For a good dose of Entrepreneur Porn come to this Friday's Stormhoek Geek Dinner! For details click on the link and add your name to the wiki if you can make it. If you can't edit the Wiki, you can't come. You're not geek enough.
Thursday, December 21, 2006
Stormhoek Geek Dinner
For a good dose of Entrepreneur Porn come to this Friday's Stormhoek Geek Dinner! For details click on the link and add your name to the wiki if you can make it. If you can't edit the Wiki, you can't come. You're not geek enough.
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
Entrepreneur Porn
Rapelang Rabana of BlueVoice
I had a few beers yesterday with the highly energetic Greg Durst, who runs Endeavor South Africa.
Endeavor is a highly selective entrepreneurs' network that aims to find 'high-impact' entrepreneurs in developing countries who are already swimming in the deep end of the pool and toss them a buoy. Sorry, make that a lilo with a built in champagne cooler.
Okay, I'm embellishing a bit; Endeavor won't make life easy for you, but they will significantly help fast-track your business into the 'big leagues'. But only if they believe that you're already well on your way to changing the world.
One of the interesting things Greg and I touched on was 'Entrepreneur Porn'. I've received a lot of free 'consultation' for my business over the last 2 years from brilliant entrepreneurs (Vinny Lingham, Steven Levy, Tai Schierenberg to mention but a few) who wanted nothing in return. I reap this up, realising that there is no way I could repay them. What I can do however is 'Pay it Forward'. Even though I'm still in the startup phase, I've made a lot of mistakes and have learnt a thing or two about starting a business. I get high from being able to help out young entrepreneurs who have great ideas. Greg calls this phenomenon 'Entrepreneur Porn'!
I got a good dose of 'Entrepreneur Porn' today when I met up with Rapelang Rabana, a young computer scientist who was going to be reaped up by a major investment bank upon graduation. She was filling out the application form and came to the question: "Please describe how you would fit in at our firm?". She couldn't find an answer and plunged into the deep end of the pool! I.e. she started her own business, developing a Vo3G (Voice over 3G) application. Go check out BlueVoice. They're launching in January so get ready to start paying R0.10 a minute for mobile phone calls!
Friday, December 08, 2006
Exclusity leads to mediocrity
One of the words I'd recommend any entrepreneur to stay away from is 'exclusivity'.
I've often been asked by IT firms, ISPs, distributors etc. for 'exclusivity' to setup Skyrove Wi-Fi hotpots in certain regions or sectors. They often throw it in early in the discussions, I've always said no without beating about the bush, and never has it tarnished the relationship.
Besides for 'exclusivity' being a long, ugly English word reminding me of seedy gentleman's clubs, here are some of my reasons for not doing 'exclusivity' deals:
Firstly, exclusivity goes against our vision. The whole point of Skyrove is allowing ANYONE to start their own Wi-Fi hotspot and in this way earn an income while making broadband access more accessible and less expensive for more people.
Secondly, let's say you now have exclusivity in your region or sector: other companies that may want to resell our product are now forced to sell our competitors' solution. If instead they set up another Skyrove hotspot, we would gain customers signing up there. These customers can now also use your Skyrove hotspots, thus more income for you! Exclusivity has the effect of both of us losing customers.
Finally, exclusivity leads to mediocrity. If I gave you exclusivity, I'd want some form of exclusivity in return, e.g. you won't start selling one of our competitors' products. Without exclusivity, I have to work much harder to ensure Skyrove remains the best Wi-Fi billing & roaming service out there. Hard work you want me to keep on doing if you're selling my product. On your side, you can now relax a bit, because no-one else has the right to sell Skyrove in your region, except you. Both of us become mediocre. Because I'm not working so hard on my product anymore, and you're not working so hard on sales anymore, my competitors and your competitors now come in and take over the market.
When someone asks me for regional or sector exclusivity for Skyrove, I typically say: "Sure, but we would expect you to focus all your business activity exclusively on selling Skyrove". I say this as an obvious joke, but it puts to bed the notion of exclusivity pretty quickly, without me having to give the preceding harangue.
I've often been asked by IT firms, ISPs, distributors etc. for 'exclusivity' to setup Skyrove Wi-Fi hotpots in certain regions or sectors. They often throw it in early in the discussions, I've always said no without beating about the bush, and never has it tarnished the relationship.
Besides for 'exclusivity' being a long, ugly English word reminding me of seedy gentleman's clubs, here are some of my reasons for not doing 'exclusivity' deals:
Firstly, exclusivity goes against our vision. The whole point of Skyrove is allowing ANYONE to start their own Wi-Fi hotspot and in this way earn an income while making broadband access more accessible and less expensive for more people.
Secondly, let's say you now have exclusivity in your region or sector: other companies that may want to resell our product are now forced to sell our competitors' solution. If instead they set up another Skyrove hotspot, we would gain customers signing up there. These customers can now also use your Skyrove hotspots, thus more income for you! Exclusivity has the effect of both of us losing customers.
