Guest Blogger: Jonathan Campbell

Our guest blog is a week early, but we just really wanted to share what Jonathan Campbell of 231 Commerce had to say. Our Young Professionals love living in Traverse City and Jonathan sheds a little light on why starting your own business in the area is a great idea. Take it away, Jonathan!

If you were to tell me Four Years ago, that I would be married, living in Traverse City and own my own company, I would have thought you were crazy.  But, here I am living, working and playing in TC, loving every minute of it.

Three years ago I moved to Traverse City from California, where I had been living and working for a friend and before that I was in Boston working for a Commercial Contractor.  I am a Northern Michigan native, so I had a pretty good idea of what I was getting into, but little did I know how much had changed since I lived here 13 years ago!  My girlfriend (now wife) had a job in TC, so I thought it wouldn’t be bad to live here for a year before we moved down to Chicago, so we could both pursue our careers there.  I began looking for work, but never really expected to find much because the economy was so bad and hey, we would be leaving in 8 months anyways.

The rest of the story is history, because I found a job with MyNorth Media, began my new career in Digital Marketing and decided to buy a house and stay for a while.  I began meeting a lot of new people, networked into the business community and quickly learned that the Northern Michigan that I grew up in had changed.  Traverse City is now an incubator for young energetic talent looking to succeed in an array of different fields.

In April of 2012 , myself and a business partner decided to start our own company.  With his background in E-commerce and my background in web design and development, we thought it would be a perfect match for an E-Commerce Management and Digital Marketing Company.  We both agreed that there needed to be a young, fresh and progressive digital company in town that is well versed in the industry locally as well as nationally.  We are currently managing three online stores, Consulting with future clients about steps they need to take to successfully launch an online store, designing and developing websites and working on a couple smartphone applications.  We feel that we are able to offer our clients the best service in the digital market because we are diverse and have a proven track record of success.  Instead of telling clients what we can do, we can just show them the success of the products that we have already launched.

Everyday at 231 Commerce is different and exciting.  We are able to learn new techniques to optimizing our resources and trouble shoot new problems with customers.  We are writing our own book on Product Management, SEO, Customer Service, Product Fulfillment and online branding and Traverse City is the perfect place to do this. 

We have access to everything we need here in TC and that is credit to the continued hard work of the business community encouraging and supporting young entrepreneurs as well as the groups we are a part of, including the TCYP.  The TCYP is a great group that allows younger professionals the opportunity to interact and learn from one another and share helpful information as it pertains to our generation.  Without the TCYP I feel that our younger generation would be less informed, which would make it difficult for us to assimilate into the business community and be successful.

I couldn’t think of a better place to start a company.  Traverse City is a wonderful place to live and work and I look forward to growing my business here.