Britto art always make me happy

My email signature, which has gotten a lot of notice recently (I think it’s the economy) says “Look at the good you have in your life, your friends, your family, your health and everything else will work out.” Sometimes I read it to remind myself too.

I’m would never claim to be a self help guru, but I believe that a negative attitude helps no one, especially yourself. Not only will it keep you from being successful, it won’t make anyone else want to be around you or assist you.

Today, a friend of mine posted a link to a blog that centers around seeing the glass as half full. Here’s the list of top ten reasons the economy sucking is a good thing for us.

http://seeinggood.com/?p=45

Just Keep Talking!

1) No one else will probably be as passionate as you are about the idea to actually make it

2) If you don’t talk to people, they can’t tell you all the red flags you might be missing

3) Sometimes that how you recruit advisers, partners, and evangelists

Based on his advice and others that agree, I talk about the Iphone apps I’m developing to loads of different people.

Today, I learned an additional reason why sharing is a great idea… it turns out that I can’t be everywhere, I know, shocking, and I can’t read everything, again shocking. But with a network of people who know what I’m doing, when they see things that are of importance, they send it over.

If you’re interested in the newest data out there about Iphone Application usage and why you should probably charge for an app you’re developing… read on….

http://tr.im/gDzu

Today site: cr.am

God I love it when you use the .xx to finish your name, like chi.mp

Cram will shrink your links to very small links, like tinyurl does but they’ll actually pay your site if you add their toolbar and your users start using them. Cool beans.

Alternatively, there’s tr.im which help shorten your urls and can give you great analytics, but no money.

Be warned of burn out. If you’re going to go to every networking event that comes your way and go on every interview, even if you don’t want the position, you’re going to start getting frustrated. Once you get frustrated, you become less genuine, and less effective. This is not good. It also does bad things to your relationships that you’ve had before you started networking like mad.

Concentrate your efforts on targeted opportunities where you will be able to connect with the right people, on jobs that you are properly qualified for an interested in. This will leave you less frustrated, which will make you happier, and more excited to talk to that person who will actually connect you with your dream job.

Oh… and as one of my best friends says… don’t forget to sleep, it works wonders.

Last week at Startonomics, the final speaker I was able to stay for discussed the importance of building out a good team, and what he looks for in team members for his company, the Rubicon Project. As I listened to how much he cared about his employees, I said to myself, “wow it would be awesome to work in that sort of environment”. While walking to my car it occurred to me that an old friend of mine from rockclimbing had mentioned a new job at a cool company called Rubicon and upon contacting him I learned it was in fact the same group. He invited me to take part in their catered lunch and to introduce me to their team leaders and HR representative. It was a good time, and who knows what will come of it, but I learned about their company and the services they provide first hand, and the value there is worth a thousand burritos.

If you’ve never heard of the Rubicon Project, you’re missing out… as they say, they can help you make mad cash. How? (Paraphrasing my friend’s explanation here) They give web publishers (anyone with a website) a very small piece of code to put in the space you would traditionally put ads in. Then, using great technology that ping the hundreds of ad networks out there to get an ad that fits in your space and you get paid for it. They optimize which ad networks make you the most money and make sure those are the ads that end up on your page. Currently, they are working on a number of patented processes that make sure pornography and competitor advertisements never show up on your site, but they are rare even with their algorithm that is in place today.

Now that I understand what they do, I’ve become one of their biggest advocates. Maybe it’s just me, but I’m willing to give up 10% of a lot of money to make the pool it’s being taken from larger to begin with. Why not have someone who’s vested in making that 10% as much as possible be working on making the bigger pool as big as possible. They are an automated commission based sales program, and you don’t even have to buy them lunch

At which point I realized we should go together, and invite the other unemployed people we know. Let’s be serious, we aren’t doing anything else more important, and waiting in line can be entertaining. We had five people join us for the meeting of the unemployed and hungry.

It was amazing how much help we could be for each other. Kyla is a former HR person so she’s incredibly knowledgeable about the application game. She taught us about the importance of reading the post and responding with exact level of experience desired, even if it’s a stretch, simply to get into the real applicant pool. I will be getting her my old roommate who works as a recruiting manger to talk to about next steps in her HR career.

I connected Loren with a contact of mine that works for the Ant Farm to talk about trailer marketing. Then we offered to give Uti leads for teacing jobs at private schools where we know deans/assistant deans.

We all listened to what each of us was looking for and will be keeping an eye out. Now I just need to find the next free meal to host another group at. Is it wrong to meet at Cafe 50’s for free foor pajama night?

Last night I had drinks with the Director of Product Development of a new awesome start up that will change the way we shop online, called Eblizz. She’s an old friend of mine that I met a few years back when I was at a friend’s restaraunt in Pasedena with a friend of hers. She’s got connections out the wazoo, and I’m just lucky to have her as one of mine.

After drinks where we talked a little bit of tech and had a lot of laughs, she invited me up to see her amazing downtown loft. This place is one of those apartments that really rock and are well put together. It’s got lots of cool tech add-ons like a projector over her bed to watch movies. Being there and knowing how accomplished she is in tech, I said “I want to be you one day, will you be my mentor, “Get over this mentor thing, be yourself, you’re already amazing.”

Now that’s what a good advisor/mentor should say. This maybe the best advice I’ve ever gotten.

Mint.com is this great website I found out about at Likemind a few weeks ago.

They help you organize your finances for FREE. They keep track of your spending, organize it for you, and help you understand where you might be spending too much. How do they know you’ve been spending too much, or that you’re a great budgeter? They allow you to compare your expenditures with everyone else who uses them. Very big brother meets web 2.0, I know.

