From police force to Founder, with Billing Better’s Jack Ray
Jack Ray shares his journey from police officer with the Metropolitan Police to entrepreneur by founding Billing Better.
Three key juicy bits from this week’s episode:
- Finding a gap in the market by becoming more aware of your own surroundings
- Turning an idea into a commercially viable business
- Creating a system for managing your money as a business
In this episode we discuss:
- 01:21 Introduction to Jack Ray and Billing Better
- Why Jack started his own business [02:23]
- Identifying a gap in the market [04:21]
06:50 The first steps Jack took to build his business
- Reaching the target market: students [07:48]
- Billing Better’s financial strategy [9:10]
11:58 Billing Better’s competitors
13:00 Acquiring customers in the beginning
15:16 Getting support for the business
18:17 The importance of having a few key people to turn to for advice as a new entrepreneur
19:27 When Billing Better finally became profitable
- Juggling a day job as a police officer with being a startup entrepreneur [20:34]
21:24 Hiring the first few employees and outsourcing
29:42 When Jack started to pay himself
32:19 Why Jack never sought investment for Billing Better
- Billing Better’s current revenue [34:26]
36:00 Jack reflects on the freedom that entrepreneurship brings
39:03 Jack’s biggest failure and lessons learned from it
41:35 Billing Better’s system for managing money
44:29 Billing Better’s three core offerings
46:44 Jack’s parting advice for those looking to start a business
47:44 Jack’s vision for the future of Billing Better
Links Mentioned:
Quotes
- We just had to find a way of getting the word out to people. If we did that, the product would eventually sell.
- The biggest failure I made in the beginning was not implementing a proper system for how we manage money.