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We have been looking a new space for 84ideas to move in for the last month. One has to consider many things when moving office. Location, Type of Office Space and Feasibility.
Location
Considering that most of our clients have their businesses running from in and around Banjara Hills, it was the top choice. Jubilee hills was an other great option for the fact that, this area seems more green and airy.
Requirements
As a digital agency, we are a bunch of people from various backgrounds and workstyle. We are thinkers, marketers, designers, developers and human. Considering the type of work we do, we wanted a few things from our workspace. Flexibility, Formal meeting space, Catchup table, a nice kitchen and a brainstorming area.
Flexibility
Sitting in-front of the computer might not be the greatest place to think and might not stimulate everybody to solve problems. So, a casual seating area with a coffee table where you can sit and think clearly was very important to us.
Formal Meeting Space
This is for the clients who walk in to our office for a concept presentation or signing a cheque. We want them to be comfortable and convenient when they visit us.
Catchup Table
This is for those informal team gathering, to criticize a design or discuss the next marketing campaign or wireframe a concept. This could also double as a dining area.
Brainstorming Area
The place should foster team work. A big wall with a whiteboard for team huddles and co creation. This place could also be used for training sessions.
Kitchen
All of us at office have got some serious gastronomical issues. Some coffee lovers and some sambar lovers. And having friends like Cinnamon Sugar, one thing we all definitely needed was a good kitchen.
Type of Office
Initially, we were definitely inclined towards the idea of open office space. They look cool and promises to foster greater communication among the team members which will eventually make a happy workplace. There is a lot of debate and research going on this topic.
An open space mean that, we have to take up a bare shell and convert it to your liking. Bare shells are typically available on commercial complexes on the main road. So, we are paying for the location rather than the space. For 10-15 member team, we needed a 2500 Sq.ft space to accommodate all our requirements. This was too heavy for our pockets as we were looking for a place in a prime-location. Despite the flexibility the bare shells would offer, the cost of setting up and cost of renting is too high. We are basically going to pay for things we don’t need, main road location and expensive floor cost.
Taking our requirements into consideration, what we needed was clear. We decided to look a duplex house which could be rented out for a office space which would offer us the space we need and keep the environment very boutique in nature. Here is a sneak preview. Watch this space for more.
If enthusiastic and social media savvy is what describes you, then 84ideas is looking for you to fill in this position.
You should have a flair for communicating and social networking, be connected to the web at all times and should have a bent towards word-play, creative contexts and never-heard-before ideas.
The job would require you to take care of our clients’ networking profiles like facebook, twitter, LinkedIn etc. always keeping in mind the brand-guideline, as well as brainstorming and coming up with strategies to keep visitors engaged.
At 84ideas, we work hard, party harder, work from cafes and believe that we can use technology to revamp the way information travels effectively. Naturally, you’ll have to be willing to learn, switch roles or multi-task and be ready to roll up your sleeve to get the job done.
Inspite of this, winning the beer pong and passing out at 3 a.m. sounds familiar to all of us!
Join us for the next one!
At 84ideas, we live, eat, drink and breathe design.
We’re looking for individuals who can add to our space with their talent and drive.
If you think that your stints of 3-5 years with graphics design (2-4 of which should be with webpage design) and a strong portfolio have made you equipped enough in addition to ample exposure to Photoshop, Illustrator and their integration with web programming, then we’re looking for you. And if you are a pro at Flash InDesign along with HTML, CSS and JavaScript, then you must call right away.
In case you choose to, then you should look forward to a fun-filled work atmosphere and like-minded people, an environment that will allow you to play with concepts and be in tandem with industry trends, to give a form to rough concepts and give them the shape of art.
You will be expected to come up with multiple creative solutions for web design, user interface for software applications interactive learning tools, presentation design, and information visualization with focus on user experience and branding. As well as designing, prototyping, and usability testing web applications across multiple platforms.
If the idea of adding creative input and support throughout various stages of the design process – as a key player in design team – excites you, then lets work together and create!
We’re waiting!
We love brightness. We love the color orange. We adore warm and friendly people.
We’d love to have you as the face of 84ideas for our clients.
If in addition to this divinity, you also have an e-commerce or Internet technologies marketing work experience of more than a year and a marketing qualification to match, then you’re the person we’re looking for.
Do look forward to a fun-filled atmosphere here, benign smiles all around, and opportunities to create and build client relations within the country as well as overseas, and to develop a good sense of how to understand project scopes and communicate it to team 84ideas.
You will be expected to get business through different channels like online portals, web-based engines, social networking sites; to build a good Client Database and maintain project pipelines; communicate with the clients regularly on phone, chats and emails; make proposals, RFQ (request for quote) and a difference!
So, wear that smile and show up – we’re waiting to see you!
Download the Social Media Strategy & Implementation Cue Cards!
You can print these cards and use them when you are planning to use social media for your organization.
These cue hards help you keep you focussed in your discussions and ensure you ask all the right questions .
01 Oct, 2011 5 Reasons Start-ups, Small & Medium Size Business Owners should have profiles on LinkedIn.LinkedIn is an amazing platform to make valuable connections that are relevant to your business.
Especially small and medium size businesses with limited marketing budget can promote their products and services to the right kind of target audience. Here are the 5 important reasons why small & medium size business owners should have a personal profile and a company profile on LinkedIn:
#1. Turn your former co-workers into potential customers
Through your personal profile, you can find and connect with all your professional connections who are most likely to become your potential customers. Just enter their email addresses and send invitations.
Why wait till 2nd October? Follow these steps to get your Facebook Timeline now itself. Believe me, it is just awesome!
1. Log on to your Facebook
2. Click here to https://developers.facebook.com/apps login to the Facebook Developers Page. If this is the first time you are doing this, a pop up will appear on your screen requesting for permission. Click on <Allow>
Earlier Facebook had a condition for pages to have a minimum of 25 fans to claim their custom URL’s.
