MINDdrift - inside the mind of an entrepreneur - David Hauser

Nando Parrado Talks Survival and Success

2009-10-28T14:05:04Z

What would you do if the plane you were on crashed into the snow-covered Andes, you survived the crash with an injury, but then you had to figure out how to survive a night in horribly cold and treacherous conditions? Imagine what that would be like--not having food, enough clothing, perhaps even injured, and never having seen or felt cold snow before.

Now imagine having to face those conditions for 72 days.

That was precisely Nando Parrado's experience in 1972 when his rugby team's plane crashed en route to a match in Chile. The movie "Alive" was based on the team's experience. I had the pleasure of hearing Parrado's powerful story a couple of weeks ago when he spoke at a joint EO Boston and YPO event at Mount Wachusett. It was nothing short of inspirational. He described how, after 60 days wasting away on the mountaintop, he and his friend, Roberto, decided they were going to leave the crash site and try to find help. It seemed like a foolish idea--after all, they were surrounded by hundreds of miles of mountains on either side of them, and had no idea where they were going. But to hear Parrado tell it, they had no other choice. He said he preferred to die trying to get out of that nightmare scenario rather than wait for death to come.

Parrado's presentation was filled with amazing lessons about the human spirit, but he also shared a lot of the wisdom he gained from the experience on the mountain in 1972. Although he survived, Parrado lost his mother and his sister in the crash--he and many other players had invited family on the trip because there were extra seats on the plane. In light of this, Parrado has a lot to teach people about life and about loss. I found what he had to say extremely valuable.

Key take-aways from Nando Parrado:

"If you look back, you get nothing more than a damn pain in your neck." When Parrado uttered these words, I took note. He was talking about looking back at that fateful flight and the loss of not only his teammates and friends, but his mother and sister, too. It was clear he'd suffered initially thinking about all of the "what-if" questions that pop up after a decimating loss like his. But in the end, it was his father--who lost his wife and daughter in the event, too--who told Nando that looking back only serves to paralyze you in the present. That's an important lesson.

"Be a little irresponsible and love a little more. Enjoy life but never give up your family." Coming from a successful entrepreneur--Nando has launched many successful businesses in his lifetime--this really hit home. What Nando was saying was that he loved all the cushy things life had to offer, but if he had to choose between working all of the time to afford those things, and being able to spend time with his family, he'd always choose his family over working non-stop. By saying be more "irresponsible," he was asking the audience to slow down. Enjoy life and stop trying to think about how you're going to take over the universe. Live right now.

"Each day is a gift." Nothing we face as entrepreneurs will ever be as intense and cataclysmic as trying to survive in the Andes for 72 days. After the 60th day on the mountain, Nando and his friend set off to get help. They had no real food, and they weren't dressed for the snow. They climbed without equipment. And finally, after almost two weeks of climbing and walking, they got help. Each day after that, Nando said, was a gift. I think everyone could benefit from this kind of thinking.

If you're an entrepreneur--and even if you're not--no doubt you've gone through ups and downs in business, and in life. You may have regrets, you may even replay pivotal moments over in your head from time to time wondering how you could've done better in some way shape or form. Or, perhaps you get so passionate about your ideas that you have very little time for family or friends. If you've experienced either, you have something to learn from Parrado's advice. Learn to slow down and appreciate what life has to offer you. As Nando discovered after his harrowing ordeal in 1972, every day really is a gift and we all have to learn to appreciate it.

The Power of Gratitude

2009-10-19T22:37:18Z

In between meetings, projects looming on the immediate horizon, and the rushed interactions of modern life, have you stopped to say thank you to the people who make everything happen? Not in a glib or half-hearted way, but really stopped and recognized all they do? If so, did you then express your gratitude in a meaningful way? I started thinking about this because I just finished reading The Carrot Principle on my Kindle (which is actually a pretty nice way to read) and it made me think about how we don't say "thank you" enough and really mean it, even when it can have such a profound impact on how we relate to others, and how they relate to you.

The Carrot Principle did a great job using massive amounts of data from surveys to explain critical points, showing the value of saying thank you, and how to systematize the process of expressing gratitude in a company. I would suggest any entrepreneur read the book, since most of us never look for or expect it when someone says "thanks." But not saying thank you doesn't mean you're a better leader or entrepreneur, and it certainly isn't what motivates your people. Be grateful for the work your employees do--and show it in obvious (calling out someone's awesome work) and not-so-obvious ways (respecting their time by not throwing last minute projects their way). No one wants to feel alienated from their work, and when you don't recognize what people do, they start to feel invisible.

