Tag Archives: Entrepreneurship

WorkBar Boston: Putting the “Community” in Community Workspace

21 October 2009

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WorkBar Boston is a great workspace on South Street in downtown Boston. With two available conference rooms, a mix of open workspace and cubicles, free coffee, free wifi and a number of other amenities, they provide everything a small company needs to step out of the home office.   There are quite a few workspaces in the area, but WorkBar goes a step above the rest with their community efforts.

From Yoga to Viral Marketing and Pokin’ Holes to Art Galleries, WorkBar is hosting a wide array of events.  As a young entrepreneur, it’s great to have such an easy to reach location with such diverse offerings.  All of the events I have attended have been free, and the crowds always vary.  These efforts are turning WorkBar into more than a workspace; they’re a key part of the small business community and certainly are recognized by those that enjoy the evening events.

Last night, I had the pleasure of speaking with one of the co-founders of WorkBar.  Despite all the amenities they provide and the events they host, he still wants to do more. He wants to try to build an even stronger community, especially during the workday.  This is no easy task, as people often like to get in their zone and tune out the world, but he still wants to try.   This is both admirable and sets WorkBar apart from other workspaces.

When looking for affordable workspace, there may be a number of options in Boston and Cambridge, but WorkBar is leading the way in making those spaces more than a place to hold a meeting and get work done.  WorkBar Boston puts the “community” in community workspace.

Mass Innovation Nights: Great, but Not for Young Entrepeneurs

15 October 2009

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Mass Innovation Nights has always been one of those events I intended to check out, but never did.  There were a lot of reasons, but the biggest was it’s out in Waltham.  Like many young people in the city, I do not have a car and so I depend on public transportation.  To make it to Waltham requires about a one hour trip each way, which is certainly not something I look forward to.   Last night, I finally decided to make the trip.

One of the reasons I finally decided to go was because a member of Mass Innovation Nights told me that they are, “steps from the commuter rail station.”  While that statement is technically correct, it is not obvious to find them.  I ended up walking up and down Moody Street multiple times in both directions, completely perplexed as I watched the street numbers jump from 138 to 200 (The event location, the Charles River Museum of Industry and Innovation is 154 Moody St). I finally noticed a sizable industrial-looking complex (it looked like a bunch of old factories) tucked away before the bridge over the Charles River.  It was there that I met Dan, a fellow young entrepreneur, who upon parking his car, could not figure out where to go either.  After more searching we finally stopped at the local movie theater and got directions.  As it turns out, you head down a dark pass between some buildings, walk around a corner along the river and then a modest entrance to the museum appears.

Entering the museum was an interesting experience as we were surrounded by giant, old machines and barely heard any talking.  As we wondered deeper into the museum, we finally found some people chatting in an open room.  It turns out, all the action is on the second floor, so we both went up there to check things out.

On the second floor of the museum is a large, open room.  Like many other events, it has tables set up along the walls for each presenting company.  The crowd is then free to move around and interact with the companies and other visitors.  While this set-up is the same as events like WebInno’s “side dishes” and TechCocktail, the crowd and company types is definitely different.  The vast majority of the crowd was much older than I and most of the presenting companies were in the B2B and enterprise space.  The crowd seemed much more serious than others I’ve found at events like these, as many of them quickly moved from table to table and had closed off conversations with specific people.  There is nothing wrong with this; I’m sure many were setting up meetings that could lead to important business deals. However, this is certainly not the kind of open discussion I’m used to seeing at many Boston based events.

After quickly moving through the company tables, I moved over to check out the “Experts Corner.” In this area, there were experts in venture capital, finance, banking, PR/marketing and more.  Visitors could reserve a 15 minute slot to talk to any one of them.  I had a great conversation with two members of Square 1 Bank, who specialize in the banking needs of startups.  I also noticed a few familiar faces from other Boston events on the experts side such as VC Ready Law Group and Launch Capital.   This “Experts Corner” is a great idea. It brings together groups of people that may otherwise have difficulty finding each other: new businesses and the services that can help them.

In the end, I think that Mass Innovation Nights is a great event; it’s just not for young entrepreneurs.  There is a laundry list of organizations in this area, and many of them go to great lengths to attract a younger crowd.   With so many choices, there is no need for every event to focus on the same types of businesses or groups of people.  Mass Innovation Nights represents a different look on new businesses in the area, focused on an older crowd starting small businesses.