Not anymore! Now you can claim your custom URL, once your Facebook page is created. All you need to do is go to http://www.facebook.com/username/
and choose custom URL’s for your pages. (more…)
The new Share feature on Facebook looks pretty interesting.
Earlier it was difficult for page owners/admins to track the count of how many fans shared the page post and what comments they added when the post was shared on their personal profile.
When you click on view shares (which is highlighted in blue color), you will be able to see who shared your post along with their respective comments. (more…)
Google launched its new product, web store. This is the future of computing .
The apps are behaving like native apps and I am impressed with the speed. Even though Google OS has some more time before it hits the market, the webstore gives a brief idea on how it is going to work.
Let’s look at an example to see why web store will change the way we work and live. Evernote is one app that I love the most. It allows me to make notes on any of my gadgets, iPhone, iPad or Mac and it instantly makes the notes available on all the other gadgets. I love their product. But they demand me to have their product installed on all my devices.
Similarly, any other applications that I need to use, I need them installed on all my devices. Now with Chrome webstore, I just need to have Chrome on all my devices and the data is synced across all my devices instantly.
This is going to be the future of easy and on the cloud computing. Four apps built in CSS3, HTML5 and JS look native and are impressive. The NYT, a game called Poppit, and both Amazon’s Window shop and Kindle for the web are sensational.
Big corporates are a great place to start your career; wads of money, impressive brand value and also stability of working for an established organization. But there is this thrill about being part of an organization in its nascent sprouts…the startup.
Quite a simple thing, many might say about creating a Facebook page. In fact, it is.
- Create a page
- Fill in the bio with all necessary information, including URLs
- Add an appropriate display picture
- Create a relevant landing page
- Write an engaging welcome post
- Link your blog and Twitter account to Facebook
- Add Facebook plug-ins and widgets on other sites
All done. What next, you ask? How do I get people to like my page? How do I reach people and let them know a page exists?
This can be done in the following ways:
- Run an offline marketing campaign and provide necessary links for people to sign up.
- Run Facebook ads targeting the right audience. The better copy the Facebook ads have, better conversion rate they will result in.
- Tap into other platforms like blog and Twitter and ask people to join.
- Invite all people you know to ‘like’ the page. This is highly unrecommended as repeated behaviour will create an impression of a spammer. The only time this should be done is for highly personal brands.
- Promote the Facebook page on another page or website which has good traffic.
- Create a viral concept on Twitter or Youtube and promote your fan page.
The ways mentioned above are progressively tough to create and use for promotion of page.
Once your page reaches a desired number of fans, you can publish engaging content and interesting campaigns so your existing fans will spread the word and get more people to ‘like’ your page.
Do you have more ideas on how to kickstart a Facebook page?
How many fans should a facebook page have? Are a 1000 enough? How about 10,000? Would you like 10,000?
Businesses and brands are in an unprecedented chase for fans. Facebook marketing is being equated to acquisition of fans. But does having more fans mean you are marketing yourself better? Does having more fans improve the bottom line of your business?
Any marketing strategy should be built upon a fundamental understanding of the needs and goals of a business and solve any business related problems if possible. Social media marketing, like any other form of marketing should be aligned with the overall strategies of the organization and aim at achieving specific goals in this respect.
When it comes to facebook, the more number of fans might be better but is it relevant for a brand? It is not so always. Here are a couple of examples of face to contrast the necessity of fans and importance of the alignment of marketing strategy with business. (more…)
84ideas was at TiE-ISB Connect 2010 at Novotel in Hitex, Hyderabad. TiE ISB connect has gained popularity for being a premier event which has great sessions on Entrepreneurship, connects VC’s and upcoming startups and great chance for startups within the region to connect with each other.
84ideas took up a stall at the summit and was glad to see the good response people had to the concept of a ‘new media agency’ we have evolved into. There were many other stalls showcasing interesting services and products and our friends from Hands Media and Meraevents were there too. Below is the presentation we had up at the forum.
Gigaom ran a new article about Facebook sending the user ID to third parties. Everybody is shouting foul play accusing facebook of doing unethical things and adding to the negative attention that facebook has gotten over the last one year.
I personally do not quite agree with the allegations. Here’s why -
(more…)
We are scouting for a social media addict to fit the role of a Social Media Executive
If you are it, you will possess:
- At least a year’s experience in online marketing and/or communications/PR role, specifically, using social media
- Familiarity with and an active user of the major social media sites like Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn, as well as photo sharing, video sharing and bookmarking sites.
- Ability to research, locate influencers and contact information using a variety of online research techniques. Our outreach campaigns go beyond just blogs, so knowledge of and the ability to find influencers in a variety of online communities – like web forums, user and professional groups, email lists, and other social networks – is absolutely essential.
- Expertise to craft online engagement strategies & tactics for a wide range of brands including, viral contests, sweepstakes and consumer campaigns to increase brand awareness and extend core messaging.
- Knack to answer questions and engage in conversations where necessary / as directed
- Ability to identify threats and opportunities in user generated content
- Outstanding organizational skills and the ability to handle multiple projects simultaneously while meeting deadlines
Adrenaline Rush?? Mail in your resumes and twitter handles to work@84ideas.com
Day before yesterday Facebook launched Places. It will soon be available to all users in US and eventually for everyone worldwide.
Basically what you will be able to do is share your actual location data with friends by checking in at a location. You can also tag the friends who are there along with you, just like you would tag them in pictures. You can get alerts about (or even from) friends who are nearby like you do in Latitude. Like in every other service you will be able to check in from a mobile device. They are currently rolling out support to facebook on iphone and touch.facebook.com . The best thing about this feature’s rollout by facebook is its privacy settings. They have been properly done. You can read about them and the features here.
