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We've worked with
The Mashable Effect on Goodreads
Otis says a post on Mashable is what started his site’s explosive growth.
At Saturday’s Mashable party he told me how a Mashable blog post about his site, Goodreads, instantly generated a bunch of new registrations. Because goodreads already had its social components in place, those new users brought in other users and Goodreads kept growing.
I guess that’s why at parties there’s always a line of people trying to meet Mashable’s Pete Cashmore and Adam Hirsch.
How MashMeetLA Got Such a Big Turnout
400+ Mashable fans partied and networked at the second MashMeetLA.
Three things helped us pack the house with great people:
1. Mashable.com has a huge readership - Every time Mashable ran a blog post about the event, another wave of RSVP’s came to Mixergy. That’s why I love putting events together with big, well-loved brands.
2. We partnered with the CommunityNext conference - It’s hard to put together a successful LA party on a Saturday night because there are too many competing events here. Instead of battling for attention, I asked CommunityNext to let us be their after-party. We helped them sell tickets and they helped us grow our guest list.
3. We built on past events - When a guest RSVP’s to an event on Mixergy, we make it easy for them to request the host’s future invitations. That allows hosts to make each event bigger than the last.
Update: TechZulu has video and Mashable does too.
Meeting Matt Browne of Integral Impressions
One of my goals with this blog is to meet and learn from the people who come to Mixergy events. So I interviewed Matt Browne yesterday. He organized Happy Hour 2.0 in San Diego.
Matt Browne, is the co-founder of Integral Impressions, which develops Web-based applications.
Who needs big investors?
Many Web entrepreneurs look for investors to fund their companies. Matt went in a different direction. His company started out building Web applications for advertising agencies and marketing firms. Those projects helped fund his company and allowed him to build applications like nouri.sh and outlandi.sh.
Steps for building Web applications
Since he built so many apps, I asked Matt for tips for building an application from scratch. Every project is different, but here are some important steps.
- Know who you’re targeting - Before you decide what you’re going to create, you need to ask yourself who you’re creating it for.
- Whittle down your features - Get a list of every feature you want to add to your site. Then prune the list based on time, money and fit for your audience. Use your constraints to help you decide what’s your project’s core purpose.
- Go beyond the wire frame - Once you know your features, design a “pixel perfect” version of your site in Photoshop. Before they program an app, Integral knows exactly what it’ll look like, right down to the error messages that users see.
Tips for creating forms that people actually fill out
One of Integral’s apps, Outlandish, allows users to create landing pages which generate leads. So I asked Matt for tips on creating online forms.
- Keep the submit button above the fold - don’t make people scroll to find out how to submit your forms.
- Make the submit button’s text as descriptive as possible.
- Don’t have more than 5 to 7 fields - you’re not going to use all that data any way.
- Match the search engine - if a user came to your site from a search engine, your headline should match the keyword she searched.
- Avoid extra links - resist the temptation to make all your forms look exactly like the rest of your site. Get rid of any unnecessary links that will distract people from filling out your form.
Coming Events - Week of March 24, 2008
SoCal events for the week of March 24. If an event is missing from this list, add it to the comments.
DigitalLA (facebook RSVP) - Wednesday, March 26
Digital LA organizes mixers for professionals in online advertising, marketing, and entertainment.
DealMaker Media - Thursday, March 27
Dealmaker LA
will host over 200 leading tech startups, founders, developers,
investors, and leading industry executives.
Mindshare - Thursday, March 27
It is an energetic mix of open minded people from architects to
programmers to writers to painters to engineers and all others in
between.
Community Next with a Twiist - Friday, March 28
The Community Next conference’s pre-party.
Community Next - Saturday, March 29
Conference on new media.
MashMeet LA 2.0 - Saturday, March 29 A Mixergy event!
Mashable.com, the social networking blog, is buying everyone in the tech community a drink.
Happy Hour 2.0 in San Diego
I drove down to San Diego to do the world’s first Happy Hour 2.0, put on by Matt Browne of Integral Impressions with help from digital-telepathy.
The best part of this event for me was hearing that these two companies met at a previous Mixergy event and have since done work together.
Viss has more pictures here, and TechZulu has video.
Your “Power PR” Feedback
If you came to the “Power PR” event, could you please fill out this quick survey to help me evaluate Mixergy events? (Your response is confidential.)
If you didn’t come, you can see my notes here.
Survey is now closed. Thanks for the feedback!
Secrets of Power PR - Notes
I put together last night’s “Secrets of Power PR” panel to help hard-working startups learn how to get their projects the attention they deserve.
If you couldn’t make it, here are some of my notes.
The panelists
Alana Semuels - LA Times
Brian Deagon - Investor’s Business Daily
Nicole Jordan - Rubicon Project
Ray Doustdar - TeamDating.com
My notes
(They’re incomplete because I took them while moderating.)
