Disqus - Latest Comments for jameskm03

Re: SXSW PanelPicker®

Kyle James — Wed, 23 Aug 2017 23:00:58 -0000

The question isn't why would you. The question is why would you not? This is one of those scenarios where you have a lot more to loose than gain by not selecting Karlyn!

Re: Sunday, find out why Bill Nye has changed his mind about GMOs

Kyle James — Tue, 14 Jul 2015 11:38:25 -0000

Maybe they are fine maybe they are not but that's only part of the equation. What about all the chemicals and crap being put into the ground? I think we can all universally agree that stuff IS dangerous and something we don't want in our groundwater and other places.

Re: Website Update: What's in store for Tempo Storm.com

Kyle James — Fri, 24 Oct 2014 14:41:04 -0000

Been lurking in the shadows for a while now, but I want to help. Hit me up and let me know how I can help you and support the team.

Re: I Quit College, Quit My Dream, My First Business Failed and Got Fired – Why Chris Wilson Is Happy

Kyle James — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 10:29:30 -0000

Hey it's your life. If you aren't working on your terms they why are you doing it? Goes back to your professional cyclist dream. You were doing that on your own terms.

My dream was to build and run my own business. In the HubSpot days it was all about learning what I didn't know so I could get where I wanted to go. If I could learn everything I needed in 3yrs of totally busting my hump at HubSpot instead of 10yrs of normal pace then I knew I could get to my end goal faster. I couldn't tell you the last time I worked 40hrs/week... well actually I could... the last week I was at HubSpot. ;)

Work smart not hard!

Re: I Quit College, Quit My Dream, My First Business Failed and Got Fired – Why Chris Wilson Is Happy

Kyle James — Wed, 16 Apr 2014 10:18:19 -0000

This is awesome Chris! Goes back to all those "quick" lunches we had at HubSpot where we would talk about work/life balance, working hard and being happy. Sounds like you have finally found that happy place.

Re: The unprofitable SaaS business model trap

Kyle James — Fri, 26 Jul 2013 15:30:58 -0000

Jason,
So obviously you feel that the market has no idea how to evaluate this company and that their market cap is a joke. Why not put your money where your mouth is and short MKTO?

Re: Choosy Sites Choose .gif

Kyle James — Wed, 24 Jul 2013 09:08:26 -0000

How do you feel or deal with the reputation of .gif's being ancient web technology? So many people used so many HORRIBLE .gif's in the early webs (pre-2000) that they still hold a bad taste in a lot of our mouths. Also from an image optimization standpoint .jpg or .png usually have better compression methods and we know how important load times are on websites.

Re: Will Online Education Disrupt and Change Higher Education As We Know It?

Kyle James — Thu, 23 May 2013 08:37:18 -0000

Hey Phil - Interesting angle. I don't disagree with that at all. I can look at my own experience to justify it. For example I've taken ONE marketing class in my life but through reading, experimenting, and general self applied efforts I feel like I could go toe to toe in a marketing job with anyone who actually has a degree in the field. The last two years or so a hobby of mine has been better understanding the stock marketing and financial investing. I won't boast the same claim about my skills in that field but I've definitely self taught and learned A BUNCH on my own.

Thanks for commenting.

Re: Wookiee

Kyle James — Wed, 22 May 2013 10:51:35 -0000

I think it is safe to say 90% of the time we spend on our Xbox 360 now is watching TV (Netflix, Hulu, MLB.TV, ESPN). Those monthly Xbox Live reports they did for a while made that very obvious. It's great to hear MSFT going this path but I'm sure they had all my data to help them make that decision.

Re: Will Online Education Disrupt and Change Higher Education As We Know It?

Kyle James — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 20:39:48 -0000

Sure I could see that happening too. I think you are indirectly asking a very important question which I hinted at but purposely did not discuss because it is a whole other debate/discussion worthy of a blog post just as long. That question is "is there still real value in a diploma?"

Re: University = Schools and Colleges. Why do they want to be different?

