Matt Bernier

Truth be told, I was not going to go to StartupWeekend-Boulder last weekend.  I was going to go camping with my Fiance.  However, the weather worked out so that was a bad idea (wet tents and apartment life mean lots of mold).  Not only that, but my friend Jason was all over me about StartupWeekend.  At one point he seriously said,

You MUST go if you are serious about startups.

My first reaction to this was that Jason was just being obsessive. Turns out, my gut reaction was way wrong.  I thanked Jason probably three different times for harrassing me (about 12 emails… seriously) to go.

Why did I thank Jason?  Because, not only did I go, I pitched an idea that I had essentially thrown in the garbage and it took.  By “it took” I mean that after we were all done pitching ideas, I had 4 people talking to me about it almost immediately. I didn’t have to make a political rally type sign or anything.  I will say though, that if this didnt work out, I was very interested in @penguin’s idea for “Pools I can jump into, and parties I don’t have to clean up after”.

So, to backtrack a little, this is how startup weekend went for me:

Friday 9:00 AM

2 more emails from Jason about stupid Startup Weekend

10:00 AM

Signed up and registered after finding out about the weather, getting permission from the Fiance, and talking to Jason AGAIN about StartupWeekend.

5:00 PM

Jason shows up at my office, on the dot no less, and we leave for Boulder

~6:30 PM

I pitch my idea, LivingOffCampus to the group.

~7:15 PM

I have a group of about 4 guys who are interested in exploring the project more.  We start talking, planning, scheming.  I keep pitching to people who stop to talk.

Later that night

Bar time.  Delicious Raspberry Wheat Beer

3:00 AM

Bed time, after talking about this idea that I was now completely invested in again.

Saturday morning through Sunday 6PM

Seriously, these two days are a blur.  We planned, we coded, we planned, we ate lunch, we coded.  By this time there were a solid 6 of us cranking out business plans, logos, functionality, market analysis, a WordPress plugin, an API, marketing ideas, logo, slogan, and T-shirts. Yes, T-shirts. Oh yeah, a slogan and a pair of shorts with our slogan placed right on the butt. (when you see the slogan below, you will understand)

By Sunday afternoon there were probably 8 or 9 of us who were seriously putting 125% into the idea.  It was amazing.

Sunday 6:00PM

Everyone joined back up in one of the Leeds Business School’s classrooms that was build like a miniature auditorium with stadium seating, projectors and everything.

By this time, we all had our new SpotGrab.com T-shirts on and were standing in front of the rest of StartupWeekend-Boulder ready to present.  Did I mention that the guys put together an amazing presentation on PowerPoint?  Or that they had figured out, with our initial pricing estimates we came in 5-7x less per month in cost than our nearest competitor?

We presented the core product, the features we had, the wordpress plugin, threw out the extra T-shirts and the shorts.  They all said, “Find your spot and grab it!”.

————

I talked with the group and everyone seems excited to continue with the project.  It is an amazing thing, and it seems to have traction and momentum.  Both of which I lacked when the project was called LivingOffCampus.

I hope that I continue to get to work with this great team that we put together, I have never seen so many people get so much done in such a short amount of time.  The amount of drive, innovation, and tenacity that came with this group is unrivaled.

A couple of the amazing things that came out of the project:

SpotGrab Logo

SpotGrab Shorts

Best Marketing Idea. Ever.

Logo and “Best Marketing Idea. Ever.” Courtesy of Grant Grigorian

“SpotGrab Shorts” Pic courtesy of @heyrich

T-shirts and shorts put together by Dave Mayer

Startup Weekend

Also, just for good measure: Thank you Jason for pestering me to go to Startup Weekend.  (Follow Jason on Twitter, he finally found some use for it!)

I have been doing quite a bit of marketing via Twitter recently.  During this effort, I have noticed a couple of trends in the automatic Direct Messages I am getting when I follow people. (I am assuming that most people have an automatic Direct Message).  Some of them I don’t like, some I understand, and some I feel are inappropriate.  You make the call, I just listed them in generic groups below.

