Expand My Brand Startup Competition: 9/27 in NYC

by Nathan W. Burke on August 27, 2012

In short: If you have a startup that can help big brands expand their reach, there’s a competition in NYC on 9/27 that might be for you. If you win, you get $30,000.

I just received the following email, and it made sense to post it here:

I’m writing on behalf of a startup competition that may be of interest to your readers. What makes this competition different is it pairs founders who are building marketing technologies with today’s top brands.

The startup competition is part of a larger event we’re hosting on September 27th here in New York City that’s pairing up major brands (Google, ESPN, Mashable) with emerging technology startups to explore how innovations in social technology are shifting brand marketing and advertising as we know it.

The Competition

What is it?

5 lucky startups will receive the opportunity to pitch their startup ideas to a panel of today’s top brands and social media thought leaders. The panel will ask the startups how they can “ExpandMyBrand” and startups will have to answer with how their product will boost brand reach and customer engagement.

How do I enter?

To enter, simply fill out the startup submission form by Friday, September 14th.

What do I win?

If you’re lucky enough to win, you’ll be taken through our incubation program where you’ll receive $30,000 in incubation assets. This means office space, full time senior business development team, web development and design team, product sales assistant, customer introductions and everything you need to turn your product into a business and that business into revenue.

Submission Deadline

To have a chance at being selected, your startup must be registered for the Startup Challenge by Friday, September 14th.

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Using Charity Donations In A Marketing Campaign: Clever, Sketchy, or Both?

by Nathan W. Burke on August 13, 2012

It’s rare to get an interesting direct mail piece, but I just got one that is certainly memorable.

The letter is from elixiter, a company that creates add-on solutions to the Marketo platform, and congratulates me for being inducted into Marketo’s “Champions” program (a customer recognition program). It then says:

We wish you all the best for your future work and we offer you our congratulations on this prestigious accomplishment.

As a token of your hard work, we would like to donate $10 to one of (the) charities listed on the enclosed form.

We will gladly send you an email to confirm your donation.

Elixiter MailerA few notes on the letter:

1. The first paragraph plays to the prospect’s ego, congratulating them on being a leading member of a community. It makes sense that a person who belongs to a community is motivated by recognition as an expert.

2. The second paragraph is a soft-touch introduction to the company sending the letter. It’s purposefully vague, as a hard sell at this point in the letter would be a turn-off. It answers the question “who is sending me this congratulatory letter?”

3. Another congratulations as a transition.

4. This is interesting. They want to donate $10 to a charity in my behalf.

5. If I confirm my email address, they’ll send me a confirmation of the donation.

Clever

After reading this, my initial impression was: “Whoa. That’s clever.” It’s a win-win-win for all:

  1. I get a good feeling knowing that I just gave to charity
  2. A charity gets a $10 donation
  3. elixiter gets a confirmed email address from a prospect

There’s no way I’m going to throw this out, as it’s equivalent to taking $10 from a charity. And I have an immediate, positive association with elixiter as a company that recognizes my brilliance (that’s sarcasm), and a company that is charitable, donating to good causes.

….But

Sketchy

I  knew that others would see it differently, so I started to ask around. Though most people I asked agreed that the campaign was clever and memorable, a few people had an overwhelmingly negative association. Some examples:

  • These guys are exploiting charities to add email addresses to their databases.
  • So they’re making people feel bad for throwing away junk mail just to get your contact info?

What Do You Think?

While I can certainly see both sides of the argument, I’m firmly on the “clever” side. But I’d like to hear what others have to say. What do you think?

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Tips for Startup PR – Interview with Conrad Egusa

by Nathan W. Burke on August 8, 2012

A while back I posted A Beginner’s Guide To Startup PR and Tech Reporter Contact List from Conrad Egusa. Since he’s been a writer for Venture Beat, he’s been on the other side of the PR pitch, and I wanted to hear his perspective on what startups can do to effectively pitch stories to get coverage. The following is a short conversation we had last week.

Note: As this is the first video of its kind, I realize that:
a) I need to cut down on the “um” and “you know” talk
b) I was far overdue for a haircut
c) I tend to put my hands in front of my face when thinking and listening

With that out of the way, here’s the video.

For more on Conrad and to see what he has compiled for startups looking to optimize their PR efforts, see his web site.

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Customer Case Study: Pandora

by Nathan W. Burke on July 20, 2012

Our company sells security software to the largest Google Apps customers in the world, but every now and then a smaller company with a big name buys our product, and we want to tell the world. Pandora is one of those companies. If you’ve been on the internet in the past few years, it’s likely that you know about Pandora and the Music Genome Project.

We’ve just added Pandora to the long list or customer case studies on CloudLock.com.

I can’t overstate how important case studies are for any startup. I used to think that no one reads them, but they really do, and do so fairly early in the buying process. Customers read case studies to:

  • Find out whether companies in similar industries and size have used the product
  • See whether reputable companies are willing to endorse what the startup is selling
  • Understand if the product was used to solve a specific problem or use case
  • Find a balance between what the company says the product can do, and what the customer has really used it for

For us, the Pandora case study is a really nice win. Not only is it a household name, it’s the first case study we have where a customer talks about using a new feature that we just announced. It’s always important to announce what new features you’ve just delivered, but it’s great to have a customer actually talk about their experience using it.