After reading this book, I know that I personally need to do a better job of recognizing and celebrating more successes and saying thank you to people myself. Not only will it change my relationships, but it will also help build a culture of gratitude, which can only lead to more professional respect and a better team. Sure, it sounds cheesy, but the small thanks we share can make a huge impact on the people around us.

Learn how to fund a web app startup from nothing to $170M acquisition

2009-10-15T01:41:55Z

If you're in the web app startup space, no doubt you've heard the big news during TechCrunch50 that Mint was acquired for $170M. That's a very high return on a company that did a great job visualizing data from Yodlee. What is Mint? It's a great service that allows you to track all your accounts, expenses, budget and more. Many people, even ones that use the service, didn't know that Mint actually gets their data from Yodlee, which preforms all the heavy lifting and connecting with financial institutions.

What's even more interesting than the fact that Yodlee feeds all of the info into Mint.com, is the presentation that Aaron Patzer, founder of Mint.com, gave, which was subsequently released online for the Founder Institute. If you're interested in getting funded or curious about the process at all, I would strongly suggest watching the video and viewing the slides as Aaron walks through the process of funding the startup, his views around value contribution, as well as some original slides from investor presentations.

Aaron talks about and provides great insight into the typical angel-to-VC model for web apps, but why not talk about the other model where companies are bootstrapped and actually charge for their service from day one? I know, I know--it's "sexy" to say you've raised money and there certainly are many incubators, angels and others that support this perception, but we need to focus on value generation. There are way too many startups focused on social media, news aggregation, and crowd sourcing that have no real business model other than to raise money and hope to figure something out. Is that really a plan?

Getting funded can work for a few companies, and there will always be huge success stories like Twitter which didn't have a business model when they started, but there are far more failures sitting in the deadpool. I am all for innovation in any industry, and if you have a passion for social media, launch something there, but at least have some model for making money. The model may change, you may give the service away later, but put some value on it today.

Now that my mini-rant is over, watch the video and slides. It's well worth the 30 minutes of your time to gain some insight into an interesting process that might be right for your startup. What other great resources like this are there to get an education about startups online?

Mint CEO Aaron Patzer on Startups from Techcrunch on Vimeo.

Startup Building 101 -

Does 160mph Wind Make You More Creative and Fuel Growth?

2009-10-13T14:10:52Z

You're brain is tired, but your body wants to go. I find this to be the typical sensation following one of our quarterly off-site planning sessions for Grasshopper. I've looked at data, talked for hours, and at the end of it all, it's nice to give your mind a rest and find an outlet for that pent-up physical energy.

See the indoor skydiving video and full post at Grasslands, the Grasshopper blog.

The Great American Healthcare Debate Depicted in Digital Media

2009-10-07T00:12:54Z

Whatever your perspective on the great American healthcare debate, it's undeniable that the discussion has spawned some interesting presentations of people's various viewpoints. The two that stood out to me were "Healthcare Napkins All" by Dan Roam and C. Anthony Jones and this animated video I found on YouTube called, "Health Care Reform Thought Bubble." While one was SlideShare's first prize in The Best Presentation 2009 contest, the other is just one person's perspective explained on the issue using motion design from Thought Bubble. I don't necessarily agree with everything in either of the pieces, but I think it's awesome that digital media has given us the platform to create and share visual "explanations" like these.

No doubt healthcare (and its possible reform) is an incendiary topic. After all, we're not just talking about an intangible, abstract policy, we're talking about people's health and their ability to access medical care. It's a touchy subject (if you were in doubt, just read some of the comments on ReadWriteWeb's post about the presentation created by Roam and Jones). However, when we have visual aids such as these two videos--and many others--at our disposal, I think we have an opportunity to inform ourselves and at least understand the basics of very complex issues (reminds me of my post about Jeff Jarvis' "Credit Crisis" video).

Healthcare Napkins All

What do you think of the way these two groups of people expressed their opinions about healthcare? What could they have done better? Is anything lost by creating presentations and videos like these?

How to Avoid "Obligation Overload"

2009-09-28T19:28:23Z

We all have a lot of obligations these days--not just at our jobs, but in our private lives--to our families and to our so-called "personal brand," our commitments to organizations as well as individual pursuits such as fine-tuning specific skills with classes so we can remain at the "top of our game." But that's just it--sometimes all of these obligations feel like a game, and leave us overwhelmed. This can drain your energy and make you generally useless to family, friends, and of course, co-workers. So, how do we stop this "obligation overload," or at least mitigate the effects of it?

