By Gretchen Glasscock

A while back, in By the Numbers: How I built a Web 2.0, User-Generated Content, Citizen Journalism, Long-Tail, Social Media Site for $12,107.09,  web guru, Guy Kawasaki, details how he built a website on the cheap.  That is, for Guy Kawasaki $12,107.09 is cheap.  And it is cheap for a top ranking, major website.  But if you’re not in Guy Kawasaki’s league yet…. and most of us aren’t …. you can build an attractive website that captures eyeballs, brings in revenue and turns a profit for $100 to $250.00.  I know.  I’ve done it.  Many times.

Let’s look at how, working off Kawasaki’s list ( in italics).  Actually Kawasaki only had four expense items, and you can pare those down dramatically.

As Kawasaki says, “Here’s a quick overview by the numbers:”

1. 0. I wrote 0 business plans for it. The plan is simple: Get a site launched in a few months, see if people like it, and sell ads and sponsorships (or not).
2. 0. I pitched 0 venture capitalists to fund it. Life is simple when you can launch a company with a credit-card level debt.

Times have changed since people on the web spent weeks or months laboring over business plans. The web is fast, fast, fast and you have a built in, real world focus group.  Start from where you are with what you have. Put it out and see if people like it.  Or, as they say in advertising, see if the dogs will eat the dog food.  If they do, then keep leveraging up. You can and should leverage up for the life of the site to keep it fresh, interesting, constantly evolving and compelling.

As for money, I agree with Mark Cuban who said: “Rule #1: Sweat Equity is the best start up capital. There are only two reasonable sources of capital for startup entrepreneurs, your own pocket and your customer’s pockets. You shouldn’t have to take money from anyone. Businesses don’t have to start big. The best ones start small enough to suit the circumstances of their founders, As much as you want to think that all things would change if you only had more cash available, they probably won’t. The reality is that for most businesses, they don’t need more cash, they need more brains.”

Kawasaki has plenty of brains and, if you follow his moves, you will be using and improving yours.  On to Kawasaki’s next point :

3. “7.5. 7.5 weeks went by from the time I registered the domain truemors.com to the site going live. Life is also good because of open source and Word Press.

I couldn’t agree more. WordPress has revolutionized ordinary people’s ability to rapidly deploy an attractive, sophisticated website which can then be updated in plain text. According to Wikipedia, “WordPress is a free, open source Content Management System (CMS), often used as a blog publishing application, powered by PHP and MySQL. It has many features including a plug-in architecture and a template system. WordPress is the most popular CMS in use today.” Being open source, it has thousands of man hours of coding and is constantly being refreshed and updated.  It is powerful and elegant, plus it offers many plug ins and widgets, automated pieces of software which work in the background doing essential tasks it used to take programmers many hours to do. These tasks include search engine optimization, providing Google with a sitemap and a constant stream of updates and a thousand more functions, all of which work together to make your site a success.

As for design, WordPress has a huge array of free themes you can select.  There are also some premium themes for which you pay a small price. A lot of professionals prefer the Thesis theme, at $87,  because it is simple, elegant and endlessly customizable without having to code. Thesis is, right off the bat, an expertly-coded HTML + CSS + PHP framework. Thesis is known for the quality of its design and search engine optimization, SEO, which is critical because it is SEO traffic which drives the success of a website. There are also many free or inexpensive”skins” or looks available that overlay the Thesis framework. But to keep it simple, and for your own look, go to Istockphoto.com, put in your keywords to search for suitable photos then pay a buck or so each for a half dozen photos to go in your rotator or media box and you’re ready to go.  Add your Twitter.com widget on the sidebar to drive more traffic.

At BlueHost.com, you can get great web hosting, features and service, 24/7 for $6.95 a month, payable a year in advance and only slightly more by the month.  Among the many features they offer, to make life really simple for a webmaster, is the ability to install a WordPress platform to your site with one click.

• · $4,500. The total software development cost was $4,500. The guys at Electric Pulp did the work. Honestly, I wasn’t a believer in remote teams trying to work together on version 1 of a product, but Electric Pulp changed my mind.

These guys at at Electric Pulp are top notch talent who’ve developed a well deserved reputation and  consequently are well known.  You pay top dollar for well known.  I am a believer in remote teams and, trust me, a lot of remote techs aren’t well known and their prices are correspondingly much lower.  Last week-end, I had an issue with a website and, through eLance.com, I located a Canadian demon coder who worked through the night and all the next day to fix it.  I paid him $150 including a $60 bonus.  I also brought on a certified IT Security Expert from Ireland who handled all the IT security for a global firm.  He did a review of my site security for $125.  You don’t have to be expensive to be good.  You just have to know what you’re doing.

