Wired on Public High Techs

Last week Felix Salmon, a Reuters blogger writing for Wired Magazine’s Epicenter website, published a thorough and well-done article called For High Tech Companies Going Public Sucks.  It investigates, with several examples, how the act of becoming publicly traded can consequentially destroy a high tech startup’s business model. The story touches upon, among other things, the history of the IPO’s impact on high tech companies, why going public might be irrelevant to those companies that already have VC capital, and how conflicting  interests from either VC or general-public investors results in a struggle for short-term profits over long-term best practices.

It ends on a positive note though, referencing potentially new SEC legislation that would change the tipping point at which a company would need to publicly sell its equity.  This one’s definitely worth the read if you follow the industry.  It almost makes me feel sorry for Mark Zuckerberg.  Almost.

Trends Magazine

If you’re, oh say a VC firm, and therefore trying to stay- not just abreast but ahead- on the business frontier, then Trends Magazine is a good place to start.  According to its About page, the Trends editorial staff of business experts, have a secret sauce of, among other things, “tips, inside information, privately distributed reports.”  bizologie sure likes the sound of that! The publication’s Economic Outlook reports take big-picture looks at primiarly our country, while its Research Library covers a range of relatively more focused topics like investments, nanotechnology, and energy.  A couple of particularly tantalizing article titles include, “A New Trajectory for Moore’s Law” and “Solving the Global Water Crisis Moves Beyond the Technical Feasibility Stage”.

Of course only the introductory paragraphs are free, but we wouldn’t leave you bereft right after telling you all about the magazine.  For those with limited pocketbooks, or perhaps those needing only the occasional article, the good news is that Trends is a current subscription in the Business Source Complete database, which as we have mentioned before, is likely freely accessible in your vicinity.

Investopedia - Financial Education

I use Investopedia regularly when I'm looking for definitions and formulas. They do an excellent job of explaining financial concepts in simple, understandable terms. But, Investopedia is more than just a dictionary. They are the experts in online financial education. The site offers news, calculators, and even a fantasy stock simulator. Their broad selection of tutorials covers everything from the basics of stock picking, and choosing between retirement plans, to real estate investment information like a condo-buying walk through.  Now you can even find Investopedia videos on YouTube. Here's a perfect example of how they can explain a confusing concept like Beta in just two minutes. Amazing combination of education and entertainment. That is hard to beat!

I hate commercials! Wait, what's that song?

You're on the edge of your seat waiting for Ryan Seacrest to tell you who isn't going to be your next American Idol...right after these messages. Argh! But next thing you know, you're singing along with the commercial and wondering "Who's that band? What's this song?"  In walks findthatsong. They do nothing but keep up with all the songs played in commercials. You can search their site by keyword if you know the song or band or product, but they also have a nifty little dropdown menu with the companies listed so you can click right through to someone like Apple or Volkswagen and see their most recent commercials and the songs attached. You'll see the artist, name of the song, a video of the commercial and a link right to iTunes to purchase the song if you like it. If you're my age (*cough* over 30? way over 30? *cough*), you probably remember feeling like a band "sold out" if they lent their song to a corporation (a.k.a. "the man"), but more recently,  commercials have become a much more viable way for bands to get their music out there. Large radio stations have small, limited playlists so smaller bands have limited venues for promoting their music. And while you can fire up your Shazam app for this service as well, I find that I don't always have my smartphone ready in time to snag something from a 30 second commercial. So, while you may not feel like the coolest kid on the block "discovering" new music from commercials, it's a pretty great service. I've recently fallen in love with the song Lowe's uses for their new service to store your paint colors:

Thank you, GlobalData!

Dearest darling GlobalData, We adore you for devoting a bookmark-worthy Media Center to those of us who are perpetually jonesing for great industry news articles.  You must have been following our blog entries like this one and this one, because you know that the best way to our hearts- ok actually probably the left hemisphere’s of our brains- is through freely available news and analysis.

You woo us not just with the standard page of Press Releases but also with an Expert Insights page covering categories like Alternative Energy and Medical Devices.  Your headliner titles like, “Hydropower's Hold over Indian Renewables Market Set to Decline” make us all giddy and flustered with all that forecasting.  And we love a company that is open to communication; email alerts for emergent research in our category of choice is such a turn-on.

Of course you might break up with us when you figure out that we librarians can’t afford to actually buy any of your full-length market research reports or take you up on one of those consultations, but there are plenty of fish in the sea.

