To all the folks who are driving this effort, thank you thank you. This is just the beginning of helping the community for the long term, not just a holiday effort. Looking forward to seeing this seed germinate. Please go to www.needmap.com to give us your ideas.

President Bill Clinton addresses @inc500 conf thru video
5:42 AM Oct 1st via TweetDeck

Gary Hirshberg CEO – Stonyfield Yogurt

Should be good! RT @inc5000: Today’s 1st session is starting! Gary Hirshberg, the CE-YO from Stoneyfield at #inc500conferenece!

Stonyfield Yogurt is up to $360 million in sales now. Gary going to go over his philosophy on triple bottom line.
5:47 AM Oct 1st

Churchill quote “success is the ability to move from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm”
5:49 AM Oct 1st

If the rest of the world adopted USA energy and total consumption, we’d need 5 Earths to be able to handle it.
5:52 AM Oct 1st

67% of Americans are obese or overweight. Just like the environment, unintentional actions lead to disastrous effects.
5:56 AM Oct 1st

Stonyfield first 9 years to get to $4m revenue and barely unprofitable. Never got venture money. Grew with cradle to cradle thinking.
6:04 AM Oct 1st

9 carbon footprint teams – transportation, greenhouse gas emissions, sustainable packaging, etc
6:08 AM Oct 1st via TweetDeck

Real sustainability is about innovation not just Eco efficiency
6:11 AM Oct 1st

@inc5000 Gary hirshberg, stonyfield yogurt CEO. Cradle to cradle = no waste. Highly profitable, requires a little investment up front.
6:15 AM Oct 1st

Organic cows live twice as long as conventional cows. Whoda thunk that?
6:21 AM Oct 1st

The challenge: stonyfields gross margins are 10 percent less than competitors. Better net margins from less advertising.
6:25 AM Oct 1st

Stonyfield lids talk about their causes. Huge customer loyalty. Advocacy.
6:27 AM Oct 1st

Stonyfield is deeply engaged in PR and social media. This year- 4 billion media impressions.
Fri Oct 01 2010 06:33:56

Mollusks take calcium carbonate from their environment to make their homes. Humans will need to do this with carbon.
Fri Oct 01 2010 06:38:33

Kevin Surace CEO – Serious Materials

@inc5000 next speaker Kevin Surace of Serious Materials rethinking an industry retrofitting homes and building with Eco drywall
Fri Oct 01 2010 06:44:24

Kevin surace – Inc. Magazine entrepreneur of the year. Need to identify a big problem. For him: climate change.
Fri Oct 01 2010 06:51:34

Today- only 0.4% comes from wind and solar. Everything else is coal, oil, and others.
Fri Oct 01 2010 06:54:45

Ecorock tackles the problem that 40% of total world energy usage is in building energy inefficiancy.
Fri Oct 01 2010 06:57:33

QuietRock is 5x more than drywall but total installed cost was actually quite a bit less.
Fri Oct 01 2010 07:02:39

People advice- look at hiring people outside your industry who look at a problem differently. Take company to next level
Fri Oct 01 2010 07:04:37

Your customers will not go with you just because you are green. Got to save them money. Most important.
Fri Oct 01 2010 07:07:22

Serious Materials replaced out all windows on the Empire State building with high Rsquared value windows. 6500 windows, saves $28m.
Fri Oct 01 2010 07:09:53

Everyone says they are innovative, but to truly disrupt an industry is really really hard.
Fri Oct 01 2010 07:11:47

Apple is most well known example as a disruptor. iPod was 50th digital music player in the market, but did it uniquely.
Fri Oct 01 2010 07:13:44

Serious Materials CEO is PR genius by buying shutdown doors and windows manufacturing plants and partnering with unions. Moving fast.
7:27 AM Oct 1st

Tim Westergren Founder – Pandora

Pandora founder Tim Westergren speaking now @inc5000 conference. Very psyched to hear his story of going broke then $100m rev this year.
7:36 AM Oct 1st

By end of 2001, over 50 Pandora employees worked for free. It stayed that way for 2 years. Founder had $200k personal debt. Got $9m VC in 04
7:46 AM Oct 1st

Tried it as a subscription model, but people didn’t want to pay. Pandora now has 65 million users in US. 100k new users per day @inc5000
7:49 AM Oct 1st

@pandora – your founder talking now about responsiveness to real human listeners. Do u engage on Twitter?
7:55 AM Oct 1st

