The Bootstrapper’s

Practical Guide to
Starting a Business.
Feargal Byrne
1
Introduction 3

Web Hosting 5

Phone 6

Administration Software 7

Office Space 8

Internet Marketing 9

Credit Card Processing 12

Advertising 13

Analyzing your Marketing Campaigns 14

2
 Introduction
Ok, so itʼs Global Recession time and you have already, or are about to, lose
“Avoiding waste is the your job. Donʼt worry, millions of others are on the same boat. You have three
choices.
most important thing 1) Wallow in self-pity.
2) Try to get another job.
for a new business to 3) Start a business.

do in the early If you are thinking about option 3 then this guide is going to be a crucial resource
for you as you start your business. You see, avoiding waste is the most important
stages” thing for a new business to do in the early stages. If you can do this in the early
stages, then your business is likely to maintain a lean and efficient business
model as it grows. Your business is like a child. If a child picks up bad habits
early in life then they are likely to continue them on throughout life. Conversely, if
they avoid bad habits and pick up good habits when they are young, these habits
will enrich the person throughout their entire life.

Let me take you back 15 years ago. Back then it was difficult to do “extreme
bootstrapping”. Yeah, you could cut costs but not to the extent that you can today
without hurting the operation of your business. Today, the Internet has allowed us
entrepreneurs to run a business at a small fraction of the costs that we could 15
years ago. However, I still see the vast majority of start-up entrepreneurs
throwing valuable cash away when they can make huge savings by making a few
simple adjustments to how they operate.

Cash is the oxygen for your start-up. If you have cash on hand, your business
survives. If you run out of cash, your business dies. By bootstrapping, especially
in the early stages, you are giving your business time to develop. You will reach
profitability faster.

3
 I decided to write this guide to help other entrepreneurs bootstrap. I have
“Today you can have included the most important areas where I think fellow entrepreneurs can make
improvements.
an operating
Today you can have an operating business for between $40 -$100 per month
business for depending on your business model.

between $40 -$100 Oh, and unless otherwise stated anything I recommend, I use myself.

per month Make sure you check out LostJobStartBusiness.com where you will find some
useful tips on business plans, marketing and general start-up issues.
depending on your
business model.”

4
 Web Hosting
Given the importance of the Internet to modern marketing and in particular to
“Your web hosting marketing a new start-up. Your web hosting provider is an extremely important
factor in your business success. Sadly, many entrepreneurs overlook this, and do
provider is an not put the required thought into which hosting provider best meets their needs.
As you will see, by making the right choice of hosting provider you can save a lot
extremely of cash.

important factor in There are many different hosting options and providers out there. These all vary
according to bandwidth allowance, space available etc. However, in this day and
age you should be looking for a hosting provider with unlimited bandwidth and
your business unlimited space. You should also look for a free domain name registration.

success.” Also, a major money saver is getting a hosting provider with “Simple Scripts”.
Basically, this makes it easy for you to install free scripts like WordPress, Joomla
etc. As a result, you will save $100s on web development fees. I used Simple
Scripts to install WordPress for my blog and it was truly a one click experience.
Really simple. I have very limited web development experience so if I can do it so
can you.

Look for a hosting provider with all of the above for under $8 per month. I use a
provider called BlueHost for LostJobStartBusiness.com. You should definitely
check them out. I have used 3 other hosting providers and have found BlueHost
to be head and shoulders above the rest.

Another thing, you can get a significant discount if you bulk buy your web hosting
for a year or more instead of paying monthly. Thatʼs what I do.

5
 Phone
Any Start-up Entrepreneur not using VOIP especially for international calls needs
their head examined. Iʼm sure most of you are familiar with Skype. Itʼs what I use.
“Any Start-up As a result, I would recommend SkypeIn for your phone service. People can call
you on Skype using their regular phones. The great thing is that this comes in a
Entrepreneur not package. You can get a regional or global package which contains SkypeIn,
Voicemail and unlimited landline calls. You will easily save hundreds of dollars
using VOIP every year by using this service from Skype.

especially for If you are considering making contacts and networking internationally itʼs a real
no brainer. One of the really cool features that I like is that people can contact
international calls you on your SkypeIn number wherever you are in the world. I travel a lot in
Europe and I regularly take calls on my laptop with Skype from my SkypeIn
needs their head number. Also when I make calls, people donʼt even know that Iʼm in another
country.
examined.” You donʼt need a phone line and itʼs very cheap. I love it when I am on a bus or
train with WIFI access. I really do have a portable office in my laptop. There are
other VOIP providers. However, I am extremely happy with the value and service
I get with Skype

6
 Administration Software
“For a start-up Use as much free software as possible. There is no need for expensive
accounting software. A spreadsheet is all you need to record your expenditure
going the free and sales. Use Google Docs, OpenOffice or for Mac NeoOffice for your word
processing, spreadsheet and database requirements.
route for your All these are good free applications that have more than enough power for what
“administrative” you will need.

software is For a start-up going the free route for your “administrative” software is definitely
the way to go. Look, itʼs a secondary operation to developing your product.
Nobody really cares what spreadsheet or word processor you use. It doesnʼt
definitely the way have an effect on your core product.

to go.” Hereʼs another reason for going the free route. Much of the commercial software
has been designed for large established businesses. Therefore, many of the
features included will not be used by you during the start-up stage. Why pay for
something that youʼre not going to use?

