Category Archives: technology

iNsanity

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iPhone coverage from Yahoo, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and apparently the circus is in town in Manhattan. Rob Scoble is blogging while waiting in line, and TechCrunch is streaming live coverage of people in line in Palo Alto.

Having worked for Sprint for almost 8 years, I’m curious to see if the iPhone lives up to the hype since I’ve seen so many phones march to their death when the expectations were so unreasonable.

Come on people, it’s just a phone, right…?

Dove: The Social Ad (r)Evolution

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Dove’s “Evolution” video wins the top prize at Cannes Lions Ad Festival this year. This viral video was created as part of Dove’s “Campaign for Real Beauty” and promotes Dove’s self-esteem charity efforts.

Why is this important?

The social movement on the internet (i.e. web 2.0) has allowed this ad to be viewed and dicussed at unprecedented levels. This ad campaign was fueled by the masses. Five (heck, even three) years ago, this type of awareness and communication simply did not exist.

Pete Blackshaw of Nielsen Buzz Metrics has a great post that details out the specifics of Dove’s marketing success.

This just proves that the social web matters in the “real world” and can be used for more things than the MySpace crowd’s party shout outs and obsessive niche markets like twitter and Google Earth. When companies start talking to us about stuff that matters, we get engaged and become part of the community.

Welcome to the (r)evolution.

Supernova 2007

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Guys like Mike Arrington, Reid Hoffman, and Max Levchin are all hanging out at Supernova 2007 this week in San Francisco.

From the site:
At Supernova, we attempt to answer “what’s next” after everything is connected. Supernova is the only event that assembles the most compelling people and companies from the converging worlds of computing, telecom, and digital media to put decentralization issues into meaningful social and business contexts.

In addition, Google, Yahoo!, AOL, Comcast, Verizon, Cisco, Sun, and IBM are all represented as well.

Some interesting topics of discussion include virtual worlds, user-generated content, online identity, social commerce and media, net neutrality, advertising, and copyright.

Check their blog for updates.

Can Online Advertising Be Useful?

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The Future of Online Advertising (FOOA) conference wrapped a couple weeks back, and I’ve been reading a lot of summaries and commentary about the different sessions and the overall direction of online advertising.

Not surprisingly, the topic of video was very hot. YouTube and Google made sure of that. And of course, the traditional TV networks are in full support of a medium that they are at least somewhat familiar with, but the trend that I thought was more relevant to us here at eNeighbors was the demand that online direct marketing be even more measured and tracked than it already is, and secondly, that the media and channels provide accountability.

With so many different online channels (e.g., blogs, videos, social networks, etc.) to use for your ad campaign, picking the right ones are going to be determined by how measureable and accountable a particular channel is willing to be.

Additionally, the content aggregators that are stripping content from their source only complicates the measurability situation. So, I think the question for how to determine effectiveness will ultimately end up with figuring out where and how people want to receive their content. And if (and that’s a big “if”) when they do receive that content in their personalized fashion, they are willing to put up with advertising.

The key is relevance. If I’m looking for a new grass treatment company for my lawn, then I’ll welcome all the ads I can get for lawn companies. But the icing on the cake will be whether I can quantify those ads in regards to value.

So, what we need is useful aggregator of content that is personal and relevant. And when I need it, provides me with a useful way to find and assess a service provider for whatever my need might be.

Good luck.

TechStars: My Take

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Update: David Cohen’s perspective is here. Jeff Rohrer, another entrepreneur, has a good synopsis too.

I attended a TechStars event tonight that was open to the public. We didn’t apply to be apart of TechStars but I kind of wish I had.

The panel discussion was excellent, but more than anything it was great to be in a room full of other entrepreneurs going through the exact same thing that I am.

