Jerome Touze came up with his business idea, Wayn.com, while on holiday in San Francisco. He envisaged a social network for travellers and holidaymakers which could help them meet up, share experiences and increase the fun they had while abroad. As a business idea it was very scalable, had international appeal and was original. There was also potential for a mixture of revenue streams from advertising and subscriptions. However, Touze, by his own admission, was no technology expert and his business experience was limited. But, like many true entrepreneurs, he decided to go for it anyway and search for others who had the necessary expertise to fill in the gaps.
“I am not a technology person and I am only 28, which means that I’m relatively inexperienced,” says Touze candidly. “All I had was an idea. I knew nothing about the internet, so I had to learn everything.”
Today, five years on, Wayn.com is a successful social network with 13.5 million users. The key is that Touze and his business partner, Peter Ward, found experienced entrepreneurs who were able to not only invest money, but also provide crucial advice and guidance.
Business mentoring, while well established in the US, is now gaining ground rapidly in the UK. The idea of going it alone might sound daring and exciting, but more often than not, very successful entrepreneurs have got experienced and knowledgeable people on their boards as non-executives or as investors. They can be the calm voice of reason that you need to hear at 4am when you lie awake in a cold sweat, or who take on board your ideas, understand your concept and provide direction and focus.
Touze aimed to bring the best help into his business that he could find. His first investor was Steve Pankhurst, founder of Friends Reunited, one of the great successes of the first wave of the internet. This got the ball rolling and, using a subscription model in a similar vein to Friends Reunited, Wayn.com became profitable from the off.
But Touze was aiming high and needed more investment and help. Fortunately, Ward met Brent Hoberman at a conference where the Lastminute.com founder was speaking. Coincidentally, Hoberman told the audience that he was still very interested in the travel industry, and that social networks fascinated him. Hoberman was added to
Wayn.com’s list as a potential board member and the campaign to bring him on side was underway.
Finding mentors
Finding the right business mentor is not easy, and you must see it as a selling job where you and your business are under the spotlight. The ambitious should aim high, and the results of this are demonstrable in the case of Wayn.com and others, such as Christina Domecq’s SpinVox (see box on page 51). You have to put the time in and help your mentor targets understand why you are worth backing.
Deborah Meaden, of Dragons’ Den fame, invests in and advises many businesses. She says that she really tries to get under the skin of those seeking help.
“I will put an afternoon aside and ask them to come and present their business to me. I generally don’t give them too much instruction on how this is to be done,” she reveals. “This gives me an idea about how aware they are of what their business involves, how well they understand it and how self-aware they are. It is the details they’ve chosen to give me and what they have left out that tells me about them.”
Your prospective mentor will want business information, such as accounts, marketing, statistics and your personal history before coming to an informed view. But chemistry is important, too. David Soskin and Hugo Burge, of Cheapflights, invest in Web 2.0 companies via the Howzat Fund. They put money into Wayn.com with Hoberman, and Soskin says that the personal characteristics of the founders were important.
“We were impressed by their passion and commitment, and the fact that we could understand what they wanted to do. We also liked the fact that they had investment from Steve Pankhurst,” he explains.
However, Howzat wanted Wayn.com to boost its board with high-calibre personnel. Touze and Ward were pursuing Hoberman, but he was proving hard to get and turned them down at one point. Eventually, he succumbed to their persuasion. “The guys were very persistent and ambitious, and I thought they deserved a shot,” says Hoberman. “They were tenacious and I admired that.”
The right chemistry
Your relationship with your board members is important, as is their relationship with each other. You need to be able to work together as a team, and shared values, aims and ambitions are key. Trust and respect are prerequisites to success, and this can make meetings both enjoyable and productive.
Ajaz Ahmed, founder of the multi-national advertising business AKQA, says he, his chief executive officer Tom Bedecarré and others meet up regularly for ‘Kitchen Cabinets’ which are crucial. “Every now and then we have these sessions where Tom and I catch-up at our houses over lots of cups of tea,” he says. “If you have good relationships with the team you work with day-to-day, then you can discuss ideas and listen to advice and opinions.”
You must be selective when picking your board and, as Soskin argues, it’s best to keep the team tight. “You don’t want a large board, particularly if the company is quite small,” he says. “The problem with early stage businesses is they get funding from many places and entrepreneurs give out board seats to investors.”
The right board members are crucial to your success. To find that you have someone with influence on your board who you don’t want is a headache you can do without. “It is easy to give people seats, but difficult to get rid of them,” Soskin advises.
