Sleeping Giant Media Managing Director, Luke Quilter, recently presented to undergraduate business studies students at Canterbury Christ Church University. Many of the students are considering becoming entrepreneurs upon graduation. Luke wanted to share his personal journey of what it's really like to start a business. See the video here - http://youtu.be/_zcrWDJb410 www.sleepinggiantmedia.co.uk

1. Canterbury Christ Church Uni

2. Focus
- I talk about setting up a business quite a bit
which is because it is my background
- Not everyone wants to do this, but the
principles and challenges I talk about apply
in corporate life too
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3. What business is
really about

4. There is no perfect situation
- Imagine you are 65
- Imagine you had a recipe for how to cook a
dish that your friends liked
- Imagine if you then had to convince existing
restaurants that it was better than theirs
- Then for the privilege of using your recipe
they had to pay you a percentage of the
profits
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5. How many issues do
you see?

6. Thats the KFC story
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7. but I am too young
- There is no right time or wrong time to start a
business
- There are however lots of excuses
- Too young, too old, not enough
knowledge, not enough money, not the
right location
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8. Introduction
- Take you through the last 5 years of starting and
then running a business
- Talk about some business systems and process’
that are important
- Look at some of the more personal requirements
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9. My story

10. What I would like to tell you
- Created a business plan
- We got all our legal elements sorted
- We followed the plan to the letter
- We knew exactly what we were doing
- It was really easy
- We made loads of money and lived happily
ever after
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11. The reality

12. What we do
We focus on delivering more
relevant visitors to our clients
websites
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13. What we do
With the ultimate focus of getting
them more customers and growing
their business
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14. What we do
PPC
Social
SEO
Website
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15. SGM vs the competition
- Client
High
performance
Customer
service
Low
Giant Sized Gap
Low
Technology
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- Client
retention
High
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16. Where it began

17. Year -1
- Part time
- Working full time, studying a
masters degree
- Put together a business plan
- Kept the costs low - built up a
few clients
2008
- Planned the processes
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18. Best laid plans
- Who is it for?
- The point of the business plan
- Main things to include
- General road map plan
- Financial forecast
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19. Getting started
- Keep your overheads as
low as possible
- Reduce risk where ever
possible
- Don’t worry too much
about planning every
detail
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20. Year 1 - Full time
- Long hours
- Pretending to be bigger
than you are
- Understanding the concept
of running a business
2009
- All hands on deck
- Very exciting!
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21. Year 1
- It is about learning what business is all about
and how it works
- There isn’t really anything you can do to
prepare for that, it is just a case of doing it
- Just try and learn it as fast as you can
- Academic models help to give you a frame of
reference and a start point
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22. Year 1.5
-
More structure, more
process
2010
- No tie’s (getting our
own identity)
- Money coming in
- Important to reinvest
money back into the
business
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23. Year 2 - 3
- More established agency,
structure, and tone
- Managing and monitoring
staff becomes more
challenging
- Legal elements
- Managing the growth
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24. Building a team
- Decentralized structures
- Bottom up approach
- Less structure and more of
a collaborative approach
Directors
Management
Executives
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25. Building a team
- Decentralized structures
- Bottom up approach
- Less structure and more of
a collaborative approach
Directors
Management
Executives
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26. Year 4
- All about the team
- All about marketing and building a brand and
asset that is bigger than 1 person
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27. Sleeping Giant Media
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Clients
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28. 275%
2012
10 out of 10
94%
10 out of 10
2013
Staff growth
Are you happy
with SGM's service?
Average customer
service rating
Client questionnaire October 2013
Would you feel
comfortable
referring SGM to
other companies?

29. IG
personalities

30. Year 4
- Challenges we face
- Retaining quality of service while scaling
- Internal communications and knowledge
sharing
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31. Moral
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32. The practical stuff

33. Model
Financial
Clients
Innovation
People
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34. Internal technology
- Cloud based computing
- Online document storage
- Time sheeting
- Cloud based CRM - mobile
integration
- Apple based
- Fibre optics in the building
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35. External change
Algo to reduce
value of low
quality links
Talk of algo
change
Algo change
Algo change
Penguin 2.0
coming
Out reach planning
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36. Long term objectives
-Utilisation of technology to help
client retention and management
-Continue to build knowledge sharing
within the business
-Monitor external technology change
and adapt the business
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37. Set goals
Profit
Office move
40000
Recruitment of
5
0
December
January
Key targets:
Over £200k np
February
March
2011
April
May
2012
June
2013
July
August
September
October
November
Projected
Over 33% profitability
Retention of 100% positive months
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38. It’s not business,
it’s personal

39. What you need to be
successful
- “It not personal its just business”
- What attributes I have found important in
order to be “successful”, and things that I am
still working on
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40. What success takes
- 1. Awareness
- 2. Emotional Control
- 3. Invincible determination
- 4. Positive perspective
- 5. Continual learning
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41. Awareness
- Know what you know
- Know what you don’t know
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42. Emotional control
- Don’t let your decision making be changed
by your emotions
- Make your emotions work for you not the
other way around
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43. Invincible determination
- You are the biggest blocker to your success
- Overcome your own inner fears of failure
- Set your goals and don’t deviate
- No matter who tells you that you can’t do
something believe you can
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44. Positive perspective
- You can’t control external events
- You can control how you view them
- You can help develop a positive attitude
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45. Continual learning
- Every day the challenge is different and you
have to stay on top of it
- The only way you can is by learning every
day
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46. Thanks for your time
-Please don’t hesitate to ask any further
questions as we would be happy to answer
them
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