Disqus - Latest Comments for brentter

Re: Do Online Backups Count Toward Your Bandwidth Cap?

brentter — Thu, 21 Jul 2011 14:34:11 -0000

umm i live in an apartment complex and switching from residential cable to business class was one phone call...the guy swapped out the modem for a better one the next day... and not only is there no cap, it's faster, and 5 dollars cheaper...

Re: The Hippy Hacker

brentter — Sat, 16 Jul 2011 15:05:00 -0000

sadly i didn't learn it through this site but if i was you i'd do a little 5 min. intro to RoR webcast showing just even the most basic of tutorials.....then open up your laptop and show them the working app. I can't imagine anyone not seeing that and being "WOW" its that easy..etc... i'll back teaching anyone a programming language.. esp one that has a easy 'entry' level like ruby does for basic apps. brent (at) brentter (dot) com

Re: Angela Baldonero’s Philosophy On Interviewing

brentter — Fri, 15 Jul 2011 10:37:32 -0000

Switching sides, let's say you go in to a casual interview with someone you know has no time to spare, yet still grants you the favor of five minutes to hear your pitch (which you obviously are grateful for). To cut to the chase they immediately give u a task to see what your thought process would be related to the job you were aiming for (in this case marketing), only to find their end response addresses not what the position required (or was described as being needed filled), but rather you end up being criticized for not starting with the basics....i.e. instead of leading off with various ideas for viable 'stop-gaps' to solve a problem which was resulting in a loss of revenue I should have instead started with describing whether I was going to first do a SWOT type exercise on my first day had I been hired or any other similar long-term strategy.

Truth me told my first thought (yes this wasn't a hypothetical question but an old experience of mine) was maybe I had miss-understood the real problem at hand and in the 3 minute trial by fire picked the wrong approach, only to then realizing the silver-lining in the criticism - i wasn't going to be a good person for that role, regardless of if I switched gears and presented later on what they wanted to hear...I was going in thinking they were looking for what i'd do on day one not on day 5. It was somewhat like a back-handed compliment though one and one that I was happy to receive.My question to you guys though is what my next move was and your thoughts on it. I stayed in contact, though didn't ever pursue another opportunity with the company, however instead of sending a thank you card became an evangelist for their product/company and sought out the target demo which wasn't being tapped on my own....mind you this company relied on selling content as a revenue stream. Which would you have preferred, the more traditional approach or an accountable new source of income as my way of saying thanks (the advice was I walked in having been too use to 'wearing many hats' instead of tailoring my approach directly at a more singular strength). It was true, and he'd been the only one to actually bring it up because he also was the first i'd had to pitch myself to for a job without first showing a portfolio/past experiences prior to the chat. So I guess i'm being long-winded in this post, again the question is just which would you prefer: a traditional job candidates' response, or an unseen tip of the hat? Better yet, are you still relying on old methodologies of hiring practices or do you see a room for change?

Re: Hot Dates and an Interview with Sarah Bray

brentter — Wed, 15 Jun 2011 13:39:00 -0000

I love her view on life/business..... esp. her answers to #4 and 5. Thanks for sharing!

Re: The Bitch Slap: Theory vs. Teaching

brentter — Sun, 22 May 2011 08:21:27 -0000

FYI: catching up to all the blogs i love after taking an extended break from the social scene (including social media and other things) makes it hard to pick which of your bitch slaps to respond to. I know the last time i posted on your site I didn't read what i typed so it ended up looking like I was calling you a bitch or something similar (which i think i was told about within a few hours by a very very angry friend of yours). But i do like your blog/posts....don't always agree with you but hey, opinions are like assholes, everyone's got one and apparently I tend to show my ass when i don't mean to in post responses more than most do.

Hopefully this one will come off a little lighter though.. its advice my dad told me early on in life when i was trying to sell websites to local businesses and most were asking for me to make them stuff for free....well.. its actually a short story that i was instructed to tell them but its worked ever since i was 14.. including repeating it to some asshole last night on the phone. Never gets old. Use a car dealership as the example:
"what if you owned a car dealership and asked me for the same thing - telling me that you'd add a link to your site and a bumper sticker with your contact info on your car, heck think about how many people would see that and hire you? Plus this is easy for you, it'd take no time at all!" Then tell em what your response would be: "fine, i'd love to make you the site, but how about instead you give me a brand new car for free in exchange for the work and i'll keep your dealership tags on the back... everyone stuck behind me in traffic (i grew up in LA if that helps explain that part) will see i bought my car from YOU! they'd rush to buy new cars at your dealership after seeing how happy I was in my new ride and you'd be rolling in the cash."

