Naming a Company and Building My Tech Stack v1.0 🎨 - Issue #16

Hey y'all 👋

Learning of the week: Not everyone is thinking about remote work 🙄

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This week we'll cover:

🗄 Building the Infrastructure: My Tech Stack v1.0

💸 Stripe Tax Follow-Up: The Internet Rewards the Loud

🎨 Designing a Winning Brand

🗄 Building the Infrastructure: My Tech Stack v1.0

Currently I'm setting up a company for my remote work e-learning & consulting business.

I have to be able to:

• Incorporate and run a business
• Communicate with clients
• Create and publish content
• Market the work
• Provide value to clients
• Capture value from clients

Below is my current tech stack I'm using for the business.

• Fixed cost: $2,550.00 per year
• Variable cost: ~2.9% Stripe fee on digital sales (courses; templates; eBooks)

I'm sure this will change in the coming weeks but at least you can have a glimpse at v1.0 👇

💸 Stripe Tax Follow-Up: The Internet Rewards the Loud

For weeks I have been writing/talking about the EU VAT convolution for creators (here, here, and here).

When Stripe released their Stripe Tax product last week I was happy and shared it in my last newsletter.

Kelly - the product manager for Stripe Tax - took note and messaged me to offer beta access 👇

It pays off for both of us.

I get access to the makers of the tool + Kelly gets access to vocal users of her product.

The internet is a wild place to network 🤯

🎨 Designing a Winning Brand

Incorporation is not as fun as selecting colors for your company 👨‍🎨

Joking aside, branding is one of those areas where (a) everyone - from sys admin to your friend's mom - has an opinion and (b) the clear value of bad vs. good branding is rarely quantifiable.

There's no right or wrong but there definitely is a better or worse.

It's a spectrum.

Brand as a Corporate Asset

As an e-learning and consulting entrepreneur I'm competing with a lot of other service and entertainment providers for the client's attention and trust.

In order to double down on my B2B target audience (leaders of remote teams) I am switching from my personal brand to a new corporate brand.

🧬 remote fabric 🧬

Finding a Name

Naming is interesting.

I wanted to check the following boxes

• Available top-level domain (.com)
• Easy to transcribe if heard
• Must contain 'remote' since it's the core focus of my business + the most common search keyword

I did the same process as in my previous ventures: name storming ⚡️

TL;DR: structured brainstorming

1. Open a google sheet
2. Write all associations for the brand into the top row of the columns (horizontal)
3. Fo column by column and write all the associations for the term in the top row (vertical)

By the end of this process you will have a better idea of what is possible and you'll uncover new naming paths.

The term 'fabric' was not even in my initial consideration set but once I saw it on the sheet and realized that remotefabric.com (a) was available for $12/yr on google domains and (b) looked kick-ass in the browser window I was set 🎉

Why fabric?

A fabric is an underlying structure and this is exactly what I want to uncover with my business: Identify how remote works (from the inside out).

That's why it's remote fabric 🧬

Completing the Brand: What's Next?

It's still work in progress but this is what happened so far:

• Decided on Name ✅
• Acquired Domain ✅
• Set Up Website ✅
• Set Up Newsletter ✅

A brand name is very important but the visual language of your brand works on an even-faster channel (eyes - vision).

My friend Nate is lending a helping hand with designing a visual identity from the inside out.

He is one of the best in the game and he shared basic method in this thread 👇

I hope I can share something exciting with you next week. 🙌

Random

If you need music for work, check these 2 sets:

1. Amonita for Anjunadeep (beautiful)
2. Innelea for Cercle (crazy)

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If you want to riff on any of the above just reply to this email.

Stay happy, stay healthy 🙌

Art