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pmart4

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About pmart4

  • Rank
    Registered User
  • Birthday 07/09/1979

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  • Location
    Sheffield
  • Occupation
    Manager
  1. Sorry to hear about your job. Your first hurdle is new business. You need to look at how you are going to advertise and then maybe get talking to event organisers. Marketing your business with free samples/tasters to event companies is always a good shout (but you will really need to impress). There are lots of local business support groups who offer free advice on getting started.
  2. Hi All, I'm not sure if anyone can help me but I often get good advice on these forums so I thought I'd take a chance. I am currently working for Call Centre and have been the manager there for just over a decade. I have around 16 years experience withing the industry and am really wanting to set up my own consultancy business. I have a lot of knowledge to share (although I am always searching for more) and it's something that I am confident I can succeed in. I have a proven track record as I have gained experience from working with internal outsourcing partners in the past. The fear I have is that these companies were already partnered with the company I currently work for - acquiring my own clients is a whole new ball game (and outside my expertise). Does anyone have any advice on how to attract new business clients or any tips on how to get started building up connections? Anything would be really helpful. Thanks in advance
  3. I've known him a while but mainly as an acquaintance - we're not what I call friends but we say "hello" that kind of thing. He seems to be a straight up guy, but you never know. I'll look at the footage and most likely just pay - Maybe I'm being over-sceptical as its 2015 and scams are rife, lol. Thanks for the help guys - I'll just use a different drive to turn on in future.
  4. No problem - just wanted to know where I stood. Thanks guys
  5. I will be going up to view it on Saturday. I most likely will end up paying it just to avoid the hassle, but if I'm honest I really do not think it's a valid accusation.
  6. Hi All, I just had a neighbour say that I bumped into his car when I reversing using his drive on the 27th September (yes, a month ago)! He called me out of the blue today, saying he's got it on CCTV and will not go to the police as long as I arrange for someone to go look at it and pay for the damage? He said that on the CCTV you can see both cars rock from the impact - surely I would have felt that? No? Anyway, my question is - Am I liable for this? He offered to show me the CCTV footage but I don't even know if that holds any relevance. He is into photography & digital art and I know the CCTV footage is easy to edit. Should I go to the police first and say that I am being accused? Hope you guys can help me!
  7. It's funny as I just got similar questions from a person I was just speaking to! Preferably I'd like to aim at the corporate sector. My target market would be any company with 'Sales or Customer Service' staff (telephony or direct) and also I would specialise in the development and growth of both new and experienced managers. If I decide to focus on SME's then my whole approach and pricing would need to be very different, but still manageable. I think there is room for this, but the question is which has the most demand and (even with excellent branding and unique course content) how do I get their attention?
  8. The appearance and presentation of the site looks great - it's clean and not overly fussy like some that I've seen. I think the earlier poster was right. It's not clear what you do until you delve deeper into the site and even then some examples would be great. The Henderson's printed tiles look really cool, so why not make them more prominent at the front of the site? Also, I'd give a better description of what things are. Acrylic Letter 'R' for £34.95 - where would I use that? What is it? Can I see an example of where it has been used or where I could use it. Overall I really like the site. A few tweaks to make it easier for the end users and you've got a professional, clean and informative little Web Site in my opinion. Good Job so far
  9. Me and a friend looked into something similar a few years ago but with more of an eSports twist. We abandoned the idea after months of research as it is very difficult to turn a profit. We spoke to some companies in the US who run centres similar to what you suggest here. There success (like many businesses) was down to location. The area that one of the Centres was located is near a university and in an area that is highly social. They ultimately were a cafe with LAN gaming access. Now this does not meanit cannot work in the UK. eSports and online gaming is picking up some huge momentum at the moment (see Free to Play featuing Dendi on Steam). I believe there is a business model that could turn big profits from this side of the industry - like you though - we just could not figure out how. You're on right to investigate this path though and I wish you luck Hope this helps.
  10. Thanks for the replies guys - that actually gives me a lot of confidence. The area I enjoy most is Sales and Man Management BUT the demand seems to be higher for Customer Services and Marketing so it's swings and roundabouts. I don't like to see Training Companies with a massive course list as I think it takes away from the 'specialist' theme I wish to promote. I really appreciate these comments. You've each given me a lot to think about - as well as a much needed confidence boost! I think I can get started and begin researching how to best promote the courses once they're completed. Any other views on this would be very welcome. Thanks PS: Thanks Steve - well spotted - I've edited it now
  11. I have a wealth of experience in Sales, Customer Services, Marketing, Motivational Speaking and Man Management (all at what I consider to be at a high corporate level). I am pretty good at web design and was thinking of setting up a company to share my knowledge. I've always wanted to set up on my own but never been brave enough to take the plunge until now. Many businesses within my circle do their training in-house, but is there a market for this? I am currently doing my own market research which is going quite well but I am curious to know people's thoughts on here. In your opinion do many company's still outsource to teach/learn these type of skills? Thanks in advance EDIT: Title typo - Thanks Steve
  12. Horace Hull (mentioned in this post) was my Grandfather. His son Alan is my uncle and Linda Hull (now Martin) is my mum He was married to Alice May and lived in Jordanthorpe for years. Hope this helps ^^
