Disrupt Your Industry With No-Terms Contracts With Nick And Antoine

[00:00:00] Antoine: I greatly value the fact that we’re in partnership and I’m not a sole trader or working on my own. 

[00:00:04] Ben: Would you have done this on, on your own? 

[00:00:06] Antoine: I probably would, but I would not have got nearly as far, done nearly as well, or enjoyed it nearly as much. Having someone that in the bleakest and darkest of moments where you just think this is pointless, someone else is, “I think we can do it. I think we can get through. Here’s a path,” is fantastic.

[00:00:26] Ben: Ant, Nick, welcome to Berko and Beyond. 

[00:00:27] Antoine: Thank you very much. Thanks for having us. 

[00:00:29] Ben: It’s a pleasure to have you here, uh, ’cause I’m fascinated with your business. Uh, tell me a little bit about it first, and then we’ll dig into the history of it. Who wants to do the overview? 

[00:00:38] Antoine: Uh, the, the back- the backstory. Um, so, uh, Nick’s wife is a GP, and my wife is a GP, and they were trying to buy phone systems for their practices.

And, um- They were faced with, uh, a, a horrendous choice, we felt. Yeah, te- telephony can have the same sort of reputation as secondhand car salespeople, so perhaps not the best reputation. 

[00:01:02] Ben: Honestly, is it really that bad? 

[00:01:03] Antoine: Yeah. The reputation? Yeah. I mean, I could tell you stories that would turn your hair grey about contracts we’ve seen.

[00:01:08] Ben: And is that within sort of the GP sphere or is that acro- 

[00:01:13] Antoine: That’s across the board … 

[00:01:13] Ben: across the board?  

[00:01:13] Antoine: Telephony in general. 

[00:01:14] Ben: Telephony across the board. Okay. 

[00:01:15] Antoine: Yeah. It’s not, it’s not, doesn’t have the shiniest reputation. 

[00:01:18] Ben: So, uh, Babble Voice is a te- a cloud-based te- telephony system. We’re gonna get, uh, get that word right by the end of this podcast. Um, which is for GP surgeries. Yes. So take me back then, as you were. Um, both ways, GPs looking for these systems, really bad reputation. 

[00:01:38] Antoine: Yeah. Just- So we, we, they, they were looking at really expensive equipment, um, functionality that really didn’t add any value to what they were doing, and worst of all, really long onerous contracts.

And we thought, “There’s gotta be a better way to do this.” And, um, we were running another business before that called, uh, Omnis, and then Nick, um, stepped up to the plate and, uh, and decided we, we can solve this problem. 

[00:02:04] Nick: So how does that thought come around then, Nick? You’ve got an engineering background sort of?

Yeah, so I’m, I’m a, a electronics information engineering by, by background, a chartered engineer. Um, so I’ve always run the, the more operational technical side of our business. And the, the IT support business that we had, we always, um, we, we did a core bit of business which was IT support. Um, and then every so often we’d see an opportunity where we could add some value, um, in some way, and this was one of those opportunities.

Um, so not only were, was the, the industry, the, the, the IT industry had gone leaps and bounds and became more affordable and was certainly you weren’t locked down with massive onerous contracts just to buy a couple of computers for the office and things like that. But the telephone system was, you would s- you would be locked into f- five-year contract for the phone system, a three-year contract for the leased line, and a six-year contract for the support for it, with the idea that they never line up.

Wow. So getting out is, is very, very hard. Um, so we, we intentionally kept, went into the market to address functionality problems where the GP surgeries… I don’t know whether you remember back to 2010, 2015 kind of era, where if you had to call your GP, it was dial it, engaged, hang up, try again, dial it. I- and it was a, it was a dialing roulette ga- kind of game for 15 minutes until you were the one that got through. 

[00:03:30] Ben: Well, all while you’re not feeling very well. 

[00:03:32] Nick: All while you’re …So i- if you’re lucky, you’ve got someone in the family to kind of do it for you… or you’re kind of doing that yourself. Um, and that problem was because GP surgeries literally had one line in and one line out.

So, uh, within the surgery, the GP was also at that same time trying to get an outside line to speak to a patient about a problem. Um, so, um, that opportunity was there very, was very real. These phone systems that Antoinee was referring to, they weren’t really solving those problems either. So they were, um, still just installing traditional old-school phone lines, which were limited by count.

[00:04:08] Ben: Yeah. 

[00:04:08] Nick: The broadband rollout had happened by then, and we could … So, uh, uh, a phone line you would typically get two lines into a G- a small GP surgery. Broadband, suddenly we’re at 10, 20 concurrent phone calls, uh, for the cost of a broad- what was a broadband line at the time. Um, so we started rolling that out, and we sold to a couple of GP surgeries locally.

We proved it, and they improved their service massively at the time. 

[00:04:34] Ben: S- so what I love about this story is, um, that, that it’s seeing a real problem and then actually building a business to, to solve it. Was there a point when, when the penny dropped for you? But it was, “Oh, we’ve got this. We know what, we know what we’re gonna do.”

[00:04:49] Antoine: Um, i- in complete honesty, the penny, the penny didn’t fully drop until Nick walked in with the first surgery saying, “They love it. This is amazing. This is really working.” And then, then suddenly the pieces started to, uh, fall into place for me. So it really was on the back of Nick’s effort that we managed to solve this.

But the three problems we’d identified, the, the expensive equipment, the poor functionality, and the long contracts, we were able to solve all three, and that’s what’s really amazing. Um, the, instead of making them buy expensive equipment that they have to screw to the wall or, or desk phones, we, we allow them to use software to make, receive their phone calls.

Um, the functionality Nick designed specifically to meet the needs of practices, patients, and staff. And, um, we didn’t ask them to sign a minimum term, minimum term contract. And I think that’s the, that last one made the biggest difference because surgery suddenly realized, oh, they don’t just want a contract from us ’cause we can leave at any time.

