AllThingsD » Zappos

Forget Cleantech -- It's Cleanweb at SXSW

Kara Swisher — Mon, 12 Mar 2012 14:00:32 +0000

Earlier this week, I slogged through the rain in a very dorkish GroupMe plastic poncho at SXSW in Austin to attend what I thought was one of the more interesting sessions, titled “Why Cleanweb Will Beat Cleantech.”

Perhaps because it was not yet another creepy location app (memo to Banjo and Highlight users, please stop attempting to get me to allow you to stalk me, cuz I ain’t!), it was more sparsely attended.

But the presentation by longtime Silicon Valley entrepreneur Sunil Paul was a good one, given his premise that current information technology tools were at the heart of creating solutions around energy conservation.

The founder of Brightmail — and also the first start-up partner of Zynga CEO and founder Mark Pincus at a Washington, D.C., company called Freeloader (where I first met the pair) — thinks that clean technologies like solar can be better leveraged with Cleanweb, which he defined as the “application of information technology to resource constraints.”

In other words, more Airbnb (fewer hotel rooms mean less carbon emissions), more Zappos (fewer stores, less driving to stores, etc.) and more teleconferencing (that’s easy to grok) is evidence that the Cleanweb could be an important contributor to saving the planet.

Quoting a recent tweet he saw, Paul noted that a smartphone today has as much computing power as the computers that put a man on the moon, but all we do with them is launch birds into pigs.

“I am saying we can do something better with the aggressive application of software technology,” he said.

Actually, those Angry Birds are now in space, too.

In any case, here’s Paul’s interesting deck from the talk:

cleanweb_presentation-Sunil-2012-mar-10

RELATED POSTS:

The Homeless Defend Becoming Hotspots

Pinterest CEO Ben Silbermann’s Lesson for Start-Ups: Go Your Own Way

The Best and Weirdest Requests and Errands at SXSW From Zaarly, TaskRabbit and Others

Al Gore and Sean Parker Blame TV and Money for Ruining Politics, and Say Social Media Ought to Fix It

Letters From SXSW: How to Be “Disruptive”

SXSW News: Jerry Levin’s StartUp Health Academy for Entrepreneurs Announces First Class

The Best (And Worst) Marketing Gimmick in Austin

Forget Cleantech — It’s Cleanweb at SXSW

Houston Comes to Austin as Kara Swisher Talks Lessons Learned with Dropbox CEO

After Nearly Doubling Its Userbase in Three Months, Instagram Will Finally Come to Android

The Power of Power at South By Southwest

How Jimmy Fallon Uses the Nike FuelBand (It’s Naughty, Of Course)

Gawker Will Deputize Commenters, Says Sheriff Nick Denton

Microsoft’s Danah Boyd: Social Media Makes the World More Fearful

Etsy CEO on Building a Lean Start-Up: Deploy, Deploy, Deploy

South By Southwest Parties On, Despite the Rain

At SXSW, Joi Ito Invites Tech Entrepreneurs Into the MIT Media Lab

Texas Gov. Rick Perry Drops In on South By Southwest

Can Playing More Games Make Your Life “SuperBetter”? Jane McGonigal Thinks So.

Google’s Vic Gundotra on Why Plus Isn’t a Minus

Rain Douses Austin as Crowds Flood Into SXSW

Checking In and Checking Out South by Southwest

SXSW Serendipity Gets Yet Another Helper: Kismet

The Essential SXSW Tech Tool Kit

Geek in the Heart of Texas: AllThingsD at SXSW 2012

Better Hurry, the Shipping Deadline for Christmas Is Approaching Fast

Tricia Duryee — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 00:04:42 +0000

Just in the nick of time.

That’s Target’s motto this holiday season, as it promises on-time Christmas deliveries for online orders placed by Tuesday.

But some retailers are being a little more jolly.

In today’s fast-paced digital world, procrastinators are being rewarded, and will be able to shop online as late as Thursday and still get presents safely underneath the tree in time for Christmas.

For example, Wal-Mart will rush packages to your door for orders placed as late as Wednesday; Amazon is offering regular free two-day shipping as late as Wednesday; Zappos is offering free shipping for orders made by 1 pm PT on Thursday; and Toys “R” Us will go as late as noon on Thursday for express shipping.

There are exceptions, of course, and Amazon is a big one.

For orders placed on Thursday, one-day shipping will cost shoppers $3.99 an item; for items ordered on Friday, only Amazon Prime members will be able to pay $9.99 an item for on-time delivery; those in 11 U.S. cities can wait until Saturday, at which point it will cost $3.99 per item to ship by local express.

Amazon Prime is the e-commerce company’s membership service; it charges $79 a year for free two-day shipping and other perks, like free streaming videos.

One of the biggest limitations for the holiday is the logistics of getting a package from a distribution center to someone’s home. For example, FedEx won’t be running on Christmas, but will be running partial operations on Christmas Eve, a Saturday.

At this late point in the year, physical retailers shine.

For example, Apple’s shipping cutoff date is on Wednesday, but it will allow customers to order online and pick up in the store until 11 pm on Friday. On Christmas Eve, many of its stores will be open until 6 pm. Toys “R” Us and Best Buy are also offering free in-store pickup, adding late hours to accommodate the busiest of people. Best Buy will be open until 3 pm local time on Dec. 24, and Toys “R” Us will will stay open for 112 hours straight, starting at 6 am Tuesday, Dec. 20 and closing at 10 pm on Saturday night.

Online retailers can’t compete with store hours but, conversely, stores have had a hard time competing with the deals online, especially earlier in the season.

This holiday period, Amazon prompted consumers to consider the moral dilemma of shopping in stores versus online, when it kicked off a Dec. 10 promotion that offered $5 off to consumers as an inducement to walk out of stores empty-handed. EBay fired back with its own promotion, which gave online shoppers a $10 coupon to return to stores.

To be sure, online retailers will have something to celebrate on Sunday.

ComScore, which is tracking online spending habits this holiday season, said $30.9 billion had been spent online during a 46-day shopping window that ended Dec. 16, marking a 15 percent increase over last year.

Spending last Friday — dubbed Free Shipping Friday — hit $1.07 billion; it was the fourth day to surpass the billion-dollar mark this year. Still, Cyber Monday — the Monday following Thanksgiving — appears to rank as the heaviest online spending day of the year for the second consecutive season.

One of the Biggest Winners on Green Monday Won't Be a Retailer

Tricia Duryee — Mon, 12 Dec 2011 22:00:22 +0000

Everyone from online retailers to FedEx are hoping to be rolling in the dough by the end of today.

