February 15th, 2011 | This post was written by RajMalik
Our good friend of KikScore, the Swami Shashi B is organizing a fun night this Friday for small businesses in the DC metro area. It will be a night of networking, learning, probably one or two tweets, maybe even some tweets while folks are networking and learning. The networking happy hour is for small businesses in the area and it is at the fabulous Indique Heights in Chevy Chase, Maryland. Indique Heights is also metro accessible and is located on the Red Line.
So for those who need some convincing here are 5 reasons to attend the small business meetup/happy hour.
1. You get your chance to have a drink with THE Swami.
2. It is a long three day weekend for many so you have an extra day to shrug off that hangover from too many Taj Mahal beers.
3. You get to celebrate an assortment of birthdays from Paris Hilton, Dave Klingler, Denise Richards, Michael Jordan, Lou Diamond Phillips, Cleveland Brown legend Jim Brown. – Ha I fooled you, all of these people were born on Thursday the 17th, but lets celebrate them on Friday!
4. Its Pluto-palooza meets Motley Crue – We can all celebrate the anniversary of astronomer Clyde Tombaugh discovering the planet Pluto in 1933 or better yet the anniversary of Pamela Anderson & Motley Crue’s drummer Tommy Lee getting married in 1995. Fun fact by the way about myself. In 1992, as a part of my final exam in Aerobics 101 at Miami University, I had to lead an aerobics class to the classic Motley Crue song Kickstart My Heart! Yes, the beats per minute for that song are insane and I nearly had a heart attack after the first 45 seconds!
5. Drinking red wine can cut rates of heart disease so do your part to help your heart!
So if you have a small business, startup or an aspiring entrepreneur or just want to join a good group of people for some drinks, we hope to see you there on Friday! Here is more information about Friday’s happy hour.
February 11th, 2011 | This post was written by dojomike
Part of my morning routine is having Morning Joe on in the morning. It’s a great mix of politics, policy, news and pop culture (this isn’t what this post is about, but if you can check out the show). I was expecting to hear another news update on Egypt, the deficit, or a freak snow storm in Georgia (it’s a great show, but pretty predictable).
As I’m brushing my teeth, I hear Misha (Joe’s sidekick) talk about a recent study on how people who drink at least one diet soda each day double their risk for heart attack or stroke. Not good. I hammer down about 5-8 cans of Diet Pepsi or Diet Mountain Dew each day. Math is not a strong suit, but by my calculations, I should be going through my 10th heart attack right about now.
With that news, I left my hotel room (I’m traveling, I’m not in a fight with my wife) and dedicated myself to making a change. Herbal teas. Spring water. Fruit juices. I’m going to be a new man. By 11:00am (4 hours since hearing the study), I was opening my first of 3 Diet Pepsis.
Why did I change my tune? Was the well articulated response from the beverage industry? Did they put out a list of counter-arguments to the findings (i.e. that people that drink diet soda or more likely to be overweight and thus more likely to have a health problem)? Nope. Partly it’s because I have a problem and I love my morning soda. But the other reason was the more I thought about the study, the more it kept raising the brand in my mind. Diet Pepsi is bad for me… Diet Pepsi is bad for me….mmmm Diet Pepsi.
So keep this in mind when your product gets written up or criticized in a blog or something…there definitely will be loss of revenue, but to your die-hard customers, it will just be a reminder that they need another Diet Pepsi.
February 10th, 2011 | This post was written by mitalib
Gigya, a company that integrate business websites with social media sites, such as Twitter (need I go on?), has done a recent study. The results of which say that more people are choosing to log into business tailored websites using their LinkedIn ID’s. Since Linked In has begun letting people use their LinkedIn ID to sign in to other websites, business websites have taken advantage of that. Thus LinkedIn is becoming the favorite social sign in tool for many websites.
Intergrate : Actually, get LinkedIn intergration. How are you going to make use of it if you don’t have it? Since more people seem to want to use their professional identities than personal identies for business tailored websites, this can be an advantage for these types of sites.
Participate : Make sure your company has a prescense on LinkedIn. If no one knows who you all are, why should they come visit you? You can sync your LinkedIn and Twitter accounts to make sure you have the same information on both. Also, on LinkedIn’s directory you can find industry groups to get involved with and you can use those connections to grow your network.
Collaborate : Exactly what the label says. Two good companies that will help you to do this on LinkedIn are Manymoon and Huddle.
Generate : Ask customers to write recommendations for you on Linked In and use the site yourself to answer related questions. People who search in the answers section of LinkedIn will find the questions that you answered.
Due to the increasing number of people separating their social and professional identities, it seems likely the number of people using Linked In is going to grow. It’s best if you start making a presence on LinkedIn today.