Hugs and kisses,

bizologie

The CDC Under Magnification: Part Two

Wouldn’t you know, watching the very smart movie Contagion last night would get me psyched to write this second installment on the CDC?  This part deals with the National Center for Health Statistics, a CDC subset that works to, “compile statistical information to guide actions and policies to improve the health of our people. …Working with partners throughout the health community, we use a variety of approaches to efficiently obtain information from the sources most able to provide information” (About). For someone trying to do business research through the NCHS website for the first time, be forewarned that these pages, understandably dense with information, have a nearly overwhelming barrage of links, terminology, and acronyms-that-all-sound-the-same.  My advice is to acclimate to the site’s organization by starting at the beginning:  use the left-side navigation menu to peruse the NCHS’s various Surveys and Data Collection Systems’s sub-pages on an individual basis to see which one might offer information that’s relevant to your research.  If a particular survey sounds promising, then also stick to that left-menu’s Survey Results & Products link, or any comparable link, when they're available.

In this manner, I managed to drill down to a site that breaks the National Hospital Discharge Survey, one of the  more exhaustive surveys, into spreadsheets of information based on popular aggregating factors.  (Alas, I don't know if this url and my last link are persistent).  For example, I downloaded a chart that gives me totals for “all listed procedures” from hospitals by category and age, meaning I see things like the number of appendectomies performed in the 15-44 age group.  This type of information is great for those trying to compile a numerical justification for their newfangled product or pill.

Zanran: Numerical Data Search

Business researchers are always looking for the numbers.  We do love our charts, graphs, and tables. bizologie has shown you how to search Google for market research reports that might present that kind of information. Now there is Zanran, a new search engine that calls itself the Google for data. "Zanran helps you to find ‘semi-structured’ data on the web... The numerical data that people have presented as graphs and tables and charts. For example, the data could be a graph in a PDF report, or a table in an Excel spreadsheet, or a barchart shown as an image in an HTML page."

Instead of a user searching for text on a page, Zanran searches the web for files that contain images with numerical content and the user searches that smaller universe. I love this idea. The only thing I see missing is searching for PowerPoint presentations. So much rich data can be mined from PPT files, it is a shame they are not included in the search. Zanran is still in Beta so maybe that will be added soon.

This search engine sounds similar to Wolfram Alpha. The difference is that Wolfram Alpha is looking to find the answer by analyzing the data, and Zanran presents a list of links that contain visual representations of numeric data that might answer the question. Zanran offers a hover over feature which allows you to see the PDF without waiting for the download. That save a ton of time when you are scanning a lot of documents. They also even pull out market research report links on the right. It still has a way to go, but this could be a great tool for competitive intelligence. Plus, you've got to love their office dog Freddie.

NYT: How Companies Learn Your Secrets

Happy Monday!  We're starting out the week by revisiting a post on our Facebook page which deserves its proper due on our blog too.  We all know that companies are researching us as much as we do them, but as Charles Duhigg's NYT article titled "How Companies Learn Your Secrets" explains in excruciating detail, the extent to which retailers like Target can hone in on select life events based on shifting purchasing habits is, well, fascinating. We highly recommend devoting a solid 20 minutes of quality workload procrastination to reading the whole thing.  Yes it's a bit long in parts, but stick with it through the obligatory rat-and-maze experiment because the case study on Febreze alone is worth the price of admission.  Overall, depending on your metaporical empty-or-full-half-glass outlook when it comes to consumer psychology, you might come away a bit terrified, or you might want to try to cheat the system next time you buy groceries, or you might be jonesing to try that spiffy weight loss trick.

The CDC Under Magnification: Part One

We’re lucky to live in a country where our government collects and disseminate scads of information for free, case in point, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  Of course nothing is easy with our government, and the CDC website is no exception, mostly due to its sheer scale.  So, having nothing better to do, being kind and selfless, I decided to spend some quality time frolicking through the CDC.gov realm in order to point out a couple highlights that are relevant to business researchers. First and foremost, the Features -> Data & Statistics Page lends itself particularly well to background and/or market validation types of research.  It has been going strong since 2007, and it covers a surprisingly wide array of topics concerning our health.  Interested in opening up a recovery center?  Check out the 2011 Painkiller Overdoses report.  Selling hearing aids?  Read the 2010 or 2011 Infant Hearing Loss report.   Manufacturing air conditioners?  See the 2009 Working in Hot Environments report.

These reports are presented in a format akin to the brief executive summary, with a sprinkling of impactful charts scattered among a handful of paragraphs (including citations).  The bottom of the reports will also feature a series of links to related resources that might, depending on the institution, freely provide their own information too.