With only 13 days until Christmas, today has historically ranked as one of the heaviest online shopping days of the year, thereby earning the nickname “Green Monday.”

This year it’s almost a guarantee that history will repeat itself.

Already, six individual days have surpassed the billion-dollar threshold this holiday season, according to comScore. That’s up from last year, when only one day eclipsed $1 billion in spending.

The term Green Monday was coined by eBay in 2007 to describe the second Monday of December because it tended to attract shoppers who wanted to make sure their presents would arrive in time. And, well, because the color of money is green.

This year, a number of online retailers are banking on it by offering a number of holiday specials.

But one of the biggest benefactors of all is FedEx, which must ship all the orders.

The commercial postal service is predicting that today will be the busiest day in its nearly 40-year history. The company is forecasting that it will ship more than 17 million orders today, double its daily average volume, and will exceed last year’s busiest day of 15.6 million shipments.

FedEx might be one of the first indicators to reveal how well the online shopping is fairing.

It says the increase is largely driven by residential shipments sent from online and catalog retailers. ComScore’s data would agree with that hypothesis. Already, the research firm says that online shopping is up roughly 15 percent from Nov. 1 to Dec. 9, compared to the same period in 2010.

ComScore Chairman Gian Fulgoni said, “We know that Green Monday will rank among the top online spending days of the season.”

But he added that it will likely not be the last hurrah of the year.

Other important days to come include the promotional day coined “Free Shipping Day,” which occurs on Dec. 16, and other days this week as we near the end of the year.

One retailer, however, was not in the holiday spirit.

Amazon-owned Zappos put out a press release today calling itself the Anti-Green Monday. It said shoppers don’t have to get caught up in the hype because it is guaranteeing that all orders made on Dec. 22 will receive next-day delivery for Dec. 23.

Now that’s the true definition of a procrastinator.

Here is comScore’s list of the 10 biggest shopping days of 2011:

Zappos Founder Focuses on Brand Loyalty for His Next Gig

Tricia Duryee — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 16:12:16 +0000

As soon as Nike agreed to start selling merchandise on Zappos, founder Nick Swinmurn stopped wearing Adidas and became a huge fan of the Nike brand.

“I have about 50 pairs of Nikes in my closet, and it seemed to me like I should be treated differently by Nike than a customer who has zero pairs,” he said.

The thought inspired Swinmurn to start RNKD, which is launching in beta today. Customers can create profiles and upload pictures of items of clothing they already own by snapping a picture and designating brands and where they bought each piece.

“The idea was to bridge the gap between consumers and brands by using what people already have in their closets,” Swinmurn said.

Users will be rewarded with badges and points for uploading photos, and will have the opportunity to win gift cards based on their participation. Swinmurn believes brands could use RNKD as a way to offer clothing at a discount to their most dedicated fans.

The emphasis is on the brand, rather than the store at which the apparel was purchased, which is how many other loyalty programs are designed.

Swinmurn, who left Zappos before it was sold to Amazon, also gained inspiration for RNKD after starting a small clothing line called Dethrone, which creates gear and clothing for practitioners of mixed martial arts. He said he sells 99 percent of the apparel to small shops. “We have no idea who walks into the shops and buys the product,” he said.

Swinmurn is hoping to tip the market on its head. Brands are already giving discounts on clothing at stores like Ross and T.J. Maxx, and on online flash sales sites like Gilt Groupe, ideeli and Rue La La. But those discounts aren’t being given to the biggest fans of the brands.

Instead, Swinmurn argues, discounts should go to consumers who deserve them.

RNKD is based in San Francisco, and is self-funded by Swinmurn, who has an engineering team of one.

Upcoming Zappos iPad App Mimics a Fashion Magazine

Tricia Duryee — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 00:41:36 +0000

The new black this fall: Retailers producing content alongside their products, like an online version of a glossy fashion magazine.

Zappos expects to launch its first attempt at recreating the catalog experience on the iPad in early December, just in time for the holidays.

The app was developed by the Zappos office located in San Francisco, where a dozen or so employees are working on building new shopping experiences.

Zappos, which is owned by Amazon.com, is headquartered in Las Vegas.

The new app joins the regular Zappos iPad app, which features most, if not all, of the products found on the company’s Web site.

Instead of being generally available in iTunes, the Zappos app will be found on Apple’s Newsstand, which organizes magazine and newspaper subscriptions for those who use iOS 5. It will be free; a new edition will appear monthly.

Articles will highlight things like fun and funky boots for winter or trends in color. All of the items will be for sale, making it more catalog than magazine.

Will Young, a director in Zappos’ San Francisco office, said the catalog will highlight about 100 items a month, featuring shoes, clothes and handbags. “Most people still think of Zappos as shoes,” Young said. “The main goal isn’t sales. It’s about educating.”

The app was unveiled to all Zappos employees at an all-hands meeting yesterday.

Amazon Using Local Deals to Boost Interest in Affiliated Sites

Tricia Duryee — Thu, 25 Aug 2011 18:33:10 +0000

Amazon is now operating a local daily deals site across 30 cities in 10 states, as of today including New York City.

It launched its first AmazonLocal site in June, and has been able to expand quickly through its investment in LivingSocial, which sells many of the deals to spas, restaurants and other services in those cities on behalf of Amazon.

Today, Amazon announced that in addition to local deals, it will also be sweetening the pot by offering special discounts from Amazon-affiliated sites, including Amazon.com; MyHabit.com, which offers flash sales on apparel and home decor; endless.com, a designer apparel site; and 6pm.com, a discounted apparel site operated by Amazon-owned Zappos.

AmazonLocal said over the next few months, offers will include $25 for $50 to spend on jewelry and watches at Amazon.com, $40 for $80 to spend at MyHabit.com and $25 for $50 to spend at 6pm.com.

The offers will drive traffic to its lesser-known brands, which at times have had difficulty gaining traction, and also provide some incentive for people overwhelmed by offers from a dozen Groupon wannabees to subscribe to yet another daily deals site.

While it may appear the daily deals business is a small side project for the large e-commerce provider, if done well it may become exceedingly important as it uses ads and offers to discount the price of hardware.

Amazon has cut the price of its 3G Kindle to $164 and the Wi-Fi version to $114 thanks to the introduction of advertising on the platform.

As evidenced by the extreme interest in the discontinued HP TouchPad tablets that were being sold off in a fire sale at $99 apiece, you can see how important it is to drive the price of similar hardware below $100. Amazon plans to release a tablet computer by October, people familiar with the matter said, intensifying its rivalry with Apple’s iPad.

