Hello there

**ysg** · 11-14-2011 07:00 PM

Hi all. Very excited.

I've been meaning to strike out on my own. I really don't want to work for someone else and want more control over my future.

I've been looking into starting a phone card business. I have an idea that can add value to the consumer (no, don't want to tell you :-) ), but I don't really know where to even begin. I've been reading on it, but if someone could provide more info/data on this, much appreciated!

**Inceptive Solutions** · 11-15-2011 03:44 PM

Hello!

I'm sure you are feeling very overwhelmed.

If I were in your shoes the first thing I would do is a whole lot of research and start recording my progress. Does anything similar currently exist? About how much would this cost to produce? Are people interested in the idea? What people will I need to collaborate with (eg. programmers, engineers, designers, etc.)?

Have you started putting together a business plan yet?

**ysg** · 11-15-2011 05:13 PM

If you mean by a business plan of figuring out how my business should work and how I'm going to make money, the 'edge' that I'll seek over other companies and what my -- roughly -- expenses will be, yes.

But as for research, to be honest I have more enthusiasm than actual clue

.

I have seen similar ideas implemented, but they were kind of kludgy and were tied down to established business models, sort of like attaching an anchor to an ultra-light plane. Silly.

Potential customer base would involve the plethora of immigrants in US (me being one) that would like to call abroad. Making a website/advertising multi-lingual is fairly simple. So that doesn't really worry me in the long-run.

My biggest obstacle is getting all of the technical components to make this actually possible together. If you bake bread, then you buy the raw ingredients, make bread and then sell it. What do you do for a calling card business? I'm researching that right now and making some progress, working towards that "eureka" moment when all of these technical pieces fall together.