Washington dc political process nearly shut down pandora due to Internet levy on streaming music. 400k faxes to congress in 3 days. Saved.
8:04 AM Oct 1st

Radio is 85% of how people consume music. Biggest $ part of industry. Pandora makes money thru advertising. Cash flow positive, but not prof
8:10 AM Oct 1st

Pandora 90k artists. 70% independent. @inc5000
Fri Oct 01 2010 08:12:44

@inc5000 panel “inside the mind of an investor”. Only 500 actine VCs in country. As entrepreneur, still need to be selective
Fri Oct 01 2010 09:19:41

Danny Meyer – New York City restaurateur and CEO of the Union Square Hospitality Group

@inc5000 current speaker is Danny meyer of the famous NYC restaurant Gramercy Tavern
Fri Oct 01 2010 11:58:01

51% of your success is how you make customers feel. 49% is the technical delivery of your products and services. Hospitality is adapting to
Fri Oct 01 2010 12:19:48

Jean Chatzky – Author of “The Difference”

@inc5000 speaker now is Jean Chatzky, author of “the difference”. Anyone can prosper even in toughest times.
Fri Oct 01 2010 12:48:23

As an entrepreneur, Jean knows company owners think often about finances, but how structured are we in our thinking?
Fri Oct 01 2010 12:58:47

#inc500 Human nature in personal finance is to be over-confident about our future finances.
Fri Oct 01 2010 13:03:12

3 traits of financially secure people: Habitual savings, diversified investing, and …
Fri Oct 01 2010 13:11:34

Money doesn’t bring happiness. Statistically, happiness attracts money and success in all stages of life.
Fri Oct 01 2010 13:18:53

Saturday, Oct 2 – Day 2
#inc500 First session on virtualization and cloud computing is a bit of an infomercial for Dell.
Sat Oct 02 2010 06:11:29

RT @IncMagazine: “Giving entrepreneurs better access to capital would have been No. 1 way to get us out of the economic downturn.” S. Felice
Sat Oct 02 2010 06:12:54

Steve Felice word of advice is to not wait so long to get international experience. #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 06:41:03

John Gerzema says the great recession could be the best thing for america. Underlying sense of optimism. #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 06:43:31

Based on a huge study on American spending habits, there is a major shift from mindless to mindful purchases
Sat Oct 02 2010 06:44:51

Author of “Spendshift” says American consumers collectively saying “if you want to sell to me, you better have my back”.
Sat Oct 02 2010 06:46:51

Shift happened in 2005 from superficial stuff to authentic, craft-driven meaningful products. #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 06:48:23

RT @IncEvents: Final Day @ Inc. 500 conference! Listen to @johngerzema talk about Decoding the New Consumer right now.
Sat Oct 02 2010 06:49:57

Trends since 2005 – fewer logos on new clothing, more volunteerism, retooling empowerment betterment, people becoming self-reliant.
Sat Oct 02 2010 06:52:38

Lots more Americans, even in Dallas, have backyard chickens. Fascinating that this defines a trend.
Sat Oct 02 2010 06:54:44

Time banks is a cool concept. You give time as a guitar teacher and I give back by doing yardwork. #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 06:56:23

Spend Shift trend – badge of awesomeness – creativity but keeping it simple and frugal and Eco. Nimble, adaptable.
Sat Oct 02 2010 06:58:54

50% of mellenials don’t have a land line, bookrenter.com, neighborgoods.com. Use hulu.com and don’t pay for tv cable #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 07:02:40

Recyclebank – works like frequent flyer miles for rewarding recycling. Trend towards uber-local support #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 07:06:43

Simplicity example – Shoebox banking. Put all your personal financial statements in a shoebox and bank figures it all out for u #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 07:08:52

We are moving from a credit to a debit society. The $ that we are spending today is really ours. More selective, mindful consumption.
Sat Oct 02 2010 07:13:34

America is an emerging market for values-led innovation. Future is bright. #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 07:14:41

Hilarious zappos video about the “happiness bus” playing at #inc500conferenece. 3 month happy bus tour
Sat Oct 02 2010 08:54:06

I gotta check out the happy bus outside the Gaylord resort Hotel here #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 08:57:55

Tony Hsieh CEO – Zappos

Tony Hsieh speaking now. Glad he is adapting his presentation from last year #inc5000. Happy bus coming to Portland in 6 weeks
Sat Oct 02 2010 09:02:27

