By: Co-Editor, Bobby B:
Companies seeking to provide web-based solutions for small business are easy to find on the web. Indeed, GreatStartups.com has covered several startups operating in this space. Fore example, Beezang.com (helps roommates and colleagues manage joint expenses), Outright.com (Free Online Bookkeeping), Projjix.com (helps business engage with consultants) and Invoicera.com (eBilling).
Out of Australia now comes BillsTrust.com. Launched two weeks ago, BillsTrust is a flexible and novel way to pay all your bills and invoices online, both handwritten and printed. The idea is to help users avoid late payment fees by taking care of each and every bill in due time. Once the user has signed up he will have access to a dashboard in which he will see all his upcoming bills queued up as well as historical payment information and digital copies of bills in an archive. That is, the individual will have a true overview of what has to be dealt with, instead of having to browse through bills individually.
When bills are paid by the due date, SMS or email alerts are sent to the client keeping them in the loop at all times.
The system requires no data entry, at least not in the conventional sense as users simply fax/scan and email their bills to the company to have them added to their control panels. Clients are also provided with personalized 2D bar-coded (QR code) stickers, and these are stuck onto the front of their bills as they receive them. The moment a bill is paid the individual will receive both an SMS and an email notification letting him know that the bill has been paid, and also how much money the transaction has entailed.
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By: Co-Editor, Bobby B:
The Internet is the perfect vehicle for aggregating information for those disseminating and those consuming that information. However, as myriad startups demonstrate everyday finding a niche that will bring user back over and over is the hard part. Usually, when a site does heed that call, it is almost so simple that you want to say, “why didn’t I think of that.”
The newly launched Rentjungle.com based in Pittsburgh is just such a site. The concept is simple, but it is in the execution that it succeeds. If you are looking to rent an apartment this site should be your first stop.
The site has more listings than any other online site, and its innovative technology shows you every available listing on a user-friendly map. You instantly know where each vacancy is located and what’s nearby: parks, shopping, ultra hip watering holes. Rentjungle.com works much like Google in that it scours the Internet and pulls together apartment listings from a variety of sites and puts the listings on a single results page.
RentJungle.com launched on June 1, 2009 and within four weeks had experienced nearly 1000 unique daily visitors though word-of-mouth advertising only. Behind its success is Rick Ferris, a real estate broker with over 30 years experience in residential and commercial realty. He founded RentJungle.com to fill a real void in the online real estate market by offering a simple, easy-to-use directory and one-stop-shop destination for leasers.
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By: The Editor
For the past few months GreatStartups.com has primarily written about companies less than 2 years old. Today, I decided to write about a company that has been around since 1999. I think as entrepreneurs it is always great to see companies that were just startups that have blossomed into successful businesses.
Based in San Mateo, California, Vendio.com has grown tremendously over the last 10 years. If you have something to sell online, chances are you want to use some of their online services.
Vendio lets you reach buyers where they are shopping, without forcing you to learn a different interface for each channel. Whether you are a seasoned online sales veteran, or the next ecommerce success story, Vendio makes it easy to build and run your online business no matter where your buyers shop.
Vendio says on their website “The keys to successful selling: Get quality products in front of buyers at a reasonable price, and manage your sales and customers effectively. The Vendio Platform provides you the easiest and most robust solution available to manage all your online selling: eBay, Amazon.com, or your own store. Completely hosted with nothing to install and no upfront fees, the Vendio Platform grows with you. Describe an item once and make it available to buyers on your own free online store, Amazon.com, eBay, Google Product Search, and other online channels. As sales come in, the Vendio Platform enables you to process all orders using one convenient interface while keeping inventory quantities in sync across your sales channels.”
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