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We all get paid to sell our products. The best sales advice used to be "Always Be Closing" but that's not always true in Internet marketing. Too often, we've become so focused on selling our product right at that moment—Buy Now! 70% off!— that we sound more like carnival barkers than people truly interested in solving our customer's problems. (And guess which approach works better with customers on the Internet.) To see how to re-orient your thinking to use search marketing in the most optimal way, check out my latest post on Search Engine Guide, "Stop Selling Your Products!"

When angel investor Chris Sacca announced the launch of his new investment firm Lowercase Capital on Friday, he positioned the news with a lengthy essay - the firm's "creed" - titled "Venture Capital is Broken."

In it, Sacca observes that ten years ago, it cost over a million dollars for a tech business to launch, with steep hardware, software, office, and Internet costs, not to mention the "lavish parties so print media would write about their pipe dreams."

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Lowercase Capital's Creed

But today, it is far easier and far less expensive for entrepreneurs to design, code, and launch web services. But, Sacca writes, "many traditional VC funds have been loath to admit this reality and downsize their five hundred million dollar hauls. Why? They are paid fees based upon their total amount of money managed, thus there is no incentive for them to be smaller. Yet, as they try to inject those piles of money into early stage companies, interests become misaligned and an inherent conflict between the investor and the founder often arises. Fund returns, the companies, the entrepreneurs, and the users all suffer as a result."

Sacca contends that Lowercase Capital recognizes the shift in the tech and investment landscape and that the firm offers more than just investment and money management. "We dive in to work with teams that obsess over user experiences, customer happiness, and that, to quote Paul Graham, 'make something people want.' Along with relatively small amounts of money, we give them the time, attention, and the empathy tha/> [...]

Sun Jun 20, 2010 15:20 pm

Exactly one year ago today, a product that was supposed to represent a new and innovative means of communication debuted at Google I/O.  Now, Google's celebrating Wave's first birthday by trying to convince a few more people to give the tech a chance.

That observation isn't necessarily meant to slight Google Wave or the team behind it; almost any time a company chooses to commemorate something, one purpose must be to attract new users (and/or reengage old ones).  It's just that an official blog post concerning Wave's birthday focused more on promoting it than distributing stickers or some other nonsense.

Anna-Christina Douglas, a product marketing manager at Google, appealed to ordinary individuals by writing, "[T]he ways I use Wave aren't revolutionary or groundbreaking - I communicate about everyday things, but it is these incredibly ordinary and important communications that are transformed in unexpected ways when you use Wave."

She later added, "I've been struck by the really personal nature of communicating and working together in Wave, and the emotional response people have to their first uniquely wavey experience, what we call the 'Wave a-ha moment.' . . .  You really do have to try it to believe it, though - so if you checked out Google Wave six months ago and found yourself at a bit of a loss, take another look."

Happy first birthday to Google Wave, then, and here's hoping the rest of you have a good Memorial Day weekend.

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Sat May 29, 2010 20:50 pm

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Yahoo Reports Impressive First-Quarter Profits

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Yahoo's first-quarter earnings report is out, and it looks like the company got off to a decent start this year.  Most of Yahoo's key financial stats either measured up to or exceeded analysts' estimates, and the company's stock hasn't plummeted in after-hours trading.

To be clear: Yahoo reported $1.13 billion in revenue, while analysts thought it would bring in more like $1.17 billion.  And Yahoo's stock is down 2.50 percent at the moment.

It's important to remember, though, that Google's stock pretty much plunged after it beat most forecasts last week (down 4.51 percent at around 5:25 PM), so in that sense, Yahoo's in good shape.

Also, Yahoo reported net income of $310 million - which is quite a lot compared to the consensus estimate of $118 million - along with earnings per share of $0.22 versus the consensus estimate of $0.09.

It might not be unreasonable, then, that Carol Bartz said in a statement, "We had a good quarter . . . .  Thanks to our efforts, our search share has stabilized, and we grew display advertising by 20% year over year.  More importantly, guaranteed display grew by 24% as advertisers took advantage of the science, art and scale that only Yahoo! can offer."

Yahoo expects that the second quarter could turn out even better, too, projecting an increase in revenue.

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Tue Apr 20, 2010 14:25 pm

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