For other daily deal providers in the space, ranging from Groupon to Google, the entrance of Amazon may be intimidating. Despite announcing the launch in New York City only today, it has already sold 80 vouchers for food and drinks in downtown New York; 121 vouchers to hot yoga in the Upper West Side; 581 tickets to Cirque du Soleil’s “Zarkana” performance; and 259 vouchers to a restaurant in Brooklyn.

Myspace: A Cautionary Tale or Just a Basic Belly Flop?

Kara Swisher — Thu, 11 Aug 2011 18:51:50 +0000

A sad little period was put on the even more pathetic story of Myspace yesterday by its former owner, News Corp., which said it had lost $254 million. The media giant announced the writedown during its quarterly earnings call.

The down-the-drain social networking site generated $230 million in operating losses over the last year.

The most recent quarter was an “improvement” on previous losses — but what a way to go.

After its once stratospheric valuation heights, Myspace was sold for just $35 million to a company that included singer/actor Justin Timberlake as an investor, which just adds that last little bit of cringe to the sorry situation.

Many had long predicted Myspace’s demise — the bloom was off the rose very soon after it was the most hyped company in Web 2.0 history. But it’s still a good question to ask: Is this a case that other hotsy-totsy start-ups need to look to as a cautionary tale? Or was it simply a digital belly flop?

Well, it’s both, of course. So here are the five key things the current crop of pretty start-ups might want to take away from the Myspace debacle:

1. Stay current: One of the big problems of Myspace, as has been much observed, was its inability to keep innovating its technology and improving its offerings. While this seems simple in retrospect, consistently trading up the experience and deliverables to users is something that many companies quickly lose sight of. But in a fast-changing digital world, it is very easy to get behind very quickly.

2. Stay focused: You certainly can go in a lot of directions in life and in your business, but most companies that succeed — Apple, Amazon, Facebook — tend to stick rather closely to their knitting and do not veer off into too many orthogonal directions. Myspace, riding on huge waves of attention and hype, seemed to have a new plan and scheme every five minutes. When it comes down to it, most companies are lucky to get one amazing and significant business.

3. Stay humble: Speaking of waves of attention and hype — they’ll sink any company fast if it spends too much time swimming in their deceptively lovely waters. As anyone at the top of a curve knows, the riptide downside will come soon enough (see: Airbnb). Thus it’s important to have the right amount of attention. While it goes against a lot of marketing strategies, underplaying can often be more powerful.

4. Stay customer-focused: Another obvious rule that Myspace repeatedly broke, with its rush to add all kinds of traffic-inducing elements to the site, rather than build it for quality and layer them in later. While people joked about the circus act that Myspace’s interface became, it actually was not very funny for those using it.

5. Stay independent: One wonders what might have happened if Myspace had not taken the money and run. While the pile of money from News Corp. was perhaps irresistible, it’s hard to find to anyone on any side of this deal who did not bemoan the pressures of being inside a big company, and its negative impact on Myspace.

Facebook — which CEO Mark Zuckerberg was allowed to carefully nurture before imposing a definite business plan — is often pointed to as proof of the importance of allowing delicate start-ups the space to thrive. But there are also instances of hot entrepreneurs doing fine within a larger entity — YouTube at Google, or Zappos at Amazon, leap quickly to mind.

In the end, of course, none of this might have helped Myspace, which may have simply been one of the Web’s shooting stars. That is to say, remarkable to watch — but, in the end, also a lot more common than you might think.

All Aboard Zappos' "Happiness Bus"

Tricia Duryee — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 15:04:02 +0000

As if he were hosting an episode of “MTV Cribs,” Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh takes us on a tour of the “happiness” bus parked outside the D conference in Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif.

The bus, which was used to promote his book “Delivering Happiness,” has nine bunk beds, pomegranate seeds in the fridge and the obligatory groupies hanging out in it.

From the lounge in the back of the bus, Hsieh talks about what it was like to sell his company to Amazon in a deal worth $1.2 billion, how he’s determined to stay independent and the correlation between being happy and running a successful business.

Now, the bus continues on as a symbol for the company’s culture, which encourages a blurring of the lines between life and work.

Here’s the video, including the ending where we attempt a MTV-esque goodbye, where Hsieh kicks me off the bus, although I screw it up by failing to leave.

[ See post to watch video ]

How About #Dontvoteforme, So BoomTown Gets the No. 140 Spot in Time's Tweet-Off

Kara Swisher — Tue, 29 Mar 2011 15:35:45 +0000

Yes, it is perverse, but I really want to come in dead last in Time magazine’s “140 Best Twitter Feeds.”

Why? Well, there’s no way I am getting near the top with the likes of Sarah Palin and Lady Gaga in the same list, so I felt the 140th–get it?–slot on a Twitter poll is the next best thing to aim for.

Here’s the deal, according to the magazine’s Web site:

“TIME picks the 140 Twitter feeds that are shaping the conversation. Take a look and vote on whether you think these top tweeters should be on our list.”

The list is split up into categories, such as authors (Neil Gaiman, who is #1, and Margaret Atwood), celebrities (Gaga and the inevitable Justin Bieber) and companies (Zappos and Whole Foods).

There is also a technology group, with luminaries such as New York VC Fred Wilson, man-about-Web Kevin Rose and, of course, the King of Tweets Robert Scoble.

I am in that group too, with the description: “When this woman reports a rumor, you can pretty much count on it to be true.”

Thanks…I think–although I prefer to call it reporting a fact.

In any case, early on, I was doing badly in the voting–as I had hoped and is entirely correct considering I am unknown to anyone but certain geeks–and was right near the bottom with some suspect deal sites.

But by last night, GigaOm’s Om Malik had dropped below me, along with Wilson. I was at the unacceptable 131 spot.

This will not stand! Thus, so I can shoot the moon, I urge everyone to vote for:

132 Mike Allen
133 Om Malik
134 Amazon Deals
135 Fred Wilson
136 DealDivine
137 Nieman Lab
138 Best Buy Deals
139 Coupons.com
140 Steven Johnson

A well-known writer and entrepreneur, Johnson has 1.4 million followers on Twitter and does not deserve this ignominious loss as much as me.

Tweet that.

One Kings Lane Raises $23 Million From Kleiner Perkins, Greylock & Others

Tricia Duryee — Fri, 11 Feb 2011 11:00:52 +0000

One Kings Lane, which is competing in the trendy flash sales market, selling home décor, furnishings and accessories, has raised $23 million in a second round of funding.

The round was co-led by existing investor Kleiner Perkins and new investor Greylock Partners. Also participating is First Round Capital and LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman, as well as new investors TriplePoint Capital and Marissa Mayer.