James Kane & Loyalty

What makes a customer loyal to a company, brand, or organization? James Kane is the leading expert in the field of loyalty and he helps companies and non-profits take customers from satisfied to loyal. Loyalty, he explains, is beyond satisfaction, when the customer is thinking about what the company did for them yesterday, and moves the customers to think about what they can do for the company. One of the best examples of company loyalty is Apple. Talk to any iPhone users and you know they will sell you on the product. Imagine having every single one of your customers as a commission free salesman for your company. That is the strength of social media, but you have to have loyal customers to make it really payoff. Kane works with a lot of associations and I was lucky enough to meet him at the Special Libraries Association Leadership Summit in Atlanta last month. Jim is conducting a Loyalty Pilot Project with five chapters of SLA to determine how to expand loyalty and build membership. The themes of the project are membership, leadership, remote members, vendor relations, and community. Each of the SLA chapters took one of the five main themes and spent months developing new programs and trying new strategies to enhance loyalty. Overall the message was clear, the way to build loyal members is to get them involved. The members develop a sense of belonging and purpose which keeps them involved and they sell the value of the association to their peers.

Here's a clip of one of Kane's presentations Satisfied vs Loyal on Vimeo. Find out more about Jim on his website and watch for his two upcoming books, The Loyalty Switch and Virtually Loyal.

Casual Friday: The New Maps

The New Maps are not just an Americana-laced pop/rock band from Austin, Texas, they are the creative outlet of business researcher Michael Hill, colleague of righteous Bizologist Laura Young. In addition to Hill on vocals, guitars and piano, The New Maps features Paul Grotevant on upright bass and vocals, and Jeff Olson on drumkit. The band, which formed in early 2011 and spent the last year playing shows around Austin, released its 11-song debut, These Parts, in January 2012. In addition to original songs by Hill and inspired performances by the band, These Parts features guest vocals from Hill's former Marmalade/Mudville Nine bandmate Kim Vance Baker and a re-imagined version of Bruce Springsteen's epic "Badlands." The album can be purchased digitally via iTunes or Amazon.

The history of The New Maps traces back to the mid-90s Denton, Texas scene, where Hill cut his teeth writing songs and serving as bandleader for acts like Marmalade, Mudville Nine and 12lb.Test, while also playing lead guitar and singing harmonies for Slobberbone and former Fever In The Funkhouse leader Nick Brisco's solo project, the Nick Brisco Band. Meanwhile, native Austinite Grotevant was in San Francisco playing bass with the likes of Matt Bauer and alt-country orchestra Angel's Camp, and another native Austinite, Olson, was finishing up grade school.

Fast-forward to 2010 and Hill, back in Texas after a 6-year-stint in the Pacific Northwest, was performing with with fellow First Grade parent Grotevant, a founding member of The 145s, at Austin coffee shops. In early 2011 the duo invited Olson, sometime member of Balmorhea, to play a show with them at legendary Austin live music haunt The Hole In The Wall and The New Maps were born. Shortly thereafter, the trio took to recording and, a little less then a year later, These Parts was released. For more information, please visit the band online at www.thenewmaps.com.

More Love This Valentine's Day

Last year was a good year for Valentine's but this year is even better! According to the National Retail Federation spending is up 8.5% over last year. Yep, sweethearts are going all out this year to show the love. "The average person celebrating the holiday will shell out $126.03...the highest in the survey’s 10-year history. Total spending is expected to reach $17.6 billion!"

"Total spending on jewelry is expected to reach $4.1 billion, up from $3.5 billion last year. Second to jewelry, those with a case of the love bug will spend more than $3.5 billion on a special evening out. Consumers will also spend $1.8 billion on flowers, $1.5 billion on candy, $1.4 billion on clothing and $1.1 billion on gift cards."

This year, "more than half of all tablet owners (53.8%) will use their device to research products, compare prices, redeem coupons, look up retailer information or purchase products. Four in 10 (40.4%) smartphone owners will use their mobile device to do the same." I've seen a lot of commercials for those same tablets and phones on sale for Valentines, so maybe you'll be lucky and get some new tech from your favorite techie.

We Owe Forbes a Cocktail

Business researchers are asked all the time to provide financial data on private companies, and as you can see here and here, we love any resource that helps us pin down those numbers.   Today we’re looking at one more resource from none other than Forbes, the reporting powerhouse that puts forth juicy lists on all sorts of stuff including rich people, good colleges, and small companies. The good people at Forbes have, for the past several years, been making a list of America’s Largest Private Companies, and even better, they’ve freely posted it online for our benefit.  Here's the complete 2011 list.  Besides an estimated revenue, (for which Forbes details their methodology) this ranking also includes industry and employee count criteria, both of which are sort-able features.  Below is an excerpt from the list- the top chemical companies.