6 Lists of 12 for MIT’s Startup Bootcamp

13 October 2009

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Yesterday, hundreds of aspiring entrepreneurs filled MIT’s Kresge Auditorium for “Startup Bootcamp.” 12 renowned entrepreneurs shared their insights and advice into the journey of starting a company and the entrepreneurial life.   There were many presentation styles and personalities on display, but they all shared common traits of passion and honesty;  you could feel that every entrepreneur was fully invested in the idea that they had 30 minutes to share the most valuable advice they could possibly give.  I wasn’t the only one who had pages of notes, so to honor one of my favorites sports bloggers and his “10 lists of 10” theme, I’d like to present you a few lists of interesting items that came from the event:

List #1: The 12 Entrepreneurs, in order of appearance (names link to Twitter):

1. Adam Smith, Founder, Xobni
2. Alexis Ohanian, Co-Founder, Reddit
3. Ken Zolot, Founder, MIT Innovations Teams & Heartland Robotics
4. Dan Theobald, Founder, Vecna
5. Kyle, Vogt, Founder, Justin.TV
6. Angus Davis, Founder, Tellme
7. Hemant Taneja, Founder, Sunborne Energy, Managing Director, General Catalyst Partners
8. Dharmesh Shah, Founder, HubSpot, Author and Blogger
9. Robin Chase, Founder, Zipcar
10. Dan Bricklin, Creator, VisiCalc, Blogger
11. Aaron Swartz, Founder Infogami, Blogger
12. Drew Houston, Founder, Dropbox

List #2: My Favorite Quote from Each Speaker:

1. Adam Smith: “90% of execution is not giving up when others would.”
2. Alexis Ohanian: “Being Good is insurance for when you’re dumb.”
3. Ken Zolot: “Progress is about taking and managing risk.”
4. Dan Theobald: “Outside investment is like in the movie Alien, when they set the auto-destruct and gave themselves 1 hour to kill the alien or everything blew up.”
5. Kyle Vogt: “Take enough shots and eventually you’ll do the right thing.”
6. Angus Davis: “Think like a shareholder…remember what you own.”
7. Hemant Taneja: “The West Coast has a few VCs that are all about the young ones building companies…It’s evolving here now.”
8. Dharmesh Shah: “Stealth mode is for fighter jets, not startups.”
9. Robin Chase: “Everyone you come in contact with is your free consultant.”
10. Dan Bricklin: “Avoid lawsuits; they’re rotten things and you have no control.”
11. Aaron Swartz: “Have users from Day 0.”
12. Drew Houston: “Don’t worry about failure; you only have to be right once.”

List #3: 12 of the Most Tweeted Quotes:

1. Dharmesh Shah: “The more you postpone interacting with real people, the more time you’re wasting …”
2. Drew Houston: “As founder/CEO, your job description is rewritten every 12 months”.
3. Aaron Swartz: “Do not underestimate the degree to which your early users will help you define your product.”
4. “2.5 years of crazy hours, equal parts terror, panic & elation, & a savage obsession with making something people love.”
5. Drew Houston: “Our checking account has $60, can it actually hold $1.2MM?”
6. Drew Houston: “easier to pick up biz side, than for biz people to pick up engineering side”
7. Dharmesh Shah: “Thinking of a startup? You have a genetic defect that’s going to make you miserable for the rest of your life.”
8. Robin Chase: “Everyone you come in contact with is your free consultant”
9. Drew Houston: “Don’t worry about failure. you only have to do it right once”
10. Drew Houston: “I dont know if they thought it was drugs….or a startup”
11. Dan Bricklin: “Don’t celebrate with lawyers — you’re paying for it.”
12. Aaron Swartz: “Instead of the “Hollywood Launch”, go with the “GMail Launch”. Have users from Day 0.”

List #4: Favorite Concepts Introduced by each Speaker:

1) Adam Smith:
2) Alexis Ohanian:
3) Ken Zolot:
4) Dan Theobald:
5) Kyle Vogt:
6) Angus Davis:
7) Hemant Taneja:
8) Dharmesh Shah:
9) Robin Chase:
10) Dan Bricklin:
11) Aaron Swartz:
12) Drew Houston:

1. Adam Smith: Take Risk. 1/4th of your attempts should fail or you aren’t trying.
2. Alexis Ohanian: “No one wants to use your website.” Find out what your customers Do Want.
3. Ken Zolot: “Find your Strawberry Seeds.” (Fruit Roll-ups had a 10x increase in sales when they added Strawberry seeds)
4. Dan Theobald: “experimenting with OPM (Other People’s Money) is dumb.”
5. Kyle Vogt: “Listen to your users in the right way; just get them to tell you when something’s wrong.”
6. Angus Davis: RIFLE: Find your product-market fit. Segment your customer base.
7. Hemant Taneja: Raise VC money only if you Have To. (Bootstrapping works!)
8. Dharmesh Shah: “Build a barrier to entry with Marketing.”
9. Robin Chase: “As a start-up, be the peacock.” (Tiny bird, big appearance)
10. Dan Bricklin: You can build something great in a basement or bedroom.
11. Aaron Swartz: Is your startup an r (small and simple) or a K (large and complex)?
12. Drew Houston: “Drink from the Firehose.” (read as much as you can. learn.)

