This was by far my favorite video they have put out, after the Life before the segway. So for those lucky souls that preordered their new 17in Macbook Pro please let me know how long your battery really lasts.

Building a brand is something I have blogged about before while networking, but after my vacation in September (which was awesome) I attended a meetup group and it hit me even more.

You need to create a brand around yourself, me, I, (in this case John Murch), everyone needs to brand themselves (all the cool, kids are doing it). By your domain (if you can still get it!), build a website/blog/tumblr/whatever, get business cards, and establish yourself within your industry. Just think of your website as a big resume, the more you put up there the more you are out there spreading the word of yourself 24/7 online. Set yourself apart from others within your field and create your own business cards with overnight prints it’s easy and simple. You can get 100 Business Cards ONLY $9.95. FREE SHIPPING on all orders over $75 1000’s of Free Templates, Design Today, Ready Tomorrow!

Personally I have started to establish my own brand and recently started to set myself apart with new initiatives. I have highlighted this before for college students, but you need to as a business man (or Geek in my case!) pickup some business cards and get started today!

Remember you need to Sell yourself. No matter what you do in life, as an employee or employer, you meet people and build your network. If you are in sales you meet a lot of people, and even if your a secretary, you meet other peoples via clients. Get out there and sell yourself. In the game of business you are always selling something. Remember in sales you are either making a sale of your product, or having someone sell you on a reason they can’t buy the product.

Okay, back to the point, back in September at the New York Internet Marketing Meetup Group I got to see first hand the reactions to my new business card.

I made these cards since I was getting a lot of slack about my “print your own”. I was a networking whore in Arizona and learned that while networking the first impression is key. You need to be confident and present yourself well, especially if you Want clients. Your business card is you, so put your name up front and make the user focuses on one key factor. I have seen this work time and time again with my friend Brian Shaler. His Business Card is just his name, that’s it. It’s double-side with his name, Brian Shaler. Now some networking whores may say - but how do they contact me, well if you hear of this small company called Google, I am sure you can find all the information you need. Branding is key in this industry, you need to set yourself apart.

The idea of branding should be focused around how many people know your name. The ones who know your name, but have not met you in real life.  Online everyone has a “following” no mater the size of your blogs RSS subscribers, Twitters, Facebook stalkers… everything. I remember when Facebook was just for college kids, and the way to show your coolness was how many friends you had. Connections are key to business as well as personal growth and employee options. It’s all about the who you know who know you. So go build your brand today and hit me up on Twitter (@jmurch).

So why all this bitching about not upgrading to a 3G iPhone, lets start with price. The price of $199/$299 is very reasonable. I have no problem paying that and rather enjoy paying that over the $599 for the first release (Although, Thanks Steve for that $100 check due to lowering the price to $399, which was used to buy Lepord OS X). The thing that I am bitching about is at&t and their shitty service and hidden fees!

Okay, lets start off with the fact that I have a FAN and therefore qualify for a discount with at&t. Well the first generation iPhone is NOT a business phone, as you can see from my previous blog complaint about my “none business phone” as well as other bandwidth tests and javascript tests. Now the 3G iPhone or second generation DOES qualify as a business phone. If I upgraded to the 3G I would get the

FAN discount (Which I should be getting now!), BUT (oh and its a big BUT) lets walk through all the detailed fees about this.

First off if I was “renewing” my “plan” as a current iPhone customer, I would have to pay at&t $18. This is an “activation plan” a “new” customer would have to pay $36 (Price gauged, yet?). Okay so I would have to pick up this iPhone from an Apple store, cause you can’t find them at any at&t store due to “stock shortage”. Wait, you have that FAN number which DOES NOT give you a discount on your first generation iPhone and the genius Apple people tell you to visit an at&t store to “remove” the FAN from your account. Apple WILL NOT DO THIS; THIS IS WHAT BROUGHT ON ALL THE LONG LINES AND MORE ISSUES WITH APPLE/at&t! Okay, so theoretically I have now visited an at&t store, several hours later my FAN account will disappear and now I go back to the Apple store. Okay, so now you drop $199/$299 on your iPhone depending on size…after waiting in line (mmm more lines!). Okay, now you have to choose a new plan and signup for another 2 year contract. The base plan starts at $69.99 per month for 450 minutes, but if you use SMSes, you’ll have to add on an extra package ($5 for 200 SMSes, up to $20 for unlimited). So now you’re at $89.99 for 450 minutes and unlimited texting (plus theirs local government tax, state tax, and a $1 service charge for being an at&t customer).

