Startup Next Door

It’s been a while since I’ve posted under the “stealth” tag.  If you’re unaware, these stealth posts are for businesses made up of just one or two people that try to give the illusion of a thriving office environment, instead of just a living room/office.

Most businesses have 9-5 business hours.  It’s not necessary that you post business hours on your site.  And responding to customers during business hours may be difficult, depending on your day job, service or technology.

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Like any “real” company, you’re probably publishing a phone number for your customers.  For the stealth startups out there, and those who are running a business from your home, services like Kall8 or Grasshopper make this easy by providing an 800 number that can ring your home number or cell when people call.  you may be dumping these to voicemail and calling customers back later.  If so, you customer sees your home number or cell number on caller ID.  Doesn’t sound too good, does it? 

So how do you keep your real phone number anonymous and still your customers from your home or cell number?  Read on for the solution.

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Back when my startups were under the radar, I wanted to display a mailing address on my contact pages, but not my home address, of course. My assumption is that a mailing address gives customers the impression that you have an office somewhere, even though you’re actually working from a folding table in your living room.

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OK, So GooberBlitz is not a real startup, and a $20.45 round of funding isn’t likely to make TechCrunch.  TechCrunch reports on startups and businesses in the Web 2.0 space that are dealing with large VC and angel funding. TechCrunch rarely reports on bootstrap startups unless they are doing something exceptional.

That’s a problem!  Where can the home-grown startups go to share the good news on what they are doing?

Let StartupNextDoor be the TechCrunch for the home-based/lean/bootstrapped startups!

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I used to run a forum on zKorean, and in early 2005 I “came out” and let everyone know it was just me running the site.  Over time I wanted to jump back in to stealth mode to avoid backlash from jerky decisions and accepting criticism. So I did. And I made it look like my site had been bought and a corporation was the now the decision-maker.

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After a discussion with my buddy Harry, I decided that the “privacy” tag and “Private Enterprise” categories were a poor choice.  “Privacy” tends to link minds to privacy policies, identity theft, cookies, etc.  And “Private Enterprise” was too vanilla.

I’ve changed the privacy tag to “stealth”, and changed “Private Enterprise” to “Stealth Startups”.  This should lessen the confusion.

Next post: Cross-startup stealth

Back when I ran my startups under the veil of secrecy, I had to manage my secret identity, and did it pretty well.  This post continues in that regard for those who want to keep their privacy while running startups.

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I used to run my startups anonymously, and made them seem somewhat corporate in order to gain credibility. I didn’t want anyone to know it was just a one-man show. So in order to cover my tracks I used anonymous domain registration.

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I’m not going to tell how you should run your business, or how much privacy you should give up. I’ve run both closed and open door businesses, and they both have advantages for  your business.  But since I have quite a bit of experience in keeping my identity hidden when running startups, I thought I would be helpful in assisting you if  you need to keep your venture closed-door.

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