As working from home and freelancing becomes an undeniable fact of life, so do co-working spaces -- places where people and companies gather to work next to each other, collaborate and share ideas.

My game company, Lunar Giant, recently opened its first co-working space called SpaceLab in the Chicago suburb of Mokena, about 45 minutes south of the city. Though not the first space we’ve started (we also founded the hackerspace Workshop 88), there have been some real challenges and new lessons to learn along the way.

Here, we'll go into the work behind building an online community for a co-working space.

Building an Online Community

An online community is critical to the success of any organization reliant on membership. Building a strong online community generates passive leads and keeps existing members engaged. It also helps you generate buzz for events.

By using these online tools to promote offline events, you’ll bring people together and get them interested in what you’re doing.

Meetup

People use Meetup to find events and organizations near them. It’s a very passive tool for recruiting new members as well as announcing new events to people who “join” your group. There’s a small monthly payment ($10-15 depending on the plan), but after that, the time investment for maintaining this is rather low. I create a Meetup group right at the outset of every community I build. You’d be surprised at how fast the membership grows from zero to 300.

Wordpress and Themeforest

People sometimes focus too much on the things that don’t matter when they’re starting a business. A website is not one of those things, but building a custom one at the outset generally is. I’m a server management guy myself, but if you aren’t into that, you can grab hosting at a place like Bluehost for about $4 a month, do a Wordpress quick install using the tools they provide and then wander over to Themeforest for a nice looking skin for your new site. Use your blog to announce events, show the things happening at your space, provide information about what you’re doing, and show pricing for signup.

Eventbrite

Eventbrite handles event tickets, check-ins and payments. Any time you’re going to host an event, use Eventbrite.

Talkerapp

I found out about this tool from the guys at Workshop 88. Talkerapp is a free chat tool that you can use to keep all of the members in the organization talking. Great for creating a sense of community, even when people aren’t at the space. 

Jay Margalus is a game developer at Lunar Giant, an adjunct professor at DePaul University, and the creator of the co-working space SpaceLab. He can be reached @Poplicola on Twitter.

You may have just started your business and do not know how to scale it or have an idea and are not sure how to launch it or even how to make sure it is a good idea. This is the time to take a step back and get some help. You can start by reading this.

At all stages of a business it is important to seek outside counsel to make sure your business is on track. However, in the start-up phase it is critical. Vetting the idea and the business plan is critical to success. There are many resources out there to help. Some to help you get going and provide you support can be relatively low cost or even free.

Local Library

The local library and its librarians can be a world of help and can either turn you on to workshops to help meet your needs or direct you to books that will help. Visit Chicago Public Library -- it has an area with online resources that can help you get started.

S.C.O.R.E

A nonprofit organization made up of mainly retired business professionals that are dedicated to helping small businesses get started, grow and operate. This is a low to moderate cost option for business workshops on various topics or even one-on-one assistance to work on your specific business, offering as much or as little assistance as needed.

N.A.W.B.O.

The National Association of Women Business Owners is a great source for women in business. Providing networking, resources and information for women at all stages of business.

If you need a bit more intensive help and are ready to jump start your business an organization like Impact Engine may be just what you need. Impact Engine is a 16-week accelerator program for the impact entrepreneur. It's accepting applications now until June 30, 2013 for its second class. It's looking for entrepreneurs that want to address today’s societal and environmental challenges. What's somewhat unusual -- and good for you! -- is that the Impact Engine is not limiting the opportunity to just tech startups. It's open to all types of ideas that want to have a positive impact.

These are just a few of many resources out there including local chambers and industry associations that can provide support. Take some time to explore and find the resources that match your needs so that you can give your idea the best chance of succeeding.

As managing partner of MJF Partners LLC, Ms. Flynn brings over eight years of experience in small business and non-profit development. Prior to founding MJF Partners, Ms. Flynn was the executive director of the Lincoln Square Chamber of Commerce. As executive director she brought her passion for independent business and community building to Lincoln Square and created a sense of place that helped to transform the Lincoln Square Community. Flynn is a skilled and experienced executive with a proven track record of creating a successful business climate balanced by strong values of sustainability and community. This experience is utilized as she partners with businesses to maximize resources and opportunities to exceed their goals.

The West Loop business owners that depend on Blackhawks crowds remain a bit traumatized by the winter labor lockout that cut the National Hockey League season in half and slashed their game-day sales of beer, food and merchandise by 20 percent or more.

"It was kind of sad to be on Madison Street," recalled Christina Lemperis, whose family runs The Palace Grill. "It was like a dead zone over here."

