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Angel-Backed Companies More Likely to Succeed, Says Harvard Study

cgseo — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 20:30:00 +0000

A new study published by professors at the Harvard Business School shows that angel-backed companies are more likely to succeed and show more growth than those funded by venture firms alone. Researched and written by William Kerr and Josh Lerner, the report found that companies with angel funding see between 30% and 50% higher growth figures in terms of website traffic, are more likely to survive for four years, and are also in a better position to receive further rounds of funding. Sponsor Angel investing itself has seen large growth over the last several months with the creation of various organizations, events, firms and legislation to spur it on. We've discussed the Open Angel Forum series of events, the creation of "Super Angel" firms , the curated Venture Hacks AngelList , as well as current legislation both helping and hurting angel investments. Angel investing has become more common, and as this report shows, this is largely due to the value and success it tends to breed. But why are angel investments the secret sauce for some companies? As the report points out, its the intangibles that angels bring to the table that could be playing a large role in company success. "Access to capital per se may not be the most important value-added that angel groups bring. Some of the 'softer' features, such as angels' mentoring or business contacts, may help new ventures the most," the report says. One of the other reasons that companies could tend to be more successful with angel funding is because of the human face placed on the investments. Angels are usually investing in companies at an early stage, and are investing their own capital in the company. Entrepreneurs may be more likely to work that extra bit harder when they know they are playing with the personal cash of an actual person, not the collected funds of an entire firm without a human name. The reputation of the angel could play a large role as well, both for the attitude of the people running the company, and for the audience they are looking to attract. Most angels tend to be successful entrepreneurs themselves, and thus are likely well known in the startup scene. The chance to sit and talk with these investors, let alone receiving funding from them, is likely a treat for most entrepreneurs, so they may be more likely to be more careful with their money. Additionally, when the public hears of a new startup that may not immediately interest them, the mention of particular angel investors can change their mind. As angel investors mature, they build their own personal portfolio of companies they noticed and provided early funds for, so when company XYZ launches with angel funding from an influential angel investor, that alone can attract people to the product. I know personally that I have looked into startups I otherwise would have largely ignored simply because an important angel investor was certain they'd be a hit. "Some of the 'softer' features, such as angels' mentoring or business contacts, may help new ventures the most." - Harvard Business School report Since some companies receive early financing rounds from angels, it is also logical to assume that when working with a limited amount of cash, the entrepreneurs may be more focused on doing more with less. A company that bursts out of the gate with large amounts of VC firm funding may spend it slightly more haphazardly, whereas a company running on limited angel funds may adopt leaner practices and take baby steps toward success and future funding. As the report mentioned above, the "softer" features provided by the angels are also a large help to the companies. In his email newsletter yesterday, angel investor Jason Calacanis discussed loyalty and how he goes to bat for the people who are loyal to him and his companies. He mentioned that whenever he invests in a company, he immediately becomes an evangelist for that company and it's founders, doing all he can to promote it. This may not be the same for all angels, but when influential investors like Jason get behind your company, they do their best to make sure good things happen. I would be interested to see similar data from this report that compares companies with solely angel funding versus those with more traditional VC firm funding mixed in. The influence of angel investors is significant, but I would think the angels alone are not enough to create more successful businesses at a higher rate. But the lesson here is, if your startup has the opportunity to include some angel investors (especially at the early stages), it would seem like a wise decision to go ahead with. Photo by Flickr user Brooke Anderson . Discuss

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Angel-Backed Companies More Likely to Succeed, Says Harvard Study

Giving in to Facebook: A Weekend on the New "Instantly Personalized" Web (Op-Ed)

