Ordinary people like you and me are choosing everyday to leave their traditional jobs and work for themselves. A terrific way to start your own business is to create an app or software company that will serve your customers and bring you passive income.
Showing people how to do that, we get to meet and learn from experts like Jessey Kwong who not only can generate income by running a successful online business with his wife, but also how to create software for real estate investors everywhere.
Jessey walks us through steps to be successfully unemployed by creating an app or building a software company from the ground up.
What Jessey Does to Provide for His Family
Jessey founded and runs REI Conversion, a wordpress themes and plugins service for real estate investors that helps land investors utilize websites and tools to scale their investing business.
Additionally, Jessey runs the REI Conversion Podcast helping other investors with the core products, the themes and plugins used for their businesses.
Jessey first got started in online business with his wife, a professionally trained japanese nail artist. They built a learning website for nail artists all over the world. Neiru, where students can go in and learn how to create nail art was their response to the lack of tutorials for nail artists.
He runs a lot of the business on the back end while she mostly does the teaching.
They connect with major brands from Japan and bring their education into the Western World. They always knew they wanted to do something for the nail world and now have Neiru.
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Since Jessey’s wife is Japanese, and they are able to work remotely, they have been able to spend months at a time in Japan. Jessey loves sitting in cafes and watching the city life in motion while he works.
Dustin, who’s father is also Japanese, is able to travel often to the island with his family and explore because he, like Jessey and his wife, is location independent. That is, able to work from anywhere.Â
What Jessey Did Before and How He Transitioned Into App and Software Creation
Jessey used to work for an upper end, recreation facility in the marketing department.
He was the in-house Graphic Designer where he worked on marketing materials and all of the web stuff. At that point, he realized he could never work for a boss.
It was the pressure from the boss. Additionally, he felt he could never express himself correctly or confidently communicate what he thought would work so he became insecure.Â
Since Jessey always wanted to do his own thing, he started taking steps to do so. He began listening to the Smart Passive Income podcast on his way to work everyday.
Then, the fire was lit in him so he and his wife began selling international products for the nail business. They made YouTube videos, tutorials, and created a membership site.
Listen to the Podcast Episode on How to make an App or Software Company
They dove right into internet marketing and real estate investing. The evenings were the time when he and his wife would be working on the nail business and packing and sending orders.Â
Eventually, they scaled up with website setups, and created REI Conversion 7 years later. At the time, REI Conversion was new so they focused a lot of time on that as most of the nail business could be automated.Â
How You Get Started In App Creation and Software Development
Find The Right Team MembersÂ
Finding the right team members is important.
Jessey said that he does not code and has a coder on his team. Jessey is the guy who finds and solves the problems. He recommends you always keep searching because you never know when someone will come along who can do something you can’t.
He didn’t go into thinking he had to create something, it just grew over time.
If you are looking to create software, you will want to know how to code or know someone who does. The struggle is the business side of things, not the idea you come up with.
Programming is a lot of work, and you need both sides, the programming and the business side, to work well. Â
Dustin was working in IT and a boss asked if he wanted to learn programming.
Dustin told him no, that he was more of a project manager. The programmer type is very analytical and good at what they do, but it just wasn’t for him.
Make sure you are good at what you are doing, and if it doesn’t fit, get someone who can do the task well.Â
Always Be Working on Your Product
Jessey never thought he would be doing what he is currently doing with his businesses.
What’s important is to start somewhere that is easy enough to get started and know when to pivot your actions.
You’re never going to know the answer right at the beginning.Â
Get Involved In The Community You Want To Tap IntoÂ
It is important to be involved in the community you want to infiltrate whether it is a Facebook group or a forum so you can get important feedback from that audience.
Pay attention, read the comments and really listen to what your audience is saying and needing.
This group could ultimately be the ones who will end up paying you for the services. Jessey suggests starting with something you know and you are good at.
Bring something of value to the table and if you want to grow, keep your ears open to what people are looking for.Â
Always Test The Market Before You Launch
Jessey says that a great way to go about your idea is to ask your audience.
Pre-selling, or beta testing the reaction and seeing if people are interested, is a good way to start before putting a lot of time and energy into a product or course.
Whether it is a free webinar or simply asking them what they are looking for is a great way to get the feedback.
For example, you could put together something on a smaller scale and run the idea like you have something you are working on and gauge the response.
Offer a 1.0 Version First And Continue To Work On And Grow For Later VersionsÂ
Stick with what you know and are familiar with and offer a simple version of your product and test it.
REI Conversion put out a product last year on a simplified level and it allowed them to learn from it, allowed them to pivot and make the changes and fix the issues.
Even Windows purposefully sent out the version with bugs so people would test the version, give feedback and allow Windows to work out the issues.
