John Sokolowsky. (Darren Brown, OBJ)

John Sokolowski has a lot of experience in fitness training. Now a personal trainer, he was recruited by the Canadian National Bobsleigh team in 2000, competed in world cups, world championships, and the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.

To capitalize on his expertise, Mr. Sokolowski has developed a website with iPod-compatable sessions for people who want to train even when they can't make it in to the gym to get one-on-one lessons. At $100 a year for access of up to 300 fitness lessons, it's a real steal.

For the month of October, the OBJ will profile entrepreneurs who have run with an idea to discover how they validated their business plans, secured financing and are staking their claim in the market. For the first instalment, we spoke with Mr. Sokolowski about how he developed his idea and got the business off of the ground.

OBJ: Tell me about Athlete365.com.

SOKOLOWSKI: It's a web-based personal training service designed for busy people who don't have a lot of time to exercise. Maybe they aren't looking for a personal trainer, but they are looking for a resource with some good-quality fitness information, with programs and access to a trainer if they have any questions.

With a membership to the site, people can scan all the different workout programs. There are some that are women specific, some for athletic performance, some for strength if someone is looking to improve muscle mass. People can also download the programs. All the programs are linked with photos or video demonstrations. People can download the demonstration videos onto a personal device if they so desire.

It's web-based, so you can access it anywhere you have the Internet, and if (customers) have any questions with any exercises they can just e-mail me or call me. It's very convenient.

OBJ: Where did you get this idea from?

SOKOLOWSKI: I got the idea from some of my friends from university, some guys I played football with. After we started working, I found that some of them really couldn't exercise the way that they used to. These were guys who used to really be in shape and I found that they had difficulty finding the time to fit it into the schedule. I thought because I have a lot of training and fitness knowledge, maybe I could create something that was fast and convenient and people could just log on and do the workout in 20 minutes to 60 minutes.

OBJ: Did you do any kind of market research to see if this idea was marketable?

SOKOLOWSKI: I looked around the Internet to see things that were similar. I didn't really find anything. I came across a lot of bodybuilding sites, but the site I created wasn't for body building, it's more for everyday people, people who have a job, have a family and they just want to have quality exercise and fitness information.

In my training I also come across a lot of people who have little questions, and this is a good way for them to contact me at their convenience and I can guide them to where they want to go.

OBJ: Did you consult with anyone else in the development of the idea?

SOKOLOWSKI: The web design was by an Ottawa company called Pixelera. I went on their site and contacted them and we took it from there. Initially, my idea was a little different from what it turned out to be. I was going to focus towards the male audience, and after talking with Michael Foley (of Pixelera) and looking around the Internet, I thought I should make it so it covers more of the market. I made sure it would include women as well. Through my experience with fitness training, a large proportion of my clients are women.

OBJ: Did you have to get any financing for this?

SOKOLOWSKI: Actually it was just from my savings and from my fitness training income. I was doing this on the side, as I was a high school teacher. Now it's becoming more of a full-time thing.

OBJ: How is the site doing?

SOKOLOWSKI: With the re-launch site I have about 80 members, mostly from the Ottawa area. I've had it going for two years and we just re-launched it to be membership-based a few weeks ago. I had an online personal training service before that. I would have people who were training for a particular sport ask about having a program designed. I would give them the videos and photos and they would do the program. Now I want to offer more, so I put up the exercise library with all of the programs. People can just log on and access it.

OBJ: What's next for your site?

SOKOLOWSKI: I would like to get some advertising into some local gyms here in Ottawa. I would also like to get more trainers involved into the site and athletic therapists and chiropractors possibly. I want to turn it more into a resource for injury prevention and a health and resource site.

THE EXPERTS SAY

A good question for someone just getting started is: What's your unique selling proposition? A USP tells consumers why they should do business with you. It states the key feature that distinguishes you from your competition. It highlights the unique benefit that you offer that no one else does.

When you think you have a fabulous and unique idea for a business, the first thing to do before quitting your day job should be to find out if there is a market for it in your area. The easiest way to do this is to ask people in the industry who would be most suited to referring you customers or clients. Best case would be that the market is crying for what you want to provide. Worst case is there is no market or the market is already saturated. It's better to find out now that the idea won't fly than to become one of the 90 per cent of small businesses that fail in the first five years.

The worst mistake you can make is to quit your regular job and move blindly into trying to start a business. You should have enough money set aside to live on for approximately six months, plus the working capital to start and support the growth of your business. Otherwise, it is highly likely that you are setting yourself up for failure. Think of your business just like a plane, it takes a lot of energy and momentum to get off the ground.

David Mason, author of Marketing Your Small Business for Big Profits

It has been shown through surveys that less than six per cent of businesses have written goals and plans. But when they looked at those who were over five years old, 32 per cent of them had written goals, and when they looked at those 10 years or older, 81 per cent had written goals and plans. I would surmise that the guys who have learned to survive the longest are good at writing business plans and putting goals into place.

But if we look at what are the critical victory factors in starting a business, the first one is to develop a unique selling proposition. The next would be subject matter expertise. That is, they know what they're doing: if they're going to sell pizzas they are good at selling pizzas.

The next factor is they have to have a success mindset. They take ownership and responsibility for everything in their business and their life, they don't take a victim attitude and deny that they could have changed the outcome. The next category is good financial management. Especially in the early years, you need to understand the difference between cash flow and profit.

Also marketing is a big area where people fail: they don't have a marketing plan or they haven't found a way to encapsulate in very simple terms what makes them unique and why people will be interested in them. This is particularity true of people in the technology sector.

Sandy Kemp, president, Action Coach