Information is Wealth.

The method of business funding that involves getting lots of small donations from individual investors, has become more and more popular over recent years. Not all businesses are appealing to big investors, and crowdfunding can be a way to get a project off the ground that otherwise  might not see the light of day. These are just a few of the ways to tell if crowdfunding might be the right choice for your business. Traditionally Marginalized Entrepreneur Women, people of color, those who are disabled, and those who have multiple marginalizations – women of color, for example – have historically had a more difficult time getting bank loans or big funding acquisitions. Even venture capital teams who think they are approaching pitches without bias are more likely to accept the exact same pitch when it is given by a man. With more women and people of color making their ways into venture capital circles, this inherent bias may slowly shift, but in the meantime, these entrepreneurs m...

Social media has come a long way in the past few years. You have a Facebook Page, Twitter profile, Pinterest, YouTube, Tumblr, and all most everything on the internet. It seems like a lot of work to keep up with all of these channels, but what if I told you that you could be missing the most important network of all? Yours! Social networks  are great for socializing and promoting your latest posts or products, but what would happen if they up and disappeared one day, or more realistically — changed their rules or the way your posts are delivered? Would you be confident in saying that your followers are loyal enough to stick with you and remain readers, even if they can’t see your status updates? We’ve already seen the many Facebook algorithm changes that impact how many people actually see your content. Could you deal with having the same thing happen to your other profiles? Besides the fact that your status updates have a limited viewing time frame, there is one major probl...

There’s a number of things you can do actually, and it’s called inbound lead generation. What this means is that customers come to you instead of you actively reaching out to them to sell your product. From experience, here’s what I think are the three best practices for lead generation. SEO SEO is critical in any B2B lead generation effort because it identifies how potential buyers find you. The importance of “user intent” is one that’s often understated in many marketing departments. Beyond keywords, competitor research, and page analytics, there lies the qualitative data that can elevate the way you do marketing: understanding user intent. Knowing what your prospects are searching for when they find you holds great value in shaping your messaging and your product as well. Content marketing While everyone’s out there heavily making content, it doesn’t necessarily guarantee an outpouring of leads. The key here is to create content tha...

The Meshchansky Court of Moscow fined Telegram 800,000 rubles (the equivalent of about $14,000) for failure to provide the Russian government with decryption keys to user messages. It's not an outright ban, which is what Russia threatened Telegram with, and the size of the fine implies that Russia's doing this for show. Telegram founder Pavel Durov  posted about the decision on the social networking site VK  (which he also founded). He claims that the demands of the FSB, Russia's state security organization, are unconstitutional. What's more, they are not feasible from a technological standpoint. After all, providing backdoor access to an app isn't exactly a simple endeavor. Durov is currently working on appealing the decision. His VK post asks any lawyers interested in this case to contact him; they will choose from the candidates in the next few days. It's not a large fine, to be sure, so Telegram could just pay it, but it's clear that Durov wants to tak...