Note that the first generation iPhone rates started at $59.99! Well I spend some time on my phone and pay for the 1350 minutes and spend $99.99, well that plan now under the 3G iPhone is $109.99 an additional $10 per month higher then my current plan.

Now say for example I want this new 3G and I will cut back on minutes to “afford it”, well if you downgrade your plan at anytime, your rollover minutes are capped at the total amount of minutes you downgrade to. So if I switch from 1350 to 900, and have 4,000+ roll over minutes, I will now only have 900! WTF! Okay so lets take this new $109.99 rate plus the $20 for unlimited texting, I am at $129.99 a month before taxes/service charges. Granted this is only up an additional $10/month for the 3G network. Since we want this amazing “3G” network, where can I get it? Well luckily I have moved back to civilization and spend my time near NYC area and not in states that canNOT get the iPhone (such as Vermont!). Now say I lived more towards Scranton, PA or parts of Arizona such as Tombstone, will I have 3G coverage? Most likely not! Now maybe I am totally wrong and your reading this saying WTF, just upgrade or stop bitching about it, well that’s true, but let me explain how much I pay for bandwidth vs Gasoline.

Bandwith vs Gasonline is an interesting argument. Although I have internet in my pocket and its 2.5G, its still the internet, so I have this “amazing” phone bill for access to the interwebs. I also have (will have) my FiOS bill for broadband plus my 3G laptop card.

So I have 3 bills for broadband for a device at my home. Now lets get into gasoline, I drive a 2007 Toyota Prius. Now since I have moved into the NYC area, I do not drive this car as much since I am taking public transportation (still relatively expensive) and walking to where I need to go. I tend to travel to Boston or make a weekend road trip one to four times a month. I tend to average about 500+ miles per weekend, so that’s about 1 to 1.5 tanks for each of these trips, plus driving around town running errands is another 100+ miles. So I tend to fill up my tank about 2 to 6 times a month. I have a 12 gallon tank, so with gas at even $4/gallon that’s $48 max per tank! So with 2 to 6 times that $96 to $288 per MONTH! Okay, so FiOS is what $39.99 plus $59.99 for 3G card, plus my phone say $30 for the “unlimited broadband” which is $128. So on slow driving months I pay more for internet then for gasoline. Seems like I should be investing in broadband!doesnt make sense with the article…

So we cover the new cost and even “upgrades” so I would have a bigger sized hard drive (possibly) and a “faster” connection with 3G. Just to note, I would NOT have made this post if I could have used my 3G connection from my iPhone to my laptop via WIFI, so my iPhone would act like an access point. If I could do this and cancel my 3G laptop card, I would be an awe and be jumping up and down… but I am not and NO Apple won’t let you, they even take down the App that does and phone home. So for the rest of you saying that I guess I am a cheap basterd, well suck it Trebek suck it long and suck it hard!

The basic article discuss how ideas have little to no value, it is all about the execution of an idea that determine how much the idea can be worth. The idea of a execution multiplier.

Derek Sivers explains with the following concept:

AWFUL IDEA = -1
WEAK IDEA = 1
SO-SO IDEA = 5
GOOD IDEA = 10
GREAT IDEA = 15
BRILLIANT IDEA = 20

NO EXECUTION = $1
WEAK EXECUTION = $1000
SO-SO- EXECUTION = $10,000
GOOD EXECUTION = $100,000
GREAT EXECUTION = $1,000,000
BRILLIANT EXECUTION = $10,000,000

“The most brilliant idea, with no execution, is worth $20.
The most brilliant idea takes great execution to be worth $20,000,000.
That’s why I don’t want to hear people’s ideas.
I’m not interested until I see their execution.” via oreilly.com

This is the most brilliant concept I have seen in a while and hit me like a slap in the face. I have millions of ideas day in and day out, but executing them, well I have been slacking in the department in the past, but trying to change.

Ideas are just thoughts, they need to be ironed out and eventually executed. Recently I had an idea about some SEO tool and wanted to executing them. Myself and another partner have been working on building these SEO Tools, that I am sure my readers would want to use. These SEO Tools have mainly been developed based on a idea of automating SEO optimization. I had this idea, but can’t be worth that much, but if executed, it can be vary valuable. So I want to improve on Derek Sivers post by discussion automation as in an Idea is worth little to nothing, executing an idea has a multiply and automation well, that can raise the number to a high power. The automation of a product can also be the repackaging of a product, just checkout 37 Signal’s post on Making Money Twice. You want to automate processes so you can leverage the idea/execution as another stream of passive income. As for my SEO Tools I am hoping to demo the product by end of month, but always looking for beta tests, so contact me if your interested and/or do some SEO work of your own.

