Disqus - Latest Comments for Mat Atkinson

Re: Battening Down The Hatches

Mat Atkinson — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 14:09:05 -0000

I think that a recession is a chance for web-based businesses to thrive.

For consumer oriented apps with an add revenue model, Fred is spot on saying that CPA and CPC advertising revenue will hold up best.

For business oriented apps with a SaaS subscription model, the pay-as-you-go, nothing upfront, rapid deployment, rapid ROI model has huge appeal to businesses needing to tighten their belts.

If a company has bootstrapped (like we have done at ProofHQ.com) then a recession could be a great opportunity.

Re: Is "Social Enterprise Software" An Oxymoron?

Mat Atkinson — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 08:24:14 -0000

Fred

I think that the fundamental difference between social applications and enterprise application is that social applications are, at their core, about self expression, whereas enterprise applications are about process automation.

Enterprise applications may borrow elements of social apps to facilitate collaboration (still a big enterprise opportunity) and ease of use (always a winner), but fundamentally self-expression is not a goal for the enterprise.

Re: When Greed Is Good

Mat Atkinson — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 02:03:24 -0000

Involving private equity in that way is a great solution, but is restricted to including professional investors and institutions in the solution.

Why not let the man on the street get involved as well? If the security backed by their mortgage or credit card debt is trading at x cents on the $ why not let them buy the security and retire their own debt?

Re: The American Express Blues

Mat Atkinson — Mon, 04 May 2009 02:21:43 -0000

I have just shut down my Amex Platinum charge card after eight years of use. As a result Amex loses a £300 per annum annual fee.

Similar reasons... unexpected payment failures and a curtailing of what was an "unlimited" spending limit when I took out the card. Amex was unable to look at my credit history or use of my other Amex card to set an appropriate limit. They actually wanted me to send them payslips and copies of bank statements - at which point I cut the card in half and sent it back.

Amex need to understand that there are lots of card companies out there that now provide premium services (travel, concierge, travel insurance, etc).

Re: Where and How am I Investing in Early-Stage Today?

Mat Atkinson — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 14:53:36 -0000

Roger. Great post.

What do you mean by "A business that has an inherent call option, that could boost its base-line exit value by at least 10x"?

Re: The credit crunch is starting to make itself felt in venture capital

Mat Atkinson — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 15:20:36 -0000

As I mentioned in Fred's post, I think that a recession is a chance for web-based businesses to thrive.

For consumer oriented apps with an add revenue model CPA and CPC advertising revenue will hold up best.

For business oriented apps with a SaaS subscription model, the pay-as-you-go, nothing upfront, rapid deployment, rapid ROI model has huge appeal to businesses needing to tighten their belts.

If a company has bootstrapped (like we have done at ProofHQ.com) then a recession could be a great opportunity.

Re: A note of optimism in these hard times

Mat Atkinson — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 10:42:28 -0000

Nick

Thanks for the mention.

Paul is right pointing out that more mature businesses needing capital for customer acquisition may struggle to raise that capital. They would then be at a disadvantage against better capitalised competitors (time to focus on winnable niches?).

Recessions are painful and will affect most sectors. All companies: new, old, SaaS, CPC will have to work harder and be more astute to succeed. However, those that do can take advantage with the right strategy.

Re: Why you should almost never re-write your software

Mat Atkinson — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 13:27:44 -0000

We're going through some of these issues at ProofHQ now.

We threw away the first couple of prototypes, but from the point we created a fully working application we have only refactored. New API, new permissions engine, etc. The temptation is to go for the big rebuild, and that pressure is ground-up from the development team.

Re: Extreme bootstrapping

Mat Atkinson — Sun, 03 May 2009 11:58:24 -0000

Bootstrapping at the lower levels is possible.

We got ProofHQ to Beta for about $15,000, including graphic design, coding, hosting and hardware. We did core coding ourselves - the secret sauce (source?!!) inside the app, and outsourced everything else. We eventually hired the coders in Poland full time.

We wouldn't compromise on quality or cost, so it did take longer than we would have liked, but we were aware of that trade off and maanged through it.

Re: Zuckerberg on the merit of cash out deals

Mat Atkinson — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 07:25:41 -0000

It amazes me when investors take the attitude of wanting to hold founders' "feet to the fire" like this.

In my last company we were funded with a mix of bank debt and investment. At the end of a round of funding we had the opportunity to remove the founder's homes as security on the bank debt. This had no impact at all on the investors, yet they wanted the houses "on the line" simply to "motivate" us. We got our way, but it created a rift with one or two of the investors that never healed.

Even a small level of personal security for founders allows them to take a longer term view that is more aligned with investors. It also reduces "familiy" pressure for founders. The chances of a founder becoming less motivated when pressure is reduced is very low as the personality type that starts a business from scratch is not the type to cruise when financially things are a little easier. In fact, probably the opposite... not worrying about "losing the house", or being able to afford a short vacation with the family actually re-energises a founder.

