A Vietnamese man who runs an emerging digital marketing and market research company, based in Ho Chi Minh City, has achieved success thanks to his perseverance and refusal to give up after repeated corporate failures. 

Nguyen Thai Son, or Peter Nguyen, made five business startup attempts in Australia, three of which ended in devastating failures.

Thanks to his perseverance and relentless efforts, he now runs Buzzmetrics, an emerging company which offers major international groups such as Samsung, Unilever, and Coca-Cola a wide range of digital marketing services, including social media monitoring, social care, and social media research.

Nguyen, in his thirties, began studying accounting at the University of Sydney in 1998 on a scholarship.

Like many other overseas students, the young man took up a part-time job during his first year at university to cover his tuition.

First failure

During the early 2000s, when computers, particularly with the appearance of Google, became an integral tool for all economic and social fields, Nguyen devised his own accounting and client management software.

Despite his innovation and hard work while working with a translation-interpretation company, where he helped cut the staff from 18 to 5, he earned a mere US$12 per hour.

It then dawned on him that no matter how hard he worked for the company’s sake, the only beneficiary was his employer.

In 2002, he quit his accounting job and spent all of his savings over three years to launch a store and website which sold computer parts, and provided computer repair and Internet installation services.

After nine months of struggling, Nguyen had to shut down his business due to exorbitant office rent, and his staff’s poor performance.

After this first failure, the young man resumed his accounting job at another company in Australia.

Apart from his day job, he offered computer repair and network installation services at night, while cherishing his dream of running his own business.

Not-so-bad second attempt

Three months later, when income from the computer repair service became three times larger than that from his day job, he started up his business again.

After two years of hard work, Nguyen built Safemode Co., which helped residential customers get their computers to the best working condition, and provided better IT support and services for small- and medium-sized businesses.

His company had clients across Sydney and Melbourne.

Nguyen shared that the key to his success was his and his staff’s commitment to all customers.

“Peter was extremely helpful from the very first phone call to completion on the job. He listened carefully and was able to answer all my questions,” remarked Michelle Sheperdson, a client, on his website.

In 2006, he handed over the company, which was doing good business, to his younger brother, to continue his education.

And second and third failures

Two years later, inspired by one of Safemode’s clients that owns the “Pieface” cake shop chain in Australia, Nguyen learned how to make chocolate cakes, in the hope of launching a chocolate restaurant chain.

His restaurant closed after just six months.

His second failure cost him more than $250,000, but brought about a profound change in his corporate orientation.

After another failed attempt in the financial market, when he tried to launch a system to connect investment funds and stock companies, Nguyen decided to work for a market research group in Vietnam in 2010.

The job allowed him to learn management approaches, which have helped him considerably in running his current company, Buzzmetrics.

Founded in 2012, Nguyen’s Buzzmetrics offers a market gauge channel based on feedback from social networks, online forums, and newswires, which all gather people from different walks of life with a high interest in economic and social fields, instead of giving conventional gauges and surveys.

His company offers gauge solutions for digital marketing and analyzes as well as monitors his clients’ social ‘brand health’ and dominant trends on social networks.

His clientele includes major international groups such as Johnson & Johnson, Kimberly-Clark, Samsung, and Abbott.

“I still distinctly remember the feeling when I fell while installing a shelf in my first store. The heavy table weighed down on me, causing me lots of pain, and I realized that I wouldn’t be able to do anything if I didn’t stand up,” Nguyen recalled.

One of the most important lessons he has drawn from his successes and failures is that one should never give oneself the opportunity to retreat.

“Just as Hernán Cortés, a Spanish military leader, ordered that their vessel be burned down so that his troops had no choice but to win, so I did things which prevented me from getting back to my previous jobs, such as making a one-year down payment for my leased premises or resigning from where I was working before setting up my own business,” he noted.

“Compromises with oneself and backup plans tend to make them easily prone to failures,” the businessman stressed.