But here’s how they do it. They anonyize everyone’s data and compare your spending and suggest ‘Ways to Save’. Yes some of these are driven by advertisements, but the person who suggested the site said that it tracked his car insurance payment and realized he was overspending. Now that’s valuable information.

For me, after the two-minute sign up process, it noted that I spend too much on bills and utilities in comparison to other months. When I looked to see what fell into this category it was because of the City of Los Angeles charges on my credit card ($340 in tickets later I will never park in a red zone again!!!) We’ll see what else I learn about myself in the coming days. Supposedly Trader Joe’s is my most common vendor… what’s yours?

Side note- lowermybills.com in theory is supposed to help out with this too, but they are way more ad/lead driven and don’t analyze personal spending. I have an interview with them tomorrow, maybe I’ll find out more interactive things are in the works.

2/27/09 Update…Mint just told sent me an email reminding me that my credit card bill was due… LOVE THEM!!!

1) I’m organizing events for Mixergy and sharing part of the profits for the events.

2) I got to work on a SWOT analysis for a small start-up consulting firm.

3) I have an interview tomorrow for a job I”m actually qualified for.

My morning started when an auto insurance broker called me. We had played phone tag yesterday, and it was my turn, but he took the initiative and called me again. He followed up later with quotes, that were still more expensive than my current carrier, but it got my day off right.

Today’s job search started by googling “product development los angeles” which led me to a number of local companies and an organization called Product Development and Management Association’s Los Angeles chapter. They had a contact number about an upcoming certification class and rather than emailing, I picked up my phone and made direct contact. The organization representative I spoke with was very helpful, referred me to a free networking event they were having in a few weeks, their national job board, and a product consulting company called MSquared (msquared.com) that he said is often looking for consultants. I created a profile on their site and signed up for an upcoming networking event for their group as well. By submitting my credentials, and for some reason having a resume that uploaded incorrectly, I was emailed directly by one of their managers who’s direct contact information I now have. I left her a message asking her to call me to explain more about the Msquared process, and hope to hear back soon.

I also called three of the local companies I found, and though none of them were looking for anyone, I was amazed as to how nice they were on the phone and how they offered to “keep my resume on file”. I am fully aware that this does little for me right now, but if I reach out again in a month or two, there’s a better chance I won’t be a complete stranger. Finally, I called an owner of a small web design firm I had contacted about a project at my last job to see if he had any openings. Though he didn’t, because we have mutual connections, he offered to send my resume out to a few of his connections in case they had openings.

Then I went to my favorite job board… LinkedIn. Yes I use indeed.com as an aggregator to look at other sites, but LinkedIn is my personal favorite. Why you may ask? Because it allows me to see how I might be connected to but it also allows potential employers to see my recommendations. It’s my perspective that recruiters appreciate knowing that the quality of my work and my professionalism is getting the seal of approval of others. A communications manager posting at a local startup pops up and I submit my resume. Then, LinkedIn helps me look at the company and the person who posted the position for potential connections. It turns out the the VP of Business Development and I are in a few groups together, so I send him a friendly email explaining that I had sent in my resume and I was requesting his help in getting in touch with the hiring manager. Within minutes he sent me back a personal email requesting my resume directly and offering to hand it personally to the hiring manager. Once sent, he then cc’ed me on the email he sent to the hiring manager which said “I like Tami’s resourcefulness in also sending an email to me. She’s also a UCLA grad. I also printed-out a hard copy of her resume for you.” Now, I don’t know if I’m going to get the job, but I got a lot further by sending that extra message than I would have without it.

My afternoon surrounded an informational interview I had with a high ranking non-profit consultant who now works in house at a prestigious hospital in community relations and donor development. Important tidbits that came out of my meeting: 1) a product centered consultant for non-profits does have a place, 2) I do still need to find a place to learn, even if my next job is only a 2 year position, and 3) though being a generalist now may seem like a problem as everyone is looking for specialists, in 10 years my variety of skills and experiences will look great.

During my evening of returning emails and researching, my friend Andrew Warner of mixergy, the professional networker, reached out to me today to help him find lead generation companies I might now for an event he’s running next week. Not surprising to those who have been reading this far, one of my best friends is a silent partner for eleads.com, so I’m connecting them. I also emailed Andrew to follow-up with him on his offer to introduce me to any LinkedIn connection I thought would be helpful, and he publicized his connections for me. In my effort to understand his job a bit better I snooped around mixergy and came across the best listing for tech networking events in Los Angeles that I’ve seen: http://blog.mixergy.com/events/ it’s a very impressive list.

Finally, I have been working with some Iphone application developers on my “One Status” concept that works off of the ping.fm platform. We were about to sign a contract when I decided to reach out to a few people. First I checked out the ping.fm blog and got in contact with a very tech savvy individual who’s working on a similar application. As I looked through his open source specs I became aware that he’s a few steps ahead of me right now. I also talked to my long time mentor Marcy Hoffman who a few years back started a company called I-ligher, it allows you to highlight online text and have it automatically saved into files without copying and pasting. It’s a very cool tool that has one many awards, yet still hasn’t been picked up in mass. She reminded me to look at Alexa for web traffic comparisons, and I assessed that Friendfeed is probably going to continue to grow and the ping will not grow fast enough to make my investment in the application worthwhile, especially if there is direct competition for the same small population. So we killed that project and moved on to another Iphone application idea that came from my friend Jamie, a “To Call” list that works with your contacts and allows you to set repeating reminders for calls.

Thus today’s phone calls and emails might get me a job, saved me a large investment, and helped me help a fellow networker.