Most of the time you'll get the same response, "but the car would be worth more, I'd be losing money!" Then ask them how long do they think it'd take to make the site/content/product that they're asking for and if I'd have to do any pre-planning before starting the actual work, or if I'd need other people working with me to complete it (they're rarely if ever right or even close to the real answer, that or they'd say they straight up don't know). Bingo. Briefly explain just how much actually goes into the work....If they start to try and continue their plee for free content tell them to fuck off or to realize how the triangle of business works...(another gem of advice probably already given on this site somewhere): You've got a triangle with three words, u have to pick two: quality, time, cost. Because if you want a 'cheap' site from me that isn't what i'm quoting you it's on the bottom of the to-do list, and i won't put much effort into it nor would I put quality/expensive developers or designers on it. I'd find the cheapest way to get it done and it'd take a long time to get finished - so it'll probably be pretty shitty compared to what you actually want (or have seen in the portfolio)... ohh and if u want it fast AND to be kick-ass: it'll cost ya because it'd be a rush job with folks that already get paid pretty nice salaries/fees (if you're working solo just remind them that'd mean you'd probably be working on their work when you should be focusing on another clients deliverables and they're paying customers too).

Btw back to the triangle... i only say that because at an ad agency an old boss of mine actually drew one on a whiteboard when a potential client tried to low-ball the original offer... he left without giving us the business.... two months later they called and asked us to fix what the cheap company they hired had given them...no questions regarding the rates this time. That method is risky... but if you don't need the work/client and feel ballsy it's one hell of a way to convince someone your work is worth the price. Just don't do it if you actually need their $ as it's a coin flip whether the message will get through.

As for my comment to the actual post by Erika:
I offer free services, i rarely give them when asked....i.e. any ignite, a few non-profits who needed a way to collect donations, etc...I'm happy to help them. That's why I offer. If you want something that I charge my clients for but you expect it for free you better be either a really good friend, dating me, or you've done the same for me in the past when I couldn't afford whatever it was you do for a living. Otherwise here's my rate for a formal RFP based on your needs (yes i charge for rfp's...project management is a job, not a social service. The smart ad agencies charge as well, it's where i picked up the tip.. well, not all 'smart' ad agencies.. just usually the ones i like the most it seems).

and thats my two cents/short-essay.
hope it helps. Congrats if you found this 3 month old post and actually read even half of what I wrote.. I'm still working on the whole brevity concept when responding to folks when not on twitter.

Erika - keep bitch slapping, people will either find help in the advice or learn to duck....most the time though they needed the slap to wake-up to reality (god knows i've been there many times in the last year).
-brent

Re: Prosper202 + Shared Hosting = Epic Fail

brentter — Wed, 27 Apr 2011 12:51:08 -0000

seriously... linode.com beats the living pants off a DEDI from most places in IO and download speeds... instantly scalable.. you can setup reverse dns in their control panel.. they have an api to control everything (cah we say dashboard/)....data centers on west coast, east, midwest and EU......i'm willing to even bet my lowest linode 500mb vps can beat out the biggest packaged vps from beyond. it's called buying the right equip. knowing how to set it up... but more importantly... knowing how many slices to limit each box to. which very few know how to. beyond is a good host.. don't get me wrong... but there are way better options...

Re: Money Loves Speed

brentter — Wed, 27 Apr 2011 12:46:47 -0000

dude... linode.com is faster.. in IO and speeds... more powerful than any of their dedi's.. plus u can always scale up, add a EU, west coast, east coast, midwest datacenter, etc....

Re: Customer Service.. At It’s Worst.. Or is it Best..

brentter — Mon, 28 Mar 2011 20:15:44 -0000

You know i did and i started out talking about did u google for the photography theme... but am so caught up in about 3 diff projects (all open and currently being worked on) that my train of thought just did a 180 and all of a sudden i finished the post thinking it was about the standard theme. My apologies. I've installed the photography theme before..... it was up on hdbell.com for about a month before I decided to give him a custom setup (he's a friend and local artist who just wanted 'something' up on the web). Here's a free theme that's similar in layout to the one you initially downloaded that i've used which worked perfectly out of the box (and yes comes with a doc) http://everydays.hassii.com...

sorry about that

Re: Customer Service.. At It’s Worst.. Or is it Best..

brentter — Mon, 28 Mar 2011 19:58:38 -0000

By any chance did you do a google search for your problem that you were facing with the standard theme? Becuase if you did... you would have found his blog probably as #1 (with the page that has the documentaiton on it).. plus about 100 others giving their own tutorials on how to install and modify the theme.. one of my own blogs included ( i detailed out how i took the basic standard theme and converted it into a cms for a client's website). come on now....

Re: A Win-Win-Win: Help Us Help You And Win LOTS of Free Trek Light Gear

brentter — Thu, 07 Oct 2010 15:03:39 -0000

what a great choice for how to scale up your efforts.... and props on keeping it local. :)

Re: Essential On-Page Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

brentter — Fri, 01 Oct 2010 16:31:30 -0000

no but i'm sure if u gave me a minute i could find you a link ;p

I just always get a kick out of when people end up using blatent affiliate landers when trying to explain seo/sem/aff marketing/online business, etc..

just giving you a hard time (esp if you're really running teeth whitening offers, in which case i'll happily buy u a beer because u probably deserve one). :)

You going with lesley to podcamp tonight? I can promise that you'll meet some good creative people (not to mention a whole lot of name.com clients) ohh and as i've been mentioning for the last week.. yes, free beer. :)
-brent

Re: Essential On-Page Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

brentter — Fri, 01 Oct 2010 14:10:56 -0000

ahh art, so now we see that real you - just another teeth whitening->fake hollywood tan upselling affiliate it seems.... :P

Re: Untitled Startup | RowFeeder

brentter — Thu, 16 Sep 2010 03:18:56 -0000

Digging the new features my friend... keep it up (plus the css/design is slick)..

