If you had £100k in your bank account, what business would you love to open for a healthy profit?

[superhero1993]

nowadays I am thinking about Auto CAr Wash, is it good or nat?

 

[The Byre]

Nat.

 

[Stefan Joubert]

I think if you are good at business then the £100K will help towards building a business. However, if you are just starting, the £100K will probably be lost within a few years...

It's not the money that is important, but the skill!

 

[techygirlD]

Property investments and a good advisor to help me navigate the housing/property market.

 

[The Byre]

It's not the money that is important, but the skill!

This!

£100k is very little for a new start-up, so you MUST have something where your special skill gives you a head-start and a USP.

 

[The Byre]

I would probably try to set up youtube channels. For music.

There are millions of such hopeful enterprises on YT already. What would your USP be?

 

[Karimbo]

There are probably 12 business ideas I have that I could have gone into.

WHat I would say is make sure:
business is scalable, as you grow it doesn't require a proportional increase in employees/manpower
sales can be semi-automated (web payments)
isn't location dependant (do not need to pay huge rents and rates to be in business)

Lastly, unless you're a bonefied entreprenuer who can hire talent to look after the business while you go off and juggle your time between your businesses. Chances are you'll be married to this business for the long term so make sure you enjoy it, but at the same time dont be imprisoned by it.

E.g. you might love organic herbal treatments and you spend 13 hours a day working on your websites, PR/SEO campaigns and filling orders. But you are passionate about it so you can put the hours in and become a market leader in the niche.

On the flipside the wrong sort of "marriage" is when you buy into a corner shop/convenience store and you have to be at the store 8am to 10pm every single day, 7 days a week. A lot of corner shop owners have a lifelong anchor to their business. They have to live nearby, send their kids to nearby schools. It ruins marriages and affects your social life massively. Loads of people cannot get out of this rut because they just can't scale the business and hire managers because the store thefts rise massively as soon as they are away.

Hired help cannot be as vigilant as the shareholders. They might be lazy with detection and/or even pinch a snack/drink from the store.

 

[Needl Analytics]

definitely a Saas product...90% margins...result.

 

[Karimbo]

definitely a Saas product...90% margins...result.

will need more than £100K to create a saas product. Because of margins investors are flocking to saas which makes getting customers hard. Marketing is as high as DEV costs, you need to promote the hell out of the service in order to get buyers.

Also if you want to do this right and not get ripped off you need to have some sort of Dev background. Having the background means you can partition the project up and get overseas coders to build for you.

You dont want to give the entire project to overseas coders though - they could [read: WOULD] use parts of the code for someone else or flat out rip you off.

There is a bit of a gold rush on web apps now, just like in the real california gold rush where word spread so fast that people all over the wolrd were flocking and the ones making most of the money where the ones selling tools, food, housing to the prospectors.

So many people without a clue in apps/web software jumping on the bandwagon now paying coders to build apps for them and they just check £30K down the drain because they can't get a single paid downloader.

 

[Deleted member 281732]

will need more than £100K to create a saas product. Because of margins investors are flocking to saas which makes getting customers hard. Marketing is as high as DEV costs, you need to promote the hell out of the service in order to get buyers.

Also if you want to do this right and not get ripped off you need to have some sort of Dev background. Having the background means you can partition the project up and get overseas coders to build for you.

You dont want to give the entire project to overseas coders though - they could [read: WOULD] use parts of the code for someone else or flat out rip you off.

There is a bit of a gold rush on web apps now, just like in the real california gold rush where word spread so fast that people all over the wolrd were flocking and the ones making most of the money where the ones selling tools, food, housing to the prospectors.

So many people without a clue in apps/web software jumping on the bandwagon now paying coders to build apps for them and they just check £30K down the drain because they can't get a single paid downloader.

There's some truth to this if you have no background in software.

If however you are indeed a software developer, then SaaS products are ideal, and they do not cost hundreds of thousands, or even tens of thousands to create.

 

[DontAsk]

they do not cost hundreds of thousands, or even tens of thousands to create.

If you work for nothing whilst creating them.

 

[Karimbo]

If you work for nothing whilst creating them.

That's my feeling. I have seen very simple projects cost £30k.

A friend of mine created a niche go fund me type site.

