Hello Blink Show

Harris and I are sad to report that we have decided to shut down the Hello Blink Show. We had an incredible time creating the episodes, sharing knowledge about sales and marketing, and meeting amazing new people. We learned a lot from our guests, and we hope you did, too. We discuss some of the things we could have done better if we were to go back in time and redo the show: Contextual Electronics ForumHarris is pivoting his career to go from individualized consulting to building a virtual...

Nonsense marketing is the seemingly frivolous activities that marketers do that have a chance of “catching on” or “going viral.” For example, Wendy’s often provocative Twitter account is an example of nonsense marketing. It requires creativity and is often experiential. Christine gives us some other examples of nonsense marketing, such as Ford’s Home of the Future project. The purpose of these projects can be difficult to grasp sometimes if you’re not the intended audience. Shawn gives the...

In this episode, we talk to Alessandro Grande and Robert Wolff, who run the Arm Innovation Coffee livestream on YouTube (which you can check out here). They tell the story about how they joined forces about a year ago to create a weekly interview video series during the pandemic. Alessandro and Robert use StreamYard to help manage the livestream, including green (waiting) rooms for guests, overlays, and live comment pop-ups. They also use Open Broadcaster Software Studio (OBS Studio) to...

Darian Johnson joins the Hello Blink Show crew for a live brainstorming session. He is working on a low-power, battery-operating LCD digital assistant. He plans to fund manufacturing through a crowdfunding campaign, but he needs help figuring out how to market the device first. Darian starts the episode by sharing a personal story about how he encouraged his 12-year-old son to build his own TV. Rather than simply buy a TV, he gave his son a Raspberry Pi and a monitor. The son had to install...

Description Sean talks about launching his product, EmotiBit, on Kickstarter. EmotiBit is a wearable biometric sensor used for research, engineering, and maker projects. Julio discusses what types of products do well in crowdfunding campaigns. For the most part, business-to-consumer, physical products with a price range of $50-$300 do the best. Shawn asks if crowdfunding should be seen as a way to fund research and development or more of a pre-order system. Sean mentions that he is using...

Description We chat with Christine Sunu and Dominik Kundel from Twilio about the importance of developer advocacy in a marketing strategy and how it can help build trust with prospective customers. One of the keys of successful developer relations (DevRel) is to “meet people where they are” rather than trying to create a community out of nothing. This includes going to events and engaging developers on forums and chat rooms that already exist. However, you must make sure that your...

Description Harris opens the show by giving an account of his experiences with implementing good search engine optimization (SEO) practices and what he’s learned. After spending a little bit of time learning about SEO, he says that he was able to grow his organic traffic sooner than anticipated. Your goal for top-of-funnel content is to rank highly in search engine results whenever someone looks for your target topic (e.g. the topic of your blog post, podcast episode, or video). You can...

Description Sean gives his reasons for moving to New Zealand and starting his company, MagicDAQ. He was inspired to create the MagicDAQ after working for companies where many hours of labor were spent on manual testing. The MagicDAQ automates the testing and data acquisition process by allowing users to script the process with Python. Sean had success making early sales by cold-calling potential customers on LinkedIn. Specifically, he sought out junior to medium-level design engineers to...

Description We start by checking in with Jonathan Georgino, who last appears on the show in episode 5. Since then, he has gotten more sales and more distributors to carry his product (the Binho Nova host adapter). Specifically, Jonathan mentions that paid ads have not worked well at attracting new leads. However, collaboration with influencers (e.g. Shannon Morse) and appearing on podcasts has worked well. He also mentions that he is starting to see a trickle of new visitors to his site...

Description Daniel Bogdanoff joins as a guest to discuss his experiences creating video content as part of the marketing strategy for Keysight. He noticed that Keysight, like many other tech companies, had essentially 2 options for creating video content: high-budget ads or off-the-cuff webcam shots. As a result, he transitioned into a marketing role to create the Keysight Labs YouTube channel, which has about 80k followers (at the time of this recording). Daniel believes that companies...

