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We Want To Launch Our Startup With The Most Traction: Startup Dilemma Of The Week

We’re back with another Justdecide.com/Nibletz startup dilemma of the week. We’ve teamed up with justdecide.com to bring crowdsourced startup dilemmas of the week. If you’ve encountered a dilemma in the startup process and need some help figuring out what to do than email info@nibletz.com and we will post your dilemma in this feature.

Today we’re faced with a dilemma that most startups in “stealth mode” face, and that’s how to build traction. First things first we are adamant believers that “stealth mode” for lack of a better word is bullshit. It’s not about the idea as much as it is about the execution. 100% total original ideas, that are going to knock it out of the ballpark from the minute they go live, are rarities. Further more, most startups that go in “stealth mode” have the same problem that this startup has. Obviously, if your idea is so great that it deserves stealth mode, than you should have no problem with traction right?

Well since that’s definitely not true, our startup this week is now worried about how they can develop traction.

Should they:

Send PR pitches out to the top tech publications such as TechCrunch, PandoDaily, Venture Beat, GigaOm, TheNextWeb, etc.

Hire a PR firm to take care of it

Review articles written by different technology journalists in different publications and choose one that we deem a good fit for our product launch

Don’t contact anyone and wait to be contacted once we gain traction and/or a Series A round of funding

What’s your advice for this startup? Please weigh in here for the Justdecide/Nibletz Startup Dilemma Of The Week.

Linkage:

This week’s dilemma

Previous dilemmas

Submit your own dilemma

Israeli Startup: Managed For Mimi Provides Content Solutions For Your Company Brand INTERVIEW

So you’ve got your own company and everyone around you has a blog. This isn’t a new situation for today’s business owner. More and more businesses are adding blogs with actual content as part of their web presence. Content can be anything from a CEO’s daily ramblings, to content related to their business type.

More often then not, you’ll find great travel blog entries on hotel and airfare booking sites. If your favorite insurance agency has a blog they may talk about events they are going to sponsor and insurance needs. If you run a hunting and fishing store your blog may contain your personal hunting and fishing exploits or tips on the best gear to buy.

No matter what your business is, blogging and social media are some of the best ways to market yourself and your company.

The problem faced by most business owners though is that they are too busy to write a blog every week or every month, much less everyday. That’s where startups like “Managed For Mimi” come in. This Israeli startup helps provide, aggregate and churn out branded content for others’ sites.

We got a chance to find out all about this lucrative new startup, growing up in the Startup Nation. Check out our interview with “Managed For Mimi” below, and no we didn’t find out who Mimi is.

South Carolina Startup: OpenMenu Standardizing Restaurant Menu’s Online

It all started over 2 years ago in Columbia South Carolina, over a piece of “death by chocolate” cake. It was Chris Hanscom’s birthday and in like most relationships is wife asked him a simple question, “where do you want to eat tonight?”. It was Hansom’s night and he didn’t really care where he ate, but he wanted a piece of death by chocolate cake.

This search, online and through phone calls, almost brought the death of him (or perhaps his smart phone), but Hanscom was determined to find his favorite piece of cake. What he found was a mess of websites for local restaurants. Some had mobile pages, some had scaled down pages, others had flash that he couldn’t get to load, and still others had text that didn’t look right. When he went to the computer, it was much of the same. There was no consistency in the online menu.

With Hanscom’s battle with the chocolate cake, an idea for OpenMenu was born. Now what Hanscom is proposing is a daunting task and he is well aware of that. He’s hoping to make a platform attractive enough that most restaurants will streamline their menus utilizing the OpenMenu platform.

Lets make this abundantly clear though, Hanscom doesn’t have some groovy restaurant app that he wants to sign restaurants up for, he wants them to JUST streamline their menus. The framework around the websites can remain the same, the graphics are all the restaurants, however the menu part, if streamlined and then tied to an API could become a very welcomed thing for restaurant patrons, and a very lucrative startup for Hanscom.

