Pamela Pavliscak and I founded Change Sciences 11 years ago about 4 months before the dot com bubble burst. It was a time when everyone was starting companies. If you weren't starting a company back then there was probably something wrong with you, or so the thought process went.
In retrospect, we were a little late to the dot com party. It was the people who got in a few years prior that cashed out with their millions (or saw their paper millions go poof). As we would learn, our expectations of "getting big fast" were not to be. It turns out to be a good thing.
We think small is beautiful. Staying small allows our management team to have a hand in every project that we do. We don't have a sales force. All of our new business comes in through word of mouth or "traditional" web marketing. (Since the people who hire us are usually in marketing we ought to eat our own dog food.)
How Small Works
We regularly do very big high profile projects for some very big companies. Example: Pamela has recently headed up several very detailed research and strategy engagements for some of the world's largest entertainment companies. I regularly advise big banks on their web sites. Over the last 10 years we've done over 500 projects for more than 85 very big companies.