Don't wait: Graeme Wood's advice for launching an online business
- Josh Mehlman
- 22 May 2009
Photo credit: Anthony Geernaert
in March 2000, during the depths of the dot-com crash. While he has retired from actively running Wotif, he works with startup companies, applying his experience to guide them through the difficult early stages. We asked him for his best advice to
companies starting up online.Don’t forget to phone
For online businesses, the phone can still be a valuable channel to communicate with customers.
“One of the interesting things about online businesses is you seldom get to meet or communicate directly with your customers, so the call centre is important to us as a way of understanding who our customers are and what they expect,” says Wood.
Clever names may not translate
Businesses put a lot of thought into choosing a company name and domain name. However, if expanding overseas is part of the your plan, even a long way down the track, it pays to put in that extra bit of thought about how your name might work overseas.
“We’ve had problems with the language, like understanding what the word 'Wotif’ means and trying to convey to people that it’s just a bit of a joke,” says Wood. “I’ve had some curious conversations with German hoteliers who just don’t quite get it.
“The main thing was we engaged local people to help us through it. In most countries now, we’ve got a strong local workforce that lives there and understands the cultural issues.”
Build talent internally
Wood encourages business founders to nurture internal talent and know when to let go of their baby.
“My main inclination is not running big businesses, it is starting small ones and watching them grow quickly,” he explains. “Once we had the strategic direction set, I handed over to somebody who was better at it than I was.
“For a business to reinvent itself, I think the people need to reinvent themselves.” “We hired bright, young graduates who knew nothing about accommodation, threw them into the mix and said, 'Here, go solve this problem’. That way you get fresh thinking. We didn’tS try to do things the way people did them 20 years ago.”
Give it a go – now!
Wood believes a good business idea is a good business idea no matter when it comes around or what the external circumstances. He told us it would be a mistake, if you came up with a great idea, to wait around until 'the right time’.
“I wouldn’t stop doing something just because times are a bit tough out there,” he says. “[Now is] a good time to do it because a lot of people are distracted by all the mayhem going on. If you’re focused, you can steal a march because everyone else is going around saying that the sky is about to fall in.
“Have a crack at it; a good idea is a useless idea if it never sees the light of day. Find a way to do it for no money at all, or for as little as possible.
“Don’t get sucked into venture capital if you can avoid it, just find a way to prove or disprove your idea. You can have all the experts in the world saying OThat’s a great idea’, but until you put it in the hands of the consumer who is going to pay for it or use it, you’ll never know. Only one response really matters: the marketplace.”