But the Blackhawks’ run through the Stanley Cup playoffs -- which continues Wednesday night with the start of the final-round showdown against the Boston Bruins -- has revived the commercial streets around the United Center, proprietors say. Depending on how long the best-of-seven series lasts, the frenzied atmosphere around the Madhouse on Madison could come close to wiping out some businesses’ lockout losses.

"In many ways you want the Hawks to win in four games, but you also want it to go seven games, and still get the win, just to get the added activity,” said Chris Wortendyke, who manages The Beer Bistro, which is trying to recoup a 25-30 percent drop in sales during the three-month lockout.

The 2012-2013 season was supposed to begin in early October, but the labor dispute wasn’t settled until January. The shortened 48-game season began Jan. 19.

That left local businesses with 17 fewer regular-season Blackhawks games at the United Center. Thanks to the Blackhawks' playoff success, there have been another 10 home games. The finals guarantee at least two more. A seven-game series would mean another two.

At Clark Street Sports, sales of apparel dropped by about 50 percent during the lockout but has rebounded in almost equal measure during the playoffs, said manager Felipe Flores.

"Now it seems like we’re coming back to breaking even," Flores said.

Wortendyke, too, said he’s hoping to get "as close to even" as possible.

"But we’re still down," he said. "We’re not getting all the games back."

While the financial health of Madison Street seems to ride in part on the Hawks’ playing schedule, it’s difficult to show any wider impact, said Robert Baade, a sports economist at Lake Forest College.

When there aren’t games to spend money on, there’s something else closer to home, Baade explained. And when there are games to focus on, fans take their money to Madison Street rather than buying things in their own neighborhoods.

In other words, the same amount of money is being spent in Chicago, just going into different pockets.

"By and large, I think this is pretty much a wash," Baade said. "It’s a reshuffling of the spending but not a change in the overall spending."

But on Madison Street, business owners don’t make such macroeconomic distinctions. What matters to them is whether people are in their bar stools or at their tables.

And that hinges on the home team’s continued winning.

"The lockout’s in the past; nothing will ever make up for it. But we are certainly are glad to have hockey back," Lemperis said. "We can only look forward from here. We’re excited for what’s to come."

With bright colors and flashy logos, cars wrapped in ads seem to be roaming the roads just about everywhere. 

Debi Tully of Chicago Ridge sees them all over the place, which is why she said she didn’t think twice when an email that offered her a job driving her own ad-on-wheels vehicle popped into her inbox.

The deal was purportedly from a French-based energy drink that would soon be heading to American stores that wanted her to have her car modded out with designs for their product. Easy money, she thought. But not so fast. 

"He would send me a check," Tully recalled. "I would keep 'x' amount, the $300, and the rest of it would go for wrapping." 

Tully did receive the check -- which totaled nearly $3,000. She was instructed to cash it, keep her $300, and wire the rest to a graphic design artist to design the wrap.

"I think that might have raised a red flag," she said. "Why would I be paying their vendor? Why aren't they paying their vendor directly?"

Tully explained the concept to her bank, and the bank advised her against cashing the check. At the last moment she avoided a major headache and possible overdraft fees. That check was likely fraudulent.  

It’s a scheme similar to others that have preyed on consumers for years. The Federal Trade Commission likens it to the "sweepstakes scam" where consumers win millions of dollars, or the "secret shopper" job that pays so well.

"They all involve situations where the consumer receives a check and are supposed to deposit it in their bank account and then wire funds through Money Gram or Western Union to some third party they don’t know," said FTC spokesperson Todd Kossow.

A federal banking law plays an unfortunate role in the scam. The Expedited Funds Availability Act requires banks to make money available to consumers within 48 hours of being deposited. The problem is it usually takes a couple of weeks for the banks to determine the check is fake.

"And by that point, if the consumer has already wire transferred the funds off to this third party, the consumer is on the hook," Kossow explained.

The Federal Trade Commission has received hundreds of complaints from consumers who claim to be victims of the "car wrap" scam.

"If it’s wrapped, your eyes are just drawn to it," said Mike Heffner, who has been wrapping cars for a decade in Burr Ridge. Heffner worries that this scam is hurting an otherwise legitimate industry.

"That’s a myth! No one’s going to pay you to wrap your car and pay you to drive around in it. It’s just unheard of," Heffner said.

In most cases, the FTC won’t go as far as to say all car wrap offers are scams. Consumers who do get paid to wrap their car are the extreme exceptions. It is important to note that those offers never include wiring money to a third party. 

Chicago graduates Derek Tarnow, 26, and Zahra Tashakorina, 28, turned a class project into a professional innovative concept that caught the attention of technology accessory company Logitech. 

