We’re launching a new update of BC here very soon.

We’ll be testing a variety of things with landing pages and focus groups first, trying to find that hook that:

1. Draws attention because it is different.

2. Gets job seekers something they really want…something that makes what they’re already doing easier + better.

3. Moves users from thinking that we are ‘nice to have’ into something that they say ‘don’t take it away’.

4. Gets users to tell others about it.

Setting up to track all user activity is going to be key.  The toolset is below.  Any suggestions?  Let me know.

• Current user surveys: http://survey.io + Great reading from survey.io folks: http://startup-marketing.com
• A/B testing: http://www.optimizely.com
• Live chat: http://snapengage.com
• Live analytics: http://getclicky.com
• Google analytics + webmaster tools (obvious one…but optimizing it more): https://www.google.com/analytics
• One survey question: http://www.kissinsights.com

Updates to come.

The Excelerate Labs Mentor Twitter list was popular, so keep checking it out…I’ll be adding more tomorrow.

We had another insane week, but we’re starting to get focused:

1. We validated some assumptions and ditched some others.

2. We are beginning interviews, focus groups and user testing this week.

3. We are BUILDING parts of our new site this week…I’m really impatient about this one.

One of the most important questions we were asked was “what percentage of your app features come from your users VS your vision?”. Ummm, 70/30?  90/10? The wrong 90/10?  Ouch.  That is why we are hammering on learning like crazy and quickly building to test and iterate…no more long builds and long guesses here.

One book I’m dusting off is Positioning…there are far too many ways in our industry to be bland and generic…we CANNOT succumb to trying to be like everyone else.  User experience is a big part of that.  Communicating to get users to experience us is just as important.

Here’s to another great week.  One week at a time.

View from our sublet (we actually have an apartment to call our own, at least for the next couple months):

Another week, another set of great meetings.  The quality of the conversations are getting better too.

If you want to follow some of the mentors, here is my twitter list.

Before our last meeting with Mike from LinkedIn, we met with Sam and got some immense focus: don’t just show up on demo day with a great product you “just know” everyone will love…show up with a solid, focused way to show “this is how we will get 100k, then 1m, then 10m users, etc”.  Tell that story that leaves the audience saying “how do I get in on this”.

As I go through a pile of notes from the past few days I’m seeing patterns and we’re starting to crystalize where we need to focus.  After all, 3 half-assed strategies will fail and 1 full-on strategy has the best chance of succeeding.  It is getting the feedback on these 3 strategies we’ve laid out that helps the most.

Last, we’re getting to know the other teams here really well…happy hour last night was great.  We all need to blow off some steam and that was needed.

Chicago is cold and rainy…but great for a run today. Here was the view:

This past week my co-founder Kevin Melgaard (and friend since 1994) and I started at Excelerate Labs, the nation’s #3 web startup mentorship-driven accelerator.

We will be spending the next 90 days meeting with the best and brightest start up mentors (investors, entrepreneurs, teachers…all around successful people) to get a crash course the on the best way to launch a web startup. Building relationships with the best-fit mentors is job #1 at this point. After all, being resourceful as hell is the key to being a good entrepreneur, right? Here…the resources are coming to us. It is our job to make the most of it.

Getting in was hard. Excelerate gets hundreds of applications from all over the country. They only pick 10 companies. Getting in was great validation, not that we’ve got some insanely awesome idea, but that we’ve busted our asses and that we’ve shown we have what it takes to go through the REALLY rough spots of going through a startup and still

We’ve got a ton of work to do to build a better product, build a better team, build a better business…in 80 days…no pressure, eh?

After the first week, we’ve:

- Pitched to 100+ mentors, after hearing we would only the morning of…great learning experience and I’m glad it happened the way it did.

- Sat with David Cohen, Brad Feld, IDEO, Craig Wortmann, the class of 2010 Excelerate and many others. Seriously, how else could you get this level of quality in one week?

- Met with the Excelerate leaders about where we are and where we need to go.

- Slept very little and learned a lot.

Here’s to week 2…starting bright and early tomorrow!

To see what data you are sharing with the world (ok, just every site you use Facebook Connect to create an account), just type in:

http://graph.facebook.com/yourusername

To see your friends’ data you are sharing:

http://graph.facebook.com/yourusername/friends

*If you don’t know your Facebook username, go here: http://www.facebook.com/username/

**If you have tight security settings already, you’ll probably get “o auth required” type messaging. You’re ok.

Then, set your security settings to allow or not allow all this info…your decision. FB says it aggregates this info you share, the sites you share it with to then give you a better experience / more targeted experience. Sooo, the tradeoff to signing up to 3rd party sites with Facebook Connect is it is easy/fast for you and the site owners, everyone gets more data (especially FB) and then you IDEALLY get a better FB experience going forward. What could go wrong?