They really want us to use this, benefit from it, and, um, and stick around. 

[00:05:46] Ben: So r- really it’s going in there from, I guess, from a commercial side and also from a technical side as well. 

[00:05:53] Antoine: Exactly. Yeah. 

[00:05:54] Ben: So h- how does that, how does that relationship work between you two guys then? So you’ve been running this business together.

Do, uh, w- 

[00:06:01] Nick: I think that’s one of the splits that actually works really well actually because, um, Antoinee will, uh, uh, is, is, is amazing at the sales and marketing and the, the going out and telling, uh, uh, customers what our system can do and, and, and, and, uh, and dealing with the commercial problems, which adds a huge amount of value.

But then that really needs to … If you, if you’re gonna keep a cu- a, a customer for long term, I always use a phrase, you’ve got to have the meat. You’ve got to … So- 

[00:06:29] Antoine: I sell the sizzle. He, he delivers the actual meat. 

[00:06:32] Nick: Yeah, yeah. If you, if you go to a barbecue and someone sells you and go, “Oh, we’re gonna have the best steak or the best burgers,” when you, and you, when you get there, you get an empty bun, you’re gonna be pretty disappointed.

[00:06:41] Ben: Yeah. 

[00:06:41] Nick: Um, and the same thing is true in, when you’re, when you’re selling and then delivering. If you don’t deliver, especially when you make the promise of a no term, m- no minimum term contract, you know, you, we would lose customers in, in an instance. But we’ve, we’ve held onto customers for 10, 15 years since it, since day one of running Babble Voice. Um, and they stay because that we’ve got to stay on the edge of that- Uh, developing features and actually b- making sure that we actually stay ahead of the game. So that divide between the, the two of us, I think, is one of the, the critical, critical things that we’ve actually, we’ve got right.

Um, in our space, I think there are, um, uh, actually going back to your previous question, what were the, what were, were the, um… I’ve got another answer to the question about what was one of the moments where you thought we’d got something righ. So Antoinee’s right. It’s very exciting when, uh, you know, if we, we, we’ve had a long history of selling to normal businesses, so we were very, very comfortable there.

But when we were moving to GP surgeries, even though we, we kind of married into the industry effectively, um, it was still quite nerve-wracking. It feels like you’re stepping up in terms of grown-up solutions when you go into a GP surgery. The seriousness of reliability and making sure… you do things right is a, is a step up.

So it’s quite nerve-wracking. So when we, when we, when we achieved that, that was quite exciting. But then the second thing is the, um, the industry, the medical, GP, medical industry have seminars every so often, and there’s one run by a company called EMIS who, uh, sell the software that manages GP surgeries.

[00:08:13] Ben: Clinical records. 

[00:08:14] Nick: Clinical records. Uh- That type of thing, and we had integrated with that clinical record system for some of the functionality. 

[00:08:19] Ben: Yeah. 

[00:08:19] Nick: So quite early on, we went and exhibited at one of their fairs. Um, and every stand had people just milling about. We had a queue at our stand with 40-odd people waiting to, to speak to us the first year that we attended that.

So that was, “Ah, we’ve, we’ve got something. It’s something that people really-” Uh, really, really want. Um, but then jumping forward to y- to your second question, that, that, yeah, that, that divide, it means that there is meat and there is a k- kind of a commercial conversation, uh, to be had with, with these customers.

So that balance is really, really massively important. 

[00:08:54] Ben: So on the, the comm- going back to the commercial side, that’s quite a big decision to, uh, for, you know, no term contracts. Yes. That is c- flips that industry on its head. Yes. What … How did that decision come about? Is that a big discussion that goes on between you as, as well, or

[00:09:13] Antoine: Um, when the idea was first floated, it was definitely a big conversation because the value of the company is the value of the customers, and if you don’t have a contract that forces the customers to stay, then it dramatically diminishes the value of the company. 

[00:09:27] Ben: Yeah. 

[00:09:27] Antoine: But, uh, you know, our values are include do the right thing, and we felt that surgeries were being really badly treated with these contracts and we thought, “Let, let’s take the risk.

Let’s take the hit. Um, we’ll do the right thing for the customer and not force them to stay.” If they’re happy, and they’re getting benefit and, and everything’s working well, then we’d love them to stay. If we’re not the right supplier for them, if they, if they don’t like what we’re doing, if, if, um, we’re letting them down, then I think it’s right that they should be able to go and find another supplier.

So we, we’re not in the business of twisting anyone’s arm. We’re offering a great product at a great price, and if surgeries are happy to continue using it, we’re happy to continue serving them. 

[00:10:04] Ben: So then how does that get received a, A, by the surgery? I mean, obviously they… they like it ’cause it’s d- it, it’s different. But what about competitors? 

[00:10:12] Antoine: It’s a great question. The, the- Obviously surgeries love it. You just see their eyes go, “Wow, that,” you know, “That’s almost too good to be true. That’s fantastic.” 

[00:10:20] Nick: There’s a little bit of skepticism, I, I suspect because it is so different on occasion. 

[00:10:23] Ben: Yeah. 

[00:10:24] Antoine: A couple asked me to confirm.

“Just let me make sure I heard what you said. There’s definitely … You’re not tying us in.” “No, no, it’s not. Read the terms. It’s … You’re not. You can leave at any time.” Um, but competitors were very, uh, skeptical and very unhappy. Um, there’s a story That, uh, what was his name? Uh, the h- the Secretary of State for Health at the time decided that access to surgeries was important. So he put 240 m- West Street in £240 million into, uh, telephony for primary care. So the NHS, you know, rushed to the pen and paper and started writing a framework that everyone has to comply to, and we said, “Why, why sign … Why get these surgeries sign up to minimum term contract? Th- th- there’s a bunch of suppliers pre-approved by you that any surgery can choose from.