cgseo — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 16:29:52 +0000

At last week's F8 developers' conference, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg unveiled plans to offer "instant personalization" all over the web , a way for websites to become instantly more social. Without even signing in, sites gain access to publicly available Facebook information like your name, profile picture, friend list and more, in order to personalize your experience on the site. At launch, only three partner sites are offering this feature: Microsoft's new Docs.com , Internet radio Pandora and user review site Yelp . You can opt-out of this experience if you like, but by default, you're opted in. Sponsor These changes have raised concerns among privacy advocates and are even now being questioned by government officials like U.S. Senator Charles Schumer who is urging the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to look into how social networks handle our private information. And yet... and yet ...after spending the weekend on these "instantly personalized" sites, I have to admit...begrudgingly, mind you...that the experience itself is amazing. Online Music Gets Personal, Too Personal? Pandora's Internet radio is a service I usually partake of via its mobile application on my iPhone, not its regular website. But after the launch of the newly personalized Pandora , I had to take a look. And it was worth it. I immediately discovered which of my friends had the same musical interests as I do. My editor, Richard MacManus, for example, is also a fan of The Killers! Who knew? And apparently, a whole bunch of friends are getting into MGMT now. But finding connections like these aren't the only types of discoveries you can make here. As social media user extraordinaire Robert Scoble found out , you can easily discover your friends' more embarrassing personal tastes too. Kenny G?, Scoble laughingly chides a co-worker after stumbling upon his decidedly unhipster musical interests. These are precisely the types of things we want to stay hidden. Kenny G, for instance. But also our secret obsession with that attractive actor or actress, our fondness for pictures of cute kitties, our forays into celebrity gossip sites when we have a reputation for being intelligent thinkers, our secret Star Wars addiction and so forth and so on. While there aren't " instantly personalized " sites showing you all these types of interests just yet, believe me, there will be. If Facebook has its way (and guess what? It will), your real identity , not just the public parts you've willingly shared in the past, will be revealed to anyone and everyone unless you take action to opt-out. The Real You Can No Longer Be Hidden This is precisely as it should be, Facebook CEO Zuckberberg, more or less said. Earlier this year, he made statements regarding Facebook's new openness, claiming that if he built the social network now, he would make a lot of the data housed there more public by default. This would reflect the current social norms, he said. But that's not exactly true. Facebook isn't reflecting social norms, it's attempting to create them. That said, what an amazing creation it is. On Yelp, I can find the reviews my Facebook friends authored with just a click. I can see who else really digs that local sushi place. And I can do all this without going through the whole "re-friending" process that Web 2.0 sites have put me through in the past again and again. I'm there, my friends are there, and I didn't have to do anything to make that happen. Frankly, it feels right. (Fellow ReadWriteWeb blogger Mike Melanson agrees .) A Minute on the Lips... But it's oh so wrong, isn't it? By giving into to Facebook's vision for the web, we're ceding control of our data, our likes, our interests, our "social graph" (aka who we know, who we friend) - everything - to one company. Historically , one very, very closed company . We're definitely worried about the implications of that. You should be too. But in the meantime, like that calorie-rich dessert we know we shouldn't eat, we're sampling Facebook's web and secretly savoring its deliciousness. Why does everything that's so wrong have to feel so good? Blast you, Facebook. Blast you. Discuss

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Giving in to Facebook: A Weekend on the New "Instantly Personalized" Web (Op-Ed)

The State of Web Spam: Human-Posted Spam is on the Rise

cgseo — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 18:49:30 +0000

Even though we have lots of tools to detect blog comment spam these days, spammers always tend to be one step ahead of our algorithms. While early blog spam was often posted by robots and easily detectable, today's blog spammers are smarter. Instead of relying on robots, the team behind Automaticc 's Akismet spam filter reports that modern blog spam is often written by low-paid workers in India, South-East Asia and Turkey. Sponsor The "best written spam," according to Akismet, comes from South-East Asia. As the Akismet team notes, SEO firms will often hire these low-paid workers and set them up to work out of Internet cafes and local universities. Akismet: "The 'best written spam' comes from South-East Asia." Detecting Human-Posted Spam is Hard We have definitely seen this increase in human-posted spam here at ReadWriteWeb over the last two years or so. While early comment spam was easily detectable because it had nothing to do with the actual post, we now have to take a closer look at all the links our commenters use in their personal profiles in order to weed out the spammers. Often, comments that look perfectly legit will include a link to a Viagra or SEO site in the profile link. What About Regular Spam? Besides the rise of human-powered spam, traditional spam is still going strong as well. Akismet notes that "old-fashioned" pill, porn and malware spam still tends to originate from Eastern Europe and the Russian Federation. Spammers there still operate huge networks of malware-infected machines that run spambots. According to Akismet, the number of fake blog networks on services like Blogspot, Weebly, Tumblr, Ning and WordPress is also becoming more frequent and more highly organized. Instead of just abusing other people's blogs, these spammers just create their own blog networks. Other forms of blog-related spam that are on the rise are auto-blog pingbacks from people using auto-blogging plugins ( mostly for WordPress sites), as well as hijacked blogs and wikis. From Porn and Pills to Pet Food and Roofing Akismet also notes that while early blog spammers used to focus on the traditional (and highly lucrative) niches around pornography, pills and malware, today's spammers are often more interested in search engine optimization than hawking fake Viagra. Because of this, modern blog spam often includes links to "dentists, roofing and pet food." Discuss