Would you be surprised to learn that 50 percent of all sales are closed in follow-up communication? What is even more staggering is that only 10 percent of seasoned sales professionals follow up more than once after a sales call or interaction with a potential customer. I’m not suggesting you need to become a seasoned salesperson, but as a sales expert, I know first-hand the importance of the follow-up.

According to Grant Cardone’s book "Sell Or Be Sold," the sales professionals who experience the greatest success, meaning close the most deals and make the most money, are the very 10 percent of people who follow up with customers more than one time.

What does this mean for you and your business? It means that by developing a sound follow-up system, you stand to gain fifty percent more business. While it may sound too good to be true, simply doing the common things uncommonly well will separate your business from the rest of the competition.

Follow these simple steps to implement a successful follow-up into your business.

• Become a conversation catalyst. Follow-up communication happens after the initial sales conversation. I hear people say all the time that they are unsure how to locate their target market or how to connect with them. One surefire way to become a conversation catalyst or get the conversation started is to give away a freebie. Pharmaceutical companies do this all the time with free samples, which get the representatives in the door to start a sales conversation with a doctor.

• Record everything. Develop a system to keep track of how you want to follow up after a sales call. Be sure to include the mode of each individual follow-up. Examples of possible follow-up modes include emails, phone calls, written letters or face-to-face meetings.

• Don't stop. Ever. Many people will give up before they see benefits. Don’t be one of those people. Why? The follow-up is about keeping the conversation moving forward. All things being equal, friends buy from friends. All things being unequal, friends buy from friends.

Continuing to follow up in an authentic way will create a relationship. Implementing a follow-up system can help develop sales connections that pay off like manna raining down from heaven: paying clients!

Kendrick Shope is a sales expert and coach. She created a sales strategy called "authentic selling" that focuses on engaging conversation, dynamic ideas and compelling results.

The term “social media” can be intimidating for most small businesses. But for small businesses, social media is a potent promotional tool.

Social media marketing refers to the process of gaining website traffic or attention through social media sites. You are probably most familiar with Yahoo! and Google. It is through these search engines that your customers do their “shopping” for services and products. The more mentions you have, the easier it will be for customers to find you.

Some 167 million people will shop online this year, which will increase to 192 million by 2016 (spending an average of $1,800 per person per year). Social commerce sales should total $9.2 billion by the end of this year and are expected to climb to $14.25 billion in 2013 and $30 billion in 2015.

I have used social media from the very beginning of my Assisting Hands franchise. Not only is it the best way to reach my target audience of technology-savvy baby boomers, but healthcare is the most widely searched topic on the Internet. So having a social media presence was a no-brainer.

The first thing you must do is to invest in a workable, well-designed website. Don’t put up a website just to have one. It must reflect your business’ advantages, so it is worthwhile for people to visit it. It needs to convey why your services or products are better than your competitors.

If you don’t really have any skills in this area, like most of us, hire a firm that knows how to create websites. Not your college-aged kid or nephew/niece, unless they really know how to build a site. A well-designed site promotes your small business, while a poorly designed site detracts from it.

Make the site easy to navigate. That is, make it easy to move from page to page so visitors can find what they are looking for. If you waste people’s time, they won’t return to your website. That also means regularly adding new content so the site doesn’t get stale.

Your site must attract attention immediately. The use of graphics helps, as well as bold print and topics that will resonate with visitors.

The biggest mistake small businesses make is not promoting the site. People aren’t going to visit your website if they don’t know about it. List the website on every piece of promotional material you distribute, including business cards.

If you are uncomfortable with social media, think about attending classes at the local community college. They often have computer classes especially for small business.

Invest in social media and it will bring dividends to your small business.

Contributed by Richard Ueberfluss, PT, MBA, FACHE, the president/owner of Assisting Hands® Home Care franchises in Hinsdale and Naperville; and who is also a regional franchise developer. Contact Richard Ueberfluss at assistinghands.com/Naperville.

It’s no secret that Chicago has been thrust to the front of public education debates. Between the Chicago Public Schools strike last year and the current controversy surrounding CPS school closings, residents have questioned whether it’s the school system or the city that is failing our kids.

The scrutiny on the inner city schools has caught my attention, but it has also focused toward one school that’s doing something positive amid the chaos. The Chicago Tech Academy, founded in 2009, is located in the heart of Pilsen and provides students something not many neighboring schools can offer: opportunity.

Here, high-school students learn how to write code, build mobile apps and build a start-up from the ground up, all while fulfilling the state math and English requirements.

Now, thanks to the involvement of Chicago’s Lightbank office, a venture capitalist firm, the students are also learning how to write business plans, and develop, pitch and fund their start-up ideas. The students turn out scalable solutions for real world problems. Just recently, four sophomores presented their own business plans to a panel of investors, entrepreneurs and Chicago tech leaders; the winning idea was a price-comparison scanning app and review aggregator for in-store shopping.

