16 Short Rules To A Successful Business & Life

Everyone in the tech world has heard the name Godaddy before, but some of you may not know the name Bob Parsons. He is the Founder /CEO of Godaddy and a guy who makes a valiant effort to share his success rules. I for one think he is on the money, so I felt the need to share his rules with you...

1.	Get and stay out of your comfort zone.
	I believe that not much happens of any significance when we're in our comfort zone.  I hear people say, "But I'm concerned about security."  My response to that is simple: "Security is for cadavers."
2.	Never give up.
	Almost nothing works the first time it's attempted.  Just because what you're doing does not seem to be working, doesn't mean it won't work.  It just means that it might not work the way you're doing it.  If it was easy, everyone would be doing it, and you wouldn't have an opportunity.
3.	When you're ready to quit, you're closer than you think.
	There's an old Chinese saying that I just love, and I believe it is so true.  It goes like this: "The temptation to quit will be greatest just before you are about to succeed."
4.	With regard to whatever worries you, not only accept the worst thing that could happen, but make it a point to quantify what the worst thing could be.
	Very seldom will the worst consequence be anywhere near as bad as a cloud of "undefined consequences."  My father would tell me early on, when I was struggling and losing my shirt trying to get Parsons Technology going, "Well, Robert, if it doesn't work, they can't eat you."
5.	Focus on what you want to have happen.
	Remember that old saying, "As you think, so shall you be."
6.	Take things a day at a time.
	No matter how difficult your situation is, you can get through it if you don't look too far into the future, and focus on the present moment.  You can get through anything one day at a time.
7.	Always be moving forward.
	Never stop investing.  Never stop improving.  Never stop doing something new.  The moment you stop improving your organization, it starts to die.  Make it your goal to be better each and every day, in some small way.  Remember the Japanese concept of Kaizen.  Small daily improvements eventually result in huge advantages.
8.	Be quick to decide.
	Remember what General George S. Patton said: "A good plan violently executed today is far and away better than a perfect plan tomorrow."
9.	Measure everything of significance.
	I swear this is true.  Anything that is measured and watched, improves.
10.	Anything that is not managed will deteriorate.
	If you want to uncover problems you don't know about, take a few moments and look closely at the areas you haven't examined for a while.  I guarantee you problems will be there.
11.	Pay attention to your competitors, but pay more attention to what you're doing.
	When you look at your competitors, remember that everything looks perfect at a distance. Even the planet Earth, if you get far enough into space, looks like a peaceful place.
12.	Never let anybody push you around.
	In our society, with our laws and even playing field, you have just as much right to what you're doing as anyone else, provided that what you're doing is legal.
13.	Never expect life to be fair.
	Life isn't fair.  You make your own breaks.  You'll be doing good if the only meaning fair has to you, is something that you pay when you get on a bus (i.e., fare).
14.	Solve your own problems.
	You'll find that by coming up with your own solutions, you'll develop a competitive edge.  Masura Ibuka, the co-founder of SONY, said it best: "You never succeed in technology, business, or anything by following the others."  There's also an old Asian saying that I remind myself of frequently.  It goes like this: "A wise man keeps his own counsel."
15.	Don't take yourself too seriously.
	Lighten up.  Often, at least half of what we accomplish is due to luck. None of us are in control as much as we like to think we are.
16.	There's always a reason to smile.
	Find it.  After all, you're really lucky just to be alive.  Life is short.  More and more, I agree with my little brother. He always reminds me: "We're not here for a long time, we're here for a good time!" One thing I would like to add relating to your company is never give up control to someone you don't know well enough to trust, no matter how much money they throw at you, unless you are selling the company completely.  RJ Garbowicz Co-Founder / Chief Talker Webtalk Corporation www.Webtalk.org

2011 Internet Bubble...Fact or Fiction?

The first thing I think when people say, "today's internet growth is just another 2001 bubble" is... "Come on now? You must not know what caused the 2001 bubble burst, because if you did, you wouldn't be making those statements."

In 1998-2001, it was a gold rush to get to the internet because many people had the foresight that it would be the next "TV". Unfortunately, those people had a lot of great ideas and great plans, but the technology infrastructure didn't exist to gain a large audience (customer base). Most entrepreneurs and investors thought internet technology would advance very quickly, so they threw a lot of time and money into companies to be ahead of the curve.

Well, they were all right about their predictions regarding the upward turn of the internet software market, but wrong on the prediction of hardware technology advancements. Even though many Dial-Up subscribers began converting to DSL or Cable between 99' and 2001', it wasn't until 2007, with the launch of the smart phone, WiFi Hot Spots, and the $100 laptop that the subscriber base of high speed internet had reached the point where investors thought it would be in 2001.

After several years of pumping money hand over fist into internet software companies (because the barrier to entry then was very high), many investors began to pull out causing the "bubble" to burst. Here we are 10 years later with more than 2 billion internet users worldwide, of them 700 million on Facebook, with half of them logging on daily using a smart phone and people are calling all of the fast growing companies part of a new "bubble"?