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The State of Web Spam: Human-Posted Spam is on the Rise

Amazon Refuses North Carolina’s Demands for Customers’ Personal Data

cgseo — Tue, 20 Apr 2010 16:24:36 +0000

North Carolina has asked online retailer Amazon.com to turn over the names and addresses of every customer who has made a purchase on the site since 2003 and what they bought. The N.C. Department of Revenue is making the request in an attempt to audit Amazon's compliance with state sales and tax laws, according to a Reuters report. Amazon says revealing this data violates customer privacy and has filed a lawsuit to prevent having to turn over the records which hold the transaction details on 50 million purchases over a 7-year time frame. Sponsor Government Wants Names, Addresses and Purchase History In a lawsuit filed Monday in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington, Amazon states that North Carolina has no need for the personal details of its customers - details which include full names, addresses and information about exactly what they purchased and when. The Internet retailer had already given the state information on what has been sold to N.C. residents, but in the form of anonymized data, which should be sufficient. North Carolina, in turn, is now threatening the retailer with contempt proceedings if they don't hand over the requested records. The issue at hand, and likely the reason behind the request, has to do with N.C.'s sales tax laws. Amazon doesn't maintain any offices or warehouses in the state, so they are not required by law to collect sales tax on purchases. However, last year, the state passed a law that required retailers like Amazon to collect tax in the state if they ran marketing affiliate programs, which Amazon does. Amazon responded by shutting down Amazon.com Associates in N.C., the referral program that allows website owners to advertise Amazon products via links, banners, widgets and embeddable "mini-stores" on their web sites and blogs. Despite the program's shutdown, N.C. wants to find ways to collect back taxes on sales that took place before the law went into effect. Right to Privacy or Right to Tax? Amazon has already given the state order numbers, city, county, zip codes, transaction dates, prices and product codes for seven years worth of purchases - information routinely requested in audits like this. But asking for personally identifiable information goes too far, says the retailer. In the filing, Amazon says N.C.'s demands violate customers' First Amendment rights, Washington state law and federal law. Now it will be up to a federal judge in Seattle to rule as to whether or not this demand is, in fact, illegal. Beth Stevenson, the N.C. Department of Revenue's director of public affairs has not yet commented on the lawsuit Amazon filed saying the agency needed to review it first. Discuss

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Amazon Refuses North Carolina's Demands for Customers' Personal Data

Your Inbox as Platform: Google Calendar More Closely Integrated With Gmail

cgseo — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 17:29:37 +0000

Email may be old fashioned, but it's still where we spend a lot of our time online. Today Google announced that it's webmail service Gmail is becoming all the richer with the inclusion of support for sending Google Calendar invitations inside the email composition window. In addition to being able to insert invitations, you can also cross reference your calendar availability with the availability of anyone included in your email thread that you have permission to see the Google Calendar for. It's not a perfect system, but it's pretty neat and it demonstrates the potential for building cool new features on top of our email inboxes. Sponsor Mashups and platforms are all about cross referencing multiple sources of data or functionality, as in this case: email plus calendar. We wrote earlier this Spring about a startup called Rapportive that cross references email and social media data about an email's sender (see also competitor Etacts ) and earlier this month we discussed the incredible potential in Google's announcement of a way to give developers secure access to the contents of your emails for analysis and the creation of innovative services. Yahoo has been calling this kind of approach Inbox 2.0 and has been working on it for more than two years. Here's what we wrote in November, 2007 coverage of Yahoo's vision - how do you think it's worked out? ( Yahoo Says the Future Will Be Modeled on Facebook ) The social network of the future will be populated by the RSS feeds of the activities of your friends and your friends will be determined by email. The big players won't put a major push into building a new social network. "It is much easier to extend an existing habit than to create a brand," are the words Google's Joe Krause. Your email account isn't valuable because it's got the email adresses of other people who could be solicited commercially - it's valuable because it articulates who in the world is able to command your attention. It contains analyzable, direct communication between you and the people most important to you. [Yahoo's] Garlinghouse says that in the future email and IM will be prioritized depending on the importance to you of the people who send it to you. We're not talking about the number of times people email you - we're talking about the percentage of times you open those emails, the keywords used in them relative to your personal/work profile, there are metrics so crazy we can hardly imagine that are available for determining the importance of people in your life. In your email. Facebook's people-search uses some similar math already. Various Ways Email Gets Innovated On Clearly there are all kinds of different levels of sophistication that can come with these sorts of developments. In fact, two plus years after Yahoo's call to action, things still seem relatively elementary. Rapportive displays data uniquely well but Etacts displays more data. This new Google Calendar integration with Gmail offers some visibility into your and your contacts' availability, but it doesn't tell you what you've got scheduled at a given time. Etacts offers inferior invitation sending but has a whole set of reminder and follow up features that Gmail doesn't offer natively. And Yahoo Mail more closely ties in Facebook than any other email, something millions of people are sure to enjoy. So while all the kids rant and rave about Twitter, Facebook, Augmented Reality, iPads and location based social networking, don't let them deny: email can still be very exciting. Discuss

