Young Entrepreneur Challenge!
We have been preparing some great questions for an ongoing series of Entrepreneurial interviews with some up and coming entrepreneurs and also some very successful entrepreneurs. On a recent brainstorm with my brother Matthew he asked me: Are you going to send any of the interview questions to our members of YoungEntrepreneur.com?
That was a great idea! We have almost 35,000 members on our forum and over 600 subscribers to our Blog and many of you are already running successful companies and contribute to your own Blog as well. The answers that our members and readers provide will most definitely be very interesting and make for a great read!
So, here is the challenge for you!
Answer the 20 questions we wrote below on your own Blog. Add one other interesting question you wish you could ask other entrepreneurs (this is question #20). Talk about the various entrepreneurial adventures you have been on recently! Then link back to us here at YoungEntrepreneur.com/blog and comment so we can all go and check out your answers on your Blog.
We will then compile a complete list of the entrepreneurs who participated in the Questions and Answers and do a brief spotlight on the top 10 most interesting responses! Matthew, Evan and I will then pick one lucky person with our favorite overall interview and one person who came up with the best original question not on our list and buy you each one iPod nano (PRODUCT) RED™ Special Edition, 8GB – Personalized with Congratulations from YoungEntrepreneur.com (engraved on the back.)
Without further adieu, here are the questions:
List the name of your company and website.
- What ignited the spark in you to start a new business venture or to make significant changes in an existing business?
- What is your definition of success and has your company achieved it?
- To what do you attribute your company’s recent achievements?
- How important have good employees and team members been to your success?
- What three pieces of advice would you give to high school or college students who want to become entrepreneurs?
- What have been some of your failures, and what have you learned from them?
- Describe/outline your typical day?
- Where did your organizations funding/capital come from and how did you go about getting it?
- What stops you from throwing in the towel and giving up when you are frustrated?
- Do you believe there is some sort of pattern or formula to becoming a successful entrepreneur?
- Who has influenced you most and been your greatest inspiration?
- What book has inspired you the most?
- How do you go about marketing your business? What has been your most successful form of marketing?
- In one word, characterize your life as an entrepreneur.
- Excluding yours, what company or business do you admire the most?
- How do you achieve balance in your life? Or do you?
- Where you see yourself and your business in 5 years? 10 years?
- What’s your exit strategy?
- If we could introduce you to anyone, who would it be and why? (you never know who we know!)
- If you were conducting this interview, what question would you ask?
To your success,
Adam Toren
Evan CarmichaelYoungEntrepreneur.com Blog Manager
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12 Comments so far
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I don’t have a blog, but I do run a business. Am I eligible to enter? I don’t want to just create a toss away blog just to enter this challenge.
This is a great idea! I look forward to reading everyone’s responses!!
Edward,
Sure you can enter if you do not have a blog. Please answer the interview questions here on the YoungEntrepreneur.com blog.
Thanks,
Adam T.
Thanks Adam. Here’s my interview:
1. What ignited the spark in you to start a new business venture or to make significant changes in an existing business?
I have to be honest here: It was the money. However, this did not mean that I wasn’t interested in business earlier.
When I was young, I spent my time reading books like Computers Simplified and The Motley Fool Investment Guide, among various others. I built a computer when I was in third grade. I was known as a computer guru and, after learning of the Amazon affiliates program, built up a small java arcade hosted on my ISP’s connection. Kids at my school started playing “Pang” and “Urbanoids” during lunch on my site instead of going outside for recess, as I lived in rainy Seattle. Although I didn’t make any money at all from the Amazon affiliates program, this built up my foundation to become a entrepreneur. Further solidifying my knowledge in computers, I earned a A+ Professional IT Certification before I was in junior-high school.
My junior-high and high school is a school that goes from 7-12th grade. As upper-classmen controlled the clubs and politics in my school, I created a 7th grade student-run newspaper, the “Krazy Letter”. It didn’t do very well, as our writing clearly sucked at the time, but my first business venture directly resulted from my involvement in creating an unofficial newspaper for my school.
While working on Krazy Letter, a friend of mine registered on “Zer0 Host”, free-hosting company, so that we could create a website for Krazy Letter. However, Zer0 Host ran into financial trouble, and our websites all went down - except for the Zer0 Host forums. On the forums, I learned that Zer0 Host relied on Google Adsense for revenue - people would click on the ads while posting, and Zer0 Host would make money. This revelation would spark my interest in creating websites for profit.
Google Ads sparked my interest in creating a website for profit. However, I made a total of $80 my first year through Google Adsense. I asked my dad to help renew my hosting for another year - that next year, I made a couple hundred bucks. After that, I was financially independent.
2. What is your definition of success and has your company achieved it?
If you define success as “lots of money”, then I’ve achieved it. If your definition is “fame”, then I haven’t achieved it. However, I don’t think there’s a true definition of success - I guess defining success would be counterproductive to the goals of a business. Even though there are short term, medium term, and long term goals for every business, there’s no limit for where the goal can be, and the goal always changes due to market changes. Thus, I don’t believe there’s an explanation of success in the corporate world. However, I do have a personal definition of success: being successful is being happy. If something isn’t fun, well, it’s not helping my success in life. After all, what’s the point in life if it isn’t fun?
