Felix Muchnik: “The client must be satisfied”
Softkey CEO Felix Muchnik gave a lecture for students of the specialization “Management in the field of Internet technologies” . The director of Russia's first electronic licensed software store touched on the organization of his business on the Internet.
At the beginning of the lesson, Felix Muchnik described those factors that, in his opinion, are decisive for the successful implementation of business ideas, and then shared the main secret - what needs to be done to make the project “shoot”.
“By and large, it’s all the same what to sell and what business to do. The main thing is that you should be really interested. If you are not passionate about the idea and don’t see how it will live over the coming years, you need to leave and try to realize yourself in something else, ”said Felix Muchnik. Among the most important conditions, the fulfillment of which is necessary to turn a startup into a successful business, the factor of the team that works on the project and the degree of its motivation in terms of the development of the company were also named. “The most important thing is the people who go near you. One man show does not work here - at least for a company that is designed for long-term existence. I strongly advise you not to start your own business without a team of at least five people. It’s important that the company has an evangelist, which will teach people and increase their faith in the business idea of the project. You also need to understand that at a certain stage in the development of people you will have to recruit people from the street, so you will initially need to organize the process so that any boy or girl who comes to you can work with invoices in a week. That is, your technology must be self-organizing. "
The goal of any online business, according to the director of Softkey, is to satisfy the needs of the client. “The most important thing is that the customer is satisfied, because the Internet is the place where the customer is loyal and comes back to you again and again.”
The second part of the lecture, Felix Muchnik did, by his definition, “dialogue” and began to answer questions from the audience.
- What ideas do you find the most promising in terms of implementation in business?
- If I knew where to move, I myself would move in this direction. However, we have promising projects that we are going to develop. In general, it’s easier for me to say in which direction you should not move. I do not recommend using ideas that involve receiving money only by the advertising model. Also, I do not advise developing social networks.
- How to choose a security service that can protect the company from a tax audit?
- Do not be afraid - you need to know your rights and not violate the law. If everything goes well for you, then you won’t have to fear checks. It’s easy to build a white business - I can say this with all responsibility. We have been pursuing such a policy from the very beginning and are very happy about it.
- Tell us about the differences in the state of the Internet in Russia and in the West ...
- Let's talk about two years ago. The Western Internet is one wave ahead. While we are ending the second wave and the third begins, they are already ending the third. The fourth begins the multi-platform wave of universal mobilization, when you are always in some kind of environment, always inside; this wave is already beginning in the West. In some ways we duplicate them, but in something we are different. A typical mistake of our geeks of the first wave is the creation of the Runet. We fenced off everyone, and the money was there ... So you need to understand that there are other markets, and that they are at different levels.
- How many people work for Softkey?
- Last year, the number of employees did not change, but the year before last it increased significantly - from 50 to 140 people.
- What allowed Softkey to become one of the leaders in its market segment?
- For Internet projects, automation is very important. Someone thought about it earlier, someone later. In fact, automated control systems in our country are not particularly used now. Especially for business, because computers often continue to be used as typewriters. Few people thought that it was necessary to create a system for its automation with a business that did not yet exist. Our competitors began this process not so long ago. We have invested an insane amount of money in automation since the formation of the company. Our second advantage is electronic delivery. When we announced it, many believed that for an accountant, for example, one electronic version was not enough and delivered the software in boxes. In the end, this became our clear advantage, because no one did it. And our main advantage is that we always think about what we are doing. We analyze the business all the time and devote 8 hours of our time to this, and some of us - even 24.
At the beginning of the lesson, Felix Muchnik described those factors that, in his opinion, are decisive for the successful implementation of business ideas, and then shared the main secret - what needs to be done to make the project “shoot”.
“By and large, it’s all the same what to sell and what business to do. The main thing is that you should be really interested. If you are not passionate about the idea and don’t see how it will live over the coming years, you need to leave and try to realize yourself in something else, ”said Felix Muchnik. Among the most important conditions, the fulfillment of which is necessary to turn a startup into a successful business, the factor of the team that works on the project and the degree of its motivation in terms of the development of the company were also named. “The most important thing is the people who go near you. One man show does not work here - at least for a company that is designed for long-term existence. I strongly advise you not to start your own business without a team of at least five people. It’s important that the company has an evangelist, which will teach people and increase their faith in the business idea of the project. You also need to understand that at a certain stage in the development of people you will have to recruit people from the street, so you will initially need to organize the process so that any boy or girl who comes to you can work with invoices in a week. That is, your technology must be self-organizing. "
The goal of any online business, according to the director of Softkey, is to satisfy the needs of the client. “The most important thing is that the customer is satisfied, because the Internet is the place where the customer is loyal and comes back to you again and again.”
The second part of the lecture, Felix Muchnik did, by his definition, “dialogue” and began to answer questions from the audience.
- What ideas do you find the most promising in terms of implementation in business?
- If I knew where to move, I myself would move in this direction. However, we have promising projects that we are going to develop. In general, it’s easier for me to say in which direction you should not move. I do not recommend using ideas that involve receiving money only by the advertising model. Also, I do not advise developing social networks.
- How to choose a security service that can protect the company from a tax audit?
- Do not be afraid - you need to know your rights and not violate the law. If everything goes well for you, then you won’t have to fear checks. It’s easy to build a white business - I can say this with all responsibility. We have been pursuing such a policy from the very beginning and are very happy about it.
- Tell us about the differences in the state of the Internet in Russia and in the West ...
- Let's talk about two years ago. The Western Internet is one wave ahead. While we are ending the second wave and the third begins, they are already ending the third. The fourth begins the multi-platform wave of universal mobilization, when you are always in some kind of environment, always inside; this wave is already beginning in the West. In some ways we duplicate them, but in something we are different. A typical mistake of our geeks of the first wave is the creation of the Runet. We fenced off everyone, and the money was there ... So you need to understand that there are other markets, and that they are at different levels.
- How many people work for Softkey?
- Last year, the number of employees did not change, but the year before last it increased significantly - from 50 to 140 people.
- What allowed Softkey to become one of the leaders in its market segment?
- For Internet projects, automation is very important. Someone thought about it earlier, someone later. In fact, automated control systems in our country are not particularly used now. Especially for business, because computers often continue to be used as typewriters. Few people thought that it was necessary to create a system for its automation with a business that did not yet exist. Our competitors began this process not so long ago. We have invested an insane amount of money in automation since the formation of the company. Our second advantage is electronic delivery. When we announced it, many believed that for an accountant, for example, one electronic version was not enough and delivered the software in boxes. In the end, this became our clear advantage, because no one did it. And our main advantage is that we always think about what we are doing. We analyze the business all the time and devote 8 hours of our time to this, and some of us - even 24.