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Your Inbox as Platform: Google Calendar More Closely Integrated With Gmail

Microblogging vs. Blogging: 5 Ways to Create an Open Twitter Alternative

cgseo — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 22:35:00 +0000

Given the recent developments in the Twitter developer ecosystem, I think it's a good time to revisit the idea of an open Web alternative to Twitter. The fact is, the differences between microblogging and normal blogging are insignificant. I'm going to detail five of the differences. My point in doing so is to illustrate that the best way to bootstrap an open alternative to Twitter is not by inventing a bunch of new technologies or products. Instead, I want to show that most of the pieces already exist in the current blogging ecosystem. With a few modifications, a distributed microblogging ecosystem can easily emerge. Sponsor Guest author Chris Saad is VP of strategy at Echo , the world's leading provider of comment/conversation technology to Tier 1 publishers. His role is to track trends in the marketplace, listen to and participate in the community and translate those needs into actionable product direction. His background includes co-authoring of the Attention Profiling Markup Language (APML) specification, and co-founding the DataPortability Project . Used by Digg, BBC, NewsGator, France Telecom and others, APML is industry standard for Attention Profiles. The DataPortability project's mission is to advocate interoperable data portability for users, developers and vendors. Length Microblogs are, well, micro. They are shorter. This is not some marvelous invention - it is a simple, imposed limitation on the input field. Any publishing software today, from WordPress to Drupal, can be modified to force users to stick to 140 characters - call it "microblogging mode". I don't think this particular difference (or how to bridge it) warrants much more explanation. Real Time While blogs used to update rather slowly in a publish and subscribe model, microblogging has had a reputation for being faster or real time. The old school refresh rate of 15 minutes or more (the time between RSS refreshes) seems like an eternity these days. Of course the reality is that the Twitter API is still incapable of sending updates to individual clients in real time, and the whole thing is far from real time. Updates in seconds, however, is a key trait of microbogging. The fact is, however, that blogs now have a method of pushing updates that's faster and more effective than even the Twitter API. It's an open standard called PubSubHub and it's supported by both Blogger, WordPress, Buzz and countless other smaller services. Blogs are already real time. Identified Subscriptions One of the nice things that Twitter does that traditional Blogging software does not do is called Identified Subscriptions. That is, when you subscribe to (a.k.a follow) a user, their name and face appear in your sidebar, and you get a nice little ego boost in the form of a notification email and increase in your follower count. Why couldn't we add a simple mechanism to PubSubHub so that when a client subscribes to push updates, it leaves behind some optional identifying information about the user like their name and avatar? Or maybe instead of leaving the actual username and avatar, it might provide a URL to the subscribing user's own microblogging site that has that metadata stored in the header. Addressability This is perhaps the most complicated difference and gap to close. With Twitter, you can easily say, "Hey @chrissaad you are are a crazy hippy" and I will get it in my message stream. Blogs can't do that right? Well, actually, blogs have been doing addressability since day zero. The same way the rest of the Web does addressability - using links. Bloggers frequently link to each other and then check their trackbacks and pingbacks for incoming references. The only problem with this model is that it's not user friendly enough. Mainstream users don't understand URLs and checking pingback and referrer logs is just plain silly. So rather than reinvent the wheel, why not just add rubber? To make it easier for users, imagine if blogging software kept track of the users you were following (see Identified Subscriptions above) and when you type the equivalent of "@", they provided a list of suggested aliases to choose from. When you select the person you are addressing, the software could insert the alias and hyperlink the name to the associated URL of that user's microblogging site. Clients, then, could subscribe to Google Blog Search (remember blog search is essentially the blogging world's open firehose) and search for any reference to your personal URL. The rest is just presentation tricks to show those replies mixed in with the rest of your microblogging items. Clients Why can't existing Twitter clients allow users to subscribe to PubSubHub enabled RSS and Atom feeds. They would also subscribe to the Google Blog Search for references to your own URL (for @ replies). No need to rip and replace Twitter, just offer an open alternative: subscribe to any site - anywhere. The Future As you can see here, microblogging is and could be fundamentally the same as blogging in terms of the mechanics and technologies involved. The techniques used to build and improve the open blogosphere could be used to bootstrap a microblogging sphere as well. There have been many big strides in this area, such as Status.net. The opportunity now is for the (ex?) Twitter clients and blog publishing platforms and the standards groups to make small tweaks to extend the technology in the right way. Discuss