Why have a minimum term contract? Surely if one’s not doing a good job…” But the other, uh, suppliers went crazy. And although it started off no minimum term contract, now there is a, a three-year contract, um, that the NHS ask us to sign, but we waive that. So we have our surgeries h- have a clause of convenience where they can leave at any time.

[00:11:33] Ben: So when you first started out, obviously, you know, y- you’ll chat, you chat with the wives at home. Talk about, you know about their jobs. You know about how it goes. H- how do you then immerse yourself in that world? ‘Cause it’s a, it’s a, it’s a world you know a little bit about. It’s a problem that you wanna solve, and I guess you wanna solve for them as well, is the first, the first part of this, right?

[00:11:55] Antoine: Yeah, absolutely, yeah. 

[00:11:56] Ben: So how do you th- how do you go about sort of clean sheet, you’re, you’re going in- into a new market, into a, a, a new area? 

[00:12:03] Antoine: What do you, this is definitely one for Nick, because you’re talking more about day-to-day life, aren’t you?. 

[00:12:08] Nick: You, you, uh… We, we have a … I have personally, and, and I think that’s true of quite a few people within our business now, uh, a collection of customers, and this goes back fr- right from the early stages.

So when we started s- started this area of business, I was pretty much doing everything operational, from designing the system, implementing it, and then actually going to the surgery, installing it, sitting down with the practice manager or an admin member of staff, and actually, quite often, instead of sh- showing them how to use our software, I’d quite often sit there and watch them do it and, and watch where they would go and, or try to go if it was poorly designed, and then take that back and actually re-implement it.

I think one of the scariest situations that I actually, uh, uh, did though was, we eventually sold to my wife’s surgery where she was a senior partner, and I was really… I, it, it started as a conversation where we’d had all these conversations about the problems with telephony, uh, uh, and what the headaches that comes along with that.

And, and, and GP surgeries, they like, sometimes they like running their surgery and the business side of it, but sometimes it’s just the technical side of it which is outside their remit, their skillset. Um, it’s just sometimes a little bit too much. So it, it becomes just a point of stress. So I was sitting down with her one evening and she brought home a pile of quotes from BT and a bunch of other suppliers, and they had, like, “You will get this phone,” and it didn’t even have a picture of the phone, but it had a serial number as though you’re supposed to know what that phone is.

“You’ll get two voicemail boxes and, you know, limited, and here’s the price, and your, your lease will be over this period of time.” So we were sat, and I was desperately not trying to sell to her because we had three young children at the time, and we had enough stresses at home, and I ju- really didn’t want to go into business with my wife as well as raising three children.

[00:13:54] Ben: Mix both, both worlds. 

[00:13:55] Nick: Yeah, yeah. Um, so that was a really scary moment, but it, but it was equally quite a good opportunity to- Um, get that closer insight as well. And it, it turns out actually we worked quite well and she… Very professional with each other and, um, there were no, you know, I didn’t embarrass myself and she didn’t embarrass herself.

So that was, that was all, that was all good, and the implementation was in that surgery until… That surgery, that was Botshill Road in Berkhamsted, which eventually merged and, uh, and we actually then went into the other surgery… as, as a result of the merger. Um, so you’ve got to stay close to these surgeries is the point.

You know, whether it is my wife and I got that extra ability and knowledge because we’re actually having that conversation over an evening meal, or whether it is the opportunity to go and sit with a GP or a, a p- a practice manager and listen to what they, they want. So when we did the first implementation, we, we, we realized the capacity was the problem, you know.

The GP could not get an outside line whilst the, the, the 8:00 AM rush was happening. 

[00:14:56] Ben: Yeah, so I guess ’cause on, on that point, most people are thinking it’s, “I just can’t get through. I can’t get through.” You, you don’t look at it from the other side of, “Oh, well, actually, they’ve got a bunch of people to call as well.”

[00:15:06] Nick: Yeah, yeah, exactly. So we’ve s- we’ve solved the problem of the GP being able to get out. Unfortunately, there’s still often a queue to get through, but we m- we provide the tools and the queuing capacity and the tools to actually get through that efficiently. Um, and one of the things w- when we were having the conversation for the practice managers that came shortly after solving the one call in, one call out type of problem, was reporting.

You know, you can supply 20 phone lines, but, you know, you could have all your patients silently queueing and people having a… Your, your, your, your, um, surgery staff, you know, they’re turning the volume down of the, uh, the phones because I’m just finishing my cup of coffee or something… and before you know it, you’ve got 45 patients in the queue.

Um, without the practice manager having access to that additional information to what is actually going on within the queue and the patients, you preempt a mechanism of preempting customer complaints before it’s a customer complaint. Um, so that was the very m- next product that we had, and that was, all came out of sitting with practice managers and saying, hearing what they actually wanted from us.

[00:16:08] Ben: ‘Cause, uh, essentially a GP surgery for that time i- in the morning is a call centre, right? Oh, yeah. If you go into any call centre in the, in the land, we’ve been filmed in them a few times, there’s always a whacking great screen with all, all those statistics on there. 

[00:16:25] Nick: Yeah. 

[00:16:25] Ben: And then, so that’s how, and that’s how those businesses run, and there’s no reason why that shouldn’t be going on with, with a, with a GP surgery or any other business that’s basically customer Customer care, which is a strange word to use with a GP, I guess, in that, in that sense, but customer satisfaction, I, I, I guess.

[00:16:44] Nick: Would that be- It, it is exactly that problem, and, and I refer to GP surgeries as the unintended call centres quite a few times for that reason. They, they don’t, they don’t see themselves as call centres, and they don’t want to be a call centre, but in effect, that’s exactly what they are. Um, and we do have some surgeries now with a wall board to show the queue growing and things like that.

Um, and there’s, there, there are definitely a few stories of practice managers having that challenge of I’ve been sat with a practice manager training them on their new phone system up in an office. Uh, I remember one, I can’t remember where it was now, but I was, um, we’d just installed Babble Voice, and I was sat in the, uh, the room with her.

