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2. Doing all the business related tasks. 3. Doing all the customer service. 4. Handling all incoming e-mail. 5. Doing all of the social networking stuff (
by falsestprophet 17y ago
2. Doing all the business related tasks.
3. Doing all the customer service.
4. Handling all incoming e-mail.
5. Doing all of the social networking stuff (facebook, twitter).
8. Tracking all of our expenses, etc., into Excel and getting everything ready for accountant (see 7).
13. Handling payroll. I do that.
14. Dealing with the bank accounts. I deal directly with the small business rep at our bank.
16. Handling all incoming advertising requests, setting up their campaigns, etc.
17. Dealing directly with all our merchants (credit cards + PayPal). Dealing with the very few chargebacks we receive.
18. Paying all of our bills (server expenses, software licenses, domains, advertising, etc.) and monitoring our cash flow.
20. Anything that requires a phone call. Incoming or outgoing.
Frankly, this sounds like work for an administrative assistant more than an equal equity partner.
1. Writing the copy for the website. Mainly keeping the support documents up-to-date.
6. Doing all of our marketing. Handling Google AdWords, banner advertising, text advertising, etc.
7. Dealing exclusively with our accountant
9. Handling all legal work with our lawyer.
11. We all come up with ideas for product development.
10. Doing all of our networking. I'm the guy that goes to all of our relevant events.
12. Blogging. I do all the blogging.
15. Market research. I find out as much as I can about our competitors, what they do, etc. I also learn about our market as a whole.
19. Pitching. I handle all of that.
There is no reason a technical founder wouldn't be able to do these things and continue to work on the product.
- awolf 17y agoI'm a technical founder and 1) I certainly don't WANT to all of the above listed things and 2) I know I certainly wouldn't do these task as well as someone who specializes in them. A lot of these jobs are very important and should be done right. They shouldn't be done by a programmer who sees them as an inconvenience. If the scope of business and the size of the startup justifies it a business minded founder can certainly be a good thing.
- christonog 17y agoHm, I think it's all a matter of cost/benefit. What value would hiring an administrative assistant bring compared to just having an equity founder with more of an incentive? At least the founder can abstract everything business related away, so all you need to do is code. And, to me, that's hard enough as it is.
- eru 17y agoMore incentives and the communication barrier may be lower.
- joeythibault 17y agoPlus I would never outsource copywriting. Good way to end up with a FAIL.
- eru 17y agoThanks for your comment. I guess you should look into outsourcing / hiring / automating some of the more mundane tasks. Though for the second group of tasks you outlined, having a founder specialize in them, so that the other founders can focuse on the technical side, sounds like a good thing. And it allows the business guy to grow. Eventually you will want to have a business guy anyway, so it's a sound approach to train him from day 0.