List #5: Speaker summary in a tweet or less:

1. Adam Smith: Hit the high notes; create a product that no one else can. It’s a huge barrier to entry and wows your users.
2. Alexis Ohanian: Startups are about embracing serendipity and being good; karma matters.
3. Ken Zolot: Ask your startup: Does it work? Is it special? Who cares? What do I have/know (Team!) Who can help? (Network!)
4. Dan Theobald: Hire the best people for all roles & take care of them; a great engineer does 10x the work of a good engineer & 100x of an average engineer.
5. Kyle Vogt: Startups are about being leaner, smarter, more efficient, and lasting long enough to find what works.
6. Angus Davis: Understand your customer base and maximize your return on them (i.e.- Yelp vs. Service Magic)
7. Hemant Taneja: Choose a VC who is 1) smart & a good listener 2) has a network relevant to your company 3) operates with transparency
8. Dharmesh Shah: Utilizing social media to share great content and interact with your customers is the best marketing for a startup.
9. Robin Chase: Create a company with a great product and exceptional customer service and you’ll have a lasting competitive edge.
10. Dan Bricklin: Competition is always around the corner.  Never grow complacent.
11. Aaron Swartz: Build a product with your users from day 0 and with a little cheap marketing, you’ll grow naturally and healthily.
12. Drew Houston: Running a startup means constantly learning and evolving your company and your role in it.

List #6: 12 Organizations Helpful for Young Entrepreneurs:

1. StayinMA
2. DartBoston
3. Boston Young Entrepreneurs
4. Innovation Open Houses
5. Onein3
6. MIT 100K
7. TiE Young Entrepreneurs
8. Mass Challenge
9. Tech Tuesdays
10. Mass Innovation Nights
11. Web Innovators Group
12. You can see all of these and more at: GreenhornConnect

…here’s hoping this last list becomes a baker’s dozen with the addition of an annual Startup Bootcamp.

What do the Oakland Athletics, Hubspot, the Houston Rockets and LEAN Startups have in common?

12 October 2009

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It’s all about metrics.

Regardless of the business you’re in, you have to be measuring and analyzing everything you can.  Who are your customers? What are their habits? How are they finding out about you?  Which products are each customer type buying? How much money are you making off of each customer?  What are the causes for not converting leads to customers? To understand these questions (and deeper ones) is what creates a competitive advantage.  All of the organizations listed above use metrics to gain their advantage:

Thanks to their metrics-progressive GM, Billy Beane, the Oakland Athletics were able to compete annually in the late ’90s with the economic powerhouses of the Yankees and Red Sox, who regularly spent multiple times more money on their player payroll than the Athletics were able to.  An innovative team led by Billy more deeply analyzed both the the players and the game itself to discover new ways to compete by defying industry norms.  This competitive advantage lasted for years until finally the rest of the league started to catch on and teams like the Red Sox hired GMs who used similar deep, statistical analysis.

The old adage for marketing used to be, “half of our marketing is working…I just don’t know which half.”   Thanks to the Hubspot tools, small and medium sized business can precisely measure and optimize their inbound marketing process.   The advantages of the web are just being realized in many industries. Those that take advantage of them are seeing great results in boosting their sales.

The statistical revolution is just starting to hit the NBA, and MIT alum Daryl Morey is leading the way with the Houston Rockets.  In just 2 seasons as the team’s GM, he has built a team that has surprised the NBA with its level of success.  Just like in baseball, there’s more to be learned if you look past the basic statistics…

Finally, LEAN Startups is all about measuring your customer.  You have to communicate with, analyze and respond to your customer.  If you don’t have great metrics, you won’t succeed in creating that great product that people will pay for.

How are you measuring your business? How else could you analyze it? You could be missing your next great competitive advantage.

MassTLC unConference Session Summary: Dodging Bullets that Kill Startups (LEAN Startups)

8 October 2009

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Occam’s razor states that the simplest solution is usually the correct one.  When you ask the question, “why do most startups fail,” the simple, and often correct answer is, “because of a lack of customers.” The main message of John Prendergast’s session on “Dodging Bullets that Kill Startups” was to focus on your customer as early and as much as possible, so that your business can avoid that common cause of death.  John is a disciple of the “LEAN Startups” principles created by Eric Ries, which acted as the basis for the tenants he covered during his session of the unConference.