We, I was showing her the wall board, and the queue was just growing, growing, growing, growing, and all the phones down in reception were not being answered. And she walked across the room and opened the door. We were upstairs, and, uh, there was, at the bottom of the stairs was where all the call centre was.

She opened the door, and I could see on the screen suddenly the phones were being answered. She closed the door again . She came and sat down, and it quietened down again. So she kind of, suddenly she had the perfect insight as to I’ve got … That’s the problem that I was tr- you know, that I need to address and solve.

Obviously, she’s got to get in from a personnel HR type of… situation at that point, but she had the tools at that point to, to, to deal with that particular problem because, yes, absolutely, they’re a mini call centre now. 

[00:18:04] Antoine: Fundamentally, you can’t manage what you can’t measure, and in the days where there were a fixed number of lines, uh, uh, patients would hear the engaged tone, and the practice had no idea how many people were trying to get through.

Then, when we made the number of lines unlimited, uh, you could have a almost infinite queue length, but if you didn’t know how many people were wait- sitting in the queue, again, it’s no good. So by giving pa- the, uh, practices the tools necessary to manage their practice, you allow them to provide a much better level of service and look after their staff.

Another example, um, when you call up the practice, the practice needs to look at your record to serve, to help you. 

[00:18:38] Ben: Yeah. 

[00:18:38] Antoine: And, um, so they need to look in a large patient record database. It takes a long time for those records to appear when they’re typing in your name, your date of birth. So, uh, Nick developed a system that when the receptionist answers the phone, your record appears on the screen straight away.

So the amount of time a patient spent speaking with reception was suddenly halved. Or put that a slightly better way, a receptionist could talk to twice as many patients in the same amount of time. So s- one by one, we’re solving these problems through conversations at home, conversations at work, conversations internally, increasing the number of lines that the practice had, telling, telling the management of the practice exactly what was going on in their practice. Giving the staff tools to their job, uh, more efficiently and effectively, and that’s what we’ve been doing over the last, um, 10 years. 

[00:19:24] Ben: I wanna dig in a, a little bit now to you guys as, as business owners, and let’s go back to that garage and back to that dining room table, how, what- wherever it was all those little, little bits started.

Um, you’ve got this idea. Um, it’s a blank sheet of paper. Um, obviously there’s tech evolving all the time as, uh, as well. Where, where do you start? I mean, I guess the fact that you were running a business together beforehand is, is a massive help. Um, but, but where, where do you start? How do you look at it?

How do you … I, I guess the divide of, as we talked about earlier, of, of roles is kind of easy on the … That, that didn’t need a lot of talking about? 

[00:20:06] Antoine: No, I think the sto- It’s better to start the story from the beginning of, uh, our first company together. I still think it’s quite an amusing story. Um, our wives went to the same medical school, uh, in Sheffield, and we both- we all ended up in Berkhamsted, and, uh, our wives bumped into each other in Waitrose, obviously.

[00:20:26] Ben: Hang on. You know, the centre of the universe. So they both were- The centre, epic centre of Earth … at university in Sheffield. And, uh, I’m Sheffield born and bred, by the way. Oh, okay. Uh, so yeah, and another one who’s ended up in, in, in and around Berko. Um, so they didn’t know, they didn’t, they didn’t know they were both in- Well, they, 

[00:20:40] Antoine: they didn’t know they were both in Berko- No, no

till they literally bumped into each other. 

[00:20:43] Ben: In 

[00:20:43] Antoine: Waitrose, of course. In, in Waitrose warehouse, and they’re, they’re getting, they’re reminiscing. 

[00:20:48] Ben: Yes. 

[00:20:49] Antoine: And, um, they said, “We’ve gotta go out for dinner, obviously, and we have to drag our husbands along who’ve never met and, and don’t know each other, so we’ll definitely bring them.”

And, um, the four of us sat down at a dinner table. I can’t even remember which restaurant it was, but … 

[00:21:02] Nick: Was it your home? 

[00:21:03] Antoine: No, no. It was, um, it used to be a fish restaurant on the high street, and it’s b- and it’s closed now, and it’s now the Six Bells. 

[00:21:10] Nick: It’s a long time ago. It’s a 

[00:21:11] Antoine: long time 

[00:21:11] Ben: ago. Yeah. Oh, 

[00:21:11] Antoine: yes. Yeah.

[00:21:12] Ben: Um And it’s now, and that’s now closed as well 

[00:21:15] Antoine: Yes. Anyway, we’re in there, and the, and the ladies were catching up at full speed, and Nick and I were sort of looking at each other. And I explained to him that I’d just finished an MBA, and I was trying to decide what to do next. And in fact, I’d written a business plan of a business I wanted to start.

And Nick said… Was, uh, doing, uh, IT contracting at the time. And he said, “Well, I’ve got some spare time. I’d love to help out.” And, um, we, we had built… Was it a study or a bedroom in our house in, uh, Middle Road? And, uh, I was working up there in the attic, and Nick came and sat next to me, and we just picked up the phone and started talking, um, started talking to, to, uh, potential customers.

Uh, we went back to, uh, Ashridge, where I did my MBA, and said to the, um, customer care guy, “How would you go about starting this?” And he said, “Every person you meet, ask them for two references, just two people, two other people you should talk to.” “And, uh, you’ll have a list of people to talk to longer than you can call in no time at all.”

So we literally did that And if someone says, “I can’t think of anyone,” I’d say, “Well, who’s your accountant? Who’s your lawyer?” And I’d call them up and say, “Look, we’re doing this. Do you fancy giving us a go? We’d love to work with you.” And it grew from that. 

[00:22:26] Ben: Old school cold calling in a, in a sense, I guess.

[00:22:29] Antoine: It was. It was very much. Yeah, this was in 2002. Yep.