I know Iʼm preaching to the converted here, but I see lotʼs of new entrepreneurs
pay out hundreds of dollars on software that they frankly donʼt need.

7
 Office Space
“ When you first When you first start out. Set up in your garage, house or apartment. Just avoid
paying rent for an office. Itʼs an unnecessary expense in this day and age,
start out. Set up in especially for a 2 - 3 person start-up team.

your garage, If your product/service is good enough people wonʼt mind the fact that you donʼt
have an office. In fact, they probably wonʼt even know.
house or However, I do understand that in some cases you will need an office. But only
apartment.” rent one if it is truly absolutely necessary. Rent is a major drain on your
resources. On top of the cost issue, there are also social and environmental
benefits to working “remotely” from your home.

I pledge to you right now, that I will never start-up in an office or rented space
again. I will only rent an office when the business needs to expand.

If you are working as part of a start-up team use Google Docs as a means of
collaboration. Itʼs free and easy to use. I personally find it much better than face
to face collaboration. It eliminates distractions such as “coffee breaks”, “going to
lunch together” and the absolute worst and most evil “Hey, check this
out” (YouTube video).

Internet Service Provider

If you operate from your home you should already have broadband installed for
your personal use. Use this. A standard connection is enough for most start-up
businesses. Basically, use the connection that you already have in your house.
As long as itʼs broadband it should be ok.

8
 Internet Marketing
There is no doubt that Internet Marketing is the most cost effective and best way
“There is no doubt to get your start-up on the radar of your customers. The good news is that itʼs
cheap. I would only recommend spending money on a good sequential
that Internet autoresponder for sending bulk e-mails. This is extremely important.

Marketing is the Email Marketing

most cost effective Statistically email marketing gives massive returns on the money you spend on
it. According to the Direct Marketing Association email marketing gives a return of
and best way to $43.52 for every dollar spent. Because of this, you need to pick a good
autoresponder service. You need an autoresponder that maintains a good
get your start-up relationship with ISPs and mail clients.

on the radar of Some entrepreneurs pay their web designer to send a mail shot. In my mind this
is crazy. Not only does it add a lot of hassle to mailing your customers. It costs
your customers.” more. You must be hands-on with your mailing list. These people deserve your
attention. They should not be farmed off to someone else.

Today, there are a number of autoresponders available. You should get one that
creates the web subscription form for you so you only need to paste code into
your website. Secondly, it should have a spam checker that checks each email or
newsletter that you send against the latest spam filters.

I use AWeber. Itʼs really great and offers fantastic value. In my view itʼs on a
different level than the competition and an invaluable element in my marketing
mix.

9
 Design Your Own Website

“See, you gotta be Hereʼs a dose of reality. Are you ready. Your life as an entrepreneur will be so
much easier if you spend 1 week learning the basics of Web Design. Learn CSS
and HTML. Look itʼs easy. There are hundreds of YouTube videos that spoon-
hands-on with feed you all you need to know. There are plenty of excellent tutorial websites that
will help you. See, you gotta be hands-on with your web content. The Internet is
your web content. far too important to be left to others.

The Internet is far For your website to work, you need to make hundreds of changes to it as you
constantly test and measure each key component. Itʼs extremely expensive to
too important to get the appropriate level of service from a dedicated web-designer. They are
great for brochure sites, but thatʼs not what you need as a start-up. You need to
be left to others.” evolve your website into a marketing machine. This involves making constant
adjustments.

You just have to start with a simple website (look at some of the most popular
sites on the Net - Googleʼs own site, Craigslist, Facebook et al.) and fill it with
search engine friendly text.

You can use a free development applications like NVU and Komposer.

If you want to play with the big boys and girls use could a professional package
like Dreamweaver.

I use Dreamweaver, itʼs the industry standard. Although many of the free tools
have the same capabilities. I personally find Dreamweaver better suited to my
needs and more straightforward to use. However, donʼt spend any money unless
you believe it will be worth it.

