Hi There!
My name is Edward.
I live in sunny Cape Town, South Africa.
Technology has been a passion of mine since I built my first app when I was 13.
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I took a 120 page book on numerology and turned it into software that reads you back your personality and if you and your admirer are a good match when you enter your names and date of birth. Me and you were meant to be together. I knew it!
I was so eager to learn that I typed the whole book into a DOS interface. That’s the old black screen in Windows 95, if you remember those? Playing with the computer was cool!
Unfortunately, that project never saw the light of day. Too many hurdles to get it published, and “I was just a kid”.
“I was just a kid”
Windhoek Technical High School prepped me to do an apprenticeship with BMW and Westlake Technical College.
My sister, as my guardian, had to sign for my employment contract and bank account because I was too young to sign. Back in the day when you had to be 21 to be considered an adult. Anyway… BMW make very technical cars with lots of gadgets that can misbehave.
When you work for the dealership, you see where the technology is going. A spanner and a hammer are not enough anymore. You need to know how to talk to the car.
A car is really just a computer plugged into a power source on wheels, isn’t it?
You see where technology is going
I used to page through dad’s Auto Data and dream about fast BMWs (and Nissans). I got to drive a bunch of cars on my bucket list though.
If there was one car, it was the 1991 BMW 850i. The boss, the myth, the legend. I drove it! The only one my dealership ever saw in the time I was there, and I got to work on and test drive my dream car.
I will forever be thankful for the great experiences I had there. However, driving M3s and M5s I’d never be able to own on my income rubbed me up the wrong way.
Being the young hot head I was, I left the dealer when I finished my apprenticeship at age 20 to go work for the bank. Of course. “That’s where the money is, right?”
“That’s where the money is, right?”
If cars taught me technical skills, the finance industry taught me about people.
I mean, the products are all the same from one big bank to another big bank and from one big insurer to another big insurer.
The difference comes down to relationships.
A big part of managing relationships, I’ve learnt, is to keep in touch with your clients and to stay top of mind.
I went all out to beat out my competitors. I had the website, with the email newsletter, and the Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.
A big part of managing relationships, I’ve learnt, is to keep in touch
I spent almost 20 years in the sales game.
One thing I learnt is that you never get a second chance to make a first impression.
If my prospect doesn’t know me, my prospective customer will judge me. Before she does, she will first want to have a look. Your first impression can be your last impression, so it’s best to make it count.
It’s important that when the prospect searches for my product or service in my area that my business shows up at the top of the search, that I direct them to my professional website and that my team are using company branded email accounts.
If you’re not online…, do you even exist?
“If you’re not online…, do you even exist?”
Having taken the long way round, I’ve come back to technology… my first love, and I’ve lost nothing in the process. Only gains.
Understanding products like cars is easy. Understanding people is a little more complicated.
I know what entrepreneurs want. Running a business is stressful. There is always a problem. Business owners are like fire fighters.
If only there was a magic wand that will make things easy and have happy customers that bring new customers? There is a solution in technology. The first step is to set up a professional online presence.
That’s the problem I solve.
The first step is to set up a professional online presence
