Category Archives: Technology

For any business with tangible product, one of the things that can probably drive them crazy is the ability to track all of it and make sure that they have enough or know when to re-order them. This is one of the problems that Stitch Labs is trying to solve with their inventory management service. With it, businesses are able to manage contacts, handle fulfillment and invoicing, and generate powerful reports and analytics–know what you’re selling and what people are interested in buying. Small businesses will find this pretty useful since the data isn’t stored in some database in their office. Rather, Stitch’s service hosts all your data right in the Cloud allowing you unfettered access from anywhere you are. Customer satisfaction and redemption is just right around the corner!

This service seems almost like a god-send for some businesses and the investors have definitely paid attention. Announced today on TechCrunch, Stitch Labs just raised $1 million in seed investment led by True Ventures. This is a welcome boon for a company that was started because its founder, Brandon Levey, just couldn’t find “a satisfactory SaaS to manage his own business”. It turned out that Mr. Levey wanted something more than just accounting software and not just an inventory management platform. Well, if something isn’t available, create it yourself…and that is exactly what Mr. Levey did with Stitch Labs. TechCrunch’s Alexia Tsotsis spoke with Mr. Levey and according to her post, Stitch Labs is “dedicated to working with [our] customers to make sure Stitch is powerful and intuitive…” so one can imagine that this $1 million in funding will go a long way into helping scale the service and create something “awesome”.

So how exactly does Stitch Labs work for businesses?

Stitch Labs is a paid service that gives you a free 30-day trial to see if it works for you. If you have an account with services like Etsy, Shopify, or even Quickbooks, you’ll be glad to know that those services will work with Stitch seamlessly. All that you need to do is simply sign up for an account and then you can begin to build and manage your entire product catalog and inventory right from Stitch. The service will even allow you to create professional line sheets, build full product lines, handle unlimited pricing structures, and even attach images to products. Basically, Stitch gives you the power to grow your business without resorting to shelling out thousands and thousands of dollars just to market yourself. Take power back into your own hands and make these services work for you, not the other way around.

Users of Stitch will gain access to their very own dashboard that gives quick sales statistics to the business so that they know what’s going on in near-real time and what needs to be done. From being notified of low stock inventory to being able to manage all expenses and user activity on your site, it all winds up with your business being able to be paid a lot quicker. The dashboard also offers users the ability to help manage their contacts so that they can manage and keep track of the people and other businesses that they do business with. No longer will you need to search for a name or address in another system–Stitch will keep track of it for you. And with their service being stored in the Cloud, you’ll always have access to it no matter where you are. And as an added bonus, you can even use it as a file-saving mechanism as well. Stitch will allow you to take a contact and attach distribution agreements, resale licenses, purchase orders, and other relevant documents so it’s all in one secure and central place available for easy access.

There’s a lot more to Stitch that is available if you are a member, but this inventory management service is probably a good thing to consider when you’re running your own business. If anything, it helps make you more efficient: the faster you are, the more money you save and gain, and the more you’ll be able to grow your business. Everybody wins!

The cost of doing business

Right now, there are only three plans available to businesses interested in being part of this service. If you’re a entrepreneur and a very small business, you can go for the Solo plan which will run you $12 per month and give you up to 2,000 products and 1 GB of storage.  But if you’re in a business with partners and employers. then try the Group plan for $24 per month, giving you a 3 user license, 3,000 products to display, and 1.5 GB of storage. Lastly, for larger businesses who still want something affordable but with a bit of a kick, try the Business plan for $79 per month allowing you up to 10 users, 5,000 products to display, and 2 GB of storage.

Each plan that you choose will have its own unique custom domain, secure 256-bit SSL encryption, unlimited companies, contacts, and people, user permissions, multiple daily backups, free phone & email support, reporting, invoicing, and a helpful dashboard.

So since there are paid options available, what will Stitch be doing with the $1 million in seed funding? Well, they’re looking to bring on some “awesome developers” to help grow the business and offer bigger and better services. The company will be working on developing a shopping cart and marketplace integration and get new partners on board in the near future.

Not bad…

Photo Credit: SheKnows.com

In one of several announcements he’s expected to make over the next few weeks, proud Mashable alumnus and their former Editor-at-Large, Ben Parr, has posted on his blog that he is joining tech publication, CNET, and its parent company, CBS Interactive, as a contributing columnist and commentator.

Offering social commentary about tech news and interests isn’t anything new for Mr. Parr. For more than three years, 2,446 articles, he has been at the forefront of the tech industries news, often breaking them and conducting the necessary investigations needed to get the real scoops and information his readers really care about. He intends to continue on with this type of journalism in his new CNET column that will follow the footsteps of his Mashable one–The Social Analyst, but it promises to have a bit more of a bite to it and he vows to keep the tech industry’s biggest names honest.

