Mitch Hills wanted travellers to his city to spend more time exploring and less time researching, so he came up with an app idea. To turn that idea into a business, he turned to Melbourne tech powerhouse Appster.
The 22 year-old founder and CEO from Brisbane is one passionate entrepreneur, driven to achieve. He knew what he wanted early and went for it. When he dreamed up the AroundAbout app or as he calls it, the ‘Tinder for Tourism,’ he didn't know where to start.
“When you're talking about tech, it's a whole new realm of stuff that you don't even know where to begin, like you don't even know what C++ is, or Java or IOS - you don't know how to develop anything. It's also a dangerous position to be in, because sometimes you're so motivated, to get something done, that you just go with whatever opportunities you have," Mitch says.
Employing Appster isn't cheap; it will cost anywhere between $50,000 to $100,000 but there's high demand. From starting Appster five years ago with $3,000, co-founders Josiah Humphrey and Mark McDonald have seen many clients like Mitch, enthusiastic and courageous.
“I really love our business and I love our customers, because they're very daring people, right, like they come up with this idea that they want to take to market, and we obviously get to play a part in that and we're very lucky to be able to do so.” Appster co-founder Josiah says.
The premise of AroundAbout app is simple. It’s an app that can help you pinpoint your ideal destination, categorised in three really easy to use sections: Do, Eat and Drink. However, Appster co-founder Mark McDonald encourages caution, because a lot of work goes into building an app. It can take months and that's after the concept has been realised, funding established.
“Typically those people will be very raw, they won't have much detail about what they want to build, so at that point, it's about convincing them not to build anything yet. To learn a little bit about how startups work, to validate the idea, to figure out their capital raising strategy.”
Appster is Australia’s fastest growing App Development company, with 200 apps produced under their belt via offices in Australia, India and the US.
With their global footprint growing, Josiah and Mark haven't taken on any investors, relying on themselves instead of venture capitalists. It's allowed them to operate entirely out of cashflow and head in any direction, they like.
Not bad for a dream they’d been working towards as teenagers. Even though their clients are getting bigger and bigger, Josiah and Mark's advice is the same across the board.
"So if you can look to be smart about how you validate and test your idea, in the early phase, without having to risk the farm, so to speak."
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