Create an “MVP”

An MVP, or Minimum Viable Product, is the absolute minimum features that would satisfy your customer’s most basic needs.  As a LEAN startup, your goal is to quickly and effectively create your MVP, so that you can deliver it to your customers.  However, the reason for this is not to drive early revenue; rather, you’re releasing your product at this point in order to learn from your customers.

When you release the MVP, you’re accomplishing 2 key goals. First, you’re getting customers to not just talk to you about your product, as you would in market research, but also open their checkbook; you don’t really know anything about your customer until they make the decision that your product is worth paying for.  Second, because you and your customer know it is an MVP, they understand it will be improved based on their needs.  With this in mind, you will have an open channel to designing the full product they want and will continue to pay for.  It is often easy to develop your product in a bubble in your offices or labs. By creating the MVP, you avoid creating a feature intensive, expensive product that doesn’t actually satisfy your customer.

Facts Live Outside the Building

At the center of having a LEAN startup is bringing the customer into the development process. This means delivering them the MVP and then having in place the proper communication and metrics to properly assess their responses to the product.  You need to ask them, “what are your pain points?” and evaluate their behaviors in using your product.  Most customers are ineffective at describing the product they need, because they don’t always know what is at the heart of their problems.  By watching their actions and understanding their key obstacles, you can tailor your product to what they need most.

Scaling a Company is your Last Step

In the dotcom era, you often heard about companies growing as quickly as possible in the hopes of gaining immense market share. Given the success rate of those companies, LEAN Startups likely has a point in suggesting that staying small and agile initially is best.  When you are small and dealing with only your core customers, you can focus on learning from them and perfecting your product; your burn rate will be lower due to fewer employees, and the smaller customer base will be more manageable for maintaining communication.

This harks back to some of the concepts found in the book, Crossing the Chasm. Author Geoffrey Moore suggests using those early adopters, who are anxious to be a part of the development process, to better position your product before reaching the early majority of customers.  It is in reaching those early majority customers, which represent significant sales that requires scaling, that creates the “chasm” companies often fall into.

Test, Analyze, Iterate, Repeat

In the end, the principles of LEAN Startups is about bringing the scientific method to the business side of the equation.  You need to measure everything you’re doing related to your product and understand what works, what doesn’t and what is needed.  The only way to know this is to test.  If you’re product is a website, that means trying things like an A/B test.  If you’re creating a physical product, you need to have customers using it and observe  how they use it. Regardless of the product type, you should be giving them short surveys and calling them. As John said, “call God himself if you can get his number!”  When you perform these tests you can then evaluate the results and improve and reshape your product; you can add features that are needed, while avoiding mission creep.

LEAN Startups is all about your customer. Get them involved and you’re much more likely to create a product that will satisfy and maybe even delight them.  Through this process you will also build a personal relationship with them, which is quite likely to improve the chance of continued revenue from them;  your product will be exactly what they need and they may even feel some ownership and loyalty to you because of how the product evolved with their input.

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There is a lot more to learn about LEAN Startups.  John was kind enough to tweet additional resources, which you can find here:

Lean Startups Meetup Group, Lean Startups Google Group, Steve Blank’s Book & Blog, Eric Ries’s Blog & MIT Event, and another blog

BYE Event: Upstarts: Gen Y Entrepreneurs Panel

6 October 2009

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Last night, Boston Young Entrepreneurs (BYE) hosted a panel at Emerson College to promote Inc. Magazine contributor, Donna Fenn’s new book: Upstarts: How GenY Entrepreneurs are Rocking the World of Business and 8 Ways You Can Profit from Their Success. The panel was comprised of a trio of impressive young entrepreneurs:  David Hauser from Grasshopper; Brendan Ciecko from Ten Minute Media; and Brad Weinberg from Shape Up the Nation. Despite their very different backgrounds and company types, they shared very similar thoughts on entrepreneurship.

There are many different key roles an entrepreneur can fill in a startup. David and Brad both emphasized the need for a partner to compliment their skills for theirs; these partners fill in for roles and responsibilities that they are neither proficient nor passionate about.  David described the difficulty he experienced in hiring leaders; he found that leading the company as a whole, person to person wasn’t in his interests and that they were hiring many “doers,” but no one was leading. It wasn’t until he left for his “first vacation in 3 years” and didn’t answer emails that a few people started stepping up.  When he returned, he recognized this and worked to cultivate those that emerged.  As David said, “If you [stink] at doing something, hire someone who’s good at it.”  Not every entrepreneur is necessarily the inventor, the salesman, or the visionary CEO.  Find someone to fill the role(s) you’re lacking and make sure they’re as passionate as you are about the company.