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Microblogging vs. Blogging: 5 Ways to Create an Open Twitter Alternative

Weekend Reading: The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur, by Mike Michalowicz

cgseo — Sat, 10 Apr 2010 00:15:00 +0000

While this week's entry in the Weekend Reading series is an established book from 2008, it is still a highly touted read for aspiring entrepreneurs with little time and resources that are looking to get a business started. The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur: The Tell-It-Like-It-Is Guide to Cleaning Up in Business, Even If You Are At the End of Your Roll , by Mike Michalowicz is an entertaining hard-edged read mixed with valuable business lessons from an experienced entrepreneur. Sponsor In 1996, at the age of 24, Michalowicz started his first company Olmec Systems, where we was recognized as Young Entrepreneur of the Year by the Small Business Administration. On New Year's Eve 2002, he sold Olmec Systems, and on New Years Day 2003, he launched his second company, PG Lewis & Associates, which quickly grew until being sold to Robert Half International. Michalowicz's current company, Obsidian Launch , is a business growth accelerator specifically aimed at young entrepreneurs. In his book, Michalowicz provides advice for the up-and-coming entrepreneurs of the world on how to get a business started with the bare essentials, including some tips for taking advantage of little-known resources to get ahead quickly. But above all, Michalowicz knows that starting a business takes more than planning and acting on that plan; it takes the entrepreneurial spirit, and passion. "What makes you lose track of time, complete tasks almost effortlessly, and come out even more energized? When you are talking with friends, what is the one subject you can just go on and on and on about, until they are rolling their eyes? Answer these questions and you've found your heart's desire," writes Michalowicz. "And when you have found you insatiable thirst, your passion, you will have taken the most important step to launching a company that will excel." Throughout the book, Michalowicz provides "TPE Tips," which are small, but valuable nuggets of information that will help a small business gain ground on-the-cheap. An example from the first chapter of the book explains how while every business needs a web presence, not every business needs a website. "You can establish a web presence by sing Facebook.com, MySpace.com, Squidoo.com or a million other social sites," says Michalowicz. "Spread the word about what you are doing through these social sites and set up free email. Supplement your social networking site with a free blog at Blogspot.com. That's more than enough to get some business rolling in." This echoes similar advice we've discussed from other books, such as Gary Vaynerchuk's Crush It! which focuses heavily on building your personal brand. Author of the Personal Branding Blog , Dan Schawbel, says Michalowicz has built his brand quickly and efficiently and suggest that entrepreneurs pick up the book in order to "stop wasting time and start building your entrepreneur brand today." The title alone should tell you that this book is lighthearted and easy on the brain, but don't take its outward appearance at face value. The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur is full of great advice for entrepreneurs - advice that still holds true in 2010. Be sure to also visit the TPE website where Michalowicz regularly blogs and posts videos of updated advice. Discuss

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Weekend Reading: The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur, by Mike Michalowicz