 [00:22:37] Ben: Uh, so how was it then joining in, in- into the attic and where, where do we go from, where do we go from there? How did y- this business… ‘Cause the bi- you scaled that business, right? 

[00:22:43] Antoine: Yep. Yeah, we grew it and grew it. 

[00:22:46] Ben: And then? 

[00:22:48] Antoine: And then, uh, how do you mean? How did we leave the attic? 

[00:22:51] Ben: I guess, how did you leave the attic? How did you, how did it then become Babble Voice as well?

[00:22:55] Antoine: We moved out of the attic when we started winning enough customers and wanted staff. 

[00:22:59] Ben: Yeah. 

[00:22:59] Antoine: And Nick, uh, had an NCT buddy who had an, who had office space, so we moved into that office. 

[00:23:04] Ben: The, the reason I ask is people will be listening to this podcast who are in attics- Right … and there are people who are in offices. And a lot of the time, it, it’s, there’s a different trigger for how that happens and why, or, or why that move, or actually it’s taking that leap, isn’t it, often that leap… of faith. 

[00:23:20] Nick: I can- ‘Cause quite often, it’s quite often driven by we’ve always been organically funded, so we’ve always won work, gone out, delivered, revenue in, and start paying ourselves.

That’s the first challenge. That’s certainly a challenge that we had to take home to our partners and- 

[00:23:35] Ben: It’s the feast and famine, right? 

[00:23:36] Nick: Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. So that was, uh, that was, uh, the first hurdle, and then you start… You hit a hurdle of where you hit capacity, but y- you’ve now got revenue, so you can afford, can you afford an office and a salary?

So once you get there, then that’s when you get the, the office. And it just so happened we, I had a mate who had some office space, so we got a reasonable deal for a quite nice office down in Chapel Street. Um, it was a lovely little office. Um, so, and you, and you… It is, it’s just that ratcheting, slow ratcheting up.

You don’t… There was never any major decision point. It’s always, you know, you’re solving one little problem at a time, and the answer often reveals itself. 

[00:24:15] Ben: Yeah, sometimes it’s just obvious, right? Yes. It’s just, “Oh, well, this is the, the next step” And you don’t need- Evolution rather than revolution … to think about it too much. 

[00:24:23] Nick: Yeah, we ended up with 2,000 square feet on Northridge Road, uh, w- was the… When we eventually got to, you know, a full helpdesk. We had, what, eight engineers, uh, uh, on a little mini… Running our own little call centre- 

[00:24:35] Ben: Yeah … 

[00:24:35] Nick: um, in, in Northridge Road, fielding calls. We were one of the first… The, the actual business was the, one of the first IT, remote IT support solutions.

Up until that point, you’d, you’d contract some guy to come down in a van and fix your computers in your, in your office if you’re a small business. 

[00:24:51] Ben: Yeah. 

[00:24:52] Nick: Um, and we were one of the first business, if not the first business certainly locally, that actually offered a remote solution where we all did it from our office.

So we did need bums on seats, so we eventually did need that office space. Um, fast-forward to Babble Voice, we’re actually a very distributed company. We don’t… We, you know, things have changed massively since then. Um, but yeah, that, that answer, that, that, that question answered itself in terms of when we needed a office space.

[00:25:18] Ben: So what has been the biggest ch- Thinking about both the businesses, ’cause it’s, you know, we, we, we all learn as we go along. What, what, how do you think have been the biggest challenges along, along the way? 

[00:25:30] Nick: There are numerous. Let me list a few. Let’s go. Come on. Let’s, let’s list a few. So one of the reasons, uh, I always had, actually had spare time was a world event, 9/11.

Um, the contracting, um, engineering R&D just pulls back immediately, so I was looking for things to do. What… During that period, we grew Babble Voice all the way through to the credit crunch, and then it hit a kind of a… We, we did actually have contracts with our customers then, so we had some form of re- resiliency.

Um, but we were very much prone to the, the adverse effects of the credit crunch in 2000. 2008, was it? ’09, yeah. ’09. Um, so whilst we were going through the credit crunch, that was happened to be when I was, had a bit of spare time because we’d lost a few customers, that we’d start to put together the nuts and bolts of Babble Voice.

Um, then we fast-forward, you’ve got a couple of, um, step-ups where you go from selling Babble Voice, right? Let’s sell it to everyone, but then you realize you’re a competit- you’ve got a million competitors in B- in, in the country- 

[00:26:32] Ben: Yeah … 

[00:26:32] Nick: uh, versus choose a niche vertical where you end up with a small handful where you really know your industry, and we’ve got the insight.

So that was the next step there. The challenge of then selling to a surgery is, you know, a step-up. Where have you… What surgeries have you worked with? Uh, you know… uh, is awkward questions around, “Well, you’ll be the first.” You, you always f- you always find a daring GP somewhere. Uh, but we didn’t know that at the time.

Um, and then we had massive step-ups in, uh, things like, um, when the NHS decided … Up until that, uh, to a certain point, we were, any company was allowed to sell to a GP surgery for a phone system. At some point, and someone referred to it earlier, the NHS got involved and said, “No, you’ve gotta be an approved supplier, and you’ve gotta meet these objectives.”

[00:27:17] Ben: Yeah. 

[00:27:17] Nick: You’ve gotta be ISO 27001. You’ve gotta have Cyber Essentials. You’ve gotta have all these standards. You’ve gotta have NHS standards, and you’ve got to have all these features. Um, and we were actually already there in large part, but we no- we had to… There was a step up in the sense of we- we’ve effectively got two people within our tiny company that just work in compliance because we’re in a heavy, heavily regulated industry.

So that’s a real step up again. And, and investment, right? In, 

[00:27:45] Ben: you- Often, you know, in business, where, where am I spending money? Am I spending money in the right places? Um, you spotted a couple of books that were up there. One of the… one of the, one of those Good to Great talks about the flywheel and what do you, what do you- Oh, are we talking about the flywheel? What do you do- We love the flywheel. 

