Making a business around Macintosh can be fun and profitable. Just because Apple as a store doesn’t mean that you can’t make Mac the center of your business. There are many ways that you can can make money from Macs: support, training, service, or making things with your Mac.
Remember, don’t quit your day jorb.
Every business needs a phone number. If you already have a cell phone that can be a place to start. Google “Grand Central” offers a phone number and voice mail system that is very powerful. This service is in beta so you need an invitation to sign up for it. If you don’t mind a number that isn’t in your “area” there’s K7.net which offers a free voice mail and fax service. Anyone that calls the number can leave a message which is delivered to you email as a WAV file and includes the number that called.
Business cards are essential. You can easily make your own. Or you can use one of thousands of services. One of the best “card making” tools happens to be Pages. You can have cards ready to go in less then 20 minutes. The guys at Etsy use a Cosco 2000 stamp to make cards. Go to your local paper store, find some interesting card stock, cut it to card size and stamp away. Simple.
If you don’t have a web site you can make one in an hour. While you can use one of the hundreds of “free” services we think that it’s better to have your own domain. Email is the same way. Why advertise somebody else’s service when you get your own for “free” with your domain. If you aren’t sure where to start in all the domain hosts to choose from start here.
The book that we talked about is “Art of the Start” by Guy Kawasaki. If you don’t like reading there’s a video of what amounts to the first 60 pages. Guy says “Think BIG” but we say “think small.” Laziness is a feature not a bug!
Open Sign credit.
[more as we think of it]
April 10th, 2008 at 1:39 am
The tip on being an Apple Genius as really good. The only other point i would make is that if you are going to be doing mac support, then installing the Mac Dev tools is very useful. They come with tools like USB port probers, diagnostics tool. It’s also a good idea to make use of all of the fun stuff in the utilities folder, such as the network utility.
April 10th, 2008 at 8:39 am
Hi John,
I really enjoy your podcast. It is a good source of information and tips.
In the Macking Mac Your Business episode, you mentioned you have business number from website that forward your voice messages and faxes to you as an email. I thought you said it was case7.net, but I could not find it. Can you sent me the URL?
Thanks.
Paul
April 10th, 2008 at 10:05 am
In this episode there was a mention of a voicemail to email service. I think they called it case7.net but I can’t find any information about it. Tried a lot of different spellings of the URL but no luck. Anybody has heard of this service and can post the URL?
April 10th, 2008 at 11:10 am
it’s k7, k7.net, it’s free
April 10th, 2008 at 6:45 pm
You mentioned a book with partnership forms from Nolo - could you provide the info?
April 10th, 2008 at 6:53 pm
Nolo Press.
There are links to all the different types of business you might want to set up on the front page.
April 11th, 2008 at 2:38 pm
Great episode guys.
I am in need of logo services - what were the ones you recommended? Didn’t see that in the show notes.
Cheers,
James
April 11th, 2008 at 3:20 pm
I explored some of designer tools I found in a google search. some of these things are complete rip offs. but you’ll know those when you see them.
another way to start would be to search for clip art and mod it up a bit.
April 13th, 2008 at 12:25 am
[...] last episode of MacBreak Tech was very interesting. The topic was making your Mac your business. Lots of great tips, including [...]
April 13th, 2008 at 9:06 pm
John,
I particularly appreciate your comments about pirated software. I have a lot of friends who design websites with the products included with CS3, and in recent years when I have needed software for projects, I have done exactly what you said you did, you purchased the software after you got paid to do a project with the pirated version of that software. Makes perfect sense to me. One question I had, though, is what is you opinion of using my day-job’s software to do a few contract jobs here and there outside of work? (let’s say Kenji or Ben use all that awesome Pixel Corps software for their own projects) This kinda goes back to your Adobe side business, so I think I know what you are going to say. Just wanted to pick your brain, though, since y’all didn’t address this specifically.
April 13th, 2008 at 9:37 pm
you really have to be clear on your companies “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. for example some editing houses strictly forbid employees from doing 3rd party work on company gear. it’s a firing offense. meaning don’t sneak “the band in after hours” to use the sound stage and $200K of audio gear. or if you do make sure it’s crystal clear that its okay OR be on your way out the door already.
we had one talented designer that worked for us that was always doing side projects. we let it slide because he was a) talented b) didn’t let his other jobs interfere with real job c) he really was talented. but when the not so talented guy who was trying to do the same thing tried to hook up a hard drive to the “font and installer” server to make a copy of it all it was pretty clear what he was trying to do. we helped him toward starting his own company as he wasn’t in his day jorb for much longer.
using software owned by your company my also NOT be allowed as it’s project may dictate it’s use. I worked with one company that expressly required that hardware and software get purchased and dedicated to their project so there would be no possible crossover infection of intellectual property.
you should always be careful of “education versions” of software. many times the EULA forbids doing commercial work with it. some software enforces it itself. Maya, for example, won’t let you transfer models and scenes created with EDU software to a commercial version.
April 14th, 2008 at 11:55 am
Is this the Mac Genius training you guys were talking about?
http://www.apple.com/support/products/techtrain.html
If not it seems like good training to have.
Tim
April 14th, 2008 at 1:17 pm
there’s also the Apple Consultants training.
April 15th, 2008 at 7:53 am
Why the hell does mammals.org redirect to apple.com?….
April 25th, 2008 at 10:35 pm
Hey guys,
I always enjoy your shows but I wanted to take a minute to actually log in and comment for this one - it was really great. The advice was awesome and right on. I’ve had a lot of the same experiences working for both corporate I.T. and in I.T. consulting. Thanks for all of the work you guys put into producing the podcast and providing a great source of information and entertainment for all of the listeners!
Thanks,
Joe Ramsey
Oracle DBA & Mac Enthusiast