This is quite a significant development in social media. Read more..
Couple of days ago, Facebook came out with a rather expected but huge announcement. The announcement with the revelation of these statistics is massive in a way. Facebook has been among the most visited sites in the world in the world for a while now but these huge numbers and its weight as a global platform make it one of the most powerful sites in the world. It has now obliterated all competition on the social network sphere and is head to head with Google for web dominance. It is aggressively marketing itself in emerging markets by tying up with mobile operators and often introducing a zero plan where mobile facebook access isn’t charged. ….Read More (more…)
For all those people who understand the title, yes we will be there at ISB, on 7th July for Seth Godin’s talk.
Rest of you, take time to know him.
We are excited to meet this marketing genius, been following his work for the past 5 years.
You can follow the event through our tweets at #Sethhyd.
Event Update :
The event was great. After the event Seth was standing in the lobby and talking to all the people he could. It’s amazing to see a person like Seth be so down to earth and give time to his audience. Truly following what he advocates, creating tribes.
Check the pics from the event.
 |
| Seth Live- ISB |
Creative director Alec Brownstein did this to make his potential employers find him. He targeted the employers that would hire him. He created google paid ads with their names as keywords. So when those guys googled themselves, his ad came in the sponsored links. Boom. Check this out.
Creativity at it’s best.
On web, it is all about lists. Top trending, most digged, most viewed, most shared.. Everything is a list and they do wonders. Most of us spend time trying to reach top of some list and few of us trying to create a new list.
I am currently impressed with a brand new team of young teenagers who created a list. (more…)
After Promoted Tweets and altering its Trending Topics’ algorithm, Twitter has now come up with Promoted Trends!
What is it exactly?
So, when you see the Trending Topics box on the sidebar, against one of the topics, there will be a small yellow highlight which says ‘Promoted.’ In the test phase, Disney/ Pixar was the first to buy a ‘trend.’ You can see Toy Story 3 flashing below all other Trending Topics.
According to Twitter, this topic is already available in tweets, but has not yet made it to the Trending Topics Section. Just like any other Trending Topic, once you click on it, you will reach the search results page to see what people are talking about the respective matter. (more…)
Headstart’s Startup Saturday for the month of June was scheduled on June 12th. The theme was this month’s event was ‘Social Media.’
So, a large gathering met at IIIT-H, Gachibowli with speakers from iGenero and Ohana Media planned to talk on various aspects of Social Media. Karthik from 84ideas opened the session with a presentation on ‘Social media Management – Getting Started.’ (more…)
The first and foremost point to be noted before employing Social Media to promote your event is that none of this will happen overnight. It involves a deeply researched process and is not just used to combat lagging attendee numbers. So, have a planned outlook and start activities weeks prior to your event
Twitter has recently updated its ‘Trending Topics’ algorithm. So, starting May 14th, your Twitter sidebar and homepage only lists the ‘latest’ and the ‘hottest’ topics on Twitter
What exactly is it?
Earlier, Twitter used to categorize something as a trending topic when the term was consistently popular. But, Twitter has now changed and ‘Trending Topics’ reflects keywords and categories that are currently ‘trending’ and not necessarily popular in the past. So this gives rise to any breaking news automatically becoming trending. (more…)
According to Twitter’s latest updates ‘Tweets are going to be the newest quotes!’
What is it actually?
Until now if you had to quote a particular tweet, you had to take a screen shot or go by the regular copy-paste routine. So, Twitter has launched something called the ‘embeddable tweets.’ So, according to this, you can embed tweets into your website or blog conveniently without going by the tedious screen shot routine.
So, basically twitter will give you an HTML code and you just have to use it on your webpage and viola, you will have something like this on your site!
After ‘Become a Fan’ changing to ‘Like’, Facebook now has a plan which infiltrates the entire web space. Facebook has introduced social plugins and personalized web tools to be used across the internet.
What happens exactly?
According to Facebook, a plethora of ‘like’ and ‘recommend’ buttons have been introduced for the web. So, any website implements these buttons and users can click on them to prove that they are interested. This information gets recorded and when your friend visits the same site, he/ she can see that you have ‘liked’ it.
Also all these activities get recorded on your activity feeds and friends can see a consolidated list on FB. (more…)
Walk up to Frankies, pay him Rs. 30/-, he will get you a non veg roll. If you like the food, you will go back. You are certain to tell your friends about the place. Next time they are around they are sure to try it out.
Your restaurant business works very similar to this. People pay for food and of course for the experience. They share their experiences with their friends, the conversation that they had with your restaurant. Experience becomes a conversation.
Social media is about interactions. It’s a one to one conversation that has the ability to generate many to many conversations amongst a group of friends and online buddies, a trusted community. (more…)
The Facebook fan page functionality has been altered. From now on ‘Become a fan’ is extinct and instead pages will have ‘like’ in its position.
Basically, the wording has a Twitter-isque connotation where if you want to follow a particular brand’s news feeds, you ‘like’ the brand’s page.
Twitter has come up with a new business model after 4 years of existence – the “promoted tweets” feature. According to this feature certain tweets will act like ads and will be displayed on search results with a different background. (more…)
84ideas is the official Social Media partners at Tie’s Travel and Hospitality Entrepreneurship Summit, 2010! Yes, we are excited. We are excited because it is a blend of the things which we are extremely passionate about – Entrepreneurship and Travel! Click here for more details.
So we went to ItsAP and Head Start’s event!
With calyen having overslept, anicode and I rushed to the stall by 8 30 in the morning. By that time, the entire place was buzzing with activity and everyone was busy pasting up banners and setting tables.
The event started promptly at 9 30 am and people were diligently visiting the 100 stalls and trying to understand what each firm did. There were representatives from the biggest MNCs to the newest startups. (more…)
So lets be real people. Social Media is not something which can just magically double your sales and bring more traffic to your website. Here is what social media CAN’T achieve :
- Multiply your web traffic in 3 months.