If you haven’t heard of it, San Francisco-based One Kings Lane is an online retailer that sells designer home items, ranging from large oriental rugs to sophisticated and modern side tables, at deep discounts. The offer, which is sent to your inbox on a daily basis, is limited and can sell out in five minutes or five hours.

Typically, the merchandise comes from unsold inventory at luxury or high-end interior designers, which is why it can be sold for so much lower than retail.

The concept is part of a burgeoning new industry that is being called “private sales” or “flash sales.” Companies in the space include Gilt Groupe and Rue La La, which are mainly focused on fashion and clothing.

One Kings Lane has another differentiator: It is not building big warehouses to store all the items it wants to sell, nor is it committing to purchasing any of the inventory in advance. Therefore, the costs are lower because One Kings Lane doesn’t get stuck with any excess inventory.

On the other hand, it doesn’t have complete control over the shipping process, meaning shipments can sometimes take one to two weeks to reach customers.

CEO Doug Mack said he doesn’t expect the model to change with this funding.

The site was founded in late 2008 by Susan Feldman and Alison Pincus (who is married to Mark Pincus, founder and CEO of Zynga, the social games company that has also raised funding from Kleiner Perkins–albeit on a much larger scale). One Kings Lane launched in the spring of 2009.

Last year was a pivotal time for the company.

Mack, who was hired in June, quickly ramped up the management team, hiring other executives from Hotwire, eBay, Walmart.com and Zappos.

It grew revenues five times over 2009 and boosted its membership base to around one million. It launched an iPhone app in November that generated two to three percent of its sales on the first day. Since then, the app has sustained those revenue levels.

Mack says the home furnishings are top of the line, and are compelling because they’re nothing you’d ever see at Ikea, or even in a department store like Macy’s.

While quality is hard to convey over the Web, he says the company has slowly gained customers’ trust over time. Often, customers will start by purchasing something small, like a candle. From there they might work their way up to a cashmere blanket, and eventually take the plunge into something as large as an armchair or area rug.

One of the more telling statistics that supports this is that 70 to 80 percent of sales are from repeat buyers.

This round of funding follows its Series A, which it raised back in December 2009. That was led by Kleiner Perkins, with Hoffman also participating. Hoffman introduced One Kings Lane to Greylock, where he is also a partner.

Mack says the capital will be used for three things: Accelerating the growth of its membership base, expanding the catalog of merchandise and scaling customer service as its membership grows.

To attract more members beyond the viral growth the company has already experienced, Mack says it will begin its first meaningful Web campaign, addressing its target of middle- to upper-class women, ages 35 to 55, in metro areas.

“In the grand scheme of things, we are only scraping the surface. Anyone with a home or apartment could use one of the things we sell,” Mack said.

In relation to the funding, James Slavet of Greylock will be a board observer, joining Aileen Lee of Kleiner Perkins, who has a board seat, and Bing Gordon of Kleiner Perkins, who is also an observer.

Zappos Meddles in Mobile as Opportunities Increase for Apps

Tricia Duryee — Fri, 28 Jan 2011 14:00:41 +0000

As we’ve written before, 2011 is the year that mobile begins to become a big opportunity in e-commerce.

To be sure, a lot of brands are getting on the bandwagon. Big retailers represented on the iPad with applications include eBay, Target, JCPenny, Gilt Groupe and Pottery Barn Kids. Some are even experiencing good results.

EBay has been one of the more aggressive in revealing how its mobile business is faring.

The auctions and e-commerce company said last year that mobile sales more than tripled in 2010, generating nearly $2 billion in gross merchandise volume. (That’s the value of all stuff sold on eBay, regardless of whether the buyer and seller finalized the deal.)

While that’s a big number, it represents only 3.7 percent of overall earnings.

But that could change quickly.

From what we are hearing, various retailers are expecting mobile revenues to hit about 10 percent of overall sales by the end of this quarter, and that later this year, it could inch even higher as more tablets and smartphones get into the hands of consumers.

To get a taste for how shoppers interact with applications on tablets and mobile phones, we caught up with the folks at Amazon-owned Zappos.

Zappos, which was founded in 1999 as a shoe seller and has since branched out to more categories, is a relative newbie to mobile. It started developing apps only six months ago, and launched an iPad app in October followed by an iPhone app in December.

Now it’s on a roll and expects to launch an Android version in early March, with a mobile Web site remodel also in the works. Jaimee Newberry, a product manager on the Zappos Mobile team, said, “We are pleasantly surprised. We think they seem to be doing well, although it’s really early.”

Zappos declined to share specific revenue or download figures, but so far the Zappos Mobile iPad and iPhone apps are No. 5 and No. 32, respectively, in the Lifestyle category. Overall, Zappos ranks 80th for iPad downloads and has received four stars in a five-star rating system.

Zappos Program Manager Ian Klassen said what’s interesting is how behavior differs between mobile devices and the PC. ”The results we are getting back on the iPad show that people absolutely love to browse,” he said.

In addition, he said that the iPad provides a big sales lift on Sunday evenings between 6 and 9 pm PT, whereas the PC version is stronger on weekdays– in particular on Mondays and Tuesdays. Behavior on the iPhone differs, too. ”We say the iPhone is for shopping on your lunch break, whereas the iPad is where you do shopping on the weekend, like going out to have coffee and enjoying the experience,” Klassen said.

The mobile devices are also selling more apparel than the regular site, although shoes remain dominant on both.

Sure enough, the iPad can offer a much more luxurious experience than the smaller screen on the iPhone, and can do a fairly good job of replicating a window-shopping experience.

Stealing a play from the iPad’s photo app, Newberry said consumers can use the same pinch-burst technique to dive into a whole category, such as women’s shoes. Instead of having to click to enter the category, a number of photos displaying sandals and sneakers will pop up. While the feature may not be practical for finding the exact pair of shoes you want, it’s a whimsical way to be entertained while browsing.

Zappos plans a number of updates for the applications soon, including more filters to help with browsing and free shipping for everyone. On the regular PC site, users have to sign in to VIP accounts in order to be guaranteed free shipping, but on the mobile devices the differentiation wasn’t possible before. Soon, if you buy on a mobile device, you will automatically be upgraded.

An aspect of the app experience that is completely arbitrary is the products that are featured–in nearly full size–on the homepage. “We feature what looks nice and what is the most colorful,” Newberry said.

Zendesk, Growing Like Mad, Adds a COO

Arik Hesseldahl — Tue, 25 Jan 2011 05:00:33 +0000

Zendesk, the Web-based help desk outfit, says its revenue has grown 300 percent in the last year (though it didn’t disclose an amount). It has also tripled its number of business customers, who use it to keep track of help desk calls, to 5,000. Add in iPhone, Android and BlackBerry apps, as well as integration with Salesforce.com and Twitter, and Zendesk has touched some 22 million end users, the company says.

