Jivan Achreja is a UNC alum where he focused on Biology, Chemistry, and Entrepreneurship, and has written for Singularity Hub. Putting off medical school to pursue start up life, he worked as CIO of INRFOOD and is now with Smashing Boxes in Durham, NC. When not teching it up, he loves to read, run, and spend time with his family. You can catch up with him on Google+.
For a lot of people, marketing is their bread and butter. For others, it's still a giant mystery. Seeing new and exciting products come out of the Triangle startup ecosystem is always a big deal, especially in a field like marketing where so many do not know where to go.
When it comes to website marketing, BoostSuite is essentially what the Adobe Marketing Cloud wishes it was. I sat down with Aaron Houghton Co-Founder and CEO of BoostSuite to get an update on their latest feature and the status of BoostSuite.
At its core, the BoostSuite platform is an optimization system that analyzes marketing data and generates wins by allowing small business users to perform simple tasks that take one minute or less to complete.
In Aaron's words: "At BoostSuite we will have fulfilled our vision when every small business marketer in the world can make a meaningful improvement in their web marketing results on their own, in just five minutes when they are… waiting at a bus stop, sitting on a couch, or working out at a gym."
BoostSuite constantly monitors web market data -- who is coming in, where they came from, what they are doing, and how they navigate through your site. The platform collects all of this data from various sources and finds opportunities and patterns in the data using their proprietary rule engine/pattern recognition system. --Read On
I first heard of Cherokee Investments years ago through a panel that Cherokee Investment Partners Founder and CEO Tom Darden spoke at in 2007 at UNC regarding entrepreneurship, smart investing, and the future of Cherokee. It's really great to see that, over half a decade later, not only is Cherokee continuing to flourish, but the Challenge is also in it's third year.
If you are reading this article and are an environmentally related startup, (or thinking of starting one) then you should immediately drop whatever you're doing (once you finish reading of course) and immediately go and apply for the Cherokee Challenge. The deadline to apply is April 30th.
Cherokee created the challenge because they believe "that for today's society to actively address the pressing environmental issues of our time, there needs to be a sustainable business model to back that up."
I saw down with JT Vaughn, the organizer behind the scenes, to find out the details of the Cherokee Challenge. It originally started in 2011 as a grant writing based competition for local startups and has morphed into an accelerator-style competition over the past two years. --Read On
Exit Event Last covered the RTP New Tech Meetup last May, when it was resurrected from death by StartupSpot's (formerly VCHub) President, Jeff Boardman. I sat down with him this week to hear about the future of the meetup.
RTP New Tech helps to fill a big void that currently exists in the triangle startup ecosystem: Face to face interaction. Like ExitEvent and other similar affairs, RTP New Tech's mission statement, according to Jeff, is to "Be a platform that allows startup communities to get feedback, pitch to an investor, show a new product, and in general get advice."
Once upon a time, there were a wide range of social events and outlets for startups to garner feedback for their ideas. In the last year or so, due to a variety of reasons, some of these events have moved on or fizzled out. RTP New Tech has survived the test of time and aims to increase its footprint and audience in the coming months. Currently, meetups are held every other month, and will increase if the demand holds.
RTP New Tech is open to the general public and aims to attract as many non-startup people as possible to their events to encourage a greater range of feedback for presenting companies. On Tuesday, February 26th, four companies will be showcasing their stuff: --Read On
For a lot of people, marketing is their bread and butter. For others, it's still a giant mystery. Seeing new and exciting products come out of the Triangle startup ecosystem is always a big deal, especially in a field like marketing where so many do not know where to go.
I first heard of Cherokee Investments years ago through a panel that Cherokee Investment Partners Founder and CEO Tom Darden spoke at in 2007 at UNC regarding entrepreneurship, smart investing, and the future of Cherokee. It's really great to see that, over half a decade later, not only is Cherokee continuing to flourish, but the Challenge is also in it's third year. 
Exit Event Last covered the RTP New Tech Meetup last May, when it was resurrected from death by StartupSpot's (formerly VCHub) President, Jeff Boardman. I sat down with him this week to hear about the future of the meetup.