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A Beginner’s Guide To Startup PR & Tech Reporter Contact List

by Nathan W. Burke on July 19, 2012

After a weeklong vacation followed by a week of being ill, I am still trying to catch up with emails. Luckily I saw this one from Conrad Egusa.

I’m emailing because I’m launching a free PR resource and thought it might be of help to some of the earlier-stage bootstrapped entrepreneurs you advise – my company spent 100 hours creating a free comprehensive tech reporter contact list. The list is here: http://www.brownsteinegusa.com/find-tech-reporters .

When I was writing for VentureBeat.com I learned pretty quickly that most entrepreneurs do not know how to approach the media, and when they do look for PR, they need to spend hours collecting the contact information of tech reporters. Instead of having entrepreneurs spend hours finding the emails of technology reporters, I did it.

We also launched a Beginners Guide to PR: http://www.brownsteinegusa.com/beginners-guide-to-pr/

It really is a great list, and if you’re at a startup just starting out with PR, I’d urge you to check it out. From the beginner’s guide:

THE BEGINNER’S GUIDE TO PR

New to PR? Looking for press coverage for your company? The Beginner’s Guide to PR provides the comprehensive information you need to receive professional quality PR. This guide comes from my experience as a writer for VentureBeat.com, as a founder of 2 startups, and as a marketing consultant for over a dozen companies.

A beginner's guide to startup PR

Check out the beginner’s guide to startup PR here, or download the PDF.

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Job Opportunity: VP of Marketing – Boston, MA

by Nathan W. Burke on July 18, 2012

I just found out about a new startup marketing opportunity in Boston. If you’re interested, please feel free to email me at nathan (at) marketingstartups.com with your info, and I’ll be sure it gets to the right person.

VP of Marketing

us

We are on a mission to improve the way universities admit students. And we’re doing it by creating beautiful applications to manage the entire university admissions process. We’re building out our team with people who have a passion for developing innovative products and who believe in providing a superior customer experience.  We are looking for a wildly talented VP of Marketing with a passion for developing and implementing key tactics to drive growth and promote awareness. This individual will work collaboratively with our Senior Management Team to design elegant and compelling marketing campaigns.

you

We are looking for someone who cares deeply about creating compelling events and enjoys blogging, social media, website development, copywriting, press releases, public relations, product marketing, product management, and anything that someone at a startup may need to do (everything).  You have CMO gravitas and are able to manage your resources in time, talent and treasure as well as a marketing coordinator.

In addition, we are looking for someone who:

  • has a proven ability to drive results through multiple marketing channels
  • is energetic and passionate in their approach
  • has design ability and agility
  • inspires and influences with a can-do attitude
  • has a knack for analyzing data and identifying insights and trends
  • synthesizes information and retains key takeaways
  • has marketed a SaaS “product” that’s gone ballistic

why

We build software for the world’s best universities to evaluate and manage applicants. As the VP of Marketing you will play a crucial role in creating a service that touches countless people applying to universities from around the world. Your work will help shape the future of how applicants are selected for admission and in the future will help change university admissions in many other ways. We are working hard to create a collaborative and empowering culture where the company is as flat as possible and everyone can contribute and learn from each other.

Again, email me with your details and/or questions, and I’ll be sure to hook you up with the right person.

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Vooza: Unquestionably the Best Thing Ever.

by Nathan W. Burke on July 11, 2012

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Review: Using ZipRecruiter To Fill An Open Marketing Position

by Nathan W. Burke on June 19, 2012

Aside from marketing your startup to potential customers, you also need to market to potential employees.

About a month ago, I had an open Marketing Manager position to fill, and I turned to ZipRecruiter to help take away some of the tedious administrative tasks that come along with hiring. Because when you think about it, the process of posting a job, sifting through resumes, etc. is a gigantic time sink. Just a few of the associated tasks:

  • Writing the job post in a way that makes it stand out from boring job posts
  • Posting it on multiple job boards
  • Managing and reviewing resumes
  • Rating candidates
  • Scheduling phone screens
  • Scheduling interviews

ZipRecruiter takes away many of the management headaches.

Posting a Job

Rather than posting a job individually to all job boards, ZipRecruiter lets you upload once and post to many sites:

Some sites require payment (like Craigslist and Monster), and ZipRecruiter guides you through that process.

Managing Resumes

Through ZipRecruiter, you can see resumes for each job, save them directly to Google Docs, rate them, and share with colleagues. That’s exactly what we did. Once we found a few solid candidates, we did phone interviews, followed by in-person interviews.

I definitely plan on using ZipRecruiter in the future. In less than a month, we were able to post a job easily and hire a candidate.

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Director of Marketing Wanted: Mixpanel, San Francisco

by Nathan W. Burke on May 24, 2012

I just saw this job post on Hacker News, and thought I’d share it here on the off chance that someone reading this site is perfect for this opportunity.