Another major topic of discussion was money.  They generally advised against pursuing significant outside funding (although Brad has received Angel investment).  Their greatest concern was in taking VC money, because those investors usually aren’t keen on letting young entrepreneurs learn (i.e.- they’ll reduce your role / replace you with more experienced people).  Also, getting money can lead to bad habits; if you have a lot of money in your corporate account, problems can be too often solved by throwing money at it (hire, try every option, etc) instead of digging down to the core.  While it can be stressful bootstrapping your company, they emphasized the rewards are much greater and you’re much more focused.

The greatest point of the night related to two concepts: Focus and Growth.  They all mentioned times when their companies took on more than they could handle or tried to scale too quickly.  When this happened, the company either had difficulty delivering on all the business they had taken on, or worse, ran into serious cash flow issues.  The best anecdote for these issues came from Brad Weinberg regarding a business opportunity called, “Fresh To You.”  A woman had an idea for a startup and asked him and his company for help.  What began as simple, quick assistance started taking away serious amounts of time from Brad and his employees.  They finally had to say no to the company and refocus all of their efforts on their then strained business.  To this day, when Brad’s company is concerned about whether an opportunity will affect focus, they ask, “is that another Fresh to You?”

Overall, this was a great event. The three young entrepreneurs brought unique, valuable experience that they shared with the audience.  Donna also sprinkled in some interesting statistics related to her research such as the fact that only 1 of the 64 Gen Y companies she profiled went out of business during the recession.  These are exactly the kind of events to motivate and inspire young entrepreneurs. I look forward to future events like these.

MassTLC unConference: Can We Build on the Momentum?

4 October 2009

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Across Twitter, the blogosphere and professional media, there is an obvious consensus: the MassTLC unConference was a resounding success.  Everyone has been talking and tweeting about the energy and enthusiasm that permeated the event.  I believe everyone left with a renewed feeling of optimism for entrepreneurship in New England and a new set of contacts that will be helpful in whatever ideas, ventures or initiatives they are pursuing.

I have no doubt that, on an individual basis, everyone will greatly benefit from the unConference.  However, the greater question is what larger goals may now be possible because of it. A list of action items were created during Scott Kirsner and Tim Rowe’s session called, “Turbocharging the Entrepreneurial Culture in MA.”  These items require a diverse group of people in the community to come together to address issues big and small.

Being a “greenhorn” in the community, I’m not sure how I can help in some cases, but I want to do my part.  I look forward to launching the site being built by myself and some colleagues to help young entrepreneurs  by providing a consolidated source and aggregate for events, resources and other pertinent information.  In addition, if anyone needs any young entrepreneurs to aide in any of the tasks through man power or just a different perspective, I am certainly willing and I believe I know quite a few others who would gladly get involved as well.

So, my question for you, reading this right now, is how, in any way big or small, are you able to help tackle these action items?

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I also wanted to use this entry to summarize and consolidate everything that happened at the unConference.  As I’ve been reading, listening and watching the reactions to the event, I’ve compiled those all into one place.  Below, you will find every piece of content I know of on the internet (sans individual tweets praising the event) that has been generated as a result of the awesome unConference.  If I missed anything, please comment with the link and I’ll update the list.