Take a "Think Week." Twice a year, Bill Gates takes a week by himself to ponder business and employee insight in a cabin somewhere in the Pacific Northwest. This week of "mapping ideas, [and] grilled cheese, and orange crush" as one Wall Street Journal article described it, is crucial to the functioning of Bill Gates. And if it's good enough for him, it's good enough for you. Think about taking a week somewhere--anywhere--to re-focus and re-charge. I've wanted to do this myself for a long time, but I've never been able to do a full week. In 2010, I'm going to change that.
"Unplug" on a regular basis. This doesn't mean "unplug" from just email for a few hours a day and then brag about it to everyone who emails you with an auto-reply, a process Peter Shankman described. It means unplug from everything for a period of time each day--not just email. Stop answering/obsessively checking your BlackBerry or iPhone. Pull yourself away from the television or Twitter and engage with real people about something other than your goals. Ask them how they're doing. We spend so much time "engaging" in the digital world that we don't put enough of a priority on doing it in the real one. This is becoming an issue for a lot of folks. Take control of it.
Remind yourself of your priorities. I have a lot of professional goals. You probably do, too. But do you have personal priorities? Big, lofty ideals about who you want to be as a person or do in life (that's not work-related)? If not, try to think of some because it will not only change your perspective--and thus decrease obligation overload--but it will bring added meaning to your life and challenge you. These priorities may change, and that's ok.
Realize you are not your "personal brand." This is crucial to avoiding "obligation overload." If you wake up and think, "I've got to get on Twitter and check out what people are saying about me today!" then you're headed down the wrong path. How do I know this? I've done it myself. It's good to be concerned with how you're perceived, but if you're constantly worried about what others think about you, you'll cave into pressure to do everything.
Find a hobby. Yeah, yeah, I know you're probably thinking, "I don't need another thing on my to-do list!" but I don't mean pick up a hobby that's related to your job or some other over-arching life or career goal, I mean pick up a hobby that's a stress reliever for you and only you. Whether that's getting in a bike ride for just thirty minutes once a day or taking a couple of hours on the weekend to paint or take a walk and really think, find something that's all about you and allow yourself to that every week. When you're trying to get a lot done, it's amazing how much taking some time alone clears your mind and re-charges you for other activities. The key is not to feel bad about taking the time away from others. In the long run, you'll decrease obligation overload and be more fun to be around anyway.

Unique office spaces with slides, scooters and other cool stuff

2009-09-11T15:47:56Z

Although a company's culture is mostly an abstract concept, real, physical things such as a company's physical plant and design can play a significant role in shaping its unique culture. The way a space is designed and enhanced can influence productivity, general outlook, and a lot more. There are many companies out there that sell expensive furniture and chairs to make an office better, but really these just help business achieve standardization in terms of the look of the space, but don't give it any heart.

It's no secret that some of the so-called "coolest companies to work for" such as Google, Apple, and Yahoo have spent millions to create fun, interactive work environments. I've even seen some companies do totally insane things, like build a three story slide in their offices.

But what about small companies with smaller budgets? With our limited budget and small space, we've not gone to any extremes (yet) but we have added things that represent us and our culture. From the Nintendo Wii Room with Astroturf on the floor to the Relaxation Room that was built by employees in an unused office, all of these additions add personality and depth to the work environment. They also allow people to put their own "stamp" on their workplace. Since we spend a lot of time in our offices, that's really important.

Maybe some of these extreme workspace makeovers will give you ideas for what you can create at your own company:

Red Bull, London. Indoor slide, conference room ping pong table, and reception desk that looks like a skateboard ramp.
Google, Mountain View, California. Volleyball court, swimming pool, and scooters.
Fog Creek Software, New York 200 gallon fish tank.

What are the common themes in these and many other cool office environments? Lots of glass (perhaps to evoke transparency and authenticity), no cubes or very low cubes, snacks, fridges filled with drinks, and entertainment options. If you've got a large budget, you can also have cafes, real restaurants, and maybe even a convenience store on-site for employees' needs.

What makes your office unique? What cool, interesting, and fun things have you created for your environment? What have you seen at the coolest offices? Also, are these gimmicks or actually a representation of their culture?