- Make your brand/product a household name in a matter of time
- Be a complete marketing solution that solves all your needs and eliminate the need for all other channels.
While social media is great, it requires a lot of analysis, planning, continuous work, commitment and support from other marketing channels to be successful. Social media is not about tools, its about a approach.
We have our own stall at the ITsAP Software Products’ Showcase and Awards – March 12th 2010 @HICC Madhapur. We are very excited about it and looking forward to meeting all of you there. So, do register yourself for the event here.
“ITS YOU” … NOT your company …NOT your product which your customers buy ! Throughout the workshop Bill stressed upon this very simple but very important point effectively with some really good captivating stories from his social and professional life. (more…)
Branding yourself is so essential in today’s world where everybody is closely connected. I realized the importance of this in the tough way, after loosing couple of clients just because I did not make the right first impression. This has been one of my most important learning’s as an entrepreneur.
Key to mastering self-marketing is to perfect an eloquent and descriptive introduction of yourself and your position. This strategic tool, commonly known as the “Elevator Speech,” can be your best approach in professional networking situations and those rare moments when opportunities arise to create strategic new allies.
I recently got to know about the event “Pitch yourself” which basically helps entrepreneurs brand themselves in a way that we make right impressions the first time. We are all very excited and looking forward for this event.
Being a startup we are always at shoestring budget and going for a paid event like this always needs a second thought. Thanks to “Meraevents” we got the tickets at a good 30 % discount. Now that’s a good deal.
If any of these #hashtags apply to you #hyderabad, #startup, #entrepreneur, #bd, #social media, this is one event you should not miss. We are going to be tweeting throughout the event with a #pitchyourself.
Here are the event details.
About the event : “Pitch Yourself ” – Spend 8 hours to know the value of 30 seconds
When is it Happening : 19th Feb @ Taj Banjara, Hyderabad
Who is talking : Bill Faust
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nPurMDzZCy4
He also authored a bestseller “Pitch Yourself”
Promotions
Meraevent gave us this promotional code to all our readers which you can use it during registrations to avail 30% discount.
Promotional Code : hWk9fa
How to attend :
You guys can register yourself to the event here and don’t forget to use the promotional code.
http://www.meraevents.com/Events/KRD_Vision/14
I always thought it was strange that none of companies we worked with ever talked to their employees about their social media activity.Its amazing how many companies are talked about online by their employees and so they could be a part of their online branding and reputation management efforts.
Do you have anyone in your company who’s a guru on twitter, facebook, youtube or blogging? Don’t ignore it- analyze whether you can harness their expertize to help you achieve your business goals.
Check out an interesting presentation from Social Fresh.
Yes we are going! We are really excited about this event. We are big fans of TED talks and now TEDx has come to Hyderabad!
The Event has a very interesting line up of speakers including Nagesh Kukunoor, Karuna Gopal, Dr Sunitha Krishnan, Sharat Chandra, Smitha Madhav, Sarath Guttikunda, Prof. D Balasubramanian and many more!
Find out more on TEDxHitechCity Website – http://tedxhitechcity.com
Definition: Web strategy is translation of the organizations objectives into a web implementable set of activities.
For a business/product to be successful online it has to successfully talk to all the aspects of the web ecosystem. It has to answer ‘who’, ‘what’,'when ‘s ‘ of the market.
Lately the number of enquiries we get for web strategy consulting have increased and I guess its a lot to do with people starting to realise that development / technology is very much secondary compared to coming up with a proper focus, identity and the marketing approach for their brand. For most of them though the realization has come little late and have already spent a lot of money into the development phase and it gets really difficult to go back rework the approach.
Certain minimum things need to be done before you head into the development phase -
1. Clearly identify your target audience - the cliche – but then this is seldom done properly ( some amount of Pshychographic analysis helps a lot in designing and conceptualizing the features )
2. Talk to your target audience – call/email/scrap a minimum of 5 people you know and get an honest feedback.( you will realize that a lot of things you have assumed about your audience is way off the mark )
3. Identify the core values of your brand- helps you in coming up with the features or rather removing unwanted features.
4. HAVE A PLAN! ( identify clearly the features for phase I, phase 2 etc , the marketing plan and put in place mechanisms to communicate with your customers – can be email news letters, launch page, blog etc )
5. Do mockups/wireframes – come up with detailed mockups of key pages in your site. ( these can be done on a piece of paper or on a ppt . This gives you a feel of your site and the workflows)
6. Get the visual design done – you may have to get a designer to do this, acts as an input to your development team.
7. Communicate clearly your vision your product/website with the development team. It helps them to identify a suitable technology framework. Most of the times the decision would be whether to develop the site ground up using a framwork or just go for a CMS.
Doing these minimum things will help you save a lot of money and time . Also this would give you that extra space for the change of mind.
For details Visit- http://network.headstart.in/projects/startup-saturday-hyderabad/project-home
02 Apr, 2009 Reminder: Hyderabad Open Coffee Club Startup Meet, Saturday, Apr 4th @ 3pm, OFEN, Rd no 10, Banjara HillsWhat: Hyderabad Open Coffee Club (OCC)
When: Saturday, 4th of April 2009
Time: 3pm-4:30pm
Where: Ofen (upstairs), Road no 10, Banjara Hills
http://upcoming.yahoo.com/event/1502191/
20 Mar, 2009 Reminder: Hyderabad Open Coffee Club Startup Meet, Saturday, Mar 21st @ 3pm, OFEN, Rd no 10, Banjara HillsWhat: Hyderabad Open Coffee Club (OCC)
When: Saturday, 21th of March 2009
Time: 3pm-4:30pm
Where: Ofen (upstairs), Road no 10, Banjara Hills
http://upcoming.yahoo.com/event/1502191/
Nice place … good coffee … cool people…
An interesting and innovative way to create internet awareness to the offiline population in India by Google – or…do they have an hidden agenda…But then its cool and only Google can only come up with something like this.