The Center of it:
http://www.unconference.net/
http://www.masstlc.org/
http://masstlc09.pbworks.com/Proposed-Sessions
http://masstlc09.org/wall
Professional Media:
Mass High Tech: http://www.masshightech.com/stories/2009/09/28/daily42-MassTLC-Unconference-builds-success-with-innovators-entrepreneurs.html
Scott Kirsner’s Friday 5: http://www.boston.com/business/technology/innoeco/2009/10/the_friday_five_best_session_t.html
NECN Coverage: http://necn.com/Boston/Business/2009/10/01/Tech-innovation-on-display-in/1254440945.html
NECN Reporter, Scott Montmimy: http://techprgems.com/2009/10/2009-masstlc-unconference-cars-and-tech-are-ready-to-take-flight/
Bill Warner’s Blog/Photo essay of opening
http://billwarner.posterous.com/why-is-there-a-flying-car-on-my-front-lawn-ho
Session Media:
Bill Warner’s discussion of “starting a company with no money”
http://www.utterli.com/u/utt/u-OTM5NzM4MQ#utt-OTM5NzM4MQ
Adam Zand’s Collection: http://www.utterli.com/AdamZand
PR Improv:
Part 1: http://www.utterli.com/u/utt/u-OTM5NTMxNA#utt-OTM5NTMxNA
Part 2: http://www.utterli.com/u/utt/u-OTM5NTY3Mg#utt-OTM5NTY3Mg
Music 2.0
http://www.utterli.com/u/utt/u-OTM5NDg5Mg#utt-OTM5NDg5Mg
SKirsner & TRowe:
Dana Harris: http://hiddentargets.com/2009/10/02/nurturing-innovation-in-new-england-%E2%80%93-really-shouldn%E2%80%99t-be-a-novel-idea/
My earlier entry w/ List
Picture of session: http://yfrog.com/2pzx9j
Photo of entrance: http://brightkite.com/objects/ab687598ae9f11dea522003048c0801e
Lean Startups
Meetup Group organized by John Prendergast, who led the session: http://www.meetup.com/Lean-Startup-Circle-Boston/
Google Group: http://bit.ly/ewVJs
Steve Blank’s Book: The Four Steps to the Epiphany http://www.amazon.com/Four-Steps-Epiphany-Steven-Blank/dp/0976470705/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1254449094&sr=8-1
Steve Blank’s Blog: http://steveblank.com/
Eric Ries coming to MIT: http://theleanstartuptalkmit.eventbrite.com/
Eric Ries’s blog: http://www.startuplessonslearned.com/
Another blog: http://startup-marketing.com/
Build a Community, Not a Network
http://jasonevanish.com/2009/10/03/masstlc-unconference-session-summary-build-a-community-not-a-network/
Quote of the day:
“Some of you are so smart that you take something that should be an instant failure & turn it into a 4-year failure.” -Bill Warner
“Why, @pistachio asks, are we going up against Silicon Valley as ‘Boston’ & ‘Providence,’ not New England?” -@ Pistachio

Links related to the event itself:
unConference website
MassTLC Website
The Pre-Event Session Wiki
The Sessions Listing Wall
MassTLC Blog

Pieces by the Professional Media:
Mass High Tech
Scott Kirsner’s Friday 5
NECN Coverage
NECN Reporter, Scott Montmimy

Blog Entries on the overall unConference:
Bill Warner’s Blog/Photo essay of opening of event
Bill Warner’s Video of the Event
Bill Warner’s collection of 83 Photos
Brough Turner’s Blog

Specific Session Contemt:

“Starting a Company with no Money”:
Session Audio

“PR Improv”:
Session Summary, Session Audio Part 1 & Part 2

“Music 2.0”:
Session Audio

“TurboCharging the Entrepreneurial Culture”:
Session Summary,  “The List”, Photo 1, Photo 2

“Firing Founders is VC-101: How to Keep Your Founder Job”
Session Summary

“Build a Community, Not a Network”:
Session Summary, Photo

“Dodging Bullets that Kill Startups”
Session Summary, Lean Startups Meetup Group, Lean Startups Google Group, Steve Blank’s Book & Blog, Eric Ries’s Blog & MIT Event, and another blog

Quote of the day:

Based on number of reTweets:
“Some of you are so smart that you take something that should be an instant failure & turn it into a 4-year failure.” -Bill Warner

Based on importance to improving our community:
“Why are we going up against Silicon Valley as ‘Boston’ & ‘Providence,’ not New England?” -@ Pistachio

MassTLC unConference Session Summary: Build a Community, not a Network

3 October 2009

2 Comments

Everyone in the entrepreneurial community knows about Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and blogging and yet many aren’t using them to their full potential.  To help correct this, Cort Johnson and Joselin Mane teamed up to present ideas behind using social media and social networks to build a real, vibrant community.  They were a great team that drew on their personal experiences with social media to lead the session.  Cort is the leader of the DartBoston community that has recently emerged as a key organization for young entrepreneurs, while Joselin runs Boston Tweetups, which helps broadcast local events through Twitter.  There were quite a few skeptics in the audience that they seemed to have convinced by the end of their session.

The heart of their message was to “facilitate a connection.” That means being more than a Twitter name and a random photo.  You need to build a net of all your content across the web.  Link your Twitter account to your blog, your blog to your LinkedIn and Twitter accounts and so on.  By doing so, it allows anyone who finds you to immediately learn all about you, from what you write about (your blog), to what conversations you’re taking part in (Twitter) to what your background is (LinkedIn).

A few tips they suggested:

Use the same picture for every site.
This builds continuity and allows people looking for you from any site to immediately know they found you.

Follow the 90/10 Rule
90% of what you write and tweet about needs to be adding to the conversation and sharing ideas. To not offend people you can only be self-promoting at most 10% of the time.

Find ways to move the conversation offline
All the social media and networks are great, but nothing beats a face to face meeting to build a great relationship.

