Socially conscious serial entrepreneur

When the 2008 graduate of Concordia’s John Molson School of Business is not busy running his web-development company or managing Gluten Solution Inc., a website dedicated to celiac sufferers, he’s drumming up business for his latest technology venture, Publikit.

 

Publikit targets widely: from small businesses with non-existent or basic websites to ambitious entrepreneurs with sophisticated e-commerce and mobile web needs.

 

Redler identified Publikit’s niche after his own unpleasant experience with an information technology vendor whose bill exceeded his expectations.

 

“We keep our services reasonably priced,” Redler says. “Our fixed rate allows customers to budget properly.”

 

When he’s not running Concordia’s 5 Days for the Homeless, a campaign that has raised some $250,000 for Montreal charity Dans la rue, Redler partners with experts in everything from business planning to search-engine optimization to offer far-reaching solutions. “This helps small businesses get everything they need to start up or grow,” he says.

 

Indeed, a recent Angus Reid survey, commissioned by Google, revealed that 71 per cent of Canadian small business owners want a website, yet lack the skills to create one from scratch. Of the 2.2 million small businesses across the country, more than half have no web presence. “There are so many small business owners in Canada that are under the misperception that they can’t compete with larger companies,” says Chris O’Neill, managing director of Google Canada. 

 

Yet many do by using basic web platforms such as WordPress, which supports more than 73 million sites worldwide. 

 

Basic is not necessarily synonymous with secure. “There are a range of different issues that affect not only [web] applications but the servers on which they run,” says Ryan Dewhurst, a web security specialist whose British-based company RandomStorm creates technology to help developers secure web applications.

 

Fortunately, Redler is a serial networker, too. He offers a spectrum of services that include security solutions. “I have another company that does web management,” says Redler. 

 

Of the few things that Google, Microsoft, Apple and most other major technology companies have in common is the belief that the world wide web is going mobile — a view shared by Redler. 

 

Tech research firm Gartner expects the number of smartphones worldwide to triple by 2014, reaching about 850 million units. 

 

Tablet computers are expected to fly off the shelves even faster, with sales growing sevenfold in the next two years. That’s why Publikit’s offerings focus on mobile sites.

 

Mobile or basic, Redler says his web work has no nasty price surprises. 

 

“You get a custom web package at a fixed rate designed to get you set up online quickly with a web presence that you can build upon.”

 

• “Five days for the homeless” — NOW, March 21, 2012

• John Molson School of Business

• Publikit