Two Years

[Wyatt]

Intro Thread:

Introduction - My First Purchase For My Company Is...

I already have the idea for the business. I feel that this niche I wanna go in can create a lot of business in the industry I'm working in and can help it greatly. So why not give it a shot? I will say this though. It's a social payment app like Venmo that'll focus maybe 65/35-70/30 on the social/payment part.

My goal is to turn a $2k investment into a million dollar business within two years or less. Where am I at right now you ask?

Plan:

-Have around $2k (bank) to $2.3k (~$300 cash) saved up
-In the talks with a website developer/app developer that charges $100/hr for service. It's my friend's cousin who he used to work for. Friendly guy.
-Create the name, set up domain, etc.
-Start marketing and branding my product.
-Get enough users to scale business further and get investors.
-Profit?

Goals this week:

-Get a quote for my app/website
-Make prototype of the idea.

Last but not least another goal of mine is to get to know TFF users more. If I'm sharing a diary of my life on the internet, I want to at least know the people reading it . I'm a friendly dude and would love to meet successful entrepreneurs or people just starting out. Hopefully through this thread I can meet great people.

Any constructive criticism is appreciated.

If you feel I should do something or if I can improve on something, feel free to comment it down. I would actually love the feedback. Even if you think I should add a goal in a day, mention it. It'll boost my motivation and will make me work harder .

Thanks for reading!

 

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[Scot]

Nothing wrong with your goals, it's definitely doable.

But...

Who's your target customer?

Do you know hey want this app?

How do you know they want this app?

Don't make the mistake I made. I rushed right into building without actually verifying I had a market.

 

[Wyatt]

Nothing wrong with your goals, it's definitely doable.

But...

Who's your target customer?

Do you know hey want this app?

How do you know they want this app?

Don't make the mistake I made. I rushed right into building without actually verifying I had a market.

Target customer would be around ages 18-30. I'm gonna focus on the social aspect of this as well, So when I roll out a beta, I'll target college students to try It out.

See that's the short dilemma I'm having. I've told close people my idea, and they think it's great. However, wouldn't I need to actually develop the app first, then show other people asking if they like it or would use it or not? Or should I just use Leadpages for example to gain some traction and a newsletter? Then once I get a decent internet following go from there? (Also how should I ask whether they would be intersted in an app or website like this?)

Edit: My laziness is kicking in with the paragraph before me. Time to just browse the forums for the answer .

The thing is the paying part of my app I see people would use all the time.
It's just I don't know how I would prove that my customer base wants a social media platform on the app with it as well.

Any input?

 

[lowtek]

Target customer would be around ages 18-30. I'm gonna focus on the social aspect of this as well, So when I roll out a beta, I'll target college students to try It out.

See that's the short dilemma I'm having. I've told close people my idea, and they think it's great. However, wouldn't I need to actually develop the app first, then show other people asking if they like it or would use it or not? Or should I just use Leadpages for example to gain some traction and a newsletter? Then once I get a decent internet following go from there? (Also how should I ask whether they would be intersted in an app or website like this?)

The thing is the paying part of my app I see people would use all the time.
It's just I don't know how I would prove that my customer base wants a social media platform on the app with it as well.

Any input?

Here's my input:

pop out a spreadsheet and run the numbers to see how much revenue you must do month by month, over two years, to hit $1m in total revenue by the end.

Work backwards month by month and chart a course for getting there. How many sales per month to hit that revenue? How many prospects and leads to generate those sales?

It only takes a few minutes and it's going to be an invaluable exercise.

Then, map your current state to the plan and see what needs to be done.

 

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[Wyatt]

Will do @lowtek. That's one of my goals today. Thanks!

Goals for today:
-Validate business idea
-Create excel spreadsheet.

Will update when I'm done. Got work in ~5 hours so I can get some stuff done today.

 

[Wyatt]

Progress

I thought about your question more @Scot . So I looked up what was wrong with my industry and the problem that needed to be fixed. Lets just say there were over six digit articles in google search complaining about the certain issue I want to fix. So I know the problem is there.

