Reading time #5!

Here we go again - The fifth instalment in the 'good reads'!

- "The software is processed by more than just the computer. It's also processed by a human sitting in front of the screen". Take the time to watch this: A Great lecture from Google IO about cognitive science and design.

- Having a great product might not just be enough. Check out this article "So you think you can go viral?", In order to find out the challenges behind the assumptions about viral products.

- With Flickr been rebuilt to a whopping 1TB of free image storage, Tumblr bought, and Hulu on sight, Yahoo's new strategy is marking the comeback of the all-mighty mega portals, spending billions of dollars basically on user acquisition. Yahoo aims high. We'll see how that evolves...

And, finally, check out my new pet project: The startup nation feed, bringing you great stories from the startup nation!



Previous reads:
#4

#3

#2

#1

Ah, the funnel

Ah, the wonderful funnel.
The science of users acquisition, retention, and conversion... The web has moved from pageviews, to clicks, to conversions.
And so should you!

Got your product up? Want millions of users to register and use it? Want to convert non paying users to paying users?
Some fun funnel basics.
- If your users register for free, make the initial registration almost transparent. email, that's it. (At least until you got enough viral buzz). Maybe not even by logging in and allowing an app to 'post to your facebook profile'. We just met.
- Be nice with mails. Linkedin has the habit of 'bombing' you. Twitter bombs you once you neglect them. Actually, everyone bombs you unless you learn the tedious process of disabling or throttling mail traffic. However, you're not LinkedIn, and every user pressing 'unsubscribe' would be lost.
- Try to personalize the mail message. Even if it's automated, a personal call for action is much better than a generic one.
- Always mention what value you give to your users. Real value, no slogans, especially for paying ones. You can also do that by giving value statistics to your user (250 people have looked at your profile...)
- Use analytics. If your registration has more than one step, see how many 'leaks' you've got, and improve. Try to find out which people opened a form, but never filled it. Those might need an extra push. You can automate that one as well.
- Remember what differentiates you from the competition, or from similar services. Remind that to your audience as well.

Happy hunting!

p.s. - If you're a startup, register here, and get featured!

Things I've learned from freelance projects

Few of my side projects in the last two years have been managed without an office.
As most of them were small, web based projects, management overhead was more than simple.

Other than the initial 'sale' meeting, all communication with the client was via mail, phone or even web tools. One project didn't even have a face to face meeting with the customer, just phone, contract via mail, and follow up calls and mails - And that project even needed a backend integration with a medical database!

Things I've learned from such projects:

- Listen, listen, listen. When communication is limited, you need to make SURE you 100% understand what the customer needs. Repeat it in your own words, make sure they agree and know EXACTLY what to expect from you.

- Contract signing. Make sure you are covered. Make sure that scope is 100% agreed upon, and changes cost more money. Payment milestones are REALLY important these days. Make sure that after an agreed certain 'live' period, project goes into maintenance mode - You don't want that phone call after 6 months, when you're already knee deep on something else. A contract is also the best way to see the way your project is going to shape, for better or worse.

- Sandbox communications. The best way to show a project underway is letting your customer see the work in progress. Set up a place where you can share your ideas with your customer, make milestone demos and receive feedback. Make sure it doesn't cause too much overhead - If the customer likes to make lots of 'pebble size' comments and corrections, space out your demos, so you can handle them in bulks, rather than in an annoying, fluid, ongoing dialog.

- If you can, get help with QA. Your friends, your wife, whoever can help. Sometimes you miss out on obvious things, even typos.

- It's a known cliche, that your best reference are your successful projects, however, if you see that a project is headed to a clash with the customer, remember that word gets around - Try to resolve issues, even if it means biting your tongue, and losing some money. Remember that the best protection you have is your contract...

Good luck!

The two syllable rule.

Just a thought:

What do google, facebook, linkedin, twitter, tumblr, mailbox, dropbox, flickr, yahoo, wordpress, youtube, blogspot, eBay and many other internet giant have in common?

Two syllable names.

Easy to transform into a verb (Google me), easy to remember, catchy.

34 out of the 50 most popular sites in Alexa's index have two syllable name.

If you're aiming high, this should be part of your naming strategy.

Of course, there are recent exceptions, like pinterest. But those are exceptions.

We've built a great product. Now what?

Previously, I had a post about Google Plus, the great party everyone showed up to, and a minute later went home.
After talking to some entrepreneurs recently, It seems like getting the crowd to take a look at your product is one challenge, and then getting them engaged over a period of time is even more challenging.
So after identifying what the world needs, and how to give the world exactly what it needs, got some feedback from friends, all that's left is bringing people in.
A few tips on doing that without spending on ads and promotion:

(I'll use a flower shop analogy).

- Try to think of one great benefit your potential user (Customer) receives from your product. Formulate that into a strong message. ("We promote flower shops" -> "The best way to promote your flower shop").
- Look for where your potential user hangs out (Online flower shop owners online forum). Stalk it, see how you can begin promoting yourself there.
- Even better - Find out your 'dealer' there (A power user...). Do what you can to lure him: Promise him to be featured for free. Make him get the customers to you.
- Now find 10 of these...

Marketing used to be based on ads, impressions, clicks.
Reliable, engaging marketing is based on opinion makers.

Or, you can do like these guys.

A small rant about Apple

If you have an app or a book published for both Google Play store and the Apple iTunes store, you must know that one as well:
The second you login into the Google Developer console, you see a neat little dashboard, presenting your apps statistics.
With the iTunes connect portal, you need to press two annoying links before you need to wait a couple of seconds and then, hopefully, you get your daily download graph and stats for your app.

This is annoying.

It's amazing how Apple, which stand for design for most people, offer such poor usability for its developers. And don't get me started about XCode.

The X of Y

People which have a hard time defining what their start up does, find it easy to use another start up as a metaphor for what they do:

- "The Groupon of vacations"
- "Like Twitter, but with Video"
- "Like Tumblr, but cooler"

This is something you wouldn't do on your website, right? So why would you introduce yourself like that in person?

Try to come up with what that company does (Go to the "about" in that company's site), and replace that with the company name:

- "Daily deal on the best vacations" (Vacations Groupon)
- "A social video information stream" (Video Twitter)
- "The coolest way to share everything" (Cooler Tumblr)

Still simple, much better.