BRAND STRATEGIST

Monday, January 28, 2013

WeWork Labs

WeWork Labs Startup Showcase & Party @ WeWork Labs SF 
Jan 14th 6:00-9:30pm 


This place looks interesting -especially when it's filled with CEO's!

WeWork Labs is home to dozens of start-ups and to celebrate the cool projects that their working on they were throwing a party and showcase -so of course I crashed it! An event filled with CEO's giving demos, WeWork Labs helps early state technology start-ups grow and accelerate their businesses. Whether it's about to launch next week or just went live these platforms will make your life easier, more convenient, and simply better. All these founders found a problem and utilized technology to solve it, so meet some of the newest CEO's.

Boubou Guiro: The happiest man there, he's the CEO and Founder of OnVedeo. Boubou had a smile on his face the entire time I was talking with him and I couldn't help but feel his excitement. OnVedeo is essentially a video platform for real estate and rental properties with a big focus on their mobile app.

Jenna Bilotta: Founder and Chief Product Gal of Avocado. The Avocado software is the best way to stay connected to your favorite person (assuming your favorite person doesn't change constantly). It's an application and platform designed for two people to build and share a life, as Jenna came up with the idea of Avocado with her husband. She set out to build the most advanced couples app in the world, but why name it Avocado? Jenna told me that avocados grow in pairs on the tree... and that it also makes a cute logo.


George Ludwig: Founder of 6Builder, a tool that drives new costumer acquisition via Twitter. 6Builder enables you to execute a highly effective Twitter marketing campaign in apparently less time than it takes to drink your morning latte. I'm a pretty fast drinker but 6Builder promises to grow, engage and optimize my Twitter for me while I can just sit back, enjoy my coffee and send a hug to my avocado.

It was nearly 8pm so I ditched the conversations with the CEO's for a comfy chair. 
Crashed it- For love of new technologies!









Tuesday, January 22, 2013

Groupon

Good Night Lamp @ Groupon

Jan 15th 7:00-10:00pm 



Everyone knows Groupon. This deal-of-the-day site was hosting a product demo by Alexandra Deschamps-Sonsino -and not everyone knows her. She's the Founder of Good Night Lamp and she came all the way from London, so I crashed this event to see what her new start-up is all about. Alexandra has been focused on the "internet of things" and it's implications in the design of everyday products. This has led her to create a space in people's homes for quirky, internet-connected objects.

The Good Night Lamp brings people together through a neighborhood of networked lamps -a family of internet connected lights. Turn the Big Lamp on and the Little Lamps turn on wherever they are. If you want to keep your eye on a loved one that lives alone, or if you live abroad and can't seem to call your family at the right time (or don't want to) or if you just want to connect home and work by signaling a subtle sign to tell people you're on the way -that's where Good Night Lamp comes into play. The Good Night Lamp creates a tangible reminder of the others presence and connects people around the world at a flick of a switch.

If you find Good Night Lamp interesting they recently jumped aboard the kickstarter train, so you can support it here.   
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/designswarm/good-night-lamp



CRASHED IT -a good night with lamps!

Friday, January 11, 2013

Covington

Covington's Cocktail Reception @ The Westin St. Francis
Jan 7th 5:00-8:30pm 


The clockbar was closed for this private event so I grabbed myself a name tag and crashed this cocktail reception. Covington was hosting this event in conjuction with the healthcare conference and I joined this crowd because I care about health too. Convington & Burling LLP is an international law firm representing clients in cutting edge technology, litigation, white collar defense, governmental affairs, and more -they pretty much cover everything when it deals with law. While crashing this event I noticed that I could essentially split all the attendees up into three categories: the people in healthcare services, the people in pharma companies, and the people that were crashing this event (which were two). What I also saw is that the percentage of men far outnumbered the amount of women.  I found myself with one of the few women attendees, Brianna Sandoval, from Covington & Burling and we both tried to figure out why J.P. Morgan's Health conference was dominated by men. 

Another question that's been on my mind is, what am I going to do with all of this company event crashing? Well, I plan on making a company coffee table book -which I don't think actually exists but I'm creating one that's meant for lobbies and waiting rooms of businesses and it's called, "Crashed it -50 Company Events in SF."  Not sure if this means I'm going to need permission from all these businesses because otherwise it may just turn into a book called "Sued -by 50 Companies in SF". I guess I could now ask this question to my lawyer friends at Covington.


Crashed it with the Covington Crew!  

Wednesday, January 9, 2013

Zappos

Lunch 2.0 @ Zappos Labs
Friday, Jan 4th 12:00pm-2:00pm 




If Zappos can "deliver happiness" then I can deliver pizza and that's how I snuck into Zappos' lunch event with the Escape From New York delivery man. When most people think of Zappos they think shoes, and lots of them. Zappos is the number one online shoe retailer with a major success in customer service. Zappos' call center is different, they don't follow any scripts and they're there for you 24/7... so if you ever need someone to talk to you can always call the Zappos' customer loyalty team -maybe that's how the new record for the longest phone conversation with them lasted 10 hours.  I've heard their voices, but who were these people that would stay on the phone with someone that long just to make them happy?  I went to meet this Zappos family.

I had no idea this little Zappos office even existed, and apparently some of the Zappos' employees in the Las Vegas headquarters don't either. This was their first event this office had ever hosted so when I asked about a presentation they replied, "should we have had one?" and Rian Schmidt, the engineering manager busted out a little dance for me.  Then we talked strategy, which led to me getting a personal presentation.

During this web-demo for one Nick Vincent, the Senior Web Developer, showed me some of the latest ways Zappos is leveraging social media like Pintrest and Twitter. Making sure to align with the bigger brand messaging, they've rolled out product lines beyond shoes like dresses and purses. Nick also showed me a map where I could see in real-time where people are buying which shoes. With that in mind the CEO Tony Hsieh wasn't there, although I spent a good portion of one afternoon thinking of the perfect question had I did run into him. I would definitely make sure to ask the CEO how possible it would be to hook me up with the Clarks desert boot oakwood suede shoe (size 8).





Crashed it with the Zappos Family -delivering a little extra happiness for everyone (even for my kitten that received a new toy box)

My favorite page of the book -the Core Values of Zappos