Use “Reverse Mentorship” (credit: DartBoston co-founder @Alexa)
If you’re not familiar with all the online social tools, consider asking a young person for help.  They can teach you the basics and set you up with the right accounts and tools and then you can help them with some career mentoring.

Have a Plan
It’s not just about being on Twitter. It’s about choosing all of the networks and sites you want to be on and how you’re going to use them together.  You can start out looking to just explore and better understand them, but you need to then formulate a plan for utilizing it for your business or brand.

Sites/Tools to Consider
Twitter help: Twitter’s help section is great for getting you started.
OneForty.com: Tools for better utilizing Twitter can be found here, including ratings and reviews for each by other users.  It’s started by local entrepreneur @pistachio.
Mashable.com: Provides news and information on all things social media/networks.

“Research, Listen, Contribute”
In the end, this is really the key. The conversation is happening online with or without you, so why not be a part of it? There are many opportunities to hear both what people are thinking about in your industry and about your brands.  Get educated, get involved and you can forge great relationships that can then be brought into the real world.

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In the end, it’s all about what you’re interested in doing.  As was mentioned at the “Bootstrapping PR” panel discussion at WebInno23 earlier this week, it’s important you’re passionate about doing this; like most things in life, you’ll get out what you put in.

If you know of any other key tools for getting started or have any thoughts on building your online presence, please add it to the comments.

MassTLC unConference Session Summary: TurboCharging the Entrepreneurial Culture in MA “Active – In Process – To Do List”

2 October 2009

7 Comments

Yesterday at the MassTLC unConference, Tim Rowe and Scott Kirsner led an event  entitled, “Turbo-Charging the Entrepreneurial Culture in MA.”  Those in attendance were charged with creating a list of every organization and event they knew of in the community.  It was truly an impressive group effort that created a list I don’t think anyone would have been able to build on their own that morning.

If you were at the meeting, you’ll recall a young member of the audience chimed in about how he had built a wiki on his own to try to make sense of all the events that he was able to slowly discover. For the past year, I’ve been building that wiki to include not only events, but organizations, resources, some angel and VC groups, the many summer programs and more.  It started out as something for myself out of frustration in trying to grasp the overall picture of the Boston entrepreneurial community, but soon turned into a group effort amongst myself and a few colleagues to try to create something of value for others (i.e.- a full, organized, detailed website built around the information we stored on the wiki and a crowdsourced community to keep it up to date and interact).   So, for now, below you’ll find the list created on the white board from the session yesterday.

{Update: The site is live! Please go to www.GreenhornConnect.com to see the resources all listed. Feel free to use the “Contact Us” option at the site to share any ideas, questions, comments or feedback. Thanks!}

Here’s the list (Active=occurring, In Process=In Development, To Do = Items suggested to start doing to improve the community):

Active Events/Organizations:

TechStars
WebInno
StayInMA
unConference
“Bettina’s Women CEO event”
Mobile Mondays
Open Coffee
Tech Tuesdays
Mass TLC
Social Media Awards
Microsoft NERD
MIT 100K competition
MIT Enterprise Forum
MIT E Center
Swiss Nex
Boston World Partners
Boston Post Mortem
DARTBoston
Mark’s Guide
TCN: The Capital Network
Business Innovation Factory
The Quest for Innovation
Innovate MATech
Mass Innovation Nights
Awesome Foundation
Beta Spring
TIE Boston
TIE Boston Leadership Group
BetaSpring
BetaHouse
Vilna Shul
NECINA
BYTE
Boston Young Entrepreneurs
OneIn3
Common Angels
Launch Pad
Mass High Tech
TedX
Summer @ Highland
Mass, It’s All Here
Genotrope
Green Tech Media
InnoEcoBlog (Scott Kirsner)
Xconomy
UNH Mentoring program
WPI Venture Forum
The Funded Founder Institutes
TYE (Helps w/ HS Business Plans)
CCC: Cambridge Coworking Center
UMass UDC

In Process/Development:

MassChallenge
VentureCafe
VentureFizz
Venture Well
Gary’s Guide
TCN Student Fair
Propel Careers
Northeastern University IDEA
Dog Patch Labs

Items to Add/To Do:

– Break down school silos
– Virtual unConference
– Open employer (non compete) Badges
– Court acquisition heavy businesses to the region
– Micro-investment matching mechanisms
– Organize more practical meetings (i.e.- not networking…mission based)
– Let more green horns in (i.e.- Give young entrepreneurs a shot to work in startups)
– Coordinate VC “reprogramming” of mentalities
– Build a wiki of information
– MassTLC: Coordinate challenges
– Have heads of various groups/events meet
– TC50 Event in Boston
– Connect students w/ companies more
– Have more thought leadership in the region

{Update: The site is live! Please go to www.GreenhornConnect.com to see the resources all listed. Feel free to use the “Contact Us” option at the site to share any ideas, questions, comments or feedback. Thanks!}

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I believe the website we’re building will significantly better serve the community than a simple wiki list, so I’m not sure where that leaves the content I have on the wiki I made until we launch. I’ll try to update what’s happening with the wiki/website my team is working as we progress.