Kyle James — Thu, 11 Apr 2013 09:41:21 -0000

Yes. Absolutely it should. I think you really hit the head on the nail with you thoughts about it from a student's standpoint. We have to remember that it isn't about what we think it is about how our customers use and perceive us. There is major value in being associated with the university brand as the students obviously point out in casual conversations.

The same holds true in the business world. There is value in being an Intel microprocessor or a Campbell brand of soup to customers instead of simply being a computer chip or just another Chicken Noodle Soup.

I think if we are honest in assessing the situation this is simply another case of the challenges of silos in higher ed and egos.

Re: 5 Reasons To Attend the 2013 .eduGuru Summit

Kyle James — Wed, 06 Mar 2013 14:50:44 -0000

Colleen - I'm sorry that we don't have a lineup of presenters that you are interested in.

Re: University of Phoenix, A Facebook Like, and a Sponsored Ad

Kyle James — Tue, 29 Jan 2013 14:58:08 -0000

Yes and no. Facebook terms of use grant them full ownership of the picture once it is uploaded no matter how you set your privacy settings. I could also get behind the argument that better education and increasingly savvy individuals would resolve this but the system is also getting smarter to exploit your information. By all means Eric is an extremely savvy user and he still feel into this trap where he felt his brand was damaged by this association.

Also don't forget the fact that Facebook is a business and as a business they need to make money to keep their doors open.

Re: University of Phoenix, A Facebook Like, and a Sponsored Ad

Kyle James — Tue, 29 Jan 2013 12:27:13 -0000

Well of course... how did you think they would use this. ;)

Seriously though Phoenix is one of the cutting edge online innovative marketers in higher ed. If this was your alma mater or a school you worked with you wouldn't think twice about it would you? I think that is the point. We all need to be more cautious about the actions that we take online because the internet doesn't forget. Think about how many times you have seen a picture of a college student on facebook getting drunk at a frat party? Those pictures will eventually come back to bite their personal brand when they go apply for a job. In a macro sense this really isn't any different.

Remember the internet doesn't sleep and is always monitoring our actions.

Re: Maps of Universities

Kyle James — Tue, 22 Jan 2013 10:34:23 -0000

Hey Nigel,
I own an interactive campus mapping company, nuCloud, that focuses on colleges and universities. We use gorgeous map illustrations of campus and make them interactive. You mention a lot of the data and historical value of mapping but what we have discovered is the critical need for mapping in recruitment. Any admission counselor will tell you that if they can get a prospective to physically visit campus then the likely-hood of them applying goes up exponentially, we even have data that we have shared on our blog to back this up.
http://www.nucloud.com/blog...

Anyway the online interactive campus map allows prospects to get a taste of campus online and want to take this next step to physically visit campus. So as you can see this is critical in the recruitment process. What is so great about a map as you discussed is that it has multiple purposes for a school can take this same recruitment tool and leverage it as a development tool to entice alumni to donate to a campus that they haven't visited in years or decades. The interactive map allows alumni to explore locations that might not have been there last time they visited campus and excite them to support their alma mater.

Well from a mobile standpoint there are all sorts of amazing things we can also do with self guided tours.

I could keep going on but I'm sure you get the point. We absolutely believe that mapping is going through an "adventurous phase" for colleges and universities and are helping to push engagement and adoption to new levels.

Re: Behind the Grid: What’s the Big Deal About Responsive Web Design, Anyway?

Kyle James — Thu, 17 Jan 2013 10:46:38 -0000

Georgy I just wanted to leave a comment to say that you crushed this article. Great analysis of the whole problem and solution.

Re: Farewell 2012: A notable year for mStoner

Kyle James — Wed, 09 Jan 2013 11:27:54 -0000

Michael,
That does sound like an impressive year! Congratulations and keep the momentum going!

Re: Introducing .eduGuru Experts – A Consulting and Teaching Resource

Kyle James — Tue, 08 Jan 2013 15:23:39 -0000

Thanks Kimberly! Let us know how we can help! Also if you see any gaps in our coverage I'd love to talk with you about that too. We want to make this kind of a like an eLance/O-Desk but with Higher Ed Web experts.