Students don’t face economic or social barriers for acceptance into the program, and many of the teachers at Chicago Tech Academy are retired industry professionals who are there because of their passion, not because of a paycheck.

The Chicago Tech Academy is graduating its founding class of seniors on June 15 and continuing to educate all those interested in becoming tech entrepreneurs.

Adam Fridman is the founder of MeetAdvisors.com, a social network for entrepreneurs. MeetAdvisors allows for professionals to give free advice to those seeking help with their business ventures. Forbes has coined MeetAdvisors "Yelp for entrepreneurs." Armed with a Master of Science in Finance and experience in corporate finance and investment banking, Adam spent the past 10 years tackling a number of ventures with a focus on business development and strategy.

During my 5+ years as a freelance web developer, I worked with a variety of clients. Some were really exciting to work with and made me excited to work on their project, while others were boring and failed to keep much of my interest.

Over time, I began to notice attributes about certain clients that made them fun to work with. These became the type of clients I sought to work with again and again.

Show your passion for your project

Developers enjoy working with clients who are passionate about their idea and are excited to see it brought to life. They don't want to work with people who could care less what happens to their project and show little day to day interest in what's being built. Let your developer see how excited you are to be building your project, and they'll get excited too.

Demonstrate your existing knowledge

You've researched your idea a ton and you most likely have some solid knowledge on what it is you want to create. Let your developer know this! Developers enjoy working with people who are educated about what they're creating because that signifies a certain level of commitment.

Show your commitment to your project

Developers enjoy working with clients who are serious about and committed to their project. They prefer clients who want to build a solid relationship and aren't going to disappear after three days because they decided weren't serious about their project after all. The more that you are committed to your project, the more that your developer will be excited to work with you.

Tim Jahn is the co-founder and CTO of matchist, the leading matching site for entrepreneurs and startups to find top quality developers.

Chicago weather is dreary and confusing and very weird, so here’s some sunny news: According to Intuit Payroll’s May Small Business Indexes, “revenue trends of the nation’s small businesses with fewer than 20 employees shows that small businesses created 35,000 jobs in May.”

Also from the Indexes:

• “The revenue index indicates that small businesses overall saw revenue decline in April of 0.6 percent. Among the industries tracked by the Index, none saw an increase last month.
• The ‘Real Estate, Rental, and Leasing services’ industry saw the biggest decline in April at 1.5 percent, followed by ‘Retail’ with a 0.8 percent declined, followed by ‘Healthcare and Social Assistance’ services with a 0.7 percent decline.
• Average monthly pay for small business employees remained the same at $2,676 in May, or 0.0 percent; and monthly hours worked decreased 0.12 percent in May, corresponding to 106.7 hours.”

Apparently, small business revenues are approaching pre-2007 recession levels. So, keep it up, small businesses! You can read more here.

David Wolinsky is a freelance writer and a lifelong Chicagoan. In addition to currently serving as IFC’s comedy, film, and TV blogger, he's also a comedy-writing instructor for Second City and an adjunct professor in DePaul’s College of Computing and Digital Media. (He also co-runs a blog behind the DePaul class, DIY Game Dev.) He was the Chicago city editor for The Onion A.V. Club where he provided in-depth daily coverage of this city's bustling arts/entertainment scene for half a decade. His first career aspirations were to be a game-show host.

More than 100 million Americans play mobile games and NPD reported 59 percent of all play happens on mobile devices. Despite rapid growth in the mobile gaming space, developers creating the games we know and love, are not necessarily generating sustainable incomes. In one case, developers who created a critically acclaimed tablet game made so little, they ended up homeless. This is not an isolated situation. Last year, 80 percent of mobile revenue went to just 20 developers, indicating that current monetization methods aren’t doing enough to support the industry.

For developers looking to monetize their content, 2011 was the year of mobile advertising; 2012 saw the rise of the freemium model. However, developers who want to build successful businesses need to experiment with new monetization models. This year is shaping up to be the year of real-money gaming, with the rise of tournaments and cash competitions.

Developers can enable tournaments in a variety of games to heighten competition, letting players enter free tournaments to win virtual currency or pay an entry fee to play for cash. Rather than interrupting gameplay with pop-up ads, tournaments become an important part of an existing game, making gameplay more fun and engaging. Furthermore, where cash competitions in skill-based games are allowed (currently 37 U.S. States), tournaments generate new direct revenue for developers, who get a cut of entry fees.