You Shouldn’t Wait Until It is Perfect
Never Seek Perfection, Always Seek Improvement
Trying to be a perfectionist when starting your own business will be your biggest enemy.
It will slow you down and you’ll lose motivation. Jessy suggests launching with the intent of having to improve with every version you push out.
Remember, iPhones have constant updates!
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With each additional version you push out, it is another way to make money, charge more or even go in different directions. Get the product out as soon as you can and always continue to improve.
Hire the Right Programmer for Your Job
Jessey recommends using Fiverr or Upwork, depending on what you’re building.
If you are looking for talent, you could also use Meetup, a networking app where you meet with people at events and see what they are all about.
Meetup is a great place for developers and entrepreneurs. Be proactive in meeting people and getting yourself out there.
Test, Evaluate, Then Hire
Once you meet someone for the job, offer them a small task to do and evaluate their work before hiring.
Jessey has worked with a lot of horrible programmers that have ghosted him or have not completed projects.
He tried to start a business a while back and hired a couple guys who always had excuses for why they weren’t done. He explains what he could have done better on his end.
Set A Timeline To Hold Your Team And Yourself Accountable
You cannot be emotional in business and you have to stick to your guns.
You could possibly give a couple chances but do not keep doing it. Dustin suggests hiring slow and firing fast. If your employee can not deliver what was promised, they need to be gone.
The hiring should be long so you can make sure the personalities get along and they can do what they say they can do.Â
Hold Frequent Meetings To Check In With Your Team
Make sure you have frequent meetings and to hold everyone accountable, including yourself. No matter how small your team, do not put it off even if it is as little as 5 minutes to just check in with each other.Â
Encourage Your Programmer Or Developer To Set The Timeline For Their Work And Hold Them To ItÂ
If they have the skills, they should know how long their product should take to be completed and delivered. If not, maybe reevaluate the partnership. Â
Scaling the Business Once it is Started
This can be different for everyone. Before you quit your regular, 9-5 job, at least outline or set a goal you want to reach and then work backwards.
Examine the goal, decide how you will get there and decide if it is sustainable. Ask yourself if the business is capable of reaching the goal you have set. Join a group and see how big the community is and do some basic calculations.
Consider if you sold your product 10 times, use the percentage with the group size and then look at other groups to decide if it is scalable. Decide where else you can market like a podcast or a blog.
In the end it is all just a marketing game. Dustin and Jessey are both big believers in SEO, Search Engine Optimization (more on that here).
If you write an article or have a video and it gets shared or watched and Google says it is good, you will get more traffic. Dustin recently had an affiliate link that people would click on,for free to them, and every time someone signs up, he gets $15.
All from one video, that has over 10,000 views in a couple months.
Utilize YouTube and SEO, and Google connects people with what they need and are looking for.Â
Additional Information Jessey Wants You to Know
Jessey is a huge proponent of Facebook advertising. Paid traffic has been a huge catapult to his business. It is a really predictable way to grow.
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He uses Facebook for targeting or retargeting audiences and testing ads here and there.
He used to do his own ads but now has someone who oversees the Facebook ads. Learn the basics and then if you need to hire it out, do so.Â
Successfully Unemployed Rapid Fire Round
How Jessey is Giving Back and Making the World a Better Place
Jessey is very involved in the WordPress community and loves what he does. Being an introvert, Jessey also loves spending time with his family.
Steps Jessey Recommends You Use To Get StartedÂ
Wherever you are, look for something you can solve, see what people are looking for and make it happen in these steps:
- Hire a developer: someone to do coding if you can’t do it yourselfÂ
- Presell: feel out the audience you want to sell to ask questions
- Test: test the product in a group with your ideal audienceÂ
- Launch: just do it
Jessey’s One Non-Fiction Book That He Recommends We Read
Definitely Product Launch Formula, by Jeff Walker. If you want to launch a product out there, this is a great book that Jessey uses often.Â
One Piece of Advice Jessey Would Give Himself
Know that there are a lot of ups and downs but maybe more downs. Prepare for inner struggle, mental and emotional struggle, and just accept the journey as a package.Â
Apps That Jessey Recommends and UsesÂ
Loom or Dubb. Loom for screen recording and Dubb for customer support or marketing videos. Jessey says he couldn’t survive without loom. Dustin also uses Loom especially with coaching students who are learning how to buy a rental property or work out deals. Instead of an email, Dustin gets to analyze a property with them via Loom. One more that Jessey suggests is AppSumo where there are great deals on products for entrepreneurs. It is subscription based but there are some one-time purchase options.Â
How to Find Jessey
You can find Jessey Kwong on Facebook or reiconversion.com. If you are an investor, we help you get set up with your website quickly to help you start scaling, automating and generating leads with your business.Â