A couple of weeks ago, my SEO idea was just that, and idea, but with some help, this idea can be executed and later automated to bring in a steady stream of passive income. While working on executing my own idea (or any idea) you need to surround yourself with like minded people who ask tough questions, give advice, and can help put you in contact with people who can help. Well, early this week I received an email about Ultra Light Startups and was blown away after I saw what Ultra Light Startups promote (Low permanent headcount, low overhead, low budget, and outsourcing) and how they can help (network,share ideas, work together). I have been looking for a group of entrepreneurs who help each other take ideas and get them executed and out the world, hopefully this is it! For myself I do not want to just see myself succeed in a business, I want to help everyone I can and make it a win/win. Much like cashflow, the goal is not to get yourself out of the “rat race”, you want to get everyone out of the “rat race”.

I will be sure to write up a whole blog post about the event. Ultra Light Startups is focused on ‘100% participatory’ and even offer a discount for those who “demo” a idea, how awesome is that. I will be attending their next meeting Thursday October 2nd 2008. So if you are in the NYC area and want to meet some entrepreneurs, register now.

I really am looking forward to this event and hope to meet other entrepreneurs who have taken ideas and executed them by building a low overhead business via outsourcing and working with one another. I am a big fan of multiple streams of passive income. By offering a group that encourages you to take an idea and act on it that requires small amounts of money, well.. I am just really excited. As I said, I will be posting the full story and review in my next post. I hope to see you there or at another meetup/networking event in NYC.

Anyway, Hopefully these 10 tips will help those Geeks, like myself who are moving into a startup or entrepreneur role, understand that technology is second and business if first.

10. In Business Coding is 1% of your Company

I can tell you first hand when talking to a VC or Angle Investor the actually code, methodologies, and/or programming language is almost as important as the color sock you wear that day. The Geek inside you needs to get out and think more like that suit, think like a business man and NOT like a coder! Knowing from experience I spent hours, days, maybe even a week perfecting some of my code and making sure it looked perfect with all the proper indentations and 80 character limits. Although with all this work, if no one knows you and/or your product, will anyone care? Better yet, imagine if you have this amazing code, but never release it. You get so sucked into perfection that you wait 2 years or more until someone else out there releases a free barley functional copy that does only 5% of what your software does, but you can ACTUALLY download it. To me, perfect code is like brain crack, you will get sucked into the details that no one cares about when you should be posting it up on a website and saying next version out in 2 weeks. Think iteratively, and understand that users realize everything is a beta, bugs happen in the computer world, just look at Microsoft.

9. 1 year is not long term

I know Financial gurus think in quarters and geek normally think in days, maybe weeks, depending on the various methodologies. In the real business world getting the right PR person to promote your product and get traffic can take 6 months. Even with a digg and techcrunch post that only covers the tech world, what about all those other people that probably could use your product. I know myself I get sucked into the RSS tech world and do not realize how many other people are surfing the web who have no idea what twitter is, right? Getting a product out the door and fixing buggy code is a daily task, but putting systems in place to either automate your marketing system and/or download/purcahse process can take more then your daily 1 week iteration.

8. Show me the money

I was recently talking to a VC about how they are betting on 1 of the 30 investments to hit it rich and pay off all the others. Think about it, 1/30 is a 0.03 or 3%. So if they plan to invest in you, they are hoping for a 30x payoff (if not more) and realize it could be a total flop. On the other side, they are looking at things that actually have a “monetized” approach. Being sites to save the world is great (I know I have tried with Hippy Green) but with VCs its about the bottom line. How are you planning on making that 30x back within 5 or 10 years, donations? You can hire all the best programmers in the world to build your revolutionary product, but if you can’t monetized it, no one will invest in it. In the business world and real world, the money talks and the website walks.