[00:28:00] Antoine: We use that, 

[00:28:00] Ben: yeah … what do you do to keep that moving, and what, where do you spend money? And I guess when you, going into the GP thing, did, did you think, “Oh, hang on, we’re gonna walk into a whole load of legislation here”?

Or was it something that was like- No … “Oh.” 

[00:28:12] Nick: No, 

[00:28:12] Ben: no, 

[00:28:14] Nick: we, we, we, we, uh, we often don’t look more than a year ahead. We kind of deal with the problem today, ’cause w- we know we’re capable individuals… and we, you know, if we haven’t got the expertise in-house, we’ll, we have to go and get it. Um, but there was never this kind of, “Oh, we won’t be able to do that,” because we, we know we can.

Um, but y- and you, and you never know what’s ahead five years, 10 years ahead anyway, so if you worry about that, you’re never gonna take the first step and actually achieve something. And the flywheel is probably the one of the best, best things that I’ve carried with me all the time. Um, back in 2010 when the first nuts and bolts of Babble Voice was being put together, you know, that f- heavy, heavy flywheel was stationary as anything.

Um, you know, and, and now it’s… And it is, it’s absolutely moving, and as, as the business grows, one of the, the, the, the challenges is within the business, I think we’re, what are we, 15 staff now or something? Um, is making sure that everyone, um, is going in the s- same direction… and that’s all part of the fly- flywheel.

If everyone within your business is… The, the flywheel’s moving because we’ve got customers kind of know about us now, we’ve got a reputation with the NHS, and that’s kind of certainly, uh, driving that fly- flywheel forward. I believe we’ve got a very good reputation with the actual NHS framework people as well, so that adds a bit of more momentum to the flywheel.

Um, but at the same time, internally within the business- If, if you’ve got a few people pushing the flywheel this way and a few that way and a few that way, then- Yeah … you know, that energy just cancels out. So you’ve gotta have everyone pointing in the r- same direction. And so… And that’s doubly a challenge.

We made a decision, uh, 2010, 2012, sometime anyway, a, a while ago, to be fully distributed. So all our employees work i- from home offices, and they work across the country, and that allows us to serve different areas of the country and give freedom to our members of staff. They don’t have to worry about relocating if they want, have got life, life ch- challenges themselves. So it suits our, our staff. But then the challenge is how do you keep all these members of staff kind of g- pointing in the same direction? Um, so we, uh, at the, at the very least, we meet up once a year and, and make sure that we have certain things to challenge that problem.

Um, and I think, I think l- by and large, we have a very good, uh, buy-in to the, the, the company, uh, mission. 

[00:30:37] Ben: So on that, there’s two of you, there’s two of you leading, I guess. So you guys have gotta get aligned first, right? Is that always a natural thing? Do you- No … always agree? What’s been the best argument?

What’s been, what, or what, what been the best agreements and, and how, how… What’s the dynamic between you? 

[00:30:56] Antoine: I’ve never given it much thought. I don’t even… I… You asked right at the beginning how this works. I don’t know how it works, but it does. I… Agreements, disagreements? 

[00:31:08] Nick: I, I think, I, I think we definitely have disagreements, but I think they’re always, like, at a professional level.

And… and, and, and- And we also respect each side of the business as well, so- 

[00:31:20] Antoine: I think that’s key, yeah … 

[00:31:21] Nick: yeah, absolutely paramount. So I, I will get carte blanche on operational matters. I- I’ve got the expertise, I’ve got… I spend all the time there. So I’ll absolutely involve Antoinee and listen to his views, and other members of staff. But ultimately, the responsibility lies with me. Same is true for sales. Antoinee’s responsible for making sure prospects know about us, know about our features and our products. Uh, and I’ve got certainly strong views on that, about how we deal with them and- 

[00:31:49] Antoine: Which I value- 

[00:31:49] Nick: Um- … which are 

[00:31:50] Antoine: really great insights

[00:31:50] Nick: yeah. So it’s, for example, one of the problems that we probably, uh, have had to deal with is, um, Antoinee will go in with, to a sales meeting. He’ll, he’ll do a sales pitch. He’ll send out a proposal. They’ll become a customer, and then there’ll be a complaint which is, “Oh, that’s not what I was sold.” Um, so we’ve had to, we’ve spent a lot of time making sure that that whole process…

And that’s where sales, marketing, sales, operation all overlap. So obviously there is crossover because they have to be in line with each other. 

[00:32:24] Ben: And make sure the, uh, sales department’s not over-promising on, uh… what can be delivered. 

[00:32:29] Antoine: Absolutely. Yeah, 

[00:32:29] Nick: uh, absolutely. 

[00:32:30] Antoine: Keep things in line. No, it’s true. Yeah.

[00:32:31] Nick: Absolutely. Absolutely. 

[00:32:32] Antoine: Another challenge is, uh, for staff. Who do I go to? Um- 

[00:32:38] Nick: Mummy or Daddy. 

[00:32:40] Antoine: You know, 

[00:32:41] Nick: I’m not, I’m not saying who’s Mummy is Well, let’s not go down this 

[00:32:42] Antoine: analogy. This could end in- I was skirting around that 

[00:32:44] Ben: Yes. 

[00:32:45] Antoine: But, uh, now that it’s out there, 

[00:32:47] Ben: they- Let’s just say one or two. Yes. 

[00:32:48] Antoine: Yes. If they, if they don’t get the answer they want from one, then they’ll often go to two.

Um, but we t- we talk regularly, so they, they don’t, they don’t get away with that. And we know each other’s mind on most subjects now, so it’s, uh, it’s tough for them to do that, but they do try. 

[00:33:03] Ben: S- so what has the, been the most difficult decision you’ve, you, in business that you’ve had to sit down together and, and maneuver?

