Skip to main content

The Startup Experience

I spend a lot of time with new and aspiring business owners and I think it's ti to start sharing some of my experiences. This past weekend, for example, I got to work on a new business concept called Cash Age. It was part of Startup Weekend, where I have met many bright minds overflowing with talent.

Cash Age is a work in progress, but as it's content driven for now, it shouldn't be hard to keep up on. It was a fun project proposed by another individual, Gil but taken over by my small team when he couldn't stay the weekend. Cash Age is an entrepreneurial program that enables kids of any age to make extra money, network their abilities in their community and link in to advanced tools and resources. With Cash Age, an end user can study different opportunities in affiliate sales, traditional neighborhood chores and advanced programs like how to make money with a timeshare.

The team that built Cash Age came together at Startup Weekend, a global phenomena that brings together talent in development, design and marketing. Games are played, mentors give speeches and resources are provided so that the teams created througCash Age is cute, with the basic concept illustrated and the ability to make most people laugh. It's what I wanted and that three of their team members were able to do this plus an interview video, the original music in the Emma video and the logo  in less than two days is more than encouraging and I'm excited about a growing partnership.

h popular vote are able to be launch ready after 54 hours of work. This year, I attended Startup Weekend Ogden. I went mostly to have an opportunity to work with Burning Tree Media, a company in Ogden that has that talent I mentioned before. With an inspired and individually motivated team, their work is able to move and stimulate. One of the two videos they made for

The other really cool experience at the three day event was to get to know Amenah, a U of  U student on scholarship from Cairo. She has been working at my office occasionally and chose to come to Startup Weekend, pitch an idea and she did an amazing job! She led a team of professional developers to create Refer Me, a program for self promotion and quality hiring based on referrals. I get to tell her teacher how supportive the crowd was of her idea, how hard she worked (we even slept on the couch in the venue) and how great her developed product was.

Startup Weekend is a great place to meet new people, find new additions to your referral network and to gain access to mentors and feedback you don't get when you operate solo. I got to see Jimmy Jacobsen from Las Vegas and Sean Hess who was the team lead last time. These plus many other familiar faces made it a fun event. I have to admit, my team could have done a lot better with the execution, but we had a few factors affecting a few team members so I just let everyone interact as they wanted and tried to facilitate helping my team get what they actually wanted out of the Startup Weekend in addition to working on a fun project that I believe is a cool tool for kids and possibly, adults.

It's been almost a week since the event was over and I'm now promoting the concept via the Startup Global Battle. I'm confident I won't win the awesome competition, but I'm exposing people to the idea and getting additional validation and feedback as I go. I've also been busy with actual work. Here are a couple articles I've posted this weekend. The one about PLSP is part of a multi platform / multi media campaign that launched on Black Friday.

5 tips when using PLSP
SLC Team Needs Your Vote


Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Clearing out your spaces

For the last part of 2011, I suggest on my Facebook page and will duplicate the suggestion here, that you clean out your spaces. From offices to people, from thoughts to visualizations, it's time to clean up anything that stands between you and your goals for the future. 2012 is going to be monumental-where do you want to be? Head into that office space, tackle the filing cabinet and get an orderly system together so that you can be successful and calm while you complete tasls and meet goals. You will feel better and more focused if you know where your working items are and your space will be supportive of you meeting your goals and making it through obstacles. Put up an old fashioned calendar to keep you reminded of important dates and meeting times before they get there. Think of what you will need to succeed and contact anyone you could use for advice and mentoring. Your thoughts will create your reality and if there are any blank spaces or questions, use your social media or ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Past My Limit or Internal Lies. Three tips on personal motivation.

Every time I say to myself that I have reached my limit or that I'm past my limit, I have the instant emotional response that it's just not true. Like most, throughout my life I've had a variety of experiences, some pretty harsh trials and many lessons in endurance and perseverance. Here's a few tips on how to keep going when you feel there is no possible way you can. 1. Ignore reality. Not completely, but in some ways ignore the elements that make you feel there is no way out. Relationships that are ending, finances that are drained and the faith of others in your talents that has just run out are all real and actual problems. In personal and professional realms, there are times when you just can't see moving forward nor feel you have the strength to do so. I suggest you ignore it a little and get out of your current perspective. I can recall the day I drove into Millcreek Broadcasting, a small Utah radio group, to apply for a job. At twenty two I hadn't h...
1 comment
Read more

Social Networking

I am a frequent visitor of Sedona , AZ. My favorite past time is to visit the Shambalah Healing Center, home to the Llama's and Ani's in assistance to the Buddah Maitreya. I have had the opportunity to hear the words of Llama Ian, who helped to calm me at a difficult time. I heard the words of The Buddah , which helped me to understand my relations and their value. I don't have an exact quote, however, the basis of The Buddah's comment was how technology and modern communications have altered and sped up the human relationship. Where it used to take us months or years to have a conversation across long distances-the phone, the cell phone, pager, text and internet have sped us up. We can now have real-time conversations with the masses-without using our voice, resources or going anywhere. This enables us to know more people, get to know them faster, extract the value from a relationship in a shorter period of time and-yes, move on. What does all this have to do with...
1 comment
Read more