Wow. Watch full screen and HD on. Wow.

The Mountain from Terje Sorgjerd on Vimeo.

Disclosure: the author, Rajesh Setty (@RajSetty), of the below book review is a friend that I’ve been fortunate enough to know.  Rajesh is an investor, entrepreneur, author (first book published at 13!) and speaker.  His advice on the challenges and opportunities of entrepreneurship are inspiring and motivating to say the least.

The review:

There are a TON of ‘self help’ books out there that get into the philosophy of why we’re not happy, but they don’t offer simple direction on what we should be thinking, when we should be thinking it and what the positive results will be if we act properly on those thoughts, moods and attitudes. Most of all, they don’t come in a format that reads more like a manual (which we all need) that can be read over and over, for the reader to discover something new each time.

The first time I read the book a few sentences hit me like a ton of bricks. I wrote them on a piece of paper above my desk. The next time I read the book (1st sign that it is a valuable book!!) I found 3 more sentences that made me literally change the way I was interacting with people that day. The results? More than I expected.

If you are an entrepreneur or ever want to be successful in your personal OR professional life, read this book. Act on it DAILY. Then read it again 2 weeks later. Did you see better results? I did.  And I’ve read a lot of these types of books before.

Rajesh knows what he is talking about. A great author in this space doesn’t just study life’s interactions and the success of others, a great author lays out the blueprint that worked from his own successes and lessons learned from failure…what an honest concept that makes me want to stay upbeat.

Click here to buy the book and here to learn more about Rajesh.

OK, that title is my one feeble attempt at April Fool’s joke.  Now that it is out of the way:

I had two great meetings with some very successful business leaders in Boulder and it got me thinking about the difference between mentors and consultants.

Since most of the conversations revolved around simplicity of product and messaging, it got me thinking about what my experiences have been as a marketing ‘expert’ helping others and finding experts to help me.

Therefore, I’m focusing on simple product and messaging part…the technology part will come in part 2 of this post.

Ironically, most marketing consultants (interactive, old-school or both) are the worst examples of their craft’s mission: simple communication.

Check out their company websites and they’ll have a laundry list of departments that they can help you with: website? check. logos? check. direct mail? check. “viral” anything? check. strategy? check, check check. wrapping it all into one tight bundle? check.

Where to begin? With ALL of them, of course!

The problem is that rarely do these consultants work with your best interest in mind.  Rarely do they say “wait, let’s back up and start with the core message” because it isn’t in their best interest to force you to be disciplined.  It is in their best interest for you to expand your message into 15 different mediums right away.  Rarely do they say “maybe its your product?” or “maybe we should start out simply?”.

Don’t get caught in this trap of thinking that you need to spend away your core messaging problems with more mediums.  Don’t get caught into the trap of thinking that a consultant has your best interest in mind (although there are some great ones out there I’m sure).

DO find mentors who will shoot you straight and have a vested interest in seeing you do less, but better.  Why?  Because they’re busy and can only help simple problems and follow ups are easier when you’re both on the same page.  Often they will offer advice that is harder to take, but MUCH more beneficial in the long run.

Thank you @msitarzewski and @billflagg for giving me the advice that is harder to take, but easier to act upon.

Spurlock is at it again…this time creating a 100% product placement / advertising driven documentary.

In 2011, will people even care about the trend of ad-fueled everything?

This is different, but is it something that we’re already used to?  Our music, videos…hell everything is supported by ads now.  If you read Chris Anderson’s FREE, then you’ll see why we all want “free” and we’re willing to make the moral compromise of ads popping up to get our content quickly.

Time will tell, but as the lines blur between product placement and flat out entertaining commercials with a plot, our content will either get more diluted to please the brand’s broad audiences…or more sharp to please the niche tribes of certain brands.

Right now all I need is to google your name to find out a LOT about you.

If I have your email address, then I know all the social networks you’re in, what you’ve recently tweeted and where you work.

If I have an iPhone with a few cheap or free apps, I can scan a barcode, product or random object to find out tons of information.  Facebook already recognizes your face most photos.

So the question becomes: when will I just be able to take a picture of a stranger on a train and instantly know their name, social networks and workplace?

Facial recognition is coming a long way…hell, ads in stores are looking back at you and determining if you’re a man or a woman and tailor (pun intended) ads to you.   License plate recognition already scans hundreds of cars as they fly by and give officers real-time data if you’re a criminal or not.

When will the general population be able to do this with their friends.  Can they already?