7. Be the first to admit you don’t know your Mom

People think they know something, when most of the time, they have a concept or idea in their head. Your target market, such as our Mom, might be the perfect person to pitch, but audiances make strange decisions. I will be the first to admit I need to find out more about my own audiance (here on my blog!). Knowing your marketing and “thinking” you know your market are 2 totally different things. Sometimes people do the total opposite of what would make perfect sense. For example, say you built a revolutionary diet website, and since everyone in America is fat (at least thats what I hear), you think 1% of market, gold mine! Well thats great and all, and yes diet and fitness are big markets especially during new years, but do you realize why? There is this little word called retention. Everyone wants to look like a super model and fit into those smaller sizes, but for most this is just a thought/dream that takes a fast turn to nowhere. Retention is needed in order to have a successful product. You either need to be retaining your current customers, or making sure you get enough new customers to make up for the ones who are dropping out. Talk to your actually customer, invite some of out for drinks and/or food. If you think you know your audiance, then get them to be the fist to signup and see how difficult it is.

6. Give Customers some Lovy Love

I have to give a shout out on this one, Gary Vaynerchuk at Wine library tv who has more love for his audiance and customers then I have ever seen. You need to be passion about what you are doing and support all of those people who are supporting you.

5. Remove features BEFORE the deadline approaches

Feature rich applications and programs do not mean better product. Think of simple elegant products, like a simple search box where you type in a search and get web results, better known as Google. They have an advance search, but keep it simple stupid with their main search. Building products/concepts can take time and adding more and more features that only 0.001% of your market require, may not be the best idea, especially right out of the gate. I know when building products, feature creap is a problem, just add this and that… before you know it, your product sucks because you have too many features! Take them out especailly if their hold you back. One of the best advice I recieved was if you can’t build the feature in a week, its too big of a feature. Break down the cycle and move towards a iterative apporach. Think of 37 Signals, their products are lean and mean.

4. Tell a friend about your idea

FEEDBACK! Seriouly their is nothing like taking an idea to the next level then getting others to become FANs of your products. You need a “cult” enviornment or following of “groupies” (Yes, Twitter followers count), but you need to tell others about your product. Why? Well, to start its a great way to get people mentioning your product to frineds. Telling your friends is another way to “get things done” because they will tend to ask you about it each time you see/speak to them. BUILD A FOLLOWING

3. Design before Function

Just look at the ipod and how this small device has changed the music industry and all the people who listen to music. Every time I am walking around New York City I am thrown back by how many people have those white headphones and cords. Almost all headphones that you would buy at a store from the 80’s until the release of the iPod, were black headphones. Since Apple is always killing the design they decided to give the iPod white headphones, which has created fashion statement in some case. Apple put design before function and made a killing! My iPhone has always looked the same, yet their are software updates that are fixing some of the functional/bugs that I have been dying for, such as deleting multiple emails at a time. So if you get 100+ emails a day, clicking 1 by 1 delete, ugh!

2. READ, READ, READ

Reading is a great way to not only LEARN from others, but stop you from making the same mistakes. Yes, mistakes happen and as an entreprner you will make them, but you can help your chances of “making it” but reading about how others did it. Get ideas and see what has worked (or hasn’t) and follow the great leaders. If you need some help, check out the Geek Guru Book Club.

1. Mentors Find Them, Leverage Them, Treat Them like Gods

Mentors are everywhere in your life and as a inspiring entrepreneur you should not only lean on mentors to help you, but in the process you will find others that could use your help and have them lean on you. I know I have been building my business network one person at a time. You need mentors to push you and ask questions as well as to follow up with you on your passion/ideas/business. Entrepreneurs tend to be all over the board with ideas, but with mentors to help push and guide you in a direction, you can reach your goals faster. Even if your in college or high school, a teacher might be your mentor. Even celebrities such as Richard Branson can be a mentor, just pickup a book they wrote and learn. Also don’t forget to give back, be sure to treat your mentors and take them out (dinner, coffee, golf?).

These 10 tips for moving from a geek to a startup entrepreneur should help give you a boost in the right direction. I know I person have been working on improving and bettering my best with these tips above.

What tips/ideas do you have for geeks who want to be entrepreneurs?

So to begin my day (more like afternoon) this past Saturday, the first talk I attended was about some of the media tools (twitter, video blogs, podcasting, etc). It was about getting invovled and starting the conversation. We got to hear from Chris Brogan, Laura Fitton aka @pistachio, and Roxanne from Hawaii. After chatting about the tools and opening up the discussion they passed around iFlips and used utterz to help others get others out of their comfort zone and start the online conversation via video and audio. The whole point is that you do not need to be perfect online all the time (ha, just look at me!), but to get involve with the community. It was a packed event and nice talk.