In joining with tech powerhouse CNET, Mr. Parr explained that he believed in the “ambitious vision” that CBS Interactive CEO Jim Lanzone, and CNET General Manager Mark Larkin, have with the company and publication. It’s a great outlet for Mr. Parr and we wish him well in his journey with CNET. The publication will definitely get some solid readership from his writings and also help add some insights into the tech world besides gadgetry and products.

But don’t worry, Mr. Parr’s multiple activities and projects will not die off with this new adventure. No, he explains that while he’ll be able to continue to reach millions of people with his thoughts and insights on technology, CNET’s deal will give him the ability to retain the flexibility he needs to be an entrepreneur and build amazing products–ultimately to “change the world”. And that’s good, because if you look at all of his activity, he’s busier than any average entrepreneur…he’s working on a yet-to-be-revealed startup (announcement pending), is an advisor to several startups like NerdsUnite Productions, Tracks.by, Code Academy, and Women 2.0. Keep on, keeping on, Ben Parr!

Congratulations Ben!

Photo Credit: Ben Parr @ LeWeb 11 Les Docks-9036 via LeWeb 2011 by @Kmeron

Nevada today approved a law making it the first state in the nation to establish legislation authorizing the use of autonomous, or driver-less, vehicles on its roadways. This is a win for Google since they’re one of the leaders in autonomous technology, perhaps well-known for their driver-less cars that have at least been touring the region. Most experts, according to MSNBC, believe that technology to have mass production of driver-less cars is still years away, but Nevada decided to sign legislation right away.

Spurred on by Google, according to MSNBC, Nevada was encouraged to act because the search engine giant wanted to make sure that the driver-less program it had going on wasn’t doing anything illegal or not adhering to regulations. It first started its research & development program two years ago and MSNBC reports that there hasn’t been a single collision recorded, although in doing a search on (where else?) Google, I discovered that, last year, an accident that resulted in a five-car crash was started by Google’s car, but they claim it was human error–a driver was behind the wheel, not artificial intelligence.

While legislation is now in place for driver-less vehicles, don’t expect the state to allow you to do whatever you want when you’re in the car, but not behind the wheel (or at least driving it). The Nevada Department of Motor Vehicles is saying that there’s no exemption for drinking and driving: “the bartender or bouncer won’t be able to toss you in the back seat, hit the Start button and send you speeding home,” according to Nevada DMV Director Bruce Breslow. MSNBC also reports that all operators will be able to text and use a handheld cellphone, but will need special licenses in order to be the driver in a driver-less car–a black box, similar to what’s on airplanes, will be included in all vehicles (a smart move).

Google will have to move fast in this area. General Motors is catching up to the search engine giant quickly with several tests being done in Southern California, while other participants are Pittsburgh’s Carnegie-Mellon University and Chevrolet. BMW is also gearing up to be an active participant too.

Wonder why Nevada was the first one? Is it because there’s so much stretch of road out in the middle of nowhere that Google felt it was safer to test their vehicles out there without increased risk of traffic? It will be interesting to see how this progresses as this will definitely spur innovation of (hopefully) safer vehicles and other autonomous technology.

Good news for those small businesses eager to try and find another way of being a part of the the social media collective. Last Friday, Twitter announced that they’re rolling out a new advertising solution that will help make it easier for businesses to set up an account on their own and amplify their messages on the social network. This is a great move that will benefit emerging and new businesses who often times get swamped out of the market by the bigger and more noticeable brands. To help promote this release, American Express was brought on board as a partner designed to give all of their Cardmembers and merchants in the United States early access to this new advertising platform. While it won’t launch until late March, the partnership with American Express is probably a good move, especially when trying to reach small businesses.

To encourage small businesses to participate, American Express is giving to the first 10,000 Cardmembers and merchants $100 worth of free advertising on Twitter and in March, the credit card giant will notify its customers how to begin. For many, it might seem like Twitter’s move to have a self-serve ad platform is something akin to Google AdSense or AdWords since the advertiser will be bidding on keywords. Right now, customers are able to place their bids on promoted tweets and promoted accounts — something meant to help cut through the noise and increase exposure for whatever the advertiser wants to tweet about. According to AdAge, Twitter had already begun rolling out the self-serve ad platform in mid-November with about 20 or less advertisers, but it has since expanded to about 100 advertisers. In addition to this expansion, advertisers will pay for the bids via electronic payment, not through invoicing by the sales team–an interesting decision that makes it akin to Googl AdWords since Google processes via electronic payment while Yahoo advertising used to do it through sales teams.

As AdAge points out:

As is the case for any of Twitter’s 3,000 advertisers, small businesses can set bids for promoted accounts on a cost-per-follower basis and for promoted tweets on a cost-per-engagement basis/ In the latter case they pay only when users actively engage with the tweet (by retweeting, for instance.) While national brands might be bidding on keywords or hashtags associated with major events like the Oscars, which makes bidding competitive and expensive, small businesses would be more likely to bid on highly specific terms and to localize their bids, according to Mr. Costolo. (Twitter currently allows for city-level targeting at its most specific.)