We’re looking for someone to lead up marketing for Mixpanel. We’ve built the most advanced analytics platform available for mobile & the web – tools that allow you to dive deep into product usage patterns, understand conversion rates, and understand user retention. Nobody else comes close to our current offering.

Here are the facts:

  • Revenue is in the millions
  • We’re cash-flow positive
  • We’ve raised $12M from top-tier investors: YC, Max Levchin (PayPal),
  • Sequoia, and Andreessen Horowitz
  • Example customers: BitTorrent, Path, Capcom, OkCupid, Jawbone
  • We’re not interested in getting acquired. It’s go big or go home.

We’ve got engineering, product, and support under control. Once we have a customer, we keep them.
Now we need to grow. So far we’ve grown strictly through word-of-mouth. This is, of course, wonderful – but the time has come to really go to market.

This is where you come in. As the Director of Marketing for Mixpanel, you’ll take on things like:

  • Owning both online and offline marketing channels
  • Thinking of and executing on creative marketing campaigns
  • Developing the voice and messaging of our company
  • Building out a team of talented marketers
  • Putting together events of all kinds – from meetups to conferences

We want you to help us build an incredible marketing organization from the ground up. If you haven’t done that yet, but you have all kinds of ideas, we’d love to talk to you. If you’ve been there, done that, and are ready to do it one more time, we’d love to talk to you. I think this will be a lot of fun.

If you agree, here’s what we’re looking for:

  • Someone very creative. Doing what everyone else does is a recipe for failure. This one’s incredibly important to us.
  • At least 5 years of experience in a marketing role. Experience building/leading teams is a big plus.
  • Excellent writing skills – you’ll be marketer #1, which means you’ll be writing. A lot.

Send your resume to tim (at) mixpanel.com.

The full post is available on mixpanel’s website.

Also, if you’re interested in getting notified when new startup marketing jobs are available, send your resume to nathan dot burke at gmail dot com, and I’ll add you to my startup marketing job email list.

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Job Opening: Marketing Manager, Waltham MA

by Nathan W. Burke on May 23, 2012

Once in a while, I post startup marketing jobs on this site (as well as on startupmarketingjobs.com). In this case, it’s a marketing position at CloudLock. That’s where I work.

Marketing Manager

Job Description:

At CloudLock we are building the world’s leading and most innovative Security-as-a-Service offering for the Cloud; tackling the biggest roadblock to cloud adoption head-on. CloudLock is the leading enterprise class security solution on the market and is already being used by the largest Google Apps customers in the world.

We are located in Waltham, Massachusetts ~15 minutes from Boston.

We’re looking for a creative Marketing Manager to join our small and tenacious marketing team. We’re a ridiculously fast-paced startup, so if rolling up your sleeves, multitasking, and staying on top of multiple projects concurrently are what you look forward to in your work, we want to talk to you.

Roles & Responsibilities

  • Writing – You are able to communicate effortlessly in emails, expertly in blog posts, and it shows. You don’t have to know every technical detail of our product, but you do have to grasp the fundamental concepts and be able to convey that in words.
  • Prospecting – Admittedly not the most glamorous of marketing tasks, but one that is critically important. You’ll find new potential customers, and will be able to plow through a list, qualify prospects, and load them into our CRM.
  • Event coordination – We’re doing a LOT of events in 2012, and coordinating everything takes time and effort. From printing the right product sheets and shipping USB drives to booking hotels and meeting with analysts, there are endless tasks to complete. You’ll be asked to help out with some of the meeting logistics, and you don’t mind nagging people to get things done.
  • Marketing Operations – You’re disciplined enough to get things done. You’re able to work through our marketing systems (Salesforce.com, Marketo, WordPress, etc.) to manage the entire lead cycle.

Requirements

Must Have:

  • Marketing Experience in a Company – 1-3 years experience in a marketing department.
  • Passion for Making an Impact
  • You are Ultra-organized & self disciplined – The term fast-paced startup isn’t just a cliche in this case. You’ll be bombarded from every angle with tasks, but that’s no big deal to you. Water off a duck’s back. Spreadsheets are your best friend.
  • You are Eager to Learn – We have a great team and are always willing to share what we know to help you learn. This isn’t a punch-in, sit around for 8 hours, punch-out kind of a gig.

Nice To Have:

  • Marketing experience within a software company.
  • Use and Understanding of Salesforce.com, WordPress – It’s a plus if you know your way around a CRM, CMS, and have either used or understand the concept of a marketing automation product.
  • Design experience is a huge bonus. We’re always coming up with new ideas that need graphic work, and our designer is perpetually overbooked.

About CloudLock:

CloudLock helps enterprises extend their data security practices and policies to the cloud. CloudLock’s suite of security applications give businesses the controls and visibility they need to take advantage of the collaboration benefits of public cloud offerings, without sacrificing on security. The largest Google Apps customers in the world trust CloudLock to secure their data.

Apply Now: http://c95703e9.zrjob2.com/8482c351

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