CONVRGE
By Alex Uihlein | Business, Startups, Design & the such as.
14 Podcasts That Will Make Your Business More Successful
There's something for everyone here, from aspiring entrepreneurs to successful startup founders and everyone in between.<p>If you're starting or growing a business, you need all the help you can get. But you're probably maxed out on your schedule to read another business book, and you need information …
How This Bedsheets Startup Figured Out The Right Way To Disrupt Sleep Patterns
The cofounders of Brooklinen say the secret to their explosive growth is good data and customer service. Oh, and don’t forget the men.<p>There was a time not that long ago when buying high-quality bedsheets was a major investment. Walk into Nordstrom or Barneys, and you could easily drop $750 or more …
Customer ServiceSnapchat will make Los Angeles a stronger tech hub
If you were to write a history of Silicon Valley, you could do it by looking at a series of major diaspora. Companies like Google, Yahoo, Oracle and PayPal attract top talent for years; when they reach maturity or a major liquidity event, their talent disperses and germinates into the next …
Why A Hedge Fund Manager Thinks Tesla’s Model 3 May Put Elon Musk Out of Business
Tesla Motors customers are lining up to wait as much as two years to own the company's eagerly anticipated cheaper electric car, the Model 3. But …
Autos5 Reasons Why It's a Bad Idea for Startups to Outsource Software Development
Integrating remote freelancers with your in-house team is critical and not at all easy.<p>Entrepreneurs always look for hacks to do things in a cheaper, faster and more efficient manner. Sometimes, though, the perceived savings aren't worth the ultimate cost.<p>I'm a serial entrepreneur. Over the past …
ManagementTesla's Shares Are On A Slippery Slope
In the space of two months early this year Tesla’s shares almost doubled from $141.05 on February 9th to $269.34 on April 7th. However from a technical perspective they did not trade higher than the September 2014 intra-day high of $291.42 or July 2015’s $286.65. As can be seen in the chart below …
AutosProduct Hunt was acquired and venture capital may never be the same again
AngelList’s acquisition of Product Hunt is being described as the two coolest kids joining the same team at Silicon Valley High. Startup founders already use AngelList to meet investors and raise money before launching their products on Product Hunt, the premier discovery site for the latest …
Do This 1 Thing to Fix a Failing To-Do List
To-do lists are often long and intimidating, discouraging rather than motivating us. Try this trick to get even more done immediately<p>On my most difficult days, like when I was managing my startup while being a stay-at-home dad, the to-do list felt more than overwhelming. It felt impossible. Along …
to-do listExactly What To Say When An Interviewer Asks How You Would Change Their Company
Hiring managers know their companies aren’t perfect, so saying that you can’t think of a single thing to change is never a good response.<p>“What would you change if you worked here?”<p>Uh oh. You may have just teetered across the “tell me about your biggest weakness” tightrope, and now there’s another …
EmploymentIf You Love Your Idea, Here's Why You Need to Kill It
The most important thing you can do with your brilliant idea is to try to kill it.<p><i>This series of articles explores the connections between entrepreneurship and the history of philosophy and literature. Each article traces the influence of a specific thinker or school of thought upon the development</i> …
Predictive AnalyticsHere's what one top VC firm predicts will happen to tech startups in 2017
Accel <i>is an early & growth-stage venture capital firm and is known for its investments in Facebook, Slack, and Dropbox. This is the firm's annual presentation on what the tech environment is like for founders today and what will happen in 2017, republished with permission.</i><p>This November, we gathered …
Venture CapitalSaying 'no' isn't a bad thing
According to Jony Ive, there was one exercise that Steve Jobs reminded him of every single day – the practice of saying ‘no’.<p>At least once a day, Jobs would confront Ive and ask him “How many times did you say ‘no’ today?” and then push him to say it even more.<p>The whole point of the exercise was to …
Steve JobsHow Design Startup Canva Used Social Proof To Get Valued At $345M
Examples of designs created on Canva. (Credit to Canva / canva.com)<p>Decision making is a social exercise. This may seem counterintuitive for those that identify with independent rationality, but our brains are hardwired to seek cues and indicators from our environment. We look to the actions of …
StartupsAt $10, “Super Mario Run” Could Be Great For Nintendo, Phone Owners, And The Industry
Charging 10 bucks for a smartphone game would doom lesser game developers, but it’s a smart strategy for a giant in transition.<p>After years of scornfully dismissing the potential of smartphone gaming, Nintendo has decided to make peace, not Wario, by releasing <i>Super Mario Run</i>, the first Super Mario …
