I visited Dogpatch Labs to meet with both of the guys that comprise Baydin – founder Alex Moore and Mike Chin, to learn what’s new with this startup.  Timing is everything in life, and I was happy to learn a couple of big new developments at this emerging company. First, Baydin has recently launched a Gmail version of Baydin, and I was treated to a beta version, which can be seen in the video below. You can view and download the Boomerang for Gmail beta here.

Second, in the video below, Alex also discusses the next big thing that they’re working as a new game related to “getting people to inbox zero.” When I asked Alex to elaborate on how he’s bringing game theory to the typically mundane task of email, he told me that most people check their email first thing in the morning, and now they’ll have to do it “on the clock.”

Greenbean Recycle is a startup looking to change the way people think about recycling. Even if you don’t know what a Reverse Vending Machine (RVM) is, you’ve probably used one. An RVM is the machine you drop your recyclable beverage containers in, and get a printed receipt that you turn in for refunds at a store cashier. Greenbean has joined the MassChallenge competition to fuel their idea of marrying RVM technology with wireless Social Media and eCommerce capability to personalized the recycling process and make it “cashless.”

Greenbean joins the list of local clean tech startups, like Big Belly Solar, that are focusing on ways to insert conveinent recycling stations into the daily lives of the busy urban eco-friendly set.  So, I sat down with Shankar Sahai, the founder of Greenbean Recycle, to learn more about his vision, and what progress has been made since the initial forming of the team to compete in the MassChallenge.

We don’t have all the answers on what makes a successful pivot, and if you watch the video below you’ll see that we got a lot of great help and advice from John Prendergast, the LSC Boston organizer and the people in attendance.

View the Slides

Watch the Video

With backgrounds in Finance, the initial career path put Fruzzetti on Wall Street as a trader, before returning to Boston, reconnecting with fellow Suffolk grad Dolgoff and forming an umbrella company ByteVentures that they’ve used to create several internet business. Peekaboo Mobile is their 4th venture together.

They realize they’re under stiff competition from the many “Groupon-clones,” as well as New York-based Postabon, which recently secured a $1.05 million round from Spark Capital and has presence in Boston, New York, and San Francisco. But, the Peekaboo duo feel they have a strategic advantage when it comes to the competition – the thriving, vibrant, and helpful community that surrounds entrepreneurs here in Boston.

Currently housed in the entrepreneurial frat house HangOut Labs, and planning to secure angel or seed funding from one of the many startup competitions such as Mass Challenge, both Fruzzetti and Dolgoff are supremely optimistic on their future outlook, with plans to bring their currently offshore development team in-house, and expansion to other cities in the near future. As Dolgoff explains, “there really is a community here. People who actually want to help. We’ll expand to other cities, but our homebase will always be here in Boston.”

What do you think of a “real time deal” service on your mobile phone? Is this a service you’d use, and do you think it will affect buyer behavior when out shopping? Leave your opinion in the comments, below.

1. Boston needs to celebrate our success stories in our backyard. EnerNOC is a great example.
2. This video is a must watch for any entrepreneur – it is very inspiring and it includes lots of lessons learned.

I’ve blogged about VentureFizz in past. I feel that Keith and team are doing terrific work in gathering and organizing the great tech entrepreneur community here in Boston. Be sure to watch the video below and also check out other great content on the VentureFizz site.

Many thanks to the Cambridge Innovation Center for graciously hosting this event and helping to keep it free. If you’re interested in the many great talks that were held, please be sure to check the Startup Lessons Learned website for information on how to watch the recorded day-long events.

If you’re a local Boston Entrepreneur, you may be interested in checking out the video, below, that I took during the event. Here you’ll get a chance to (virtually) meet the members of the Boston chapter of the Lean Startup Circle. I also took a few photos of the event.

Whether or not you’ve “got religion” when it comes to Lean Startups, here’s an interesting case study by a pair of folks from a local Boston startup that actually have been practicing the methodology for the past 9 months or so. Austin and Cheryl from Pinyadda.com share their experiences with Customer Development in the video below. Apologies in advance for the lousy camera work.

If you’re a local startup and interested in learning more about building your minimum viable product, or Customer Development, join us for our next meeting in April where Matt and I will be giving a case study on EditMe’s Customer Development experiences.

Management

Strategy

Customers

Company & Culture

There’s no one single question here that should make or break your decision to join a startup company. By nature, a startup is filled with risk, uncertainty, and change. But, after you’ve found out the answers to all these questions, put together a scorecard. Trust your gut, and choose wisely.

