business Archive

One of the toughest parts about starting a business is knowing where to go for answers to the questions that pop-up on a daily basis. For a long time one of the best resources was SCORE which is a group of retired executives. I met with a local SCORE counselor about 10 years ago and while the basic business help and advice was excellent, it was hard to have a technology-specific discussion regarding my needs. SCORE appears to have continued to change with the times and if you aren’t on their mailing list, you should be. 

Today there are tons of small business help sites available online providing a wealth of content and advice. This morning I met with Jeff Davis the editor-in-chief of Bizmore, a small business resource that launched earlier this year. Bizmore provides a Q&A site along with content in the form of blog posts. When the service launched as a Q&A site this past summer, Matt McGee from SearchEngineLand called the service, “Yahoo Answers for Small Business”.

There are about 30 experts listed that provide answers to questions posted on Bizmore. Bizmore is built on a combination of platforms: a custom system for the Q&A portion and Drupal for the balance of the site.

There are no content categories which really would help users move through the site. The Google search just doesn’t cut it when a directory is needed. Also, there’s no way to create a list of saved articles for future reference. I’d also like to see more guidance based on a simple questionaire. When I arrive at Bizmore, allow me to answer a few questions about my business and what I am looking for and then provide me with a list of content/feeds/websites that match what I am looking for. While not small business related, LearnVest does a good job of this with their checklists for help with your finances.

It will be interesting to watch how Bizmore grows and what their strategy for acquisition looks like. With a continually growing list of sites that on the surface appear similar, Bizmore will have to always stay ahead of the pack in terms of content and services to keep users engaged past the initial search referral. There’s a variety of detailed articles on Bizmore so they are off to a good start.

What sites do you use for help/questions with regards to your startup? Leave your favorites in the comments.

Check out the video below with John Nese. John is the proprietor of Galcos Soda Pop Stop based in Los Angeles. The video is from food site Chow although I found it via the Toddle blog. The video has nothing to do with Twitter or Facebook – nothing to do with so-called social media experts. It has to do with one thing…passion for your business. More importantly it has to do with knowing your business inside and out (watch how he can talk about nearly any of the soda bottles he has in the store). Lastly it shows how important knowledge of the industry that your startup is a part of (his talk about bottle redemption is quite interesting).
Continue reading “Passion For Your Business (video)” »

Venture capitalist Chris Fralic from First Round Capital presented to a group of entrepreneurs at DreamitVentures in Philadelphia. Chris spoke about business development for startups and took a look at his history with a variety of companies including Delicious, Wikipedia and half.com. I’ve embedded the presentation below.

If you are looking for more business development for startups topics, checkout our video recap (over 1 hour) from the nextNY business development seminar earlier this year.
Continue reading “Business Development for Startups” »

Amazon leads the the newly released BusinessWeek InfoTech100 for the second straight year. The criteria for the list is pretty complicated but it begins with companies with revenues over $500 million. Some companies were left out if BW believes they have monopoly power (thimble ya’all!).

The top 10 (in order) are: Amazon, Oracle, SAP, Inventec, IBM, Bharti Airtel, Quanta Computer, Wistra, Tencent and Acer. Other notables: Microsoft (22), Verizon (32), Google (37), and Adobe (99). Apple fell 17 positions from 2nd to 19th and Google dropped from 11th to 37th.

I am wondering when Amazon’s Web services business will pass the product sites in annual revenue.

Anand Iyer with Microsoft Startup Zone provided a video demo and details about the Microsoft BizSpark program. Microsoft describes the program as, "BizSpark is an innovative new program that unites Startups with entrepreneurial and technology resources in a global community with a common goal of supporting and accelerating the success of a new generation of high-potential Startups."

Check out reviews on Geekzone, The Register, Ostatic and Sitepoint.

The video below is part two of the nextNY group session named, "The Business Development Discipline: Practitioners’ Roundtable". Click here to view part one. About 50 people attended the session where a variety of business development topics were discussed. Most of the discussion was around business development for "major" startups and large companies.

The evening’s speakers included:

• Chris Phenner – VP of Business Development, Thumbplay (left side of camera)
• Dan Rosenberg – VP of Business Development, Rave Wireless (right side of camera)
• Matt Milner – VP of Social Media, Hearst Corporation (right side of camera)

Earlier this year, the nextNY group held a workshop on hiring for startups. If you plan to do any hiring for your startup, the videos are a must watch.

Tonight the nextNY group held a business development session named, "The Business Development Discipline: Practitioners’ Roundtable". About 50 people attended the session where a variety of business development topics were discussed. Most of the discussion was around business development for "major" startups and large companies.

The evening’s speakers included:

• Chris Phenner – VP of Business Development, Thumbplay (left side of camera)
• Dan Rosenberg – VP of Business Development, Rave Wireless (right side of camera)
• Matt Milner – VP of Social Media, Hearst Corporation (right side of camera)

I was able to tape the first hour of the discussion and part one (30 minutes) is below. The other half of the discussion will be posted on Tuesday morning.

Earlier this year, the nextNY group held a workshop on hiring for startups. If you plan to do any hiring for your startup, the videos are a must watch.