If you've got a great idea, we're here to help you make the most of it!
In mid 2007 Greig Holbrook, Managing Director of Oban Multilingual, knew he had a huge opportunity with his expertise in Multilingual search engine optimisation but was struggling to take full advantage. Based at the Sussex Innovation Centre (SInC) he decided to use a new SInC product, Superincubation, to help him structure and focus intensively on the growth of his business. In this podcast Greig gives his frank feedback on the process and how it worked for Oban.
‘I know, lets start a business, we’re all good mates – we don’t need a lawyer’.
So went one company I worked with recently, they created a great new company as four friends and to cement their egalitarian business philosophy set-up a shareholders agreement which required unanimous agreement between them for all major decisions.
So who wants to involve a lawyer in these matters, its not the money, they are just so depressing, all they do is make-up what-if-bad-things-happen scenarios and nothing bad will ever happen to us!
I’ve worked with groups of mates, husband & wife teams, brothers & sisters, extended families – the one common factor, they’re people and people fall out, get incapacitated or just have different outlooks or future plans. It is always worth recognising that company shareholders, directors and management have different roles and that having some basic contingency plans will make life simpler if things get sticky.
As it is we have a good company caught in legal limbo while ex-friends expend too much energy hurting each-other – and the lawyers still get paid.
Starting a business – get a lawyer– keep a friend!
One of the frustrations of helping new businesses start-ups is the amount of poor marketing advice that is doled out, usually by marketing consultants as a means of getting a company with little funds to splash out on a glossy brochure or a flier. There is nothing wrong with good marketing collateral, and indeed it should be a key part of brand and profile building, but not without a marketing strategy, a sales model and a good understanding of what you are trying to achieve and how.
So how delighted was I to receive through the post (I must have ticked a box somewhere) a Business Link book offering an Easy Step-by-Step Guide to Marketing. Not only that, the book had a bright yellow additional cover emblazoned with my own personalised title – ‘Mike Herd’s book on Marketing to Win More Business’. Stunning, if it had been a book on how to sell pointless marketing material to Business Link, I would have been impressed, but as example of how to use marketing to win more business it bombed.
Should you judge book by its cover? Hope not!
Mike Herd
Sussex Innovation Centre – November 2008