While cash competitions provide direct revenue, free tournaments enhance existing mobile monetization methods by increasing the time players spend in game, and the opportunities to monetize them. Both types of competition boost player retention. In fact, cash and free tournaments, translate into more downloads, higher DAUs (daily active users), and longer sessions.

My company, Skillz, the first platform technology to enable cash tournaments in U.S. mobile games, launched in April. With Skillz, developers can quickly and easily enable free or cash tournaments. Developers are already seeing promising results:

• 3D Cave Runner increased 7-day user retention from below 4 percent to over 18 percent -- a 330 percent increase by integrating tournaments.
• In Big Sport Fishing, players who entered tournaments played almost three times longer than peers.
• In GnarBike Trials, Skillz created paying users where there were none before, adding over $5 of revenue per paying user per month. Plus tournaments increased existing advertising revenue as much as 100 percent.

Cash competitions and tournaments offer a new monetization option for developers so they can spend time focusing on what they do best: making great games.

Andrew Paradise is the CEO and founder of Skillz.

“If I saw the train coming today, I’d let it hit me again.”

This comment came from a 25-year-old young man I interviewed for a branding assignment. The client is a $2 billion leader in the medical device industry. Over the past few years, they acquired eight companies and needed to do a comprehensive re-brand: new name, new logo, look, website and messaging platform. After a series of focus groups, it became clear that telling the stories of their patients and clinicians was the most compelling way to engage the marketplace.

It turns out, their founder was a Civil War vet who lost his leg and designed the first prosthetic limb with a knee. The young man who said the remark above was just 15 when he was hit by a train and lost both legs below the knee as well as his right arm. Today, he’s a rockstar. He counsels veterans and serves as an ambassador for the company that helped him build a new life.

For marketers seeking to engage with their customers or attract new prospects, there is nothing as compelling as storytelling. In simple, black-and-white photography, we put the young man’s image on the home page with his own words. Click through rates skyrocketed. Along with his story was the story of a 60-year-old man who suffered similar disabilities following a motorcycle accident. He spoke of being in the oil business (the accident happened six months before the Gulf spill.) He told me, “I knew if I could get on a boat and help with the cleanup, I’d get my life back.”

You may be thinking, “Okay, this company does dramatic things. It’s ripe for storytelling.”

Yes, but every company has its lore. Just spend some time with internal teams. I’ve heard things like “I have over 4,000 resellers and they all have manufacturer’s reps; I don’t know who’s buying my product.” That was the basis of an entire new sales and marketing push. And this one: “”We’re flat lining; without a disruptive new product, we’re stalled out.”

That one kick-started an ideation session that resulted in a whole new category of sanitary surgical instrument kits -- distributed through vending machines! Stories are not just the stuff of sexy headlines; great stories are the heart and soul of the brand. They not only serve as a communication tool, but fuel for innovation. Where do they reside? With your people and your customers. Just ask them!

Brooke Lighton is a principal at Connascent, Inc., a branding and sales consulting firm based in Chicago. Brooke is a native New Yorker who started her career as a science writer at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. She segued into advertising, working first as a copywriter at Ogilvy & Mather and later as a Group CD at Foote Cone & Belding. In 1988, Brooke launched her own agency, Lighton Colman. Today, she is a principal and heads creative services for Connascent, a branding and sales consulting firm. You can see their work at www.connascent.com.

We all make task lists -- and no matter how you manage them, whether online, with an app or with a Post-It note, eventually there are tasks that just keep getting rewritten. As these guilt-ridden tasks follow us from week to week, we feel conflicted as to when we'll find time to get them done.

The problem may be something you haven't thought of. Perhaps the task that follows you from week to week isn't actually a task. Ask yourself with each task, "Is this really a task? Or is it a project?"

• Tasks are singular in nature. "Take out the trash" or "file papers on desk" are clear tasks that will take a specific amount of time with a definitive set of skills.

• Projects are compounded -- multiple sets of tasks that come together. "Strategic Plan for 2014" or "clean the house" aren't singular tasks you can do in any one moment.

After you’ve differentiated which items on your to-do list are tasks, and which are projects, here’s how you break the projects down into manageable, schedule-able tasks.

1. Break projects into minuscule tasks. What are the small tasks you would need to complete in order to get the project off the ground and completed successfully?
2. Order your tasks. Know where you need to start and where you need to go. Picking up a project in the middle of the list may leave important tasks undone. First thing's first.
3. Note the time it takes to complete each task. If the first step in the project is a time consuming task, but the rest of the project is quick and easy, you know you'll need to set aside a larger chunk of time at the beginning to complete the project successfully.
4. Press the start button. To complete a project, you must actually start the project. Add to your task list the first task in a project immediately, and you’re more likely to finish the full project.

