While working on my moonlight project www.eventNu.com – an online event guide & ticket platform, I have been going through lots of learning, which I believe would be really helpful if I share them with other individuals looking to (or already) bootstrapping any project or startup.
Things can be range from making video, creating buzz, taking surveys and lot more and would definitely give you some options of better Return On investment.
Look forward to have Bootstrap articles on my blog, soon. Thank You!
I have always been a firm believer in making community around more stronger, because of very simple reason. When you make community strong, you as part of the community get stronger. Whether its about increasing computer literacy amongst the kid via CL4K or chairing alumni group trying to give best of world back to campus.
I am proud to introduce FounderWise a unique institute for founders in the Seattle/northwest USA to learn from the best of the breed CEOs and VCs who have gone through it and have taken the real challenge.
Below are details from mailer:
The Founder Institute ( http://www.founderinstitute.com) is a four month training program for both new and seasoned entrepreneurs. The Institute prepares founders to lead the next generation of world-class technology companies across a wide range industries, from the biotech to the internet. Weekly company-building sessions are guided by experienced CEOs, and they are held in the evening to allow participants to keep their day job or develop their companies during business hours. All of the program stakeholders, from the participating founders to the experienced CEO Mentors, share in the upside generated by the companies formed during the program. Participants also enjoy free services from more than three dozen Institute Partners, fundraising opportunities at fair market value, and a teamwork-oriented environment to build a company.
Sound good? Potential Founders (students) interested in the Seattle winter semester of the Founder Institute can apply at http://www.founderinstitute.com/apply/5. Early Admissions Close on November 12, 2009, regular admissions are due by November 27, 2009.
Want to learn more about the Founder Institute program in the Seattle area? Come to a special informational evening at the Boeing Auditorium on the University of Washington campus on the evening of November 2nd, 2009, hosted by the UW Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship. Registration for the free event is available at http://founderwise.com/events/.
FounderWise (http://www.founderinstitute.com) was launched to operate the Institute in Seattle and to be a founder-centric resource for simplifying the process of founding a successful startup, focusing on training entrepreneurs and establishing an extensive library of original and compiled startup resources.
Couples of posts back, I shared about a photo book we made to raise funds for charity and the one which is going out around the world to get autographs from contributors.
Now, Microsoft’s PR department has decided that the “Photographers at Microsoft” book is the right gift for visiting VIP’s and heads of state. With the many regulations and laws that dictate what a government official can accept, it turns out this is a perfect fit. It is a quality gift that will be received well and appreciated. It tells a great story about Microsoft’s charity work. It demonstrates an international consciousness. This was a completely unintended byproduct of the book effort and is delightful.
Today, Ban Ki-moon, Secretary General of the United Nations visited Microsoft and Steve Ballmer presented him a copy of “Photographers at Microsoft” signed by Steve Ballmer and Bill Gates.
I am proud for what we (photographers who contributed to the book) collectively did to make this book happen.
I do read and reply around 1000 emails a day, may be sometime more, sometimes less, updating status, asking status, sending out review comments on designs, sending out jokes…and what not.
What happens when I go on vacation? My emails does not get attended and keeps filling my inbox and maybe blocking other person, unless I setup an appropriate OOF message.
OOF, stands for Out Of oFfice message I set, which goes out every time someone emails me saying ‘I am not in office’
You can choose to say ‘you are not in office’ or can say something more better. Its an art and here are few points you should consider while writing an OOF email (especially if its your business email)
Set up expectation: Your message should be meaningful and should set correct expectation to the person getting your OOF message. If you are leaving your phone number in your OOF email saying ‘call me if urgent’ person at other end would be comfortable calling you in urgent situation.
Specify your OOF Time: Person sending email to you will have much better idea on when he/she should expect a response back. Otherwise he/she might call you up on your cellphone while you are chilling in Hawaii with your family.
Specify your backup: You might want to leave a contact detail of another person in your team in your OOF message, so that person expecting some quick help over email find someone who can actually help at that moment while you are out.
