All successful businesses were created to solve a problem. For this entrepreneur, the rapid adoption of Microsoft 365 led to a big opportunity.
Meet Suzy Dean
Suzy is the founder of Addin365, a business created to help support organisations wanting to make the most of Microsoft 365. Fast forward seven years and the business has created many new products and Microsoft has become a big advocate.
1. Why did you start Addin365 and what were you doing before?
I started my business to bring software products to market that I thought would really help businesses to communicate and collaborate better internally. What was available in the market left a lot to be desired – the whole experience was overly technical, and the result wasn’t brand aligned. I wanted to make the technology within businesses beautiful and the process of getting it in, easy.
2. What were the biggest sources of inspiration and support when you were starting out?
I had some brilliant relationships with internal communications directors in business who were desperate for the offering. Knowing you have a market is a great motivator!
3. What’s the biggest lesson you’ve learned since starting the business?
That the success of the business in the medium and long term is in the hands of the people that you hire and your ability to inspire them to work hard and to a high standard. I have been working on getting people to ‘do the right thing, in the right way, at the right time, because they want to’ – that last bit is vital and something that can only be instilled with a strong sense of purpose.
Early in business someone told me they thought that talk of business culture was a load of nonsense. They were very wrong, I actually think that company culture is the most important thing.
4. What has been your proudest moment/biggest achievement so far?
Winning the everywoman Athena award in 2022! I didn’t think I would even be a finalist so to have won is amazing recognition. Being recognised as a global expert in Microsoft technology is a close second. I was made MVP in 2019 (there are a few hundred of those from about 2 million practitioners globally).
5. What piece of advice would you give to anyone starting out?
Accept you are first and foremost a salesperson. You will sell yourself to your employees, investors, clients and the market. In the UK, culturally we don’t particularly like salespeople who can be seen as a bit greasy. You have to lean into that role to get any business off the ground.
6. What piece of investment did you make in the business that was worth every penny?
My FD, Laura Jones. The numbers don’t lie and having a monthly review gives you a firm reality check on how well things are going, free from the filter of founder enthusiasm and optimism. AddIn365 suddenly took off when she joined the business because I saw where we were and wanted to be further on, that we could afford to invest more and that the forecast upside of doing so would be worth it.
7. Which element of marketing has made the biggest impact on your business?
Building our own database of contacts has been really worthwhile as we can talk directly to people that might choose to buy our products. We started building it in 2015, the year the business started, but it is never too late to start!
8. What do the next 12 months look like for you?
I am really focused this year on helping my top table to run their areas really well, as for AddIn365 to get to our next milestone of £10m turnover, my managers need to be high performers. So, a lot of work is going into motivation and business culture this year.
Do you have an interesting story to tell about how your business got started? Tell us about it.
