Jay Bean. President & Founder.
- Date of Incorporation: June 2007
- Location: American Fork, Utah
- Industry (Yahoo Finance): Internet Software & Services
- Employees: 175
- Website: www.orangesoda.com
How did OrangeSoda begin?
OrangeSoda is a concept that I thought about for several years. Having been in the Internet space, I saw that there were lots of small businesses out there who didn’t necessarily have the tools or skills to market themselves online. Since ‘99 I had been working with small businesses to market their products online. The early adopters would learn to do things on their own, and they had tools like Google and other things that were fairly easy to use, but if you are a dentist up the street or a windshield repair guy, you make your money by doing what you do best, and it’s not online marketing. So OrangeSoda was started in 2006 out of the idea that there are millions of small businesses that need online marketing services. Either they are not going to know how to do it, or really it is not the best use of their time figuring out how to advertise on Google or Yahoo or any other search engines or directories. We started the company with the vision to create a place where millions of local companies could advertise their goods and services online.
Tell me about the transition from Interactive and Ah-ha to OrangeSoda?
Ah-ha.com was a company I founded in 1999 which became Enhance Interactive in 2003. We were one of the early pay-per-click companies that went after companies that wanted to advertise online. Essentially we gave people traffic at low incremental costs. We worked with Expedia, Orbits, and Priceline and for companies like auto dealerships. Ah-ha was acquired by Marchex in February of 2003. Prior to that we had a short stint with MyFamily.com. We sold it and then bought most of it back. Marchex took its company public and is now on the Nasdac. So in 2006, not knowing what I wanted to do, I went to Europe with my family. As I was getting ready to leave, I met up with a couple of buddies that I had worked with before and we started OrangeSoda in October of 2006.
So, OrangeSoda has an interesting name. Why did you choose this name? Why brand your company this way?
I studied Economics, but I’m a marketing guy. With Ah-ha we had a problem: we had a dash in our name. We grew Ah-ha to a fairly good-sized company, but it still had a dash in its name. With OrangeSoda, we wanted to deal with local companies and they all had the word “local” in their name. People assumed that they knew what those companies would do, so we wanted a name that would really stand out. We wanted a name that was easy to spell and easy to remember. So first I went through the list of domain names that I owned. I didn’t know what I was going to do with it [OrangeSoda] when I bought it, but it was the right price and it really seemed to fit the bill. It’s a great name. People don’t forget it and it stands out.
Another part about OrangeSoda that I find interesting is its culture—it’s fun; it’s youthful. What is your role in defining the company’s culture as CEO?
We look for three things when we are talking to potential employees: people who love what they do, who love to work here, and who love those they work with. It is really about finding the right person at the right place and time. We want to make sure that employees are engaged. We are a very productivity driven company; however, we want people to enjoy working here. We have various company values that we strive for and we reward people who are doing the right thing, not just those who do their job, but people who help another coworker with a project, or who go above and beyond in helping a customer—just going that extra mile. We are not the highest-paying company around, but our people love to work here and they do their jobs the best that they can.
What are some of the ways you go about rewarding or encouraging your employees?
We actually have a culture committee. We have six values that they promote individually on a monthly basis. We’ll recognize one, or two, or three different employees who show that value. If we’re working on “Service” for the month of November, we have a Birthday Bash on the first of the month where we recognize the birthdays and the employee of the month, and we’ll recognize someone who went above and beyond in customer service. It isn’t something huge, but they are recognized in front of all the other employees. When anyone sees someone doing something right, like staying after hours to help a customer or working extra on a problem, you put the date, their name and what they did on a card and drop it into a box. At the end of the four weeks, we’ll draw a name out of the box and they will win a weekend trip to Las Vegas. We don’t do that every month, but we try to use different initiatives. I try to be out on the floor to recognize what they are doing, but we want everyone to be a part of this, not just me.
There are a lot of different SEO companies is the valley. What differentiates you from CastleWave and SEO.com?
Focus. We’re different; we have a different type of customer. We’re not going after HP, DELL or R.C. Willey. We are looking for small- and mid-sized companies that have a local focus. They typically don’t have a large budget and they look at a niche audience. Take Dr. Larson over in Orem as an example. His primary keyword that we do SEO for is “Orem Dentist.” He went from having no rankings to being number one or number two. All our work centers around one or two phrases for one specific individual. We have some large accounts like Scholastic but we’re working within one division. With ReMax, we’re not doing the national ReMax but we’re working with individual agents on a specific geographical focus.
So what are some of the products and services within your industry that have still not been met?
