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GH in the news- @Grasshopper
- Look for Grasshopper co-founder @dh and Ambassador of Buzz @GrasshopperBuzz at #sxsw
- Nice! RT @scobes: @GrassHopper Aspiring photographer took a picture I thought you'd enjoy. Covered in chocolate? http://bit.ly/bP1YMm
- @MichaelFraietta - Choose "Save Link As" and it will save as an MP3
Entrepreneurs Archive
Empowering Young Entrepreneurs to Succeed – GH Goes to DECA
High school kids rock. Especially the ones I had the pleasure of meeting last week at the Massachusetts State DECA Conference in downtown Boston. DECA is an organization that aims to empower young people to pursue careers in marketing, management, and entrepreneurship through education and leadership development events. 185,000 high schools students participate through 5,000 chapters across the U.S.
Along with my colleagues, Jeremy Butler (DECA alumni) and Jon Kay, I served as a judge in the Entrepreneurship category and Grasshopper donated scholarships for the top three participants in our category. The scholarships we gave will help out the winners of our category with travels costs for the DECA National conference. Over the course of three days, we each heard from between ten and fifteen groups of young entrepreneurs who pitched us their entrepreneurial ventures. Their businesses ranged from internet properties to landscaping companies and everything in between. The vast majority were outstanding.
We were also given the opportunity to do a couple of workshops on Friday afternoon. Jonathan presented on generating buzz and Jeremy and I teamed up for a workshop on the basics of ecommerce. The workshops were well received, but at that point I think our audience was ready to go to the pool or go shopping.
These were some of the most ambitious, smart, and outstanding young people I’ve met in a long time. When I was 18, I was, well, not doing anything close to what these kids are achieving. I was impressed by not only the events’ organization and production quality, but also by the sheer size. Read more »
Save $$$ with a Virtual Office
A virtual office can be a great asset for any small business. It can be even more valuable for an entrepreneur just getting a company up and running. With the economy still struggling and everyone working hard to stay profitable, cost-cutting measures are vital.
A virtual office can help you save money in three main areas:
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Office Space
Whether you are working from home, a coffee shop or a co-working space, you can save a lot of money by not leasing out a big office. There are no costs for rent, furniture, office equipment or utilities.
Even more importantly, if you find yourself traveling a lot, working from home or just not spending much time in the office, you are not locked into a lease.
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Travel Expenses
With the average cost of commuting ranging from $110-$648 a month, traveling to work can be expensive. You have gas, maintenance and for some, tolls.
Hey Jay-Z, Meet the New Dork in ‘Entrepreneur State of Mind’
The official music video of entrepreneurs everywhere. Enjoy.
Download the MP3 (right click on link)
Entrepreneurship, It’s Personal
Nash Kabbara, co-founder of Motors On Wheels and ZipZoomAuto provides insight on building and sustaining a business.
About Me
When I was about 12 years old, mom would stop the car at the local bakery; I would jump out with a pocket full of change and buy a dozen pastries. It’s Sunday, family dinner day, and I knew what everyone’s favorite pastry was. I also
knew which uncles had the most money and which ones did not. As everyone was finishing up their dinners, I set up a table and marked each pastry with a price. Needless to say, the uncles who drove BMW’s had the highest markup!
I’ve always wanted to make a billion dollars by creating something that makes people better at what they do. At my last job I thought I was doing just that, but I was wrong. I cut my losses and quit with about $10,000 in the bank.
Sustainability
Ten thousand dollars might look like it has enough zeroes in it, but it doesn’t go very far. I needed a way to stay afloat while I waited for the billion dollar idea to come to me.
A friend of mine was in the car business. He suggested I buy a car from him at wholesale and resell it myself. I did. I made $1,300 in about 5 hours of actual work!
“Entrepreneurs Can Change the World” Video Helps Charity
Something very cool happened recently, and I wanted to share it will all of you.
In May of 2009 we created a video that inspired and motivated entrepreneurs across the globe to follow their passion. Our video is nearing 350,000 views, and has been translated into over 4 different languages. A very interesting (and fun) reaction to this video was the blitz of phone calls and inquiries we received. Being the employee whose phone number is posted on the website, you can imagine I took the brunt of these calls. I heard everything from “Can I use this at our conference?” to “Can we use your video and just put our logo at the end?” (shame on the person who asked that).
Months later in December of last year I got a call from an IP lawyer over at Nestle (yes the people who make Nesquik, Butterfinger, and KitKat!). Apparently they loved our video and music so much they wanted to use it for an internal video. We weren’t super open to people using our music, and just changing the words around a little as we didn’t want what started as, a jolt of inspiration for entrepreneurs, to be tainted.
