sized business. I see myself walking into some attorney's office, paying a few thousand dollars, and walking away with a folder of stuff that says: "You are a Company now. Your first task is to hire a tax preparer, perhaps an accountant, and a legal consultant -- Oh, and do whatever it was you were going to do to make money." I could go that far, but how do you bring on partner, principals, people who know what the fluff they're doing. How do you reasonably split an interest in a future venture so that people don't get screwed, but you don't give away control and interest without realizing it or gaining from it in some time frame? With the patent system being what it appears to be, a mess... requiring thousands of dollars to file a reasonably professionally prepared patent -- and should someone challenge that patent, it is only money that will win the argument in the end. Do you file? Or do you go trade secret? And while you're small and vulnerable and someone with big guns sues you... then all your efforts are for naught. So you know, happy thoughts and all that. What would be the advice of this group, on how to do the initial founding of a company and the splitting of interests between the early principals. What is the gold standard? Is there a book you'd suggest? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 05 Sep 2018 10:53 AM PDT I started a company that gets reviews and prevents bad ones for businesses. I can't get a single client. The common response is that the businesses get most of their work through referrals and don't need good reviews and aren't willing to pay 200/mo for them. [link] [comments]  |
| PSA: flat rate credit card processing rates aren't always the cheapest Posted: 05 Sep 2018 10:52 AM PDT There's a misconception among many businesses that flat rate credit card processing (like Square, Stripe, and PayPal) is the cheapest, especially if you're a small business. That's not necessarily the case. Flat rate pricing can be the cheapest, if your business fits a specific profile. Namely, businesses with small average transactions or low monthly volume. For example, Square's 2.75% swiped flat rate is almost always the lowest cost option for a business with average transactions under $10 or monthly credit card volume of a few thousand dollars or less. For everyone else, a competitive interchange plus processor will be a lower cost option. You don't need to be making a million a year to get good pricing, either. That's not to say there aren't other reasons you may want to use flat rate. Some businesses like the 'simplicity' of the one rate, without seeing all of the interchange rates and other fees on their monthly statement. Just know that simplicity =/= lowest cost and that you're paying more for that simplicity. This misconception gets reinforced because of two situations: Businesses for whom flat rate actually is the lowest cost, and businesses that switched to flat rate from a more expensive tiered pricing solution and aren't aware that there are even lower cost options available to them. Credit card processing rates and fees are very business-specific, so what's the cheapest for one isn't necessarily going to be the cheapest for you. It makes accepting recommendations from other businesses a risky proposition, since you may not benefit the same way they did. The biggest factors in finding lowest cost will be industry, average transaction size, and average monthly volume. If you absolutely have to get recommendations from others, try to get them from businesses that closely match yours in terms of industry and sales. It doesn't do you much good to ask a coffee shop about their rates for processing if you sell antique furniture online. Don't assume that because flat rate is the lowest cost someone else got, it's the lowest cost you can get. If you have any questions about processing costs or how to find the right processor, let me know! I'm also doing an AMA tomorrow at 11am EST to answer anything you want to know about merchant services. Disclaimer: I work in processing but not for a processor. I don't have any affiliation with the companies mentioned in this post, they're just to give examples of well-known flat rate processing options. [link] [comments]  |
| I have a business idea, but not a degree yet Posted: 05 Sep 2018 07:00 AM PDT I'm going to study at a university soon. The problem is that I dont know what to choose. Should I choose to study innovation and project management or innovation and entrepreneurship? Both are bachelor's degrees that helps you become an entrepreneur. They will also qualify me for a master's degree if I decide to continue studying. Here are a couple of roughly translated descriptions: Innovation and project management: There is a great need for entrepreneurs in both new and existing companies. This study therefore aims at educating people who can be driving forces in entrepreneurship and innovation in the private and public sectors. People who can develop ideas and start their own businesses, who can participate in commercialization and value creation in the fields of technology, culture or economics. Innovation and entrepreneurship: Study innovation and entrepreneurship and contribute to innovation in businesses . Our students have won awards for student companies several times. The study makes you well equipped to develop a business idea and start for yourself. [link] [comments]  |
| Writer, in search of work as an editor. Posted: 05 Sep 2018 10:46 AM PDT Hey, all. I've posted before. I'm an editor for Ink-N-Flow management, but they haven't really given me any work... I'm a bit confused. I've asked them about it, but haven't gotten a response. Not sure why they hired me if they won't give me any work... Anyway, I'm currently looking for work as an editor. $4 for every 1000 words. So 250 words is $1. First half of payment up front, for security purposes. PayPal only. I get all the work done before deadlines. You won't find a price like this anywhere else. Guaranteed. I've advertised on all of my social media sites, but most of my work has come from Facebook clients. I'm featured on a website as the editor for Catherine Hillin's book, "The Orphan's Code." Which I think is worth mentioning. I have a Facebook page for my business if anyone is interested. If you don't mind or you know someone in need of an editor, spread the word for me? [link] [comments]  |