By identifying your "didn't do" items as tasks or projects and laid out the key steps to making a project easily digestible, you might just find that your task list gets done every week and less of those items are making it from list to list.

Marcy Twete is the founder/CEO of Career Girl Network and the author of the book "You Know Everybody! A Career Girl’s Guide to Building a Network That Works," to be released in summer 2013.

After reading a post by my business coach about three mistakes small business owners often make, one mistake in particular resonated with me the most: don't be an island. It's something, especially as an introvert, that I tend to do really easily. What's an introvert, you ask? Does it mean I'm shy, afraid of public speaking, slightly weird and unsociable? Not at all. And it's certainly not an unusual personality type for successful leaders -- think Steve Jobs, Larry Page or Warren Buffett. What it does mean is that we embrace solitude, we seek depth over breadth, and we exude calmness. Because our default setting is to live in our own brains, though, sometimes we just plain forget to share what we're thinking and seek out commiseration.

But you don't have to be an introvert to be an island. Even the most outgoing, thrill seeking, soak-it-up-socialite business owners can get buried in paperwork or lost in management. When I start to feel stacked-up emails closing in around me and wonder if I'm the only one mishandling my work/life balance, I try to remember something my horse trainer tells me: "Don't look at the ground unless that's where you want to end up." In other words, look where you want to go. Chances are, when you open up your peripheral vision a little and relax, you'll find other people within arm's reach.

I used to think that "not being an island" meant going out to networking events, bar hopping with business buddies or spending a lot of time on LinkedIn. And granted, those are always options and can definitely put you in front of a lot of mainland. But if you're like me and do better in one-on-one scenarios, think about grabbing lunch with a friend in your industry, asking a supplier how they deal with strong headwinds, or even finding some common ground with a new client. Seriously, one of the best conversations I had recently was with someone who called my shop looking for a better business card experience, after having just been burned by a cheap and fast printer.

After I sit down for a quick cup of coffee with another business owner, I feel a little less like it's just me against the world. And when I do manage to get myself to a networking group (preferably one where I already know some folks), I'm reminded that I'm not totally crazy. Maybe we all default a little towards high school when we're staring at the ground. We think our problems are unique and that no one could ever understand what we're going through. Being a business owner is hard sometimes. A lot of the time. Take my advice and try to remember to look up every once in a while.

Nina Interlandi Bell, co-owner of Tweedle Press, a small letterpress printing company in Chicago’s Rogers Park. Nina is Tweedle Press' fearless leader of design, letterpress printing, and sustainability research. Her laserlike focus and penchant for mission-hood make her prone to both fits of creative excitement and, occasionally, an overwhelming urge to do everything.

Once upon a time, “Angry Birds” was just a little-known game on the App Store. Eventually, though, well, I don’t need to tell you about what’s become of the title by Finnish computer game developer Rovio Entertainment. It’s a massive empire now, with its most recent outposts being an online TV show (which a “Simpsons” writer is assisting on) and now a book.

It can be easy for a small developer to look at that and scowl, or look at it with puppy-dog eyes and wonder, “How can I replicate this success?”

I can’t answer that and won’t be trying to in this post. Instead, I am taking a closer look at the expansion itself and trying to tease out whether there’s such a thing as being too saturated as an IP for an App Store game — and how to tell when it’s time to branch out into new territory.

“The key to expanding your services while not blowing the budget is to go slowly,” explains Flynn Zaiger, CEO of OnlineOptimism. "It has taken the ‘Angry Birds’ franchise 4 years — equivalent
to a century in Internet time — to expand to the point where they're now on bookshelves. You can't just expect everyone to want your brand in multiple formats next week. Start by producing your product in a new, and just slightly different format.”

Zaiger is referring to the puzzle game’s evolution from iPhone game to a game on other platforms, too, and also incorporating other IPs, like “Star Wars.” It does indeed create the perception that the game is bigger than it already is, which is silly to say when discussing “Angry Birds,” but you know what I mean. But it also enables them, as Zaiger says, “to transform from a simple time-waster to two words which stand for fun, friendly, and slightly silly entertainment.”

“There is an opportunity for expansion for almost everyone with a little creativity,” says financial planner Hank Coleman.

But before you start picking out pools and butlers, there is, of course something to remember with this whole thing: “It’s bad because as a popular culture phenomenon, it's really an outlier
rather than the norm,” says Gregory Ciotti of Help Scout. “Most businesses expand through a more natural groundswell effect, such as trickling up their SMB solution to the enterprise level.”

The groundswell effect is important to note — nobody’s going to hold it against the original game that made “Angry Birds” so popular if its spinoff soda isn’t so great. So, grow slow, and maintain quality.

