Archive for May, 2008
Posted by Brett on 19th, 2008
Well it’s another Monday, and time for our weekly motivational post about a young entrepreneur. I’m a little late in getting this post together, it was a bit of a hectic action packed weekend so I ended up procrastinating quite a bit. Our featured entrepreneur this week is really exceptional as well and I think his accomplishments thus far will really motivate a lot of us especially those in the field of software and publishing.
The entrepreneur this week is Ben Casnocha of Comcate. Ben is 20 years old and has already started his own software company (Comcate) at age 14 as well as written his own book! Comcate develops software designed to help local governments resolve citizen complaints.
That’s a pretty interesting niche one that can really only come from some sort of personal experience. Ben says he realised how poorly governments dealt with customer service issues from his own experience and that gave him the idea for Comcate. That was his second company.
Ben took a year off to travel and write a book, after finishing High School. He wrote about his experiences and called the book”My Start-Up Life: What a (Very) Young CEO Learned on His Journey Through Silicon Valley.” This is truly something this is a very well accomplished young man.
On top of this Ben has been named one of the nation’s top 25 entrepreneurs under 25 by Business Week. His blog has been named one of the top 25 in Silicon Valley by the Silicon Valley Business Journal. Furthermore while running Comcate he still had time to captain his San Francisco University High School basketball team and be editor of the school newspaper.
Ben Casnocha is now enrolled at California’s Claremont McKenna college and markets himself as entrepreneur, author and college student.
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Posted by Brett on 14th, 2008
I started my entrepreneurial journey back in January 2008 and have just taken the time to really observe the different ways people are making money online and determine which might best suit me. I must say I have learnt quite a bit from my ever growing blog library and rss subscriptions. Now I think I have an idea of the route I wish to take in building an internet business.
At first I must admit I was quite caught up in the Google Adsense hype. The possibilities seemed endless but from my own experiences with adsense I realise that it still entails quite a bit of effort and seems most unrewarding. My true realisation came after reading this post at bloggingexperiment.com by Max Davis the new owner of the blog.
After reading that post I have decided to begin creating my own products and leverage the strengths of others to help make my product and business successful. My goals for this month then, are two develop the product I intend to market as well as build some credibility in the particular niche and of course build a list.
Currently I am developing two free products (newsletter and free ebook) to use on some of my existing websites so as to capture some leads and eventually market a paid service/product. I will make sure to let you guys know how it goes right now I’m just working on structure and gathering information.
Well that’s it, thanks for reading. If you enjoyed this post please subscribe to my rss feed.
Posted by Brett on 12th, 2008
It’s yet another Monday an at developingeyes.com we like to start it off with a little inspiration and motivation with our entrepreneur of the week. In this series we acknowledge a young entrepreneur that has found some level of success in his/her particular niche. The story is meant to motivate us as young budding entrepreneurs so that we keep striving and working towards our own success as well.
This week’s entrepreneur is a bit more successful than what I’ve been writing about in the past but may still be a bit unknown to quite a few of us on this side of the Atlantic. Suranga Chandratillake is co-founder and CEO of Blinkx. Blinkx is a video search engine based in the UK and San Francisco, that indexes over 18 million hours of video online. According to their website:
Today, blinkx is the world’s largest single index of rich media content on the Web, delivering more content from a broader range of sources than either Google or Yahoo!
One of the main advantages Blinkx has over the other guys is software that turns speech into text and tells you how many times that word has appeared in a particular video. Blinkx has also taken on contextual advertising using a service they call AdHoc. Think of it as an "Adsense for videos".
The ads take many forms, clickable links that scroll across the screen, banner ads and interestingly a list at the end of the video that shows all the products mentioned in the video you just watched! This is some very interesting stuff and I think has a very good future ahead as more and more videos appear online. A story on Suranga and Blinkx can be found in the Business 2.0 September 2007 edition or on the business 2.0 website.
Well that’s it for now, thanks for reading. If you enjoyed this post please subscribe to my rss feed.
Posted by Brett on 7th, 2008
I came across this in a book I was reading which had a section on entrepreneurship. The book is called New Era of Management by Richard Daft. It goes on to talk about five types of entrepreneurs. There were a few I knew about before but some are new to me. So I’ve decided to share it with you in today’s post. Let’s see what categories we fall under.
Idealist
The idealist entrepreneur is the most common type of entrepreneur shown above. He/She likes innovation and enjoys working on something new or creative or something personally meaningful.
Optimizers
The optimizer entrepreneur comes in a close second and is content with the personal satisfaction of simply being a business owner.
I think everyone would have some sort of satisfaction being a business owner but if that’s what mostly feels important then I guess you fall here.
Hard Workers
The hard workers entrepreneur category includes persons who enjoy putting in long hours to build a larger more profitable business. They like the challenge it presents and of course reap the most rewards if the business turns out to be a multi-million dollar enterprise.
Hard work comes with all businesses but as we now see not everyone works hard for the business to grow as this group of entrepreneurs does.
Jugglers
The juggler entrepreneur likes the concept that the business gives them a chance to handle everything themselves. They are usually people with lots of energy and exist on the pressure of meeting deadlines, paying bills and of course making payroll.
Who doesn’t like pressure? J Last minute deadlines are lovely! I’m sure a lot of you have ended up in a situation where the deadline is approaching quickly. Maybe you’re a juggler
Sustainers
The sustainers entrepreneur category consists of people who like the thought of balancing work and a personal life. Most often they do not wish the business to grow too large where it will cut into their personal life too much.
These guys just need enough to survive. No big hopes and dreams of a multinational corporation or interviews on “The Big Idea” J
So there you have it five categories of entrepreneurs. I’ve been trying to figure out which category best describes me, but I think I have attributes of the first four types. I love creativity and innovation so am I an idealist? I think everyone would feel satisfaction as a business owner, a natural sense of pride would always come with entrepreneurship.
I definitely would love to see any business venture I undertake grow as large as it possibly can so then I’m a hard worker? Yet I work well under pressure I’d say I thrive on it a bit so then I’m a juggler.
I guess I am hybrid entrepreneur. What type of Entrepreneur are you?
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Posted by Brett on 5th, 2008
Welcome readers, It’s another Monday and so it’s time for our weekly motivational story of a young entrepreneur. This week’s entrepreneur is only 14 years old and is by far the youngest I have ever come across online (or anywhere for that matter). I just heard about him myself last week, but I am sure most of you trying to make money from blogging must have heard of him before.
This week’s entrepreneur is Carl Ocab of carlocab.com. Carl is a 14 year old BOY from the Philippines. His major claim to fame is ranking number one in google for the keyphrase “make money online”. When I checked it he currently ranks fourth which is still far beyond anything I have accomplished.
Carl is really doing it big and still going to school. He blogs regularly after school and writes with great authority on his topics, much better than many of the make money online blogs run by adults I’ve come across. I think one of the things Carl has going for him is his family’s support. Many of his posts introductory make reference to his father who he says is a marketer himself.
Carl also has a free ebook called the kidblogger’s master plan, that he uses to make money online and replicates any number of times in different niches. Yes people he is 14 years old, and he started at 13. If this doesn’t motivate you to work harder I really think you should call it quits now. Check out Carl’s blog and read his posts he has some solid advice there and I would recommend subscribing to his blog and getting the free ebook.
Well that’s it, if you enjoyed this post please subscribe to my rss feed. Thanks for reading!