I don't think so. You call Walmart and ask them how long it took them to get 15 million customers and you will find out it took them about 20 painful years verses Groupon who pulled it off in 22 months. The internet and social media has changed everything we knew about business.

Previously, in order to reach millions of customers, you needed store fronts all over the country and were required to advertise in each market. Today, all you need is one online store that sells a great product or service with a few social sharing tools embedded to allow it to go viral. Then, offer special discounts for sharing a particular deal to your address book and let it ride. If your business/product/service is appealing enough, people will share it with their 500 Facebook friends and their 1,000 address book contacts.

What is happening today in the internet space is exactly what investors predicted would happen 10 years ago. This is why internet companies, by the hundreds, are receiving valuations at the seed stage up to and over $100 million, and why IPO's like LinkedIn, and other large private companies such as Facebook are receiving valuations in the tens of billions of dollars.

US online spending in advertising is approaching $50 billion a year, and eCommerce transactions are expected to hit $200 billion this year. Those numbers are only going to continue to grow as the internet population increases within third world countries and as the global population grows in general.

It's no longer a rush to acquire visitors (potential customers), because they are easier to acquire than ever. It's now a rush to build a great online application that mouse traps them, then gives incentives to share it for it to go viral. This is the very reason investors are pumping millions, and even billions, into internet companies that prove early on they can mouse trap on a small scale, because they know with the right online advertising campaigns the application can hit a critical mass that generates hundreds of millions of dollars within months.

Startups are able to receive large valuations and investments even before a product goes to market due to three critical elements; user experience, management experience and viral capacity. If a startup scores in the 90 percentile in each of those categories using an experienced investor's graph, or at least in two of them, that will make the difference between getting funded and not getting funded. If you do get funded, the odds are you will receive a very high valuation because of the potential ROI of your application. Plus, there is a strong need to capitalize the company with as much money as possible so it will never sell itself broke.

Growing too fast is more dangerous than not growing fast enough, because once your online reputation is burnt by the masses, you have to completely re-brand and relaunch your application, doing it all again, or spend millions fixing the negative press. It's always better to do it right the first time, but in the web world, its absolutely critical to manage and prevent terminal risks from the beginning. If you do all of the above effectively, your company is worth the premium valuation because of the high velocity growth potential. This is even more true in the cases like Groupon, that made growth history, and still have a massive market to penetrate.

Every investment is a gamble, but internet businesses have proven to have highest ROI potential in the shortest period of time. This is simply because of the massive market size and the fractional time it takes to grab a large market share compared to a brick and mortar.

2011 Bubble? ...Fiction! (with the exception of a catastrophic event to the planet)

RJ Garbowicz

Co-Founder / Chief Talker

Webtalk Corporation

www.Webtalk.org

Rules To Building A Great Internet Startup

Well, first and foremost, I have to say building a great internet business is a lot easier said than done. I got my tail end handed to me on a number of occasions trying to build my previous companies, but it was all a great learning experience. Unfortunately, it was a learning experience at the cost of not just my own time and money, but also of the additional investors who were backing the company. Granted the new owners of my last company are the ones that brought it down, but it was ultimately my decision to sell controlling interest that became the downfall of the company.

As an novice entrepreneur, you really focus on competitors and technology malfunctions being the major risks to your companies success or failure, but in all reality, there are several more factors that can be just as detrimental. So right from the very beginning of a new company, you need to lay a solid plan for every aspect of the business, especially if you are planning to raise capital. Investors wont touch a company whose books are terrible and whose stock ownership structure is less than adequate. That is in addition to all of the primary factors investors typically are looking to acquire.

Below I have assembled my personal rule book to building a successful company and I hope it works well for you.

1) Be innovative, but not too innovative

Creating great unique ideas is usually a natural trait, but your startup can acquire it by bringing on innovative team members. Building a "me too" business is fine as long as there are at least two major elements that make you better than your competition. Don't be so out of the box with your ideas until you can fund it yourself, because nobody else will.

2) Build a GREAT TEAM!

This one I cannot stress enough, no one man can tackle the world themselves, therefore requiring a team that works together well and efficiently is essential. Find talented people who you can trust, if you are starting fresh, be diligent about your new hires. Get references and check backgrounds and work closely with each one for their first month. If all goes well, be humble and offer them a piece of the pie. You will be surprised how much this enforces hard work and dedication within your founding team. Find each member of your teams strong suit and passion, and truly try to help them improve that part of their life throughout their entire relationship with the company. Your team is what will make or break your company the fastest, so spend a lot of time here cultivating relationships. Lastly, communicate, don't dictate. You are hiring people for a reason and that is for their experience. If they are truly passionate about what they do, then they will strive to do their best because its their reputation on the line and potentially their retirement if you give them a piece of the pie. If they are consistently dropping the ball, get rid of them fast. It's best to hire slow and fire fast.