The topic of the night was “How to fund your startup”. I walked away with the following:

  1. Bootstrap it – The panel was full of people who fund entrepreneurs and make a lot of money doing it. Ironic though that their advice was to NOT take money from them, or at the very least, to put it off as long as possible. I also found it interesting that most of the people on the panel started their first company with “10 bucks” (Brad Feld) or “100 bucks” (David Cohen) or “-10 million” (Gary Held).
  2. Be creative – There were a couple of really colorful and interesting business stories that the panel shared as examples of how to be creative. Basically, there’s no one right way to raise money. Do what makes sense. That may seem obvious, but so many times I see others (myself included) looking for a road map. While there are some general guidelines, ultimatley, you just have to figure it out.
  3. Real entrepreneurs eat ramen noodles – Lifestyle choices are a big part of starting a company. You have to be willing to eat ramen noodles for a while to get things off the ground. Lisa Rutherford likes you to “max out your credit cards” too because it shows passion, committement and belief in who you are and what you’re doing.
  4. Keep costs low, but focus on growing revenue – Part of funding your startup is keeping the money that you have, so you want to keep your costs as low as possible. At the same time, you have to grow, which usually means spending money. Balance is the key here. You don’t want to tighten up to the point that you stop growth. This can be scary sometimes as it may mean having to spend your last few dollars.
  5. The right advisors are invaluable – You have to find the right advisors with experience in your industry. Ideally, someone who can help you with a big probelm that you’re facing. The best advisors will never ask you for compensation, but let’s be fair, if they’re providing real value, you should invite them to participate in the upside by way of a small equity position. Be careful not to populate the back of your business plan with a list of big names that hardly know you. This may look good on paper, but you’re missing the point of an advisory board. You must develop personal relationships with each one so they have a vested interest in you and what you’re doing.

David Cohen also did an excellent job moderating the panel and keeping the discussion focused. I wanted to say thanks to him and the panel for putting this together. I really appreciate what you guys do.

The only bummer was that the MyBlogLog guys (acquired by Yahoo!) weren’t there for the panel discussion. Apparently they’ve been hanging around TechStars. I really wanted to meet them. (Update: Eric Marcoullier posted in the comments. Looks like he may be back in Boulder sometime.)

Keep an eye on the TechStars Blog for a video of the event.

Build or buy?

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Someone asked me why they should subscribe to eNeighbors instead of building their own neighborhood website. I get this a lot, so I thought it made sense to publish it here.

Here’s why you should subscribe to eNeighbors, instead of building your own neighborhood website:

  1. Permanence – Even if you have the technical expertise to build your own website, what happens when you move? eNeighbors will always be there to support your neighborhood.
  2. Updates – eNeighbors continually makes improvements to its product. Subscribing to eNeighbors ensures that you get the latest and greatest.
  3. Convenience – Why hassel with hosting, domain name registration, backup, and security? Let us do the work for you.
  4. Support – We provide e-mail support for your entire neighborhood.
  5. Savings – For $82.99/mo. you get access to a proven product with a robust feature set, world-class email support for every resident of your neighborhood, and you can reduce the cost of neighborhood communication by eliminating your costly newsletter.
  6. Registration – Building a website is one thing, getting the neighbors to use it is another. Our registration process will get the majority of your neighborhood online.
  7. Certainty – eNeighbors has a proven product with a tested user-interface. You know exactly how much it will cost and that it will work.
  8. Money Back Guarantee – We’ve never had to refund a client yet, but if you aren’t completely satisfied with eNeighbors, we’ll refund your money in the first 30 days of use.
  9. Why wait? – eNeighbors can have your site up within 5 days. Building your own site will take months.
  10. The Network – When you sign up with eNeighbors, you join a network of other neighborhoods that also use our service. Our customers provide us with valuable suggestions that you can take advantage of. For example, one person told us they want the ability to post classifieds in other neighborhoods. Great idea.

Ultimately, eNeighbors is more than a website, it’s a communication solution for your neighborhood. Does your neighborhood really need website? Not really. You need better communication.

All Things Digital

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On down the west coast, there’s another gathering this week of the technology elite in Carlsbad, CA — D5: The D Conference

The D5 conference is part of All Things Digital which was created by Wall Street Journal’s Kara Swisher and Walt Mossberg. Here’s the overview from the site:

AllThingsD.com is a Web site devoted to news, analysis and opinion on technology, the Internet and media. But it is different from other sites in this space. It is a fusion of different media styles, different topics, different formats and different sources.

This is when the tech geek in me really wishes I could get my wife to move the west coast. Should be some really cool stuff going on.

The highlight reel of the much hyped presentation of Steve Jobs and Bill Gates together on the stage can be seen here.

It’s good to be part of the 21st century.