Pizzerias.com is an online company founded last year by two family guys and friends Maz Ghani and Ron Santos. They launched earlier this year and partner with pizzerias nationwide. Pizzerias.com connects hungry diners with pizzerias and sells discounted gift certificates to customers to use at participating local pizzerias. The site went live in February of this year and is already in partnership with pizzerias in 19 states. It provides local pizzerias and customers win-win situations in forms of free advertising, recognition and money savings.
After a free and easy sign up on their user-friendly site, customers purchase and print the selected gift certificates which they bring to the selected pizzeria and enjoy pizza while saving. Pizzerias.com’s goal is to drive customers into participating pizzerias and increase their sales. Pizzeria owners also sign up for free and receive free nationwide advertising along with multiple other benefits including generous revenue sharing, a customized web page (name, logo, address, phone number, menu, hours, and description). They also have a Refer-a-Friend feature for customers.
Do you think the education you’ve invested in helped you on the road to success?
Ron and I are both doctors and we met at the hospital. Medicine is not business in the true sense of the word, but what brought us together is a passion for business, for developing, building, executing and seeing something grow. The passion we put into becoming doctors I think translated into passion for business. It requires similar drive, determination, persistence, and desire to succeed.
Ron: I remember once, our financial advisor told me that every entrepreneur has to be a little crazy. I think entrepreneurship has to be an inherent part of a person. I have to agree with Maz that our ability to transfer the drive to succeed in the medical field definitely was reflected in our business. In addition to medical school I also practiced as a contract attorney. Maz on the other hand had owned and operated a men’s clothing store at the age of 20 with 5 employees.
What was the “break point” or an AHA moment in your career that made you decide to start what you’re currently doing & how did you come up with that Idea?
Originally Maz and I were buying and selling domain names. When the opportunity presented itself and we acquired Pizzerias.com, the domain was so inherently good because of the generic nature of the name, the idea of keeping it and turning into a business came to us. Maz came out with the main concept. Then we developed a business plan and got down to developing it. It took about 8 month to develop the site with our developers. Meanwhile we did our homework, talked to local pizzerias about the idea and tweaked our site as it was developed.
In February of this year, the site went live. We started with 3 pizzerias locally. The business since then has been growing slowly but surely. The reason Ron and Maz stopped on this particular domain is their love for pizza. Plus, saving money.
Who does not love pizza and save money?
As a young professional, what were some of the mistakes that you made and what did you learn?
Ron: I can’t call them mistakes, but rather learning points that we put a positive spin into. Our similar outlook to different business situations helped us a lot as well. In addition, flexibility is the key, not everything works out the way you plan it.
Maz: Having a good and stable partnership is also important. Discussing ideas and criticizing each other helps avoid some mistakes in business. It can certainly be accomplished solo, however, having a partner makes it that much easier to execute an idea. I am very proud and lucky to have Ron as my partner.
What is one accomplishment that you are extremely proud of?
Maz: I think it is the day we launched our site this February. I didn’t know what to expect: no visitors? many visitors? Things that may go wrong? And something did go wrong. Our Paypal service did not work almost 12 hours period when we launched. Luckily I caught it, and we were able to fix the problem almost instantly.
What advice can you offer to your readers?
Ron: First, do your research. There are a lot of good ideas out there, but you need to do your due diligence and be realistic. Be your strongest critic. And then, I hate to sound commercial here, just do it! If you have an idea, one of two things going to happen, it will either succeed or not. If you don’t do anything about, it will just sit with you and only one thing can happen. It will not succeed. Get things going.
Last thing I want to add is, make sure you have at least one partner.
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What do you do for fun?
Ron: I travel. Since my kids are little older now, we are able to visit new places and travel. I also love skiing, it helps me stay fit.
Maz: I play tennis and video games with my 12 year old. I love watching movies and reading. We also travel and explore.
What is your favorite gadget(s), software(s), website(s) that makes your life easier and more productive?
Ron: My phone :D
Maz: for our e-mail marketing we decided to go with a smaller company, MailChimp.com. It’s been a great service and is working great for us. We may go with a larger company in future, but for now it working for us. We use Shortstack.com for designing our Facebook landing pages, deals, and adds. It is a very user friendly software. We also use Hootsuite.com for twitter and social media site integration.
Ways to Connect with Pizzerias.com:
Ron Santos
Maz Ghani
P: 888-667-7662
E-mail: info@pizzerias.com (customers)
E-mail: partners@pizzerias.com (pizzeria owners)
Website: Pizzerias.com
Twitter: @pizzeriascom
From: http://ping.fm/ZQvLt
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