David Wolinsky is a freelance writer and a lifelong Chicagoan. In addition to currently serving as IFC’s comedy, film, and TV blogger, he's also a comedy-writing instructor for Second City and an adjunct professor in DePaul’s College of Computing and Digital Media. (He also co-runs a blog behind the DePaul class, DIY Game Dev.) He was the Chicago city editor for The Onion A.V. Club where he provided in-depth daily coverage of this city's bustling arts/entertainment scene for half a decade. His first career aspirations were to be a game-show host.

Who doesn’t love a good joke? Sometimes the funniest ones are only funny to a handful of people -- an "inside" joke. Mingling your way through a crowd, shaking hands, meeting, greeting and getting to know new people. Good for business, right? Absolutely. And then an inimitable opportunity presents itself. The "inside joke" sparks laughter only among those who are “in” on the joke, perhaps even to the consternation of others. Inside jokes demonstrate that you and the others engaged are recalling something you’ve already shared.

Inside jokes identify you and the others involved as being on a separate, and higher plane of camaraderie, one not yet enjoyed or even understood by the others. It reveals a familiarity and a bond between you that the others don’t share. We could probably each recall at least one memory of sharing an inside joke. I know I sure can. Not only can I remember a time and place, but more affectionately, I can recall the people with whom I’ve shared inside jokes. While they may be silly and even insignificant in nature, they have the potential to promote and progress a relationship toward an even closer bond with each chuckle or peal of laughter.

The Humor of Seriousness

With all due attention to business etiquette, it is also important to foster an atmosphere of relaxed communication with others, especially in the earliest stages of a professional relationship. Failing to do so can be costly in the way of lost opportunities that might have been generated by something as simple as a smile or a laugh. No extra cost or effort at all. Consider how many people you encounter in a day who fail to offer a simple smile. Don’t make the mistake of being one of them. It is sadly humorous to contemplate such needlessly missed opportunities.

The Seriousness of Humor

I’m not suggesting business schools teach standup comedy, but humor can open the door for serious business, whether directly because of it or by referral to others. Why is that? Let’s call it the “likeability” factor. It distinguishes you, sets you apart from others and in a business context, from your competition. How often do you like to be around others with whom you share that type of camaraderie where humor freely flows versus those with whom there is none? The thing about relationships, meaningful ones, is that they have established various levels of emotional bonds. Humor, in all seriousness, is one of those factors that help to achieve that bond, furthering the relationship.

While humor is no substitute for substance, you can use humor to build camaraderie and establish deeper bonds with those you meet. Focus on establishing an “inside joke” rapport. It’s not about the punch line. It’s about the bottom line.

Mike Muhney in a recognized expert in the field of relationship management. He is the co-founder and co-inventor of ACT!, the software product that created the entire Contact Management software category and is acknowledged as the catalyst that started the entire CRM (Customer Relationship Management) industry. Today, he is the CEO and co-founder of VIPorbit Software, creator of the Mobile Relationship Management category for users of smartphones and tablets, beginning with the iPhone and iPad. VIPorbit provides full-featured, affordable solutions to today’s mobile device user. VIPorbit can be downloaded from the iTunes App Store or www.viporbit.com.

Reaching new opportunities is an ongoing challenge for many Chicago business owners. Katie Jeep, owner of Musical Magic, has cracked the code in forming mutually beneficial partnerships within her community. Similar to the story of “Stone Soup”, Katie’s success came from bringing business together to all give a little for the benefit of the community. Learn how you too can benefit from your business neighbors.

Expanding business meant there was a need for promotional photos, so Katie turned to Mark Brown Photography in her Roscoe Village neighborhood. Mark loved Katie’s music and in turn keeps it on rotation in his shop where customers frequently ask and get directed to Musical Magic. This word-of-mouth generates customers and appreciation as those customers become in the know for where to turn in their community for masterful children’s photography sessions and ongoing musical activities. Take away: share services with local business where you can.

A further success story has come from Katie’s partnering with Stroller Strides, a new moms' fitness craze. The partnership comes in the form of a shared newsletter with included coupons. Sign up for Stroller Strides and get a discount on your next Musical Magic class and vice-versa. Take away: share discounts with local business to benefit customers.

Katie has also learned that it’s not easy going it alone as a business owner. Her packed classes leave her with little down time so she’s partnered with Angie Rush, licensed therapist, to teach a musical swaddle and toddle class. The best part is that the Musical Magic clientele reap the benefits. Take away: share expertise to take the pressure off in your own business.