The Healthcare Debate Needs to Head in a Different Direction

2009-09-08T14:03:35Z

When you're hiring someone, one of the questions always asked is, "Have you done this kind of work before?" If the candidate says they have, it's important to determine the quality of their work--that is, did they do a good job? What's their track record? I view the current healthcare debate from a similar standpoint. As Americans, we need to hire someone to fix our broken system of healthcare. As a result, anyone in the running for the job needs a thorough interview; we need to know what our prospective candidates' track record is on the matter. This isn't a political issue, but an economic and human one that will define our future for a long time. So, with the U.S. government interested in taking on this great task, it's necessary to ask the crucial questions anyone would ask before hiring someone for an important job.

In this case, if we were to examine the U.S. government as a potential candidate for taking over the job of fixing healthcare, we'd discover pretty quickly that they have a sketchy past when it comes to project management. Examples? How about our gigantic budget deficit? Or the impending collapse of Social Security? Are we ready to let the government take on the massive project that is reforming healthcare in light of these shortcomings? I'm not so sure. However, I'm convinced that no matter what your take on the issue, we need to have healthy debate and discussion regarding the topic, and we must refrain from letting that debate devolve into a mob-like mentality that attempts to silence discussion on the topic.

In the middle of August, John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods, wrote, "The Whole Foods Alternative to ObamaCare", an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal. Mackey opened the article with a quote from Margaret Thatcher, "The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people's money." The use of this quotation set the tone for the piece. Mackey offers some interesting possible solutions, pointing out the need for support in tax laws and regulations that effect the current situation. However, I was disappointed with his comments regarding chronic diseases, specifically diabetes. In his comments, Mackey asserted that a whole myriad of diseases, including diabetes, could be magically cured by eating right, and lumped all of these diseases into one group. I think this was a bad move, particularly with regard to diabetes: Mackey made no distinction between type 1 or "juvenile diabetes"--the kind children get--and type 2 diabetes, which has been linked to obesity. Unlike type 2, which can be caused by being overweight, type 1 diabetes is an auto-immune disorder that attacks insulin-producing cells in the pancreas and it mostly affects young people--it can't be cured by "eating right" and kids (and the adults they grow into) have to inject themselves with insulin to stay alive. Since he was writing an article, Mackey should have done more research on these diseases; I'm puzzled as to why he didn't. It worries me he didn't do his research on that front because then I start thinking about what other areas he hasn't researched before writing about them. Mackey also missed an opportunity to provide background into the Whole Foods brand, and what the stores stand for. He should've touched on what Whole Foods was doing to encourage healthier diets for everyone--not just people with chronic health issues--by selling foods that use fresh ingredients at more reasonable prices.

While I don't agree with everything Mackey says, he never claimed to have a perfect solution. That's why I was surprised to see the largely negative response and notices of boycotts on social media sites. As Mashable posted about a week after the WSJ piece, 22,000 Facebook users pledged to boycott Whole Foods. I think that action is misdirected. Why not channel that energy into advocating more solutions for healthcare? In my opinion, people jump on the "anti" bandwagon all too soon, and take out their frustration with the healthcare system on people who are simply speaking their mind--and last time I checked, there's nothing wrong with that. It's too bad that when a business person stands up, voices his opinion, and offers possible solutions, that he and his company are attacked. Why do people fall into this "mob mentality" when these attackers provide no solutions themselves? The way I see it, it's better to engage in discussion, disagree, and find new solutions than to silence people simply for having a voice. I'd rather channel my energy into brainstorming possible solutions than galvanizing support on Facebook to boycott Whole Foods. John Mackey and his company aren't the problem.

Clearly, I'm not an expert in healthcare, public policy or anything like that, but it's evident that reform is needed. What I do understand is business, so I'll draw on my experience in that arena to share some of my perspective on healthcare, and where/how we can do better. Maybe someone smarter than me can build on my suggestions to discover ways to implement similar changes.

