User:Sam Odio/Myteks

From BluWiki

Computer consulting and repair was my first serious business. I started it when I was a senior at @ TJHSST, under the name OdioWorks, LLC.

By Freshman year of college I had expanded nationally, and had technicians serving clients in about 6 major metropolitan cities. However, overall, it was only marginally successful. Given the amount of time I invested in the project, I probably made a little above minimum wage.

Given the low profitability of our computer repair services, I rebranded the computer consulting business as MyTeks.com (click for website). This allowed the company (OdioWorks, LLC) to expand into other, more profitable businesses. Click here for a list of projects the company owns & operates.

Starting my business taught me some important lessons:

• It's hard - Running a business is 10 times harder than I thought it would be.
• They need cash - Most startups don't make money, they take money.
• They won't make you rich for a long time - If your startup is making you a ton of cash, this means you're not reinvesting profits back into the company. This will severely stunt future growth, which is bad, since growth is extremely important early on.
• If you want to grow, don't do service - If you want to grow fast, don't start a company in a service industry (such computer repair, food service, law, accounting, etc) Instead, start a company that offers a scalable product, which can easily serve new customers cheaply (like google). It costs google hardly anything to serve a million new users, while it would bankrupt a restaurant to try to do so.
• The world is vicious - Your competitors are vicious, and sometimes even your customers are vicious. Customers will try to take advantage of you. Being naive enough to think customers are honest cost me over $2,000. This doesn't mean that you shouldn't treat them well. You should. The customer is king. But don't be naive about it.