A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

DECEMBER 21, 2009

I've found that "virtual assistance" services (like Four Star Service in Austin) are surprisingly affordable if you have a lot of little time-consuming tasks. Bookkeeping is like that. Get it off your plate; you'll feel better. Mundane tasks might be outsourceable.

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A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

OCTOBER 14, 2014

(Let’s not get into exactly what sort of “shingle” is hanging out with the oldest profession …) This past weekend, WP Engine hung its shingle as well, but this time it’s so much more meaningful, and not just because this building doesn’t have rats: I grew up in Austin.

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RSS Engineer Metrics Government 309

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

JUNE 12, 2012

” Food on the Table — a now-famous lean juggernaut in Austin run by IMVU alum Manuel Rosso — talked to 120. At AppSumo , another Austin startup with startling growth, Noah Kagan ( this guy and that guy ) talked to 0 people initially, but maintains ruthless pressure on a tight and measurable product.

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Customer Customer Development Dilution Engineer 252

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

FEBRUARY 26, 2010

I'm a mentor and investor in CapitalFactory , a seed-stage startup mentorship program in Austin, TX. Help me spread the word about this program! Each year we pick 5 companies to participate in a 10-week summer program which includes: 20 real mentors.

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Seed Stage Startup PR Programming 211

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

JUNE 21, 2010

On the rare occasion that it rains in Austin we get these deep puddles in the backyard. Your A/B tests are trapped in a cesspool when they should be in the sewer.? Do you really care why A/B testing is analogous to unwanted liquids? Not yet, so I'd better get right to the point.

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Metrics Austin Global Audience 233

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

SEPTEMBER 8, 2010

Keepstream is one of the five Capital Factory companies graduating today at Demo Day here in Austin. With their new web tool you can collect tweets and snippets, arrange as nicely-formatted collections, then share directly or embed in blog posts as I've done below.

Liquidation Preference 216

Liquidation Preference Silicon Valley Startup Software 216

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

APRIL 29, 2013

But since you don’t, in my experience (and in a non-scientific survey of some of the 100 startups currently officing at the fabulously Capital Factory co-working space in Austin), a good pre-data rule of thumb is 20 months.

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Bootstrapping Affiliate Cofounder Channel 285

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

OCTOBER 25, 2010

Aaron picked up, moved to Austin, and has already been instrumental to our success thus far. Aaron could have joined (or startup) any number of startups, but he liked WPEngine because he wanted to do a startup with me. And he wanted to do a startup with me because the blog belied my attitude, perspective, and credentials.

Reputation 229

Reputation Hosting DC Social Media 229

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

APRIL 9, 2012

Here’s some tactics for blogging that I stumbled into, and my Ignite Austin presentation (5 minute video) about the broader lessons I learned. Talk about the social media echo chamber!) Of course, that worked. At 1000 subscribers I should have felt like a success — when viewed from 51 it sure seemed like it would feel that way.

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New York Ruby Social Media RSS 248

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

MARCH 20, 2012

And I’m in Austin, not San Jose, where there’s 100x fewer customers I could land at meetups. And there’s no Twitter or Facebook (or even a strong culture of blogging) to enable my few zealous fans to spread the word.

San Jose 233

San Jose Hosting Bootstrapping Engineer 233

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

JANUARY 28, 2014

You can’t “automate” responding to a complaint on social media, which as our Twitter meister Austin Gunter says is usually a customer’s last resort and thus should always be treated as the very legitimate issue that it is. You can’t “automate” a knowledgable, friendly customer support team.

Technical Review 275

Technical Review Social Media Engineer Cost 275

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

DECEMBER 20, 2010

Startup founders in my town of Austin were the most obvious target because it was easy to take them to lunch. Of course I'm the first one to say that unless you can find ten people who will actually give you money , you have a hobby, not a company. So that's exactly what I did. I got meetings with everyone I could find.

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Startup Campaign Turkey Customer Development 239

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

SEPTEMBER 4, 2012

So actually I have been advising a company in Austin, who is also in the music industry; and they actually started with an idea not dissimilar from what you described, but they are not doing it now. That’s not ever going to happen. Those kinds of industries are very much who do you know and that kind of stuff, unfortunately.

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Cofounder Technical Review Chicago Technical Cofounder 199

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

JUNE 6, 2011

To see why, here’s a trick question: A person P living in Austin, Texas voted in the 2008 American presidential election for either Barak Obama or John McCain. But we also know P lives in Austin, and Austin is a blue pimple in the red sea of the south. If you had to make a bet, who did P vote for?

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Startup Texas Cofounder Austin 234

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

JULY 19, 2010

Photodex is a little company you've never heard of I worked for in Austin in the 90's. Google's search algorithm was just better, therefore they won the eyeballs, therefore they were able to monetize. Sure Bing and Yahoo are good now , but the advantage lasted long enough.

Software Review 325

Software Review Technical Review Development Team Review Bolivia 325

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

JULY 25, 2011

This is a rough transcript of a talk I delivered recently at the start of Startup Weekend in Austin. Startup Weekend is a friendly competitive event in which teams of 3-5 build a startup from scratch over the course of a single intense weekend.

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Startup Algorithm Design Salary 284

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

OCTOBER 24, 2011

” Introduced a few months ago as an Austin event, I’m now doing this live audio advice column to the web, taking phone calls from startups around the country. It’s Episode 3 my little “ Loveline for startups. My co-hosts were Bob Walsh and Patrick Foley , hosts of the well-known Startup Success Podcast.

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Cofounder Technical Review Software Review Differentiation 208

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

AUGUST 8, 2012

Jared: Between $25 and $50 a month. Jason: All right.

API 220

API Software Review Hosting Technical Review 220