3. To what do you attribute your company’s recent achievements?
This is almost cliche, but I seriously attribute it to luck. I’m serious. Besides luck, I’m going to use a even bigger cliche and mention that, of course, my friends and family have had a huge part in my success. And in that, I’m also serious.
4. How important have good employees and team members been to your success?
Well, here’s a good question that I can’t answer. I’ve mostly worked by myself for the past few years. I’m starting to outsource some of my projects to other people, so come back to me in 6 months, and I’ll have a better answer for you. Otherwise, friends have been important to my success - as I mentioned earlier, a classmate signed me up for a free hosting account at Zer0 Host. What would I have done without him?
5. What three pieces of advice would you give to high school or college students who want to become entrepreneurs?
Networking - I believe that networking with other people is a key aspect to business. It is good to know people who are doing things similar, or even different to what you’re doing. Then, when you need help, advice, or even a business partnership, you will have many options. As a webmaster, I have programmers, linux hackers, graphics designers, marketers, website flippers - all sorts of people - on my contacts list. If you are doing something in the real world, it may be useful to go to a local city chamber of commerce networking session - you may meet people who can sponsor or use your services. Networking is good whether it is in real life, via a social networking site like Myspace, Facebook, or Linkedin, or via a site like YoungEntrepreneur.com.
Commitment - I believe that any entrepreneur should have commitment to their enterprise. If you’re committed to your business and enjoy it - it can be immensely successful - because you have a personal interest in it. Instead of financial interest, it’s emotional interest - you want the business to succeed because you like the idea. With emotional interest - you will do whatever it takes to make sure your business succeeds. If I had given up after making $80 in my first year, I’m not sure where I’d be at right now.
Take Risks -
“If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got ” -Unknown
I really believe in this principle. However, taking risks is about taking educated risks, not about taking reckless risks. Let me explain the difference: an educated risk is when you’ve studied the risks and know what can happen if the odds are against you. However, a reckless risk would be akin to buying lottery tickets or going to a casino - you don’t know what the odds are.
6. What have been some of your failures, and what have you learned from them?
One of my failures was a blog that I tried to create. I updated it for a month or two, and then stopped updating it. I realized that I couldn’t really think about what to write about. I’ve learned that blogging was not for me. Perhaps sometime later. I’m really not sure what I learned from that experience, though - it wasn’t too high risk, and was meant as a side thing.
Outside of my business, I had a huge failure: I tried to run for ASB President with only one year of experience in ASB. However, my principal wouldn’t let me. I thought that I had the qualifications and everything, but my principal did not let me run for President - and I couldn’t be listed on the ballot, even with my qualifications. Even though the reasons were debatable (I won’t go into them), I realized that I had to gain the trust of the people around me - no matter how much I am qualified, I cannot do anything unless I first gain their trust.
7. Describe/outline your typical day?
-Drive 15 miles to school
-School
-Clubs (ASB, Future Business Leaders of America, Frisbee)
-Go to work (I work as a IT/Marketing intern at Voicebox Technologies - yeah, I have two jobs with them. They’re amazing people)
-Volunteer at an art museum (depending on the day)
-Drive 15 miles home
-Get on the computer, do homework, and check websites
I’m not sure there’s anything interesting about my typical day. It’s typical. I’m a typical student at an atypical high school. Now…if you asked me about one of my atypical days…I can give you a story.
8. Where did your organizations funding/capital come from and how did you go about getting it?
$200 for the first two years of web hosting…funded by my dad. Otherwise, I guess that I had to get a computer, electricity, and square footage from somewhere, but that was mostly included in the package deal of being a child. From then on, I didn’t need any more capital. I’m thinking of opening up a line of credit with my local bank - I’ve heard of other teens with lines of credit - news articles cover them and say “oh my god their bank will let them borrow $20,000″. Anyways, I’ve never used credit before and I don’t plan to - but it probably will give me more peace of mind if I decide to dip into my funds to buy something.
9. What stops you from throwing in the towel and giving up when you are frustrated?
A nice game of Battlefield 2 or Age of Empires III. Either that, or Ice Cream.
10. Do you believe there is some sort of pattern or formula to becoming a successful entrepreneur?
I don’t think so. If there was an easy formula to influence your success, it’d be exploited to death. I do believe in a “successful personality”, however. I think the successful personality always questions what’s around them, and tries to absorb as much information as possible about various topics.
11. Who has influenced you most and been your greatest inspiration?
I don’t know. I seriously have trouble with these questions - I don’t follow a guy religiously. I read a few biographies about Michael Dell, Noyce and Moore (Intel), among a few others when I was younger. I guess I could name Steven Fulmer, a guy that I met when at a Future Business Leaders of America conference. He’s not anyone special, but he does life-planning/career-planning, and he helped me understand the value of perspective.