Excited

• You’re following me?  FABULOUS!  U Rock!  Let the tweets begin.
• Thanks for the follow! You rock Please check out my Young Internet Entrepreneur blog ******
• You totally ROCK, thanks for the follow! Please @me anytime. Seen ***** yet? How can I help U?

FaceBook

What I don’t understand about this one is, I am following you on Twitter so that I don’t have to find you on FaceBook.  Also, facebook (for me) is a site for personal relationships, not business or casual encounters.

• Thx for the follow! Extreme value on new group in facebook ***** check it, and see for yourself
• Thanks for following me! Please feel free to add me on Facebook “***** ******”.
• Hello ****. Great to connect with you. Feel Free to add me on Facebook too: *****
• Thanks for following me *****, let’s also connect on Facebook – ******
• Thanks for the follow, look forward to learning more about you. Lets connect on Facebook *****

Helper

• thank you for following, ☯ I’ll try to find you as many job leads as I can!
• hey thx for following me ****! i use Twitter for both personal and business so feel free to ask anything
• Thanks for following Kona Endurance. We help pro and amateur endurance athletes increase VO2 max and reduce lactic acid.
• Thank you so much for the follow. If there is any way that I can support you, please let me know. I wish you the best.

Genuine Response

• Thank you, great concept! I will do, not sure what to do as the full site isn’t live yet. The beta will be live in March.
• Thank you for following me. I am going to follow you back!
• It’s nice to meet you, *****.  Thanks for following.

Multilingual

• Obrigado por me seguir! Thanks for following me! Diga-me como lhe posso ser útil. Let me know how I can help you.

Religious

These are DMs with religious connotation.

• Have A Blessed day.
• Happy New Year, and may you have many more blessed days.
• Thanks for following  me *****.May God continue to bless you and your family. *****
• thanks for the follow…blessings.

Sharing

• Nice to Tweet you!  Hope I can share with you my world!
• Hello, im looking forward to reading your updates, dont be a stranger!
• Thanks for following… Look forward to Tweeting with you!
• Thanks for following me. look forward to tweeting with you
• Welcome to the stream enjoy our moments in time
• Hi – Thanks for sharing the journey with me!  Look forward to tweeting with you soon…

Site Links

I call these spammy, because they are DMs intended to get people to have a second chance to see a site link or URL.

• thanks for following me.Join my unisuccess space for better networking :http://unisuccess-space.ning.com/
• Thanks for following me. Check out  www.Soles4Souls.org where we giveaway a pair of shoes every 17 seconds
• Thnx for following! I will follow u 2! BTW I just launched my book! -> http://twitclicks.com/xsfn
• Thank you for following http://www.tweetgiveaway.com. I look forward to your Tweets
• Thanks for following  me! Be sure to check out my site http://www.TheGadget411.com and comment a post!  IT TAKES ONLY 10

Spammy

These are different than site links, because they usually come with the “get my free gift” message.

• Thanks for following, look forward to getting to know you. Posted some cool gifts for you at http://www.xaviernelson.com
• Thank you for following me! Meanwhile you can watch this free videos about list building @ http://tinyurl.com/8tjmxz
• Hi and Thanks for the follow! Grab Your Free Copy of *The Twitter Report* @ http://www.MLMIsEasyOnline.com
• Here’s my gift to you http://TwitPWR.com/3uP/ Thanks for following me. I look forward to connecting more!
• Hey Twitter friend, thanks for the follow! – The Monetizer’s moneymakers are here: http://themonetizer.blogspot.com

Thanks

• Thanks for following @TopWineNews (Wine Lover). Tell us what you’re drinking tonite and we’ll RT, sharing with the Twibe.
• Thanks for following Twit2Win! Good luck in our Tweetstakes!
• Thanks for following me. I look forward to networking with you in the months ahead.  Ask me about SocialTo

Do you have a category that should be added here? How about a classic DM that you have received?

This post is a continuation of my post about managing my tasks, projects, and responsibilities.  There are links to the other posts at the bottom of this post.

