Last week and a good part of this week has been a Chinese version of Halloween (but without the candy and and parties).
For big part of the week, I spent a lot of time on getting the pitch for RedStores Ventures polished up and tightened up. Gerry and I are debating about how much money to go after – it would seem its easier to raise $5MM+ than under $2MM – since the effort is the same and there is more options for VC’s in the bigger ranges. Larger funding means also higher ramp up, and that also implies more complexity. So, as we are developing the pitch, its going back and forth as to how much to raise.
Regardless of the amount, the play is quite interesting in that we need to burn through cash that will be non-immediately-positive-ROI as we build up a supplier side and buyer side of the business. So, both sides have to grow at the same time. So, its actually easy to spend $ by getting traffic from Google, and reality of it is, we don’t know how much we will need to spend to get the traffic and conversion we will need. Initial guesses point at between $25K per month and then up to $150K/month So, a wide range of options – which when multiplied out make a difference between as to where to go for funding.
So, having said all this, work is moving fast on new site – http://dev.redstores.com/xcart/ shows where things are .
We have established categories as to where we will enter,
We also ‘prettied up’ our backend, so that
Our backend is now handling products completely and work flows are in place to be able to have many, many inside and outside people work on product onboarding.
With all this in mind, I’m now reaching out to Chinese and English PR firms, to get a handle on the spend required outside of PPC for ‘priming’ the traffic.
We also now are trying a local Web Marketing company, with Pearls to see how they handle our existing accounts. When RedStores goes ‘live’ the spend will be more than we have in house ability to manage – so this big spend will be outsourced.
And, so, the last but not the least – to be able to execute on all this, I’m investing a bit of time into myself to recharge. This coming Friday I’m off to a Health Retreat in the US, for 6 weeks, to get my health in top notch shape. I embarked on this road because of Pecces (my mentor) recommendation, and now the closer I get to it, the more and more I see how much it is necessary. So, in a way, just as much as I’m preparing the business foundation for growth, I’m also now preparing myself for big step. Its feeling good.
On a personal note, few days ago, its been a one year since Jenny and I met. The personal turmoil of the past two years, is now something that lingers and still requires occasional cleanup, but it seems long in the past.
And so, the last week went from VC, to websites, to software, to health and relationships. Phew… busy week! 