Different Message for different group: Many email clients like MS Outlook Express provides you option of setting different OOF message for different audience( internal/external). You wont want to send an OOF email to your potential customer which reads like this’ contact john@abc.com for this super secret project about invading mars’.
Idea is be simple, short and explanatory. Think about people who might get impacted while you are out, because you might not want your boss to call you in the middle of your vacation to understand how that thing suppose to work.
In the last post I shared about a very high quality photobook which also have one of my submission. On the Book launch day, I got to sign two copies of the book. One of the book would be auctioned starting Oct 4th, 2009 and other book would go around the world to various Microsoft offices ( Beijing, Hyderabad, Dubai, various US offices, canada……….and many more) to get signatures of all the photographers who got shortlisted for this book. Isnt this awesome!
This book is now also part of blurb’s staff pick ( which is like editorial pick).
Below is me holding a hardcopy of this photobook. Order your copy now and help community!
Update: Book is really high quality. How do you know? checkout what press is saying about it
Last year sometime, i bought a DSLR camera so that I can take some nicer pictures of my daughter Pranika. But then I clicked, clicked and clicked. Took around 12,000 photographs of everything around me (well I think my wife have a fair share in these clicks as well).
In a year graduated from somoeone used to of a point & shoot cameras to DSLR cameras (Nikon D40) and then to a more advance offering from Nikon i.e. Nikon D5000. Its a hobby which turned serious. A true hobby i guess.
But then guess what, one of my photographs made it to a very special photo book (out of around other 1000 entries) from Microsoft Employees which is getting released tomorrow. This is special to me because this is not only my first time when a photographs taken by me is getting published into a book, but also because all the profits made out of this book will get donated for social cause.
I am excited to attend the launch party tomorrow where I (along with other contributors) will be signing two copies of these books, one of which get auctioned on the spot and other would go round the world for other contributors to sign-in, to be later auctioned too!
Update: This photo book is now been shortlisted as staff pick by blurb.com equivalent of having editorial choice.
Update: One of the copies I signed is going out for a world tour and would be back in Redmond next year and will be auctioned for charity. We already raised around 16,000 USD for charity as part of giving Campaign.
At eventNu we are using technology to help people find events and more and continuing the effort, last weekend I took a video interview of Startup Weekend founders at Seattle.
I was participating sometime recently in an startup forum and there was usual debate on how to best raise the venture capital or any angel investment and then discussion diverged into one should raise it only when they need it.
Fair enough. This has been said so many times before, but rarely someone has talked about the fact that one should prepare himself/team as if they really need to raise money from market.
Even if you don’t need to raise capital from VC ( which is good for you) there are certain benefits of mocking the idea that you need to raise the money and answering questions a typical VC would seek from you .
It brings discipline in you and your team: I have seen teams running or trying to run their business in a pot-luck style with no plans around why they are investing where they are and how long they will last with their current expenditure velocity. If you do the VC exercise, you and your team would know some facts about your own business and your money. Will help you to run your startup in a more planned manner.
It prepares the team to face and get ready to answer hard questions: VCs are tough nuts and they have to be because they are investing money without actually getting involved into your day to day operations. They pose tough questions and make you think outside all your emotions you have towards the product you are making and/or team you have in place.
It helps you validate: Once you are done with this exercise, I am sure you will end up with clearer vision, clearer milestones, clearer go to market strategy, clearer competitive landscape. ..you would have all your ideas flushed out clean and would be sitting in front of you in written. You can go back to it and validate how you are doing against it.
It actually prepares you ahead of time: Now that you have actually gone through mocking that you need to raise capital from VC, you are well prepared ahead of time( you never know). This would help you for your actual 5-15 minute session with the VC where he/she can figure out if this company has potential to go to next level ( they can actually figure it out sometime in 60 seconds).
I would love to know if there are people or teams which actually do this mock exercise. Also it would be good to know any professionals who can actually spend sometime with these startups and do a VC role play, pose tough questions and potentially guide them through actual fund raising from a VC.