• · $4,824.14. The total cost of the legal fees was $4,824.14. I could have used my uncle the divorce lawyer and saved a few bucks, but that would have been short sighted if Truemors ever becomes worth something. Here’s a breakdown of what I got for this amount of money.

I agree with some of Kawasaki’s thoughts on this. With lawyers you can pay now or pay later.  And, if you get very successful and are negotiating an investment or liquidity event, you definitely want top notch lawyers  “not only for her expertise but to show opposing counsel that you’re not clueless.”  Agreed.  But, if you’re bootstrapping, you can defer this expense until you are bringing in those bucks.  Yes, your lawyers may cost more then, but you will be making more, so, in my judgment, it evens out.  If money is an issue, which it usually is, I’d go with later.

• · $399. I paid LogoWorks $399 to design the logo. Of course, this was before HP bought the company. Not sure what it would charge now.

It still charges $399.  In fact, you can get a package for $299.  But there’s a larger array of choices all the way up to $2999.  I paid $299 for my latest logo from LogoWorks. But there are other choices. When I started out on the Web in 1996, I used a royalty free Matisse painting of people joining hands around the world as my logo.  As I got established and began to see revenue, I paid $2, 000 for a custom logo.  But now, I’ve learned, you can find a logo designer on eLance.com for $125 for a static logo and $150 for an animated logo.  Either LogoWorks, another logo specialty shop which you can Google,  or one you find on eLance.com is suitable.  However, what I particularly like and I think you will like about LogoWorks is that you go down a decision funnel selecting the look and feel you want and have a lot of control over the process and the look and feel of the final product.

• · $1,115.05. I spent $1,115.05 registering domains. I could have used GoDaddy and done it a lot cheaper, but I was too stupid and lazy. I registered 55 domains (for example, truemors.net, .de, .biz, truemours, etc, etc). I had no idea that one had to buy so many domains to truly “surround” the one you use.

A domain name should cost about $10.  I don’t want to quibble but I like to wait until a site is a proven success and bringing in revenue before spending a thousand dollars “surrounding it.”

Kawasaki goes on to say:

“· $0. I spent $0 on marketing to launch Truemors.

• · 24. However, I did spend 24 years of schmoozing and “paying it forward” to get to the point where I could spend $0 to launch a company. Many bloggers got bent out of shape: “The only reason Truemors is getting so much coverage is that it’s Guy’s site.” To which my response is, “You have a firm grasp of the obvious.”

I do understand he’s Guy Kawasaki.  And, as he points out, it takes a lot of experience to get to the point where you could spend $0 to launch a company.  But it will never be sooner than today, so you might as well start.   If you’re known a bit around the web or in your specific field and you put up a good site, you will find your niche and get traffic also.

In concluding, Guy says, in part:

4. I learned four lessons launching Truemors:

1. There’s really no such thing as bad PR.

2. $12,000 goes a very long way these days.

3. You can work with a team that is thousands of miles away.

4. Life is good for entrepreneurs these days.

I agree.  You can do it for much, much less, a couple of hundred bucks perhaps.  And definitely, “Life is good for entrepreneurs these days.

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So…..I guess everyone starts with the usual: your local newspaper, online jobs boards, trade publications, CraigsList, and networking with your friends and family.

Don’t forget specialty boards.  Here’s one list : Where the Talent Is: 100 Sites to Find the Elite in Any-Given-Field.  And there are more: Google for your specific field.

For all the news on jobs and job openings, go to All Top Jobs,

For an overview of all the jobs available on the Net, go to one of the top job aggregators on the Net.

What Is a Job Aggregator? As explained by – Job-Hunt.org in  Finding Jobs on Job Aggregator Sites:”Think of them as narrowly-focused search engines. Jobs are all they have in their databases.

Sites like Indeed and Simply Hired collect job postings from other sites and aggregate them into one database to be searched by job seekers. The sites with jobs included in the aggregators’ databases include some that may surprise you – Monster.com, CareerBuilder.com, HotJobs.Yahoo.com, as well as many other job sites, large and small. Postings from Craigslist have not been included, recently, but many other sites are included.

Aggregators also include jobs from employer Web sites, which I think is the most promising aspect of what they do.
Why Use Job Aggregators?
Why are they better than Monster, for example?