No surprise then that it’s beefing up its executive team. Zendesk named Zack Urlocker chief operating officer. Urlocker is ~~currently~~ a former executive in residence at Scale Venture Partners. Before that he was an executive vice president at MySQL, and helped boost its sales to $100 million before it was acquired by Sun Microsystems.

Among the new Zendesk customers are Groupon, OpenTable and Zappos Insights, as well as established brands like Adobe and Sony Music. This news comes on the heels of its $19 million round of funding led by Matrix Partners late last year, along with Charles River Ventures and Benchmark Capital.

SalesCrunch Raises $1.4 Million for a Social Network for Salespeople

Peter Kafka — Tue, 11 Jan 2011 10:59:18 +0000

A reminder that you don’t have to be a pre-revenue app-maker to grab investor funding these days: Here’s SalesCrunch, a 9-month-old a “social network and sales training platform.” The New York-based company has only a few hundred users, none of whom pay, but it has still gathered $1.4 million in a round led by First Round Capital. Other investors include Accel Partners and Alfred Lin, former COO and CFO at Zappos. SalesCrunch founder Sean Black used to head sales at Trulia.com.

Sequoia Bets $37 Million on Stella & Dot, a Next-Gen Mary Kay

Tricia Duryee — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 15:00:13 +0000

Stella & Dot’s founder and CEO Jessica Herrin is no stranger to big ideas and name-brand investors.

After attending Stanford Graduate School of Business, the then 24-year-old co-founded WeddingChannel.com, which attracted an investment from Kleiner Perkins and eventually went on to be sold to The Knot.

Now, Sequoia Capital is backing her new venture.

San Francisco-based Stella & Dot is a direct-sales jewelry business, which allows women all over the country to sell bracelets, necklaces, rings and other accessories to friends and acquaintances, similarly to how Tupperware or beauty supplies were peddled in the past–except this has a technology twist.

Sequoia has invested $37 million in return for a 10 percent stake in the business, setting the six-year-old company’s valuation at a diamond-studded $370 million. The shares were purchased from existing shareholders, so the company will be paying for future plans directly from its profits.

Previously, the company raised about $5 million from Radar Partners, whose founder, Doug McKenzie, was WeddingChannel.com’s first investor back when he was at venture firm Kleiner Perkins.

Herrin started the company in 2004, which coincided with the birth of her two daughters. It wasn’t until 2006 that she was able to kick it into high gear.

Now she’s overseeing a third very healthy baby.

Revenues in 2009 totaled $33 million, more than tripling in 2010 to $104 million. She’s expecting the same growth in 2011, and has plans to expand to Europe later this year. Stella & Dot has paid out $50 million in commissions to sellers, whom it has cutely renamed “stylists.”

Sequoia Capital Partner Alfred Lin, who was most recently chairman, COO and CFO of Zappos.com before selling the company to Amazon.com, led the investment and will join the Stella & Dot board.

According to the Direct Selling Association, $28 billion is spent annually on products sold directly in the U.S., and there are 16.1 million sales people, of which 82.4 percent are women.

Lin said that technology has changed the way we shop, from the Amazon and Zappos experience to the way membership clubs like Gilt Groupe are run. But direct-selling business “is an interesting area that has not been touched by technology as much as other industries have. The business that [Herrin] is building is not your grandmother’s. It’s the new age.”

Some of that has to do with additional help coming from the Internet and social tools, such as Facebook and Twitter.

Stella & Dot’s stylists get started by paying $199 for catalogs, order forms and other training materials, and receive $350 worth of jewelry to show off at “trunk shows.” Herrin: “For a couple hours, a gathering of friends can try on on jewelry, which isn’t locked up in a glass case. The stylist offers fashion advice–it’s a no-pressure casual event.”

Each stylist has a personalized, fully enabled e-commerce site with a custom URL, which clients can visit later to order more items. The site can be promoted with the help of Facebook and Twitter, and the head office pitches in with PR, too. Stylists aren’t obligated to purchase inventory, and the jewelry is designed and produced by Stella & Dot’s team in New York, so they don’t have to worry about competition from other sites. There are also no quotas, but there is a chance to work your way up the food chain by recruiting stylists to sell underneath you.

Herrin is calling this approach “social selling,” a more modern term for “direct-sales business,” which is likely to invoke a picture of a Mary Kay saleswoman driving a pink Cadillac. It’s a category that she hopes will add up to a lot: $1 billion in five years, to be precise.

Lin: “It’s a nice business with very little paid-in capital. It’s gotten to $100 million and is a very profitable business in a short period of time. I look forward to making it a standalone company for many years. I’m very excited to work with her and the team.”

Update: Zappos's Tony Hsieh on His Magical Happiness Bus Tour and Hugging It Out With BoomTown

Kara Swisher — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 16:30:28 +0000

Also, while in Vancouver, BoomTown tried to avoid the happiness-fueled stalking by Tony Hsieh, the CEO of online retailer Zappos.

To no avail.

I interviewed Hsieh (as well as Groupon’s Andrew Mason) onstage at the Grow2010 conference. Hsieh’s topic was his new book, “Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose.”

It came out in June and is all over the bestseller lists, and Hsieh is now headed on a nationwide bus tour to promote it.

You can see my video interview with him below, in which he discusses his fervent intent to hug me. Also other stuff.

Amazon (AMZN) certainly gave a bear hug to the company, buying Zappos last summer in a deal valued at about $850 million.

It was a good idea, since Zappos is well known for its culture of intense happiness, both in its high level of customer service and the enthusiasm of employees of the company, which started as a Web shoe retailer but has been expanding its offerings.

I actually went to Zappos’s Las Vegas HQ and terrorized its very friendly “Mayor” Jerry Tidmore, and also talked to Hsieh then. Both videos are also below.

Here is the update with Hsieh:

[ See post to watch video ]

Questions for Tony of Zappos and Andrew of Groupon? Step Right Up!

Kara Swisher — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 12:15:11 +0000

Later today, BoomTown will be onstage at Dealmaker Media’s Grow2010 conference in Vancouver, Canada, to interview Tony Hsieh, CEO and co-founder of Zappos, and Andrew Mason, founder and CEO of Groupon.

Hsieh has just written a book, “Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose,” which is topping the best-seller lists.

It essentially chronicles how he built the customer-service-focused online retailer, which was sold for $850 million to Amazon (AMZN) last year.