The technology is very basic to me, simple php & mysql. But bug fixing, compatibility, having to integrate into social media (crucial these days), ios/android app integration (crucial these days). Adds up the cost massively. Even if your core code is stable and fine, all your integration will rack up the bills fast.

Bug fixing takes forever too.

£100k would just about cover a basic saas cost. But it's a gamble. it might just pay for the software but you need money for marketing which can make or break the cost.

£100K on a saas service but no marketing budget might make all that £100k go down the drain because you just have a computer file with code and no paying customers

 

[Deleted member 281732]

If you work for nothing whilst creating them.

That's the reality for most founders of bootstrapped SaaS businesses. You put in evenings and weekends, and you hustle. The idea that one should invest £100k into a simple SaaS is absolute nonsense. Any competent software developer should be able to ship an MVP within a couple of months — and that's only during evenings and weekends!

having to integrate into social media (crucial these days)

No it isn't.

ios/android app integration (crucial these days)

No it isn't.

£100K on a saas service but no marketing budget might make all that £100k go down the drain because you just have a computer file with code and no paying customers

If your plan is to invest £100k into a SaaS business and launch to zero paying customers, you're doing something very, very wrong.

 

[Karimbo]

That's the reality for most founders of bootstrapped SaaS businesses. You put in evenings and weekends, and you hustle. The idea that one should invest £100k into a simple SaaS is absolute nonsense. Any competent software developer should be able to ship an MVP within a couple of months — and that's only during evenings and weekends!

If OP hires a coder, they probably wont get a saas project off the ground for 100K. A coder will charge 40-£50 per hour. Coders charge big bucks for client work, but for their own projects they are happy to sometimes sleep 3-4 hours, live off doritos and code away.

But based on the fact that OP has posted this, it is a fair assumption to make that OP is not a coder - because if they were they wouldsnt have posted to ask this as their heard would have been set on code.

You're talking about a coder who heads the business. That's fine, sweat equity counts.

But sweat equity doesn't count for much when you're not a coder and tyou've hired coders and they invoice you for every second they are even thinking about your project at £40-£50 per hour.

 

[Deleted member 281732]

If OP hires a coder, they probably wont get a saas project off the ground for 100K. A coder will charge 40-£50 per hour. Coders charge big bucks for client work, but for their own projects they are happy to sometimes sleep 3-4 hours, live off doritos and code away.

But based on the fact that OP has posted this, it is a fair assumption to make that OP is not a coder - because if they were they wouldsnt have posted to ask this as their heard would have been set on code.

You're talking about a coder who heads the business. That's fine, sweat equity counts.

But sweat equity doesn't count for much when you're not a coder and tyou've hired coders and they invoice you for every second they are even thinking about your project at £40-£50 per hour.

Ok, that's fair. I agree

 

[rizbit]

I would design a game, pay for some really top end graphics and artwork then pay for TV advertising (likes of mobile strike) and then if anything left over pay for online marketing of the app.

 

[Karimbo]

I would design a game, pay for some really top end graphics and artwork then pay for TV advertising (likes of mobile strike) and then if anything left over pay for online marketing of the app.

worst way to lose £100k

 

[rizbit]

worst way to lose £100k

maybe but thats what id want to do in that im sure a good game or even a 'decent; game with tv exposure would get lots of downloads and then make some money.

But i agree it might not work out, in fact is it easier to invest and make money from a 'real world' or 'physical' business.

 

[Karimbo]

maybe but thats what id want to do in that im sure a good game or even a 'decent; game with tv exposure would get lots of downloads and then make some money.

But i agree it might not work out, in fact is it easier to invest and make money from a 'real world' or 'physical' business.

most games dont break even, the best games make millions. it's very lopsided. the winners are games developers who will take anyones crappy idea and turn it into a game knowing full well the game is going to be rubbish.

tv advertising is a awful idea. for truly established, proven games with broad appeal - perhaps. for smaller games with smaller budgets you can play the freemium game (free downloads, rely on word of mouth and app store reviews to get downloads, which then funnel through the pay wall inside the game)

you can advertise ingame other games, mobile advertising etc. but tv advertising? it's just silly. i'm pretty sure 100k would pay for 1 tv ad as well.