Thanks, Forbes!  You kick @$$, and we at bizologie love you dearly for it.

bizologie Favorite Tools: batchgeo

One of our new favorite tools is batchgeo which allows you to take geographic  information you have in a spreadsheet or from a table on a webpage and turn it into an interactive map. Not only can you map out your locations, you can also color code them to group like items on the map. Once you've got your map set up the way you like, batchgeo will give the map its own link to share with whomever you like. They also provide the HTML code in case you want to embed it to a webpage. It's a wonderful time saver and all at the low, low price of free. They have a professional service available as well if you need more features, but I was able to produce some pretty handy maps using their free version. Check out the video below for a quick tutorial on batchgeo.

The Sweet Sound of… Data

I was getting my hipster on, listening to a song called Love Show by Skye, and for whatever deep reason, it prompted me to think about researching the music industry.  Without further adieu, I've put together a list of five great resources, in no particular order, for freely available music industry research: 1.  The RIAA-  Not necessarily the first name we associate with “giving stuff away freely,” but the infamously-terrifying-to-college-students trade group has a research tab that includes downloadable reports on shipment data, music’s economic impact, and of course, the effects of piracy.

2.   The IFPI- aka the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, it’s another major industry trade group akin to the RIAA, and in fact the RIAA links to a handful of the IFPI’s reports from its research page.  Nonetheless, it deserves its own mention, especially for its in-depth Digital Music Report that it has published for five years now.

3.  Digital Music News-  Not only does it sport a spiffy logo, but it also has an excellent selection of industry news and graphic-laden summaries of studies with titles like:  “92% of Music Fans Still Prefer Ownership...”, or “81% of iTunes Collections Never Get Played. Ever...”, or “Whoa: 3 Stores = 94.4% of Indie Digital Revenues...”.  It returned great results with keyword searches like: “study” or “trend” or “marketing”.

4.  Billboard.biz- The business research offshoot of the main Billboard publication, it has several categories of industry news, e.g. retail or branding, plus genre-specific news too, e.g. Latin or Dance.

5.  The Music Business Research Blog- A 2+ year blog that’s going strong, it’s run by Dr. Peter Tschmuck, an industry expert and university professor.  Concerning this endeavor, he states:  “This blog for Music Business Research is designed as a scientific discussion forum on all issues of music business/industry in all its manifestations.”  Not only is it an intelligent blog, but it also includes downloadable theses and papers that were generously contributed for Dr. Tschmuk’s cause.

The Business Journals for Private Company Research

If you spend any time conducting business research, then you know that finding private company research can be really difficult. Especially if the company is new or small. Private companies are not required to release information about themselves to the SEC,  so tracking down things like sales figures, revenues, private equity funding, company history or future company plans can be trying at best. One of our favorite resources for private company information is "The American City Business Journals" or, more commonly, BizJournal. BizJournal comes out every week and covers 62 markets nationwide. Some of their information is subscription-based but a fair amount of it is available freely on their websites. While it's possible to search their main site for companies, I typically go straight to my local BizJournal, Austin in this case, and start my local company search there. Austin is a town of startups, including Whaleshark Media, MapMyFitness, UShip, BuildASign and countless others. I've had great luck finding in depth articles about most of them in our local BizJournal. As an example, this article on Whaleshark Media, tells me when the company started, how many employees they have and how much money they've raised and who the investors are. Not bad for free, easy-to-find information.

Another helpful thing to do is follow the national BizJournals and your local BizJournal on Twitter. The local one is especially helpful for keeping up with not only local businesses, but also events going on around town. You can follow  the national account @bizjournals.

Casual Friday: Moondapple Bead & Lego Lamps

Today we're featuring  local Austin artist, Katheryn Hill. Kathy makes beautiful lamps made from found and recycled items, like gemstones and legos. Below she explains how she got started and what goes into her art: This is art with a side job. These one-of-a-kind handmade lamps are made to either convey a message, show your favorite talismans, be a good luck charm for your house, describe who you or your family is, and no matter what, they start a conversation and definitely say a lot without a word being spoken.

I needed to make extra money while my new husband and I moved to Seattle with no credit cards and the cost of living from Denton to Seattle was quite a difference! I taught myself how to make jewelry and sold them for years. With time, I accumulated a lot of inventory of all kinds because not all beads make good necklaces or earrings. I held on to them and one day I had a brainstorm- light would look really pretty coming through all these beads!

I wanted to make my sister something special for her birthday so I tried my first lamp using the beaded lamp shade. It was a hit! I have branched out with all sorts of lamps. I love to find materials at garage sales. The ugliest old jewelry can be used. I found one of those long, wooden necklaces with African animals carves on it and used them for my niece's nursery lamp that had an animal theme!

