He discussed with us his experience of coming up with an innovative idea, prototyping it, and seeing it through to the thriving, global business that it is now.  A business generating, last year, a profit of $34.5 Million (source).

Below is a summary of the questions that he believes must be answered in creating a successful business and some tid bits of wisdom that ressonated with me.  If you’re serious about starting or developing a business – online or offline – you might find yourself having a few “ah-ha” moments if you get out pen and paper and start answering the questions.  I did.

Who are you?

Can you describe yourself in very simple terms? What is your personality? What are your principles?

Why this is important:  If you don’t know, everything is flexible

At Wotif, their mission is to add value to both the customer and supplier and to keep it simple (no distracting ads on their website, simple navigation and collecting from the users only the data absolutely necessary).

What are your skills?

Strengths? Weaknesses?  Do a full inventory on yourself so that you know where you need to fill the blanks (e.g. by up-skilling or by finding the right people to work with)

Who is your customer?

Can you really define how your customer is going to benefit?…. and in a REALLY compelling way?

Who else is doing the same thing and how will you offer a different experience that is of value?

How are you going to make money?

How will you ensure your cashflow?

Don’t be afraid to take on big business

Funding/Business Plan

“The worst thing you can do with a good idea is nothing.”

Prototype it and test it in your garage.

Raising capital is not always necessary.  Try to do it for nothing!

Building a Team

What sort of people do you want?

It’s important that your techie’s understand the business side

Experiment

Make little changes/tweaks and test things as you go.  Avoid massive overhauls.

Be prepared to fail.

Keep it Simple

Ask a simple question until you get a simple answer.

As you can see, these are not complex questions or ideas.  I think the main message I took away from Graeme’s talk is that there is nothing complicated about business – just get the fundamentals sorted.  I would add to this that online business is no different to offline business.  It just uses different technology.

My personal trainers at Best Practice, Anthony and Jeames, are both as passionate about e-commerce (or “online business”) as I am so we have a lot to talk about once they’ve put me through my paces on a Tuesday and Friday morning.

Anthony and I have been talking, for a while, about how to answer the question, “What do you do?”  Up until recently my uninspiring answer has been, “I make websites.”

While it is a concise description of the end-product of a typical project here at Webnerd, it does nothing to explain how we differ from every other Joe who makes websites, nor does it inspire any further discussion on the topic.

So Anthony and I have given it some thought and come up with the following response:

“I help businesses to understand and then implement the power of the Internet to increase their profits.”

You then, almost breathlessly, ask, “How do you do this, James?”

And from there a conversation may bloom.

Well, hopefully!  I’ll give it a go and make tweaks as necessary.

How do you reply when someone asks you, “What do you do?”  Is it compelling and does it inspire conversation?

Let me ask you something else:  is the answer to this question conveyed in a concise and compelling way on the front page of your website?

Go ahead and check right now

Wishing you happiness and success in your online and offline endeavours