Posted Under: Entrepreneurship, Our Heroes

Today under the “Our Heroes” series we are talking to Jennifer Silva founder of Sign Up For Camp. Along with growing tired of the commute to work, Jennifer was ready for a challenge and a change from her position as VP of Marketing and Merchandising. As a mom she had experienced the exhaustion of planning activity-filled summers for her kids and she developed her company to make this task easier for devoted parents. Keep reading to find out how Jennifer has made many parents happy campers…

DD: Who are you and what kind of corporate job were you at?

JS: My name is Jennifer Silva and until a year and half ago, I was happily employed at Sheet Music Plus, where I had been working for 7 years. At the time I had no idea that 12 months later I would have launched a new company, Sign Up For Camp, that was and still is getting great feedback from parents and camps.

At Sheet Music Plus, I was the VP of Marketing and Merchandising, which meant I was responsible for generating traffic for the website and converting the traffic once it arrived. The website is an Internet Retailer top 500 company and receives over 2,000,000 visitors each month. The company was successful but I was feeling ready to move onto a new challenge. Also, my oldest child had just entered grade school and I didn’t want to have to commute anymore.

DD: What made you leave the job? When did you realize that you wanted to be an entrepreneur & why?

JS: My “ah-ha” moment took place after planning my son’s summer last year. For years I had been hearing from mothers about what a challenge it was to line up summer plans. I didn’t really get it until I went through it myself. Finding the right camps was tough – I had to consider location, start and end times, cost, activities and the overall quality of the program. It was often hard to just find camps of interest. My son really wanted to go to art camp, and it was surprisingly tough to find art camps in our area.  And I had 10 weeks to fill – so it was a lot of camps to find and evaluate.

But the coordination with other families was the really time consuming part – I had endless rounds of emails of other moms reviewing the various camp plans. After setting up the summer, I told my husband that I wished that there was an Open Table for summer camp, and I immediately thought “I could do this.”

DD: How did you prepare yourself for the employee to entrepreneur transition?

JS: Given my internet marketing background, I was confident that I had the skills to create the business. The two major steps of preparation that I took before leaving my job were to line up resources and to verify the concept. I spoke to everyone I could think of about the idea, especially parents and camps that could become my customers. The feedback was overwhelmingly positive and it was clear that a number of the camps I spoke with would be interested in listing on my website. This was critical in my decision to start the business. If I didn’t have those potential customers I would not have felt comfortable making the move.

In addition, by the time I left my job, I had put together an agreement for a developer to build the website. This was the one position that could make or break the company. I had talked to a number of developers so I felt comfortable about the investment I would need to make to make the company go. The day after I left my position at Sheet Music Plus I was able to start building the company.

DD: What are your Top 5 tips for employees who want to be entrepreneurs but are hung up on something?

JS: 1) Identify potential customers who will likely buy from you before you make the leap. Until you have a company and a product, you probably won’t make any actual sales. But if you have 5-10 potential customers that say “that is a great idea – if you do what you say, we’d probably sign up”, you are at least starting with some validation of your business model and prospects for your first sale.

2) Once you make the leap, focus on getting revenue as early as possible. Until you have customers, you can’t validate your business model. The earlier you start pitching prospects, the earlier you can get feedback on your offer. If you have an Internet business, try to get customers before you launch.

3) Don’t go stealth – get feedback from as many people as possible on your business. Many would-be entrepreneurs are very secretive of their ideas, and are worried that someone will steal the idea. So they operate in stealth mode. But this will slow you down. The reality is that few start-up ideas are very unique and the idea is a small component of what you need to pull together to launch a company. (As I was talking to folks, I had several people say “I had this idea!” but they had never done anything with it.)

By talking to people about my idea, I gained a lot of insight into what parents wanted in a camp directory and ways to market my business. I also received many connections to camps to add to my website. I was often surprised by who was able to help me further my business and how they were able to help.

4) Find help or a partner that believes in your business. No matter how great your idea, launching your business will be filled with ups and downs. Having at least one other person involved who truly believes is extremely helpful. My developer started with me at launch and I had a project manager join me shortly after. They were essential in helping me get everything done that was required, and also in providing feedback on the business and perspective on the inevitable setbacks. It’s much tougher to go it alone. Just make sure it is someone who truly understands why your business should exist.

5) Focus on product and revenue and don’t sweat the small stuff. Spend at least 90% of your time on product and revenue at the beginning. This will determine the success or failure of your company. You will have to do other things – like set up email, set up a corporate structure, get phones, get business cards (most likely), etc… But remember that none of this will impact the viability of your business. Take care of the other details as efficiently as possible and go for the “good enough” solution. Make sure your mental energy is devoted to the tasks that will have long term impact.

DD: How are you now? Are you still in the same business, and how do you feel?

JS: We launched the website January 19th, and now have over 150 camps with paid listings. We’re getting great feedback from parents on the site. We’re confident about the future, and looking forward to moving into new marketing.

DD: Wow! Thank you so much Jenny for sharing your story with me. It is so great to hear about a successful (and clever!) entrepreneur who used her life experience to develop a much needed service for others just like her. I wish you all the best in the future with Sign Up For Camp. What a great idea!

JS: Thank you, Devesh, for taking the time to hear my story and for believing in the transition from employee to entrepreneur. Although at times it is hard to actually make the change, I found it well worth it and I am happy that our business is growing and that we are getting great feedback from parents and camps alike. I also wish you the best of luck and thanks again for having an interest in my business.

DD: There you have it folks, Jenny Silva who went from VP of marketing and merchandising to entrepreneur and founder of Sign Up For Camp. I wish her the best of luck; what a great idea! It probably makes parents lives so much easier! Good job Jenny!