the goose

I said something rather rash while on the recent bizcamp limerick panel.

“You don’t need funding to start a web business”

At the time I said it was thinking of the small businesses I had come across while I was working with the BNI to build chapters around Dublin.  The BNI is made up of hundreds of small businesses in Ireland and possible hundreds of thousands worldwide.  My experience has been that the vast majority started up ‘boot strapping’ without any bank, let alone EI funding.  95% of all those employed in the private sector in Ireland are employed in businesses like these.  So is ‘funding’ really necessary to start a business?  For some businesses – absolutely.  For others …

Simone Rusnakova of 3r sales and marketing, a SEO company based in Dublin, says, “Getting started as an SEO consultant really requires just a laptop, some software, google certification and a lot of time”.  Simona has built up a successful practice from scratch since arriving in Ireland three years ago.

Richard Greenane hails from the UK and has been here for over ten years. He now has several employees at his successful IT support company, SupportsIT.  “I went the investment route with a previous company. We raised close to €1 Million of funding, however after three years of development and sales we were unable to create a decent market for our products and we had to wind the company up. At the same time we were bootstrapping the company by offering IT support and so out of the ashes SupportsIT was born.  I decided that the new company would be grown organically with minimal capital investment. Organic growth can be good because you have to make a profit from the word go, otherwise you can’t afford to eat. I only needed transport and a laptop to begin with, and I have built the company from that.”

Nilsson Denver of the Irish Bookkeepers association “A few hundred euros for a multi-company software package, a computer and printer are all you need to get going.  I decided to instead offer training on bookkeeping which has been more lucrative and less hassle.”

Margaret, a friend of mine who runs a photography business advises “Someone doing press, PR or basic jobs could probably survive on …  [a] camera body and one lens, depending on quality, the cheapest is about €3,500- €7,000…but obviously this is not enough, as you need chargers, compact flash cards, flashes (on camera)…etc….. so add another €1,000 at least”.   It seems to be that even this isn’t beyond the means of a PAYE employee seeking to dump the day job.

Of course you could argue that some of these professions amount being ‘just’ self-employed.  On the other hand, many of these businesses grow to something bigger.  Indeed, having some control over your own time allows for spending time on other projects that can be ‘productised’.

This is how the poster boys of web2.0 business got going at 37signals.com.  They started off doing client work and gradually migrated over to working on their products.  Was there any advantage to doing this ‘apprenticeship’?  Does it teach how to manage cash flow and manage resources wisely?  I’d say so.

I know this works because this is how we started piehole.ie.  We kicked it off over a couple of weekends and we worked up slowly from there.  It is still far from delivering the lifestyle we ultimately aspire to but it is definitely on the right track.

In summary.  Traditional businesses start without any real assistance from anyone.  They get going on probably less than the contents of your communion money account.  Why would we treat ALL web businesses differently?  Building a business on the web is low cost.  My advice is that if you are starting to look for an opportunity, and don’t want to take funding, pick something niche that doesn’t need above the line TV advertising or expensive sales trips to the Middle-East.  Better still, quit the day job and become self-employed so you can learn how to manage your own money before you ask to start spending someone else’s.