Startup Kids Documentary Outlines Journey for Young Entrepreneurs

The Startup Kids features young entrepreneurs

Vimeo, Dropbox, Foodspotting, Soundcloud - what do all these have in common?

Besides being successful tech startups that you’ve probably heard of and likely even used, they were all founded by young people. The founders of these startups and more young entrepreneurs are the focus of a new documentary called The Startup Kids.  The film is now holding screenings before audiences of startup entrepreneurs. Screenings are being held in cities in Europe, Canada, the United States, Australia and Vietnam, among other places.

Technology has opened doors for young entrepreneurs to start companies without previous access to a lot of resources and funding. It has also made it easier to reach large groups of people without traditional marketing methods.

“Young people often have less to lose,” said Vala Halldorsdottir, co-creator of The Startup Kids. “It’s maybe harder to bootstrap a business when you are older and have a family and loans you need to pay off.”

Halldorsdottir knows this because she is a young entrepreneur herself. She and her business partner, Sesselja Vilhjalmsdottir, created a successful board game production company in Iceland in 2009. The two business partners filmed The Startup Kids together after their company took off.

Motivating others is why they created The Startup Kids. “We were so motivated after our success that we wanted to motivate others to do the same,” said Halldorsdottir.

But the documentary isn’t just about how great starting a business can be. The young entrepreneurs interviewed in the film, including those from Vimeo, Dropbox, Foodspotting and Soundcloud, also outline the difficulties of starting a business.

“I don’t know why anybody thinks that startups are all rainbows and sunshine,” said Founder of Grove, Leah Culver, in the film’s trailer, shown below.

Founder of Dropbox Drew Houston (pictured above, from the film) added, “Everything you’re doing is basically something you’re just barely qualified for or not qualified for. It’s like jumping off a cliff and having to build your own parachute.”

Even Halldorsdottir and Vilhjalmsdottir faced their own startup challenges as they created their board game company. It was during the Icelandic financial crisis that began in 2008, when traditional job prospects were hard to come by.

After the two beat the odds and found success with their company, Halldorsdottir said they learned a lot about entrepreneurship. And they learned even more while interviewing others in the United States and Europe for The Startup Kids.

“Entrepreneurs are the same everywhere,” she said. “They are ambitious and hard-working, with the ‘I’m going to change the world’ mentality.”

Halldorsdottir and Vilhjalmsdottir turned to Kickstarter to fund their documentary project. They raised over $23,000 to defer production expenses and travel to the United States and Europe to interview people. The film is available on iTunes and Amazon and on DVD through The Startup Kids website.  Watch the trailer below:




The Smallbiztechnology Weekly Roundup And Look At What’s Ahead

Each week on Smallbiztechnology.com, we post a lot of articles that help small businesses GROW their business. We want to make sure you didn’t miss anything, so here’s a quick roundup of what we talked about last week and a sneak peek at what we’ll be sending your way in the week to come. Check out our video here, or watch below:

Mobile Technology

Office Tech

Software and Cloud Computing

Social Media

Security

Get Customers

On Monday, we’ll have 7 Things To Look For In Web Conferencing and our Executive Spotlight on Janine Popick, CEO and Founder of VerticalResponse.

Tuesday, we’ll look at 6 Marketing Opportunities The New Facebook Hashtag Will Offer and 7 Tips To Generate Leads At A Trade Show Without Even Attending.

Wednesday, we have Twitter Advertising 101: 8 Things to Know About Advertising Your Business on Twitter, and Five Lessons To Protect Your Business From Identity Theft.

Thursday, we have 4 New Apps To Help Customize Your Email Marketing Campaigns and Survey Results That Reveal New Marketing Challenges.

Friday, we’ll give you 4 Benefits of Webcasts For Small Business and Tips On How To Do It Right, and 5 Best Practices for Bring Your Devices To Work Implementation.

You won’t want to miss any of that, and there’s a lot more beyond what I just mentioned, so come on back and let us know what you think in the comments! Thanks for watching and see you next week.



