Without getting into the cryptocurrency stuff, my natural instincts tell me that blockchain technology is about identity. We work, spend, invest, and socialize digitally, but when it comes to some of the most important stuff of life –– birth certificates, passports, driver’s licenses, titles, deeds, college transcripts –– we revert to analog. The ways…
Chicago-based ActiveCampaign is absolutely crushing it in the CRM, sales, and automated marketing space. But it didn’t come out of nowhere –– the company is a 13-year “overnight” success story. When he started back in 2003, Jason VandeBoom was just trying to pay for college. For more than a decade, he and his small…
“As travelers, we focus on the journey,” says Jeff Katz of his new travel startup, Journera. “None of us are just focused on the flight or the hotel. It’s about the entire journey, whether it’s for work or for play.” Jeff’s own journey has spanned nearly 40 years in travel and tech. An…
“There were a million babies born to Millennials last year, and that number’s growing,” says Elizabeth Harz, CEO of Sittercity. (I happen to know this firsthand). “Digital natives are used to running everything from their phones and expect a data-centric, efficient, beautiful user experience to manage their whole lives. “There’s also a sense of…
“We literally had somebody tell us that after she paid off her loans, she was going to Walt Disney World,” says Peanut Butter founder and CEO David Aronson. “That’s how excited people get.” It’s understandable: American college grads, and Millennials in particular, are up to their eyeballs in student debt –– on average,…
“The pitch is ‘reinvent yourself or die’,” says JC Grubbs, founder and CEO of digital product studio Tandem, formerly known as DevMynd. “When we first started, we were really focused on startups –– how they can be very nimble, quickly identifying a new market and pivoting without the weight of a large organization.” With…
“If you ask any retailer, 80 percent of their profitable revenue comes from the top 20 percent of of your customer base,” says MaryLiz Lehman, CEO and co-founder of concierge retail technology platform Pixavo. “What are you doing to differentiate –– personalize, retain, inspire, engage with them? I think that’s where the downfall…
Like many successful startups, this one began with a problem that needed solving. “Three years ago, I adopted my puppy, Patrick,” says John Dillon, founder and CEO of GuardianVets. “My guy’s a boxer-bloodhound mix. Boxers are super energetic, and bloodhounds are super stubborn.” Although he’s adorable, Patrick’s particular combo of puppy traits…
“I wasn’t the sort of little girl who thought about her wedding her whole life,” says Nicole Staple, co-founder of Brideside. “But I thought the business was super interesting, because there was a wide open space for a new, digital player to come in and really disrupt this sort of stodgy, old school industry.”…
“Our brains are wired to resist being influenced,” says Todd Caponi, author of the new book The Transparency Sale. “You walk into a room as a salesperson, even if you’re charming and engaging, the customer is thinking, ‘all right, when’s Johnny Salesperson coming out?’” Salespeople, too, tend to think this way, Todd says. “B2B…