[00:00:01] Nellie: I always look at life as, it’s not happening to me, it’s happening for me. COVID really brought us to the forefront when it came to solving problems out there for small business owners who were either starting out on their own business or entrepreneurs. We fast-tracked it, making the service very permanent on our website and to our clients, and it proved very fruitful for us, very lucrative.
[00:00:30] Niraj: Welcome to Experience Matters by Hiver, a podcast where we keep it real about customer service. Every episode features industry experts who share what really goes into creating unforgettable customer moments. No boring stuff. No fluff. Just honest conversation. Stay tuned, and we promise you’ll walk away with insights that you can actually use.
[00:00:52] Niraj: Welcome, Nellie, to the Experience Matters podcast.
[00:00:55] Nellie: Thank you so much for having me.
[00:00:57] Niraj: Hey, Nellie. Love to start with CorpNet.com. We’d love to know what corpnet.com does as a business and what you do at corpnet.com.
[00:01:04] Nellie: So, I’ve been heading the team over at corpnet.com since 2009 when it was started, and truly, our mission is to educate and inspire entrepreneurs all around the world, nationwide professionals, accountants, entrepreneurs, anybody in the business of wanting to start their own business or help their clients start their business with all the A – Z filing requirements of starting a business, incorporating a business, forming an LLC, or expanding a corporation and LLC into other states and keeping that corporation or LLC in compliance throughout the lifetime of the business with all the other compliance services that we offer. One of our biggest ones being the payroll tax setup and account closures, and we offer our services in all 50 states.
[00:01:53] Niraj: Excellent. Thanks for the introduction to CorpNet, Nellie. I was reading through, you know, details about your company, and I was very excited to learn that, you know, you and your company have helped more than half a million entrepreneurs in the last 10 or so years, right? So it’s a significant impact, and I can totally feel it being an entrepreneur myself. Could you please walk us through what inspired you in the start, to start this business in the first place, and why this business, why this and not something else?
[00:01:42] Nellie: Yes. So I started my first document filing company in 1997, when my husband and I graduated from law school. And back then, we felt there was a market for this because there was a lack of awareness that filings such as starting a business, incorporating, forming an LLC were only limited to getting the assistance of an attorney or an accountant who can offer these services, and that’s not the case. And so when we went to law school, graduated, you know, the Internet was just about to kind of take off, and we found a great segment for us to enter into the market and offer these services to the masses because obviously, there was a lack of awareness, people wanted, there was a need, there was a problem, and we wanted to solve the problem by offering the services to the masses and creating this awareness that you don’t need to go to an attorney or an accountant to get these types of filings completed and pay those enormous, you know, attorney’s fees or accountancy fees, you know, we can take care of those filings for you at a fraction of the price and then, you know, you can save your money and just use it for legal advice or tax advice as needed. And the beauty of this is that it’s been a win-win for us because even lawyers and accountants are now using this.
[00:03:46] Niraj: Thanks for the introduction to corpnet.com. Would love to start from the start, right? Would love to talk about the challenges of starting corpnet.com, right? I’m sure entrepreneurship is a great journey, but very fraught with challenges. So in the initial days, you know, maybe dial back to the first one or two years, and what were probably the toughest things for you to get around when you started the business?
[00:04:08] Nellie: So, you know, when I started our first company, it was really easy, because there was no really barrier to entry; however, you know, after starting my first company, selling it, getting acquired, and then taking some time off, I started again in the same industry with CorpNet. And starting CorpNet had its challenges for us because, you know, now we were in an industry where there was a ton of competitors and, you know, including our old company that we had sold, and now they were a competitor to us. So, there was a lot of barrier to entry, and I think that was the biggest challenge in creating a model for ourselves to enter the market without it being challenging for us. And at at first, you know, we kinda came into the to the market and started CorpNet with this ego of, like, we’ve done it before we can do it again, but it really, really caused a lot of havoc for us and really taught us very quickly that, you know, what happened in the past may not be the same business model that, you know, we should follow for this business. So we quickly had to pivot, and took a look at our customers and took a look at our top 100 customers. And we soon realized that the single transaction model for us that worked with our initial company, our first company, wasn’t gonna work with CorpNet. And so, what was gonna work for us is creating a B2B business model where we’re partnering up with businesses that are representing a ton of clients and coming up with a strategy where we’re going after business owners representing clients who are getting to the end user to be able to get to the end user. And we created what is now called our CorpNet partner program, where we partner with accountants, enterprise clients, lawyers, CPAs, tax advisors, and basically we’ve created an opportunity whereby all of our B2B partners can now offer our services to their clients while we’re the back-end fulfillment partner. And this model has quickly proven to work for us.