Check out Amit Agarwal’s post on this :-
http://www.labnol.org/internet/google-internet-bus-in-india/7015/
So we finally rented a new office place, apart from making us feel good about working from a place of truly international standards we also believe that the place will impact our prductivity leves. Roger Dooley explains the science behing this.
16 Jan, 2009 Open Coffee startup meet tomorrow Saturday, Jan 17th @ 3pm, OFEN, Rd no 10, Banjara Hills*Wishing all of you a Happy Shankranti!!*
Several of the attendees of the previous Open Coffee Club wanted to meet more often at Ofen 
We figured we’ll try meeting on the 1st and 3rd Saturday of every
month instead of once a month.
What: Hyderabad Open Coffee
When: Saturday, 17th of January 2009
Time: 3pm-4:30pm
Where: OFEN, Road no 10, Banjara Hills
Please forward onto others in the startup ecosystem.
Brands employ all possible strategies to suck in the consumers, attract them and retain them. Social media is under explored advertisement medium, at least in India. Come future you will see more brands online, engaging and updating their customers. This ranks 10 on Paul Dunay’s marketing predications list for 2009.
Junta42 came with this list of single best marketing predications by their top 42 bloggers.
So as we see we are betting on future (our future product).
After much contemplation, we have finally moved our blog from blogger to WordPress hosted on our own servers. The old blogger template was not really happening and we wanted a better looking blog with more white space, nice widgets and more flexibility in managing the posts.
WordPress we felt was the best one out there with elegant and easily customizable themes. Much to our surprise It took us just a little over a day to migrate and customize the theme to our liking.
We have used the Modio theme developed by Upstart blogger.
Do update your RSS readers to get latest updates from our blog.
Hope you like the change!
2.0 has been around for sometime and it has changed the way business operate around the globe.
India has the difference that this could make(People are at least comfortable booking their tickets online now ), but will our people really absorb this medium and will this accepted like other channels(like TV) is a question that everybody is trying to answer. This is an interesting anlalysis by WindChimes on social media trends in India.
Even though the people who participated are below 35 and the study has been done only in the metros, we can safely extend the trend to other big and small cities.The study emphasizes the requirement of continuous engagement of the users to keep them interested.
So how many companies are actually doing this, how many of them know what tools to use. Its is important for us to educate them about the new media, develop proper ROI tools for them to understand and estimate.
Our yet to be launched product KeepATab is one of those tools which will help business to keep their potential customers engaged and discover the potential of this new medium.
What: Hyderabad Open Coffee
When: Saturday, 3rd of January 2009
Time: 3pm-4:30pm
Where: OFEN, Road no 10, Banjara Hills
Please forward onto others in the startup ecosystem.
We’re too high on ‘spirits’ now to really say too much.
Greetings from the 84ideas team for the new year!
And yeah…by ‘spirits’ I mean the spirit of ushering in the new and exciting year that awaits our firm.
Please avoid drinking and driving
(issued in the interest of 84ideas to all our clients…we don’t want to lose you guys!!!)
Here’s wishing all of you a Merry Christmas
Did you know that Ukrainian Christmas trees have an artificial spider and web as a part of their decorations?
Or that in Mexico, wearing red briefs on New Year’s Eve is said to bring new love in the upcoming year?
And that if you receive all the gifts in the Christmas song ‘Twelve days of Christmas‘, you would receive 364 presents? (Wonder when we will find such a generous gifter!)
More interesting facts:
http://www.theholidayspot.com/christmas/facts.htm
http://www.christmas-celebrations.com/trivia.htm
P.S – There have been some interesting variations of the ‘Twelve days of Christmas’ song…check them out.
http://in.youtube.com/watch?v=-UhcmUU0QpY&feature=related
http://in.youtube.com/watch?v=owK5tHjL0aE
Our third post in the series of posts on the TIE ISB Connect Jumpstart event..
DD Ganguly of DimDim Web Conferencing services spoke about his experience of raising funds for his business.
- Angel investors fund because they like you – this is a bigger reason than the strength of the business plan (NO…that doesn’t mean you can have a hopeless business plan)
- It’s a good idea if you can get good bloggers and journalists to cover your product launches…VCs will get in touch with you for funding instead of you going to VCs.
- Rules for naming: high recall, .com has to be available, international name (for global firms).
Happy money raising wishes to all!!
What: Hyderabad Open Coffee
When: Saturday, 6th of December
Time: 3pm-4:30pm
Where: OFEN, Road no 10, Banjara Hills, Hyderabad
See you there!!
Second post in the series of posts on Tie ISB Connect 2008 Jumpstart learnings. Some of the interesting points Sateesh Andra from DFJ ventures had to say about “Spirit of Entrepreneurship.”
- Every morning if you wake up excited about an idea, then its an indication that you are getting passionate about the idea and its not just a passing thought.
- Have to believe in your gut instinct and don’t get bogged down by over analysis.
- See if your idea is a pain killer or vitamin.
- Whether to go for VC funding or not – one of the points to consider is what’s the kind of competition existing in the market that you want to enter.
- Hear what your customers have to say but use your judgment.
We were at the TiE ISBConnect 2008 Jumpstart event earlier this month and we plan to share the the thoughts by some of the speakers in this series of posts.
First post in this series we feature Sashi Reddi the founder of Applabs and FXLabs, and he spoke about his beliefs about the success of an entrepreneur:
- You shouldn’t be a part time entrepreneur i.e. doing your job and running your own business…it does no good to your business.
- Jump before you think – Don’t wait to make a perfect business plan before starting out your business…jump into your work and then tackle the problems as and when they come
- If you are starting a company, it is to make money – it is not meant to ‘help people’
- It’s better to be playing in a fast growing big market with big players than in a small market.