However, they brought an interesting offer to the table…they were willing to give us money in exchange for our cooperation.
Give Your Customers a Great Online Experience
If you’re lucky enough to get found in Google, a major differentiating factor between you and your competition could be the user experience you’re providing for current and potential customers on your website. I know it sounds simple, but think of all the really bad websites you’ve been to lately. There are too many. Do you know what your customers think of yours?
The caveat is that most of us aren’t web designers or user experience professionals. We’re entrepreneurs who are kicking the tires every day to take our businesses to the next level. Who has time to test or get feedback from customers?
There are no excuses anymore.
We’re excited to announce today a partnership with UserTesting.com, a fantastic service that we use ourselves here at Grasshopper to make sure we’re delivering the best user experience to our customers.
It’s simple and affordable. UserTesting.com has a panel of pre-screened users (matching demographic information you supply) who will record themselves using your website while they speak their thoughts and give you feedback on their experience. You learn where they get confused and what they like and don’t like on your site.
The Grasshopper 2010 Entrepreneur State of Mind Survey
Today we launched the “2010 Entrepreneur State of Mind Survey” designed to learn more about you, the entrepreneur.
Yes, there are a number of boring surveys out there on entrepreneurship but nothing dedicated to finding out about your lifestyle, how you think, who you are and what keeps you up at night.
The survey will take you less than 6 minutes and might even give you a laugh or two.
Plus, if you tweet it with the hashtag #entrepreneursurvey you earn a chance to win an iPhone or Netbook.
Featured Entrepreneur: Allan Branch of LessAccounting
This week we are featuring Allan Branch. He’s the co-founder of LessAccounting and also a Grasshopper customer.
Could you explain the philosophy of Less?
We believe business software should easy. It should get out of your way, allowing you to get back to work and make money. Being a business owner is hard enough without having your software make it harder.
I’d love to hear more about your path to entrepreneurship. What were you guys doing before you started Less?
I was a freelance designer and Steve was a contractor doing software engineering. We both were looking for each other we just didn’t realize it at the time.
I’d like to focus on LessAccounting for a second. In college, I had to take this awful accounting class where we learned Peachtree accounting software. After this experience, I vowed to stay as far away from accounting as I could. How does LessAccounting help a guy like me (who can barely add)?
We like to say all bookkeeping software sucks we just suck the least. Bookkeeping should be easy, after all it’s really just adding and subtracting. LessAccounting keeps things simple, organizing your data, showing you where you’re at, who owes you money, who you owe money to, and then having a variety of reports that make it easy to understand your business. We also have bookkeepers on staff ready to help you if you have questions and even help balance your books for you. Ask Intuit or Peachtree to help you do a bank reconciliation.
Grasshopper & Web 2.0 Show Partner to Help Entrepreneurs
Grasshopper and the Web 2.0 Show have teamed up to help entrepreneurs like you promote your business.
“Pitch the Show” is a new element to the Web 2.0 Show that gives ANY person the chance to be featured on the show! You will have the opportunity to talk about your business in front of a large audience as well as a monthly special guest who has left their mark in the entrepreneurial world. It’s a great opportunity to gain exposure and extremely simple:
“Call 1-888-WEB20SHOW and give your best 90 second pitch about your business.”
Two pitches will be selected each month and along with exposure on the Web 2.0 Podcast, you will be featured on the Grasshopper blog.
It’s important to remember that Twitter is a big part of this contest as well. By engaging @grasshopper and @web20show on Twitter you can actually influence your chances of getting featured. Here at Grasshopper, listening is a really big part of what we do, and that is why we will be tracking hashtag #pitchtheshow, so make sure to tag your tweets!
For more information check out Web 2.0 Pitch the Show and start pitching your business!
Three Pieces of Any Good Referral Program
A referral program is one simple marketing initiative that can be a cost effective move for any small business. One of the reasons Grasshopper is so successful is due to our Refer An Entrepreneur program and our great customers.
On every page of the Grasshopper.com site, we have a navigation element that allows users to click on the link, fill in the form and send a $25 credit to their fellow Entrepreneur, encouraging them to sign up for the Grasshopper virtual phone system.
The Word of Mouth Marketing theory dictates that once you have the customer in the door, it’s much easier to convert them to a paying customer, especially if their friend sent them in the first place. By comparison to the COA (Cost Of Acquisition ) from search, online advertising, print, TV, and radio, it’s a no brainer. In addition, if this new customer now endorses you to his or her friends, it causes a ripple effect.
