My Visit to Smarta.com

Something a little different for me today. A chance to visit the team behind smarta.com - a terrific online resource for business teachers and students, which is actually designed to support entrepreneurs and small businesses.

I was there at the kind invitation of Shaa Wasmund and her team to conduct a short video interview about tutor2u. I’d spoken at Shaa’s superb social media conference in London a few weeks ago and it was great to be able to see a little of the Smarta setup at their lovely Leathermarket offices just south of Tower Bridge.

I’d mentioned Smarta.com earlier in the day at our inaugural TBBLE2010 Teacher Conference as a great source of lesson materials - particularly video interviews. Smarta comes highly recommended for just about every business course which requires students to develop their understanding of the startup process and the challenges facing small businesses that wish to grow big!

So it was strange to actually find myself at the other side of the camera, being interviewed by Bex Burn-Callander, the Deputy Editor of Smarta.com. It was a neat set up - a mobile studio in the offices; quick to assemble and take down. it got me thinking about doing something similar with interviews of our passionate teacher contributors.

The questions about tutor2u came fast and furious. I’m hoping I made some sense and that some of the video content might make it onto the Smarta site. Amongst the probing topics addressed by Bex were:

- How and why Geoff and I set up tutor2u
- The basis of our freemium business model
- How we measure market share
- Who are our competitors and how do we compete against them
- What our exit strategy is (we don’t have one - we’ll keep going for ever )
- How we use social media to drive website traffic and to build the customer base
- What the best highs and worst lows have been

Great fun. If the video appears, and its not too embarassing, I’ll add a link to the blog!