We had the privilege of asking Collis Ta'eed, founder of Envato, a few questions. We learned that he is more than an awesome entrepreneur with a bunch of great sites; he's got a great sense of humor and a story that might be similar to yours (we certainly have a few things in common). Read on to learn more about his life before the founding of Envato, his advice for freelancers and plans for the future. If you find this article interesting, be sure to subscribe via RSS or email because we've got plenty of great interviews on the way.
I think just about everyone who freelances these days is pretty familiar with you, but can you give us a little background on your design-related experience before co-founding Envato?
I first began designing when I graduated from a totally unrelated degree and discovered I had no passion for what I was doing. There's nothing worse in my opinion than doing a job you hate! So I used to read tutorials, magazines and design books - anything I could get my hands on.My first design job was in a one man (well two including me!) agency that made websites for small local businesses. It was great because I got to participate in all parts of the business from web design to client meetings to SEO to learning new programming languages to fix things when they broke. But the best thing was that I had a boss who was very entrepreneurial and we used to spend hours talking about ideas for businesses - a favourite hobby of mine!
I worked at one more agency before deciding to go freelance with my wife Cyan doing both print and interactive design. We took on pretty much any job that came our way, ranging from teeny little jobs which sometimes really weren't profitable up to working for clients in government and eventually some really big businesses. I think not ever saying 'no' led to some interesting introductions, recommendations and referrals getting us in to all sorts of places that we might not have made it to otherwise.
What inspired you to become a web entrepreneur? Were you nervous at all getting started?
Freelancing, as I discovered, can be a difficult business. In particular, Cyan and I were very bad at managing our workload and client list, so we worked some fairly extreme hours to meet all our deadlines and jobs. At first it was fun, but it quickly became apparent that the demands of freelance work didn't match the way we worked. I also often found myself wishing I could take over our client's businesses so I could show them how they *should* do things :-)
Since Cyan had always
wanted to travel the world we thought we'd try building a business that
had no clients, and hence was location independent. Along with my best
friend Jun and a very talented developer we knew named Ryan we set
about developing FlashDen (now called http://activeden.net).
It was a very long, arduous process that used up all our savings and
had me working even longer hours - if that was possible!
There
was definitely some nerves, particularly around July 2006 when we were
a month or so from our eventual launch date. At that time the project
had dragged on for a lot longer than we'd intended, we'd finished the
last of our credit and it wasn't clear at all that we were going to
ever finish. But as they say, the night is darkest just before the
dawn. Thankfully everything came together in that last month, we had a
few extra freelance invoices get paid and launch day did finally arrive.
How has Envato changed since 2006?
Things are wildly different from the little operation we began with. For one thing we have an office! At one point back in 2006 I was working on a desk made out of a door and two wood sawhorses because we'd run out of space on the dining table :-)I think over the years we've been working hard to build a company structure to support all our ideas and sites. It's very cool seeing it come together and knowing that I can take a holiday and that everything will still run!
What is your best piece of advice for a freelance designer who is just getting started?
One useful piece of advice I would give is to have a good safety net of cash stockpiled up. A hard truth I had to learn as a freelancer was that there is a difference between having an invoice out and actually getting paid. The gap between these two sometimes led to cash flow issues because let's face it, your landlord isn't going to accept your invoices as rent payment!
Of course I'd also advise reading http://FreelanceSwitch.com because it's full of great advice from much cleverer people than me!
Where do you get your ideas for launching new sites? Do you have an idea pipeline or a roundtable discussion - how exactly does that work?
We do have a bit of an idea pipeline - or more like an idea backlog! My favourite hobby is to sit and drink tea and brainstorm things we could do. Generally, I find thinking about new projects to be a lot more fun than working on my email! So usually I'll write ideas and possibilities in my notebook and then slowly flesh them out. Many ideas never pan out, or upon further thought turn out to be a bit dumber than I first thought. But for every silly idea there's one which is pretty good and turns into a site or promotion or feature that makes it out the gates!Do you ever have any ideas that you feel the market is not quite ready for that you have to put on the backburner for awhile and if so, is it hard to make the decision to wait?
Oh yes, all the time! Mostly we have to shelve ideas for lack of resources. It's generally better to do fewer things, but do them better than to try to do everything ... not that that stops me trying! Generally speaking, we release sites and products about as fast as we possibly can, and still have them function well!Do you have an opinion on design contest sites that pit designer against designer with only one eventual winner? Do you view these sites as mere competitors for potential client attention or as a threat to the design industry or as something else entirely?
My personal opinion is that contests where many people do work but only one gets paid aren't very fair. I accept that they aren't going away as they are quite popular. However in their current form I don't much approve of them. I'd like to see companies like 99designs and Crowdspring work on adding measures to better compensate designers contributing work who don't end up winning, and on creating a fairer system which doesn't empower the client at the expense of designers.I think there probably is a way to shore up the flaws in the current system, though I must admit I've not given it a lot of thought. I don't believe they are a threat to the design industry at large, I think they will cannibalize a part of it and additionally supplement it by opening up design services to new markets who might not have bothered previously. I imagine there are certain types of clients who are more attracted to working this way, and vice versa plenty who prefer the proper care and attention you get with a freelancer or agency.
Many industries have had to evolve with the introduction of the web and design is no different. The trick is for it to evolve in a sensible, ethical and fair way. For that to happen I think we definitely need some leadership from 99designs and Crowdspring. I believe it will be in their best interests too, as a more acceptable model would receive more acceptance from the design community and ultimately result in a larger, more profitable business.
Still it's a very difficult problem to solve. But that's the best bit of running a business!
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