Mason is also a bit of a phenom, having turned the social local buying service into a start-up juggernaut, garnering massive funding and a valuation of above $1 billion.

Yesterday, Groupon had a big day, offering its first national social discount at the Gap (GPS), which blew off the doors at the service.

I will ask both the usual questions, but feel free to suggest any for me to use.

Note to Tony: No trying to hug me or getting me to do a group cheer.

Note to Andrew: No, I do not want a 50-percent-off spa treatment today.

Of course, I will post video updates with both innovative–and unusually likable–entrepreneurs later, but here are the interviews I did with each earlier this year to enjoy until then:

Amazon Goes Shopping, Comes Home With Woot

Voices — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 20:45:16 +0000

Woot.com, the commerce site that made its name featuring one big deal a day, announced today (in entertaining fashion) that it is being acquired by Amazon.com, where, like Zappos and Audible, it will continue to operate as an autonomous subsidiary. Amazon invested $4 million in Woot in 2008. Details of the deal were not announced.

As BoomTown Said: Partovi Brothers Finally Leave MySpace (Here Are the Internal Memos)

Kara Swisher — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 00:22:40 +0000

Well-known tech entrepreneurs and twin brothers Ali and Hadi Partovi (pictured here, right to left) are leaving MySpace, in a high-profile departure for the struggling social networking company.

Internal memos were sent around to staff this afternoon about the executive change, said sources, which you can see below.

“Hey everybody, it’s been super tough staying quiet about this news at the request of our execs,” said Hadi Partovi, in an internal memo obtained by BoomTown. “I know some of you are very surprised about this, and I want to apologize for not having had the option to brief you personally in advance.”

Hadi was SVP of Technology at the News Corp. (NWS) unit, while Ali was SVP of Business Development. Hadi will leave MySpace entirely, while Ali will have a special adviser role, said the memo from MySpace Co-President Michael Jones.

In a blog post in March titled, “MySpace Musical Chairs: Will the Partovis Stay or Will They Go Now?,” I wrote:

“In all likelihood, said sources, the Partovis will remain at MySpace for the next several months, although they are likely to move eventually to more senior advisory or special-project roles there in order to pursue longtime outside investing and entrepreneurial interests.”

Now that has come to pass.

The fate of the well-known tech wunderkinds has been one of the more interesting guessing games of late at MySpace.

MySpace managers have been keenly interested in avoiding the appearance that the company is in the grip of a talent drain, especially related to such well-known innovators.

The Partovis arrived in the midst of turbulent change at MySpace last August, just after its original CEO and co-founder, Chris DeWolfe, was suddenly tossed out and replaced by CEO Owen Van Natta, as well as COO Jones and Chief Product Officer Jason Hirschhorn.

As part of its new strategy to become an entertainment hub, the Beverly Hills, Calif.-based MySpace bought the Partovis’ social music start-up, iLike, in a deal engineered by Van Natta.

After it closed, Hadi was mostly working in MySpace’s Seattle office, and Ali was mostly based in San Francisco.

(See this funny welcome video Ali Partovi did at the time.)

But Van Natta suddenly got the boot in January after clashing with News Corp. digital chief Jon Miller, as well as Hirschhorn and Jones, sending MySpace into yet another storm.

Hirschhorn and Jones were then named co-presidents.

While several sources said the Partovis are not unhappy with the pair or with the new MySpace mediacentric strategy, the brothers sold their company with the idea of working with Van Natta.

“That firing reset things,” said one source close to the situation in March.

Nonetheless, there was some progress with iLike, including integration of MySpace Music with Google (GOOG) and a MySpace Events offering.

In addition, the pair have wide-ranging interests outside the company, including an active investment portfolio in such start-ups as Facebook, Dropbox, Opower, BlueKai and Flixster.

They have already scored big with investments in Tellme, which was sold to Microsoft (MSFT); Zappos, which was acquired by Amazon (AMZN); and IronPort, now owned by Cisco (CSCO).

And though iLike was not the success they had hoped for, their entrepreneurial record is strong. Ali Partovi sold LinkExchange to Microsoft, and Hadi Partovi, who also worked at Microsoft, co-founded Tellme.

Now, it seems, the Partovis are moving on to the next challenge.

Here are the internal memos from Hadi Partovi to iLike staff and from MySpace’s Jones:

From: Hadi Partovi
Date: Tue, Apr 20, 2010 at 5:15 PM
Subject: Fwd: Organizational Update (re Ali + Hadi)
To: staff
Cc: Ali Partovi

Hey everybody, it’s been super tough staying quiet about this news at the request of our execs. I know some of you are very surprised about this, and I want to apologize for not having had the option to brief you personally in advance.

I also want to call out looking backwards that we’ve all done a heck of a lot in just the last 6 months to help improve the MySpace business and to integrate iLike technology. Just a short list is below.

- iLike integrated MySpace Music into Google search (iLike provided the team, technology, and Google deal)
- iLike team+technology helped implement MySpace Events, launched with multi-million-dollar sponsorship commitments
- all iLike.com traffic has been merged into MySpace’s overall Comscore metrics
- iLike’s products have been featured in a TV ad by Apple, and will be in an upcoming TV ad by another major tech company
- iLike’s promotional engine has been used multiple times in coordination with MSM to promote new albums or new artists
- MSM videos have been integrated into iLike.com and iLike on Facebook
- iLike’s artist-stats are integrated into the MySpace artist dashboard
- iLike.com drives search engine traffic to MySpace artist pages
- iLike team implemented the imeem traffic redirection and data backend of imeem playlist integration
- iLike team provided backend metadata + recommendation engine for MySpace music search and song-similarities

Most importantly, thanks to our work, MySpace is the #1 provider of music on Facebook, music on Google, and Concerts on iPhone. Regardless of any challenges that MySpace needs to overcome, that is a great legacy that I know we’re all proud of.

I’m personally very sad that I won’t be working with any of you–the amazing team we built at iLike is perhaps our greatest accomplishment.

I’ll send an email to the Seattle folks to organize a proper going-away celebration :)

hadi

From: Mike Jones
Date: Tue, Apr 20, 2010 at 4:52 PM
Subject: Organizational Update
To: XXX
Cc: Jason Hirschhorn

Hi everyone,

Effective on Friday, MySpace SVP of Technology Hadi Partovi is leaving to pursue other opportunities. In addition to continuing his work as an advisor and angel investor to various startups, he will be following his passion for education by working directly with technology focused non-profits. Hadi leaves as a valued friend to the company, and we wish him the best of luck in his future endeavors.

Ali Partovi will be stepping down as SVP of Business Development, but will continue working with MySpace as a strategic advisor working on special projects. He will also be taking time to invest in and advise startups.