Finally, exclusivity leads to mediocrity. If I gave you exclusivity, I'd want some form of exclusivity in return, e.g. you won't start selling one of our competitors' products. Without exclusivity, I have to work much harder to ensure Skyrove remains the best Wi-Fi billing & roaming service out there. Hard work you want me to keep on doing if you're selling my product. On your side, you can now relax a bit, because no-one else has the right to sell Skyrove in your region, except you. Both of us become mediocre. Because I'm not working so hard on my product anymore, and you're not working so hard on sales anymore, my competitors and your competitors now come in and take over the market.
When someone asks me for regional or sector exclusivity for Skyrove, I typically say: "Sure, but we would expect you to focus all your business activity exclusively on selling Skyrove". I say this as an obvious joke, but it puts to bed the notion of exclusivity pretty quickly, without me having to give the preceding harangue.
Wednesday, December 06, 2006
The Venture Capital Aptitude Test (VCAT)
Guy Kawasaki wrote a brilliant post recently explaining why young people should not go into Venture Capital: "Venture capital is something to do at the end of your career, not the beginning. It should be your last job, not your first."
Guy's concocted a Venture Capital Aptitude Test (VCAT) for folks considering a career in Venture Capital. You get points if you have a background in Engineering or Sales, but points are subtracted (*gasp!*) if you have a background in Management Consulting, Investment Banking or Accounting!
Now, let me go rate some of the VCs I've had dealings with...
Guy's concocted a Venture Capital Aptitude Test (VCAT) for folks considering a career in Venture Capital. You get points if you have a background in Engineering or Sales, but points are subtracted (*gasp!*) if you have a background in Management Consulting, Investment Banking or Accounting!
Now, let me go rate some of the VCs I've had dealings with...
Wiki Woes
My Wiki Woes continue this week... (see my last post)
I've now done testdrives of Wetpaint, SocialText, PBWiki, StikiPad and Wikia; and did WikiMatrix comparisons of a dozen more.
Although Wetpaint wasn't the right one for me, I received a very nice email in response to my blogpost from Wetpaint founder Ben Elowitz explaining why they don't allow private Wikis at this stage. Just because Ben contacted me directly I decided to stick with Wetpaint for 2 community Wikis I'm creating.
I finally settled on using StikiPad for doing our internal project documentation. StikiPad is 'crisp' and functional. The design is also attractive and Oh-So Web 2.0.
However, there's one thing that StikiPad founders Matthew DeWaal and Jonathan George really need to learn quickly if they are to succeed in a Web 2.0 world, (or any world for that matter) and that is how to properly engage your customers...
Today when trying to access my new StikiPad Wiki, I repeatedly got an error stating '500 - Internal Server Error'.
No problem, I thought, I'd go check out their forums and see if anyone's posted about it. There was no related post, so I decided I would post about it. However, the StikiPad founders decided for some bizarre reason that people would first need to be 'approved' before posting to their forums. I applied for approval and am still waiting 7 hours later!
I then thought I'd post a quick comment on the StikiPad blog. When I read the blog earlier, I was surprized to see that none of the posts had any comments. Mostly, if a blog is in the least bit popular, you'd see dozens of comments. (To see what I mean, have a look at Signal vs. Noise) Once again, my effort was thwarted by draconian comment moderations!
When trying to post a comment I was told: "We get some pretty crappy spam, so if you haven't left a comment here before you may need to be approved before your comment will appear. Thanks for waiting though!"
Guess what? All bloggers get spam from time to time but we manage it without turning our backs on our customers.
Get your act together StikiPad, because at this stage I'm still wondering if I should 'approve' your service.
I've now done testdrives of Wetpaint, SocialText, PBWiki, StikiPad and Wikia; and did WikiMatrix comparisons of a dozen more.
Although Wetpaint wasn't the right one for me, I received a very nice email in response to my blogpost from Wetpaint founder Ben Elowitz explaining why they don't allow private Wikis at this stage. Just because Ben contacted me directly I decided to stick with Wetpaint for 2 community Wikis I'm creating.
I finally settled on using StikiPad for doing our internal project documentation. StikiPad is 'crisp' and functional. The design is also attractive and Oh-So Web 2.0.
However, there's one thing that StikiPad founders Matthew DeWaal and Jonathan George really need to learn quickly if they are to succeed in a Web 2.0 world, (or any world for that matter) and that is how to properly engage your customers...
Today when trying to access my new StikiPad Wiki, I repeatedly got an error stating '500 - Internal Server Error'.
No problem, I thought, I'd go check out their forums and see if anyone's posted about it. There was no related post, so I decided I would post about it. However, the StikiPad founders decided for some bizarre reason that people would first need to be 'approved' before posting to their forums. I applied for approval and am still waiting 7 hours later!
I then thought I'd post a quick comment on the StikiPad blog. When I read the blog earlier, I was surprized to see that none of the posts had any comments. Mostly, if a blog is in the least bit popular, you'd see dozens of comments. (To see what I mean, have a look at Signal vs. Noise) Once again, my effort was thwarted by draconian comment moderations!
When trying to post a comment I was told: "We get some pretty crappy spam, so if you haven't left a comment here before you may need to be approved before your comment will appear. Thanks for waiting though!"
Guess what? All bloggers get spam from time to time but we manage it without turning our backs on our customers.
Get your act together StikiPad, because at this stage I'm still wondering if I should 'approve' your service.
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