  13. Yeah, that's more the right lines but we will be targeting some of Kickstarters market share with regards to games developers, toy makers, child safety items etc... The theme is pretty broad in that it needs to 'benefit children aged 16 or under in some way. There's a lot of room for niche crowdfunding sites, you only need to look at some of the ones we listed earlier. I think the demographic is much wider than I probably made clear. The FCA only regulate Investment-based and Loan-based crowdfunding. As no monies are being paid back and no equity is on offer, Kickstarter are (for now) operating within an unregulated market! Just Giving is a fantastic site. We spoke to some of their PR & Social Media team who really knew their stuff when it came to getting the word out there and they gave us some valuable advice to take with us. Their niche is far smaller than ours. They are a site for charities and fundraisers only. Although we hope to give them some competition and given that we have a wider target demographic we have an advantage in the long term. We don't expect to come in and shake up the industry, but more carve out our own profitable space within it. The schools will initially go to sites like Just Giving, but long term the crowdfunding industry has more than enough room for more than one platform. People naturally love choice and options - that all we are initially providing I've liked your input on here Steve as it has made me revisit many areas of the business and its processes. Even after the highlighted risks I am still very confident the site will be a success. We've been speaking to 'The Next Web' today and they were really supportive and are looking over our press pack. If you want I can email you a copy with more information. Let me know
  14. Hi Steve, As explained we cannot list 'all' of our USP's at this stage, but the fundraising options that we will provide is just one of many that we plan to deliver. Indiegogo have been using a 'part-funded' structure for years and have seen much success. If executed correctely this can be a very viable option for many people, startups or fundraisers. As also stated above the big crowdfunding sites are saturated. Getting through Kickstarter's application/vetting process is becoming more and more difficult and they have even openly said that they are struggling with the sheer volume of campaigns being put to them each day (hence the very funny potato salad campaign that somehow passed through their automated test)! We agree that ‘All or Nothing’ campaigns do motivate both the backers and campaign managers much more for various reasons, but (as long as you’re transparent from the start) helping someone raise some of the money towards a project can also work. For example – if a School needs £1500 for new facilities, but only manages to raise £850 it is still a huge help and they can then look at other ways to raise the remaining funds. Either way our site has achieved its goal of ‘benefiting children’ as we’ve made life much easier for their school to fulfil their needs. Crowdfunding is expanding very quickly and the demand for niche sites is bigger than ever. We have -of course- done our research and seen the likes of 'AppSplit', 'Catincan', 'Faithlauncher', 'Kiva', 'Piggybackr;, Razoo; and more all become very successful in their retrospective niche. The time for niche crowdfunding is more relevant than ever - if you go onto Kickstarter or Indiegogo right now you'll see a sea of projects on 0% funds that are coming to an end. The average reported success rate on Kickstarter is 42.73% and 57.27% fail. Whereas 'some' of the niche sites we listed are reporting success rates as high as 75%! If you choose a niche crowdfunding site then you ‘could’ increase your chance of being funded because the people on the site are focused on benefitting your particular cause – e.g: App Development, Property, Religion, Charity etc… Our focus is benefitting children, which we feel is an excellent cause and one we (and many others) care about. I do not agree that crowdfunding is purely about volume. As in most areas of business there is an 'optimum' range. If a person wants to do something good (and you'd be surprised how many do) to benefit our future generation then we aim to be a viable 'option' for them. We can –of course- back this point up. Take a look at: http://fundit.ie/ - they are a crowdfunding site that only caters for projects based in Ireland. Now, you can get still funds from anywhere in the world, but still you are seriously limiting what can go ‘onto’ your site via your niche (as are we). That said, they recently reported a 78% success rate compared to Kickstarters 43% we mentioned earlier. I believe that you are right in the fact that loads of crowdfunding sites will emerge over the next few years. We are certain that many other niches will be catered for going forward (some that haven't even been thought of yet). It's an exciting time for this industry and having kids ourselves we're really looking forward to helping people, schools, businesses, game developers etc mobilise their projects by getting the funding they need. Hope this helps PS: Sorry for the long response, Steve. I love talking about the project and could go on for hours
  15. Thanks Jon, I'll call you either this evening or in the morning for a chat - look forward to speaking to you. Thanks ---------- Post added 06-08-2014 at 20:02 ---------- Thanks Steve, Finances for this project are not an issue for us and given our expertise no remortgages or loans are required. We agree that volume helps, but given the vast amount of social media options available these days, spreading the word is far easier than it used to be. We already have contacts with some major media bloggers as well as tabloids and radio stations (and not just the local ones). We haven't given 'all' the information on this post as we are limited at this stage, but we have many USPs in comparison to other crowdfunding sites in the market already. Did you know that if you don't reach your funding goal on Kickstarter then you receive no funds at all? Indiegogo do allow you to receive funds on part-funded campaigns, however they are so big that most projects go unseen (let alone reach their monetary goal)! Crowdfunding cannot forever be aimed at these major players - the market is already far too large for that and niche sites like ours have every opportunity than ever to thrive. Just because Facebook dominates the social media scene it doesn't mean that other social media platforms cannot emerge and successfully co-exsist (twitter, myspace, instagram, google+ to name just a fraction of these). We are under no illusion that this project will take a lot of time and hard work but we are already receiving a great deal of support from businesses, start-ups, schools, the media and most importantly the general public (like Jon in the above post). That said, we really appreciate your advice and welcome any input you have for us. The site is being crafted to help the general public raise funds that they otherwise could not attain via other methods, so your input is invaluable
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