Hadi and Ali were instrumental in integrating iLike’s best in class technology into the MySpace brand. Last week’s successful Events launch was a direct result of that collaboration. Other noteworthy product integrations include last year’s Google Music Search integration and the Local Concerts App, which is currently the most downloaded concerts app for the iPhone and was featured in one of Apple’s latest iPhone TV spots.

Please join us in thanking Ali and Hadi for their contributions to MySpace.

-Jason & Mike

(Full disclosure: News Corp. owns Dow Jones, which owns this site.)

Zappos's Tony Hsieh Talks About His New Book, "Delivering Happiness" (Get It?)

Kara Swisher — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 12:34:43 +0000

Tony Hsieh is unusually quiet in person, especially for someone whose innovative company is well known for its incredibly friendly customer service.

He has a new book, “Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose,” which comes out in June, so I chatted with him outside the Zappos HQ in Henderson, Nev., about this and more.

Zappos was bought by Amazon (AMZN) last year, but Hsieh still runs it pretty independently of the mother ship, employing a set of “core values.”

Here’s the video interview:

[ See post to watch video ]

Terminally Happy Mayor of Zappos Meets Born-Grumpy Dictator of BoomTown: High Jinks Ensue!

Kara Swisher — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 12:33:57 +0000

While in Las Vegas recently, BoomTown dropped in at the HQ of Zappos, the online retailer Amazon (AMZN) bought last summer in a deal valued at about $850 million.

The company is well known for its culture of intense happiness, both in its high level of customer service and the enthusiasm of employees of the company, which started as a Web shoe retailer but has been expanding its offerings.

I can tell you first hand that I nearly went into a diabetic coma on my recent tour of the e-commerce company, led by Zappos “Mayor” Jerry Tidmore. That included a lot of sweetness from the staff, as well as way too many baked goods strewn about.

Here’s the video, in which Tidmore related to me at the end of our time together the innovative secret ingredient of Zappos’s success:

[ See post to watch video ]

(I also did a video interview here with Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh about his new book, “Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose,” which comes out in June.)

MySpace Musical Chairs: Will the Partovis Stay or Will They Go Now?

Kara Swisher — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 07:11:06 +0000

While there have surely been a lot of departures of talent at MySpace over the last year, including two major shifts in top management, one of the more interesting guessing games of late concerning the social networking company has been over the fate of well-known tech wunderkinds Hadi and Ali Partovi.

According to many sources inside and outside the company, that’s just the discussion the pair of serial entrepreneurs has been having with its newest leaders, as well as with News Corp. (NWS) digital head Jon Miller.

(News Corp. owns MySpace, as well as Dow Jones, which owns this site.)

In all likelihood, said sources, the Partovis will remain at MySpace for the next several months, although they are likely to move eventually to more senior advisory or special-project roles there in order to pursue longtime outside investing and entrepreneurial interests.

“They’re definitely staying for now,” said one source. “But it’s the ‘how’ is what’s being worked out.”

There are many shifting scenarios as the sides hash it out, said sources, but MySpace execs are keenly interested in avoiding the appearance that the company is in the grip of a talent drain, especially with such high-profile innovators.

Still, in an interview with BoomTown at MySpace’s Beverly Hills, Calif., HQ earlier this week (you can see part of that chat in the video below), Co-President Jason Hirschhorn said that there are likely to be a lot more departures at the company, as well as arrivals.

“It’s normal in a situation like this,” said Hirschhorn, quite correctly, given the wringer MySpace has gone through over the last year.

The Partovis arrived in the midst of turbulent change at MySpace, after its original CEO and co-founder, Chris DeWolfe, was suddenly tossed out and replaced by CEO Owen Van Natta, as well as COO Michael Jones and Chief Product Officer Hirschhorn.

As part of its new strategy to become an entertainment hub, MySpace bought the Partovis’ struggling social music start-up, iLike, last summer in a deal engineered by Van Natta.

After it closed, Hadi (pictured left) became an SVP of technology, mostly working in MySpace’s Seattle office, and Ali (pictured right) became its SVP of business development, mostly based in San Francisco.

But Van Natta suddenly got the boot in January, after clashing with Miller, as well as Hirschhorn and Jones, sending MySpace into yet another storm.

Hirschhorn and Jones were then named co-presidents.

While several sources said the Partovis are not unhappy with the pair or with the new MySpace media-centric strategy, the brothers sold the company with the idea of working with Van Natta.

“That firing reset things,” said one source close to the situation.

In addition, the pair have wide-ranging interests outside the company, including an active investment portfolio in such start-ups as Facebook, Dropbox, Opower, BlueKai and Flixster.

They have also already scored big with investments in Tellme, which was sold to Microsoft (MSFT); Zappos, which was acquired by Amazon (AMZN); and IronPort, now owned by Cisco (CSCO).

That said, with talent-retention packages in place for both Partovis, and good will between them and the new leaders, the sides are trying to come up with a workable arrangement.

MySpace declined to comment, but The Clash sure will (as well as Jones and Hirschhorn, below):

[ See post to watch video ]

[T-shirt photo courtesy of Zazzle.com]

New Way to Flit from Store to Store

Katherine Boehret — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 02:16:00 +0000

Imagine going to the mall in search of a new pair of black leather gloves. But this time, rather than starting the search by going straight to your favorite stores, which look familiar and carry recognizable merchandise at expected prices, you must walk to the center of the mall and sort through a giant bucket of gloves with few identifying marks other than price.

Wacky as this scenario sounds, it’s the way many people shop online every day. They look for specific items by searching Web sites like Amazon.com (AMZN) and eBay.com (EBAY), where results are displayed in big lists without much association to stores. That means all the details a customer knows about a store—its ambiance, prices, style, quality and variety—aren’t put to use.

[ See post to watch video ]

This week, I shopped online with Flit.com, a free Web site owned by San Francisco-area company enterONCE LLC that encourages people to shop using the same method they use at the mall: Start inside familiar stores, not in a giant bucket of products. It’s designed so people will enter a search item once and receive multiple suggestions of places where the item might be sold. As shoppers “flit” off to those stores, Flit.com serves as a home base, remembering the original search so shoppers can flit back, choose different stores and shop from there again and again.

I used Flit.com to shop online for black high heels, a digital camera, the iPad (not yet available), a robe, running sneakers and black leather gloves. I found that using it saved me from having to manually enter multiple URLs, and I liked how it helped me shop from store to store, since I already associate certain styles with each.

Select from the list of stores carrying black dresses. The store’s Web site opens to reveal all the black dresses carried there.