We need transparency and accountability in healthcare. Make it clear how much medical care and treatments cost and give the responsibility to the consumer for the spending. If we purchased healthcare like we do any other service or product, there would be no way a hospital could charge $50 for a BandAid. People forget that this is driving up the cost of healthcare, and the cost is being passed along to ALL of us. A common solution for this is high deductible Health Spending Account (HSA) plans.
Let's incentivize preventive care. Rather than preserving a system that encourages providers and companies to wait until there is a problem to sell a solution, reverse this and create incentives for preventing larger health problems down the road.
Fix the food supply. Healthcare is more than dealing with problems once they land in your front yard. It's also about giving people access to wholesome, nutritious food without hormones, harmful ingredients or preservatives. A person should be able to go to the grocery store and know that the meat they buy isn't from a cow who has eaten feed laced with all sorts of unknown things. They should be able to purchase milk for their kids without hormones in it. This seems like basic stuff to me, but it's not a required part of our food supply right now, and I think that's silly. Organics and natural items are a step in the right direction, but must be available at a reasonable price to all people.
Healthcare is not a 'right' but it should be easy for everyone to access and affordable. Mackey said healthcare isn't a 'right' in his article for the WSJ, and it's what incensed people most from what I can tell. However, he didn't do enough to explain his point--something I'll try to do here. It's crucial that everyone at all income levels has access to great healthcare for both the good of the individual and society as a whole, however, that doesn't make it a human right. Let's just get rid of the term right now--it adds nothing to the debate and only serves to mire us in circular discussion instead of progress. What does make sense from my perspective is the ability for each person, if they work and contribute to society, to get healthy food from their grocery store and affordable health coverage for their entire family. This takes work from everyone in society--the government, huge corporations, small businesses--everyone.

I'd like to hear your constructive thoughts on what I've discussed. Add your ideas to the conversation by posting comments here, talk to people, ask your employer, contact your local representatives, anything. I don't support any specific political view on this, and at this point neither Democratcs nor Replublicans have a good solution, so we need to demand more options.

Netflix Company Culture Slides Provide Key Take-Aways for Entrepreneurs

2009-08-10T20:05:20Z

This past week I was very interested to read the "leaked" 128-slide Netflix (NASDAQ:NFLX) culture presentation. It is great to see large companies taking culture seriously and it is obvious this presentation was not leaked since it was embedded on the company's jobs page. Although the presentation is a quick read, it gives you a good idea of the culture they are trying to create at Netflix. What is most surprising is that this is from a public company, many of which never enter into a process of trying to really grow a strong company culture. As an entrepreneur and co-founder of a company that prides itself on providing a flexible and innovative work culture, I was also surprised to see Netflix discuss core values and vacation policy. Their vacation policy is particularly unique: they do not track time off. At Grasshopper, we give 4 weeks' paid time off, which is a lot. Netflix's approach to vacation policy is not just unusual, it raises a couple of questions in my mind, such as: How does the company manage a vacation policy where employees can take off as much time as possible? Does it reduce the usage of time off, and does it reduce the liability when they terminate someone? I'm not asking these questions because I think it's a bad policy, but interested to understand the impact.

After thinking about the vacation policy, I focused on the core values section of the presentation. Netflix gives an excellent introduction to why core values must be authentic, but not all Netflix's core values are not unique to their company, which makes me question whether they're genuine about having real core values. They stayed away from the common mantra of "trust and respect," for the most part, but do have 'honesty' in there as part of the nine values. I would argue that these are ground rules, not core values--they're the bare minimum necessary to even "play the game" and should not be called out as a company's unique core values. To be clear, core values are what differentiate a work culture, define how people fit into the culture and answer the difficult decisions. Why would any good company hire someone that was not honest? You don't list "honesty" as a core value because every good company wants honest employees--this doesn't make Netflix unique. Calling out Enron and others is great, there are many people that have written about making core values mean something and I am sure many would agree 'honesty' is not a unique core value.

Whether you agree with everything in the presentation or not, every entrepreneur, senior manager, and HR person should check out the presentation. There are some great concepts to inspire you and get you thinking about your workplace. It's true, not all will work in every person's work environment, but you should pick and choose which ideas fit and could make your work culture vastly superior to others'.

Netflix Culture Presentation

ClusterScale just "gets" load balancing, open source and support

2009-08-04T22:48:32Z

A little over a year ago we started to look for a load balancing solution for both front end web application as well as the service layer of our applications. The first name which came to mind was F5 and within seconds the huge price tag came to mind, too. Trying to be economical, my next stop was Google, where I searched for other options. The typical providers surfaced: F5 again, Barracuda, Coyote Point, Radware, and Kemp. Our team requested demo units from a number of vendors, some sent them, and some essentially told us, "We do not want your business." Either our expect purchase size was too small, or they just did not send evaluation units (maybe cause their solution was too complex?).

While the demo evaluations were going on, I started to look for open source solutions. There were a number of resources like HAproxy and Pound that, if combined, could be a very strong solution. Of course I had no desire to become an expert in these resources, and then have to configure and manage them, so I dug deeper and found Loadbalancer.org and their enterprise solution, ClusterScale. The more I learned about the company the more I liked them. From combining open source solutions to offering the solution as a virtual machine within ESX, to the pricing, they seemed ideal. After some good evaluations--which were set up in a matter of minutes since it was a virtual machine--we moved forward with ClusterScale in our production environment.