[00:06:23] Niraj: Very interesting, right? So, I understand that, so just to summarize, right, your prior experience was providing, you know, one-time services to businesses directly. And then after you started doing that at CorpNet, you very quickly realized, after maybe 100 customers, that probably you are better off working with these agencies, which are corporate customers, lawyers, etcetera.
[00:06:43] Nellie: Yeah. I mean, and I wouldn’t call it a bad experience. It’s just the model for us with CorpNet, of going after the end user directly wasn’t really going to be profitable for us, during the time that we launched CorpNet. It once worked, you know, at the birth age of the Internet, where there was no barrier to entry. However, fast forward to 2009, where you know, we were faced with hundreds of thousands of competitors offering the same services as we were about to offer. It wasn’t gonna prove lucrative for us. So we quickly pivoted to a B2B business model that has proven really effective for us.
[00:07:26] Niraj: Sounds like a very smart pivot, Nellie. Congratulations on that.
[00:07:29] Nellie: Thank you.
[00:07:30] Niraj: I’m sure it was a long journey, right? And I’m sure you would have had a lot of interesting things that you’ve done, one that you just talked about, which is this pivot, right? But any other turning points, any other, you know, big decisions that you can think about the journey that will be very interesting to the audience?
[00:07:44] Nellie: So one big one for us was on the heels of COVID, and the government shut down, and our whole nation shutting down, and, you know, unfortunately, COVID did cause a lot of dismay for a lot of business owners and a lot of companies, but, I always look at life as it’s not happening to me, it’s happening for me, and whatever is out there is happening, and something good is kinda come out of it. And COVID was one of those examples for us. It really, really brought us to the forefront when it came to solving problems out there for small business owners who were either starting out on their own and entrepreneurs quitting their 9 to 5 or getting fired from their 9 to 5 or furloughed and, you know, opening up their own business or even other companies that remained open but now have to go remote. And the problem out there was that people were looking to hire employees remotely and pay them through payroll, but they had a hard time registering for payroll tax setups and payroll tax account setups. And this was a service that we were already offering to our clients, but not so aggressively. It was kind of one of our ancillary services. And so on the heels of COVID, we fast-tracked, making this service very prominent on our website and to our clients, and it proved very fruitful for us, very lucrative. In fact, from it, we got the opportunity to partner with some large payroll service providers who started using us for their clients in processing payroll. So the business quickly went from a 12 to 15-person organization to a 100-plus-person organization. So I think that was the biggest turning point for us, and then from that we realized, like, wow, you know, this is a service that accountants are gonna need even more now, and so we went really really aggressively in trying to promote our CorpNet partner program and the services that are available to businesses out there who not only have employees, but hiring employees, expanding into other states, and hiring employees remotely in other states. So it proved to be a great business tactic and move for us.
[00:10:08] Niraj: Great. So essentially, you’ve done two significant direction changes, right? Or maybe, you know, learning from what was happening around you and then turning that into a success. So, yeah, that is great learning. No. I would like to quickly pivot to, of course, the first part was talking about your journey, how you started and how you have built the business further on. I’d like to get into how you run the business and the core aspects of, you know, your service delivery and what you do for your business for your customers’ sake. So one thing I noticed was that, given the very nature of what you do as it is, right? I mean, it’s about trust, and it’s about accuracy, right? I mean, you have to get it right, plus your customers have to trust you. When you started, you were a small business, you probably employed 10 or, you know, 15 people. You probably had direct connect with a lot of the customers, which is now a lot more abstracted, and you probably do not spend as much time with your customers as you could earlier. So, how have you made sure that these two aspects, which are trust and accuracy, have remained intact as you have scaled the business?
[00:11:09] Nellie: So I think it’s really a top-down model where, when you have great team members who work for your company and you’re very clear on the direction, the mission, the vision of the company, I think the company will always retain its core values. And again, it goes back to setting the core principles and values for the company. And my vision and principles or and core values, have always remained very clear that the customer is always number one. And in order for us to remain the leader in this industry, it really boils down to the customer experience and how our customers view us as a company. So when your mission is clear to your team, then the team and the team leaders have a clear direction to carry that out to the rest of the team members. And I think that’s been something that’s always remained intact for our company, and especially, you know, me making that vision and mission very clear from top to bottom.
[00:12:16] Niraj: Makes sense. Any learnings on designing your business processes right? I mean, first of course, you would have had a very close handle on everything, but then now you’d probably have, you know, layers of leaders and managers, right? Any learnings on how you design this entire process with multiple people in the rear, and still maintaining your service code?