• Comprehensive! Because they draw jobs from many, many other sources in addition to Monster (and you don’t have to fight your way through all of the Monster advertising to get to the search results or the job descriptions).
• Time saving! At one site (Indeed), you can search through the jobs posted on the Big 3 – Monster, CareerBuilder, and HotJobs with one search!

If they are just search engines, why and how are they better than, for example, Google?

• Because of their focus on jobs, they have additional functionality that makes them much easier to use for a job search. Want search results sorted by employer? By posting date? By full-time vs. part-time vs. contract? Within 25 miles of a specific city? Within 5 miles of that city? Within 50 miles?
• They have access to information, because they accept automated “feeds,” that may not ever be available on a search engine or may become available at some later point in time.
• Because all they have is job postings, the good ones will only return search results that are jobs.”

Go to LinkIn – The De Facto Resume Repository on the Net.

To really get into the nitty gritty of how to dig down and find that job which is perfect for you and get in to see the person who has the power to hire you, take Guy Kawasaki‘s excellent and very detailed advice. Become a LinkedIn Power User in the service of your job hunt: How to Change the World: Ten Ways to Use LinkedIn to Find a Job.

All of these are tools for your job hunting tool kit.  But the best way to find a job is through a friend, associate or family member who knows you and is sold on your skills and special attributes.  So, do all of the above, but don’t forget to Network, Network, Network.  Tell everyone you see that you are looking for a job and practice you elevator pitch until you’re blue in the face.  That’s what pays off.

Good luck and happy hunting!

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So, here goes:

Career News & Job Search

All Top Career News:  a cornucopia of career news, articles, tips by hundreds of bloggers.

Job Mob: has some insightful articles and good tips.

Entrepreneurship

How To Change The World: Guy Kawasaki, is a pretty down to earth guy, but he is actually world famous as a tech entrepreneur, evangelist, author, speaker and blogger. He gets it, big time, and he shares his insights generously.

Toilet Paper Entrepreneur: If you can get beyond the initial toilet paper analogy, which is humorous, if a little indelicate, Mike Michalowicz offers good advice and tips for new entrepreneurs.

About Entrepreneurs: Scott Allen’s practical guide for entrepreneurs.

Planning Startups Stories, the very seasoned and successful Tim Berry’s blog, sharing his insights on starting your business.

Bootstrap Me: about bootstrapping, small business, entrepreneurs, start up.

Escape From Cubicle Nation: a favorite and one which will start you thinking about how to move on.

Marketing

Duct Tape Marketing: John Jantsch has to be at or close to the top when it comes to marketing.

Seth Godin’s Blog: marketing guru has insightful things to say about all things marketing

Winning the Web: internet marketing strategy and other very insightful tips on running a blog.

Social Networking

How To Change The World: Guy Kawasaki, from time to time, has more social networking how to information in one blog than others do all year.  Yes, I know I mentioned Kawasaki under entrepreneurs, which he definitely is, but he is an uber successful guy, who wears many hats, so I thought I’d mention him again in this context.

ChrisBrogan: one of the most popular social networking bloggers, sharing many moments of his life with you and informed tips on how to raise your social networking IQ.

Tech
TechCrunch: Tech news for those in the know.

Silicon Alley Insider if you like to keep up with gossip and goings on in Silicon  Valley

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I’m usually an “early adopter“.  I’m pretty much at the front of the line for new technology, cool gadgets, new forms of automation and new platforms.  But I’ve been slow to get up to speed on Twitter and I see that is a big mistake. Twitter is changing the world of marketing ourselves as we know it. Twitter is where it’s at and we all better get there soon.

I’m planning a crash course for myself on how to use Twitter most effectively to leverage the task of getting  known far and wide in the blogosphere with a ripple effect into the real world.

So let’s learn a little more about Twitter, shall we?

Guy Kawasaki is a tech evangelist and way ahead of you and me, probably, in being an early adopter of effective technology. Kawasaki, as we’ve noted, is sold on Twitter and has a lot to say about it.