Since then we have been very pleased with ClusterScale and their support. This company just "gets it." They understand that providing open source solutions is more than just charging a lot for it and calling that "support." They understand that support should be staffed with real engineers that can answer actual problems quickly. They understand it is better to help a customer do something the right way compared with the "cool way." I have dealt with many enterprise open source companies in the past, and this is one of the few that is doing it the right away.

If you are looking for a load balancing solution that is easy to work with, does what it should, and is supported by a great group of people, then I would recommend ClusterScale. If you are looking for a large name company with overpaid sales people and solutions that are too complex, then go with one of the other more "established" players.

Ogilvy & Mather, Your Work Reminds Me of Something... My Company's Own Messaging

2009-07-29T20:44:54Z

A little over two months ago, we released the video, "Entrepreneurs can change the world" to spark a movement to help turnaround the economy, remind entrepreneurs why they started out in the first place, and inspire others to go out there and realize their dreams. As an entrepreneur who serves other entrepreneurs, I hear stories about growth each day: how people went out and offered new products and services, created jobs, and used their entrepreneurial passion to make a difference.

Our goal with the video wasn't to generate more sales. Instead, right from the start, our success metrics were: 'number of video views', and 'comments and ratings' (both on YouTube and other social sites). We also released all of the data about our campaign so that other entrepreneurs could use it as an opportunity to learn about this kind of unique approach, and the costs involved. In other words, we made the entire project (and our strategy) transparent. With just under 200,000 views, over 200 comments and 575 ratings on YouTube, the response has been truly amazing.

As I've described in previous posts, tremendous effort was spent by talented individuals (not large agencies) to create an authentic and inspirational message with words and design, and also music--we even had an original score created by Carly Comando in order to give the video a fresh sound. It turned out great, and the video's received a huge, positive response.

Imagine my great surprise then, just a few days ago, when I got phone calls and emails from people asking if Grasshopper had done a TV commercial with American Express. People were telling me they had heard "the song from the Grasshopper video" on TV, and I had to explain that, no, Grasshopper had not partnered with AmEx, or permitted them to use any of the elements of our campaign. It wasn't until a couple of days later when I was watching the news that I heard music very similar to Carly Comando's score emanating from the TV. I ran to check it out and sure enough, it was the AmEx ad everyone was telling me about. As I later found out, not only was the music the similar, but so were the words and overall message.

After a little research, I discovered that Ogilvy & Mather was American Express' ad agency. I then researched a lot more and discovered that Ogilvy & Mather had visited the Grasshopper website page regarding our campaign multiple times prior to the release of the American Express ad on TV (thank you, Google Analytics). I reached out to the video's producer and writer, Sonja Jacob. She also checked her site analytics and found that Ogilvy & Mather had visited her site multiple times. And can you guess which page they spent the most time on? Yup, you got it--the page where she discussed her work with Grasshopper and displayed the video. Curious.

It's important to note that the amount of time Ogilvy & Mather spent on our website is very high. Below are the Google Analytics reports from both websites for May 1st to July 26th. As a result of this data I had to conclude that at minimum, Ogilvy was aware of what we created (and that is the absolute minimum you can conclude--although you can extrapolate much more). With site analytics to tell the story, at the very least one can say that it wasn't just a coincidence that American Express came out with an ad that sounded a lot like ours only two months after our video was released.

You might also want to listen to the radio ads The Cultivated Word created for the movement, which were also on Sonja's website. I mean, you might as well--Ogilvy & Mather definitely checked them out while they were there.

It bothers me that a very large ad agency would "borrow" from not one entrepreneurial company (Grasshopper) but also an independent communications professional we hired to produce a video. But what bothers me more is that the message is being used for direct commercial gain by AmEx to promote another venture of theirs, OPEN Forum. Obviously, we sell a product at Grasshopper, but the purpose of the video was to motivate entrepreneurs--hell, anyone--to go out and do something, make a difference.

This video was never created so that we could monopolize the message, "entrepreneurs can change the world," but there are certainly lots of ways to get this message across without replicating someone else's campaign (especially if you have the resources of Ogilvy & Mather). After all, we were open to sharing the video. In fact, we even released it under the Creative Commons license so anyone could download it, show it at conferences, company meetings or anything else. What's more, we removed our branding almost entirely so that people could just use the video to motivate people. Instead, a very large ad agency decided it would be easier to just "borrow" the feel of our messaging, and not even engage in a partnership that would truly help entrepreneurs (there are definitely ways to do this, American Express).