3) Mange your risks with great planning

In every facet of a business there is risk and those risks become problems when there is a gap in your planning. Creating a great plan will prevent problems and therefore reducing your potential risk of failure. As a great example, in my last company I decided to use authorize.net as our credit card gateway and choose to let them manage reoccurring transactions for subscription sales so we didn't have to be PCI compliant. When I sold the company, the new owners wanted to switch gateways, but it required cancelling out all reoccurring subscriptions charges, making the users repurchase them. Something I would never have done, but they did it and they lost over 95% of all sales overnight, which drove the company to its death because no one thought, "hey what happens if people don't repurchase?". This is just one example of how a single bad decision can destroy your company. However, from hearing that experience, I decided to make my new company PCI compliant, so we are not dependent to any gateway. It also allows for easier up-sells and future purchases, making it worth the investment.

Here is a general list I have complied of "need to do's" when launching a startup that are imperative to reducing risks and increasing your chances of success:

*Build your product story board! Building a story board does exactly what its name says, it tells a story. In the web world, your story board is your business plan, it's your best hiring and training tool and it's your best selling tool to investors. If your story board doesn't attract talent and investors, then your application is not going to attract visitors and customers. In addition, you never want to begin your coding until you have finalized your user interface design because your expenses can multiply quickly if design changes happen after coding begins.

*Plan for every potential single point of failure to happen. You may not be able to prevent every major issue, but you can try, and plan for an immediate action to manage your risks when they occur. Hosting and server architecture is half of your business, so make sure that doesn't go by the wayside. Address scaling, load balancing and security early on and plan for a course of action if issues arise. Use SaaS applications and other software tools to help you optimize your software throughout it's entire life cycle. Keep your legal and administrative departments in order at all times. It's easy in a software company to let those things fall behind, DONT! Proper legal agreements, corporate books, stock structures and accounting documents are ultimately what can stop an investment deal in its tracks if they are not completed correctly. Even worse is they can get you shut down and thrown in jail by the SEC if you are not following their guidelines for investment raising.

*Everything costs three times more than you think. Many early entrepreneurs make the mistake of budgeting, then fund raising, to find they are three times over budget and back looking for startup capital. I have found it much easier to budget for 90 day periods at a time and let investors know that we will be looking for capital again over the upcoming three months to cover the funds required at the next stage of business development. This way they know that there is, one; another opportunity to invest when the risks have decreased, and two; a risk of not finding that round of funding, in turn potentially causing setbacks in your projections. If you can, get an investor to cover multiple rounds of funding that payout when you reach your benchmarks. That works for all parties, it lets the company focus on development while giving up less of the company at each stage. It also allows investors to disperse their funds over time while the risks at each stage are reduced. In addition, it gives the investor confidence that you can pull off the things you said. This can also backfire on you if you don't plan correctly, so pad each investment raising with at least 25%-50% reserve capital. Always remember that investment money does not belong to you, it belongs to the investor and the company is just borrowing it even if it's equity and not debt. Treat it as if you were pulling it out of your savings and putting it into the company. No one wants to see their money wasted, and if it is, you can bet your tail you will be spending the next decade in court. I was fortunate enough to inherit that knowledge early watching others make that mistake and learning from it.

4) Never give up or stop learning

When you hear of a familiar company name, I don't care what you think, the founding members of that company busted their butts and never gave up to make their company a household name. Persistence is what creates a success in addition to adaptation. If those company heads stayed with their original business models, they would be out of business today no matter how hard they worked. Don't be married to a model because the industry is ever changing and if you don't adapt, you will die. Listen, listen, and then listen some more. Allow your customers to make feedback, and rank it by popularity. Address the most popular feedback items first, because ultimately you are building your application for your customers, not for you.

5) Show me the money!

Know exactly how your company is going to make money and target that customer audience quickly. Show your proof of concept as fast as you can before you dump too much time and money into a bad business model or an application that has a sub-par user experience. If you are going after eyeballs to generate ad revenue, then just know you will have to raise tens of millions of dollars within your first year to sustain and promote growth. This is simply because the ad model only pays off when you have a critical mass of users, which now requires at least 50 million unique monthly visitors. However, you will never raise that kind of capital if you don't build a great mouse trap that engages the users for long periods of time and encourages daily use. Find your niche and grow from there, because you can always scale up later to reach a broader audience. The only time this doesn't apply is if you are trying to compete straight up with the big boys. In this case, their consumer base is accustomed to a certain standard of features making the barrier to entry much higher because they have set the bar higher. If this is something you want to in today's internet era, make sure you have at least $500K to $1MM in startup capital before you begin development, or have a team that can afford to work for ownership over the course of a year while you develop the application, or two years if they are working part time.

Hopefully this collection of my rules will help you build your next startup. Until next time, good luck and thanks for reading.

RJ Garbowicz

Co-Founder / Chief Talker

Webtalk Corporation

www.Webtalk.org