In Kawasaki’s blog How to Change the World: MediaOnTwitter , he says: “Came across a very useful wiki called MediaOnTwitter. This wiki contains the a list of the reporters, journalists, and bloggers on Twitter. You can use this wiki in two ways:

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Image via CrunchBase

Even if you have demonstrable skills and great results, what good will it do you if too few people know what a valuable asset you are to any company or any client?  Zero, or close to it, is the correct answer.  Remember that question: “If a tree falls in a forest and no one’s there to hear it does it make a sound?” Answer: no, it makes sound waves; someone has to hear the sound waves for them to be perceived as sound.  And someone has to hear about your successes, achievements and accomplishments for you to  be perceived as effective and successful. There is real currency in perception. And it is up to you to shape those perceptions.

I just Googled my name, Gretchen Glasscock and it returned 9,350 results.  It’s kind of scary, when you think about it, how much information is out there about you.  There’s a profile of me on Amazon.com from when I reviewed a book on the Net for them.  One of my Internet providers, of many moons ago, has a profile posted of me with nothing but my name.  Which makes it all the more important for you to write your own profile, which is accurate and which you have control over, so that is the first place potential clients and colleagues go when looking for information about you. ( Not the website with you wearing a party hat or your nieces and nephews climbing on your shoulder as your dog is kissing your ear and you are struggling for balance.)

First, let’s focus on Linked In

Guy Kawasaki, the popular VC and entrepreneur has provided us with Ten Ways to Use LinkedIn. I’m going to point out a couple of his tips, but I’d also like to say how much I’ve learned from Guy who is probably one of the most popular personalities on the Net.  It’s easy to see why, when you read his linked in profile.  He comes through as very engaging and personable. He says of his first degree from Stanford, before he went for his MBA:

“These were some of the happiest days of my life. I loved Stanford. Sometimes I wish I could go back to school there. By the way, I majored in Psychology because it was the easiest major I could find.

I think most of us have a tendency to make these facts too stiff and formal. I know I do.  And I’m going to go back and work on mine, to let my hair down a bit, and be more personal, like Guy is.  The end result is you, the reader, immediately think of Guy Kawasaki as approachable, someone who’d like to help you, which is, after all, what you want when your goal is for people to seek you out for your service or product,

Some of Guy Kawasaki‘s advice for your Linked In page”

• Improve your connectability.

Most new users put only their current company in their profile. By doing so, they severely limit their ability to connect with people. You should fill out your profile like it’s an executive bio, so include past companies, education, affiliations, and activitiesYou can also include a link to your profile as part of an email signature. The added benefit is that the link enables people to see all your credentials, which would be awkward if not downright strange, as an attachment.

• Improve your Google PageRank.LinkedIn allows you to make your profile information available for search engines to index. Since LinkedIn profiles receive a fairly high PageRank in Google, this is a good way to influence what people see when they search for you.To do this, create a public profile and select “Full View.” Also, instead of using the default URL, customize your public profile’s URL to be your actual name. To strengthen the visibility of this page in search engines, use this link in various places on the web> For example, when you comment in a blog, include a link to your profile in your signature.
• Enhance your search engine results.In addition to your name, you can also promote your blog or website to search engines like Google and Yahoo! Your LinkedIn profile allows you to publicize websites. There are a few pre-selected categories like “My Website,” “My Company,” etc.If you select “Other” you can modify the name of the link. If you’re linking to your personal blog, include your name or descriptive terms in the link, and voila! instant search-engine optimization for your site. To make this work, be sure your public profile setting is set to “Full View.”

These small changes, which don’t take long to execute can make a huge difference how visible you are on the Net, and that is your first hurdle: Visibility.  We will work on the rest as we go along.

To read Guy Kawasaki’s  entire post go to Ten Ways to Use LinkedIn

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Popular entrepreneur, venture capitalist, and blogger, Guy Kawasaki understands business. Guy is a managing director of Garage Technology Ventures, columnist for Entrepreneur Magazine, and author of eight books on innovative business.  He’s a guy who should know what he’s talking about.  Here he expounds on the following principles:

1. Focus on cash flow.
2. Make a little progress every day
3. Try stuff.
4. Ignore schmexperts
5. Never ask anyone to do something that you wouldn’t do. ( And he’s funny too… listen to this advice:) This goes for customers (“fill out these twenty-five fields of personal information to get an account for our website”) to employees (“fly coach to Mumbai, meet all day the day you arrive, and fly back that night”). If you follow this principle, you’ll almost always have a good customer service reputation and happy employees.

But the most important of these, AdvancingWomen believes, particularly for start ups, is

“Focus on cash flow. …cash is what keeps the doors open and pays the bills. Paper profits on an accrual accounting basis is of no more than secondary or tertiary importance for a startup. As my mother used to say, “Sales fixes everything.”