Hey Startupers: Don't Forget to Attend the Launch Festival

The world's largest startup event will be held in San Francisco, California on March 2 through March 4. There will be 250 speeches on three stages, with 15,000 attendees. The LAUNCH Festival is designed to help founders of startups build, scale, and raise money.

Some of the more interesting companies that will be featured include:
Hyperloop
Opendoor - the company that will provide liquidity for real estate
Udacity - the free college class company
Carbon3D - Star Trek type replicator
Houzz - connects homeowners with designers and architects
FanDuel - daily fantasy sports
Planet Labs - over 100 satellites

Founders of the above companies, and many others, will be speaking at the conference.

You still have a chance to get tickets. You have four options:
Founder
Festival
Festival Plus
Super VIP

The LAUNCH Festival is being held at Fort Mason at 2 Marina Boulevard, in San Francisco. Last years' conference was extremely successful, and I highly recommend that you attend. More info can be found at the LAUNCH website.

Book Review: The Sustainable Edge

The book, The Sustainable Edge: 15 Minutes a Week to a Richer Entrepreneurial Life, by Ron Carson and Scott Ford, is a guide to help entrepreneurs with their work-life balance. With the spectacular growth of startups, many startup founders and entrepreneurs have their entire lives revolving around their businesses. The authors can help business owners improve in the four areas of business, teams, clients, and personal lives.

The book covers everything from knowing your core competencies to listening to your customers to setting your company's one clear annual goal to creating your brain trust to measuring your progress to time management to delivering value.

One nice feature of the book is that at the end of every chapter, there is a quick exercise to help you apply the principles of the book.

In addition, the appendix section has extensive charts, worksheets, and resources to provide further support for the reader.

The authors relate many of their personal experiences from their financial services businesses (both authors are CEOs of wealth management companies).  The authors obviously know what they are talking about as they are very successful in their fields. As a matter of fact, Barron's ranked Carson Wealth as one of the Top 100 Financial Advisors for 2015.

If you want to improve your business life while maintaining a balance with your personal life, you should check out  The Sustainable Edge.

Exclusive Interview with Ken Fisher, Billionaire Money Manager & Forbes Columnist

Republished courtesy of Stockerblog.com

The following fascinating interview was provided by Kenneth L. Fisher, head of the money management firm Fisher Investments, long time columnist for Forbes Magazine, billionaire, and author of numerous books. His latest book is Beat the Crowd: How You Can Out-Invest the Herd by Thinking Differently, which I highly recommend.

Ken Fisher

You may have seen him on TV commercials, or you may have spotted his magazine ads. If you are a reader of Forbes, you would definitely find his column. Fisher is on the Forbes 400 list of richest Americans and Forbes world billionaires list. According to Investment Advisor magazine, he is one of the 30 most influential people in the investment advisory business over the last 30 years. Fisher is considered to be the largest wealth manager in the United States.

We cover a lot in this interview, including:

• Whether or not we are still in a bull market
• What it means to be a true contrarian
• What the professional forecasters are predicting for the stock market this year (and why they are probably wrong)
• Using the Leading Economics Index to predict the next few months
• The concept of "not in the next 30 months"
• Positive and negative "Elephants in the Room"
• Concerns about the future consequences of punishing good banks for bailing out bad banks
• Annuities, terrorism, climate change, debt, and much, much more.

Books by Ken Fisher

Here are some other books by Ken Fisher, which are worth checking out:

The Only Three Questions That Still Count: Investing By Knowing What Others Don't 
(A great companion to the Beat the Crowd book.)

The Ten Roads to Riches: The Ways the Wealthy Got There (And How You Can Too!)  
(This is actually my favorite book of his, maybe because it is so different from all the other finance books. It basically tells you ten ways, with all the steps, to get really rich, including "marrying a billionaire." Lot's of insight and lots of humor.)

Markets Never Forget (But People Do): How Your Memory Is Costing You Money and Why This Time Isn't Different 

The Little Book of Market Myths: How to Profit by Avoiding the Investing Mistakes Everyone Else Makes 

Debunkery: Learn It, Do It, and Profit from It-Seeing Through Wall Street's Money-Killing Myths 

How to Smell a Rat: The Five Signs of Financial Fraud 
(If you want to avoid getting ripped off, you really need to read this book.)

Other Books that Ken Fisher Recommends

In Chapter 8 of his Beat the Crowd book, he recommends several books for additional reading. Here are many of those books:

The Intelligent Investor: The Definitive Book on Value Investing 

Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits 

Reminiscences of a Stock Operator 

Contrarian Investment Strategies: The Psychological Edge 

Where Are the Customers' Yachts?: or A Good Hard Look at Wall Street 

That Which Is Seen and That Which Is Not Seen: The Unintended Consequences of Government Spending 

How Capitalism Will Save Us: Why Free People and Free Markets Are the Best Answer in Today's Economy 

Business Cycles 

How to Lie with Statistics 

A Monetary History of the United States, 1867-1960 

Growth and Welfare in the American Past: A New Economic History 
The Rational Optimist: How Prosperity Evolves

Senseless Panic: How Washington Failed America 

The Interview

You will certainly enjoy all this great information that Ken Fisher provides.

