BEST SITE UNDER 20 STAFF: RetailMeNot
Many start-ups that achieve early success find it difficult to scale the business, and end up losing everything. But RetailMeNot has managed to become the biggest coupon site in the world with a staff base of only 10.
Judge Andrew Dalton from Webfirm says the site's success boils down to its perfect timing, and its ability to grow without risking overreaching itself.
"Like any good online business, this concept has plenty of scope for scale and global reach.
It's a surprisingly wellcoordinated project for the budget. I look forward to seeing where this goes; mobile vouchering perhaps?"
Co-founder Guy King says the small staff base is a positive. While some businesses are often looking for ways to bring on new workers, King says he made a conscious decision to keep the team small.
"We've got 10 full-time staff and one part-timer. We keep it small for various reasons, with a big one being we don't want to be running ad teams and so on. We want to be focused on innovating, and that's got us as far as we have."
"The small staff lets us move quickly rather than being tied down in the day-to-day administration details. We're fairly busy, and that's an understatement, but we have lots of tools that automate various roles, so we invest the time into automating processes instead of hiring people."