Re: IT vs. Marketing

Kyle James — Fri, 21 Dec 2012 09:51:57 -0000

Mike, As you know I spent time in both higher ed IT and Marketing. In your example above I'm going to play devil's advocate a little. I honestly think for most "smallerish" non research public institutions external hosting is absolutely the way to go. I've fought, and backed off, in the past that all institutions should be this way and here is why. You say that it opens up security risks, adds layers of complexity and limits functionality but I could easily argue that going external actually helps all of those. A hosting company that manages websites 24/7 can probably hire a better security expert than you can because of scale and repetition advantages, you have less complexity because it is possible to access the server more easily from anywhere without having to setup extra complex firewalls to get to it from the outside and you increase functionality because now if you need extra resources or bandwidth or whatever you can just upgrade your service. Also don't forget the advantage of redundancy and backups in the cloud where you probably won't need local backups that if a major disaster hit campus might destroy everything for you anyway.

Like I said I'm playing devils advocate on one specific scenario here but it's been a soap box topic of mine for a while and I saw an opening.

The big takeaway... Communication is HUGE!

Re: Have We Put Social Media On A Pedestal?

Kyle James — Mon, 17 Dec 2012 13:47:01 -0000

Thanks. Yeah I don't know what the deal w/ blogs has become. I've also noticed over the years that commenting and actually engaging in conversations, like this one, has become a thing of the past. Guess they are all commenting all over Facebook?

Re: Have We Put Social Media On A Pedestal?

Kyle James — Mon, 17 Dec 2012 13:10:51 -0000

Bryan - I actually love blogs, why would have I have been writing this one for almost five years, and have a couple of podcasts that I listen to religiously. I think maybe you misunderstood me on that piece. I was more commenting on the fact that when you have been reading and engaging in these conversations as long as I have that so much of it is repetitive to the point where it's uninteresting and unimaginative.

Re: 100% of Colleges and Universities are Doing Social Media

Kyle James — Thu, 15 Nov 2012 14:16:29 -0000

Mike - Click through and read the report I'm referencing in this article. Under the second section there is a bold sentence with these exact words. I'm not making up this adoption simply sharing what was reported.

"In 2009-2010 that number rose to 95% and in the latest study, 100% of colleges and universities studied are using some form of social media"

98% are on Facebook and the other 2% that aren't are doing something else that is classified as social media.

Re: Losing Focus with Social Media

Kyle James — Wed, 19 Sep 2012 09:22:39 -0000

I completely feel you on this. Long story short I'm much more interested in some of the smaller private FB groups that I'm a member of. Honestly I think most of the fatigue just comes from years of the same stuff... I think we are starting to see a shift in SM consumption.

Re: How To Actually Measure Social Media ROI

Kyle James — Thu, 16 Aug 2012 07:48:49 -0000

Erik - but a last click or referring site model is better than doing nothing and claiming it is too hard.

I might also say that if you have all the data then you can do a fairly good job of estimating the percent gain from doing work on different channels. For example if your work on Facebook is leading to very few click through or conversions on your site then you can make a fairly educated guess that all that engagement you are doing isn't actually impacting the bottom line.

Re: How To Actually Measure Social Media ROI

Kyle James — Wed, 15 Aug 2012 15:11:22 -0000

Jess you ask some great questions but ones I think you can also tie back. What is the retention rate? You should be figuring that into your "value of a student" calculation. If you work at a 4-yr institution and the average student is there 2 years then you could theoretically increase the value of each student by 50%. It's still the same basic formula you would just need to measure how social media is increasing retention if at all. Yes that is more subjective but still very possible.

For alumni your numbers would tie back to donations.

Bottom line is people need to stop coming up with excuses NOT to do this. It is not too hard or impossible. I think the bigger problem is schools know once they start doing this then they actually have to be accountable for things and we all know how higher ed hates to be accountable for anything we do.