Business Advice Needed Please

[mvaughn]

I've been working with Alpha 5 for almost 2 years now and feel like I am ready to hang up my own shingle on my door. What kind of advice would you recommend for someone just starting out? I was thinking of specializing in developing eCommerce applications. I have no advertising budget but I do have a nice site on my portfolio (http://ablejobs.us) that is entirely Alpha 5 driven. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

[WayneS]

Re: Business Advice Needed Please

Hanging a sign on the door is nice but it does require some fundamental basics that you might consider before you affix it with nails or perhaps crazy glue. Hehehe.

I found this article that might help you in these fundamentals. Actually there was a link on this board. Here is the url: http://forum.applicationallstars.com...ba4a803b89ffba

The author(s) give a pretty good rundown of what you might consider as a pricing schema, or minimally, a pretty good idea of what you might charge for the services rendered.

I must admit that I am somewhat confused about the focus of what the shingle reads. Are you planning on doing customized software or running a job site?

If the former then I don't understand the keywords you use: able jobs,available jobs,employment,resumes,job application,interview,longview,white oak

You might like to do some research on those words, minimally adding something like customized software, software, or whatever it is your shingle would read. Please don't forget to add some entries on the site that actually deal with those type of jobs.

For backlinks, you might like to write some articles and post them in various places. Ezine articles comes to mind as one possibility.

By all means, before you jump into the shingle stage, make sure you put together some plan that has realistic goals. Don't expect to make $100,000,000.00 the first year out. Detail your plan as much as possible for the entire year. Then, I recommend, throw it aside for a short time and return to it. You may be surprised at how much you forgot or perhaps didn't put in the plan.

Hope these few suggestions help.

Good luck.

Wayne

[Steve Wood]

Re: Business Advice Needed Please

Michael,

Visit www.iadn.com and then call me to discuss what you want to do. I've been looking at low or no cost options to promote business and I already have a draft. You've done a great job with ablejobs.

[Steve Workings]

Re: Business Advice Needed Please

I'll invite you to call me as well. Send me an email at [email protected] and we'll set a time.

Alpha needs more more professional developers.

[mvaughn]

Re: Business Advice Needed Please

Thank you Wayne for the excellent advice. Ablejobs.us is an employment agency who hired me to create their site and incorporate eCommerce and back office applications. I developed ablejobs.us and globaljobscreening.com (click on the Employers tab). Ablejobs is the employment agency; globaljobscreening is the eCommerce branch. I am using these as examples of my work only.

[mvaughn]

Re: Business Advice Needed Please

Thank you Steve and Steve! You've both given me excellent help in the past and I certainly would not have gotten this far without you. I would be honored to be a part of IADN and will be sending those emails shortly.

[Clipper87]

Re: Business Advice Needed Please

Michael,

I would recommend you to focus on mobile, with alpha it now comes into reach of SMB's to let develop mobile applications. That is where the money is today I think. For e-commerce you'll bump into loads of competition with almost ready made solutions. Do something others aren't doing and you'll prosper.

Good luck!

[mvaughn]

Re: Business Advice Needed Please

Thank you Frank, that was great advice and makes perfect sense. True, everyone is into eCommerce now. Thanks for reminding me of that. If you don't mind me asking, are you developing mobile and how are you getting your clients?

[DoronF]

Re: Business Advice Needed Please

Hi Michael,

eCommerce will get you into steep competition with the commercial CMS available already. I will use A5 for straight database application and taking advantage of the mobile capability A5 has. You need also to have your own web site to advertise your services.. Where is it? This is how you get your clients. Do you have LinkedIn account? Then when you have your web site you are not done with it. Then comes SEO (Search Engine Optimization). Get yourself a domain that can be used as key word.

Regards,

Doron
The Farber Consulting Group, Inc.

Web site: http://www.dFarber.com
MS SQL Blog: http://www.dfarber.com/computer-consulting-blog.aspx
Convert Ms Access to Web
MS SQL Remote DBA
Alpha Five Development
No Interest Loans Application

[mvaughn]

Re: Business Advice Needed Please

Thank you Doron for your excellent advice. I will be putting together a web site this weekend. Your idea about using a keyword for a domain name is priceless. I'm sure the best ones are taken, but I still have my college thesaurus that will help me find something clever. I'm also a Jersey native (Clifton) so its always nice to meet a kindred spirit!

[DaveM]

Re: Business Advice Needed Please

Hi Michael,


You built a very nice website there!

On the business side, Doron, Steve, Frank and Steve all know a great deal about that.

With no Budget, SEO will have to include very smart work and a lot of social submission and connection.

Let me toss my own name in as a contact at [email protected] . We can all talk to you as you wish and I suggest to write everything down and make your own decisions to which advice on each subject to go with. There are sometimes many roads that all lead to the same place.

Definitely a website of some type as a front and I think less than 60-70.00 at minimum per year. As one of the above stated, it becomes your store front.

The greatest "anything" would never have been sold if no one knew it existed and where to get it. Take any opportunity to place any demo, or product wherever there is a place. IADN does have a store as do many other places that people DO visit and if they see your product, it has a better chance to get into a buyers hands.

Linked, Facebook, Twitter, and many others will help get you launched. Site submission to all the search engines is not so great a deal, but still important since most sites are discovered before that they are evee online for over a few days by about all the robots(some not good).

[mvaughn]

Re: Business Advice Needed Please

Wow, I am floored. You guys are the best and you compliment me. That's awesome.
My sister site to ablejobs.us is Global Job Screening, where the Alpha 5 fun is.
Here are some screens of the back office app and Employer's area:
back office.gifemployers-home-page.gifsearch grid.gif

[DaveM]

Re: Business Advice Needed Please

Here is one of those tools that will help you and others especially to let you know a bit about where you are so you can work to where you want to be.

http://www.domaintuno.com/

[Clipper87]

Re: Business Advice Needed Please

Michael,

I'm a special kind of breed

In the SMB market (that is +/- 20-200 employees out here) you'll find that your first customer brings your 2nd customer & so on. Projects never end so with maybe 5 to 10 customers you'll make a good living as a one men show.

[forskare]

Re: Business Advice Needed Please

Do you have LinkedIn account?

Beware of LinkedIn. They use deceptive practices. I have often received email from them saying that " " has recommended you for " ". One of those folks has a presence with Alpha Software as well as some on the Alpha forums. I have also received email from others saying I recommended them for this or that. I assured them that was not the case, that LinkedIn may have 'mined' my address book. I've also received email from LinkedIn saying " " wants me to join up with them on some deal connected with LinkedIn. Such was not the case.

LinkedIn, in my opinion, is out to make a buck at anyone's expense. I, and perhaps everyone else who has joined LinkedIn have been abused by their tactics. No doubt, there may be some benefits but I've yet to see any of value.