To stream the interview, click:

HERE

You can download as an mp3 by right-clicking here and choosing "save as."

Let us know what you think about this interview by entering your comments in the comment section below.


All opinions are those of Ken Fisher, and do not represent the opinions of Stockerblog.com or the interviewer. Neither Stockerblog nor the interviewer nor the interviewee are rendering tax, legal, or investment advice in this interview.

Exclusive Interview with Chris Lin, Author of the book 10,000 RIDES: What it's REALLY like driving for Uber & Lyft

In a continuation of our series on startups, the following exclusive and fascinating interview was graciously provided by Christopher Lin, author of the book 10,000 RIDES: What it's REALLY like driving for Uber & Lyft, provided to you in the form of a podcast. 

Christopher Lin drove for Uber, Lyft, and Sidecar for a year in San Francisco and decided to write a book about his experiences and some of the more unusual passengers he has had to deal with. The book even has illustrations throughout showing his amazing experiences. But he did more than just write a book, he looked at it from a business standpoint, from the research, to the development,  to the marketing and promotion.

Chris currently has a Kickstarter campaign going and has already far exceeded his goal. There is still time left to get in on it so check it out. He also has a website/blog where he features a few of the most interesting chapters in his book. It can be found at 10000rides.com.

We cover a lot in this interview, including:

• How he decided on which publishing route to use
• Why Uber and Lyft drivers are not his market
• The way he designed his Kickstarter campaign to blast through his goal
• How he did his Kickstarter research
• How he got several strangers (including a politician) to pledge $111 each to the project
• The way to use Starbucks to get incredible feedback, research data, and customers

You will enjoy the incredible advice he gives.

Stream by CLICKING HERE.

Download as an MP3 by right-clicking here and choosing “save as.”

New Zip App Pacing 3x’s Twitter Initial Engagement

The app that launched less than two months ago has user engagement levels that rival the social networking site’s initial growth and is on pace to be a billion dollar brand. 

Zip, the Question Answer App, a social media tool that lets users ask and answer questions and see results from other users, is on pace with Twitter’s initial users back in 2007. The average Zip interactions per day, based on span from 9/29/15 to 11/12/15, are 4,613, compared to Twitter’s 2007 Internet LiveStats’ reported 5,000.

Based on an average over the entirety of the year which also allowed for considerable ongoing exponential growth, Twitter had a 6-month ramp up period in 2006 not accounted for. In turn, Zip’s comparison numbers are based on just six weeks of its launch to the public.

“We are humbly overwhelmed with the levels of engagement we are seeing to date,” says Ric Militi, Founder of Zip, the Question Answer App. “But we are not comparing ourselves to the social media giant in any other way than engagement based on similar downloads at the same historical point in time. In our opinion, there are no other apps that have the same functionality as Zip, which is why it is patent pending.”

Tracking backwards from the 2007 figure of 5,000 daily interactions, the end result is Zip, the Question Answer App, is conservatively pacing at over three times the engagement level of Twitter.

Already implemented on iHeart Radio stations throughout Los Angeles and used to engage viewers on Fox 5 San Diego, the app was created by the self-funded Crazy Raccoons, a private company that did not use an angel investor.

"I've had the opportunity to work with several start ups, and its absolutely amazing that Crazy Raccoons has been able to accomplish everything to date without outside investment," shared Adam C. Aparicio, Principal Attorney at APARICIO LAW. "As I discuss the company with my colleagues in the legal community, they are all simply astonished that we are completely self-funded. It should go without saying, being self-funded in this day and age is unheard of. Most companies do not have the freedom that comes with not being beholden to venture capitalists."

The original idea behind Zip, the Question Answer App, was to settle arguments, and now, it’s also introducing a whole new, simple and proprietary way to communicate with media outlets (i.e. TV, radio, print, digital, etc.) The rapidly growing interactive app is revolutionizing everyday conversation and mass polling. 

Zip, the Question Answer App, is available for Download for free at the App Store for iOS and the Google Play Store for Android.

For additional information and to download, please visit http://www.thezipapp.com. 

Great Books on Startups for the Holidays

Holiday shopping has already started, and the time for you to start is now. Might as well get it over with, so that you can go back to starting on your startup.

Here is a selection of books related to startups. By the way, you might want to pick up one of these books as a gift for yourself.

Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future by Peter Thiel and Blake Masters

Startup: Essential Startup Guide - Entrepreneur, Small Business & Online Business by Bill Robb

The Lean Startup: How Today's Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses by Eric Ries

The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers by Ben Horowitz

Bold: How to Go Big, Create Wealth and Impact the World by Steven Kotler

How to Win at the Sport of Business: If I Can Do It, You Can Do It by Mark Cuban

Small Time Operator: How to Start Your Own Business, Keep Your Books, Pay Your Taxes, and Stay Out of Trouble by Bernard B. Kamoroff

How to Make $1,000 Per Day Clear Profit on Amazon with One Single $35 Product You Choose by Bradford Sullivan

The Startup Owner's Manual: The Step-By-Step Guide for Building a Great Company by Steve Blank

The Millionaire Fastlane: Crack the Code to Wealth and Live Rich for a Lifetime. by MJ DeMarco

Crossing the Chasm, 3rd Edition: Marketing and Selling Disruptive Products to Mainstream Customers by Geoffrey A. Moore

The Pathfinder: How to Choose or Change Your Career for a Lifetime of Satisfaction and Success (Touchstone Books) by Nicholas Lore

Hopefully a few of these books will be useful to you and your business. Read on!

Exclusive Startup Interview with Shaun Moore Co-founder & CEO of Chui

In a continuation of our series on startups, the following exclusive and fascinating interview was graciously provided by Shaun Moore, who is the Co-founder and CEO of Chui.

Why don't we start by briefly describing your company's intelligent doorbell?

Chui’s first product is an intelligent doorbell that uses a blend of facial recognition and proprietary technology capable of learning with time to make our homes safer, and our experiences with connected devices seamless; Chui does more than enable a house that is smart – it shapes a home that is you.

How did you happen to come up with the idea for the business?

I had just left my corporate job in Chicago and booked a one way ticket to Casablanca Morocco which is where my CTO is from.  We were catching up and reliving memories from college as well as digging into sites like Kickstarter to generate ideas.  The more we talked about trends in the home we realized that everyone was innovating the inside of the home and making it smart but no one was changing the gateway or the portal to the connected home.  We saw an opportunity to not only connect the front of your home but to make it intelligent to the point of recognizing visitors/yourself and acting based on identity.

Who do you consider your direct competitors?

 Ring and Skybell are competing with us in the Smart Doorbell space.  Ring has done an incredible job getting out there in front of the mass market and showing the world why its important to adopt technologies like these.  They have inadvertently helped us do our market research although we have a slightly different approach as we are focusing more on intelligence by using biometrics (Facial Recognition) as a means for customization and access control.

When do you expect to generate income?

 We have been taking pre-orders since last year and intend to fulfill those shipments early in 2016.

Did you get any venture capital to begin with or are you self funded?

We started as self funded and raised a small round of angel financing after completion of Boomtown Boulder Accelerator.

How long have you been in business and where are you located?

We started engineering the product in March of 2014 in Boulder Colorado and have since relocated to Dallas, Texas.

How many employees do you have and do you use virtual assistants?

There are 5 of us and we do not use virtual assistants.

Tell us a little about your background.

I'm driven by a love for exploration and innovation. This has led me to be the Co-Founder and CEO of Chui, an  intelligent device that uses facial recognition, machine learning, AI and other computer vision technologies.  Chui has customers in over 30 countries and has been featured in TechCrunch, Forbes, CBS, WSJ and a few others.

I played Division 1 football at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, TX and graduated with honors with a degree in Finance and a specialization in Alternative Asset Management.  My journey to create Chui began three years ago, leaving Merrill Lynch Private Wealth in Chicago and booking a one-way ticket to Casablanca, Morocco to pursue my entrepreneurial vision: make technology accessible, personal, and trustworthy.

Prior to Chui, I worked on a startup in the mobile application industry. I've been fortunate to have lived on three continents and regularly participate in international communities for the advancement of global entrepreneurship. I've continued to share my story and vision through speaking at several events across the world from San Francisco to Barcelona.

What are your plans for the future of the company? Any new products on the horizon?

We have some exciting announcements in due time (I can't give those away yet!).  We feel that our technology will create an environment that is as seamless as walking through a door.  We firmly believe that biometrics is the future of authentication and authorization and with a product like Chui we are one step closer to breaching the nexus of convenience and security.

What do you consider your biggest challenges as a startup?

Attracting top talent to leave their comfortable job to come help disrupt an industry or thought process.  As a startup there is no class you can take or book you can read that will give you the answers to your problems.  You have to learn by doing and by making mistakes and by surrounding yourself with people who have been in your shoes before.

What one or two pieces of advice would you give someone who is developing a startup?

Listen, listen, listen!  Listen to you customers, your backers, your investors, your friends and family.  Aggregate everything people have told you and make your own decision based on all of the available information.  At the end of the day you are writing your own story so make intelligent quick decisions that get you from point A to point B and if it was the wrong decision learn to never make that mistake again.  Entrepreneurship is very much about continuing education and the best resource that we as entrepreneurs have is the available knowledge on the internet, in books and through relationships.

Where can people go to get more info on your product?

www.getchui.com

Thanks very much for your time.