[00:12:33] Nellie: So I don’t wanna take credit for it all by myself. I think one of my biggest ‘aha’ moments, I would say, and I’m still learning, is that you gotta bring in people that are gonna be able to provide you with data. Because in any department, everything is based on data and analytics. And in order for you to be able to obtain that data and analytics, you have to have clear, clear objectives, including KPIs for whoever is working in that role. And that’s something that I’m still at this day learning and improving on. I’m not a magician, and I’m a human, and to me, it’s like life is a learning process. So, as I’ve built companies and as I’m continuing to build CorpNet, you make mistakes along the way, and those mistakes for me are the opportunities to learn from. So I would say, for us, one of our biggest challenges is always finding great talent, but the other big challenge is learning to make sure the objectives are very clear when we bring talent on and being able to manage them properly to be able to measure their performance, you know. And, you know, we’re learning and improving and perfecting it as we grow CorpNet.
[00:13:55] Niraj: Good to know that you keep an open mind, you look at data, and you learn from what is around you. Probably that’s the most prudent way to do this. I would also love to talk about support. Of course, trust and accuracy is important, but you know, with a business like yours and to a large extent ours, right, I mean, support is key to these long-term relationships with customers, right? So, how do you look at support? How do you ensure that customer centricity and this DNA of providing great support is, you know, through the organization and is maintained through the organization?
[00:14:26] Nellie: I think it comes from setting a clear vision and mission with a set of core values for the company that you, as a company, holistically can go back to on a daily basis. And when that’s clear and it’s clearly communicated from top all the way down, from your executive management to your managers, to your leaders, to your frontline, it becomes a lot easier to carry that out to the end user, being the client. Obviously, for us, we have a dedicated customer experience team as well that is able to, you know, manage the customer experience and provide us feedback on a daily basis. But, again, to me, you gotta look at this area holistically and look at it from a standpoint of, is the mission and vision clear? Because when you have a clear vision and mission for your company, and it’s clearly communicated to the entire members of the company, then it’s very easy to carry out.
[00:15:27] Niraj: Makes sense. Any examples, you know, where your team might have gone above and beyond to really get it done for customers, right? I mean, that is always interesting to know.
[00:15:34] Nellie: That’s something that’s not foreign to us. We go above and beyond for our clients every single day, literally, and that’s our mentality here at CorpNet. And, even myself, you would ask the question as to, you know, the company when it was in its infancy and not a lot of customers, I’m sure you had more touch points with your customers. They can get to me even at this point if they wanted to. You know, we are a very open, transparent company. We don’t hide behind names, and the organization really has a mission that the customer is always right and that the customer comes first. Now, don’t get me wrong, we do have the right to fire a client when they’re being abusive, out of line. I mean, we have clear, clear principles that we follow, but at the same time, it’s really our normal. Our ordinary is to go above and beyond for every single one of our clients.
[00:16:29] Niraj: Precisely what I was going to say. So, about going above and beyond is the norm, not the exception, right? So makes sense. That is what we would also love to do, right? So great. Good to hear that. The next aspect that I would love to talk about is building your teams, right? I mean, you can have all the processes. You can have all the KPIs, but ultimately, it is people who do things. And how companies operate has had, you know, multiple upheavals and changes in the last six years, right, after COVID hit, right? We all went remote, then we all tried to come back in various capacities. And then, it’s just a state of constant flux. So how do you make sure that, you know, while you scale, you make sure that you have empathy, you have alignment, and you have a team that is extremely motivated.
[00:17:10] Nellie: I think again for us, we’re a company that promotes a culture of collaboration, and open, honest, transparent communication where everybody’s voice matters. And I think when you have that sort of culture within the community and the organization, it really promotes dedicated employees who will go above and beyond for you. Also, when it comes to scaling, I think it’s really important to put systems and processes together that it’s going to allow a company like ours to grow efficiently, whereby we’re not really dependent on the human aspect or the human knowledge, but we are dependent on the systems to be able to grow the business. Now that doesn’t mean we don’t need people, but the people are there to really make the systems and processes work more efficiently and kinda connect the pieces together.
[00:18:13] Niraj: That’s a great way for me to get into my next question, which I want to talk about, right, which is automation, right? As your business has scaled, as you probably have, you know, many times more customers now than you’d have 5, 6 years back. You have automated a lot of processes. So, what is the general thought process on automating? Right? How do you figure out what to automate? And what is a good idea to automate? And what is a good idea to have humans do?