Description How do you get your first customers, and when should you hire help? Natalie Luneva joins us, who runs her own coaching and consulting business for software as a service (SaaS) startups. She talks about how she got started helping small businesses and offers insights into finding initial customers, the importance of joining communities, and the pros and cons of developing technologies that rely on other, larger businesses. In the second half of the show, Natalie talks about...

Trailer for the Hello Blink Show.

Sponsor We want to thank Cyber City Circuits for sponsoring this episode! Cyber City Circuits is an electronics shop and contract manufacturer based in Augusta, GA. Use the coupon code HELLOBLINKSHOW to receive 10% off your order of electronics or mention that you heard about them on the Hello Blink Show for a 25% discount on the assembly costs of manufacturing. Key Topics In this episode, we take a step back to look at how the show has performed over the past year. The Hello Blink Show...

Sponsor We want to thank Cyber City Circuits for sponsoring this episode! Cyber City Circuits is an electronics shop and contract manufacturer based in Augusta, GA. Use the coupon code HELLOBLINKSHOW to receive 10% off your order of electronics or mention that you heard about them on the Hello Blink Show for a 25% discount on the assembly costs of manufacturing. Overview In this episode of the Hello Blink Show, Harris and Shawn wanted to share their presentation on sales and marketing for...

Sponsor We want to thank Cyber City Circuits for sponsoring this episode! Cyber City Circuits is an electronics shop and contract manufacturer based in Augusta, GA. Use the coupon code HELLOBLINKSHOW to receive 10% off your order of electronics or mention that you heard about them on the Hello Blink Show for a 25% discount on the assembly costs of manufacturing. Overview Whether you have a new product idea or business project, listeners will appreciate hearing her experience with...

Sponsor We want to thank Cyber City Circuits for sponsoring this episode! Cyber City Circuits is an electronics shop and contract manufacturer based in Augusta, GA. Use the coupon code HELLOBLINKSHOW to receive 10% off your order of electronics or mention that you heard about them on the Hello Blink Show for a 25% discount on the assembly costs of manufacturing. Overview In this episode of the Hello Blink Show, Harris and Shawn welcome back legal expert and attorney, Mark Tyson. Mark...

Sponsor We want to thank Cyber City Circuits for sponsoring this episode! Cyber City Circuits is an electronics shop and contract manufacturer based in Augusta, GA. Use the coupon code HELLOBLINKSHOW to receive 10% off your order of electronics or mention that you heard about them on the Hello Blink Show for a 25% discount on the assembly costs of manufacturing. Overview In this episode of the Hello Blink Show, Harris and Shawn interview Matt Liberty. Matt shares his experience with...

Sponsor We want to thank Cyber City Circuits for sponsoring this episode! Cyber City Circuits is an electronics shop and contract manufacturer based in Augusta, GA. Use the coupon code HELLOBLINKSHOW to receive 10% off your order of electronics or mention that you heard about them on the Hello Blink Show for a 25% discount on the assembly costs of manufacturing. Overview In this episode of the Hello Blink Show, Harris and Shawn interview electrical engineer, Mihir Shah. Mihir shares his...

Sponsor We want to thank Cyber City Circuits for sponsoring this episode! Cyber City Circuits is an electronics shop and contract manufacturer based in Augusta, GA. Use the coupon code HELLOBLINKSHOW to receive 10% off your order of electronics or mention that you heard about them on the Hello Blink Show for a 25% discount on the assembly costs of manufacturing. Overview We chat with Lisa Lewis Miller, career coach, owner of Career Clarity, and author of an upcoming book about changing...

Overview In this episode, Harris and Shawn chat with David and Chris, owners of Cyber City Circuits. David and Chris are working to expand their contract manufacturing (for electronics and PCB assembly) business and need help reaching new customers. As a result, Harris and Shawn perform a live consultation with them to give advice on how to approach marketing and sales. In particular, Harris gives his thoughts on best ways to set up a sales pipeline, and Shawn helps brainstorm marketing...