The biggest thing within our industry is that it’s always changing. Social media is big right now; there’s huge value in those results. A few months ago we launched a huge map utilization project. We’re having great success with it and clients are seeing real value. There has been a lot of negative press about SEO organizations and there are a lot of small businesses who don’t realize the value of a search optimization program for them. They don’t know the difference between a paid result and an organic result. We have to do a lot of education. They only know that they need more web presence. We have to educate them on the long-term value of things. The market place is always changing. While there are some basic tools for Search Engine Optimization, everything else can potentially change.
All of your services rely on Search. What do you foresee as the future of search? Do you see a future with more human interaction like found in social networks?
Google is great. While they are more real-time than they have ever been before, they are not as real time as Facebook or Twitter. The challenge for marketers is to find real-time or real-world apps. For example, a bakery that uses Twitter to say that its cinnamon rolls are coming out of the oven has a real advantage; they may have a following of people who like this. However, a car dealership that says, “We got 50 new Fords in today,” might not be as important. Different businesses can effectively use the Internet in different ways. For the dealership, the maps might be more important. For a cart in New York that sells tacos, Twitter may be a better solution where people may want to know where the cart is going to be next.
Where would I go if I wanted to learn more about SEO?
The Web is full of great sites, tips, and tricks, and there are some great books on the complex or the simple side of SEO. It’s not like you are going to read a book and be a SEO master tomorrow. It’s not just what you have to do; it’s how you do it. One of our employees teaches a class at UVU. At least there you can ask questions. He can help determine where you are and help you get the right tools and right processes to move you forward. There’s a lot of good technology out there, but for the small businesses that use our services, it’s a waste of time for them to try and figure out how to do it on their own. It’s just not their expertise; it’s not what they do best. One thing about being an entrepreneur is knowing that you can’t do everything for yourself. You have to know your limitations. You have to look for people who are better than you in those areas. One of the biggest mistakes entrepreneurs make is trying to do everything themselves.
Let’s talk about that. From your perspective, what is an entrepreneur?
I think an entrepreneur is somewhat of a risk taker. Starting any business is harder than you think it will be and it takes longer than you think it will take. What is success? Is it just making a lot of money or is it building something that changes lives? Success is different for different people. I think it is important to recognize where you are on the road and where it is going. I think many businesses that fail lose track of their destination, but when we lost Ah-ha in 2000 and we laid people off, they kept working even just for stock. Then we got picked up by MyFamily. They kept us going down that road. That’s trust. What are you working for at the end of the day? When you look at the road that Josh James over at Omniture was going down when they were to be bought by Netoptex Fusion, and Netoptex went bankrupt before the transaction closed, they had to change their whole business. They ended up selling a lot of their computers to VerSign and it changed their business. They were going after the wrong type of customer, but by staying focused look at the success they’ve had! Being an entrepreneur is knowing where you are going and what you want to get out of it, stepping up to the challenges and working your way through them. It’s not just a job. You have to make tough decisions that affect the people around you. People are relying on you. Not only is your own family dependent on you, but now other families are relying on you too. You are driving the bus.
Are there any web resources or books that have been pivotal in your career?
I don’t like technical books, but I re-read Good to Great in the last month or so. This last weekend I read the 22 Immutable Laws to Marketing. It’s super simple. It says that there are 22 laws that drive your business and what you get out of it. I like reading customer service books, because we are a very customer service driven company. I don’t have one book or two books that have been key. I typically read one book, maybe two books a month, then take out one idea and implement that idea. I read a book a couple of months ago about the importance of recognizing employees. It is easy to focus on the bad or the negative but that doesn’t necessarily help your business to grow. If you used that same amount of effort on what is working, it will continue driving in those directions. From a culture standpoint, that has been important for us.
Do you have any general advice for the entrepreneurs of our community?
Do it! Get out there! So many people have the desire to start something on their own and they spend hours and hours and even weeks and weeks in their basement planning. Getting their buddies together, they’re all excited about it but none of them actually take that next step of registering the domain name and starting the business. Sometimes it takes quitting your job. It’s a step that most people won’t take; it’s a fear of the unknown. Sometimes they get concerned about the costs and they think they need to tweak this or change that and they make these zig zags. It is when you get to the market place that you know if you are going to succeed or fail. But if you don’t go you have failed already. The sooner you can get out there and try something, making tweaks along the way, the better. When I was started Ah-ha, a buddy of mine who was at the same business and I went in to give our two week notices to our bosses on the same day. That two weeks came and as I was cleaning out my desk, rather than picking up my wife up from the hospital—I sent my brother-in-law to get my wife from the hospital with our second son being born. Not a good thing.—he said, “I thought it was best if one of us kept our full-time job just in case until we see how this goes.” He wouldn’t take that next step. People take a lot of time thinking, but they won’t move forward. My advice to entrepreneurs is, “Just do it!”