We got a chance to interview this bold entrepreneur. Check out the interview below:

Drexel Students Launch Philly Startup: Tagitbest

Nicholas Pirollo, a self proclaimed serial entrepreneur and an undergraduate student at Drexel University and his team have launched a new and exciting SEO product. Sure you’re saying what’s new and exciting about an SEO product? Well first off Tagitbest is about Twitter and Instagram, moving SEO to two of the hottest spaces on the planet right now.

Rather than search engine optimization Tagitbest is a “hashtag optimizing engine”. Tagitbest is actually solving a huge problem for people. Take the DNC for instance. We’re on the ground in Charlotte NC operating out of Startup Hub “Packard Place” at the PPL blogger/online journalist lounge. Now in a room full of 500 journalists no one could tell us the “official” hashtag for the DNC on Monday morning. Some are using #DNC2012, some are using #DNC12, Some are just using #DNC and then some are using #obama and #4moreyears.

If you head upstairs to the official Politico convention studios and hub they use their normal tag #Politico and then a different tag for each event that they’re hosting which has been a minimum of 4 events per day. All of these various tags can get a bit confusing, and that’s just for this one event.

Tagitbest will optimize your content, whether it be a picture, tweet or other piece of media and tell you what tag will be best to get your content in front of the most people.

Tagitbest comes in three flavors, web, iOS and Android and you can find their app in both the Google Play Store and the iTunes app store.

The interface is easy to use and as long as you know what a hash tag is you’re in business. Now if you’re a developer they do offer an API as well so that developers can embrace their new backend technology.

Linkage:

Check out Tagitbest here

Nibletz is the voice of startups “everywhere else” here are more startup stories from “everywhere else”

We’re on a nationwide, sneaker-strapped nationwide startup road trip, wanna help?

Canadian Startup: BufferBox Had Amazon Locker Idea A Year Earlier, INTERVIEW

By now we’ve all hearda bout Amazon’s new locker service. Amazon Lockers is a system of lockers at public locations that Amazon customers can use for picking up their packages in a safe, secure and more private area. These lockers are a great idea for people who aren’t home and can’t get home for a daily delivery, and also can’t get personal deliveries at work. They’re also great for those of us that shop for nosy kids and spouses around the holidays. Of course you can read between the lines for other reasons that you may not want your Amazon shipments going to your house.

A Canadian startup called BufferBox, actually had the idea a year earlier. The difference between BufferBox and the Amazon Lockers though, is that online e-commerce channels outside of Amazon can use the service.

When BufferBox co-founder Mike McCauley first heard about Amazon Lockers he was disheartened and felt their idea had been ripped off. He was later able to turn it into a much more positive spin when he said: Amazon “put credibility behind the technology,” McCauley said. “Now there’s a big new market Amazon has created. Because Amazon controls 30% of the e-commerce market, you need a third party to offer the service for everyone else.” to the Wall Street Journal

We got a chance to talk with McCauley ourselves about the service that could easily be utilized by the other 70% of the e-commerce industry.

Check out the interview below:

Politico Hosts Energy & The Presidency Panel At DNC2012

Politico hosted a great panel for lunch today. The panel was called “Energy & The Presidency” and talked about clean energy, solar energy and wind energy which are cornerstones to President Obama’s energy plan for the next four years. The panel included: Kevin Book, the Managing Director at Clearview; Carol Browner, former administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency; Congressman Ed Markley; Former New Mexico Governor and Former Secretary of Energy, Bill Richardson; and the Former Governor of Colorado Bill Ritter Jr.

As you can see Politico provided a powerful line up of speakers who carrier Obama’s message of finding other forms of cleaner, sustainable energy going forward. Conversely, as Congressman Markley pointed out, Mitt Romney’s campaign has just received $6 million dollars from big oil and his energy plan includes oil above all else.

The Republicans have taken to the airwaves to confuse the people when it comes to energy, the costs and the savings. Kevin Book mentioned that “It’s hard for people to see the monetary effects of these energy changes through ads”.