| What are the most important tools for your business? Posted: 05 Sep 2018 10:32 AM PDT |
| Talk to me about what you love and hate about the CRM you use? Posted: 05 Sep 2018 10:30 AM PDT This isn't entrepreneurial in the traditional sense of this sub, but I thought there would be a wealth of knowledge here to tap into. I work for a software company that has a CRM product in a niche market. I think we have a good product, and with some tweaks to to make it less niche specific I believe we could reach a much broader audience. I'm potentially taking over as the product owner of the CRM, and I want to pitch us spinning off just our CRM. As part of that I want to start planning out enhancements or changes. What I'd like to know from all of you is what things you really loved and hated about CRMs you have used. Are there any unique features you loved? Random things you thought were interesting ideas but poorly executed? Stuff you never used? Stuff you hated? Even just general thoughts about CRMs as a whole. Or what price points work for you or you find worth it. I appreciate any feedback you all have to offer! [link] [comments]  |
| Finally breaking even and things just got really complicated and stressful. Could use some advice! Posted: 05 Sep 2018 06:19 AM PDT I have bootstrapped my recreation company for 2 years and the company I license software and purchase equipment is amazing.... but they have decided to move to a franchise model. I can keep my current licensed location, but if I move, I must buy a franchise. My current location is terrible ( outdoors, zero foot traffic, and no signage). It allowed me to work the kinks out of operations, but the plan was always to move indoors or a much higher traffic area. My credit was destroyed moving cross country, taking care of the family and starting this crazy business. Buying a franchise is not possible without serious investors. Should I just stay stagnate in my current location, pump borrowed money into updating and really make my current location a destination, lay down and die, find investors who could bankroll a franchise. My organic growth and great return customers proves to me I have figured out the operations side, but this decision seems to be a major one and I am trying to get as much info as possible. Thanks for your help. [link] [comments]  |
| My company is a month from launch! Let’s make you some soundtracks! Posted: 05 Sep 2018 10:03 AM PDT Hello! We are Future Factory Music, a start up collective of musicians, engineers, producers, emcees, and singers. Our business is sync licensing and we are prepared to launch in about a month! As with any upstart we need to get our testimonials up-so we are offering a few beats to service that. NO PROJECT TOO SMALL OR TOO BIG-we will provide (for various price points) music for your youtube video, ig promo, your own song, your playlist for your business, etc ANYTHING. We currently have a large and ever growing catalog of about 100 beats, can do custom orders, and post launch will be releasing about 50-75 beats per month with loads of options to suit you or the needs of your business. In regards to this specific post heres the nitty gritty: 1:00-2:30 mins beat = $15 - non exclusive, but high quality wav. non profit use or you pay +($5) for a lease with no terms for amount of plays (will discuss with you further detail) no stems. 2 revisions. Turnaround time 1 day. 1:-3:00 mins beat = $45 - non exclusive, high quality wav. for profit use with a lease. stems for an extra $10, 5 revisions, and a 2-3 day turnaround. We can and will work other deals with you as no budget is too small in regards to us being a new business, but we look forward to speaking with you and sharing some of our art in hopes to further your exploits as well! Curious about what we sound like? We're sure you are! Shoot us a DM and we will shoot over private links with references, or just give us a chance and we will go to work right away on your next masterpiece. Stay Healthy! [link] [comments]  |
| Bad idea to invest half my net worth into a business? Posted: 05 Sep 2018 09:39 AM PDT Background: I have about 6 years of starting/managing International K-12 schools and making them successful. I have an opportunity to invest about $300,000 into a school that is currently losing about $200,000 a year. For $300,000, I get 15% of shares. I would invest my money, and then join as the managing Principal and earn a relatively low salary of just $50K (about 1/2 of what I made before). A long-term business parter just started working there and is in charge of recruitment, which he's awesome at. With only about 12 additional students, we can break even and since this guy is a great recruiter, I am reasonably confident we can get there within a few months. If I'm managing the school, I am also confident it will improve its reputation and parents will be more satisfied and we can grow quite a bit pretty fast. If we get it up to 250-350 kids (now have about 100), we can likely earn $1-2 million a year net income at least. If I own 15%, then I'll be doing pretty well. And in the school industry shares typically sell for 6-8X net income, so I could potentially sell my shares later on. I'm 70% sure this plan will work and we can make the school profitable and I can get my investment back. However, it's hard to pull the trigger on risking such a big chunk of my net worth. Even if I lose it all, I'll still have enough to survive pretty well. I'm 34 and not married, no kids, no house, no debt; so no big obligations. In theory, if it all fails then I am still young enough to recover. Do entrepreneurs typically put such a big portion amount of their savings into their businesses? Any advice about such a big risk? I think most people here are investing smaller amounts of their personal savings... [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 05 Sep 2018 09:15 AM PDT I had a product sent back to the manufacturer when it had a problem, and it literally cost me more in duties than the product cost me to purchase in the first place. My business is sinking by these fees alone. Where can I learn about the different customs declarations, what they mean, what they cost, and which countries charge what? Mostly concerned with Mexico right now. [link] [comments]  |
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