A male colleague of mine explained that he doesn’t naturally shop according to stores, so it’s worth noting that Flit.com may appeal to women more than men. I wish Flit.com had a way of combining its store shopping with side-by-side comparisons of the same product; the company plans to add this in March.

The Flit.com shopping process works as follows: Type in a search item, such as “red dress,” then choose to search in Value or Premium stores and press the Enter key. This returns a list of stores from a pool of more than 300 that carry red dresses; store categories can be selected to return more accurate results. Select one store, and its Web site opens to reveal all the red dresses carried there. Search results include stores like Target, Best Buy (BBY), Bloomingdales, Sam’s Club and J. Crew, as well as popular shopping sites like Amazon, NexTag, Buy.com and eBay.

The value behind Flit.com’s method of flitting you out to individual store sites is twofold. First, you still get to shop on a store’s own Web page, many of which were designed to uniquely reflect the store’s spirit and style. Lots of shoppers have saved shipping and credit card information with a store Web site, or they have coupon codes or gift certificates to use there. Shopping on each store’s page rather than on a general shopping site lets them tap into that data.

Type in an item such as ‘black dress’ (above), choosing to search in Value or Premium stores.

Second, after you flit off to a store Web site, an orange button remains in a Flit.com toolbar at the top of the page; click there to return back to home base before flitting off to yet another shopping site. Flit.com will keep a breadcrumb trail of where you have gone in your shopping session, using store icons to represent each site that was visited. You can place a check mark beside sites to remember them.

Flit.com’s search results are only as good as each individual store’s search engine, so if a store doesn’t do a good job of querying its own inventory, you’re out of luck.

The Flit.com home page would benefit from offering more ways to sort stores, such as by price range rather than just by using Value, Premium or alphabetical order—especially because “value” and “premium” mean different things to different people. The company’s CEO says Flit.com will likely add sorting by price and other categories by this spring.

In a hunt for a robe using Flit.com, I was surprised to see that of the 12 top stores that appeared at the top of the list, seven of them didn’t carry robes, according to what the store sites told me when I linked out to them. I asked Flit.com’s CEO about this and he said that search returns don’t filter out some stores that may have limited or no selections, and that this is valuable because it shows shoppers that a certain store doesn’t carry an item—just like physical shopping. I had hoped that one advantage to Flit.com would be less virtual wandering in stores that don’t carry what I am looking for.

Banana Republic, Gap and Old Navy Web sites, all owned by the same company, didn’t display the orange toolbar button that returns shoppers to Flit.com because they use their own toolbar at the top of their pages.

It’s too bad that Flit.com’s breadcrumb trail, which tracks where a user has shopped, doesn’t hold specific items. For example, I found the same pair of running sneakers in my size after digging into Web sites for Road Runner Sports and Zappos, but I couldn’t save the shoes anywhere. Flit.com’s CEO says capturing individual products and merging them into the search trail will be offered in March.

Snipi.com, a free shopping site I reviewed last spring, uses a toolbar for holding items that are dragged and dropped into it so they can be remembered and revisited for buying at a later time. Flit searches can be saved or shared with others with the “save your shopping session” button. It prompts the user to enter an email address for sending a Web link of the saved session.

Flit.com is currently funding its operating costs from an original private investment and doesn’t have any formal relationships with the stores where it sends users. The site’s CEO says the company hopes to negotiate a system where it gets paid by the stores, or by third parties, for any business it generates.

After doing a lot of flitting, I noticed a screen between the Flit.com search results page and the store page that asked if I wanted to share Flit with friends, and offered to let me do so through email or a social-networking site like Twitter or Facebook. This screen pops up roughly every 25 flits, according to the company, but it includes a step to skip this and continue to the store’s Web page.

The people working at Flit.com seem to know what the site needs to improve, thus preventing it from being just another fleeting online shopping site. Its shopping trail needs a little help, as do its result categorizations, but the way it lets users shop online starting with familiar stores makes Web shopping comfortable and easy, much like visiting physical stores.

Edited by Walter S. Mossberg.

Write to Katherine Boehret at mossbergsolution@wsj.com

Facebook and Zappos's Different Views on Worker Retention

Tomio Geron — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 08:00:46 +0000

For fast-growing technology start-ups, there are many approaches to employee hiring and retention.

Two of the more successful ones, Facebook and Zappos, have very different methods, each with different goals: Facebook wants to hire entrepreneurs even if that means they will eventually leave, while Zappos wants to hire the best people to fit its culture and figure out how to keep them.

Mark Zuckerberg, chief executive of Facebook, said at a talk this weekend at Startup School, a Berkeley, Calif., event organized by Y Combinator, that Facebook seeks to hire entrepreneurial “hackers”–people who want to build something new–even though they may not want to stay for long. The company is focused on technology and tilts its hiring toward engineers, even for people in non-technical roles such as marketing, he said.

Read the rest of this post on the original site

Spare Change for Amazon Shares?

John Paczkowski — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 21:59:38 +0000

$118.49. That’s the price at which Amazon shares closed Friday, a day after the company reported a 69 percent jump in third-quarter profit and a 28 percent gain in revenue. It was a new 52-week high and the stock’s best since December 1999, when it hit $106.68.

Which is saying something. Because as you might recall, in 1999, Nasdaq was soaring on the back of the dot-com bubble to levels never before seen.

And here we are amid the worst recession since the 1930s. Haven’t even entered that “all important holiday shopping season” yet, either.

Things are looking pretty good for Amazon (AMZN) right now. Sure, there’s renewed competition from retailers like Wal-Mart (WMT). There are potential sales tax issues and income tax liabilities and a raft of Kindle-killers headed to market. But Amazon’s stock is up 131 percent this year, brokerage firms are upgrading their ratings on the company, and analysts are saying it’s only going to go higher.

Said Citigroup analyst Mark Mahaney: “Near-term outlook very positive as AMZN heads into holiday season fully armed against shrinking/de-stocking offline retailers, with one of the must-have gadgets of the season (Kindle), a significantly strengthening International presence, and soon-to-be closed Zappos acquisition.”

Yeah. Things are looking pretty good right now. But we said that back in ’99 too–when Amazon had a similar P/E.

A Billion-Dollar Question for Zappos and Amazon

Geoffrey Fowler — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 15:25:05 +0000

When Amazon.com (AMZN) agreed to buy Zappos last week for $847 million in cash and stock, most reports said that the online shoe and clothing store had over $1 billion in sales last year.

But when Amazon filed its official paperwork about the deal with the SEC today, the company reported 2008 net revenues of just $635 million.

Why the more than $300 million discrepancy?

Read the rest of this post on the original site