Sam Plecic Blog

At first all I wanted was to be able to purchase something wonderful and uplifting for my bedroom wall. Then the goal was — if we could just find a piece that was inspirational above the desk in the den — that would be enough. Soon, we realized that we spent much more time in the living-room and to be real — so did our friends. Was I trying to be inspired myself — or show what great taste I had — to the friends? Let’s get real — artwork fills all of these “needs.” I decided to tryout Meural. “Life Imitates Art”– But Do You Want It To? Thomas Merton said, “Art enables us to find ourselves and lose ourselves at the same time.” Well, I sure didn’t want the peeps at work losing themselves in art. “Lose yourself in the next tech project, please — this is a tech company.” If you’re a writer, “Lose yourself in getting that article written — or the editing done. Hey devs...

In the technology industry, almost more than anywhere else, image is everything. Image is the bedrock part of the “fake it till you make it” culture that animates most of Silicon Valley today. Innovators use it to sell illusions while they figure out the nuts and bolts of their big ideas. Here are four critical challenges of tech startup PR. Without it, companies like Magic Leap would be starved of capital while trying to bring their AR technology to market. Even Amazon would never have survived years of losing money to becoming the retail juggernaut it is today. Technology industry startups have to pay more attention to their image than most other companies do. To have the correct image in technology means businesses must have a thorough understanding of the field of public relations (PR). They must realize that the breakneck pace of innovation in the industry makes it difficult to differentiate themselves from competitors. Overcoming that obstacle requires some industry-sp...

“I didn’t even know who Mark Zuckerberg was back in October 2015. Eighteen months later, I’m keynoting at conferences and serving clients in London, Sydney, Singapore, Los Angeles, Lisbon, Vancouver, and 50 other cities,” says Logan Young, the co-founder of BlitzMetrics, a Facebook dashboard and advertising company. Learn, Do, Teach: Build Your Expertise First New companies often create a storefront and brand based on promises because they have no testimonials or case studies to begin with. They fake it till they make it — or spiral out of control at 100 miles per hour. Logan Young and Dennis Yu decided to take the opposite tack with BlitzMetrics, building the business on reliable methods they’d developed themselves with proven results. The philosophy at BlitzMetrics is that you must first learn how to perform a certain task; then, you do that same task over and over before teaching others how to do it. That’s how the method of “Learn, Do,...

We all want to be more productive and improve our time management skills. Unfortunately, while time management is simple in theory, it’s not always an easy concept to put into practice. It takes knowledge, effort, and discipline. Here are seven critical time management skills to boost your productivity. We can’t make you work harder or become more disciplined, but we can provide you the knowledge you need to be more productive. In this post, you’ll learn seven critical time management skills you can use to boost your productivity levels today. The Truth About Time Management We can’t control time, only what we do with the time we have. ‍First, it’s important to realize that time can’t really be managed — at least not in the traditional sense. We can’t slow down or speed up it’s passing; we can only control what we do with the hours we have. This may seem obvious, but it’s worth noting. Effective time management isn’...

Thomas Edison wasn’t just known for his startup, the Edison Company. He was known as an inventor — and a prolific one at that. He contributed to innovations, including the phonograph, the light bulb, the motion picture camera, and others. In generating ideas and inventions that had a profound and lasting impact on the world, Edison became synonymous with invention. How do we free up the world’s best entrepreneurs to keep inventing today? Silicon Valley isn’t producing new “Edisons” to keep inventing. These days, Silicon Valley has become synonymous with the concept of the invention, even to the point of satire. But Silicon Valley isn’t producing new Edisons. The fundamental model that powers Silicon Valley’s innovation runs entirely contrary to what is required to foster and empower the greatest inventive minds among us. Under the traditional VC model, Silicon Valley entrepreneurs can rarely tuck more than one invention under their belts, ...

Marketing tactics change constantly. Each year new tactics become more impactful, and old ones fade into obscurity. Sticking to the same tactics is stale for your current customers and potential customers, too. Instead of just running the same growth tactics for years on end, it’s time to make a switch in 2020. Here are four unique growth tactics you can implement in 2020 to help you make the switch to growth. 1. Optimize Your Sales Pipeline For Engagement Having a sales pipeline is nothing new. And you probably have a great one in place already. But there is always room for improvement. A significant issue I see in many sales pipelines is a failure to communicate effectively with prospects. If you have great leads, you need to engage with them to build a relationship consistently. As Gaetano Dinardi from Nextiva says: “Engagement is the number one spot that most fall short in closing sales. Whether it’s poor timing on the engagement or simply not enough...

In the technology industry, almost more than anywhere else, image is everything. Image is the bedrock part of the “fake it till you make it” culture that animates most of Silicon Valley today. Innovators use it to sell illusions while they figure out the nuts and bolts of their big ideas. Here are four critical challenges of tech startup PR. Without it, companies like Magic Leap would be starved of capital while trying to bring their AR technology to market. Even Amazon would never have survived years of losing money to becoming the retail juggernaut it is today. Technology industry startups have to pay more attention to their image than most other companies do. To have the correct image in technology means businesses must have a thorough understanding of the field of public relations (PR). They must realize that the breakneck pace of innovation in the industry makes it difficult to differentiate themselves from competitors. Overcoming that obstacle requires some industry-sp...

Fitbit is on schedule, as its boss James Park keeps reminding us, to launch its next smartwatch by the end of the year. We don’t know what the smartwatch will be called, though Blaze 2 seems likely, but thanks to leaks we know its design and some of the hardware improvements. Images obtained by Wareable show a similar large display design to the Blaze – which we have already seen in a Yahoo Finance report – alongside a new heart-rate arrangement that uses two red lights and one blue light. The company’s previous devices have used a green light to track heart-rate because blood absorbs the light. However, it reflects red light, which allows it to penetrate deeper into the skin, providing a more accurate heart-rate and new biometrics like blood oxygen levels. This should help close the gap between Fitbit and the Apple Watch when it comes to heart-rate accuracy. Fitbit is also reportedly improving the accuracy of GPS for the new smartwatch. It won’t be just ha...