You’ve probably noticed by now that rewards-based crowdfunding is a great way for new businesses or projects to take off. What you may not realise is that crowdfunding is being used by established businesses. In fact, its being increasingly embraced by existing businesses in some pretty creative and resourceful ways. A player like Sony doesn’t need
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Sustainability and the Crowd
Sustainability. Where to start? While sustainability may seem to be a buzz word, it can be found on many corporate agendas because its historical and present day insights are an increasingly important consideration for planning and growth. There are as many definitions of the word as there are companies in the Fortune 500, the FTSE 100
How Can You Use Reward-Based Crowdfunding To Grow Your Business?
Struggling to get your small business off the ground? You could do away with the stressful bank loan appointments and endless investor pitches and go straight to the people you’re hoping to reach through your product. Crowdfunding is an exciting, modern way to raise money for your project. It gives you the opportunity to flex
Got A Business Start-Up Idea? Stop Pondering And Get Started Today
If you’ve been struggling to find a way to fund your start-up and haven’t had much luck with traditional investment routes, crowdfunding is your logical next step. Crowdfunding offers small businesses the opportunity to reach out to a potentially global audience of supporters, raising the investment funds they need to finally get a foot on
What can startups learn from Olympic athletes?
As the 2016 Rio Olympics and Paralympics come to a close, what learnings can business startups and entrepreneurs take from the world’s top athletes? The Olympics represent the pinnacle of sporting excellence and achievement after years of dedication and sacrifice. Competitors try to extract that extra ounce of physical or psychological advantage in an environment
Building Dreams & Breaking Down Barriers
Starting a new small business can be tough, but crowdfunding is an increasingly popular way for new and existing small business to get funding. Here’s a look at how one woman in Brisbane, Australia has used crowdfunding to build her dream and break down barriers in numerous ways. At the SheSkills workshop in Brisbane, the
Software Testing Explained for First-Time Entrepreneurs
Testing Your Software Product: Many first-time entrepreneurs unfortunately underestimate the importance of software testing, simply because it’s not taught in the entrepreneur courses and it’s not an exciting part of the product development process. But guess what? The lack of software or product testing can lead you straight to disaster. Imagine you built the greatest
What entrepreneurs need to know before building a tech product
Have an idea for an app, software or tech product? Here is a checklist for all entrepreneurs that want to avoid failure when launching a tech product. This checklist will be essential in guiding your strategy – and will help you to determine a budget. This in turn can help determine at what point you
Have a business idea, but no tech knowledge and little money? Read this!
Strategies for nontechnical entrepreneurs in software development In recent weeks I have had some interesting feedback from start-ups and entrepreneurs requiring affordable options for software development. Software development is not an easy game to play. Especially if you have had limited or no exposure to software development. The romance of Silicon Valley start-ups making instant
The Role of Culture in a Start-Up
A start-up culture needs to be very conscious and strategic, rooted deep into the underlying and mutually agreed upon vision, core values and beliefs. Building a strong company culture from day one is just as important as the product and the go-to-market strategy. Start-up life is stressful and unforgiving and the risk of failure grows exponentially
2015 Intergenerational Report – What does it all mean?
The Australian Government’s Intergenerational Report: Implications for business planning and important insights. Any business, regardless of size or whether it’s existing or new, must take into account external environmental factors during its planning process. One such factor is Government policy which needs to be understood and the impacts assessed early. This will not only help
Budgeting for Businesses – Why is it important?
Many business owners fail to set a budget and don’t consider this to be important. They either think they are not big enough to require a budget or they have their budget in their head. A budget is the success plan for a business, it helps you plan and to reach goals within your business.
The Legal Basics All Entrepreneurs Need To Know
Whilst not applicable in all cases, when establishing/operating a business involving the sale or supply of goods and /or services it is quite important to consider having a set of terms and conditions tailored to such sale/supply. Terms and Conditions Prior to entering any commercial arrangement it would be prudent for a business owner that
The NOSE Knows!
So, you’ve decided to run a crowdfunding campaign to start a business or raise money for charity. Good on you – you’re ahead of most who are still thinking about it. So, what now? Last month we talked about techniques you can use to create your story. But how do you get people to understand
The Importance of Cash Flow Forecasting
Across years of providing advice to small and medium businesses, most recently as a partner of BridgePoint Group, I have been privileged to provide advice to dozens of start-ups. I love the enthusiasm and ingenuity of the men and women that are prepared to ‘risk it all’ and ‘have a go’. And I love the fact
Employee Share Schemes just got more attractive
On 14 January 2015, Treasury released exposure draft legislation that is aimed at reforming the taxation of Employee Share Schemes (“ESS”). While the stated aim of the draft legislation is to create special concessions for start-ups to encourage them to reward key employees with equity in the business, there are incentives for all employees to
Setting Up A Business
There are a plethora of issues which will confront a new business owner ranging from ascertaining the most suitable business structure for the business to operate under to ensuring that its business activities are compliant with all laws, rules and regulations. In starting a business one of the first issues to consider is
What’s your story?
Selling your story actually means creating a connection with your supporters or customers. Writing your story and the story of your business or idea is less about what you have to say and more about what people will want to hear in order to believe and buy in. That doesn’t mean you should write
Creating a Context for Success
Across years of providing advice to small and medium businesses, most recently as a partner of BridgePoint Group, I have been privileged to provide advice to dozens of start-ups. I love the enthusiasm and ingenuity of the men and women that are prepared to ‘risk it all’ and ‘have a go’. And I love the
