Without Knowing Much About Technology, How Can I Launch an Online Service Platform? A tutor would like to sell his services online, but doesn't have the tech chops to bring it to life. Ask Entrepreneur's business expert suggests a CTO and other solutions.
By Ryan Himmel Edited by Dan Bova
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
I'd like to launch a live online tutoring service for math and English very soon. Since I'm a bit of a beginner with technology, how would I figure out which is the right technology solution for me to use? For my business plan, what should I set for my first milestone? Also, where would I find customers for this kind of online service?
The most successful entrepreneurs are typically cognizant of their strengths and weaknesses. Your question indicates that technology isn't one of your strengths – and that's ok. Some entrepreneurs often feel compelled to do it all on their own when it's actually best to try to address your weaknesses with the strengths of other team members.
On that note, I would recommend that your first milestone should be to hire a chief technology officer (CTO). This team member should be able to answer the question of what is the best technology platform to run your business. If you're neither a technology enthusiast nor involved with the tech community, you're going to have to network. Utilize your professional network and attend tech events to begin to become familiar with technology platforms and possibly find your CTO.
From a marketing perspective, I would focus on developing relationships with companies and organizations that serve a like-minded audience. An affiliation with educational publishers would likely be a significant source of new customers. I would also recommend working on building a large knowledge base of questions and answers as well as video tutorials for search-engine optimization purposes, as this type of business has the potential to drive a significant amount of traffic from online search. Of course, you can also utilize some offline marketing channels by gaining the attention of students in key locations.
Whatever path you decide to take, make sure you document what you learn. Part of the process of becoming a great entrepreneur is learning from what worked and even more so from what didn’t.