@lowtek I honestly don't wanna focus on earnings just yet. This video explains what I want to say in my head but better:

View: https://youtu.be/c1gtBC5Na48?t=3m22s.
I want to focus on the value of the app and how you can make paying your friends fun and cool . Once I get a decent amount of users to then charge, can I come back to you about that spreadsheet?

As for the social aspect however, if I market this right and target my MAIN audience (18-25 year olds) by marketing myself at concerts, instagram, snapchat, journalists, facebook etc....I feel I can get a fast userbase since that's where my target audience usually is. Basically, "I want to push the payment to the background for now and focus more on the moment or experience of using the app." GM of Venmo.

So since I validated the idea, is it now time to contact a developer for a quote? My friends uncle isn't really responsive and I can't have that in a business.
Also would it be a good idea to bring down costs of building the app/website, in return of giving the developer a portion of my company? Anyone have experience with this?

Had to run errands for mom and brother so couldn't work on the business for too long. I work in half an hour for about five hours. Then gym so I can expect to be back working on this project tonight around midnight. Even better I have all weekend off so expect big things!

 

[lowtek]

The reason I asked you to do the spreadsheet is so you can see the enormity of the task of grossing a million in two years, starting from zero. It's geometric growth in revenue, which will require exponential growth in learning.

And no, don't give the developer a portion of your company. That's a huge mistake, for both of you.

 

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[Wyatt]

The reason I asked you to do the spreadsheet is so you can see the enormity of the task of grossing a million in two years, starting from zero. It's geometric growth in revenue, which will require exponential growth in learning.

And no, don't give the developer a portion of your company. That's a huge mistake, for both of you.

Ok so no giving out equity, got it.
So what is recommended to do first then? Call up businesses around my neighborhood and see if they want to discuss my idea? Then have a full on business plan discussing two years worth of strategies? Or build the app first then show the app to them? I feel that you're implying that I should just take this step by step and don't get too ahead of yourself by saying I'll obtain that amount of money.

I'll update this continually during the time I'm at work. I have lots of free time.

 

[Wyatt]

I'm doing an average month to month expenses and revenue spreadsheet right now, so I can figure out when I'll hit profit. If anyone wants to view, here's the Google Drive link: Expenses and Revenue

 

[Wyatt]

Currently reading up on how to calculate monthly to monthly expenses on the forums. Also looking at some progress threads that started with an app and became fastlane, and seeing how much it cost money wise. If anyone has some info I would love to hear your input. Thanks for reading.

 

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[mark51669]

I'd do a one page with lead capture to start interviewing prospective clients. From there, gather how much your product is worth to them.

At face value, $2k to develop an app is no where near enough money. Even getting a spaghetti coded app done in a foreign country would be a stretch.

That being said - can you raise more capital? Are you able to boot strap development by getting paying customers on an "alpha" platform?

Biggest risk I see is having an idea, and lacking a technical partner (or learning it yourself), and hoping that investing money in the problem will solve it. Make sure you're solving correct problem by finding customers that are willing to pay, before investing in any development expenses.

 

[lowtek]

Not sure if it's been linked here before, but here is a great resource that goes into the process of bootstrapping a SaaS product.

The Epic Guide to Bootstrapping a SaaS Startup from Scratch — By Yourself (Part 1)

 

[Wyatt]

Hey guys so I got some good and bad news.

Bad news is that I'm going to drop this plan. Not because it's too hard, but because there's just so many laws that can conflict with my app that it's just not worth it. Or in terms of the Fastlane, there's not really and control. Researching this industry showed me that there's things you can and cant do legally. Good news is that I've been researching this industry more and more each day while learning so much. Sorry for the sudden drop in idea, but hopefully you guys can follow me in my other thread that I'll post soon.

Thanks everyone for all the advice. It means a lot!

 

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[SvvyDO]

Just this amount of information would have saved my friend that's in the hole with 60k in debt developing an SaaS product.

He made all the wrong moves. Went legal first, then gave equity to his app developers, then spent most of his funds on a website. All without even getting his first sale...

It's amazing how much a few posts can shift you away from all the wrong moves.