Hey this is the daily overpass, my name is Eric and I make apps! Now today I want to talk about getting started in a business. Ok so it's 8 p.m., I'm in the office.
Y'know today has just been a really hectic day! I've just been slammed with client work, so a lot of the clients that we've had in the past few years have contacted me in the last couple days, either with enhancements or issues and things that just have to be seen to, so... yesterday when I talked about your freedoms, on some days, you're just run off your feet and that's just part of the game.
List app demo:
https://www.amazon.com/Hoang-Nam-hoangnambinhduong/dp/B0996B4X5Y
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Hoang-Nam-hoangnambinhduong/dp/B0996B4X5Y
https://www.amazon.de/Hoang-Nam-hoangnambinhduong/dp/B0996B4X5Y
https://www.amazon.com.au/Hoang-Nam-hoangnambinhduong/dp/B0996B4X5Y
https://www.amazon.com.br/Hoang-Nam-hoangnambinhduong/dp/B0996B4X5Y
https://www.amazon.co.jp/Hoang-Nam-hoangnambinhduong/dp/B0996B4X5Y
https://www.amazon.in/Hoang-Nam-hoangnambinhduong/dp/B0996B4X5Y
https://www.amazon.de/Hoang-Nam-hoangnambinhduong/dp/B0996B4X5Y
https://www.amazon.es/Hoang-Nam-hoangnambinhduong/dp/B0996B4X5Y
https://www.amazon.fr/Hoang-Nam-hoangnambinhduong/dp/B0996B4X5Y
https://www.amazon.it/Hoang-Nam-hoangnambinhduong/dp/B0996B4X5Y
When you do client work especially, you don't have, you know, if I talked about being able to set your own schedule, sometimes with client work you don't have that, they have these things called deadlines and all that stuff.
But that's just the way things work. I just wanted to thank everybody yesterday for all the great comments you left and everything. I felt a bit vulnerable I guess talking about that stuff. I felt like you're all here and I'm just talking about me, and I didn't want to be just boring.
I felt like I just turned on the camera and started talking, wasn't sure where I was gonna go with it, which is what I normally do anyway. But you all asked a lot of really good questions and a lot of you I think would want to start up your own company if you haven't already, or you're thinking about it. and Gable, you asked a lot of really good questions. I keep thinking I'll answer all these, but I think it will take a long time, so we'll visit all those things as we go. But the first thing I wanted to say is, I just wanted to just be completely plain and open - it's like, I don't necessarily know what I'm doing.
To me running the company and getting everything off the ground is a bit like being a parent.
Other my site:
https://hoangnambinhduong.blogspot.com/2021/07/tu-lap-trinh-phan-mem-auto-on-gian-bang.html
https://local.google.com/place?id=13823349647467744805&use=posts&lpsid=8695911720847044404
You go from one step to the next and then you're in over your head, and then you figure your way out of that. So like when you have kids, when you don't have kids you think you can't imagine yourself as a parent, and then the kids come and you think, okay now what do I do? What do I have to learn? What do I have to do this?
And we face this a lot as app developers, we face it as business owners, if you do client work you face it that way too, we all know this. you have an app idea, so then you think, what do you do next? So you have to learn how to code it or who to hire and get it out there, and then once you get it out, you realize "well nobody's buying it. Nobody's downloading it. What do I have to do now?
Oh, I have to learn about ASO, I have to learn about key words, I have to learn about App Store optimization and running ads, and that kind of stuff." And doing a company, you know, when I started I made so many mistakes. I went to my bookshelf - so, I'll just tell you this real quick.
When I started out my company was in 2004, but I mostly did contract work but I would take these long periods of time where I take off and I think "I want to set up my own client base, I want to do client work, not just me but I want to hire developers overseas and then we'll just take local clients, and we'll set up a company and all this kind of stuff. So I set up a website, I got the business cards, all that kind of stuff - 'overpass is open for business' and everything.
And then I didn't really do anything. But then I realized I had to go out and get people, so I thought, you know, I'll do some cold calling, that's what everybody does as a company, you have to do cold calling.
But I didn't want to just jump into it because, why would you do that? So I need to research. I need to know everything before I go.
