Category: web 2.0

Thanks for getting in touch!

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

Got this email back from a company that sells custom t-shirts on the web called Neighbourhoodies after I sent in an email query. 

Dear Steve,

We at Neighborhoodies think Curiosity is an underrated virtue, so thank you for writing in. This email is merely to confirm that your question or comment has been successfully received. 

Here is your ticket number:

 http://www.neighborhoodies.com/ticket_view.php?tlid=8L4Q4I 

Ticket Number: 8L4Q4I0s3E8uxyt  

It is a meaningless number and you do not need it. Nevertheless, please print out this number, memorize it, then shred the number into pieces and eat it. Chew first. If at that moment your phone rings, it’s us. Let the phone ring twice then speak the code in Swiss-German, or make guttural sounds to indicate you are choking on the shredded bits.

Thank you. 

Sincerely, Neighborhoodies 

It tells me so much about them, their values, that they’re human and they have a sense of humour. All the things that ‘real people’ have and corporate facades do not.

Cost – zero. Value – infinite.  

Kudos Neighbourhoodies.

Spreading the ‘Green’ word

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

This is where I request the assistance of my loyal readers….

 

I’ve blogged about the recent launch of rentoid.

Rentoid is very green. The basic concept is to encourage people to rent items from each other, rather than buy them. Net result being same lifestyle with less consumption. The climate crisis is really a symptom, not the problem. Hence, I’d really appreciate a little help in spreading the green word on rentoid

The request is simply to help us get it on the eco radar / blogisphere / community. Sure there’s, something in it for rentoid – but there’s something in it for the community and the environement. Be sure to let us know or comment below on any ideas / actions taken.

Of course the acid test is how many start up blog readers believe it deserves the exposure. This will help us determine if we’ve got it right.

Attitude

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

We are modern day entrepreneurs. We cut new ground and bring change. We need to act a little bit like rockstars – rockstars of a new genre. Like rockstars we need self belief which borders upon arrogance.

We need attitude. We can’t fake it.

We can’t act like employees

Employees are conformists

Conformists never change the world

We’re bringing change

We are not conformists

Overnight success

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

It’s seems facebook has taken the title as the latest overnight success. It’s a choice whether or not entrepreneurs become jealous or inspired. We ought to take the inspired route.

 facebook-mark-zuckerberg.jpg 

The thing about most overnight success stories is that they’re usually a few years in the making. And so it is for Facebook. Facebook actually launched in early 2004 and has been almost 4 years in the making. Mark Zuckerberg didn’t whip it together a few months ago. You can get a little history here.

What this means, is that you might be working on the next overnight success -now, it’s just that no one knows it yet. If so, you’ll be all the rage in 2010.

Stay the course. Be patient.

Clustering

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

Here’s a live example of niche marketing in action.

 

At rentoid we are currently implementing a niche strategy by ‘clustering’.

 

As blogged about, rentoid is the place to rent anything. To make this true, we need people to have a great user experience. Therefore we are focusing our global website on one town. The town rentoid was founded in.

 

We think it makes sense for these reasons:

  • We have many items for rent in this town

  • We can implement old school awareness campaigns like letter box drops, and hand outs at the local train station

  • We can leverage local contacts & friends

  • When people first visit the rentoid, they’ll see many items in ‘their’ suburb

  • People want to rent things locally where possible

  • We can rent items off new members and provide a great user experience

  • It leverages a growing sense of ‘community’ in small suburbs

  • It has a higher chance of users telling their friends – who also live there

  • Membership will grow geographically to the next suburb, and so on – virally

  • We can test what works on a micro level before investing on a larger scale 

You get the picture.

 

So our niche plan is to cluster geographically, and grow from their. I’ll let you know how it goes.