Sproutly » Events

SeedCamp Underway, Youth Innovation Abroad

Jeff Wang — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 02:07:21 +0000

SeedCamp, a week-long event targeted at young entrepreneurs, is now fully underway. The program chooses up to 20 companies and provides them mentorship as well as connections to VC, marketing, PR, the whole package. Five companies will be selected as winners and given funding. All in all, it’s a European event trying to replicate the big self-boasting community, which calls itself the Silicon Valley. All joking aside, it looks exciting and I’m trying to follow it from this side of the Atlantic.

I still remember at TechCrunch50, when Yossi Vardi was giving Ron Conway a hard time about not investing abroad. SeedCamp shows that there is no lack of talent internationally. Sure, Silicon Valley is the world capital of tech innovation and probably will be for a long time. However, as the cost of infrastructure diminishes, there is less of need to raise massive amounts of money from Silicon Valley VC’s. People also argue that it is easier to find programmers in the Valley, but all the companies seem to be interested in bringing in better programmers abroad.

I had always wished universities would host SeedCamp-like events to bring a different perspective to the students. But, SeedCamp did say they were going to coming to the “Valley”, right?

TechCrunch50 Livestream

Jeff Wang — Tue, 09 Sep 2008 18:26:26 +0000

For the people who can’t be there, here are the livestream.

TechCrunch50 Tomorrow

Jeff Wang — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 04:30:27 +0000

“The conference features a variety of keynote speakers, expert panelists, and a DemoPit with 100 additional early-stage companies.”

TechCrunch50 is tomorrow! I was helping them set up at the exhibition center today, making a bazillion name tags. It looks like it’s going to be fun. The floor place is way larger than last year, lots of space to sit, stand, and schmooze. I’ll probably be there around mid-morning (if that makes any sense).

If you’re going, let me know. Let’s meet up.

Half Broken Phone

Jeff Wang — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 00:34:21 +0000

I seem to be having a string of bad luck this summer. The latest victim is my 2+ year cell phone. I believe someone stepped on it while I was playing basketball.

Amazingly, it can still make phone calls with just the bottom half! That’s pretty awesome. The bad part is that I have lost everyone’s phone number. Also, I can’t tell who is calling me or read any text messages. I can only talk to people on speakerphone; it does make me feel geeky. Maybe i’ll find some way to hook things back together. Please email me your numbers!

Also, I really want an iPhone 3G but just can’t afford one right now. Dang it!

Steve Wozniak Speaking Live at UC Berkeley

Jeff Wang — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 02:35:16 +0000

Steve Wozniak is coming to UC Berkeley today to speak about his journey in the world of technology, entrepreneurship and the early days of Apple. I will for sure be this event and live-casting, using Justin.tv.

Watch live video from Sproutly on Justin.tv

Startup 101 Metrics at Web 2.0 Expo

Jeff Wang — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 21:46:01 +0000

I’m attending the Startup 101 Metrics at Web 2.0 Expo right now. Dave McClure and Hiten Shah are giving at talk about at Web 2.0 about Startup 101 Metrics. They break down the key points in online marketing: (1) Acquisition, (2) Activation (3) Retention (4) Referral, and (5) Revenue. You can remember as AARRR, like a pirate Below are the slides.

| View | Upload your own

As you guys probably realized, I was able to get into Web 2.0. Can’t exactly say what happened, but am lucky to know some people. The atmosphere was definitely different from that of Startup School. I felt young again as everyone was older than me. I’ve learned a lot from this workshop and attached my own key notes below:

1. Acquisition

What channels? Which user? Why?
A: High Volume (#), Low Cost ($), HIgh Conv (%)
Find the channels have provide these factors. Possible channels:

SEO/SEM – Paid search and organic
Blogs
Email
Social Media/Networks
Domain – mini-sites.

Acquisition (Keyword Vocabulary)

Top 10-100 words
Your Brand / Products
Customer Needs / Benefits
Competitor’s Brand / Products
Semantic Equivalents
Misspellings

Things to analyze: Sources, Volume, Cost, Conversion
Key Metrics to Track: Quantity (#), Cost ($), Conversions (%)

2. Activation

What do users do on their first visit?

Example Activation Goals:

Click on something!
Acount sign up / Emails
Referrals / Tell a friend
Widgets ? Embeds
Low Bounce Rate

Activation Tips: Less is more, Focus on user experience / usability, Provide incentives & call to actions, Test and iterate continuously
Key Metrics to track:, Pages per visit, Time on site, Conversions (ie .sign ups)
Tools: CrazyEgg, Google Analytics

3. Retention

Retention involves getting your users to come back to your site.

Example Retention Goals:

1 – 3+ visits per month
20% open rat / 2% CTR
High deliverability / Low spam rating
Long customer life cycle / Low decay
Identify fanatics and cheerleaders

Email is simple and it works
BUT make unsubscribe easy
80% subject line / 20% body text

Tools: Campign Monitor, MailChimp, TriggerMail, Litmus

4. Referral

Referral generally means viral loops, affiliates that

Send to a Friend: Email / IM
Social Media
Widgets / Embeds
Affiliates

Viral Growth Factor = X * Y * Z

X = % of useres who invite other people
Y = average # of people that they invited
Z = % of users who accepted an invitation

A viral growth factor ? 1 means an expoential organic user acquisitions

Tools: Gigya, ShareThis, GetMyContacts

5. Revenue

Different for every business model. You got to figure this out for yourself really.

