July 9, 2010 by Nick Barker
How awesome it that – we won the Nottingham Post New Business of the Year 2010!! It was an absolutely fantastic evening. Not just because we won our category, but because so much effort was channeled into the event. It was an incredible atmosphere.
Aware Monitoring’s Nick Barker & Simon Oxley accepting the New Enterprise Award
Source: Nottingham Post & Nottingham University Business School
We were greeted with a champagne reception at the wonderful historic council house in Nottingham and then enjoyed a marvelous meal. All the finalists had short video’s shown on their companies before the winners were announced. The winners and finalists were:
Well done to the winners and finalist for all the blood, sweat and tears put into their companies. For me the event shows the outstanding innovative companies we have in the area. It was especially great to see so many web and IT related companies in the finals. It ‘s also interesting that companies like Bunches Florapost are maximizing the Internet with 70% of their revenues coming through the web.
We need to thank all sponsors and British Business Awards Association for making the event happen and the Nottingham Post for pulling together the awards for the last 26 years.
In the end, my evening went onto the wee hours in the morning celebrating!!
Tags: Awards, Aware Monitoring
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June 30, 2010 by Nick Barker
There’s lots of local, regional and international Business /Tech awards around (Ernst & Young, Red Herring, TechCrunch50, UK IT Industry Awards, etc). Some cost alot to enter and some only a little. But are they worth winning? And how do you win ‘em..
If you not heard my startup Aware Monitoring is through to the final of a local Award competition – Nottingham Post New Enterprise of the Year 2010 Award. We’ll know this week if we’ve won.
Simon & I in the papers (click here for full article)
Source: Nottingham Post & Nottingham University Business School
I recently met David Atherton, the founder of Dabs.com, an ecommerce IT retailer. Dabs went for a whooping 800 awards and won 200 of them! Dave said ‘they were a great low-cost form of PR and marketing.’ Most people I’ve spoken to who’ve won awards say they are worth winning because they bring:
- Immediate press attention – The awards organisers and sponsors tend to promote the finalists and winners to the press. Its great free PR.
- Knock-on press attention – Other publications will take attention if your company wins an award. They’ll want to write about you too!
- Confidence – The feel good factor is extremely valuable for the founders and employees moral. Everyone is recognised for their hard efforts.
- Success – Everyone wants to be a success. To be finalist or a winner shows your company is succesful, even if it’s not aways the case.
- Credibility – Prospects and customers want to feel they can trust their suppliers. Awards seems to bring confidence in companies.
In a talk by Doug Ashby he felt that the Awards got in the way of selling to prospects and customers. Doug has won several awards before exciting well from his Mainframe hardware maintenance business. Doug felt the awards bloated the winners ego to the extent where they take their eye (focus) of their business.
A friend of mine, Adam Harris, won the IoD (Institute of Directors) Entrepreneur of the Year Award in 2008. Adam said ‘that you have to put the time and effort into the application to win.’ Sounds obvious, but Adam said ‘most people leave completing the application until the last-minute and rush it.’ Like an important proposal take your time and get the applications right. Of course, you need a great story, a business with some strong successes and good writing skills to be noticed.
I took Dave & Adam’s advice and we’re through to a local award final. Whether we win and it then goes to our heads (ego) is yet to be seen 
UPDATE:
We won! Amazing!! It was a truly fantastic evening. We did well to win our category against stiff competition. For our ’Aware Monitoring wins Award’ company post on the win, click here and for the full Nottingham Post write-up click here.
Tags: Awards, Aware Monitoring, Marketing
Posted in Aware Monitoring, Marketing, PR | 4 Comments »
June 17, 2010 by Nick Barker
Innovation is extremely alluring to companies and startups. It offers so much potential. However innovation takes mountains of time. You just can’t come up with a Facebook, Dyson or Ford in 5 minutes!! It’s simply not a light bulb moment. It can take 1000′s of attempts. “I have not failed. I’ve just found 1000 ways that won’t work” – Thomas A Edison. Innovation is a gradual internal company and external market process. This makes innovation very frustrating for the entrepreneur because the one thing they have in short supply is time! Innovation is awesome but it also sucks!!
Innovation has to build-up momentum and be developed over several or many iterations. This evolution of ideas can be within the same team, company or marketplace. It can even be ideas shared between different markets or countries. That’s the great thing about our modern economy, its survival of the fittest ideas. The key to unlock innovation is for the idea to be at the right time and in the right place.
I’m sorry, but time and time again I hear startups saving we are the next Facebook, Twitter, etc. In reality you need to know where are you in the innovation cycle – that ranges from innovation to commoditisation. Geoff Moore ‘Crossing the chasm’ is always a good book to read on this subject. The position in this innovation cycle dictates your actions, growth and timescales.
The challenge with innovation is that it takes eduction, thus the need for time. The educating of potential customers is difficult because people don’t really like change and risk. Companies, especially big ones, definitely don’t like change and risk. Education costs an awful lot of money whether with mass market consumer items or niche corporate b2b products. The marketing message needs repeating over and over and over again. First mover advantage is great but second mover can be better. Just look at Google (2nd to market) and Yahoo (1st to market) and who came of on top.