End result? We're not whining about Ogilvy's usage of our message, we just think it's kind of lame for a big ad agency to come in and take messaging from an entrepreneurial company. Not holding people accountable for their actions is what has put our society in the turmoil we're in today, and I think Ogilvy & Mather should be held accountable, too. Yes, "imitation is the sincerest form of flattery," but I think it might have been more authentic if Ogilvy & Mather had just come up with their own campaign. Moreover, it would've been cool if AmEx had considered a partnership with us to help entrepreneurs, or raise awareness on an even greater level of how entrepreneurs really can change the world, without using someone else's original ideas. (AmEx execs, if you're reading this, give me a call.)

All of the data is here. Draw your own conclusions. Either way, I hope you'll consider spreading the word about the video that inspired it all, "Entrepreneurs can change the world," as well as the important message that we really are capable of turning the country, and the world, around.

Music from "Entrepreneurs can change the world" video available on iTunes

2009-07-27T13:02:10Z

The Grasshopper 5000 campaign has been amazing for our company, and a large part of our success is due to the inspirational video we made for entrepreneurs (and, of course, the people that love them). As of today, the video has been viewed nearly 200,000 times on YouTube, and we've received mountains of feedback from entrepreneurs (many of whom are Grasshopper customers) and numerous organizations who find the message in the video compelling and persuasive.

First off, I'll give credit where credit is due. We hired copywriter and creative Sonja Jacob to come up with the concept and story for the video, and she got motion designer Ben White, who does amazing motion design work, involved in the process. Last--and certainly not least--Carly Comando was brought on board to create a one-of-a-kind and incredibly moving piano score for the video.

As soon as the video went live back in early May, people began contacting us for details about the music--they wanted to know who it was and where they could buy the track. Up until a week ago, we'd been telling people to buy the track on Amazon.com, but now the song Carly created for us, called "Chain Reaction," is also available for purchase on iTunes. Hope you enjoy listening to the track as much as I have, and thanks again to ALL of the incredible, creative people who brought the video to life.

What you can learn from brewing beer

2009-07-16T13:27:54Z

Our quarterly strategic planning sessions always include an activity that's interesting, fun, and team-building. We've done kart racing and snowmobiling in the past, and recently decided we were going to brew our own custom beer. We found Barleycorn's Craft Brew in Natick, MA, and made a reservation to brew a red and an IPA. It was an interesting process with several steps including weighing the ingredients and getting familiar with Barleycorn's custom brewing equipment.

The whole brewing process, from start to finish, took about 2.5 hours. They allow you to bring in beer to drink as you brew, so we essentially hung out, drank beer, and brewed our own custom brew, too. After the beer fermented for three weeks, it was time to bottle it. This wasn't as fun as making it. It consists of washing bottles, and then waiting while your custom beer is loaded into three bottles at a time. After you close each bottle, you adhere a label to your creation and pack it up. Since we'd made so much beer, we were bottling for a little over three hours. This was made more manageable by "testing" our custom brews extensively. A slight decline in productivity, but nothing major.

While bottling wasn't so much fun, it was fascinating to learn about the business during our two visits to Barleycorn. Due to Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) regulations, Barleycorn can't brew and sell their own beer. But you are buying ingredients from them and leasing time on their equipment when you brew beer at their establishment. This allows them to qualify as a "home brewery" so they don't have to charge taxes or comply and with certain regulations to which commercial breweries must adhere.

While there were many first-timers at Barleycorn, there were also tons of regulars coming in and out, mixing their unique beers and chatting with the owner. The facility--if that's what you want to call it--was lively and fun. If you can get past the intense smell of hops, you'll have a great time not only because you're drinking, but because it's clear how much passion the owner has for what he does. He took something he loved--beer--and turned it into a real business venture. This is how to be happy and successful as an entrepreneur: transfer your passion to others while working with what you love each day (in this case, it's beer). In addition to passion, the owner of Barleycorn also has integrity. He demonstrated this when one of our beers came out a little differently than we expected. Sensing our disappointment with how the batch turned out, he offered to let us brew more beer for free to make up for it. While we didn't take him up on his offer, the fact that he even offered made me a huge fan.

It was great to be able to make beer brewing a part of our strategic planning session this time around. It was also a great opportunity for us to support a local business, and get some really great beer out of it. We'll be serving the fruits of our labor, Grassshopper Red, the Premium Beer for Entrepreneurs, at our company bbq in a couple of weeks.