Read Contagious and Learn How to Take Your Ideas Viral

viral marketing examplesWanna know my sure-fire advice for taking your video viral?  Just video yourself doing anything you’d never want a single soul to see - ever.  That should do it.  Up until I read Contagious: Why Things Catch On by Jonah Berger, that was the best advice I could give.

Aren’t you glad I got my hands on this book?  I’m glad too because now I have a much more solid understanding of why things go viral and even more importantly, how to put certain elements in place to increase the likelihood that my product, service or video will have the best chance of going viral. And after reading this review, so will you.

It’s Like Made to Stick and Then Some

If you think Contagious sounds a lot like the Heath Brothers’ Made to Stick, you’d be on the right track.  You see, Jonah Berger’s mentor in graduate school was Chip Heath and as he says early in the book, “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.”  The key distinction between the two books is that Made to Stick (as the name implies) is about how to get ideas to stick so that people remember them.  Contagious is more about how to get ideas to spread, so that people talk about them.  And this is why I picked up a Kindle copy of this book on early order as soon as a friend mentioned it to me.

The Six Elements to Consider for Contagious Ideas

Let’s just jump right into the nitty-gritty.  I know you’re probably chomping at the keyboard and scrolling through this review to get to the meat of the book.

Contagious quickly gets to the key points - that a viral idea, product, service or video has to contain at least a couple of these six ingredients:

  1. Social Currency:  The bottom line is that human beings like to brag.  We like to see ourselves as being special, important, knowledgeable and unique.  In short, human beings want to look good.  So if sharing something is going to make us look good, we’re going to share it.  The examples given in the book include: A restaurant bar with a secret entrance through a phone booth.  They don’t promote this entrance, you just have to know about it.  The place is packed.
  2. Triggers: This is really an interesting element of contagious ideas.  Would you believe that Cheerieos gets more word of mouth than Disney?  It’s all because of triggers.  People have breakfast every day; they don’t go to Disney every day.  And it’s this daily dose of Cheerios at breakfast that generates the word of mouth.  The phrase to remember here is, “Top of mind, tip of tongue.”
  3. Emotion:  Making people feel something gets them to talk about it.  One of my favorite examples is the Google video that shows the story of a meeting, turning into a romance turning into a wedding, all through the various search terms entered in the search field of Google.  “When we care, we share” is the phrase associated with this element.
  4. Public:  This is one of my favorite elements in viral content.  Berger illustrates this element using the Armstrong Livestrong story and the story of the Mustache movement for men’s health awareness.   The basic idea is to make some element of your idea, product or service visible to the world in such a way that makes people ask about it and ultimately participate in it.
  5. Practical Value:  This is one element that may or may not be a function of your idea.  But if your idea has practical value; if it shows people how to do something, overcome a challenge in a creative way or solve a problem, it’s got a higher likelihood of being shared. Think of this one as, “News you can use.”
  6. Stories:  This element should come as no surprise.  Stories have always been amazingly powerful and shareable.  Everyone loves a good story.  Read this chapter carefully because the stories you create have to have a specific connection and relevance to the idea you are trying to spread.  Remember that, “Information travels under the guise of idle chatter.”

Contagious Contains Even More Content You Can Use

Another wonderful thing about Contagious is that there is even more content.  You’ll find a downloadable workbook as a PDF file that you can use to add some viral ingredients to your idea.  There is also a STEPPS (those are the six elements I described above) framework on a single sheet that you can carry along with you and finally a book club discussion guide that you can use with your team.

Don’t Just Read Contagious BE Contagious

When you get your own copy of Contagious you’ll want to read it all the way through for the sheer entertainment value.  But then, I’d recommend that you download the worksheets and keep them close and handy.

This is a book you’ll want to spend some time with and perhaps use it as a checklist.  Another element that I like about the book is how useful it can be in starting discussions with your team about how to give your ideas and campaigns the highest chance of success.

If you’ve ever found yourself wondering why some ideas spread while others don’t - read contagious and learn how to add a viral element to your business.