February 9th, 2011 | This post was written by RajMalik
The Super Bowl was Sunday night and thank goodness the Steelers lost. Didn’t you just get the feeling when they had the ball at the end of the game that they would yet again pull out another victory. Good job Packers to play strong defense at the right time to cut that off. I hope someone from my beloved Browns takes a few lessons from them for next season and maybe we can win a few more games!
Well this post is not about the game, but those commercials. You have heard about the hype. There is the yearly run up to each Super Bowl where huge brands (and late stage startups with lots of VC money to blow like Groupon) go “all in” usually to the tune of $3 million bucks for a 30 second ad. Is it worth it? Really? Thinking back over the last decade I was trying to remember what were the best and most memorable commercials that still leave a mark on me. I could only remember two. Somewhat surprisingly each commercial was from the career placement and job advertising industry. They were from CareerBuilder and Monster.com and I included them at the top of the post and below.
So what do these two ads have in common. Dead simple delivery and execution and story that everyone can relate to. It helps that they use two main ingredients that are so often successful to any campaign: little children and animals (especially cute ones!).
The point of this story is really not so much about these commercials, but that these days any of us can now try to compete at the level of these large brands in order to spread the word about your product and business. Here are some steps that can help:
Story Counts Advertising is viral now so take the time necessary to create a good story that is engaging and means something not just to you, but to your audience that you are going after. Make sure that story is simple in your ad and that people can relate to that story in a real world practical way. Tara Jacobsen from the Marketing Artfully blog has some good tips about making your story funny for your video ad.
Your Own Video Camera Now take that story and it is as simple as getting a decent video camera from Best Buy to film your own commercial. Even better is that most computers now come with video editing software that is easy to use or if yours does not there are a number of vendors online that provide editing software for low prices.
Crowdsource Actors/Actresses Try to look somewhat professional when you are filming. But that does not mean you have to pay big bucks for known actors and actresses. This only means put some real thought into props, actors, actresses that can include employees, friends or even your own pets. Your costumes for the commercial are as close as your own closet or even the nearby Salvation Army store.
YouTube Once you complete your video ad, upload it to YouTube. That is your first step and then make sure you title the clip in a way that grabs your audience’s attention. Also remember to use keyword tags that are relative to the content, your product and company so that the video ad will appear in relevant search results. This is a key component that will help drive traffic and page views so take the time to think about how people will search to get to see your video ad. Here is an excellent article from Mashable on Top 10 YouTube Tips for Small Business.
Distribute Your Video Ad After the video is uploaded, create a blog post around the video and give that clip a story and some context in your blog post. Also post the video on your blog, your website and even try to submit it to other video distribution sites through Tube Mogul. This helps get your video in as many places as possible. Remember the more places the higher the chance more people will see your video ad.
Social Media Channels Do not stop at your website, make sure you use Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and other bookmarking sites to get the ad out. That way your followers, customers and friends can help you distribute that ad! If you video is funny or has a viral element to it, that will give the community even more reason to pass it along to others.
So using the above 6 steps is your first step to advertising with the big brands. All you need is a video camera, a little creativity and some of your own co-workers, friends, family and pets. Any startup, small business or even non-profit can use these tips to get the word out about your product, company or cause. Now I am not promising you huge overnight success with these steps, but what you will get is the beginning of the process for pushing your brand out there. And isnt Super Bowl advertising all about just that. So on a slightly smaller level you can do what the big brands do all by yourself. Who knows, if you are creative enough you may just land yourself a hit on YouTube!
Let us know which Super Bowl ads were your favorite and what video ad you would put together.
February 4th, 2011 | This post was written by dojomike
The past few weeks the U.S. as seen its fair share of Winter weather. Last week D.C. shut down and KikScore co-founder, Raj, had to take refuge at a bar for several hours. Not really sure how that is different from a normal day with perfect weather, but I digress.
But the biggest storm of the season was the blast this week. 20 inches of snow hit Chicago, but more importantly, so did“ThunderSnow!” This is a combination of a snow storm and thunder. It’s happened twice this year (that have been televised) and the Weather Channel is freaking out about it. Why? I have no idea.
Neither of these two things (snow or thunder) really are that exceptional. It’s not like a hundred foot wave crest that sunk the Andrea Gail. No, it’s just the combination of two ordinary things that rarely happened together. Or if they do happen together, it’s not ordinarily captured on tape.
So, you have two common things, that may or may not happen concurrently. I guess that’s exciting. But what really is the sizzle is the name — ThunderSnow! I think you have to include an exclamation point after you right that. ThunderSnow! sounds like a lame cartoon hero. It sounds so much more awesome than it really is….sort of like the McRib (mmmm…McRibbbbbb).