Know your message. Nicole says you need to be very clear about what you do, what separates you from your competition and who you serve.
Have sound bites available. Ray says that before he contacted the media about TeamDating.com, he wrote down a few sound bites. When reporters asked him why they should care about TeamDating, he was quickly able to pull one of his pre-written bites out and say something like, “We’re the safe and fun online dating site.” There’s usually no time to think up an answer on the spot. You have to have them pre-written.
Have customers ready. Nicole says when reporters are ready to write about you, they’ll usually ask to interview some of your customers. So have some loyal, articulate customers available for press inquiries. Articles tend to get written quickly, so don’t wait till you’re interviewed to look for those customers. Have them prepared ahead of time.
Know who to target. Ray sets Google news alerts to tell him when someone writes about online dating, social networking, or anything related to his site.
Write to the reporters. When you find an article related to your business, contact the reporter directly and give them more insight into the story. You live in your industry, so you may know more than the reporter. Share your knowledge. Don’t pitch. Just let them know you can be a resource. Alana says getting short emails like this can be helpful.
Put it into a larger trend. Reporters aren’t nearly as interested in your company as as they are in the bigger trends. So attach yourself to those trends. To use YellowBot.com as an example (because they were in the audience). Instead of asking reporters to write about YellowBot being a great replacement for the yellowpages, they should explain that there’s a growing trend of people are abandoning the yellowpages and using the Internet.
Talk about your competition. Alana and Brian agreed that if EduFire.com (whose founder, Jon Bischke, was in the audience) wants to get into the media, instead of pitching themselves, they should pitch their industry. They should say that learning online is a growing trend. Then they should list some companies that are growing the in the space, and explain how EduFire fits within this growing trend.
Be original. Brian says every week he gets hundreds of emails and dozens of phone calls from companies pitching themselves. To break through that clutter, you have to be original.
Start with the trades. It’s easier to break into the trades than into newspapers like Brian’s and Alana’s.
Network. Everyone agreed that you’re better off building a relationship first and then pitching your business.
Do NOT call first. If you don’t know a reporter, email them first. Don’t call, don’t use Facebook. When you email, personalize the subject line and keep your email short.
Go after online influencers. Nicole said that Rubicon Project got hundreds of new registrations after ShoeMoney.com blogged about them. Those online hits may not be as exciting as holding up an article about your company in the local paper, but they deliver more business.
Tentative Event Dates
To help everyone who’s hosting Mixergy events coordinate, here’s a tentative list of coming events. When the event dates are finalized, you’ll see them on Mixergy.com (and other sites).
April 25 - San Diego Lunch 2.0 @ Microsoft (Update: It’s live)
April 29 - LA Lunch 2.0 @ Experian Interactive Media (Update: It’s live)
May 9 - LA Lunch 2.0 @ Yahoo in Burbank (Update: It’s live)
May 19 - “Venture Capital” Panel
May 27 - LA Drinks 2.0 @ eHarmoney
June 13 - San Diego Happy Hour 2.0 gWave Consulting (Update: It’s live)
Bring Lunch 2.0 to Your Office
Help the tech community get to know you by brining Lunch 2.0 to your office.
Have you heard of Lunch 2.0?
The Wall Street Journal called it a “nationwide phenomenon.”
San Francisco Chronicle said, it’s “like a progressive cocktail party.”
Financial Times said, “in a phenomenon dubbed Lunch 2.0, workers in the Valley are descending on other companies for free food and the chance to satisfy their appetite for making contacts.”
What is it and why should you bring it to your office?
At Lunch 2.0, you open your office to the tech community for lunch. You provide the food and the location, and Mixergy will take care of the rest.
By bringing Lunch 2.0 to your office, you help the tech community get to know your company and you give the community a place to network.
What’s the format?
It’s 2 hours of very casual networking. Halfway through the lunch, we quiet down the room and give you an opportunity to tell guests about your company. Tell us what your company does? What’s your mission? Etc. If you’re hiring or looking for partners, this is the time to talk about it.
What kind of food should you provide?
It’s up to you. Some companies have lunch catered, others have pizza delivered.
Since guests walk and mingle, it’s a good idea to have food that’s easy to carry. (Sandwiches, for example, are better than pasta.)
Who brought Lunch 2.0 to their office?
Google, Yahoo, Business.com, Oversee.net, shopzilla, and others.
How can you get the most out of bringing Lunch 2.0 to your office?
Have a few people from your company walk around and greet guests. We want to know what you’re about, so have people there to tell us.
Have a business card jar at the door so you can collect your guests’ contact information.
Don’t stress the details. This is a casual event. It’s about helping you and your guests make contacts, not about making you work hard.