While education is always a big part of bringing home any initiative and the statistics under the current president include a 50% drop in the price of solar energy. Also, before the end of the year 15,000 more megawatts of power will be added to the grid this year and that will come from solar and wind energy exclusively.

If you’re a frequent reader to nibletz or our former site you may be very familiar with Congressman Markley. While Markley sits on the energy committee, and has since 1976, he is very active in the world of privacy and data and also a strong advocate for startups. In fact the entire state of Massachusetts is as well.

Former Secretary Of Energy Richardson pointed out that global energy demand is going to increase 47% over the next five years, so regardless of previous election cycles, energy is very important this year.

Not only is energy an important issue because we need it, it will also fuel jobs for many years to come. From the corporate world, cleaner energy companies will need to hire workers to build infrastructure, wind mills, solar panels etc. On the startup front, even the government is watching the great ideas that are coming from the CleanTech and green space.

Linkage:

More coverage of the DNC

Frequent Traveler Creates Siesta Pillow Startup In Los Angeles INTERVIEW

California based serial entrepreneur and frequent traveller Mark Hill is looking to re-invent the travel pillow. As we all know, most travel pillows are shaped like a U and designed to go around the neck. They are ugly, awkward and have no reasonable place to store them. When you travel with a travel pillow you’re locked into it’s clutches. For many it’s more discomforting that sleeping on a plane or train with no pillow at all, or worse, the “free pillow”.

So on a return flight from Hawaii one day Hill decided he was going to do something about it and did it. Hill knows his market is ripe with over 730 million passengers who boarded domestic flights.

Hill’s pillow is different. He’s found, and many agree, that the most comfortable position to sleep on in a plane is leaning forward. This also goes for buses and trains as well. You pretty much rest your head in your hands or on the seat in front of you. This process can get complicated and uncomfortable for many reasons.

First off the person in front of you controls where their seat is positioned. They could, in mid flight, train ride or bus ride, decide to recline the seat or put it back to it’s upright position, which would discomfort you a great deal. Next, on a plane and some trains there is a tray table in front of you which means your forehead or the top of your head is vibrating against a large plastic or metal object, again not worth the pain that’s going to come from riding that way.

Hill’s pillow is designed to make that position comfortable and insures great rest while traveling. Hill is a serial entrepreneur who’s tried his hand at technology startups and hard goods including water bottles with removable bottoms. This latest invention/startup, Hill is confident will be a big winner.

Check out our interview with Hill below:

Meeting Burner Partners With Startup America For New Member Benefits

The member benefits that Startup America members get when they sign up for Startup America are plentiful. There is a wide range of great businesses resources, tools, literature and more available to Startup America members at deeply discounted rates and sometimes free. Microsoft, Dell and American Airlines are just some of Startup America’s large corporate member partners that are hoping to spur innovation by providing their hardware, and services at discounted rates. (did we mention signing up for Startup America is free?)

The latest company to join the ranks of Startup America member benefits partners is MeetingBurner.

The Startup America partnership has been using MeetingBurner’s platforms to host their educational webinars with top startup ecosystem advocates across the country. Here’s a short list of just a handful of people featured in Starutp America webinars hosted on the MeetingBurner platform:

SEOmoz CEO Rand Fishkin
Rebecca Corliss (Head of Social Media at HubSpot)
Eric Jackson (CEO CapLinked/PayPal),
Jason Best & Sherwood Neiss (founders of Startup Exemption and two of the key guys who pushed the Crowdfunding bill through Congress)
Ingrid Vanderveldt (Entrepreneur and Dell’s first Entrepreneur in Residence)
Don Charlton (CEO The Resumator)
Tristan Walker (Andreesen Horrowitz/Former BD at Foursquare),
Tony Tjan (Founder CueBall VC firm/HBS Author)

Now, Startup America member companies can use the same webinar platform for their own webinars and web meetings. MeetingBurner is offering a 25% discount on MeetingBurner Pro or Premium for Startup America members.