The trick is to get into a market niche on an upward curve, get running with the pack (competition) and then gradually innovate. As always it is easier to say than do!! Apple is a great example. The success they enjoy today with the iPhone popularity goes way back to 1993 with the failure of the Apple Newton. Apples’ iTunes which is intrinsically linked to the iPod and therefore the iPhone originally benefited from the downfall of Napster. These innovations have been brewing for many years and between many competitors.
The great thing about innovation is that it has unlimited possibilities. It’s brings the combination of creativity and exciting growth potential. Innovation is awesome but it takes time, money, careful listening to the market and mountains of persistence. One hit innovation wonders are rare and not the norm. All of this can be frustrating for startups because no one is in a rush except the startup and the one things startups are most short of is time.
Tags: Crossing Chasm, Entrepreneur, Innovation, Marketing, Startup opportunities
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June 1, 2010 by Nick Barker
Our startup, Aware Monitoring, is moving up in the world – we’ve relocated desks from our old hot desk facility to our very own desks. This event may sound trivial but it’s not. It’s a significant milestone in our evolution.
We’ve now got our own phones, our very own sign at the front door and permanent desks! This move is happening just as we are looking for our 1st employee. These really are exiting times for our startup. I’ll miss the old office but it will be great to have our own space. I’ve not had my own desk since leaving employment way back in 2006.
We’ve been using The Nottingham University UNIEI incubator hotdesk facility since September 2008. The new desks are still in the same building. Nottingham University have been good to us. They’ve supported our startup and helped us grow. I first posted about our website monitoring startup idea - ‘Our new software baby is on its way’, back in January 2009 with baby Jack-Jack imagery (The incredibles, Pixar). We’re now growing up ;) It’s great to be moving onto the next level.
Next stop – break-even and our very own offices!!
Tags: Aware Monitoring, Nottingham University
Posted in Aware Monitoring | 8 Comments »
May 13, 2010 by Nick Barker
It’s been a heroic effort by my CTO co-founder Simon Oxley in building our website and web app monitoring service. Over the past year and a half we’re engaged with development companies, freelancers and students to help us build our app.
We’re now on the market for our 1st full-time developer to help take Aware Monitoring to the next level 
It certainly will be an extremely exciting and dynamic place to work. Our employee numero uno will have the chance make a real difference in the company and to the world!!
Slide not included (Google’s Zürich offices)
If you are looking for an extremely exciting, challenging and rewarding role look no further! Ideally we’re looking for developers with some Django and Python experience. Its OK if these skills are in there infancy. What we really need is individuals with a solid work ethic and the desire to learn!
If you have some of the skills we need and want to find out more drop us a line at info@awaremonitoring.com.
Tags: Aware Monitoring, Recruitment
Posted in Aware Monitoring | 1 Comment »
May 4, 2010 by Nick Barker
I’m in ore at the support we received from our friends during The Internet World exhibition. My startup, Aware Monitoring, had at booth at the show. During the three-day exhibition we were visited by other startups, press, and customers who’ve been following our progress. Thank you so much for all your support and help We really appropriate it!!
Jonathan English from Skeleton Productions
I’d especially like to thank Jonathan from Skeleton Productions for spending an afternoon helping to man our stand. We had a real buzz with three of us working on the booth. At one point we had eight people around the stand! It’s a real shame Simon my co-founder was not there – he was busy with his wife having a baby. Alex Witkowski, a 3rd year philosophy student supplied by Model Students, did an outstanding job working with me on the booth for the three days. We wouldn’t have had such a great show without Alex’s help!
Alex Witkowski and I on the Aware Monitoring booth
Nick Walker came down from Nottingham for the show and took some great photo’s of us – thanks Nick As always it was great to see Glenn Shoosmith and Gregory Bockenstette from the awesome BookingBug who visited our stand! And finally not forgetting Josh Rathour for dropping by. I also made some great new friends and acquaintances throughout the show.
Tags: conference
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April 23, 2010 by Nick Barker
Love was defiantly in the air at this years Techcrunch Geek ‘n Rolla. The tech event, on its second year, had a strong focus on Venture Capital and real world startup experiences. The talks highlighted VC’s love of huge exits and startup entrepreneurs love of making great things. Unfortunately, these two paths to love don’t always meet. But often they both need each other to survive and grow. If you want a full debrief of the event Inma Martinez , Joao Belo and of course Mike Butcher at TechCrunch, have great detailed writeups.
In Tommy Ahlers‘s talk he compared a startup exit to finding love and Eden Ventures described engaging with VC’s as romance. Tommy went on to say “don’t build a startup to sell out.” I’ve heard this before – if you just focus on the money you won’t get anywhere. In the subsequent panel discussion Saul Klein of Index Ventures went onto say “Most entrepreneurs are not looking for an exit, they’re looking to create a great product and change the world in some way”.