RT @IncMagazine: “I sold LinkExchange because it wasn’t fun anymore…the company culture went down.” says Tony Hsieh @zapppos #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 09:02:40

New zappos record for longest phone call. 7 1/2 hours. What if you need to go to bathroom? #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 09:10:44

Zappos Call center people are trained to check pricing with 3 competitors and tell customer to go with less $ competitor product
Sat Oct 02 2010 09:13:04

Nice! RT @sandydlc: #zappos saved me for inc conference gala outfit. Ordered sandals Monday, arrived Tuesday, flight early Thursday #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 09:16:02

Growing zappos brand over next few years – clothing, customer service, culture #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 09:17:45

Two books in Zappos giving library – Good to Great, Tribal Leadership. Important findings #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 09:20:37

Commitable core values – doing a google search on any 1 of 10 core values – zappos shows up #1. Unique. #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 09:23:39

Luck is really about being open to opportunities. More perspective than fact #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 09:25:29

Zappos has 1500 vendors that have total access to info in zappos extranet #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 09:28:31

Great companies had really strong cultures and all had a higher purpose. Chase the vision, not the money #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 09:33:27

Zappos took the high human touch approach, not high tech approach.
Sat Oct 02 2010 09:37:35

2009 timing of when zappos vision became broader to “delivering happiness”. #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 09:38:48

What is your goal in life? Ultimately, it’s to be happy and fulfilled. #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 09:49:42

Happiness framework – perceived control, perceived progress, vision #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 09:51:37

To build enduring, great companies, you need profits, passion, purpose. #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 09:55:46

Norm Brodsky #inc5000 talk on sales -listen to your customer, take responsibility, everybody sells
Sat Oct 02 2010 11:31:31

Learn from others. What you like. What you don’t like. Borrow others ideas and embellish them. #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 11:33:46

Hire salespeople who want to stay with the company forever. Right attitude is everything. #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 11:46:04

Norm Brodsky – some of the best suggestions come from employees. Put up a suggestion box and use it! #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 11:54:02

The real question is “why are we doing this?” prioritize. Need to write down your life plan. Do that with your wife. #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 12:06:18

Norm says you have 48 hours to put things you’ve learned into action or you won’t do it. #inc5000
Sat Oct 02 2010 12:12:58

Great black tie #inc5000 awards ceremony tonight!
Sat Oct 02 2010 17:02:43

What an amazing #inc5000 conference. Heading back to pdx now. Looking forward to putting some of what I learned to use!
about 21 hours ago

Below is a little video that Chase did on me as part of a series of videos of entrepreneurs at the event – cool idea to engage the audience. I thought I might win an iPad for this, but I didn’t. They made this really relevant for the Inc. 5000 crowd.

Some quick facts:
3-year growth: 77%
2009 Revenue: $4.8 million
2006 Revenue: $2.7 million
Employees: 41
Founded: 2002
Industry: ■ Advertising & Marketing
Industry rank: #252
#27 in Portland, OR

See the Full List of all Inc. 5000 honorees

Click above to see our Inc 5000 profile

These guys know small businesses drive the economy and in Portland that is just what we need now, being known as a pretty slow start up scene when compared with fast runners Seattle and San Francisco. They may not seem so glamorous to the naked eye but these small start ups need investors to get them off the ground and angel investors in Portland have not been so quick to spread their wings.

Oregon Business Magazine has just published the article to explain who is out there and what they are doing to get these small businesses and startups funded and on a steady growth pattern. The young business leaders featured here bring with them a wealth of new ideas to “ignite the startup scene”. These are the guys who are investing in Portland’s small startups not only financially but with new ideas and dynamic views on how to succeed.

Find out who they are and what they have been doing.

eROI: What do you do here?
Rich: I am the Product Manager for all eROI software products and services.

eROI: What did you do before?
Rich: Most recently I built a personalized children’s book company – a mash-up of a web-driven personalization interface, children’s picture books/content, and on-demand book publishing. Behind that I have a pretty varied (I like to call it “dynamic”) career, like: driving product development for a video-based e-learning company; creating a sales/marketing team for a medical device company while developing a medical device; sales engineering big streaming media deals with a little company called Enron; knowing way too much about optical microlithography and its implementation in a high-volume semiconductor manufacturing environment.

