Hello and welcome to a new Word of the Week podcast episode.

In today’s show you will gain access to something that you probably have never been part of before: a platform made of passions (and a free Google Hangout with the creators!).

Enjoy the audition!

In the podcast we discuss:

• 01:21 – Meet the brains and hear the story: Tom & Seb


• 05:44 – The birth of a new concept


• 10:00 – ShurDoo: create your perfect webpage… and more


• 12:05 – The 3 big pain points that Shurdoo relieves


• 13:28 – What can you do on Shurdoo?


• 17:10 – When & How will you be able to use Shurdoo?


• 21:33 – A platform created with passions


• 22:34 – What’s with the name?


• 23:55 – Getting in touch with Shurdoo


• 25:24 – Have Qs? Get your A’s directly from Shurdoo’s creators

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Here is the podcast’s transcription:

Fiona: Hi, it’s Fiona Lewis here from Super Savvy Business with the latest podcast interview! Now, as you all know, one of my projects that I have a big space in, is Mumpreneurs Online and that business is all about helping mothers work from home and primarily use the internet as a way to get their business out there to others – so I always have a look out to ways to be able to help mums and to find people that I can bring into the community that are going to be beneficial for them.

Only a couple of weeks ago I was put in contact by a fellow entrepreneur with two other entrepreneurs who were on to something really exciting. They are in the middle of a project which, I believe, is going to be transformational for many mothers who are wanting to work from home, but are trying to find the best way to get it out there, and a really good vehicle to show  other people what they are doing.

01:21 - Meet the brains and hear the story: Tom & Seb

I will introduce these two people to you…

The first person I would like to introduce is Tom Bass. Tom is in Project Sales Marketing in real estate by day, but he is also a budding entrepreneur by night. He has majored in spatial design at the College of Fine Arts, but he wanted something more engaging than staring at a computer screen all day and working on somebody else’s ideas, so he went into sales instead.

However, the urge to dream and create something of his own was simply too great so, with his 30th birthday looming less than a year away, he made a promise to himself that it was “now or never” and he dived in with his new project, which we are going to be revealing in just a moment.

The other person who is partnering with Tom on this new project is Sebastian (or Seb) Hulst. Sebastian is from the Netherlands and he has a background as an industrial designer. He has worked for small-size companies and at the moment he is working as a Senior Software Developer for a Sydney startup.

Like Tom, he has always wanted to work on his own ideas, so enrolled in a course to help him get started – and that’s where he and Tom met and they started working on this wonderful project.

So, guys, I am not going to reveal what this project is yet, because I would actually like you two to do that. But first of all, I would just like to welcome you both to the call today …

…and, yeah, this is the Super Savvy Business show and bringing you live to the Mumpreneurs Online podcast as well!

So guys, you know, I have met with the both of you and, as I said in the introduction, I am always on the lookout for ways to be able to help mothers, to support mothers who are wanting to find a leveraged way to be able to work from home in and around their families… and when I heard about your project I was really super excited.

First of all, before we go into what this project is, I have given you both a bit of an intro, but do you want to maybe tell our listeners a little bit more about yourselves?

Tom: I work in the real estate as Project Sales Marketing so we sell off the plan properties; it’s rather dull, but you do get to meet some really interesting people. But, at the end of the day, like Fiona said earlier, I really want to be creating something of my own.

I have got other passions as well, I have got several other hobbies, I do a bit of photography… I actually was part of a global street art project last year called, “Be The Change”, and we had our work on display as part of Art and About down at Barangaroo. I also do a bit of community radio DJ-ing on Radio Northern Beaches.

So, you know, just trying to find where my true passions lie and then trying to make something of them as opposed to just shoehorning myself into a particular career path. So that’s when I met Seb, we thought why don’t we say – take photography, for instance – create a platform where we can tell our stories as to why we are passionate about photography, put up portfolios, talk about various things, as how we do it, how we offer it, and then broaden that to encompass all these different hobbies that other people love to do and let them turn it into a product they can sell.

So that’s sort of how I got into it; how about you, Seb?

Sebastien: Well, I started basically, working for a software company and they wanted to start-up in Sydney and they have now moved overseas so they’ve gone to Silicon Valley and they’re starting to make it, which actually makes me feel like s**t. I have got all these ideas and I keep working for people who are yet to develop their ideas instead of working on my own ideas, which I have plenty of as well.

So I went to this course called “From Corporate To Freedom” and where Tom and me met. And we just had some ideas and we ended up with this idea called Shurdoo, which we will introduce in a second. And we just kept on going back like, “Ok, we need to find a way for all these people who have all these hobbies to actually have a simple way of putting it online, build a community and build a following”. That’s actually where Shurdoo started.

5:44 – The birth of a new concept

Fiona: So this whole idea, this business concept of yours, has really been born out of your own frustrations and difficulties around getting your passionate ideas out there?

Tom: Uh, very much so. We looked at existing platforms out there – places such as Freelancer.com, of course, you’ve got Gumtree just put classified ads, you’ve got AirTasker which is taking off here and then in the US you’ve got TaskRabbit and lots of similar places. But they are all centred around the job, the task at hand and the price. There is nothing that really lets you as a person, as a passionate person who loves doing what you do to really tell your story and start branding yourself that way so that it’s not about a race to the bottom.

So, this guy is charging $45 an hour to do this, I want to charge $50 because, you know, I would do a better job; I’m more passionate about it than he is, I can show that my process is superior, but 9 times out of 10 people just go “Oh, he is good enough”. You know? It is… it’s sort of like, it’s very salesy in a way, you know? You are sort of, you are fighting tooth and nail trying to underbid the next guy and we are trying to avoid that with the platform like this, to make it more authentic, and genuine, and put the focus back on to the person.

Seb: It also allows for – instead of having just the product out there and say “This costs $45” or “I’m having the service and I will charge $50” – it’s not focused on that; it’s much more like “This is my passion. This is what I like to do. This is how I work”, and that’s the thing that connects people instead of being like “Yo, I’m competing with this yo, because, doh!, he’s making the same thing!” – that’s not the theme.

In general, two people who are doing the exact same thing come up with completely different workways and completely different results, because one is passionate about it and the other one… he has been doing it so long and is bored with doing it actually that he will not give you the same result. So, it’s just… it’s very difficult if you only focus on products to show like “This is …” , “I’m generally better at doing it, because I have a lot more passion at doing it.”

…and that’s what Shurdoo is targeting.

Fiona: So, just to make it clear to our listeners today, what you guys are in the process of putting together is a platform for people who have a hobby, or a passion – whether it be in creating a product or delivering a service – it’s a platform for these people to come and to market this product or service, but coming from the perspective that it’s not just about the product or service; it’s about the story behind the person and why it is they do what they do, and why they are g