15October2009
Communicating; Funding; Standing out
Investors and partners have short attention spans. If you have something to communicate, Guy Kawasaki suggests you keep it to one idea and five sentences. I followed those suggestions when I asked him to write a sidebar for Complete Web Monitoring, and it worked.
But what if you have something more complex to say — a business plan, for example? What if you’re giving a colleague a competitive analysis? Or proposing a new product? How long should that document be?
In my experience, you should follow the seatback rule. This is the time between when a pilot asks passengers to put their seatbacks up and tray tables away, and the time when it’s safe to use portable electronic devices.
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9October2009
Communicating; Funding; Startups
Next week, the ever-energetic Phil Telio is organizing the fifth Startupcamp in Montreal. He’s assembled five excellent new ventures from a long list of submissions, and both Tara Hunt and Chris Shipley will be attending the event.
I’m helping to judge and counsel the participants, and in doing so I’m remembering just how hard it can be to explain what you do from within your own company.
- You can’t hone your pitch: At an event like this, you’re speaking to investors, employees, competitors, and advisors.
- You want to explain it all: You’re convinced that you have to offer a tour of your whole product or service, which makes you rush.
- You’ve got the curse of knowledge, something Made To Stick talks about a great deal. Basically, you know your own product so well, you forget that others don’t know anything about your market or technology.
In a pinch, here’s what I usually advise people to do if they have no idea how it’ll go. You can break a presentation up into five chunks of a minute each, and use 2-4 slides for each minute, to get your point across.
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14July2009
Creating great products
When it comes to product design, good product managers often say, “don’t sweat the small stuff.” In the early stages a good product manager needs to focus on the one thing that’s absolutely needed.
But that backfires when tight focus is used as an excuse for sloppiness. One thing taking all of the attention at the expense of all the other small things can backfire — specifically, when a user doesn’t have a well-formed understanding of the product or service and is searching for cues.
Small things matter a lot
I recently opened up a bag of arugula, that bitter green of haute cuisine and yuppie punchlines. As I was about to pile it haphazardly on plates, I spied a single wilted leaf. This prompted me to dig further — what if I’d bought a bad bag? What if it had spoiled in the fridge? Sure enough, closer inspection revealed others. Even the slightest imperfection reinforced my perception that something was amiss.
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7July2009
Case studies; Communicating; Standing out
[Update: Beth Kanter has re-posted this piece over on her blog; she's had some great guest posters keeping things moving over there while she makes the move from Boston to San Francisco. If you're looking for other resources on social networking and nonprofits, there's no place better than Beth's.]
Last week, we helped out our friends at Visible Government with their Beers for Canada campaign. In the end, the campaign raised just over $1,000 in two days; donations will help open government data to citizens and promote transparency in public offices. We learned a lot about what did and didn’t work, and in the interests of transparency, we thought we’d share some of the lessons we learned along the way (and see if we can collect some ideas for next time.)
How it worked
A week before Canada Day (July 1) we built and tested a simple site that encouraged donors to “buy their country a beer” — basically making a donation. We told a few key bloggers and Twitter personalities about it beforehand; then, on June 30, we started talking about it online. We continued to mention it, and amplified what others were saying, until midday on July 2.
From the outset, this was a short-term campaign built around a single day. We did this to give it urgency and purpose. We chose to start talking on June 30 because so many people were out the office (and away from their computers) on the holiday itself. But it’s important to realize the differences between a short-term campaign (minimal upfront work, strong word of mouth, modest goals, and real-time virality through Twitter) and a longer one. The timeframe also meant that most blog coverage only hit on July 1st (and thanks to all the bloggers who covered us!)
What worked? What didn’t? What would we have changed? Here’s a quick list.
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27March2009
Standing out; Startups
We call Rednod a startup accelerator. That means we get our hands dirty helping to design product features, business models, positioning, look and feel, business processes — whatever it takes to get the job done. It’s a lot of fun, particularly when the team is smart and they’re trying to solve an important problem.
One of Rednod’s clients, FarmsReach, fits that bill especially well. They launched on Tuesday at the Green:Net conference. After ten months of hard work on a web platform that could actually transform the local, sustainable food industry, the company’s finally taking the covers off.
Best of all, the company won the inaugural People’s Choice award at the Launchpad event with CEO Lana Holmes’ great presentation. The buzz has been huge, and while FarmsReach is taking it slow, focusing on San Francisco farms and restaurants, it’s a model that can work across North America in short order.
Congratulations to the FarmsReach team.
Also worth checking out is Saul Griffith’s awesome presentation on the energy we use, which takes a decidedly engineering-centric view at the daunting challenge humans face in trying to slake our thirst for energy. Green:Net was an excellent — and thought-provoking — event.
12March2009
Jobposting; Startups
Roughly 10 years ago, Networkshop was two people trying to figure out what business to build. A couple of years later, the company launched as Coradiant, initially an MSP and later a user experience monitoring company. It was a great experience. Early on, we posted some tongue-in-cheek positions that really set the tone and helped us find awesome employees.
Rednod has lots going on — much of which is related to Bitcurrent and the Complete Web Monitoring book — and it’s time to grow the team. To that end, we’re looking for a program manager. If you’re interested, let us know on Twitter or contact us online.
Here’s a detailed overview of the position. Read the rest of this entry »
