Today we’re joined by Naveen Dittakavi, founder of NextVacay.com, for a discussion on his personal journey and the lessons he learned along the way. Naveen began his career as software engineer and web developer before shifting into consulting and contracting. After years of working with his consulting clients, Naveen craved the security of a predictable and recurring revenue, so he launched his own software business. With Next Vacay, Naveen and his team provide personalized travel deals to thousands of paying members.

Naveen Dittakavi gives us his expert advice as we discuss transitioning from your current career, building a successful product-based business, mistakes to avoid in the early days of your company, and how to attract the clients you want.

Topics discussed include:

  • Naveen Dittakavi’s movement from engineering to consulting to creating recurring revenue with software services
  • How to generate recurring revenue by attracting bigger clients
  • Naveen’s mistakes during his business transition: overbooking and lack of planning
  • Once you hit the revenue goal you want, make sure you have a plan in place for what you’d like to do next
  • Naveen decided not to take on any new clients in 2016 so he could focus on his existing work and have more time for himself
  • Having high-quality clients means you need to be around for them. If you’re in a service-based business and want to get out of it, you need to see how you can make time to develop a product-based business.
  • Naveen’s advice for building a scalable and successful product-based business
  • Should you focus on growing your company bigger or improving your product?
  • Naveen recommends checking out your competition and putting yourself in the shoes of your members. This might mean doing things by hand instead of automating the process
  • Don’t wait for the perfect technological solution. Who do you want to be? What customer do you want to attract? You should ask yourself these questions when building your product
  • Greg points out that your dream of what you want your business to be may change throughout the course of the year. How do you keep your existing customers while refocusing your goals?
  • Build different channels for customers with different price points
  • Naveen wants to increase his site to 5,000 members and then use marketing to reach 10,000 members
  • Next Vacay is adding channels for customers by adding a premium tier to his memberships and increasing yearly fees
  • Discussing ideal customers and target audiences

Resources Mentioned:

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