[00:18:38] Nellie: That’s a really, really great question. I think when it comes to automation, you gotta look at the data to see whether it’s worth the spend. So, you know, you gotta look at the product. You gotta look at the products, see how much money it’s bringing in per month, and if the product is bringing in more in, if it’s costing less to bring the product in, and it’s costing more in overhead, then there’s your answer. You gotta automate. But if it’s costing less for you to have humans process, then you keep it that way. I really do think that it really depends on the products and services that you’re offering, the profit margin, and really what it takes to process each and every single order in order for you to be able to make the decision as to whether you wanna go through the automation route. Now with a company like ours, you know, we’re very prone to want to become a tech-driven company with a very on-the-edge-tech stack where it’s constantly, you know, improving. So for us, we’re always looking for ways to automate systems and processes within our company.
[00:19:47] Niraj: And, you know, with AI coming in in the last 18, 24 months, there being so much activity, that I’m sure you’d have found a lot more opportunity to do things that would not have been possible earlier. So we’d love to know how you see AI transforming what you do on a day-to-day basis. Any learnings there? Anything new that you might have tried out?
[00:20:05] Nellie: I love AI, and I feel that AI is, in many ways, going to replace a lot of things that we’re doing right now with human efforts. But I don’t think AI is gonna replace everything out there. I think right now, my most favorite part of AI is, for example, giving me the tools and resources to market more efficiently to my clients, it’s giving us the tools and resources necessary to code cleaner when it comes to our back end. So I love AI. I love where we’re headed with AI, but I also feel that in our industry specifically, the secretary of states, the government sides that are really in charge of filing these business documents for different business entities are not gonna be able to move as fast as AI will, and hence, you know, I don’t think AI is going to completely replace the type of services that we’re offering.
[00:21:13] Niraj: Of course, with AI coming in, right, how we work with systems and how we work with AI has also changed. We can do a lot more now as people, as employees, as business owners, than we could not have, right? So, as you continue building your business, as you hire new people, how do you think you should look at the mindset of people that you are hiring to make sure that they thrive in this very AI-centric world?
[00:21:32] Nellie: Yeah. That’s a great question. So for us, again, it really boils down to, are they able to clearly carry out the mission and vision and the core principles and values that we believe in as a company? And is there a good cultural fit? Is there a good meeting of the minds, because for us, talent is really important because they’re an extension of us. And, you know, mainly, they’re the ones who are client-facing. So it’s really important for us to make sure that there is transparency on our part as to what our mission and vision, and core values are, both company and culturally, and also to make sure that whoever is gonna be joining our team is going to be able to not only uphold our mission and vision, but believes in it as well.
[00:22:25] Niraj: Absolutely. I think the general theme is basically the clarity of mission and vision, and just being able to make sure that you get people in who truly believe in it and are going to adhere to it, right? I think that is great. The last question that I have, finally, is you know, of course, you’ve been a very successful entrepreneur. You have done this so many times over multiple journeys, right? To someone who is starting, and of course, you are extremely clued in to what’s going on right now with AI, right? So, for someone who is starting a business right now, maybe tomorrow, what are your top two, three things that you’d want to pass on to them?
[00:22:58] Nellie: Yeah. That’s a great question. I think, first and foremost, align yourself with a reputable company such as our company, CorpNet, because we can break the steps down very clearly and easily for you, even if you wanted to do it on your own, but it’ll save you a ton of money if you align yourself with a company like ours who can do it clearly, effectively, effortless, and, you know, air a few for you, bring your business into existence. Plus, we can save you a ton of time and money to make sure you’re not making mistakes along the way. But, if you’re, you know, thinking about starting a business, it really boils down to, do you own any assets? Are you worried about liability protection? Are you worried about somebody coming after your assets? And if those are all yeses, then you may wanna, from the get-go, consider incorporating or forming an LLC for your business. And right now, it’s the perfect time of the year to do that, and you can come to CorpNet, and we can help you get started literally in a matter of days.
[00:24:02] Niraj: Great speaking to you. You know, before we wrap up, I’d love to sum up or summarize the top three, four things that we just talked about that were interesting for me, right? Number one was, of course, I mean, it’s something that you did repeatedly, which was just learning from what was going on around you, learning from the uncertainty, learning from the mistakes, and quickly changing direction with confidence, so that, you know, you make the best out of it, right? I think that was a repeating theme which I just loved. The second was just the fact that going above and beyond for your customers has to be the norm, not the exception, right? And you should expect it every single time. It’s something that every company should inculcate. And the third thing, you know, which I just mentioned, which was a running theme in everything that we talked about, was the importance of clarity, mission and vision. Once you have that written down, once you have that repeated often, and when you drive that down, top down, that just leads to so much better execution, right? So that was another great thing that we talked about. Great, Nellie. Thank you. Thanks for your time. I’m sure everyone is going to enjoy this episode, and I would love to speak to you again.
[00:25:07] Nellie: Thank you so much, Niraj. Thank you for the opportunity.
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