- Start by thinking small – figure out how you are going to make money from the first few customers that you have. Once you’ve done this and have a proven business model, then start thinking big
- Have rich friends or make rich friends – it is very difficult to raise small amount funds (Rs.50 to 100 lakhs) from professional investors. It’s highly possible that your first round of money may need to be raised from friends and family.
- You need to be working on winning your first customer from Day One
- Building your company is not a team effort..YOU have to make it work! Even though will have people working for you, YOU have to lead the team…define the vision…etc.
- The CEO is the main sales guy of the firm
- Don’t look at necessarily having a sexy business idea or business model. Even the most routine and mundane of things can make you money”
Some more speakers’ opinions and viewpoints to follow…stay blogged in!!
Congrats to the Swingwind Team!!
Quite obviously, we are happy. And the opportunists that we are, we know where our next all expenses paid dinner is coming from. ?
Check our earlier blog posts about swingwind here
Visit http://swingwind.com to know more about Swingwind.
What is Open Coffee?
Its a networking event to help connect, promote and support local startups.
There are open informal discussions on certain topics as needed, so do send out ideas for topics of discussion…or better still…be there with your topics for discussion.
Open Coffee startup meet tomorrow, Saturday, Nov 1st @ 3pm, Ofen, Rd no 10, Banjara Hills
See you there!
You see the need to be a part of the startup environment but not sure where to look? Multiple websites and blogs are aimed at serving this need.
This post talks about some of the websites / Groups which you can follow to get into the startup ecosystem quickly.
Websites/blogs which cover Startups and other Indian tech Industry news :-
(1) http://ecosystem.pluggd.in – Simply put, this site is looking at providing different types of information that are required as a part of a startup ecosystem. This includes a VC directory, directory of startups and service providers (such as marketing, legal, etc.). If you are enthusiastic about working with a startup, this website can be of help with that as well.
(2) http://www.venturewoods.org/ – Read away – a technology entrepreneurship blog for those who want to start a company, for those interested in working with startups and for those trying to prevent their startup from becoming history.
(3) http://startups.in – Another Startup website – startup Jobs, news etc
(4) http://www.alootechie.com –A comprehensive site providing news and updates from the world of technology entrepreneurship – from general news to insights on marketing strategies to events around the country
(5) http://www.webyantra.net – the ground zero for Indian Web 2.0! A blog focused on Web 2.0 – its startups, innovative ideas working in the web, etc.
(6) http://www.watblog.com/ - Widely read blog – Covers Web 2.0 , Startups news etc
(7) http://www.pluggd.in/ – Startup News, reviews etc
(8) http://www.commercewiki.com/ – E-commerce, Ideas, Entrepreneurship in India
(9) Vijay Anand – Startup Blog
(10) Track.in – India business Blogs, Startup Reviews
(11) http://www.desistartups.in/ - Another popular startup blog
Groups
Headstart :- http://groups.google.com/group/friends-of-kickstart
Proto.in :- http://groups.google.com/group/prototalk
Hyderabad Startups :- http://groups.google.com/group/hydstartups
Events
Proto.in : – http://www.proto.in/
Tie ISB Connect : - http://www.tie-isbconnect.com/
Have we missed anything here? Feel free to add to this list by posting a comment
Once in a few centuries, comes along an original and creative idea that blows the universe away…an idea that can re-define the purpose of our existence in world. We all try hard to resist the change that will inevitably follow, but eventually we give in.
We have no such idea (yet)!!
However, we came up with a much simpler idea of setting up a Facebook group to get you a little more engrossed with 84ideas. In this group, you can:
1. Network with our current clients (and if you find it useful, you can network with our team members too!!)
2. Receive updates on startup and other events happening specifically around Hyderabad
3. Know the latest 84ideas news, updates, job openings.
Sounds good? Connect with us now on our facebook group .
Join us at ISB to attend the Barcamp on Technology entrepreneurship on 11th Oct . The event has an interesting lineup of sessions already. Do check out and register at-
http://barcamp.org/BarCamp
Rewind to our posting on 22nd July…
It turned out that our excitement was not in vain…we came to know about some fascinating technologies while making this report (life can’t get better than this…we get to know new things in the field that we love and we get paid for it)
Since our last post about this project was highly secretive, you probably couldn’t get any idea what the basic business idea is…
So here is a little secret…
It is a digital movies portal…
And you’ll ask how is it different from bigflix.com or something similar? Well…ask our client about that…we’ll definitely get sued if we speak anymore
We provided a comprehensive report on technology & infrastructure needed, market analysis, , vendor analysis and cost of technology and IT implementation of the project. Check out the index of the report attached with this post.
There’s more good news from our block!!
From our blog dated 27th June, you may recollect that we had submitted business plans for the Tie-ISB Connect competition. Well…Swingwind Technologies’ Pareeksha has been chosen as one of the business plans for the final round of presentations to VCs in November, at ISB. And we are mighty kicked about it!! Our belief in the potential of this product has just swelled up…
We’re happier about the fact that this gives us another reason to party…hopefully at Swingwind’s expense this time.
. If you have any suggestions on what startups need and the kind of services we should start providing, do drop a comment or two. We would love to hear from you.
The 1st ever Drupal Camp in India was organized at DAIICT, Gandhinagar from 8-9th August ’08. A week before the Drupal Camp there were bomb blasts in Surat and the whole state continued to be in high alert. This still didn’t dampen the spirits of the Drupallers and the camp did attract good number of companies and students from across India. I was really looking forward for this camp as was excited at the prospect of meeting fellow Drupallers. I met some really cool people who have varied experience right from coding to the business aspects of Drupal. I was really impressed by couple of presentations, one from Mr.Roshan Shah from Gloscon who has loads of experience handling Drupal based projects and other from Dipen who I guess has nose dived completely into Drupal code.