To get started just sign up for Startup America at their website s.co and if you’re already a member look for it in your member dashboard alongside the numerous other great benefits.

Linkage:

Meetingburner is here

StartupAmerica is here

And we’re “everywhere else”

Uber Hits Mega Capacity In Charlotte At The DNC 2012 And Issues Uber Users Credits

As our long time readers know Uber is the only Valley based startup that we cover on nibletz.com we do this because they are building out their business across the country and around the world, and each new Uber city is treated as it’s own business. We’ve got great ties to Uber in Washington DC, and New York as well as in San Francisco.

So picture this, we were at the huge StartupRockon, Startup America party last night featuring The Roots and Uber started tweeting away from their special Uber DNC Twitter account. Uber isn’t officially in Tampa or Charlotte but they’ve put together “pop up” Uber shops for both the DNC and the RNC (last week in Tampa).

Anyway, back to the story. I was standing in line and I was actually next for a Taxi when low and behold a small group of people runs out in the street and jumps my cab. When I confront the gentleman in the group about taking my cab he politely tells me to use Uber and gives me one of their “black cards” that we’ve come to know and love here. Well, ok I’ll take that $20 Uber trip and use it in DC or New York. As for tonight though, I found it alarmingly odd that the Uber team was getting in a yellow taxi.

As I had found out earlier in the day Uber was extremely backed up. Around 2pm on Monday afternoon I was able to get an Uber ride with minimal effort and a mild 40 minute wait. Last night though at midnight we started getting messages that Uber was way over capacity and they were sorry.

An email from Max arrived in my box with an additional credit for trying to use Uber last night and failing miserably.

Of course the story here is the great job, no make that phenomenal job Uber has done looking after their customers (except for jacking my taxi last night). It’s that same die hard enthusiasm for their customer base that has them fighting cities around the country so that they can deliver an uber good Uber experience.

As for getting Uber at the convention, it may be tough, but this morning I waited two hours for a cab so do whatever you can and stay hydrated.

Linkage:

More DNC 2012 coverage from Nibletz here

Follow Uber’s pop up shop here @uber_dnc2012

Here’s Uber’s DNC 2012 page

Swedish Startup: Studemia Is A Collaboration Platform For Students INTERVIEW

We are finding more and more great educational, student facing startups, are coming from overseas. Take Prague startup MySchoolNotebook for instance. Their platform allows students to easily take notes, share notes, sync notes and reference notes on and offline, digitally, in a super easy to use platform and a graphically appealing UI.

Today, we’ve got an interview with Swedish Startup Studemia which allows students to collaborate in a Google Wave/Asana type fashion with the focus being on students in either college or high school.

Now you can collaborate with friends and schoolmates in the same class or across the ocean. As they explain in the interview below it’s a seamless sharing platform for students to share resources and keep projects organized.

Studemia allows students to organize projects by project or by course. Also, just about any kind of media can be uploaded to the platform.

They’ve built the platform for students by students. Studemia’s co-founders; Vilhelm Josander, Per Almhorn and Markus Sackemark are all students themselves and realized the need for a platform like this, specifically geared towards students, quickly and have been working on it ever since.

Check out our interview below:

Lithuanian Startup: Vidiget, Teach Or Learn Anything INTERVIEW

Lithuanian startup Vidiget is all about peer to peer learning. Whether you have a skill you want to learn or you have a skill you want to teach, Vidiget is the platform to help do that.

In this day and age it’s so hard for people to take courses after work. Now it’s easier to learn and teach things online where you can have 1:1 time with the teacher and at the same time you don’t have to leave the comfort o your own home. Whether you’re looking to learn how to crochet, make biodiesel fuel, the importance of Twitter, how to draw, how to play guitar or any other form of learning and teaching, Vidiget is the platform to do that.

In the U.S. we have California startup TeachMeo doing just about the same thing. It will be interesting, to say the least, to see what happens if Vidiget expands outside of Europe.