[00:33:09] Antoine: Probably to, uh, to abandon, uh, Omnis and focus wholly on Babble Voice. Because, um, well, when we started Omnis, um, the IT support we were doing was, uh, bread and butter. Uh, that’s what I called it. It was, that paid all the bills. And on top of that, we sold, uh, additional technology solutions to our IT support customers.

[00:33:27] Ben: Yeah. 

[00:33:28] Antoine: One of the more successful s- successful ones was document management software. So we sold document management software to our IT customers and, and other customers. And then someone came along and said, “Well, I’ll, I’ll buy those customers off you.” And we suddenly realized we could make more money by building and selling other parts of the business than we could just by running Omnis on its own.

[00:33:48] Ben: Yeah. 

[00:33:49] Antoine: So, um, that’s when telephony became a feature. We had a different system before Babble Voice that we were selling. So we did that again and again, but Babble Voice grew so quickly and so, um… The, the uptake, that queue at the first conference we went to was so mind-altering that we abandoned everything else.

But that was a, that was a tough decision. 

[00:34:06] Ben: So let’s go back to the, uh, the, the ladies that started this whole thing. Um, how do they feel about you, uh, going into business together and, uh, f- from, from the gar- the loft, the garage and, and, uh, to where we are now? 

[00:34:22] Antoine: I think surprised was the word, wasn’t it? When we- 

[00:34:24] Nick: I think they were a little sur- surprised on the very, I think it was the very first e- e- evening Antoine kind of said, “We need to toast because we’ve just gone into business.”

And I think that was… Was that the very first meal that we had together? The second- No, that was, that was at my house … that was at, that was at your house. 

[00:34:35] Antoine: Yeah, that was after. Right. 

[00:34:35] Nick: So that, yeah, so it was the second meeting- Great … or something crazily stupid. 

[00:34:39] Antoine: Yeah. 

[00:34:39] Nick: Um, so that went down, uh… Now, I can’t, I can’t talk for, for, uh, for Antoinee’s wife, but, you know, my, my wife was nervous.

You know, sh- I, she was… She, she’s a GP b- and she, GPs, they, they follow rules in their… You know, they prescribe medicine based on rules, they, based on symptoms. So everything that, in her world is based on rules. And, um, so she’s quite a safe individual. She likes safety. So I think she found it quite nerve-wracking that I was, um, going into business from effectively contracting, which was quite, quite, um- 

[00:35:14] Antoine: Well paid

[00:35:14] Nick: well paid. The, the, the, uh… But the, but the, but again, the driver was, I was actually- Faced with that problem of 9/11 happened, my industry kind of went to sleep. Now, it, it would have … So it probably would’ve come back a few years later, but there was a real problem for a period of time. So for me, actually, whilst it, it, it was n- um, nerve-wracking for my wife that I was

that, that situation had arisen, it, it was kind of a natural … It kind of happened. So I’d like to think that I, I always wanted my own business anyway, so I’d like to think I would’ve done that. But it was kind of driven by other things, which kind of led to acceptance from my wife as well, I think. 

[00:35:51] Ben: That was interesting, ’cause I was gonna say, what, what was the

what was the … How did it feel like going from contracts as a business owner? But it’s interesting you say it’s something you always wanted. 

[00:36:00] Nick: Yeah, absolutely. I, I always m- the, the, the biggest, the biggest guiding star in my life was my grandad, and he was f- uh, and my grandma, actually. They were both, um, they were both antique deal- dealers.

Um, uh, and I always looked up to them, and they always, both of them … Um, um, my grandma dealt with, uh, antique jewelry, and he was antique furniture. He had, he had a, a property that he rented out. So he al- he always had things on the go. And I always spent quite a bit of time. So I always looked up to that kind of, uh, “Right, that’s what I wanna be.” He had a nice life. You know, he chose his hours. He, he worked, uh, he worked hard. 

[00:36:34] Antoine: Yeah. 

[00:36:35] Nick: Um, but it was, it was a nice life. Um, now I enjoyed engineering for a big firm. It’s very, very different when you work for a Panasonic or Anritsu or Ultra Electronics, which is kind of my background. These are large, established.

You’re doing a very small piece of the, the, the, the, the, the pie- The puzzle … the p- uh, puzzle. Um, and you go into a small business, it is a very, very different thing. So it’s been an eye-opener. I think I, I, I do wonder whether, you know, had 9/11 not happened, would I have actually happily stayed in engineering?

‘Cause I enjoy that as well. You know? That you deal … If you stay in, in industry, in large industry, you deal with … You, you’re getting your hands on some very big problems, very big challenges, and you don’t have to worry about the finance and staff and other things as well. But, but small, small business, medium s- micro-business, medium business is, is interesting for its own way, uh, reasons as well.

Um, but you’re dealing with a lot more spinning plates. A- Anton, for you, was it something you always wanted to do? Do you want, do you wanted to be a business owner? Yes. Or you wanted to be your own boss, 

[00:37:34] Antoine: I guess? Um, so when I did my MBA, I chose the entrepreneurial path. So, um, I, I wrote a business plan for a business that I wanted to start.

I’ve always wanted to start my own business. 

[00:37:44] Ben: And happy you did so? 

[00:37:45] Antoine: Yeah, I think so. No regrets. It’s been a, it’s been a fascinating ride, really exciting. Learnt a lot, done a lot. 

[00:37:52] Ben: So for anyone who’s out there, we’re, we’re coming towards the end of our time… on the podcast today. For anyone el- who’s out there, I think, uh, if they’re about to go into a business with their wife’s husband , uh, wife’s best friend’s husband- With their wife’s husband

and we get that sorted- That would be- And then, yeah, yeah. Get that, get that bit wrong. Uh, we’ll leave that in. Um, if someone’s about to go into partnership with someone in a business… what would your biggest piece of advice be? 

