App to guide start-up entrepreneurs

16 May 2013

Problemio, a Cape Town based business, has launched a four-app course developed to coach and educate SMMEs on business planning, business ideas, fundraising and marketing. The apps are available for iOS, Android, Kindle and Nook.

Having started businesses in the past, Alex Genadinik founded this company to combat the failure rate of SMMEs by helping entrepreneurs avoid some of the common but dangerous business mistakes.

According to Christo Botes, executive director at Business Partners, 75% of businesses fail within the first three years of operation because they do not have support structures in place to nurture a business. "Most people trick themselves into thinking, 'if I get finance for my business I am well on my way', but what many do not know is that the support structures are vital to the survival of start-ups."

Apps ranked highly

These apps not only draw from the experiences of their founder but also from the 10,000+ businesses which have already been planned on the apps. They provide:

Planning tools
Numerous guides and tutorials written to address the needs and questions of entrepreneurs
Chat-based expert assistance

The apps currently rank #86 in the top 100 business apps on Android and are one of the top ranked Android business apps by user reviews with a 4.7 out of 5.0 rating. This year over 100,000 people have downloaded the apps and over 13,000 people have used the app to plan their businesses.

Pinpointing four mistakes

Since the launch of the apps and after personally advising over 1000 companies on the apps, Genadinik observed, "Entrepreneurs generally make four different mistakes. They have business ideas that would not work for them, are unable to raise the money needed to build the company, cannot effectively promote their businesses, or lack of complete vision of all details of the business, which leads to incomplete planning and trouble down the road. That is why I created the course as a 4-app series where entrepreneurs can download any app then feel they may get help from, or the full series."

App stores