It's really naive when I say this. So I read all these books, I was going through my bookshelf today and here' some of the ones that I have, 'cold calling techniques that really work' by Steven Shipman. I read like 4 of this guy's books. I've got 'Secrets of telephone selling', so I've written so many sales scripts and all this stuff, and I've also got, just to cover all the bases, I've also got 'Never cold call again'. And in the early days when I was doing this, so I'd leave a contract that was a perfectly high paying contract, and I would set out I would try to do my own thing.
I wanted to start my own software company, but I needed clients. So that was the whole thing. So I set up the company, then the next step is 'how do I get clients?' So then I started doing cold calling and I tell you what guys, you know it was probably the saddest thing, if you had seen me do it, it's the saddest thing ever.
I probably only called about half a dozen companies right, and it was over months, it was just terrible and you'd call up and it was a lot like asking someone out on a date.
Because you think the conversations going just fine until they realize what's going on. It's like "hey, how's it going? Yeah yeah good,how about you? yeah yeah good. Yeah so anyway, I was wondering if you want to go out Tuesday night?
" So it was like that. Really really sad. So then I'd go back to a contract, but I'd also work on my own software and I started working on websites and stuff like that. And the problem that I had and I still do have this to a degree, is that when I work on something for myself, I get to be - that perfectionist comes in, and I start thinking "I'll just add one more thing!" or whatever.
Or I'll work on something for maybe as much as three weeks but then you know other priorities come up, or I'll have like a different idea and I'll move on to the other thing.
So when I did the first app, I started coding it myself, but in the end I hired a development company in India to do it and they did a horrible job, but, you know, in the end it was something that I could release to the App Store. So now, we have lots of clients now. Sometimes more than we can handle, and one of the things that I realized now, having a company just in retrospect, is that if nobody knows about you then they're not gonna buy from you. So we spent a lot of time on content marketing, a lot of time on putting stuff out there, putting our own apps out there, but when I talked about like last year, last year about 80 percent of our revenue was from the apps and 20 percent was from clients, but in terms of stress it was like 80 percent of stress came from client work and 20 percent came from apps.
But I guess the point I'm trying to make is that I am NOT an expert. There's still some things I need to learn, there's things I need to go. But those of you who are thinking about starting your own company, my advice would be just to start. You know, you're gonna stumble forward and you're just gonna get it done. Don't quit your job, don't hire a bunch of people unless you're really really confident.
I've never been that confident. If there's one thing that I, you know, I suppose I take a lot of risks, but I don't take unreasonable risk. There's a reason why my developers are overseas it's because it's a lower price and it's easier to move on if it doesn't work.
And there's a reason we put out so many apps, it's because I don't want to invest six months or a year or two years in one app and put it out there and hope that it does well, because that's a very risky situation. now you could argue that the quality of my apps is not as high as it should be and that might be true, but it is trying to minimize the risks if it is things like that.
Even with client work, the nice thing about now is that we get more requests for client work than we can handle. So most of it we turn down, most of it I turn down. It's just because, maybe it's because of days like today, when I'm thinking "oh man, either I hire more people or you know I just I learn to work more efficiently, and stuff like that.
So anyway, the point I wanted to make today. First of all, thank you so much for the comments yesterday and to say that, while I learn things as I go, I don't consider myself an expert.
But it's the same with everything. And I think the best way to learn something is to do it, and just stumble forward. You know, when we talk about apps and somebody will say "hey, I released an app six months ago" - by the way some of you have really good downloads which is awesome -"I released an app six years,sorry, six months ago. I've had like five downloads". And I think, to me I think, well good for you, you've done something.
Most people don't. Or most people, they'll tell you their app idea and they'll want you to to build it for them, or they want to remove all risk from the situation - they don't want to invest money in it, they don't want to invest time in it, they don't want to do all that kind of stuff. And risk is something that is always being allocated. You know, when you're a permanent employee working someplace, you work for a company that assumes all the risk of making sure you have all the work, but you have very little risk. And if you're a contractor, you assume the risk of finding work, in finding you know contracts.
If you work for clients, you assume the risk of finding clients, and they assume the risk that their project will work. And when you produce your own apps, you assume the risk of making sure that app works and you have the revenue that comes in and everything like that. Anyway, dude, another rambling on video, sorry about that! Hey, if you are gonna start, get started.
There's nothing wrong with starting and it not working.
There's no ... The reason we don't start is because we don't want to look stupid and you don't want to risk everything, and you don't want to put your family in jeopardy but you can handle a lot more than you think. So anyway that's just my opinion, what do I know?
I'll talk to you guys tomorrow!