Every entrepreneur who comes to Whinot to get advice on their business issue gets a personal email from the owner. I started this last fall after learning that it’s the CEO’s job to personally email the first 1000 users.
Some don’t respond. Others do and we exchange a number of emails with support you won’t see on Whinot.com. Here’s a quick peek inside.
Happy client:
Thanks! You guys are awesome. Like I said, I am at a very early stage, simply exploring my options. I would like to ask a candid question, if you don’t mind. How are you incentivized to help folks like me? What is your business model? If I do take a next step, how involved would you be?
Whinot:
Thanks for asking… Most importantly, we want to see more entrepreneurs and business owners be successful. We do that by providing expert advice like this for free. We hope that you find someone like Trevor who can help you with your immediate needs. If you find someone who can help, you can hire them for a short project (a few hours to a few weeks) at their hourly rate or a fixed fee. Whinot takes a 20% cut of that fee and makes sure the project is successful.
So this makes me wonder… Do we need to do a better job of making our business model clear up front? Or is it better to slowly reveal how we make money as the relationship with a customer builds over time?