eROI: So far, what’s the coolest thing about working at eROI?
Rich: It’s an easy answer – the people. I think having smart, motivated people excited to create and deliver greatness is pretty cool.

eROI: What do you feel that you’ll bring to your team?
Rich: Having been on the customer side for these products and on the development side of other (reasonably similar) software products, I think I have a unique perspective and skill set that I hope can help make these products great.

eROI: What was your first job?
Rich: During a teachers’ strike in high school, I took a job as a bark spreader. I got in trouble for spreading the bark too quickly, which was a great lesson in “work environments to avoid.”

eROI: What was your worst job?
Rich: Fencing. I used to resurface tennis courts and one summer I had to do a bunch of fence work around some big high school’s courts. Never. Again.

eROI: What were you like in high school?
Rich: I lettered in football, basketball, and chess (yes, I won a few matches at State). Never a cool kid, never a nerd, but a little bit of both.

eROI: Do you have kids?
Rich: Yes. My wife Jessica and I have two kids: Jackson (8) and Addie (6).

eROI: Where are you from?
Rich: Though I was born in Michigan, most of my growing up was in a tiny town of 4,000 people in Kentucky.

eROI: What’s your favorite thing about Portland?
Rich: It’s just the right size and full of interesting people doing interesting things.

eROI: Where’s the coolest place you’ve traveled?
Rich: That’s a hard question – I love to travel and have lots of favorite places for different reasons.  Our family just went to Brazil in February and had an absolutely amazing time. I still dream about the food in South Korea. But I don’t think anything is prettier that being back country in Banff/Yoho/Jasper.

eROI: What do you like to do when you’re not at work?
Rich: I’m a family guy – my life revolves around friends and family. I coach several sports teams for my kids (baseball, t-ball, soccer) and play soccer and basketball too. I read a lot, am big into music, and rarely turn down a chance to play a ridiculous game (ping-pong, bowling, foosball, darts, ad nauseum) or to have a drink on the porch with friends.

eROI: If you could build a robot to do an everyday task for you, what would it be?
Rich: It would convince my daughter to get dressed in under 35 minutes. EVERY morning.

eROI: What’s something that may surprise us about you?
Rich: I learned to ski in Kentucky. Yes, snow ski.

I encourage you to check out the complete case study to see exactly how we accomplished this. It details each of the eleven emails, as well as the overall results of the holiday campaign.

The 10 Golden Principles of Successful Web Apps from Carsonified on Vimeo.

To simplify the article into a straight list, here it is:
1. Speed
2. Instant Utility
3. Software is Media
4. Less is More
5. Make it Programmable
6. Make it Personal
7. RESTful
8. Discoverability
9. Clean
10. Playful

Here are the things I really like from what Fred Wilson had to say: Sometimes, words or expressions are so key to getting your point across.  I’ve really been struggling with the over-use and broad nature of the term “intuitive” as in our interface is intuitive. Most companies tout this, but very few actually pull it off (Mint.com and iPhone interface are notable exceptions).  Wilson’s expression “instant utility” means that you log in and you immediately get what to do end to end – the service is instantly useful to you. It’s critical to usability.  His other 2 Golden Rules that fall in this category are “Less is More” and “Clean”. Our newest web app to launch in 6-8 weeks is following the design principles of progressive disclosure whereby the user is guided towards completing the ONE main action for that page or interface.  By utilizing progressive disclosure, it reduces the confusion and clutter from a page or task – reducing the amount of time it takes for users to do their job while improving accuracy.

Additionally, I’m a big fan of Wilson’s Rule “Make it Programmable”. Web apps of old often kept silos of information in their app and the API was not really meant to push or pull a ton of info to other web apps.  We are really putting a lot of energy into building web apps on an entire API platform so that the very premise of the web app is to have a community of other web apps built around it and for it.

Again, if you haven’t seen Fred Wilson’s full blog post, please check it out >>

Our task was to put that brand creativity to work and drive up holiday sales.

Our challenge was to make the Icebreaker brand stand out against the barrage of holiday emails coming from every other retailer.

While the creative grabbed the attention of the viewer, the content kept people clicking and purchasing.

Using a total of 11 emails, the campaign helped to substantially increase the holiday sales of 2009 from the previous year.

Strategies we used in the 2009 Icebreaker holiday campaign included:

• Increased frequency of sends (2-3 per week)
• A/B Testing – offers and copy
• Free shipping offers
• Product bundles
• and more…

See the emails and stats from the campaign»