Revenue Tips:

Don’t rely on Adsense
Start Free -> Go Freemium
Subscription / Recurring transactions
Qualify your customers -> Lead genearation (arbitrage)
Selling something! (physical or virtual)

Web 2.0 Expo, Sneaking In?

Jeff Wang — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 00:25:16 +0000

Web 2.0 Expo starts off tomorrow. I’m pretty pumped about the event, though I don’t really have a real pass. I’m going to go anyways, but I’m not sure how I’m going to get in.

I never really understood why conferences cost so much. I suppose in the past, there was no other way to receive the information delivered at workshops and keynote. However, nowadays, with blogging and video broadcast, you can get everything in real-time. But of course, the real reason why people go to conference is to network. Call me naive, but it seems a bit weird to pay $1000 to meet people.

The crowd will definitely be different from that of Y Combinator’s Startup School. I’ll share my thoughts. I’ll see you there (maybe …)

Y Combinator Startup School 2008

Jeff Wang — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 08:03:03 +0000

So, I went to YCombintaor Startup School today. It was a lot better than I imagined. Usually at most startup events, the speakers would talk about some common sense topic. However, I thought it was great because it had such a variety of speakers.

(Image Source: Posterous)

For example, Jack Sheridan (Partner at Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati) brought his legal expertise, Greg McAdoo (Partner at Sequoia Capital) talked about why it’s important ride a huge wave, and Paul Graham (Partner at Y Combinator) talked about the importance of just being “benevolent.” Moreover, David Heinemeier Hansson (Creator of Rails and 37Signals) really just forced me to think about the simplicity in charging for your web services and attacking niche markets. People can do surprisingly well targeting a niche market and charging a subscription fee. It might not be hard to find people who will just pay you if you can solve their problem. I also liked Mike Arrington’s speech about getting press to write about you: develop a story. It makes their life a lot easier. You don’t want to give bloggers extra work of thinking about who you are and how your product fits into the whole picture.

Here is the recording of startup school, brought to you by Justin.tv

Watch live video from HackerTV on Justin.tv

Another interesting observation was how many people were coding at the event. The crowd was full of true hackers and not people who waste half their days at meetings. It also great just to be around people who are always supportive what you do. Not everyone understand why entrepreneurs think or act the way they do. Community is our best asset at Silicon Valley; let’s always remember that.

More coverage here: TechCrunch, Wired, Kontsevoy, Gabor, MistOne, and PingPlog.

Future of Media Talk at UC Berkeley

Jeff Wang — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 03:57:48 +0000

VSC Consulting and Haas School of Business Technology Club is holding a panel to discuss about current trends in technology and media. People on the panel include Matt Marshall (founder of VentureBeat), Tim Chang (Principal VC of Norwest Venture Partners), Nitin Bhandar (Founder of Skyfire), Jameson Hsu (Founder of Mochi Media), Robert Patterson (Founder of Aap!Global), and Vijay Chattha (Founder of VSC Consulting).

A lot of topics were covered, but I’ll cover 5 areas that are most relevant to young entrepreneurs and students. Excuse my writing; I’m just quickly jotting down notes.

1. What classes did you wish you took in college?

Most answers began with the usual suspects: Business Law, Organizational Behavior, Computer Science, Sales, etc. However, Tim makes a point about partying more; most of business is about networking, while also being a friendly person. Also, take classes you really don’t want to take. For example, do you really suck at finance? Force yourself to confront your weaknesses.

2. How do you guys bring together a team?

The biggest part of a startup is the people. The advantage about hiring young people is that they are more susceptible changes and adapting. Hire people who have an opinion on things. Hire people who are way smarter than you; sounds like a cliche but it’s very important. In early stages, surround yourself with people who are really passion about problem solving; there are no answers.

4. What is a VC looking for?

Are you mature enough to be CEO?
What type of network does the entrepreneur come from.
A great ability to hire rockstars.
Salesmanship and communication. Life and business are constantly about selling.
Persistence. Will the person give up? It is common to change to business model over 3 times.
Self-awareness. How mature are you? Are you able to identify your weaknesses?
Are you in it to be rich or famous? Some people there to grow the company as big as possible, while others just want control and PR coverage.

4. Lifestyle Business.

Many students are happy making a facebook app, or a small social site. You don’t need much venture capital to start a “lifestyle” business. Venture capitalists expect a billion dollar company. They need companies that return 10-20x in order to maintain a good return on their investment fund. You may be happier just owning a small website that can sell for $20M. What is your agenda?

5. How important was your MBA?

Great networks. You will meet friends who will stick with you after graduation.
Most importantly, it’s a time to take a step back and think about what you really want to do in life.
Unlike engineering schools, business schools prepare for problems that do not have a clear solution.
If you’re not interested in grad school, look for mentors. Surprisingly, a lot of people are willing to give their time back.