I Am Adam Smith

Real costs for one startup

Guy Kawasaki posts some numbers on what it costs his buddies' at Redfin to run their startup. It shows their predictions, and then the realities. I love data points like these....

The DIGG Toolbox, 70 Marketing tricks with DIGG

I haven't learned enough about Digg yet, but need to. Here's a "Toolbox" of 70 Digg apps using Digg to promote your site.

Fora.tv

Fora.tv looks interesting. Lectures and interviews from smart interesting people. Similar to Ted.com, but with broader participation.

Internet Stats + New Facebook Targeted Advertising

Couple of interesting things from Web 2.0 Summit. Talk by Mary Meaker of Stanley Morgan. Video | Slides, good overview of the state of the internet market.

Also, new facebook advertising initiative, via TechCrunch (this is some amazing targeting you can do.

As first reported on AllFacebook, the Flyers let you target by country, city, gender, age range, political views, relationship status, education level, workplace affiliation, or any keyword in a person’s stated interests. It’s that last option that could be really powerful. For instance, simply putting in different keywords into the Facebook Flyers ad-targeting page reveals that of the 19,951,900 Facebook members in the U.S., 101,000 are into rock climbing, 411,000 are into cooking, and 706,160 people are into traveling. Such targeting could theoretically allow advertisers to reach exactly the people they want, instead of the scatter-shot approach favored today. If you are a wedding planner in Salem, OR, for instance, there are 100 women on Facebook between 20 and 40 who live in Salem and are engaged. That’s pretty deep targeting. MySpace is also moving in this direction, allowing advertising by interest categories and sub-categories.

About Me

To contact me:

email: adam@travelmob.com
cell: (808) 292 5726
Add me on FaceBook

Add me on LinkedIn

My Resume

I live in Honolulu, Hawaii.

I am the CEO of TravelMob.com
I work as the director of marketing at Phase2Int.com

I play chess and bridge. I go bodysurfing and hiking.

I'm always looking for outstanding partners, investors, programmers and designers for TravelMob

I play lots of volleyball at Queens Beach in Waikiki

SaaS, SoftwareAnywhere Blog

We decided that we'll be starting our company's blog at Software Anywhere. I'll be keeping this blog for my personal use, mainly covering online travel, VC investment in travel startups, some SaaS, and some personal ranting.

Phase 2's contribution to the blogosphere will be looking at the direction of the Software as a Service market, especially as it relates to SharePoint, CRM, Project  - and their integration.

My New Job

So, I haven't been blogging in a long time, but getting back starting today.

I started working at Phase 2 International, a SharePoint and App-Dev shop, in June of this year. Its been a great learning experience for me.

The team here is working on TripInvite, and we plan to launch the beta by the end of the year. We decided to use Microsoft SharePoint as the foundation of the site. I had never heard of SharePoint before starting at Phase 2, but I'm a big fan of it now. The way I see it, it starts you off with a ton of functionality that you'd otherwise have to code. Great for Web 2.0 type apps, with social networking, and sharing built in from the beginning.

I started off doing some sales, business-development, and marketing. When I first got here, the focus was on local consulting contracts.

Since then, we've changed the focus to launching a Software as a Service (SaaS) website.
Basically, outsourcing your applications such as SharePoint, MS Project, Exchange, etc, to us. So you don't have to worry about cap-ex costs, maintaining your servers,  or keeping up to date with versions. Like most outsourcing, it saves you money, and more importantly, lets you focus on your core competencies.

I'm now basically done with local sales, and will be focused on marketing, and developing our website. Feel free to write me with any comments/suggestions/questions, smitha   at... phase2int.com

I'll be talking about the SaaS market, as well as TripInvite related issues on this blog.

SharePoint Hosting SaaS

Phase2 International launched its SaaS site featuring Hosted SharePoint. While still in beta, all the SaaS applications including SharePoint, CRM, MS Project, Exchange, and a homegrown DWG manager called ShareCAD for AutoCAD are available.

The site is being redesigned by a top-tier London based firm, and will officially launch in Mid-November.

I'll be tracking developments at the official Phase2 blog (when its up), and SharePoint related info at my SharePoint blogspot account.