Warning: No PR or Ad Agencies Used in the Making of This Campaign

2009-07-14T13:34:55Z

You may have heard about our recent campaign to re-brand ourselves as Grasshopper on Mashable, in the Wall Street Journal, or from the recent post on MarketingProfs. The media attention really raised awareness about our marketing campaign, which involved sending 25,000 chocolate covered grasshoppers to 5,000 influential people across North America. In addition to the chocolate covered grasshopper component, we also created a two minute inspirational video about entrepreneurship. The campaign was conceived and executed entirely in-house--no advertising or PR agencies were used at all. As a result of the nature of the marketing campaign and the video, we got a lot of inquiries from people asking how we did created both, how effective the campaign was, and what the price tag was to create the entire campaign.

Well, ask and you shall receive.

As of today, the answers to all of your questions regarding the campaign can be found in our case study. You'll get an in-depth look at the campaign and detailed metrics about the results it produced, such as number of mentions on Twitter, YouTube views, website traffic increases from Twitter and Facebook, and number of blog post mentions, just to name a few. There's also quite a bit of metrics on user-generated content in response to the Grasshopper campaign. Why are we making all of this information public? Easy: Entrepreneurs from all over asked for it.

And yes, we detail the actual cost of the campaign in this case study. Don't believe me? Check out the case study for yourself.

How to get a job at Grasshopper (or any cool company)

2009-07-14T02:01:42Z

With so many people job hunting these days, it's harder than ever to make your resume stand out from the crowd. As co-founder at Grasshopper, I look at tons of resumes each week. While occasionally I'll find a diamond in the rough, more often than not, candidates stand out for the wrong reasons--there are typographical errors in their cover letters or resumes, or they promise a certain level of design work and then their portfolio tells a different story. I'm not a recruiter, of course, but since resumes often cross my desk (or more accurately, my computer screen), I thought I'd offer up some pointers to prospective candidates. Keep in mind the following is what makes me really consider a candidate--it's not intended to be an exhaustive, one-size-fits all list.

Don't make your cover letter a personal manifesto. I want to see you've taken the time to personalize your cover letter, but I don't want to read a thesis before I get to your resume. If I see you've provided a lot of words for something you should've just said in a few, I have to assume that you don't value my time (or yours). My personal limit for cover letters is about three concise paragraphs.
Stand out--for the right reasons. If you're a graphic designer and on your resume you claim to have tons of design experience, I expect your portfolio and website to reflect that. It's also good if your resume has a small design element that sets it apart from the rest, but nothing crazy.
Find out if you'll fit in. Be realistic about whether or not you'll be a good fit for the company. How do you do this? Reading about Grasshopper before you apply/get an interview is a good start. You could also read this blog, since I post about Grasshopper quite a bit. However, you'll really have an advantage in the hiring process if you check out our core ideologies and think about what they mean to you. One of the most successful interviews ever at Grasshopper was a candidate--and now employee--who took the time to learn all of the core values and then described how she exhibited each one as a prospective candidate during the interview process. She was hired.
Tell me about your passion. At Grasshopper, we look for people who are passionate about what they do every day at work, but also in their personal lives. If you're passionate about cycling, blogging, or you're a budding oenophile, tell me about it somewhere on your resume or cover letter (in a subtle and tasteful way, of course). I like to see that you know how to balance your passion with your work responsibilities, too, so if you get to the interview stage, be prepared to tell me how you've done this in the past.
Show me how you're engaged with social media. What's your social media profile? Are you on Twitter? Facebook? LinkedIn? If you're using social media and you think it's relevant to your position, include the info somewhere on your resume. It's another way for me to find out if you're the right fit for Grasshopper, and checking out your profiles can really provide extra details about you as a person and as a candidate. This might not be necessary for all job applicants, but it's helpful for many, especially if you're applying for a marketing role, or any other position that requires heavy interaction with people. That being said, if your Facebook or Twitter accounts showcase a plethora of unnecessary details about you (e.g., you post on Twitter: "Eating a bowl of cereal."), then you shouldn't tell me about it. Simple as that.
Use your personality. A little personality goes a long way in my book. People in creative fields like advertising and art direction have known this for years, and always seem to have the most innovative "cover letters", resumes, and portfolios. While submitting a resume that's over the top won't work for a software development position, take a lesson from the creatives out there and add something special to your resume to make it stand out--like a short video cover letter or an inventive resume format (that doesn't obscure your credentials). While it may not work if you're applying for a position at Deloitte, when executed properly, it'll get you noticed at Grasshopper.