That’s the beauty. The name has you hooked. The idea of ThunderSnow! is way better than the reality…sort of like my Toyota Prius…in traffic…in a snowstorm…or under ThunderSnow! So, I guess my point to this (other than getting to write about the ThunderSnow!) is that you can have a decent, ordinary product, but if you market it correctly, or have the Weather Channel freak out about it, it can turn into a sensation.
Speaking of which, maybe we should change our name to KikSnow!!
February 3rd, 2011 | This post was written by mitalib
Google is claiming that Bing is copying its search results…..what? To me this sounds a little sketchy. Google is a search engine. Bing is, also, a search engine. So wouldn’t their results be the same if they are looking at the same stuff. (meaning the all the things tagged with whatever word a person is looking for)
But, wait. Let’s see what PC World’s article says. According to the article, Google discovered Bing methods through a “sting” (yes the actually used the word sting) operation. First they created some specific pages to appear in the search results and then they had a bunch of their engineers go home and use Explorer’s suggested sites feature and Bing’s toolbar to search for certain things. Then after two weeks, Google found that the same search results were on Bing.
The specific pages had nothing to do with the keywords and Google just made the pages appear in the search results. Now according to Microsoft, they use a variety of different approaches, including using (opt-in) customer search data, to get their search results. This article goes into more detail, some of which I don’t fully understand. (I’m not majoring in Computer Science.)
Also, according to the article linked above, Explorer users may technically know (’cause really who tries to slog through the privacy policy?) that their browsing data may be used. [ Suggested sites, does what it’s name implies; it suggests sites related to what you are looking at.] Then there’s the Bing toolbar which also looks at a user’s browsing history. On the other hand, according to Google, Google Toolbar and Chrome don’t send back browsing history. Google toolbar, however, does relay site speed which may be a factor in Google’s page rank system.
So overall, Bing may or may not have copied Google’s search results. Bing says that it uses a wide variety of factors, user data, and many search algorithms. However, Google views what Bing may or may not have done as cheating and unfair even though it is not illegal.
February 2nd, 2011 | This post was written by tubs
I have been using the Shopkick application on my smartphone for the past few months and then I saw this article in the Wall Street Journal the other day and realized that 750,000 people have also downloaded and used the application since it was released in August.
Basically, the idea behind the Shopkick application is that users can login and see which local retailers are closest to their current location. Users then also have the option on clicking on each of the retailers near them to see what specials the merchant is currently offering to Shopkick customers. It seems like some of the larger retailers that have close relationships with Shopkick include Best Buy, Macy’s, and Sports Authority.
The other idea behind the Shopkick application that is used to encourage users to access the application daily is driven by rewarding users with Shopkick points just for viewing the retailer’s specials by using the Shopkick application on their smartphone. Users can obtain additional points by physically visiting the retailers and checking in and also by scanning the barcodes of various products in the stores that the retailers are advertising. Shopkick users can then redeem these Shopkick points for products and gifts cards from the various retailers.
I found the Shopkick application to be interesting and useful but after attempting unsuccessfully to scan the bar codes of a few advertised products at a local Best Buy I was a little frustrated by the application as well. I can definitely see a lot of good uses for the Shopkick application and I hope that they expand the functionality included in it to possibly included automatic price comparisons and possibly an easier way to scan the barcodes of advertised products.
Have you ever used the Shopkick application in a store or any other smartphone application while shopping?
February 1st, 2011 | This post was written by SuperChief-Admin
If you have not heard about Dr. Srikumar Rao, he is a well known professor and speaker on business, management, professional development and personal enrichment. He has given a number of great talks including a recent one at the TED conference that can be seen here (Part 1) and here (Part 2). The above one is from a talk he gave at Google in 2008.
The reason you should watch this video: it is really a transformational type of video that asks critical and important questions about the journey you, your business, your career and your life is on. While the video is a little over 45 minutes, it is well worth it. My wife and I watched it on Sunday. We highly recommend it to our friends, family and the community. You will not regret taking the time to watch it.
After you watch it, please tell us what you think.
January 31st, 2011 | This post was written by mitalib
What’s back? Hacker’s toolkits! There are new hacker’s toolkits out there that are user friendly. So, your computer could be in danger from any number of foes. It could be the kid next door, the person sitting across the table in Starbucks, some computer geek in an internet cafe in India. How do we know this? Symantec released a new report about this. These toolkits are priced anywhere from $40 to $40,000.
So, what exactly do these toolkits do? They let people who have a little knowledge of coding to design malware to hack your computer. The big difference between these toolkits and the original ones is that these new toolkits use many different attack vectors. With the old toolkits, once you knew the software patch, the malware couldn’t get in. The toolkits exploit the vulnerabilities in a computer. Usually the malware gets in through the web browser and its plug-ins.