[00:38:18] Antoine: I still value that first, um… Do you remember the lunch we had at Pizza Express where we sat down and said, the first conversation we ever had was, “How do you want this relationship to end?”

And so we talked about the end goal and what we wanted to do, and, and it, it was our, our guide, how, how are we going to get from where we are now to, to there. 

[00:38:38] Nick: Although it never panned out like that. 

[00:38:40] Antoine: No. But 

[00:38:42] Nick: it was- But, but it was- … a good goal. But it’s, but the guiding star… is, is, is the, is the- That’s 

[00:38:44] Antoine: a good point, yeah

touchable point. Yeah. 

[00:38:45] Nick: Yeah. 

[00:38:45] Antoine: Yeah. 

[00:38:46] Nick: Um, oh, I don’t know, because I used to think I was in control of my life, but actually all these external for- I think I referenced them throughout the podcast. So I think, I think the vast majority, I think there are a few people are privileged enough to, um, make decisions based on complete freedom.

But I think a lot of us are, are, are actually at the behest of the economy, what’s going in the wider world, what’s going on in your personal life, and you make decisions in the moment. And that’s not to say that I, I absolutely did have a desire to run my own business, so that was always that kind of push, but all these forces kinda come together.

Uh, and you know the answer when it, when it, when it’s there. ‘Cause don’t you s- 

[00:39:25] Ben: you can set those three, five-year goals, you can set the, you know, your, your 12-month goal, your, your life goal, whatever it is, but we, we change course, right? And we move and it’s, 

[00:39:35] Antoine: but it’s 

[00:39:35] Ben: the 

[00:39:35] Antoine: planning is the, is the valuable part of that process, not the goal itself.m It’s the thinking about it and setting a direction. 

[00:39:42] Nick: So the direction is one of those forces that keeps you, 

[00:39:44] Antoine: exactly … 

[00:39:45] Nick: going. But along the way, you can’t be so hung onto that star because you’ll, you know, there’ll be things coming from either side, and you’ve gotta deal with those, and you can’t be so proud that you can’t go, “Well, we’ve gotta just pull over this side for a while now or this side for a while.”

So, you know, there’s, there’s so many forces that, uh, that you’ve just gotta deal with, uh, throughout that whole period. 

[00:40:07] Antoine: I greatly, greatly value the fact that we’re in partnership and not, uh, I’m not a sole trader or working on my own. 

[00:40:13] Ben: Mm. That was gonna be my final question actually… is would you have done this on, on your own?

[00:40:19] Antoine: I probably would, uh, but I would not have got nearly as far, done nearly as well, or enjoyed it nearly as much. Um, having someone that in the bleakest and darkest of moments where you just think this is pointless, someone else is, “I, I think we can do it. I think we can get through. Here’s a path,” is fantastic.

Having a peer, I enjoy the company of peers, and, um, and Nick is, is peerless, I would say. 

[00:40:42] Nick: I, I agree. I completely second that. I, I think, I, I know people who’ve gone, started alone, and a lot of them actually have failed. Um, not because they’ve done anything wrong, but because how tiring it is to be the sole person to actually, to make, to be responsible for absolutely everything.

And they quite often lack some skills. I would certainly… I can, I can go into a business and sell Babble Voice ’cause I’m passionate about the product, but I couldn’t do what Antoine does day in, day out. Um, the sales emotional rollercoaster is not within my skillset. Um, so you know, that, that bolstering of skillsets is, is, uh, just fundamental, and you’re, you’ve got that ability to just kinda support as well when things are getting a bit bleak and you go, “Ah.”

You can just pull back a little bit and allow the other person to pull forward. Um, and that is definitely, um… And, and conversely, I also know other people that have gone in with a business partner and have had very long business relationships with that business partner because, again, the same thing have kind of happened, has happened.

They’ve got their own skillsets, and they just build businesses. Um, I’m, I’m su- There are clearly examples of people who go it alone and, and, and do an amazing job as well. Um, but for me, I just think that, that if, especially if you’re growing organically. 

[00:41:53] Ben: I think that’s the thing for you, and it’s that, it’s y- it’s knowing, isn’t it? And sometimes you don’t know un- un- until you try it ’cause if you’re out on your own, you’ve got nowhere to b- bounce it off. 

[00:42:02] Antoine: I might go even further and say if I had my time again, I wouldn’t stop at just two of us. I would try and build out the leadership team even more because there are part- there are, there are skills that we’re still lacking, but being entrepreneurial, we fill them with education, experience, and we give it a go.

But I think if we could do it again, if we could get somebody in who had particular skills in, I don’t know, let’s say marketing, uh, I would, uh, I’d be very happy to have a larger team. Do it even more. If one’s good, then two must be better. 

[00:42:32] Ben: Agree with that. 

[00:42:33] Nick: Yeah. But that’s the problem. It’s hard to find the people.

[00:42:37] Antoine: Oh, that, there… And you said, you were talking about challenges earlier. Recruiting and retaining great people is by far my personal biggest challenge. 

[00:42:45] Ben: That, I think, is a whole other episode. 

[00:42:47] Antoine: Yes, it is. 

[00:42:48] Ben: Isn’t it? 

[00:42:48] Antoine: It is. 

[00:42:49] Ben: Yeah. Um, I think then, gents, we’ll leave it there on that, that agreement, the two business partners agreeing.

[00:42:54] Antoine: Yep. 

[00:42:54] Ben: Perfect. Thanks for joining me on the podcast today. 

[00:42:56] Nick: Thanks 

[00:42:56] Antoine: for having me. It’s been 

[00:42:58] Ben: a pleasure. Thanks for watching this week’s episode of Berko and Beyond. If you’d like to be a guest on the show, then drop us an email, podcast@berkoandbeyond.com. And don’t forget to like and subscribe wherever you watch or listen to your podcasts.

We’ll see you next week.