Obstacles to Starting Your Own Business

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Permalink Reply by Richard Michem on November 22, 2008 at 7:15pm

Money!

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Permalink Reply by Kenneth Tan on November 24, 2008 at 7:02am

comfort Zone, most of us are not willing to get out of it

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Permalink Reply by Mitchell York on November 24, 2008 at 9:02am

When I think of the successful entrepreneurs I know though, their comfort zone is that they are comfortable being uncomfortable. When they get comfortable they are bored and paranoid. So believing they are being chased is motivating. Know anyone like that?

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Permalink Reply by Allen Basis on November 24, 2008 at 8:46am

Money and comfort zone. The foundation of a good publishing company in the B2B space is its print product, however print alone will not sustain a company. Print cost money. Fixed costs of tangeable goods and services like paper postage, etc., costs a bundle. A strong complimetary web strategy needs to be autonomous and a seperatley vialble business that can bolt on or off. Emerging media technologies frighten most from their comfort zone freezing the business plan building process to halt.

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Permalink Reply by Mitchell York on November 24, 2008 at 9:07am

In 1994 I was a CMP media in charge of their internet business. We had just launched TechWeb, an amalgamation of the print content of our publications. It was the first print media company site to take advertising. We even beat ZDNet to market! (Then they crushed us.) At that time, CNET was also starting up and the CEO famously said he would bury the print media companies. Well, CMP was sold for about a billion dollars cash to the UBM, so that was a pretty nice burial. Ziff Davis was indeed ultimately crushed. So I think the foundation of a good B2B publishing company nowadays is electronic, with print used strategically if at all. Are there any B2B companies left making money on print?

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Permalink Reply by Melisa Breau on December 22, 2008 at 2:30pm

We're a B2B publisher that still primarily focuses on print...

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Permalink Reply by Mitchell York on November 24, 2008 at 8:59am

Is it really money? If money were not an object, what would you do?

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Permalink Reply by Paula Bisacre on December 1, 2008 at 8:50pm

When I became an entrepreneur two years ago and launched my magazine (www.remarriagemag.com), a business mentor warned me that I would need three times the amount of money and time than I had planned. Was he right!

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Permalink Reply by Mitchell York on December 2, 2008 at 8:01pm

Experts always say cash is the most important type of reserves you need to be an entrepreneur. After cash, what do you most need to have reserves of to be successful?

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Permalink Reply by Rory Brown on December 2, 2008 at 2:51pm

I am planning a startup at the moment and think this is the greatest time possible to start a new media business.

http://rorybrown.wordpress.com/2008/11/24/youd-have-to-be-mad-to-la...

Rory.

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Permalink Reply by Mitchell York on December 2, 2008 at 8:01pm

Rory, why do you think so?

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Permalink Reply by Rory Brown on December 3, 2008 at 1:18pm

I think in a lot of cases the traditional B2B media model needs reinvention - mainly because of the problem of making as much money online as you used to in print. However, at the moment the major incumbents cannot react effectively to their new environment because of all the legacy business they still control.

That spells opportunity to me.

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