You can get good cigars cheaply online (surprise!), and I’ve become a regular shopper at JRCigars.com. There’s a lot of places you can get good prices on cigars, but I keep going back to JR because I like him. I’ve never met JR, but I like him just the same. How? Because everything JR sends me is dripping with his unique personality – every flier, every mailer, ever product catalog.  He’s completely transparent. Take this headline on the front cover of his 70plus page Fall catalog – “Business stinks . . . so here’s a golden opportunity to save on name brand cigars, AND get 5 extra cigars Free with every box.” Like I said, I don’t smoke that much, and I already had a box of cigars, but immediately thought – “Hey, the economy stinks, he’s probably not selling a whole ton, maybe i should pick up some cigars on the cheap.”

Sure, there’s a “Crazy Eddie” feel to JR and it’s a bit schlocky. But, he is who he is, and he’s not afraid to put himself out there. I’m reflecting on JR and what we hear these days about the important of being “transparent online and in business.” If you follow any of the social media gurus, you’d think this novel concept was invented by them. But, you’ll also see a ton of accomplished, successful business entrepreneurs asking the gurus questions like “How do I become transparent?” My (private) response to this question is always the same,  ”Do you really not know how to be yourself?”

I’ve come to realize that a very common cause of  people who don’t know how to be themselves is that they don’t really know who they are in the first place. Continuing on from there, a person doesn’t know who they are, because of a central lack of self-confidence which manifests itself in self-doubt. Connect my armchair psychiatry together and you get this realization – there are people who do not allow themselves to be transparent.  If you are constantly doubting yourself, it makes it impossible to be transparent to your friends and co-workers, never-mind the whole world on social media.

For me, this was a shocking epiphany. There are highly paid C-Suite execs that are so riddled with self-doubt that they are hiding in their office afraid to have an online discussion on a blog because people might not like who they are, or what they stand for. Since these folks can’t give themselves the permission they need to be themselves, they’re seeking that permission from someone else. You can guess how successful that operation will be. I’ll end this post with an incredibly schlocky statement of my own. Self-confidence comes from within – only you can give yourself the permission to be yourself.

Mamet: What is Plummelo and what prompted you to start it?
Jin: Plummelo allows users to collect recipes from anywhere – from the Internet and the kitchen. Plummelo will automatically create shopping lists, so the user will never have to write another shopping list. I started Plummelo because I was frustrated with trying to remember where I got a recipe from the Internet. Google helps, but do you know how many hits you get when you type in “meatball”? My kitchen recipe folder was no help either. Organizing and rediscovering recipes is a major chore and only the most dedicated have create binders with plastic sheets. It shouldn’t be this hard to keep track of recipes.

Mamet: What’s the #1 unexpected thing that’s happened since you launched?
Jin: How universal the problem is, and how enthusiastic people are to the concept. I was expecting only the cooking enthusiasts and the super-organized to be interested, but the problem of recipe organization is conceptually easy to understand for anyone and because everyone eats, this solution resonated with every person, especially moms.

Mamet: By it’s nature, your user is not near a computer when using Plummelo the most. How does Plummelo bridge the gap between home office and home kitchen?
Jin: I’ve intentionally decided not to address this part of the problem yet. I’ve learned that many people do have laptops at home, so they do take the laptop into the kitchen. I’ve also learned that some are hesitant to do that because of concerns about kitchen splatter and the safety of their laptop, so they just print the recipe. Also, buying another home computer or any display device just to have something in the kitchen is not high in the home financial priority. Several years ago, there was a lot of buzz around internet appliances for places like the kitchen, but consumers didn’t really go for such dedicated devices. So, the solution I wanted to focus on was online organization rather than physical device.

Mamet: How does Plummelo fit into the ecosystem of existing online foodie communities like Food Network and Martha Stewart?
Jin: Plummelo is what I call a meta-cooking website – it sits on top of the existing cooking blogs and websites in the same way that users view them. Users typically frequent more than one recipe website and their natural process is to find the recipes they like and to collect them in some way. It’s relatively rare that a user goes to just one site for everything. Collecting recipes and organizing them is an offline process, and I want to create a simple online version of that. So, Plummelo gives users the freedom and control to collect recipes from where they want instead of being captive to any single site. Because of this last aspect, Plummelo also provides ratings of recipes from across the Web as well as ratings of recipe websites themselves.

Mamet: What does the future hold for Plummelo? What next big steps should we be on the lookout for?
Jin: We just finished phase 1 of our development plan, so now we want to use what we have to create amazing content and to support and engage the Plummelo users. So our next step is to focus on valuable content via the blog and our social network channels (Twitter and Facebook), and valuable content on the website to engage users and visitors. There are 2 more major phases that will add amazing social features and value features. We can hardly contain ourselves with excitement when we talk about what’s in store.