Jason Trost reminded us how much startups are “rollacoaster of a ride” and “to be ready for the hard knocks”. He also quoted the cold fact “that 7 out of 10 startups fail”. So why are startup founders willing to throw life savings, time and a personal life at an idea. It’s because Entrepreneurs love doing what they want to do! They love the freedom to create
The startup new product pitches of the day were: Cortexica; Cutefund.com; Decibel; DriveK; GameCreds.com; Gigaboxx; Graph.me; iGlue; LinkCloud.org; Musiio; Pownum; SongHi; and Stripped Finance. Well done guys for have the passion to follow your dreams. And congratulations to Cortexica for winning over the judges and Graph.me for the audience vote. Tamlin Magee has a great write up all the pitches.
Most of these startups have spent many months, or years, and much money building their products. Love of startups is why the speakers, the pitchers and several of the audience were willing to drive across Europe for this event when all the planes had stopped. Well done Mike Butcher for making it these events such a focal point for European tech startups!
In Ewan McLeod’s talk on “The disruptive opportunities for startups in mobile, and getting traction fast” he pleaded with mobile phone app startups to stop their love affair with iPhone app development and look at the market measures. “But love is blind and lovers cannot see, the pretty follies that themselves commit; For if they could, Cupid himself would blush” (William Shakespeare, “The Merchant of Venice”). This is where the VC’s kicks in!! They have to see the reality of money or at least the potential of it. “We’re looking for exit values of $300-400million dollars” Katie Turner, Eden Ventures.
However software startups are not about the money at the beginning. They can’t be – There is no money.. only an idea, a massive loss and very few customers, if any! Employees tend to focus on monthly paychecks but startup founders have to draw their strength and measures from elsewhere. Ultimately you have to do what you really love to do. Startup founders really have to enjoy and relish the startup challenge. “I love sales” said the charismatic and slightly wacky Morten Lund in his entertaining talk.
Without a rush of customers throwing money at a product startup founders have to deal with the VC devil to grow their startup and continue to create. They then have to dance to the pipers tune and move towards a liquidity event. The good news is that once a VC is onboard they’re on the entrepreneurs side, just as long as the founders are moving towards that big exit
Tags: Exits, Geek n' Rolla, TechCrunch, Startups, Pitching, VC's
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April 8, 2010 by Nick Barker
Conventional wisdom says write a business plan. However, many voices are now saying don’t! As a startup founder what do you do? I’ve written several plans before – at our web monitoring startup, on my MBA and in my past jobs. They take alot of time and effort, which distracts you from the job in hand – making stuff to sell and selling stuff to customers. However plans have a purpose, but make’em short (one page), make’em short-term (one year’ish) and have a single clear objective. Also, have your hockey stick sales graph, if you have to have one, grounded in reality i.e. based on real customers/prospects (difficult in pre-launched mode).
There’s an increasingly voice in the UK/US for short or even no business plans in a startup. The fundamental idea of a business plan is to help re-risk a venture through pre-examination of a market opportunity. However we all know startups are a full-on risk scenario. There’s no escaping that. And almost as soon as the ink has dry on a plan the market has changed.
There are two distinct For and Against business plan camps. The anti camp say: “The very idea of ‘planning’ is ridiculous”, Jason Cohen; Brian Halligan argues “it’s a fool’s errand” for start-up founders to create a business plan.” And ever the counter culture, 37Signals, are anti business plans – “What’s the point of a business plan if it’s obviously a fantasy that has nothing to do with reality?”. Two guys, David Sloly and Ian Sanders, have even created a website dedicated to the annihilation of business planning.
The pro business plan campaigners say: “A strong business plan is essentially the cornerstone of your business, and yet many entrepreneurs drag their feet when it comes to writing one”, Colleen Debaise, The Wall Street Journal; “The goal is not to get a VC to read your plan. The goal is to get a VC to invest so you can build a successful company.”; people like Tim Berry has even made an entire business our of business plans: “Think of your start-up business plan as a matter of blocks; pieces.”
Taking a look back through history including philosophers and the military the value of planning is clear: “In preparing for battle I have always found that plans are useless, but planning is indispensable”, Eisenhower; Prior Planning and Preparation Prevents Piss Poor Performance (time honored British Army saying); and “Let your plans be dark and as impenetrable as night, and when you move, fall like a thunderbolt.”, Sun Tzu
So, why all the fuss over putting your thoughts down on a bit of paper.. It’s the time, or more precisely the waste of this precious resource which startup are so short of. Our market economic cycles are becoming increasingly rapid, especially in tech. Therefore a young company has to move faster than ever before and excessive analysis can drain reaction time. The difficulty is acting purely from the hip or gut without much forethought brings a short-term reaction.
I think the Greek philosopher Publilius Syrus (a slave) got it right 2100 years ago when he said “It is a bad plan that admits of no modification.” They key is modification i.e. change and adaption. Like evolution – stuff changes. This point meets both For and Against camps. A plan must change. It is not a static thing, in war or in business.
A complete lack of planning is unwise but excessive long/in-depth analyst is folly. Detailed planning only delays getting into the market and in gaining real insight (tactics) into customer needs. JFDI (Just Fricking Do It)! What really matters is having a grounded insight and measure in the core aspects of a plan within a business case. This detail fits nicely on a napkin or back of a cigarette packet
Tags: Business Plans, Leanstartups, Planning, Startups, Strategy
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