GamingMaking Sense of Snap’s IPO
News of Snap’s (fka Snapchat) purported confidential IPO filing hit the press this past week. Although rumors of a pending Snap IPO were swirling for …
Private EquitySuperagents Patrick Whitesell And Ari Emanuel Are Building The Future Of Hollywood
WME-IMG co-CEOs Patrick Whitesell and Ari Emanuel are blending live events and digital to upend the entertainment business with violent speed.<p>It’s a swampy August night in Las Vegas, temperatures simmering in the mid-’90s. Inside the air-conditioned T-Mobile Arena just off the Strip, a different …
UFCHe Went To The Desert With $3 Million In Cash—And Left With 150 Tons Of Cashmere
That was step one for a cofounder of Naadam, the startup trying to disrupt the cashmere supply chain and pay goat herders a fair wage.<p>Last year, 28-year-old Matt Scanlan carried $2 million in cash, packed into flimsy plastic grocery bags, into the Gobi Desert.<p>He had transferred the money to a bank …
ClothingLyft’s cofounder has his own vision for a self-driving taxi fleet
Laguna Beach, California<p>Just about every car company, Silicon Valley heavyweight, and startup is trying to build a self-driving car of some sort. Earlier this year, General Motors announced that it had acquired Cruise Automation, a startup aiming to build after-market self-driving “kits” for cars. …
Airbnb Hell, Twitter Trolls, and Silicon Valley’s Real User-Experience Problem
Behind the massive valuations and entreaties to make the world a better place, Silicon Valley start-ups run the risk of alienating the one thing they need most: customers.<p>The sharing economy sure does look fun. At least that’s what <b>Nic Moore</b>, a fashion photographer, thought when he decided to list …
Silicon ValleyApple is spending a ton of money on products we haven’t seen yet
On yesterday’s earnings call, it became clear that a trend is emerging for Apple: iPhone sales are falling, and accounting for a smaller portion of the company’s revenue than they had in recent quarters. But while investors weren’t particularly perturbed—the market spiked in after-hours trading, …
AppleTurn Your Facebook Page Into a Cash Cow--Now
Are you making money from your Facebook page? Here's how to do it.<p>Entrepreneurs, business owners, and their employees can spend many hours and resources sharing content and engaging with fans and customers on Facebook. But at some point, you're bound to wonder: How do I get a return on investment …
FacebookFacebook is an unstoppable force on mobile
If you needed more proof that Facebook is absolutely crushing it on mobile, consider this: More than a billion people now check Facebook from their phones every single day. Facebook revealed the new milestone today (July 27) when it released its second-quarter earnings.<p>Facebook now boasts a $17 …
FacebookWhat I Learned From 10 Years of Doing PR for Apple
I first started working for Apple on the PR agency side at Porter Novelli in Sydney, Australia in 1997. Steve Jobs had just returned to the company and the product line was a shamble of computers with confusing names, printers, scanners, and a curious, yet ill-conceived PDA called the Newton.<p>The …
Harvard Business ReviewSocial Media Users to Instagram and Facebook: We're Not Into It
Survey reveals users are engaging less with brands on social media.<p>Social Media remains elusive for brands for good reason; it's always changing.<p>A new survey shows that once dominant social media channels including Instagram and Facebook appear to be losing their luster for brands. It also confirms …
8 Things the Most Successful People Do Every Night
Your happy and productive tomorrow starts tonight.<p>The importance of good morning habits is a no-brainer. It's common sense that if you wake up early and do good things to ramp your body and mind up for the day, those things will pay off. How we spend our evenings gets a lot less attention, but it's …
Productivity6 Friendly Phrases You Can Use to Delight Customers
Provide more consistent customer service by adding these phrases to your playbook.<p><i>By Gregory Ciotti, marketing at Help Scout</i><p>Repeatable phrases are helpful for bringing consistency to customer conversations.<p>They enhance your personal replies, and make providing great customer service easier, because …
Maybe We Should Just Rent Our Gadgets
A startup called Grover attempts a hardware-for-rent model as ownership starts to feel meaningless.<p>By now, consumers of modern electronics should realize that they don’t entirely own the hardware they buy.<p>In an age of persistent, automatic software updates, only the newest devices are guaranteed to …
NESDirect-to-Consumer Labels Sharpen Their Brands
As the once-disruptive business model of bypassing wholesale and going direct-to-consumer via e-commerce becomes commonplace, brands must do more to differentiate themselves.<p><b>NEW YORK, United States</b> — When married designers Lisa Mayock and Jeff Halmos began planning the June 2016 launch of their …