The idea for Vidiget came when Vidiget’s co-founder Vytis Duknauskas was teaching himself how to program. He wanted to teach himself all kinds of programming but found he could also benefit from legitimate courses. However, what he found was either too expensive or didn’t pass his litmus test for a course he could take and the learn something.

Check out our interview with Duknauskas below:

StartupRockingon With StartupRockon At The DNC

It’s been a festive night in Charlotte North Carolina. While many started partying like a democrat Friday evening, StartupRockon and StarutpAmerica along with MassChallenge have kicked off their presence at the StartupRockon party tonight featuring national recoding act The Roots.

The party has had some great people from startup ecosystems throughout the country, Luke Rafenstahl the Mayor of Pittsburgh is a huge startup advocate and he arrived early for the festivities.

Our awesome social media liaison for the StartupAmerica partnership Anna Eisenberg along with Kathleen Warner the COO of Startup America and the partnerships Communications Director, Chris Roche have been talking innovation all night.

The Publisher of Hypervocal, and founder of StartupRockon, Lee Brenner has done an exceptional job of organizing these events in a short amount of time. Brenner pointed out on stage this evening that this is just the startup of StartupRockon at the Democratic National Convention. More programming including panels with StartupAmerica CEO Scott Case and Huffington Post Publisher Arianna Huffington kick off tomorrow morning.

As for The Roots they’ve been tearing the roof off the mother sucka tonight kicking off the party with a tribute to The Beastie Boys MCA and the godfather of DC GoGo Chuck Brown. A Roots version of Paul Revere complete with vocals from MCA and a mad GoGo swing kicked off their set.

We’ll be here all week reporting all the startup goodness from the must attend political event of the last four years the Democratic National Convention.

Linkage:

More of our DNC 2012 Coverage Here

Interview With Chilean Startup: Imatag

If you own a blog or any other web-based business that produces content than you may want to pay attention to what Chilean startup Imatag is doing. Imatag is making it as simple as it is to tag photos on social networks like Facebook on your WordPress, blogger, or other blogging website,

You may want to tag people from your company, celebrities, dignitaries or others and now you can with the ease and simplicity of Imatag.

The second part of the Imatag platform is a robust analytics set that allows you to track tags and see directly how people are interacting with your web content. This startup based in Santiago Chile and was founded by Nicolas Valenzuela, and Magdalena Maino.

We got a chance to interview Valenzuela. Check out the interview below:
Read More…

Humanity.TV Named Finalist In Startup America Contest INTERVIEW

Startup America teamed up with American Airlines for a huge contest. The grand prize in Flights, Camera, Action is a prize package which includes 80 round trip flights. Of course for any startup or entrepreneur this would be a great prize. Most startups need flights to get to important conferences or investor meetings. Humanity.TV, a New York startup, has something else in mind.

Humanity.TV is a technology startup that’s using technology, specifically video, to travel around the country and around the world and show the human side of life in the 21st century. They take a brief look into the lives of fascinating people. Obviously that seems like a daunting task.

“Our messaging and overarching goal is authenticity. We try to find people that have intriguing lifestyles and live passionately, regardless of their popularity or fame. Ultimately, we want to inspire people to visit countries around the world and get off the beaten tourist path to encounter unique experiences with people that will have long-lasting impacts on them.” Humanity.tv co-founder Gaston Blanchet told nibletz.com in an interview.

Humanity.tv strives to capture the lives of fascinating people in obtrusive ways, for a more natural look at the world we live in today.

Of course with a startup like this the lack of capital to travel is definitely a hardship (we know about that first hand). They’re hoping that if they win the Startup America/American Airlines Flights, Camera, Action contest, they can use the flights to continue working on their story telling video platform.

The contest kicked off in July with a video from Startup America CEO Scott Case. The contesting period went through August 20th and the finalists were announced earlier this week.

We got a chance to interview Blanchet their startup as well as the contest and the Startup America partnership. Check out the interview below: