Biz Idea: Travel Deal Finder

Airplane Imagine if there was a site where you could enter in your home city, a set of travel dates, and a maximum spending price. Then you’d get a list of travel deals matching your criteria.

There would also be an option to find only airfare deals, or airfares + hotels, or the big three: airfares, hotels + car rentals.

Wouldn’t this be great for vacations and weekend excursions? You know you’re free on a particular set of dates (they’re inflexible), you know how much you want to spend, and you know where you live, of course. What you don’t know is where you want to go. But you’re open to suggestions. That’s what this site would offer. It’s part travel destination discovery, part price comparison shopping.

This idea came from my wife’s coworker. When I first heard it, I thought this kind of service already existed. They insisted it didn’t. Sure enough, after a few web searches, I discovered they were right. The large travel sites – Expedia, Orbitz, Travelocity, Kayak, etc – have similar functionality, but all require that you enter in a destination. And that’s the problem. We know our origin city and travel dates, but not our destination. We want this service to solve that for us by offering suggestions – then to book our selections.

Seems like an obvious idea, huh? So why haven’t the big travel services built this yet? Have they already examined this business model and found it to be unprofitable? Is there a lack of travel deals? And if this were built, what’s to stop the big guys from duplicating this feature?

This would be an awesome product, but I haven’t done any deep research to know how viable of a business it is. Sounds great on the surface, but may be a quagmire in the details. Or business defensibility. I’ve found lots of great deals on the big travel sites and the deals all seem to have a specific set of traits (dates of use, price, etc). So technically, this is doable. But I don’t know if there are business restrictions or requirements around the procurement or use of this data.

Still, if anyone wants to pursue this, let me know and I’d be glad to help!

Photo by: xlibber

Quora Surfing

First, there was Wikipedia Surfing. Now there’s Quora Surfing.

Wikipedia Surfing is where you start with one topic, see an interesting link, click on it, see another interesting link, click on that, and after a few hours, you’re on a completely different topic and full of interesting trivia. Quora Surfing is pretty much the same thing.

Some have questioned whether or not Quora will replace Wikipedia (on Quora, no less). I agree with the common sentiment: No. The two tools are distinctly different. But the wealth of fascinating information and ease of navigation are shared traits. It’s easy to get lost in either one as you follow the rabbits of information.

Quora’s buzz is largely due to the people on it. You could ask a question about Adobe Photoshop and get an answer from one of the designers of Adobe Photoshop. You could ask a question about venture capital and hear from one of Silicon Valley’s prominent venture capitalists themselves. This star-studded cast has given birth to a plethora of insights you can’t get elsewhere, though it’s decidedly biased towards the high-tech industries at the moment.

Fortunately, there are outliers. One particularly fascinating set of answers comes from Mark Hughes, a screenwriter. I’ve spent hours on his answers alone. Although I’m not a movie buff and don’t follow Hollywood closely, reading his answers has filled my brain with all sorts of interesting tidbits. Such as:

Okay, perhaps that wasn’t of interest to you. Hughes also has a number of articles of interest for aspiring screenwriters. Each is a mini novel, a meaty fruitcake of information. Each is also a time sink that will lead to new drains in which your hours will drown. And if you don’t like those topics, there are a gazillion more. That, in a nutshell, is Quora Surfing.

Working While Sick

Nothing quite depletes a company like a viral germ spreading amongst its employees. When that happens, I see a curious phenomenon. There are two types of sick people:

  1. Those that still come into the office – either because they believe face-time is important or need to interact face-to-face with their coworkers often, like leading meetings.
  2. Those that stay home – either because they want to get better or they don’t want to infect others.

Personally, I would rather sick employees follow case #2. One person home sick means some loss of productivity, but it’s nothing compared to that person trying to follow case #1 and spreading the illness.

In high-tech companies, working remotely is becoming more & more effective. That strikes me as a healthy way to minimize the disadvantages of someone following case #2.

However, face-time can be an important political tool in certain environments. Those environments tend to be highly political and appearance-driven. You don’t see them in startups often, but they are usually a fact of life in large corporations.

If you work in such an environment, I hope you bring plenty of medicination to work. Common OTC cold medicines don’t cure the underlying illness, but they can at least minimize the symptoms.

Otherwise, stay home and get better. And make use of online communication and conferencing tools to stay productive, if you must.

Problems are Opportunities

I love problems. I see problems as opportunities. If a solution can be found, that’s great. If a solution can be devised, replicated, and sold, that’s a potential business.

Of course, there’s more to a successful business than that. Any number of problems can be solved, but not all solutions translate to viable business opportunities.

But it starts with an attitude of “problems as opportunities.” It’s not a common attitude. If you want to be an entrepreneur, however, it’s a must.

The Toxicity of Negativity

It’s tough, I know. It’s not easy being an entrepreneur. Feeling bipolar is what some say. Indeed.

That’s why it’s important to shed the negativity in your life. You have enough stress as it is, why add more? By negativity, I mean habits, places and people.

Bad habits can range from decreasing your physical health – like smoking & eating fast food – to decreasing your emotional health – like procrastinating & avoiding tough decisions.

Negative places are those that aren’t conductive to a productive lifestyle. If you work best in a cafe, get out of your house. If you work best with other people around, find a coworking office.

Negative people may be tougher to shed, but is just as important, if not more so. Emotions are viral; they can be transferred from body to body. Being around people who are cynical, pessimistic, anxious, etc, can actually make you feel similarly.

As an entrepreneur, your path will include man dips and slumps. You really don’t need anything else to add to those downswings. Shedding them will feel dropping a massive weight off your shoulders. Try it, and you’ll start feeling more positive and productive almost immediately.

On Writing Faster and More Frequently

I’ve been experimenting with a new process for writing entries for this blog.

I used to mull over them for several hours, writing and rewriting each until it was somewhat more refined. This included hunting for photos, changing up the formatting, editing for clarity, etc. As a result, the finished products looked nice, but took so much time that I began putting them off.

Eventually, I found myself favoring Twitter over this blog. The barrier toward writing was much lower – just type out 140 characters and hit Send. How could a 3-hour blog entry compete over a 30-second tweet, when you have a hectic schedule? It can’t.

However, it’s difficult to express a full range of thoughts in 140 characters. So for longer thoughts and opinions, I’ve decided to return to this blog and lower the barrier to blogging.

I ride the bus every morning. That’s about 30 minutes of time to write. Or read, when the mood strikes me. So now I compose these entries on my iPhone. I write the entries in the good ole Notepad app, then copy and paste them into the WordPress app. I add some basic HTML formatting, and that’s about it.

What used to take 3 hours now takes 30 minutes. As a result, I find myself more willing to write. Perhaps the entries aren’t as refined as before, but at least I’m writing again. And that’s the goal – to keep this blog alive.

I decided to share this story in case you’ve got the same barriers and limitations I do. Sometimes, all it takes is a new method that lowers the barriers to blogging.

Dealing with Bad Coworkers in a Startup

It’s important to get the right people into a startup. The size alone requires it. One bad apple means a huge percentage of your barrel is spoiled.

But what do you do if it’s not your startup? If you don’t have firing authority? What do you do if a colleague is a bad apple?

In a large corporation, you have many options.

  • Talk to the colleague and see if there are ways to make him more effective.
  • Talk to his manager to express your concerns.
  • Talk to the company founder(s) about the colleague.
  • Transfer to a different team.
  • Leave the company.
  • Do nothing.

In a startup, transferring someplace else isn’t an option. Sometimes, neither is leaving, especially if you care deeply about the company’s mission. Caring deeply means doing nothing is not acceptable either.

There are no clear-cut rules for the first three options. They would be more clear-cut if you were at a large corporation, but startups are different. Your course of action depends on the culture of the startup and your relationship with the various parties.

Talking to the colleague directly is usually the best option. The individual may not realize how his behavior is effecting others. He may be a great employee, but not have the right tools or information to do his job well. It’s entirely possible that this bad apple can be mended.

I’m generally not an advocate for going to someone else’s manager before speaking to that person first. It’s a bit disrespectful. But if you’ve already spoken to the colleague, involving his manager is a viable next step.

Going to the founders is a last-straw option. Typically, founders are busy people and may not be able to react effectively, though that depends on their personalities and priorities.