Read Contagious and Learn How to Take Your Ideas Viral

viral marketing examplesWanna know my sure-fire advice for taking your video viral?  Just video yourself doing anything you’d never want a single soul to see - ever.  That should do it.  Up until I read Contagious: Why Things Catch On by Jonah Berger, that was the best advice I could give.

Aren’t you glad I got my hands on this book?  I’m glad too because now I have a much more solid understanding of why things go viral and even more importantly, how to put certain elements in place to increase the likelihood that my product, service or video will have the best chance of going viral. And after reading this review, so will you.

It’s Like Made to Stick and Then Some

If you think Contagious sounds a lot like the Heath Brothers’ Made to Stick, you’d be on the right track.  You see, Jonah Berger’s mentor in graduate school was Chip Heath and as he says early in the book, “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.”  The key distinction between the two books is that Made to Stick (as the name implies) is about how to get ideas to stick so that people remember them.  Contagious is more about how to get ideas to spread, so that people talk about them.  And this is why I picked up a Kindle copy of this book on early order as soon as a friend mentioned it to me.

The Six Elements to Consider for Contagious Ideas

Let’s just jump right into the nitty-gritty.  I know you’re probably chomping at the keyboard and scrolling through this review to get to the meat of the book.

Contagious quickly gets to the key points - that a viral idea, product, service or video has to contain at least a couple of these six ingredients:

  1. Social Currency:  The bottom line is that human beings like to brag.  We like to see ourselves as being special, important, knowledgeable and unique.  In short, human beings want to look good.  So if sharing something is going to make us look good, we’re going to share it.  The examples given in the book include: A restaurant bar with a secret entrance through a phone booth.  They don’t promote this entrance, you just have to know about it.  The place is packed.
  2. Triggers: This is really an interesting element of contagious ideas.  Would you believe that Cheerieos gets more word of mouth than Disney?  It’s all because of triggers.  People have breakfast every day; they don’t go to Disney every day.  And it’s this daily dose of Cheerios at breakfast that generates the word of mouth.  The phrase to remember here is, “Top of mind, tip of tongue.”
  3. Emotion:  Making people feel something gets them to talk about it.  One of my favorite examples is the Google video that shows the story of a meeting, turning into a romance turning into a wedding, all through the various search terms entered in the search field of Google.  “When we care, we share” is the phrase associated with this element.
  4. Public:  This is one of my favorite elements in viral content.  Berger illustrates this element using the Armstrong Livestrong story and the story of the Mustache movement for men’s health awareness.   The basic idea is to make some element of your idea, product or service visible to the world in such a way that makes people ask about it and ultimately participate in it.
  5. Practical Value:  This is one element that may or may not be a function of your idea.  But if your idea has practical value; if it shows people how to do something, overcome a challenge in a creative way or solve a problem, it’s got a higher likelihood of being shared. Think of this one as, “News you can use.”
  6. Stories:  This element should come as no surprise.  Stories have always been amazingly powerful and shareable.  Everyone loves a good story.  Read this chapter carefully because the stories you create have to have a specific connection and relevance to the idea you are trying to spread.  Remember that, “Information travels under the guise of idle chatter.”

Contagious Contains Even More Content You Can Use

Another wonderful thing about Contagious is that there is even more content.  You’ll find a downloadable workbook as a PDF file that you can use to add some viral ingredients to your idea.  There is also a STEPPS (those are the six elements I described above) framework on a single sheet that you can carry along with you and finally a book club discussion guide that you can use with your team.

Don’t Just Read Contagious BE Contagious

When you get your own copy of Contagious you’ll want to read it all the way through for the sheer entertainment value.  But then, I’d recommend that you download the worksheets and keep them close and handy.

This is a book you’ll want to spend some time with and perhaps use it as a checklist.  Another element that I like about the book is how useful it can be in starting discussions with your team about how to give your ideas and campaigns the highest chance of success.

If you’ve ever found yourself wondering why some ideas spread while others don’t - read contagious and learn how to add a viral element to your business.




Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)