Apologies for the rant... have been at the sharp end of this issue. This is one of the reasons why my current start-up (ProofHQ) has been bootstrapped to profitability without external funding!

Re: Zuckerberg on the merit of cash out deals

Mat Atkinson — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 09:22:09 -0000

Ah! To be clear. The house was on the line before funding, but post-funding they tried to block it being taken off even though the Small Firms Loan Guarantee scheme would have provided security.

Re: Zoho Show: Another Step Towards Better Group Collaboration

Mat Atkinson — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 03:49:17 -0000

Zoli

We mulled over these same issues at ProofHQ (ProofHQ is a collaborative review and approval app for documents, design and artwork). How do we let people distribute proofs to their reviewers without having to recreate groups from other apps all over again?

We have developed the following layers:
1. Private, not distributed. Only available to people in the creator's organisation with appropriate security rights.
2. Distribution based on email ID. Only named recipients can access the files. we will be adding a Groups feature to this shortly.
3. Controlled distribution by embedding the proof in private wikis, web pages, intranets, etc.
4. Public distribution in public web pages, blogs, etc.

We are seeing a lot of take up with the third option, which lets people embed their proofs into existing "private" web pages. By default the proof is only available to people with permission to see those web pages. This brings ProofHQ into their existing process rather than forcing the creation of yet another set of permissions.

Re: Zoho Show: Another Step Towards Better Group Collaboration

Mat Atkinson — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 03:49:17 -0000

Re: I WANT YOU to Become the Editor of a NY Times Bestseller and Travel the World for Free

Mat Atkinson — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 08:29:40 -0000

Coloured pencils sound like a quaint solution, but they do have an advantage for editors in that they maintain control over the original text as reviewers make comments "in the margin". Still, what a pain to use hard copies and old fashioned post.

Proofing and approval of documents is one of the natural fits for web-based applications. Reviewing a document in "the cloud" makes much more sense than sending multiple copies by email or snail mail.

Wiki based proofing solutions can work, but they can also have limitation as multiple reviewers start commenting and editing the same areas of text. To a certain extent they can also lead to loss of document "ownership" for the author or editor.

[Apologies for the following self-promotion...]

At ProofHQ we have created a proofing and approval system that gives document owners control over the original, whilst letting reviewers add AND DISCUSS comments "in the margin". Introducing discussion threads around comments makes it easier for all reviewers to contribute to the debate without losing the context of the original content. All of this takes place "in the cloud" so only one copy of the document exits for all reviewers to work on.

Re: 4HWW Invades London Next Week: Pre-orders and Parties

Mat Atkinson — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 14:41:30 -0000

Pitcher & Piano is marginally better and will probably deal better with a burst of activity when everyone shows up, but don't get hung up on it. Both are OK.

I need to keep this secret from my wife though. She went nuts when she saw me reading a book about "getting away with only working four hours a week". She brought it up with friends and family for months and is writing a response called "How to get a proper job". I'm not sure it'll be a bestseller though.

See you Thursday.

Re: 21 Effective Feedback Tools - Now You Can Get More and Better Feedback With Less Effort!

Mat Atkinson — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 02:39:44 -0000

How about ProofHQ?

Re: 21 Effective Feedback Tools - Now You Can Get More and Better Feedback With Less Effort!

Mat Atkinson — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 02:57:27 -0000

Excellent. There seems to be a real opportunity to create a UGC resource for creating lists like this. A moderator could start a list and users could contribute to fill in the gaps. TechCrunch did something on filesharing apps... http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/08/08/16-apps-th...

Re: Thread

Mat Atkinson — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 08:57:00 -0000

For collaborating on designs, artwork and documents you could also try ProofHQ (www.proofhq.com).

It provides rich collaboration, mark-up and commenting for teams of reviewers.

It also manages proofing on files that would be too big to send by email.

Finally, it tracks versions so you can see comments from the first version to the final one.

Re: What is a Brand?

Mat Atkinson — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 13:22:02 -0000

I like your definition very much. Really punchy and to the point.

I have always believed that a brand is a perception thatâ€™s in the mind of your â€œstakeholdersâ€ (I hate that word, but Iâ€™m talking about customers, prospective customers, partners, employees and so on). Brand building is what you do to influence that perception. Great brand builders influence greatly, but invisibly.

Re: Human Talk: Websites

Mat Atkinson — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 10:16:58 -0000

Chris

Another sharp observation. It's so easy to use boring corporate copy throughout a web app or web site. I guess this happens because we are so focused on coding and design that we leave copy until last, if we think about it at all. The lesson, as you said, is to set your persona free!!

By the way, great link to the Smashing magazine list.

Re: Simple Idea: Comfort

Mat Atkinson — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 06:57:34 -0000

Innovation is the enemy of comfort