Burnout is the worst. There is nothing quite like it. You go from performing at 100% to less than 50% and there is nothing you can do to boost your output. Not even caffeine helps. I remember the first time I experienced burnout. We had just attended a trade show in Toronto. The months prior…
Read More Burnout kills. 7 simple ways to overcome burnout learned from personal experience!Here are three of the things I would have done differently when originally founding my startup had I started with the knowledge and experience that I have today. Testing grounds. Originally when we developed our products we never really tested them. Instead, we built our products to work the way we imagined they would and then…
Read More 3 simple ways we could have built our startup faster and cheaper!I watched this fantastic video by the guys behind Flight of the Conchords, a hilarious duo folk band by Bret and Jemaine. I’m sure most of you are familiar with their TV show Flight of the Conchords, a self-defeatist comical satire, if you aren’t be sure to watch some of the episodes. These guys got involved…
Read More Crowd sourcing customers 101
Vancouver Grow Conference 2012
I’ve had a crazy week. Steve, Angela and I have been asking ourselves very important questions like, “What are the needs of our customers?” And we have struggled to come up with definitive answers. Last friday we sat around our boardroom with beers and taco chips hashing out the different layers of our customers needs.…
Read More When luck meets learning is the outcome different?About 3 weeks ago I wrote an article about remote teams. It’s a new experiment for us and so far it is working out well. But being only a short while into it, it’s really too soon to call it successful. However, there is a secret here that I believe will make it successful. Focus.…
Read More The power of focusAs of yesterday, our company, Simple Engine [media], has embarked on a new journey, remote teams. We still have our main office, the HQ, with our core team working from there. We are just excited to add some new members to our team, who will be working remotely. Remote teams brings with it some big…
Read More Remote teamsNote: Building a startup myself, I have heard a lot about the “chasm” that exists between aquiring your first early adopters versus attracting the early majority of your market. But, I have heard almost nothing about how to cross it. I hope this will help inspire some people to tell their stories. I read a great…
Read More Crossing “the chasm” by telling your storyI recognize the “commandments” as summaries from the book Steve Jobs by Isaacson. It’s an interesting book, I would recommend reading it if you have the time. I wrote another post about some of the takeaways that I thought were worth sharing from the book. Overall it’s an interesting snapshot into the life of Steve…
Read More The 10 commandments of Steve JobsI used to think that one guy (or girl) with a great idea could change the world. I’m an optimist, so I still believe it is possible, but my view is changing. I learned pretty early on in my job experience that if you believe you can do something, you can do it. When I…
Read More Executing ideas: The power of one… great teamGoogle is literally punishing sites for bad SEO habits. Not just black hat tactics, but all non-ethical spammy techniques. (The grey area stuff). On April 24th of this year Google unleashed the Penguins. Here’s a link to Google’s official announcement. Any serious Google update gets a name. There was Google Caffeine, when Google started to…
Read More Don’t get punished for bad SEO