upmarkit Career Network - Zeedoc Digital Corp

Interested in starting your own entrepreneurial journey but unsure what to expect? Then read up on our interview with Larry Zolob, founder of Zeedoc Digital Corp., located in Toronto, ON, Canada.

What's your business, and who are your customers?

Our business is upmarkit Career Network. We are a next-generation inclusive networking platform that is free to join on our mobile web app. If you simply prefer freestyle networking, we do not limit your access to other community members. If you find that kind of networking awkward and strive to build more connected professional relationships, we enable the exchange of peer advice, skill-sharing, and emotional support on nearly 300 topics.

But our greatest differentiator is how we offer members a chance to earn a nominal but increasing side income while they network through peer support. At your discretion, you can work to establish a community rating that can unlock your potential to earn for your time. We live by our motto: the rewards of moving each other forward. Our core customers are younger, career-oriented professionals, graduating post-secondary students, and diverse cohorts.

Tell us about yourself

I am purpose-driven. I figured out my passion by reflecting on my natural tendencies throughout my career. Whether I worked in marketing, accounting, or service operations, I realized that I naturally gravitated to activities related to people development. And then, when I left corporate and started to network more aggressively to build relationships in the entrepreneurial space, I was disappointed by how networking platforms were (are!) designed. I found them to be self-serving and focused on non-productive engagement – not really helping the user accomplish anything meaningful. I set out to change this and then build the rest of my career (teaching, consulting, mentorship) around career and personal development.

What's your biggest accomplishment as a business owner?

While I don’t have a set of technical skills of my own (other than being a pretty decent nerd with numbers), I am sensitive to the technical issues of building products. I spent a year finding the right developers who believed in my product and had the right capabilities and culture. I suspected that there was a gap between the concept and creation of an ambitious digital platform, which means a founder can have an idea in their head, but they can’t assume the developers know how to translate that idea into a detailed digital product that optimizes the customer experience and value created for them.

So I asked a LOT of questions of many different experts on how the process works to get from concept to final product. The short answer is that there isn’t a standard or clear answer; it requires a perfect storm of luck and the right people. I wasn’t up for that kind of proposition with the money I planned to invest that I couldn’t spend twice. So my greatest accomplishment is that I, completely on my own, devised the information architecture for the site, the rating algorithms, and all the detailed user flows - over 100+ pages of documents and spreadsheets with all the precise directions. The result was that I got what I wanted, and my devs were able to offer me a flat rate to build the app because they knew precisely what they were building. They helped me optimize about 10-20% of it, mostly to conform to established UX standards.

What's one of the hardest things that come with being a business owner?

All the problems are yours. All the decisions are yours. The more you look to others to tell you what to do, rather than simply give you input into a decision that you have to make, the less ready you are to take this on. Luckily, I have a voracious appetite for decision-making and have a well-rounded background across functional sectors such as operations, finance, marketing, and HR – so I’m not at all lost.

What are the top tips you'd give to anyone looking to start, run and grow a business today?

Know your why. If it's for fame, money, or a perception that you have all this freedom, you might want to reconsider. You will be tempted to make bad business decisions. If you are at least in part inspired by how you can impact your customers, you've got a shot.
Following from #1, understand clearly how you are adding meaningful value for your customers - and in ways others are not.
Audit your skills to understand your gaps, and then seek to close them through mentorship or formal enrollment of others within your company (co-founder)? This will help you move more quickly while also avoiding burn-out as you spin and spin over the things you don't know.

When I meet a business owner looking for advice, I go straight to the first two questions to first form a sense of to what extent they have a real shot.

Final piece of advice: don't do what's easy. All those opportunities have been monetized. The idea behind Minimum Viable Product (MVP) is less about the M - it's about the V. Sometimes, the bar for what is viable with respect to existing offerings is quite high. Customers will pay or at least engage for value, so you need to really bring it.

Where can people find you and your business?

Website: https://upmarkitapp.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/upmarkit_app/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/upmarkitapp
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/upmarkit/

If you like what you've read here and have your own story as a solo or small business entrepreneur that you'd like to share, then please answer these interview questions. We'd love to feature your journey on these pages.

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