Then, the software usually installs a keylogger which steals things like online passwords and turn computers into zombies who infect other computers. Why through the web browser? Since most of the major software holes have been patched up, it has become harder to get malware onto a computer.Signs show that these toolkits are pretty effective. According to PC World, $70 million was stolen from bank accounts using the hacking toolkit Zeus. Plus these kits are often like regular software. They get constant updates, so they have the newest and most potent version of malware. These toolkits are also attacking multiple software at once, so chances are that one application may be unprotected and the attack is more likely to succeed.
So, what can be done to protect your computer from these threats? Just the usual of keeping all of your system software, virus definitions, etc.. You also shouldn’t use Internet Explorer, but Firefox and Chrome are targets too. [The article didn’t mention anything about Opera though.] You can switch to Linux, but it takes a while to get used to. [I haven’t used Linux, so I don’t have an idea of how different it is. All I know is that it’s different.] You can also install a browser extension, such as FlashBlock(For both Firefox and Chrome), that’ll block any flash code on a website unless you opt to let it run.(YouTube is whitelisted.) Also make sure you’re using a reputable brand of antivirus softarware.
So what do you do to protect your computer from these threats and what do you think about these toolkits?
January 24th, 2011 | This post was written by RajMalik
As a small business or startup there is a constant challenge of developing a brand for your business. Unlike large companies like Coke and Apple, small businesses and startups do not have the resources to invest the time, money and effort to build a brand through advertising. So these businesses are left to rely on my scrappy tactics to develop and grow their brand. Of course with all of the large, medium and small competitors, it can be difficult to elevate your small business above the noise that is out there. Here are a few tips that can help your small business build your brand and show that you can be trusted to deliver for your customers:
1. Give Each Customers an Experience: Think about the great brand experiences that are out there today. There are product experiences like Apple and Zappos. Then there are city experiences like Las Vegas. All evoke a certain type of experience when you interact with those brands (yes, I am calling Las Vegas a brand!). So when your business interacts with your customers, treat them to an experience. What type of experience you may ask? How about “white glove” treatment from beginning until end where you make every effort to anticipate your customer’s wants, needs and desires. This is not an easy thing to accomplish, but just making this type of effort will ensure you try to create a good customer experience for your customers.
2. Every Interaction Should Make an Impression: So this is taking point #1 above and breaking it down. Think about your customer’s touch points for your business. Now think about how you interact with your customers at every touch point. Is it the first time they reach your website? The first time they call your office? An email inquiry about your product or a meeting at a trade show? A conversation over Twitter? Now try to aim to make every experience with your customers one that they will remember. I am not advocating something over the top. I am merely advocating taking special care of the customers at every interaction with your business. For example, talk to your customer, listen to them, and take the time to say that you value them as a customer. Always remember find a way to go the extra mile to help your customers life a little easier or happier. That is why every email should be thought out, every entry point to your website considered so you can get into the mind of a customer and make a good impression at every point with them.
3. Help Your Customers & They Will Talk About Your Business: Building on points #1 and #2, if you make an impression and give customers a great experience, you will give your customers reasons to talk about your business, service or product. What better way to build your brand by having your customers be your brand messengers to potential customers and leads that are out in the community. That is why the more you go out of your way to build up credibility and trust with your customers by repeatedly beating their expectations, the easier it is for those customers to tell the world about buying from your small business.
4. Promote Your Customer’s Successes: We have found at Kikscore one of the best ways to help ourselves and our brand is by promoting our own customers. We have done that by finding every opportunity to promote our customers through various avenues like our blog, on Twitter and by supporting them at every opportunity. One of ways we have done that is by giving our customers a forum on our own blog to tell their own small business success stories. What can you do? Take your customers’ successes and help them tell the world. If your product, service or company was involved with that success, that is even better for you.
Bottom line: Sell yourself by promoting your own customers!
5. Always Aim for a Consistent Message & Customer Experience: One of the biggest enemies of a strong band is an inconsistent message and uneven customer experience. Do you treat customers differently? Is your product simple to use, but your marketing copy and help materials complex and too wordy? How about your customer service – is it very responsive over the phone, but slow or non-existent on Twitter and Facebook? The key is to make sure that the way that your customers interact with your business and startup is in a consistent manner across all channels. This consistency is critical to ensure a brand that does not create mixed messages with customers. A cohesive and consistent brand is hard to create, but it is imperative to achieve to build a great brand.
While small businesses may not have the same resources as large companies, they do still have the ability to build a strong band without paying a huge sum of money. But the monetary investment is replaced with a huge human investment in time, effort, messaging and customer service. That human investment if deployed carefully and deliberately across all parts of a small business or startup can pay major dividends. The trick is studying your business, your customers and the touch points and then developing a branding plan and executing on it.
These are just some of the ways to develop a great brand for your small business or startup. Let us know if you have any tips in the comment below.
