For most businesses, life doesn’t get much better than when a local influencer is around. Some global influencers have a reach that would help any company, for example Mark Cuban. But it is the local influencer that brings the conversions to a website. Local influencers are easier to form a connection with and are close to the action. It takes effort and trust to build relationships with local influencers, but it is more than worth the energy....

As explained in this guide to keyholding, when a home or business owner uses a keyholding service, Key Guards will have copies of their keys in order to attend the property in case of emergency, or to arrange access for contractors and tradespeople. Naturally, Key Guards could also allow access for delivery people. This wouldn’t solve the central issue, though, which is the insecurity of smart locks. In the end, it goes back to the launch video:

With this latest financing, the company has raised a total of a little more than $27 million. Other participants in the round include Salman Partners Inc., Cormark Securities Inc., and Beacon Securities Ltd. Slyce offers a visual recognition search platform for retailers, allowing users to simply take a picture of a product with their phones and be directed instantly to the same or similar products in a retailer’s inventory. In the last 12 months, the company has made quick traction, implementing this functionality in mobile commerce apps and websites for some leading North American retailer and publishers....

Adding ads to a platform is always a hard sell. Whether it’s free-to-play mobile games or a more affordable streaming platform, no one likes when they’re content is broken up by ads. For social media platforms, ads can be a real killer for engagement, which means if you do it, you better do it right. Fortunately, Snapchat is at least doing something good with the revenue from these potential ads, as the company is reportedly planning to share it with the creators in a significant way....

Founded in 2011, the Startup America Partnership was blessed by President Obama and initially funded by the Case Foundation and Kauffman Foundation as a three year program to dramatically increase the development, prevalence and success of innovative, high-growth U.S. startups. It was led by Steve Case who appointed Scott Case (no relation) to drive the program. The news of the transition was shared with one hundred regional champions from twenty regions at the fifth Startup America regional summit in Phoenix in mid-April but then reiterated with more details last week....

Raising a seed round is hard, but it wasn’t hard for me. I run product and tech; I showed up and looked pretty and sounded smart for the last meeting with angels and VCs, and tried not to screw things up. The lion’s share of the work was done by John Bracken, my cofounder and Speek’s CEO. But now it’s my turn to man the forklift. As I said, I run product and tech....

During SXSW 2017, 421,900 attendees, media and companies enjoyed over 2,000 music acts, 600+ trade show spaces, 400+ screenings, 200+ gaming spaces, 1,000+ parties, and so much more. In a survey by SXSW, 67 percent of the people attended with the intention of finding new business opportunities and 49 percent came to connect with existing customers. SXSW is the place to make new connections and get noticed by people who can help build your business....

A new study out of the University of Southern Denmark has found an interesting, albeit ancient, connection between depression and creativity. After studying 1,400 letters written by three famous music composers in the 18th century, researchers were able to determine that Mozart, Beethoven, and Liszt were considerably depressed during production of their most influential and revered works. The analysis of the letters was as thorough as it was eye-opening. By using linguistic analysis software, he was able to scan the letters in question for positive and negative emotional indicators....

Published in the Journal of Organizational Behavior, the survey gathered data from the executive teams and 422 employees across 65 organizations in the United States and Belgium. CEOs included in the study averaged 13 years in the position. CEOs Should Be Humble The study directly points out the takeaway: Humility marks the difference between feedback seeking CEO and one more focused on his or her own vision. Sure, CEOs still need to measure whether the feedback is correct, but being willing to listen is a first step....

And as a new study indicates, a lack of sales professionals is leading to a talent shortage that’s beginning to highlight their importance in the commerce ecosystem. 9 in 10 Struggle to Recruit Sales Pros The 2017 study, out from Impartner and based on the results of a survey of hiring managers of 200 corporations that do business nationally and internationally, hinges on one admittedly major stat: Ninety percent of the hiring managers polled found it tough to “recruit and hire direct sales professionals....

Fintech & Europe Europe is, in fact, a hot nest of startups operating in the fintech industry. This is mostly related to the money going into the industry itself, the regulation existing in the European Union, and the amount of accelerators existing there, who are also going in strong on this industry. Enter Swanest With offices in London and Brussels, Swanest is taking advantage of this pulsating environment. They have done so well with their online investment service that, recently, the company managed to secure a seed investment round valued at €750,000 (over $800,000), coming from the Belgian early-stage investor Philippe Gillion....

Along with Wattpad and Medium, Sweek is an example of the type of international networking app that young digital-savvy writers are turning to adopt. Following its pilot launch in June 2016, the Netherlands-based Sweek has reached over 75 countries and brought together thousands of users who share stories — fiction and non-fiction alike — in over 10 languages. I had a candid chat with Sweek cofounder and marketing manager Sabine van der Plas in the privately owned startup’s origins, its growth strategy, its revenue model and more....

If you’re thinking about a new career or wanting to work at a different company, then check out some of the recent Tech.Co jobs posts and consider applying for one! If you’re looking for jobs at startups – or anywhere else – look no further than the Tech.Co Jobs Board. Here are this week’s top technology jobs: Editorial Fellow Tech.Co in Remote (Not Location-Dependent) Tech.Co is offering two, paid, full-time, four-month-long editorial fellowships for college graduates with prior professional reporting and writing experience....

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However, in recent years, innovation has taken a new form at the Olympics: wearables. And everyone from bobsledders to curlers are going to be fitted with a wide range of devices designed to improve their performance, hone their training, and generally make the Games a little more exciting. The Creator With such a prolific team and an even more impressive track record, you’d think Team USA would have a huge collaboration of researchers and scientists working around the clock in a special laboratory to produce the most innovative tech for their athletes....

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Sorry, I didn’t mean to ruin the surprise. But yes, Facebook remains the gold standard when it comes to the most popular social media websites. And while that might be the least surprising thing you read all day, the other 19 took this writer by surprise. Mostly because Facebook somehow made it into the top 4 twice with their stand-alone messenger app. While you might assume that the ever-scrolling US population would be the most-active on these various websites, you would be wrong....

Yet it is really important to pay attention to correctness and quality. When we rush and make mistakes, we then have to go back and fix them. When we go faster and miss things, we have to go back to fix them, and that usually takes more time. It pays off to spend a bit more time and get things right. Over the years, I’ve adopted a few simple principles to make sure that the work I produce is quality work....

Now take these two pieces of information and put them together. Retail apps took up 27% of a user’s time on a smartphone. At the same time, we see that over 50% of all purchases – online and offline – are influenced by digital marketing. This means that even if a shopper does not make a purchase online or on mobile, content that they browsed on these two mediums leads to purchases offline....

Below are the five essentials you’ll need in order to reach your goal. Reliable cloud storage compatible with tools you already use Going paperless shouldn’t necessitate shaking up your entire routine. You can make the switch seamlessly by choosing tools that will incorporate into your existing workflow. Dropbox and Google Drive are frontrunners in the cloud storage industry, which translates to unlimited options for integration. (Think DocuSign, IFTTT, Salesforce, Slack, Trello, and more....