After attending the event and speaking to students and the resident Drupallers, I felt that there is lot of enthusiasm around Drupal, but the Drupal community is really scattered in India. We need to have more of such events frequently to connect and share knowledge with other Drupallers. I guess the best way to get started is to have small Drupal time slots in the general Open source events and bar camps to bring this community together and then have dedicated Drupal events frequently.
We enjoy being a part of Web2.0!!
It gives us a feeling of familiarity because of what we know about it, and also a sense of mystery with its many caves and pyramids that we still need to explore and learn about.
It is this mystery that has led to 84ideas taking up a project on technology research for a soon to be set up online portal by a dynamic young entrepreneur. Spare us for not disclosing any details of the business idea he is working on…our confidentiality agreement warns us that if we disclose any details, we will not only be sued, but will also have our internet connection disconnected for a whole month (I don’t know which of the two is worse…I think getting sued is worse, but others in my team think otherwise).
So…after coming tremendously close to getting sued…I’ll quickly tell u what we are doing for him. Based on his business model, we will be researching what technology will be best for setting up and maintaining his portal. There are also some technology requirements concerned with the basic nature of his business, which we will be assisting him with. It’s a good idea and we are really excited about working on this project !
There were no bugles…no sweets distributed to the crowd…no crowd…no carpet of flower petals…
Yes…our website was launched with much pomp and fanfare!!
www.84ideas.com is now our new address on the web.
The site was designed by IndiGenius (www.indigenius.com) and integrated with the open source content management system Drupal (www.drupal.org).
As if to celebrate the launch, our website launch coincided with our decision to expand our service offerings. We now offer Web 2.0 applications development services as well. At present, these services are extended towards use of Drupal Content Management System and Ruby on Rails (www.rubyonrails.org) (Ruby based web application development framework). We’re also offering Facebook and Orkut application development services now, for those looking at making optimum use of the social media as part of their marketing strategy.
Right then…update provided…work done…its time for some chow.
Happy eating to us!!
Folks!
June…lots of things happened…we submitted some business ideas for the Tie-ISB Connect competition…got our website in place…came in contact with many more prospective clients…had new team members joining…and we celebrated
Most of our time this month was spent on working on two separate business concepts for the TiE-ISB Connect competition scheduled to be held in November’08. TiE-ISB Connect is an annual competition held at ISB, which aims at bringing entrepreneurs with great business ideas/startups and investors together to help create a mutually beneficial relationship between the entrepreneurs and the investors. In simple words…there are some great business ideas that need funding, and this is one place where we can get funds.
The first step was to submit executive summaries of our ideas, giving an explanation of the product/service that will be offered, the market, competition, etc. This being done, the next step will be to submit a detailed business plan if our idea get selected.
We’ve submitted executive summaries of business plans for two different business ideas: one for Pareeksha by Swingwind Technologies (an 84ideas client) and another for an 84ideas baby called V-Street.
Our blog post on 22nd May will give you an idea what Pareeksha is about. We are convinced that this tool has huge potential to reach out to people around the globe. Thus, we are in the process of developing a detailed business plan for Pareeksha, the executive summary of which has already been submitted for the TiE-ISB event.
V-street…an 84ideas idea is another initiative we are really excited about (after all, new ideas do keep exciting us). V-street, a virtual shopping street, is an e-commerce idea based on the concept of virtual real estate. Retailers can set up their stores on this street and consumers can walk through this street, visit and browse through shops of their choice, talk to salesmen and make informed purchases. All this without compromising on the essential benefits of e-commerce! We’re thus looking at creating a whole new shopping experience for online shoppers…quite different from traditional e-commerce so far.
While we have done all the ‘inauspicious’ things like cut our finger nails after sunset, walked under a ladder, crossed the path of a black cat, and what not…we are still hopeful that our ideas should get through the first round of scrutiny.
And yeah…not to forget…we celebrated the completion of the executive summaries with a dinner at Aroma. Below are some pictures from the celebration dinner.
So here is the news…we are now working with Swingwind Technologies on their Tests authoring and delivery software called as “Pareeksha” . I can tell you that Swingwind is one most promising startups we have seen until now..they have a very good development team and an amazing product developed on Flex platform (flash based).
The product has all the makings of scalable and extensible test authoring and delivery platform. Since its flash based, the interface looks really good…I like the vista theme they got in one of their demos. Its also takes more time to load, but once it loads its really fast. One of the good features about this product is that that, if there is some power outage or a network problem while taking the test, the state of the test is saved on the users local machine and so whenever the user goes back online, the test can be continued from where it got disconnected.
Another very good feature is the guess functionality, where the user can mark the question if he/she is guessing the question and at the end of the test can review the performance in the guessed questions.
Pareeksha also has a feature wherein the users are enforced to take the test in full screen mode. This is for preventing users from accessing any other site on the same computer.
The tests can be delivered online as well as offline in CDs.
Pareeksha is targeted at Training and educational institutions. It can be customized and used for all competitive exams like IIT JEE, EAMCET etc and also for Computer adaptive tests (CAT) like GMAT , GRE.
Swingwind.com is one of the live instances of Pareeksha, the site has lot of quality placement papers for various companies. Check them out if you are planning to write any of the placement exams.
The major problems startups face, regarding their processes, is either because they choose the wrong tools or because they tend to use the tools in a wrong way.
Let us look at some of the typical needs for a small consulting firm like ours.
Email
Project Management
CRM
Knowledge management
Intranet
Chat
Blog
Website
Calendar
One of the best tools out there for small organizations to easily set up their online communication infrastructure is Google apps. We use almost all of the services packaged in google apps :- the email, calendar, docs and chat apps for all our communication needs. These apps are nothing but google applications ( ex : email app has the gmail interface, chat is gtalk) and can be branded by uploading our logo and changing the colors. The best thing about this is that its FREE! Of course there are enterprise editions available as well, but the standard edition (which is free) serves almost all of the organization’s needs.
