Alston and c-founder Le Roux Bodenstein spent the past year and more perfecting http://withtank.com from their ‘headquarters' in an old Victorian house in Observatory. Their background stems from the web development arena, but the fact that this was a personal ‘pet' project allowed them to build something the way it "should be built" – perfecting all those small things that makes a website great. That said, the app itself and the sites it builds all stem from a singular ethos – that of simplicity.
"It's an app that builds simple, efficient sites with an 'it just works' ethos. No bells, no whistles, no widgets. You can use it for your personal site, your business site, your side business site, or an idea for a business (or side business) site. It's a simple, focused tool with a low learning curve that lets you get your work done quickly and then gets out of your way," explains Alston.
"It's a hosted web-based app, which means everything resides on a central, locally hosted server. We roll-out a new feature, or fix a bug and everyone immediately benefits. We update it constantly and these improvements are rolled out to every single customer instantly with no effort on their part. Your site, and the way you build your site, improves all the time. Not a bad way to build a website."
Alston and company raised no venture capital for their project – what's referred to as ‘bootstrapping' in the industry – living off a series of always maxed-out credit cards and keeping down a day-job between the two of them to support their dream. This may also be indicative as to why their app has a more immediate business model attached.
"We are aimed at the small business," says Alston. "And we take care of an important aspect of their business for which they are willing to pay – a fee which would be called 'hosting' in the web 1.0 language. Your site is an investment and it should be treated that way."
A quick look at their rapidly expanding portfolio of sites confirms this: Cape-based lifestyle magazine CapeEtc uses Tank, as does niched financial institutions, local artists, art galleries, bed-and-breakfasts, photographers, musicians and designers – real business and micro-enterprises of all sorts.
Tank has been compared to local entrepreneur Vinny Lingham's latest venture, Synthasite (www.synthasite.com).
