Welcome to the beginning of the rest of my life.
A few weeks ago, I did the unthinkable… on the brink of a recession, I left a lucrative, stable job at Microsoft to return to the startup world for the fourth time. Call me a glutton for punishment. Call me crazy (my ex-co-workers sure did). Call me a moron. It’s all fine with me.
I left the cozy and relatively easy world of corporate America to return to the battleground of my heroes… the people in business who I truly respect. Entrepreneurs… the dreamers… people who create billions of dollars of shareholder value on a hope, some duct tape and bailing wire, and a lot of hard work.
Notice Technologies is my fourth startup as a Founder or Co-Founder. The first startup, Stratfor.com, is a publisher of International news & Intelligence. Last I checked, they are continuing to do well although I have been crammed down more times than I can count. Perhaps I’ll be able to buy a Jolly Rancher with the proceeds when it exits. Startup #2, Infraworks, was a disaster in almost every way (I may or may not get into that in more detail later. I created Cruising Speed, startup #3, when I discovered that Google Adwords could actually pay some bills in 2002. I didn’t ever turn Cruising Speed into a mammoth commercial success, but it was the right thing for the right time.
I took a break from the startup world to go back to business school at the University of Texas, and after graduating in 16 months I took a position with Microsoft in Redmond. I really wanted to understand the tech industry from the "other side." I wanted to know how the goliaths of our industry made decisions — not just Microsoft but other companies that I’d interact with on a regular basis.
But those lessons are now learned, and I’m back. I feel alive again.
Yesterday morning was my first day of work as CEO of Notice Technologies. We have two lines of business — custom social app development and a consulting business. We create Facebook apps for ourselves because we think there are a number of untapped opportunities out there. Fortunately, it doesn’t take a huge team to validate ideas. So we’re going to work on a few apps that have a lot of potential. When we aren’t doing that, we’ll provide "Bain" or "McKinsey" type consulting services for social media. I’ve met a lot of companies along the way who don’t understand the subtlety of internet marketing in a world of social media. We know the options and the best things to do given business/marketing objectives.
I’ll use this blog to talk about social/internet marketing developments, our apps, and the growth of our business over coming years.
Onward & upward!
Congrats on leaving. I’ve added you/notice technology to my links on wetwired, course until my aritst gets done with what I provided him it looks kinda strange.
Chris,
Best of luck in this new endeavor… Let me know if you need any help from Mr. Banderas.