Business

Introduction

The following is a collection of resources related to managing a business.

Check List

The following is a check list of sorts for building a business around a web application. While the list below focuses primarily on software, there are a basic items mixed in the list that any business should have regardless of the industry that you are in. Keep in mind that while the items are numbered, they don’t necessarily represent order:

1. Web Hosting - You need a good web hosting service that is reliable and can scale. Amazon’s EC2 computing might be worth considering.
2. Web Presence - Not only do you need a hosting service for the web application you are developing but you also need a personal blog where you can talk about the things you are passionate about (preferably a professional one using your real name), a micro-blog like Twitter, a blog as part of your web application so you can talk about news specific to the app, and a corporate blog to represent your the many aspects of your business.
3. Marketing - Establishing a web presence definitely helps but you also need to be involved with the community by posting comments on various web sites, helping out with open source projects, producing easy to understand podcasts and screencast demos, and displaying testimonials.
4. Documentation - Along with the marketing speak, it also helps to have well written documentation, context sensitive help, and F.A.Q. pages. Putting the effort into writing good doc should help reduce the number of repeat questions which allows you to get back to doing what you want to do most: write more code.
5. Statistics - It is a good idea to study the kind of traffic flowing in and out of your site. One way is to add Google Analytics or similar services.
6. Payment Processing - You’ll need to handle the processing of credit card payments and other financial transactions so make sure you understand the APIs and how to integrate them in your web application.
7. Source Control - You need to be able to version your software, patch it, etc and setting up a Subversion repository or using Git is a good idea.
8. Backups - A good rule of thumb is to have your data backed up in triplicate. A couple of hard drive solutions, like Drobo, would work best with the third being a secure store in the cloud (again Amazon S3 comes to mind).
9. Bug Tracking - You need to be able to track your bugs. Many people like Fog Bugz and even Trac. You can also use OmniFocus as a single-user, quick and dirty solution.
10. Accountant - Your going to need one to pay all those new taxes. You might have to hop around a couple of times until you find one that you really like.
11. Lawyer - You will need a lawyer for those tricky contracts, terms of service, licenses, etc but these guys are serious money drains. So know of one and keep him/her in the ready but only use when necessary.
12. Software Licenses - The software you buy had better be legit.
13. Security - Any information stored about the user of your software needs to be safe and secure. Knowing what the latest security issues are and how to prevent them is important.

Tips & Tricks

• Five most important lessons I’ve learned as an entrepreneur - by Guy Kawasaki.
• Nine Deadly Startup Diseases—and How to Cure Them by Daniel Tenner.
• Web 2.0 - A Strategy Guide.

News

• Mac Software Business Podcast - A good podcast to subscribe to learning how to run a business on a MacOS. Despite the fact that the podcasts focuses primarily on MacOS software, it is also good for any startup.
• MacBreak Tech - A good site to check out in general. I am linking to this site because the “Making Mac Your Business” podcast episode is definitely worth checking out.

Resources

• All-In-One Business Packs - A collection of templates, images, etc. that can help add polish to your Keynotes and Pages and help give you that professional look to what you do.