12. What book has inspired you the most?
I enjoyed the book “Freakonomics”. I liked how Levitt teamed up with Dubner, and wrote the book to appeal to a wide audience - to make their book more accessible to the general public. I really appreciate that - to communicate effectively and make the previously boring subject of economics interesting to the general public - it’s amazing. I actually saw Stephen Dubner present at a closing ceremony at a business conference once - he gave an excellent speech.
13. How do you go about marketing your business? What has been your most successful form of marketing?
I got lots of visitors to a forum of mine through forums posts on other forums (signature links and some references to my forums), Digg, social networking sites - all free sites. I rely on organic, semi-free traffic, mainly. However, in my current project (I have yet to release details), I’m thinking on focusing more of my effort on SEO, real-life fliers, events, and perhaps even corporate sponsorships.
14. In one word, characterize your life as an entrepreneur.
I don’t think it’s very different from the lives of other teens. I just spend a little more time on my computer and less time playing Halo 3. I have a job, although it earns me less than my business. I go to school - I haven’t dropped out or anything, unlike some teens whom I have heard of. I’m just always on the lookout - open to new ideas, new things, anything that will make a connection in my mind. I really appreciate finding this site - it has allowed me to meet other like-minded young entrepreneurs, while before I had only known a few.
15. Excluding yours, what company or business do you admire the most?
I admire Google - of course - everyone does at this moment. However, I did get an opportunity to tour their campus, and they have an amazing assortment of things for their employees. They really care for the happiness of their employees - and in turn, their employees care for them. I’ve been thinking that if I ever have a midsize to large corporation, I would definitely create a department called the “Pursuit of Happiness” department. Not HR, because HR manages some of the dirty stuff for you, but the “Pursuit of Happiness”. As I’ve mentioned before, I think that the point of life is to be happy. Then again, I’m probably just in a sheltered suburban environment.
16. How do you achieve balance in your life? Or do you?
What is balance? I think that what I do is balanced - since I do what I enjoy. Also, I try to absorb all viewpoints if possible. If I forced myself to fill up my time with unnecessary activities…then I think I would have a very unbalanced life. And I know many people with very unbalanced lives.
17. Where you see yourself and your business in 5 years? 10 years?
5 years? I’m in college. 10 years? I have no idea. Why plan out for 10 years? Time is so fast right now that in 10 years, who knows what technology will have in store for us. 10 years ago, we were worried about the y2k bug, had websites with “under construction” or marquees, had 200 Mhz computers… I don’t think that the human genome had been sequenced either. Anyways, my point is, that there’s a huge industry booming here, and that nobody had any idea what SEO is 10 years ago; why should I know where I’ll be in 10 years? Wouldn’t that limit my possibilities? Of course, I’d like to own a corporation…
18. What’s your exit strategy?
My costs are low right now, although I’m starting to hire contractors to do some work for me. However, I don’t think I’ll have a fixed cost that goes very high - I’m in good control of my costs. My only concern is that I’m still a sole proprietorship - if I’m sued, I’m dead. Then again, I don’t have much to lose. Anyhow, if I do need to exit the industry, and fast, I’d stop my server payments, and perhaps sell out all of my sites.
19. If we could introduce you to anyone, who would it be and why? (you never know who we know!)
I’d like to be introduced to the founders of Google. Or Microsoft. I’d like to be introduced to people who have changed the world, or have done great things for the public.
20. If you were conducting this interview, what question would you ask?
I would ask about what the entrepreneur feels was most crucial to their success - if there was a turning point which made the entrepreneur successful. I believe that I have had many turning points, and that I have been very lucky to get the luck of the draw each time. However, perhaps I’d be in better shape had I done something differently…you never know.
Thank you, Adam, and Evan, for operating such a wonderful and successful site! I hope to meet you guys someday.
When does this end? And would you ship to Dubai? Might enter, pretty interesting questions
Edward: Great answers!
Jason: Yes, we would ship the prizes anywhere needed.
Looking forward to seeing your answers soon. Be sure to send us a link to your answers as soon as you have completed them.
Their is no specific deadline but we will keep it within reason in order to get some great responses (probably within the next 30-60 days).
Thanks and looking forward to reading more!
Adam T.
We have confirmed a deadline date of May 30th for the Entrepreneur Interview Questions.
Get your answers in asap.
Remember: Procrastination is the thief of fortune!
Adam T.
Just completed mine. This is the first time I have ever participated in something like this. Kinda nervous and excited…
Here is the link to my article: www.producernotes.com/stinson-bulletin/young-entrepreneur-challenge/
Here’s mine! —> http://www.betterforbusiness.com/learning-about-this-young-entrepreneur/
Great interviews! I am sure many of our readers find your interviews extremely interesting and very helpful!
Looking forward to reading more of them!
Thanks,
Adam T.
Thanks for the great questions. I appreciate having my perspective broadened in this way. Well done. My answers to these questions are at: http://tinyurl.com/5tnhrb/
“Remember: Procrastination is the thief of fortune!” - Adam T
As business people we should all have important things to do. Surely then, taking time out to provide responses to the above questions is the very definition of procrastination.
My answers shall follow shortly :0)
Adam