Fun Blogs: Where We Post For the Love of It

cgseo — Fri, 09 Apr 2010 18:54:16 +0000

Link blogs, light blogs, blogs on the side; found treasures and half-formed thoughts - it turns out that many members of the ReadWriteWeb team are also publishing on Posterous , Tumblr and other casual blogging platforms. These are the places you can learn about the people behind the news and analysis here at ReadWriteWeb. Where you can find cool little videos and images that we want to share but that don't cross the thresh-hold for full-scale RWW blogging. Publishing and reading on these platforms is a lot of fun. We've listed some of the fun blogs published by members of our team below. We'd love for our readers to share links to your sites like this if you have them. Sponsor Richard MacManus , our Founder and Editor, writes about his travels outside his home in New Zealand, music, books and art using the Soup.io platform at VelvetsFan.com . I, Marshall Kirkpatrick , maintain a Posterous blog at Marshallk.posterous.com . I post a lot from my phone there, I post images and random thoughts about life in Portland, Oregon, my chickens and the tech news industry. Morning writer in Florida Sarah Perez uses Tumblr at sarahintampa.tumblr.com to post "random pictures, videos and infographics I come across on the web," she says. Portland based morning news writer Frederic Lardinois scored the cool domain DishWasherOnMars and uses it to post "stuff I don't get to blog about and that I want to share with my Twitter followers." Morning news writer Mike Melanson records his experiences as a hyper-mobile blogger in Austin, Texas on his Posterous blog . RWW's webmaster Jared Smith shares "(hopefully) useful tidbits about Web development, UX, and other geeky pursuits" on his Posterous from Charleston, South Carolina. Portland based Enterprise and ReadWriteCloud writer Alex Williams uses Tumblr at AlexHWilliams.com . "Hazard is my middle name," he says and he's not kidding, it really is. He calls it "my place to feed my personal interests." Production Editor Abraham Hyatt is in Portland, too and publishes "just your run-of-the-mill photo blog" on his Posterous . Eugene, Oregon based research team member and ReadWriteStart contributor Audrey Watters uses Posterous too. She says it's "where I post my ideas too long for twitter and too malformed for my blog." Portland-based Justin Houk , a member of the research team here as well, calls GeoPDX.net his "say anything, speak my mind, and voices in my head blog." How about you, dear readers? Where is the ReadWriteWeb community posting their found items, fleeting thoughts and other curated digital ephemera? We'd love to know, so share your link in comments below. We'd love to know what these services mean to you, too. Discuss

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Fun Blogs: Where We Post For the Love of It