One of my favorites was for my father-in-law who said that he "liked my lamps but they weren't his cup of tea". About 5 minutes after he said that I dedicated myself to making one that he'd want. He's an avid bass fisherman and I made a lamp with fishing gear, all kinds of baits, bobbers, etc. and he loved it! This is when I officially switched to fishing line to make the strands for the shade! I wanted my mother-in-law to take part too, so I added charms that fit with her hobbies and personality, and then decided to add the grandchildren with small picture frames on the shade. The lamp base is a tree so now they have a scrapbook with a side job along with a family tree. It's really cool seeing the grandkids gently looking at it to find their baby pictures.

And after a few years, my son asked when he could get a lamp but not with the beads. Hmmmm....He's planning to be a lego master builder one day, so I decided to go with legos.  That was great fun adding the windows and doors to let the light out. You have to keep the shade as is and add the legos to it or the legos would melt if the bulb is too strong.

Part of the fun is I can garage sale shop and antique store and goodwill shop for the lamp bases, old ugly jewelry that no one wants anymore and buy recycled legos to make my treasures.  I love getting jewelry that people have saved for years and don't know what to do with after years of keeping them in a box. Some things just shouldn't be jewelry... wooden animals on wooden necklaces- not a good idea.

Each piece is so unique. I am unique in what I do and how I put this stuff together, and it is for you, the unique individual that will have the only lamp of its kind made especially for you. It is a great way to make a house a home, and a useful way to add light and art to your life.

Katheryn Hill Light up your life with a custom made lamp by moondapple!

You can check out Kathy's lamps and find more information on her Etsy page.

Re.vu Visual Resume

Looking for a cool, easy way to revitalize your resume? According to this WSJ article, some companies aren't even taking traditional resumes anymore. Re.vu offers a way to get you online quickly. It is a "complete rethinking of what a resume can be. You no longer have to cram your experience and expertise onto a plain white piece of paper." By creating a colorful infographic of your experience you give your resume a boost and give yourself a way to stand out from the herd.

Re.vu makes it easy to transfer all your experience and education right over from your LinkedIn account. You can choose from one of the 13 designs or upload your own background image.  Then just fill in for your vital stats, job duties, and skill evolution and the site creates visual representation with the click of a button.

And, for those companies that are still a little more traditional, you can upload your resume so that a hiring manager can print out a paper copy.

Here's a sample of what I was able put together in under 15 minutes. It's just a start, the tricky part is rethinking your work experience and putting it into numbers that tell the best visual story.

How Much Is That Doggie In The Window?

We bizologie girls are dog lovers, so we're always fascinated with statistics on pet ownership. Previously, we talked about the American Pet Products Association and their survey results for spending on pet supplies, food, medical care, etc. and today we thought we'd showcase a couple of other resources we like for pet owner statistics. The most recent Census data on pet ownership is from 2006 and has a great breakdown of ownership by income and household size:

And if you'd like to estimate how many pet owners are in your neighborhood or city, the American Veterinary Medical Association has a cool calculator for figuring out dog, cat, bird and horse ownership in your area. Simply provide the community population and they'll give you an estimate. Be sure and check out their formulas for how they arrive at their figures.

So, how much is that doggie in the window? The one with the waggley tale?  Well, according to the ASPCA , a medium sized dog could run you about $695 a year.  Assuming your best friend averages about 11 years, that's nearly $8000. We think Spot is worth every penny, but it's definitely a consideration when adopting a pet.

Enthused for Ethical Consumer

As the green movement evolves and companies try to better attract new consumers and maintain old ones, they need to focus increasingly on not only whether they (and their competitors’) goods are made of x% recycled materials, but also whether overall they are operating a good business. Enter the Ethical Consumer Research Association Ltd.  This UK based company has offerings in products/services research for consumers, and consultancy services for businesses, by training a high-powered-morally-righteous-lens on the companies producing them.  Ethical Consumer scores the brands based on 19 factors broken down into these categories:  animals, environment, people (e.g. workers’ rights & supply chain management), politics, and sustainability.

And since they are such a nice company, we appreciate that they’re freely giving away with registration, 1) the surface-level charts of companies’ scores on everything from bread making machines to travel insurance, and 2) lengthy reports on the ethical factors impacting that good/service that you’ll find by scrolling down the page.

Check out their current freebie chart for cell phones.  Based on the example of the phones’ abysmal scores, one can readily see the potential for brand differentiation by evolving into a halo-worthy institution.