I’d love to speak with any of you with continued interest in this issue. Please feel free to leave a comment/suggestion or send me a message on Twitter (@Evanish). Thanks!

Field Report: WebInno23 Session: An Entrepreneur’s Guide to Bootstrapping PR

30 September 2009

3 Comments

Last night, a near-capacity crowd of people passionate about the web congregated at the WebInno23 event at the Royal Sonesta in Cambridge.  There were a number of interesting companies making their pitches, including The Idea Startup, Happn.in, and Book of Odds. It was a great event all around, but my favorite part was the journalist panel on “An Entrepreneur’s Guide to Bootstrapping PR.” The real title could have been more bluntly named, “How to effectively reach journalists and get them to write about you without wasting money on PR people.”

The panel was a who’s who of distinguished innovation economy regional journalists: Peter Kafka (AllThingsD), Scott Kirsner (Boston Globe), Wade Roush (Xconomy),  and Bob Brown (Network World). Despite the varied backgrounds, they all seemed to be in agreement on most issues:

The Best Way to Reach Journalists

It turns out, journalists are just like regular people; if you want someone to help you out, they’re more likely to do so if they personally know you.  Peter Kafka recommended getting a referral from someone he trusts; if they’re excited about it, then he will be as well.  However, en lieu of such a connection, they all agreed that speaking to them face to face at an event or a conference is the best way to make them interested in your company.  The also emphasized that the meeting needs to be natural; they don’t like it when PR people or others grab someone and try to force an interaction.  Just thinking logically about reaching them this way, it makes a lot of sense.  Are you more likely to help someone if you were randomly messaged by them on LinkedIn or if you met them in person before?

Tips for Blogging

If you’re going to blog, you need to be passionate about what you’re blogging about and blogging itself.  A number of the panelists mentioned checking company and founder blogs to start a story.  If it isn’t current, they’re less likely to be interested and as Scott Kirsner said he’d hate to be at a company and have to ask, “‘What’s happened since your last post on July 23rd?'”  Bottom line: Write regularly and with passion or don’t blog at all.

Best Hooks for Journalists

If you want a journalist to write about you, you need to give them something they find interesting to write about. These are what they said were the most likely items to be written about:
1) If your company gets  a new leader (Someone was likely removed)
2) If you just completed a big round of financing
3) If you’re an established company making a significant change in direction for the company
4) If you have a major product being released (NOT version 7.2.1.1)
5) If you tie to a hot topic or are taking on an industry giant (David vs. Goliath is always a good story)
No surprises here.  What else does a company do that others might really want to read about?

Thoughts on Embargoes and Exclusives

The general feeling was that embargoes are a dying concept.  With sites like TechCrunch breaking news as soon as they can find it and others “accidentally” breaking stories early, there’s not a lot of incentive to wait.  The panelists were mainly concerned with spending a great deal of time on an article only to be beaten to the story by another site.  They also posed the question, “Why do you need everything to break at the exact same time?”

A similar feeling was echoed for exclusives.  Unless it’s a really unique and deep story, being exclusive isn’t a big deal to the journalists; they said they understand an entrepreneur has to try to get their story out. Their main thoughts seemed to focus on the fact that you really just need to understand your desired audience for a story.  Sites like Gizmodo will get you a mention and a quick paragaph, but to have a full story told, you’ll want to target a journalist.

Final Thoughts

The main message of the event seemed to focus on three concepts: personal relationships, passion and personality.  They all get spammed by PR firms trying to convince them to write a story and press releases filled with gobbledegook.  Neither is likely to get a story actually written.  Instead, they want to get to know you and your company personally.  As Bob Brown said, “Put away your powerpoints and put you and your company’s personality in front of us.” They also want to see your passion and personality come through in the content on your site, your blog and your tweets.  These places are where you can control your message and may even attract interest from journalists (David Meerman Scott and Hubspot would be so proud).

In the end, journalists are just like everyone else; they want to be treated like a colleague, hear interesting stories and get to know you and what you’re passionate about.  PR people are still very important for companies for a lot of other duties, but for a new startup trying to get press, the panelists don’t believe they can help much.