And as a founder, I would want to know about a trouble employee. However, it would need to be something particularly egregious. If your complaint turned out to be unfounded or just a personal grudge, I would label you a complainer. Also, you were hired because you’re a self-starter, and I would wonder why you can’t handle this problem yourself.

With that said, there’s really no room for bad apples. If all other avenues have been tried, sometimes the best way to handle bad apples is to toss them out of the barrel. That would be a call for your colleague’s manager or the founders. If it’s clear that the colleague is that kind of apple, hopefully they will do the right thing for the startup.

Biz Idea: Real-Time Brainstorm Note Taker

There is often a need to record the notes from a brainstorming session. Haven’t had the pleasure of doing one before? I’ll explain.

What Happens in a Brainstorming Session

If your organization hasn’t done a brainstorming session before, it’s essentially an open-ended meeting where ideas around a particular topic or problem are dreamt up and recorded. There is usually a facilitator to keep the meeting going, and to remind participations that there are no bad ideas. All ideas are accepted and no idea is judged or evaluated during these meetings. The facilitator may clarify, but that’s about it. Idea evaluation happens later.

The Problems Around Brainstorming Sessions

The notes from these sessions are typically transcribed and/or photographed. Then they are stored on an internal repository or simply emailed to each other.

Recording these sessions is just the first step too. After that, someone has to organize the information so it can be properly evaluated later. It also needs to be retrievable. Since brainstorms aren’t generating formal product specifications, some teams aren’t sure where to store these notes. As a result, sometimes they get lost in an abandoned email thread or text document on someone’s desktop.

The tools of choice? Some kind of text editor on the laptop, like an email client, online wiki page, or word processor. For photos, a smartphone with a camera or digital point-and-shoot are usually used. If the photographer forgets to share the photos, however, the team may forget and they are never seen again.

Seems like an awful wide range of tools and hurdles for such a seemingly simple task, huh?

A Potential Solution

So how about an app that allows participants to record notes in any media they choose – be it text, photograph, video, or audio? This app could be both a mobile and web app. Notes taken in one app would show up in all of the others in real-time. One participant could be typing in the ideas while another is taking photos of the session. A third could be recording audio or video as well. It would be like a collaborative, real-time Evernote.

The text interface would look like Google Wave (GOOG) – which basically is a rich-text, real-time, multi-user editor. Several participants could be adding notes all at the same time, while photos and other media appear as they are recorded. The media assets could be annotated and tagged for better organization as well.

All of this would be recorded in a single destination. Everyone would know where to look if they wanted to dig up some idea that was passed around. Since note taking happens in real time, the chance of someone forgetting to share a note is decreased as well.

Here’s another way to envision this product. You’re in a brainstorming session as a participant. You have your iPad (AAPL) out to jot down some notes. A coworker is taking photos with her iPhone of all the diagrams on the whiteboard. Each time she uploads one, you view it on your iPad and add some notes to it for context.

The facilitator is recording the audio for this session on his Nexus S sitting on the conference table. Another participant is on her laptop, with several tabs open in Chrome, adding URLs of articles mentioned in this meeting too.

Meanwhile, a coworker who’s sick at home is following along on the web app, watching the updates occur as they occur. He’s conferenced in via Skype. (I’m not sure this should be a feature of this app too, but who knows?) This way, he can see, hear, and even participate in the brainstorm.

All of the notes taken would be stored within the app and accessible at any time. Any note or media file could be emailed. Various levels of permissions could be applied as well. These session notes could be shared with other departments as a jump-off point for further brainstorms.

A Potential Business Model

And how would this service make money? By charging for storage. You could go with a freemium model and offer one brainstorming session free for 30 days. That ought to give users enough of a taste to purchase the premium plan. Or, forget freemium and just charge per session per month.

Potential Initial Target Market Segments

Creative agencies and technology startups could make a suitable beachhead segment to pursue first. They tend to hold such brainstorming sessions more often than other organizations. Once you’ve captured that niche, you can expand to other audiences.

And Beyond

And for future features? Why not hold a brainstorming session – using this tool, of course! What better way to improve your product than by using it yourself? The ideas you generate may be invaluable, and being able to record them in any form may spark other product ideas too.