10
 Blogging

Use a free blogging system like WordPress and Blogger. I have used both but
“Remember, a prefer WordPress. As I mentioned earlier, if you have BlueHost as your web
hosting provider then you can easily install WordPress (among other things)
blog is a must yourself.

have. Donʼt be Host the blog on your server. I believe that this is better than using the free
hosting provided by both WordPress and Blogger.
lazy.” Remember, a blog is a must have. Donʼt be lazy. You should keep it updated as
much as you can. This is a very important part of your search engine
optimization strategy.

For your RSS feed use Feedburner. Itʼs free. Also, if you use WordPress many of
the templates have feeds built in.

Social Bookmarking

Add This is a great free tool that covers all the major social bookmarking sites. All
you need to do is copy and paste the code from the Add This website into your
blog template or webpage. This works great for articles or if you are giving away
something free from your website.

Videos

Donʼt be afraid to host your videos on YouTube and embed them in your website.
In my view, this is better than hosting the videos yourself. The reason for this, is
that the webpage that the video is on, feeds into YouTube and can increase your
“views” stats. This in turn increases the chances that somebody will find your
video on YouTube.

11
 Credit Card Processing
Ok, there are two main options for this.
“If I were to sell 1) Go with separate shopping cart and credit card processing.
anything from my For example, you would combine a shopping cart with Worldpay. You pay for
website I would these separately and you must spend time and effort linking them together. In
one of my early ventures I went along this route with one of the founding team
use an all in one who was very tech savvy putting together the shopping cart and processing.
However, I would not recommend this approach especially if you have to
shopping cart and outsource it.

payments 2) Get an all in one package.

processing Believe me, this is the best way to go for most start-ups. If I were to sell anything
from my website I would use an all in one shopping cart and payments
provider” processing provider. There are a number of benefits.

If you choose a shopping like Yahoo or Amazon people tend to trust you more.
You may therefore, get a higher conversion rate. Also, if you are not a techie you
can set the system up yourself. You pay a monthly fee and a percentage of each
sale.

Overall, it takes less work to put together which means you have more time to
focus on your business. Although, I donʼt currently use any online store or credit
processing services because all my stuff is free. I would strongly consider Yahoo
Merchant Solutions for any future e-store I may set up. They are used by a lot of
Top 500 Internet Retailers. Amazon WebStore is another good option. However, I
donʼt recommend one over the other because I donʼt use them at the moment.

12
 Advertising
Iʼve seen many start-ups over spend on advertising. Hey, I have been guilty of
“Firstly, donʼt doing it in the past. Initially, most entrepreneurs donʼt consider advertising as a
start-up cost. However, you should factor this into your start-up projections. Like
bother with a space shuttle, you need enough fuel for lift off.

traditional I recommend being very very tight with your advertisement spend. Just limit it to
one or two avenues. I would just limit it to one. Hereʼs what I have learned from
advertising, forget past experiences. Firstly, donʼt bother with traditional advertising, forget about
newspapers, radio and TV. These advertising channels will burn your cash faster
about than you could with a match. Secondly, avoid banner advertising on the web. I
ran a banner campaign a number of years ago when I was fresh out of college
newspapers, radio and before I truly understood Marketing. It didnʼt work as well as I expected. I
later found out that itʼs extremely hard to get a return from banner CPM
and TV.” advertising. Bottom line avoid it.

Instead, focus your advertising on Pay Per Click performance based advertising.
For example, Google Adwords. The great thing about this is, that you are
targeting your niche exactly. They are actively searching for a product like yours.
I have achieved the best results using AdWords.

Of course, organic search is the best way to attract visitors to your site.

You might be thinking by now “Why his he talking about Internet Marketing so
much?” Well, Iʼll tell you why. Itʼs really easy to test and measure Internet
Marketing. Therefore, you have enough information to make improvements. You
really need to be able to compile workable data cheaply in order to make your
marketing campaign work. The Internet is the best way to do this.

13
 Analyzing your Marketing Campaigns
“You must analyze My friend, this is probably the most important thing you can do in your business.
Thatʼs right, you must analyze how each component of your business is
how each performing. Online, a great way to analyze you marketing and website is to use
Google Analytics. Itʼs free and very straightforward to set up and use. This is
component of your probably the most important marketing tool for you. The key is to monitor and
adjust constantly.
business is
If you donʼt test and measure you are like a ship without a rudder. You canʼt steer
performing.” your business in the right direction. Thatʼs the reality. The better you become at
testing and measuring the quicker youʼll find the right path.

About the Author:

Feargal Byrne is an Entrepreneur with experience in the Software and
Entertainment sectors. He holds a B.A. in Accounting and Finance and
an M.B.S. in Entrepreneurship and Marketing.

Recently, he has set up LostJobStartBusiness.com a website that helps

people who have lost their job to start a business.

14