Startup Strategy Roundtable: Web 3.0 and E-commerce

cgseo — Fri, 09 Apr 2010 00:15:00 +0000

As part of my ongoing Online Strategy Roundtables , this morning I worked with three new entrepreneurs, each at a different stage of validating who their customers are and building their businesses accordingly. Two have e-commerce businesses, which I love. In fact, my Forbes column tomorrow will discuss the shift from brick and mortar shops to e-commerce and how such businesses are so well poised for Web 3.0. Main Street America is changing as small business owners move online and get rid of the expensive real estate costs. Sponsor Sramana Mitra is a technology entrepreneur and strategy consultant in Silicon Valley. She has founded three companies and writes a business blog, Sramana Mitra on Strategy . She has a masters degree in electrical engineering and computer science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Her three books, Entrepreneur Journeys , Bootstrapping, Weapon Of Mass Reconstruction , and Positioning: How To Test, Validate, and Bring Your Idea To Market are all available from Amazon. Her new book Vision India 2020 was recently released. Mitra is also a columnist for Forbes and runs the 1M/1M initiative. Up first was Ellen Sinreich and her company Green Edge Workshops . Ellen is a consultant with expertise in sustainability and real estate. Based on her practice, she has designed some workshops that enable employees to develop strategies that will drive down a company's carbon footprint. She is looking to reach mid market companies in her geographic region (New York), but to date has no customers. Clearly this is a business that has yet to be validated. I believe Ellen is trying to reach too broad a market based on her experience. I recommended she narrows her value proposition to align better with her expertise by targeting companies that deal with facilities and building issues. She asked for advice on finding clients and unfortunately there is no obvious way to find clients when you are a consultant. What worked for me early on was using my personal network for referrals and I suggest she does the same to connect with her target market. Later on, while discussing the Entrepreneur Journeys methodology, I also suggested that folks should read the Finisar case study in Entrepreneur Journeys Volume One to get a good feel for what it takes to get a business off the ground through consulting, and then build a product company through that process by getting close to customers, while generating cashflow all along. Finisar, for those of you who don't know, went public in 2001 at a $5 billion market cap, and was largely a bootstrapped case study. Danny Wong presented Blank-Label , an e-commerce site that allows men to co-create and custom design dress shirts at affordable prices. This site was launched five months ago and has seen a steady increase in sales but has not yet hit its stride. While Danny is well-versed in SEO traffic optimization, he needs to narrow his market to target the exact psychographic interested in being this involved in buying shirts- in other words, style conscious men. I recommend he target his PPC campaigns to the more fashionable zip codes across the country and to go slowly. I believe focusing all their efforts on the correct psychographic will make all the difference. This is a business for a small niche market, but definitely worth building. Catherine Wood Hill gave a heart-felt presentation of La Grande Dame , an e-boutique for plus-sized women that she started with her mom. Having launched a year ago, and with thousands of customers already, this business has been well validated. Their target is women between the ages of 30 and 55 who are looking for high-end designer clothes in sizes 14 and up. I like it when a business is so tightly focused. This allows you to do so many things inexpensively through the Web. We discussed ways to fine tune customer acquisition so the business can scale faster. She said their PPC advertising has never yielded a good return on investment, so I suggested that she targets the most affluent zip codes in the country. I also suggest she continues to do more PR and all the SEO marketing, blogging, Tweeting, etc., that she is already doing to reach more customers. I believe this has the potential to become a very large business. I did research on this segment myself when I ran Uuma, my personalized fashion company for busy, professional women which Ralph Lauren was interested in acquiring in 1999. The roundtables are the cornerstone programming of a global initiative that I have started called One Million by One Million ( 1M/1M ). Its mission is to help a million entrepreneurs globally to reach $1 million in revenue and beyond, build $1 trillion in sustainable global GDP, and create 10 million jobs. In 1M/1M, I teach the EJ Methodology which is based on my Entrepreneur Journeys research, and emphasize bootstrapping, idea validation, and crisp positioning as some of the core principles of building strong fundamentals in early stage ventures. You can find the recording of this roundtable session here . Recordings of previous roundtables are all available here . You can register for the next roundtable here . Photo by Svilen Milev . Discuss

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Startup Strategy Roundtable: Web 3.0 and E-commerce

"Do Crew" Augmented Reality Cartoons Help Get Kids Off the Couch

cgseo — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 19:00:00 +0000

New York-based online video management company whistleBox has developed a new browser-based augmented reality (AR) experience geared directly at children by integrating it with the one thing every kid loves: cartoons. The project, dubbed Do Crew , is a series of animated stories for kids that include interactive AR games and challenges that the kids can play with using a webcam attached to a desktop or laptop computer. Sponsor In examples shown in videos on the Do Crew site, kids can control cartoon vehicles by jumping or leaning side-to-side, and can play other games by waving their hands in front of the camera. Think Project Natal but in a web browser, and integrated within kids' cartoons. This is an excellent use of augmented reality technology because it is a practical application with genuine value, an attribute we discussed last week as being the strongest way AR can break into the mainstream. Best of all, with games like these, kids will no longer be passively glued to their sofas as this new AR project encourages the kids of stand and use their body and arms to control the games. The Do Crew developers state that their mission with the game is help combat the growing epidemic of child obesity. "Children will not stop watching television, and parents will not stop feeling guilt about that fact. So, where does that leave us? It leaves us with a rare opportunity to acknowledge this epidemic and treat it at the most basic level," the site says. "The Do Crew team is dedicated to making all passive media active, and we believe that with a little technology and imagination we can reimage the personal computer or console video game system as effective electronic exercise equipment." Going after the children's entertainment market could also be a boon for the augmented reality industry which has yet to find the public spotlight. Time Magazine named AR as one of the top tech trends to watch in 2010 , and by engaging children, AR may be able to make significant strides towards mass public adoption and acception. Actually, AR experiences aimed at kids are not a new concept; a LEGO Store installation that helped kids see 3D reprensentations of model kits right on their boxes, and a web-based Topps baseball card experience that made the players on the cards come alive in 3D are two of the most well known AR roll-outs to date. New projects like Do Crew are not only great for kids, but also for AR as a whole as it strives to gain credibility and traction with as wide an audience as possible. Discuss

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"Do Crew" Augmented Reality Cartoons Help Get Kids Off the Couch