Specifically, we use calendar for sharing our schedules, organizing internal meetings etc. The chat is like the official chat we use for business communication. A good feature in google apps chat is that it automatically adds buddies within your domain into your buddy list.
The Google apps Docs is what we use for knowledge management and collaboration. For example we use an excel sheet for managing our budget and finances which we share among the management team. Security policies for sharing the documents can also be put in place where in you can restrict documents being shared outside your domain.
Google apps is very easy to set up. It just took us a couple of hours to get it up and running. It has good documentation and support in the forums ( not sure how good the support from google is though, but thats because we didn’t have any reason to talk to them until now).
For Project Management and client communication we use Basecamp. Basecamp is pretty simple to use, very simple and intuitive interface and has just the right set of features to for project management. Its not like one of those bloated project management tools which confuse you a lot and complicates life. It has only the most important features which is needed : Messages, Todos, Milestones, file sharing. Even though its simple, it is still difficult to get clients, who are very used to email communication, onto something new. We usually try to get the clients to use it very early in the process by proving a small presentation about the advantages of basecamp and we ensure that the contract includes the use of the project management tool. Initially there was some resistance but once the clients got used to it they aren’t complaining anymore.
For our intranet needs we created one project within basecamp itself and have started posting announcements and updates on them. Also we use the todo lists to manage internal tasks, milestones for internal projects like for example updating website and blogs.
Simple, elegant and no fuss is what we needed for maintaining our organization wide contacts. Highrise from 37signals fits this bill perfectly. Those who are comfortable with the Basecamp interface, will find no problems at all to get used to highrise. It has contacts, notes and cases. Three simple features and it really gets the job done.
A variety of options are available for setting up a blog. 84ideas blog is hosted on blogger. WordPress and Drupal are very good options for setting up your blog , for those who know how to set them up and theme it. We recommend WordPress though, if you are just looking for a blog. Drupal provides more options when you want to build a website which you update regularly and also want to have a blog to go with it.
(Updated on 29th July’08)
Ok Stop! Please…too many questions at one go…I’m getting a little stressed out…lets take this one by one…
First…what is 84ideas about? Well… all of us here at 84ideas love working with crazy ideas…love internet…love technology…and we try keeping track of all the latest happenings on the internet…social media….personalization, social applications, community building….try and test them out…and somewhere down the line, aim to make some money out of these as well
So this is where we have come up with our first service offering….
1. Web 2.0 consulting, strategy and development
Like I said…at 84ideas, we love the internet and technology…so we thought…why not make this one of the mainstays of our business! Hence the decision to offer Web 2.0 services.
One of my friends asked me ‘what on earth is Web 2.0 and how will you adapt it a business?’
Simply put…we will help you create your business’s presence on the internet. Whether your business is internet based (e-commerce) or offline, we will help you leverage the power of the internet to increase your sales. So whatever your company sells, we will come up with some useful (and possibly crazy) ideas on how you can use the internet to increase its sales…be it creating an interactive website or an informative blog or a fun Facebook application or absolutely anything else on the internet that’ll translate into more sales for your business.
Once we figured out that Web 2.0 is something we’re very fond of, we also realized that we have a keen interest in business. So…then we thought…why not combine our love for the internet and business? Thus was born our second service offering…
2. Business consulting services for technology startups
You have a great technology idea/product/service, but don’t know how to build a business around it? You know it is something that the world needs, but don’t know how to get it to the world and make money out of it? Or…you understand business completely but are clueless about technology that’s best suited to your business?
Familiar situation faced by people we know…and thus this service offering.
Once you’ve conceived a great technology idea/product, and want to make it into a full fledged business, we will help you create systems for marketing, people, etc., that are best suited to your business idea. Basically, you concentrate on your tech product/service offering and we will focus on all the business elements around it.
It may also happen that you have a complete grip over the business idea and most of the business systems needed to support it…but when it comes to using the right technology for your business, you are staring at a wall with question marks all over. Please allow us to break down this wall for you!
Rest assured that this is just the start of our journey. We’re constantly thinking of new business ideas that’ll click and make 84ideas more exciting.
Do let us know what you think about our service offerings and where we can be of help to you! We promise not to bankrupt you 
P.S – that’s of one of our ‘committed’ team members…deep in thought…’generating ideas’ for making our first million…
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_VKelmyP8WO0/SI8gL1zF1lI/AAAAAAAAAAs/Z8bE4xtHLbk/s1600-h/deep+thought.JPG)
Greetings!
Thanks for stopping by.
84ideas is now a reality and we are damn kicked about it
Probably the first question in your mind now is “Why 84?”
Let me first answer this by answering why we chose to have a number in the first place…
1. First of all it makes the name a lot easier to remember
2. We felt a number would be a good idea for building brand consistency across our products and services
3. Domain name availability; whichever other name we came up with was already taken!
4. Oh yea…we did get inspired by some of the bigger brands….37signals, network18…hope we don’t get sued by them for getting inspired by them 
Why 84? Why not more ideas? Don’t we love ideas?
1. Its not something based on numerology.
2. Yes… a li’l bit inspired by our birth year.
3. I like the number 4 and my partner likes the number 8
4. We just had that number hanging in our brains somehow…:)
Here is a very interesting blog post by Dharmesh Shah where he gives some good pointers for naming a startup …
http://onstartups.com/home/tabid/3339/bid/223/The-Startup-Name-Game.aspx
Another interesting article by Guy kawasaki gives us some insights on do’s dont’s while naming a startup. You can read it here http://blog.guykawasaki.com/2006/02/the_name_game.html
Keep watching this space for updates…