The next one I went to was about the venture capital firm, sophotec. Johannes Bhakdi the CEO gave a presentation about what web 3.0 is to them and how they plan to make money from it. After hearing him explain it, the system he envisions basically described a trivial version of kluster, a system where users can post up their ideas and get money based on how much contribution they give.

The third session was with Kevin Gamble from tiki bar. (Side Note: Tiki Bar is an awesome podcast that you need to check out!). He gave a basic history and look at what they did for their podcast as well as offer some insight into how to improve and what common problems people face. It was very insightful and a nice laugh.

The last talk was about an open discussion about online tools and how much time you waste on them. But to begin this session, everyone handed over their cellphones, yes it made everyone awkward. Think about the basic efficiency of checking email, does Outlook help you or hurt you? I mean for me I tend to get “screensucked” for hours and can get nothing done. Other times I can focus and get a lot done, even with 20 tabs open in Firefox! It was a great open debate and discussion about how some of these online tools like twitter, Facebook, etc are running our lives and making us spend too much time “screensucking”.

It was a great event and wish I was able to attend on Friday and make it over there on Saturday morning. Although after attending the sessions and stopping off for the “closing cerimony” I was given a ticket upon entering. I know from my past “lucky” experiences I have the same chance of winning the Mega Millions as I do winning most raffles I enter. Well, luck was with me on Saturday and I won a nice swag bag from yelp, including a $50 AMEX Gift Card! w00T! So yes, it was an awesome weekend and great event. Since yelp was so nice and donating this bag to podcampnyc 2.0 I will be writing up an review.

In the past couple of months I have monetized hippygreen more now then I did when I was blogging. I know this might be a capitalist move, but hey trying paying then rent without money. I guess I could have gone the “donate here” way, but I honestly do not like to beg for money.

So looking back on it and my current life setup, I need to start getting back into this blogging habit. I really enjoyed discussing some of these articles and still get new comments on the blog. I have asked for some direction from my readers and think will take some action soon.

I decided to post this on John Murch because I feel that this blog is more of my life rather then a green article. I will “link it up” and hope to continue spreading my green ideas/philosophy to others.

I suggest you spend today contacting and/or setting up plans to go see an old friend. I know for myself it’s always great to hand out with some old friends, especially college roommates. Since I have recently moved back to the NYC, I figure it’s time to do some east coast traveling on the weekends and do more of these types of weekends. Geek out and talk about companies, startup ideas, code as well as some drunken times. Everyone should have a man (girl?) day with some close friends once a year. (maybe more?)

Well, the day has come and gone and now I am back on the train back to the NYC. Oh, and if you are Jewish, Happy Passover.

The past 6 months I have learned a lot about so many different areas of life, it has been great. I know I will be back in Arizona some day, it’s just a great place to be, maybe I would consider being a winter bird at one point in my life. I loved living in Arizona, it was like everything was 50 to 75% off (coming from NYC) and amazing weather all the time! I even noticed that Starbucks is cheaper in Arizona then in NYC.

Okay, so for those dedicated readers, the end of Feb has come and gone and you are probably asking, did you reach your goal of $100/day in passive income. Well the answer is no, BUT I have increased my passive income. I knew going into this it was gonna be a challenge, but hey, Rome was not built in a day, so I plan to continue working at this until I do reach my goal.

Passive income can come from many different things, being a geek guru (might not brand myself like this, rather John Murch, build your NAME! Think @garyvee), I figured I could easily make this money using the internet. I spread myself too thin and did NOT focus on 1 specific object, but spent time looking at various ideas, concepts, etc. You need to think big (and kick ass, as Trump would put it). I only started to leverage my knowledge to the fullest, I have so many idea’s that I am holding myself back by my own limited resources. I need to think bigger and put a team together to work on some of these projects.

I also did not leverage my knowledge and understanding to the fullest. I spent most of my time relaxing as well as trying and learning many different things. I was trying to “find myself” as well as BUILD things that I have been pushing off for WAY WAY too long. Seeing how other people are making money, such as charging a retainer to host/maintain a website as well as do SEO monthly review/updates can bring in a large amount of money. For myself, I was trying out a lot of new things and failing. You need to ready fire aim where you are constantly failing, but improving. Making those iterative improvements will allow you to hit your target even fast the next time around.

In the mean time, I am at SXSW so hit me up on twitter and follow me! Also if your a reader I have NOT meet in real life, be sure to find or (twitter me) so we can meetup.

Cheers!

Update: Okay, so new redesign (at least a noticable change) coming tomorrow night. I also will be posting up some stories, links, etc. So excited