Lists In Notepads

Recently, I found myself writing everything down in a notepad.  I was writing all of my personal to do items as well as my client and work to do items in the one list.  I quickly realized that it was getting to be too much in one list and maybe even too much for a single notepad.

My solution was to run to Target and get some new stronger notepads that will withstand the wear and tear of being transported in my backpack to and from work and all around Denver.  The notepads I used in the past were either legal pads, half-legal pads, or bound notepads.

The notepads I chose are “Cambridge Limited Business Notepads”, because of the quality binding, covers, and thicker paper.  Also, they are taller than they are wider so I can keep good long lists in them.

I have two of these notepads, one for my personal stuff and current to do list.  The second notepad is where I keep my client and project information.

Every client or project has their own page, where I keep information about what is currently going on, the todo list, and ideas I may have for their sites.  I am constantly flipping through the pages and writing something down, because I can’t remember everything.

When I finish an item on one of my lists or decide not to do it, I just cross it out. Sometimes, I get to the point where a page is mostly crossed out.  At this point, I just rip it out and start a new page for that project.  I write down everything that wasn’t crossed out on the previous pages and go about my business.

This process, while time consuming to set up, has made keeping my ideas and project information all in one place easier.  The only real downside to this is if I lose the notepad.  So, I just keep a strict rule to keep the notepads with my laptop so that I will not misplace them

Conclusion

I hope that he information I have provided in this thread was useful in helping your stay organized and sane (disorganization makes me crazy!).   If you have any ideas or comments, please leave them!

Other Posts In This Thread

• Introduction
• Email

I was replying to a friend on Twitter using trim, and I had a <script> tag in the post.  I realized when I submitted that the tag made everything after it in my tweet dissapear. If you want to see the actual tweets, you can find them in my twitter feed here: Matt Bernier’s Twitter Feed

First thougt was, “No Way!”.  Second thought was, “What Else Can I do?”.

So, I tried basic HTML with this tweet:

This got me this result:

Just HTML in the Tweet

Then I tried an alert:

That got me this result:

Javascript Alert in a tweet

Then lastly, I tried a little more JS, pay attention though. To make it fit, I used a tr.im URL!!

Which got me this result:

Replaced Tr.im's images with Google's!

I have submitted this information to tr.im. I did very mundane, topical things to the page I was looking at, and did not even attempt anything more dangerous. My hope is that you will see the humor in this, urge tr.im to fix this issue and to continue the amazing job that they do.

UPDATE: The Tr.im developers are quick to read their emails, respond, and fix issues. It took all of twenty minutes from when I sent the email to them, for a response saying that this issue was fixed.

This post is a continuation of my post about managing my tasks, projects, and responsibilities.  There are links to the other posts at the bottom of this post.

Email

I have clients that insist on using just email to communicate, which is fine with me because I use GMail, which lets me keep emails in threads instead of as individual emails.  This makes keeping a conversation in control very easy.  However, my inbox is constantly full.  For the last couple of weeks, I have noticed that when I empty my inbox out before bed I have between 20 and 50 emails waiting for me in the morning.  Most of them are status updates, automated messages, or twitter messages but it is still a lot of emails to go through in the morning and my inbox would get full of emails.

I needed a way to organize the emails, so that I could find them easily and reliably.  I also wanted the emails to be categorized automatically without missing them.  GMail to the rescue! They have a labels feature, which can be automated with filters.  I found that the filters got to be too numerous though, and I was wishing for nested folder (well labels here) functionality.  I quickly went searching and found a Firefox plugin that will turn your labels into “folders” and will allow nesting.  The plugin is called Better GMail.

All I had to do was format my labels like a directory path.  A good example is “Clients/Matt Bernier”.  When I view my Gmail account without the plugin this can be annoying, but I just make sure I have the plugin, and problem solved.

With the filters I am able to make them apply and still leave the label in the inbox, so I almost never miss an email. The only time I would is if it went to spam, which almost never happens.

Other Posts In This Thread

• Introduction