Re: New to the Team: Art Enke

brentter — Thu, 16 Sep 2010 02:46:22 -0000

Glad to see the company is growing... any other openings besides the UX Designer + Engineer position listed (it seems like they've been on there for a while... want some req's for UX people in the boulder/denver area?)?

Re: Local Business Marketing: 3 Nerds Your Business Needs

brentter — Tue, 14 Sep 2010 06:00:29 -0000

Two tools that i've found which make local seo 10x easier are http://getlisted.org/ to check and see how the top search engines have your business listed as
and
http://www.whitespark.ca/to...
This one is a big help in finding additional places to list/link your business to based on search phrase.

Re: matt hixson - Blog - What I Learned In Social Media This Week: Rowfeeder

brentter — Fri, 06 Aug 2010 16:10:16 -0000

Rowfeeder FTW again! I use it for the ignite events around denver to measure the level of unique chatter/conversations compared to previous events... it's point and click easy to setup a tracking campaign, yet still has all the hardcore analytical/graphing/data-parsing features via their own interface as well as through their usage of gspreadsheets..

Re: Tedxboulder letterpress

brentter — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 20:47:23 -0000

nice! i'll definitely hit them up later in the week once i have time to finish the design i had in mind.. thanks for the referral, i'll be sure to let them know how i heard about them.

Re: Tedxboulder letterpress

brentter — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 20:24:21 -0000

I say it's a photoshopped pic!

where's the perforation? :P

hotness.. you still need to share the company you've been using for this + those crazy hand-outs @ the last igniteboulder.... i'm in need of new business cards and can finally afford letterpress (rather than my fake letterpress look via photoshop).

Re: RowFeeder Deployment and Blogging Away

brentter — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 16:06:38 -0000

haha, well, i pretty much picked up on that by the comment you made and couldn't resist the t-ball style setup for a snarky comment. it was just too easy. :)
Though now that i think about it, if you had some business cards printed up with 'spreadsheet hacker/ninja' as your job title I'd be willing to bet you'd be a memorable person/contact at any conferences or meetups you attend...not to mention the twitter/fb mentions.

A few years ago i got a card from someone where it was just his name, no contact info, but on the back it said in big bold letters, "I MAKE SHIT YOU PAY FOR*." Then in small print at the bottom was "*and use daily."
Weeks after the event he was still being talked about. ;p

Re: RowFeeder Deployment and Blogging Away

brentter — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 07:13:17 -0000

hell yeah!! Never knew there was such a thing as an excel programmer/hacker... but good to know that damon + aviel have u working on their team.

Re: Microsoft Kills Kin, Ends Rosa's Travels

brentter — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 00:51:45 -0000

i agree with everything but the iphone4 comment.... and if u remember, i have held a very passionate (not to mention loud + vocal) hatred of iphones + at&t for years...... hate to say it, but yes.. i switched over to the dark side.... and now am fully an iphone4 fan... this thing w/ video is insane

Re: Name.com Now Offering Investor Pricing!

brentter — Wed, 23 Jun 2010 14:18:34 -0000

i heart name.com

Re: Co-Working: Elk Antlers, Awesome with a “J” and Why I’m Going to Die From Diabetes

brentter — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 11:15:53 -0000

Cohere FTW... though today im touring the local denver coworking spots.... sadly none have the same type of awesome setups (not to mention any type of treehouses) like cohere....

Re: Roller Coaster Tycoon

brentter — Sun, 13 Jun 2010 20:24:24 -0000

i agree 100%. It's actually why I left a job about 6 years ago and actually was still doing (as far as work is concerned) the same thing just it was for myself rather than the condition I was in. There was a very quick + noticeable change in my entire view of how I was living my life..... and with that came a whole gaggle of other benefits including being able to sleep better (not to mention more), which always helps the mind/body/spirit. My work also (even though it was the same/similar) took on a new meaning, i don't want to use this strong of a word but it became more 'real' to me.

Re: Roller Coaster Tycoon

brentter — Sun, 13 Jun 2010 20:18:45 -0000

Well we might be agreeing actually, what i meant to be included in 'dealing with stress' is how that then correlates to the rest of your life... i.e. personal. Like the story said, u get fired a day before the big contract comes in, or your'e working long and strange hours, etc....

Some can find a life-work balance even when their work is chaos.. some need more structure, which i understand.. That was more what i was implying rather than just the stress of work by itself. I don't know if that helped or we're still taking what was meant by the article differently.. Just had to clarify.