HISTORY

If you're like me you are fascinated by how people started their business.
So here's my story...

I am by nature an extravert. If you are familiar with the DISC profile my D & I were both off the charts. So a sales career was right up my alley. In college I got a sales job selling of all things, Kirby Vacuum cleaners Door-to-Door. Talk about a hard sell. You have 45 minutes to get a husband and wife to know, like and trust you... and give you $1300. Not an easy task. This was real selling and I was good at it. I had this job for 4 years.

I started some Multi-Level Marketing (MLM) ventures, had a "I'll wash your car in your driveway or business" company, and wrote a few business plans for companies to get funding from venture capitalist.

In 1993, I took a job as a giftware sales rep. I don't know that you could call this selling. It was a small step above order taking. I didn't make much money. I drove about 50,000 miles per year. But the client interaction was a ton of fun.

One day in 1996 I was selling to a local gift shop. I knew the son of the owner from my days at Penn State. He pulled me aside and said, "A buddy and I are starting a website business and we need someone to sell for us."

I looked him straight in the eye and said, "What's a website?"

I was always computer savvy. I grew up with the series of Radio Shack home computers. I was one of the few kids in college to have a PC in my dorm room. But I had never heard of the Internet until this very moment.

It took about a week of discussions for me to quit my job and start on this new exciting path. This was more like real selling again. I also learned some graphics programs and basic HTML. How fun was this?

Then one day I was working on a deal with a Jewelry store. They wanted to buy two websites. One website for their traditional store and the other website would sell their custom line gay pride jewelry (pink triangles and rainbow flags).

The owner, my college friend, said he would not take their business. I understand that all business owners draw a line at what types of businesses they will take as a client, but this was not an acceptable answer for me. I asked if he wanted two week's notice or if he wanted my laptop now. He took my immediate resignation.

After this interaction, I did what most 27 year olds would do. I called my Mom. I asked her for $2000 to buy a laptop and a scanner to start my new nameless company.

I was now in business and had two websites to build.

The early days were filled with conversations with prominent Lancaster business owners that went like this. "Tom, you seem like a bright young man. But no one is going to look for my business on the computer. Maybe you should consider starting another business."

I'm glad I didn't listen to these visionaries. Of course they all have websites now and probably if I asked them, they would deny the conversation.

In about two years, I was busier than I could stand to be. I knew I couldn't sell this many websites and design them. It was time to start hiring people to do the things that I wasn't good at.

It was also time to start finding office space. An attorney friend and client of mine let me rent a room from him. I literally had one desk, one computer and one employee. Fred and I shared a desk and a computer for the first several months. I worked out the timing so that he could be programming while I was out selling. A few months later I hired a web designer and internet marketer. Thank goodness my attorney had more offices to rent to me.

We grew some more and moved into our own office space.

We also continued to grow the amount of servers and technology that we used. Finding a company to support my computer network was not an easy task. I found a company. They did the job. So I started to refer business to them. I figured that I referred at least $50k a year to them. So why not hire my own computer guy to support my network and refer my clients to me instead of another company.

Within a year the company who was supporting my network came to me with a great offer to buy his business. On April 1, 2006, I signed the deal and was ready for my new adventure. Supporting my network and a few clients was one thing. But supporting 50 clients was quite another.

What did I know about running a computer business?

ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!

But why not just learn on the job. Today we have three network engineers, a service manager and salesman. The business model has radically changed since the beginning of this acquisition. I now attend regular educational seminars to stay on top of the ever changing IT industry. I'll learn to be a geek, really I will.

We have always provided some level of Search Engine Optimization (SEO). At times we did the work in house, other times we referred out the service. In 2009, I hired an additional web programmer. He came with a unique skill set for SEO. We started taking on a few more clients. To say that this area of my business is booming is an understatement. This went from a department of 1 to a department of 5 in a year's time. My SEO team can get your business on the first page of Google. Guaranteed!

Internet marketing moves fast. It seems like every few months there's a new shinny penny waiting to be picked up. In 2010, Facebook was that penny. What a wonderful opportunity for businesses to connect with their raving fans. And make MONEY!

I created a done for you Facebook program. Now business owners can take advantage of Facebook without the investment of their personal time. The program has become so successful that I hired a fulltime employee to do our social media consulting. (Talk about job creation. This job title didn't exist 5 years ago.)