Runway launching a virtual lifeline
AN entrepreneurial journey can be a lonely affair. Advice, while well intended, can often come from the wrong place and reaching out to those who have walked the path before you can be intimidating.
At Runway Geelong, this is a problem to be solved.
And, because they eat their own dog food at Runway, it’s also a business opportunity.
The Geelong-based start-up incubator is about to launch a new platform that it hopes will become the go-to site for entrepreneurs, start-ups, scale-ups and small businesses, particularly those in regional and remote Australia.
The brainchild of Runway chairman Nick Stanley and CEO Peter Dostis, Runway Virtual has a host of features familiar to social media platforms, such as a live news feed and chat forums, while also hosting news and dozens of free learning modules.
Like many of the start-ups it helps educate, Runway faces the problem of getting the word out on its new offering. How do you create a buzz around your product without a significant marketing budget?
At Runway, the answer has been driven by its head of community, Brandon Burns.
Since late December, the irrepressible Mr Burns has interviewed about 50 entrepreneurs and angel investors.
They include Robert Lederer, the CEO of RTL Group Investments and son of one of Australia’s richest men, Paul Lederer; Fred Schebesta, co-founder of finder.com.au; Amanda Thomson, the US-based founder of Thomson & Scott that has developed a sparkling wine portfolio that is organic, vegan-friendly, alcoholic or alcohol-free; Chad Stephens, co-founder of autofill platform Fillr; and Shaun Sumaru, founder at cardeals2me.
“They are much more accessible and open than what you expect,” Mr Burns said.
“To be an entrepreneur you need to have an appetite for risk, and you have to have started somewhere, and you have to have stuffed up, probably three or four times.
“They get what sometimes can feel unique to an entrepreneur: that you are on your own.”
Not that entrepreneurs need to be the next Mark Zuckerberg. That is something Runway is trying to dispel.
“There is power in just solving a natural problem that exists, and getting other people who have the problem to validate it, and build from there,” Mr Burns said. “A lot of the entrepreneurs we talk to are quite supportive of that method.
“One other thing they talk about, and that we have learnt, is to solve a problem that you yourself are experiencing.”
Mr Burns has gone some way to solving Runway’s marketing problem. Some of these interviewers have agreed to stay on as mentors, but they will also be sharing their stories from Runway Virtual to their own networks.
Though those connections Runway is aiming to get 2000 registered users on the platform, connecting business founders from remote locations with information, stories, mentors and potential investors.
It can then leverage that network, adding an online community that complements its bricks-and-mortar bases in Geelong and Ballarat.