How Start-ups Should think about PR

By on November 9, 2011 in Public Relations

If you start a company, you have about a 50% chance of being around in five years, which is the same survival rate as if you were just diagnosed with colon cancer.  Now let’s talk about PR. When you start a business, you also start a timer that is counting down the days until your [...]

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The “All New” PitchEngine

By on November 1, 2011 in Online Distribution

PitchEngine has been on my radar for a while now, primarily because A. For a while they were actively positioning against PRWeb in a variety of discussions and B. because they seemed to have done a good job achieving brand recognition among a certain segment of communications professionals, primarily by positioning themselves as a tool [...]

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Facebook’s approach to privacy in product releases (aka shoot first and ask questions later)

By on October 13, 2011 in Social Media

Personally, I haven’t really cared that much about what Facebook does with their platform.  In general, I would say that they are trend-setters when it comes to design, UX and general social functionality.  People often grumble when they release new features however retrospectively, most of the features they release tend to achieve significant adoption and [...]

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Comcast – Continuing to Fail at Customer Support and Communication

By on August 29, 2011 in Best Practices, Public Relations, Social Media

Let me begin by saying that I’m writing from a Starbucks near my house because once again, Comcast (CMCSA) has failed to deliver and I’ve finally made a decision I should have made a long time ago, to cancel my Comcast subscription and use an alternative. That being said, I feel obliged to share some [...]

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Central Desktop – So Close and Yet So Far

By on August 20, 2011 in Applications

In this world of overpriced CRM’s that nickel and dime you to death (Salesforce), I keep wanting to love Central Desktop but they keep letting me down with buggy software and terrible support. Here is a thread you never want to see if you care about customer experience.

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Differentiating BuildZoom

By on August 15, 2011 in BuildZoom

With a general concept and set of foundational tenants in hand, we began socializing BuildZoom with a small group of people we trusted.  Key voices included several close personal friends and colleagues including Ryan Petersen from ImportGenius.com, Sean Shadmand and Daniel Odio from Socialize, Yaniv Masjedi from Nextiva, Alex Dulac from Alvin Valley and Trevor Cornwell from Appbackr.  Our [...]

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Conceptualizing BuildZoom

By on August 8, 2011 in BuildZoom

Sometime around the beginning of 2008, I became a first-time homeowner and exposed to the wonders that come along with owning your own property – leaky faucets, overgrown lawns, malfunctioning appliances, mold, etc.  Within a few months, I was feeling like homeownership was a second job, which is not something I really wanted.  To make [...]

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A new venture

By on July 31, 2011 in BuildZoom, Uncategorized

Well, not really South Beach (nor the Miami Heat) and I really have nothing in common with Cleveland’s most hated, but after over four amazing years at Vocus, I’m going to be transitioning into more of a consultative role with the company to free up time to focus on a new venture.

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Domain Name Considerations when Expanding Globally

By on March 31, 2011 in Globalization, Strategy

For businesses whose success is strongly tied to an online strategy, there are a variety of factors to consider when thinking about your domain and brand as part of global expansion.  This article will outline some of the major considerations and help provide a loose framework that can be used to design and evaluate your [...]

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An Early Look at Sprout Social

By on February 25, 2011 in Applications, Marketing, Social Media

Mashable reported yesterday that Sprout Social just closed a $10m series B round from New Enterprise Associates.  The company, which can “turn social connections into loyal customers,” is a business application that helps users manage their social media marketing across the more prominent social sites (Twitter and Facebook) as well as some of the more [...]

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