Kavin Paulson
He was born to be an entrepreneur. At the age of 9 he launched his first website known as PowerDunk. During his high school days, when kids his age used to have fun with their friends, he joined his father’s business and learnt the nuts and bolts of financials, billing, invoicing, collection of payments, project management, technical support and more. But over time, the entrepreneur in him did not allow him to work under someone, his passion to achieving something bigger kept increasing. After spending 2 years in the job, he finally decided to quit the job and take the big leap; becoming an entrepreneur at the age of 17. Surprised? More surprises coming for you!
Today, at the age of 20, Jeet Banerjee is a serial entrepreneur, author and digital marketing consultant. He successfully launched two startups namely StatFuse, an online guide for students who seek admissions in colleges and JB Media Force, a web agency (which he sold later). He has authored two books, the latest one is The Pursuit of Passion – an entrepreneur’s starter guide to success. He is also a speaker who often gets invitations to speak at conferences around United States. Jeet has also been delivering motivational speeches among the student communities with the aim to motivate and guide them. At such a young age, he is also a business consultant who has helped hundreds of business owners to leverage the power of internet and grow their companies.
This high-performance entrepreneur is also in the process of establishing a few more businesses in the coming months, one being Vintelli, which offers affordable SEO services to small businesses.
Are you excited now to know more about him? Here we go….
In Conversation with Jeet Banerjee: Interviewed by Kavin Paulson, editor-in-chief of The iMarketing Café.
Kavin Paulson: Hi Jeet, thank you so much for taking time for the interview out of your busy schedule. Please tell us some thing about your current projects or plans.
Jeet Banerjee: Kavin, thanks for having me. Currently, my main focus has been working on StatFuse and getting it ready for the upcoming college season. I’ve also been working as a startup consultant/adviser to a few different tech startups. In addition to that, over the summer I plan to launch aUdemy course helping entrepreneurs turn ideas into businesses and re-launching my second book.
Kavin Paulson: you play multiple roles; the role of a consultant, a speaker, an author, a business owner, a blogger and so on. How do you manage your time? I think effective time management is crucial when your hands are full.
Jeet Banerjee: I manage my time by prioritizing tasks, working smarter not harder, and by avoiding procrastination. I always try to do the most important or urgent tasks first, I avoid waiting till the last minute to finish things, and I value my time. I work smarter by valuing my time and doing the things that can’t be done without me while hiring a great team around me to do the rest of the things.
Kavin Paulson: You have experienced entrepreneurship and I guess you have been enjoying every moment of being an entrepreneur. So, tell us what it takes to become an entrepreneur?
Jeet Banerjee: To be an entrepreneur, it just takes a lot of persistence, dedication, and drive. No matter what happens, you have to be wiling to get back up and try again. Many people look at successful entrepreneurs and think it’s easy to get where they are at, but it really isn’t. Many entrepreneurs work 16-18 hour days and thus have been able to achieve their high levels of success.
Kavin Paulson: What is that one piece of advice that you would like to give to upcoming entrepreneurs?
Jeet Banerjee: Don’t let the fear of failure or failure as a whole stop you from becoming an entrepreneur. Failure doesn’t define you or your business unless you allow it to. Failure is an event, something that happens at a specific time on a certain day. If you want to be successful, you have to embrace failure and get back up every single time.
Kavin Paulson: Great….what are some common challenges faced by start ups and how do you think they can overcome them?
Jeet Banerjee: 9/10 startups fail, which is a harsh reality in the world of entrepreneurship. However, I believe that such a high number of startups fail because they do not take the right steps necessary when building their business. The biggest challenge people have is building something that their target audience or niche really wants.
Kavin Paulson: Coming to your latest venture, Vintelli which seems to be a promising one. Tell us more about that and your future plan for it.
Jeet Banerjee: I recently stepped down as the co-founder and took a consultant role for Vintelli. Vintelli was my idea, but I don’t have the time necessary to commit to it so I’ve put some other great people in charge of it. Our future plans for it is to continue the growth that we’ve been able to achieve thus far and hopefully take it to the masses.
Kavin Paulson: since it’s a marketing blog, I would like to ask a couple of questions related to marketing. Marketing is the core function of any business. What marketing options do cash-strapped start-ups have?
Jeet Banerjee: I think there are many marketing options that are available for boot-strapped startups. Whether it’s partnering up with organizations, leveraging free tactics on social media, or even PR/Media outlets – entrepreneurs can do a lot of marketing for cheap.
Kavin Paulson: Where do you think small businesses often go wrong when it comes to social media marketing?
Jeet Banerjee: Small businesses forget how to be social. Everyone tries to do social media when they should just try being social. To be successful with social media, you have to treat each individual person just like you would in real life by establishing a genuine connection with them.
Kavin Paulson: After all the recent Google updates, the SEO landscape has completely changed. What kind of SEO advice do you give these days to your clients?
Jeet Banerjee: The best SEO advice I give to my clients are the following:
• Create great content.
• Don’t focus on creating backlinks or other “spammy” SEO stuff.
• Make your website social because social media plays a huge role in SEO as well.
Kavin Paulson: As a consultant, do you recommend your clients to build an in-house Social Media team or suggest hiring an agency? Tell me the reason as well.
It really depends on the organization and where they are at. If it’s a bigger organization that has grown to a certain stage and already has many key in-house pieces, I recommend them to hire a social media team. However, for companies in all other stages, I think hiring an agency is the easiest and most effective way to do it.
Kavin Paulson: You are an experienced blogger. What is that one piece of advice that you would like to give to upcoming bloggers?
Jeet Banerjee: Value the quality of your articles over the number of articles you write. I know a lot of bloggers focus on writing as many articles as possible, but I’ve realized over the years that you cannot sacrifice quality if you wish to build a loyal following on your blog.
Kavin Paulson: You have become a busy entrepreneur at such a young age. Young people often get distracted by various factors. How do you stay focused?
Jeet Banerjee: For me, it’s been really easy. I have this determination and drive to live a better life, change the world, and accomplish great things. Distractions are always there, but my purpose is so much greater that I’m always able to get back on focus.
Kavin Paulson: Inspiring! What motivates you?
Jeet Banerjee: Being able to change the lives of people around me motivates me. I always try to build technology and innovations that solve problems, simplify people’s lives, and give others what they want. After creating something and hearing from someone that it really helped them or changed their life motivates me to continue doing this.
Kavin Paulson: Cool…where do you see yourself five years from now?
Jeet Banerjee: 5 years from now, I hope to be financially free. I plan to be an advocate of young entrepreneurship and plan to open programs/ways for teenagers to get into entrepreneurship at an early age. I also plan to do a lot more speaking around the nation to share my story and inspire/motivate others. I also plan to invest in a lot of great tech startups and continue advising/consulting them and finally I plan to continue my own entrepreneurial ventures as well.
Kavin Paulson: What does entrepreneurship mean to you?
Jeet Banerjee: Entrepreneurship is the freedom to do what you want, when you want, how you want. I think the greatest part about being an entrepreneur is the ability to create what you like and do it the way you want. You don’t have to listen to anyone else or follow any instructions and that control is what entrepreneurship is all about.
Kavin Paulson: Awesome! Thank you so much Jeet. It was great talking to you. The iMarketing Café team wishes you all the best for your future endeavors. We hope all your future projects become immensely successful.
Jeet Banerjee: I appreciate that, it was a pleasure being interviewed by you! Thanks.
To know more about Jeet Banerjee, logon to www.jeetbanerjee.com
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