Could this move by Twitter be a boon not only to the small business but also to Twitter’s bottom line? We’ve all been wondering what the public monetization strategy will be for the company–sure, they have a deal with several companies to allow them access to the firehose and also has/had a deal with search engines like Google and/or Bing. Now, it just seems right to really take the advertising opportunities on the service out for a ride and see how it handles. But if recent studies are any indication, Twitter is set to make a hefty profit off of this endeavor–according to an eMarketer report, ad revenues are projected to grow 210% in 2011…and as you can see from the chart on the right, Twitter’s advertising worldwide is going to increase year after year all the way to nearly $400 million by 2013. There’s definitely a lot of demand for people to want to get their message across on the service. According to eMarketer’s principal analyst Debra Aho Williamson, “since their debut in April 2010, Twitter’s Promoted Products have proven successful in the US. Marketers have seen solid engagement rates with Twitter advertising—in some cases better than those on Facebook—despite Twitter’s relatively smaller audience.”

American Express’ involvement in this promotion is definitely not a coincidence. For the past few years, if not longer, the credit card company has been a strong supporter of the small business community. They were the first ones to start the Small Business Saturday campaign during the Thanksgiving holiday and have recently launched a social media show that is designed to help small businesses “harness the power of social media”. They’ve even partnered with Foursquare by offering specials to specific check-ins–most likely small businesses. Recognized for being the credit card of choice by small businesses, it’s not a tremendous leap to believe that American Express would partner with Twitter on this initiative. Definitely a win for both parties.

It will be interesting to see how Twitter’s advertising platform will still play out. At this point, there’s not a lot of advertisers that are participating in this endeavor, but soon more advertisers will be on the service and how will that add to the noise that everyone already has? With increased growth and use, comes the question about scale. But I’m sure that there are contingency plans in place to ensure sanity for all.

Photo Credit: Moma Propaganda via Laughing Squid

If you’re a user of photo-sharing applications like Instagram, PicPlz, Path, Streamzoo, or any of the countless others that are flooding the app market, there’s at least one inevitable thing that you’re used to: when you use that app on your mobile device, you’re only going to be able to only pull in photos that are right on your phone. Those locally-stored photos might not be the only photos you’d like to share once in a while. Maybe there’s an existing photo on another application that you want to share on a different network–just how would you do that? Well right now, you’re going to need to first find that photo, save it to your phone (if you can even do that), and then upload it to the new network. It’s a big pain in the butt, and this inconvenience may cause people not to actually follow through.

This fear is probably something that haunts app developers all the time. But no longer do developers need to worry about things like this because Chute has just released an application just for developers that they can use to tap into the most popular photo-sharing services and enable cross-network sharing. Called Photo Picker+, this developer app is completely free for anyone to use and can power the photo program of any app out there. Imagine Path uses Photo Picker+ and you want to share with your private social network and specific photo that you have on Flickr. That Flickr photo wasn’t taken using your phone, it was with a camera so how can you push it to Path? Well since Photo Picker+ is part of the application, the user will be able to select an album from one of the supported accounts and your photo will be shared to Path.

Currently supporting services like Facebook, Instagram, Flickr, and Picasa, Photo Picker+ is a smart move for any developer. Everyone hates trying to cross-post all the time so if developers have the functionality that Photo Picker+ has, the better it will be. And just think that now you’re going to be able to share filtered photos in applications that normally you wouldn’t have filtered photos: a tilt-shift filtered photo done through Instagram shared on Picasa? Simply amazing.

But this isn’t about posting to just other social networks. On the contrary, what Photo Picker+ offers is an incentive for brands and businesses who are encouraging people to share their photos to have an easy ready-made feature that can be integrated into their application. Take NBC News, for example…at the 2012 Olympics, they could have a feature in their application designed to display user photos right from the venues. By having Photo Picker+ integrated right into it, they can have Instagram, Flickr, Picasa, and Facebook photos shared on their app and eventually pushed to the NBC website. Using the proper authentication protocols, they might even be able to assign usernames and give proper attribution when displayed.  Or what about for travel destinations like Hawaii, Chicago, San Francisco, or New York City? Those destinations could have an available mobile app and host a library of photos from tourists and residents. If you really want to receive active engagement, don’t make people take photos using multiple apps–instead, just do it once and import from several other sources. It makes things much simpler. This same process goes for any other application currently on the market or waiting to be developed. If you are planning on bringing in photos from any social network, then Photo Picker+ might be something to consider.

Photo Picker+ is free to download and available now. This application is a product of Chute, a hosted media platform service  founded by Gregarious Narain and Ranvir Gujral, which first launched last year at the inaugural LAUNCH conference hosted by Jason Calacanis. No programming is needed and a simple SDK file is hosted on Github.