Generating new customers is always a gift, however, Katie feels the greatest bonus is the camaraderie she now shares with other business owners. Discussing business strategies over coffee has brought yet another revelation where customers can enter and win raffle prizes from participating local business. The gift of partnerships will keep giving.

If you’re looking to partner with your local business why not reach out for a shared coffee, stop in as a patron, or swap services to begin down the road of positive partnerships in your business community.

Chelsea Duggan is currently running Milestar Babies while chasing her sprinting boys, Trouble One and Trouble Two. She enjoys being an entrepreneurial guinea pig, serving up delectable scones with a posh accent, and playing every single day.

For many years, business has focused nearly entirely -- some might argue completely -- on the customer. Customer relationship management systems, contact managers, Rolodex systems (yep, they’re still around), notes on business cards, they are all designed to help facilitate a better focus on customers and prospects. These systems help sellers collect data about their customers, things like where they like to vacation, what colleges their kids go to, what their hobbies are. Why does that information make a difference when it comes to selling your product or service?

What’s “Sold” First?

You’ve got something to offer? That’s great. It meets people’s needs? Sure, but yours is not the only one that does. So, what is your most important first step? It isn’t what you’ve got to sell in the way of your product or service. It isn’t your better price. It’s not even your better service, as important as customer service is. You’ve definitely got to differentiate yourself from your competitors. But what is the most unique thing that you have in your arsenal that you can use to stand apart from competition and gain that all-important competitive edge? The answer is you.

What the Prospective Customer Needs First

We’ve all heard the saying, “People do business with people they like.” You’ve got to differentiate yourself, first by being liked, and second by being liked more than your competitors. Your initial efforts need to focus on letting customers and prospects get to know you. Don’t tout the kinds of industry-centered credentials; share your personality, and in doing so, you’ll provide a sense of your authenticity.

Use Your Customer Data to Share What Matters to Them

Depending on your target market, and what you know about them, share the kinds of qualifications and/or credentials that might interest them. For example, if you’re from the Midwest, which is known for its strong work ethic, let those customers with a similar background know you were raised with those beliefs and how that has played out in your career. This invites a personal discussion between two people of similar viewpoints and experiences before it invites a discussion between two potential business people.

I’ve never read or heard anyone say that people do business with businesses that they like. People do, in fact, do business with people they like. Who you are, and what you are, can be your most competitive edge.

Mike Muhney in a recognized expert in the field of relationship management. He is the co-founder and co-inventor of ACT!, the software product that created the entire Contact Management software category and is acknowledged as the catalyst that started the entire CRM (Customer Relationship Management) industry. Today, he is the CEO and co-founder of VIPorbit Software, creator of the Mobile Relationship Management category for users of smartphones and tablets, beginning with the iPhone and iPad. VIPorbit provides full-featured, affordable solutions to today’s mobile device user. VIPorbit can be downloaded from the iTunes App Store or www.viporbit.com.

I was born into the snack business, so I guess you can say I have 33 years of experience in the industry. Not to mention, I was born with the name Cretors, since I am the great-great-great granddaughter of Charles Cretors, the inventor of the popcorn machine. However, my career in snacks officially began when I joined Cornfields Inc. in 2006 to help my mom manage my father’s (Henry Cretors) business after he passed away.

As a leading, healthy-foods private label company, we recently invested some of our own capital toward launching two retail brands, GH Cretors popped corn and Hi I’m Skinny Sticks. Both brands have launched with an absolute bang, with GH Cretors becoming nationally available in less than three months. The following is my advice for launching a brand and making your way in the snack industry. Everyone has their own recipe for success, but this is what worked for us.


The first step is the product itself. You can have all the “attributes” in the world, but if it doesn’t taste great, you won’t keep your customers.
 
The second is a strong, clear brand image and voice. Packaging is the only tool that we have to catch our customer’s attention. In fact, we only have a few seconds to grab them as they walk down a very crowded aisle. It’s not easy to tell a story in three seconds visually. Have a purpose and a story for your brand. This not only engages your direct consumer, but it provides excitement for the buyers at retail. This was at the forefront of our minds when designing the bags for GH Cretors and Hi I’m Skinny.
 
Third, is that the brand must be supported at the retail level. We have found that having strong sampling programs is our strongest marketing tool. Sampling gets your product in the hands and mouths of snackers, and it hooks them. Once we have them hooked, we know they’ll be back for another bag or two.
 
At Cornfields Inc., we also have the advantage of controlling our own destiny because of our existing private label business. Unlike some other brand builders, we own our own manufacturing. This allows us not only to control costs but to be very nimble. We can react quickly to industry trends -- a task that large multi-nationals are often challenged with.  It also helps that we have a passion for the products and brands we are going to market with. This is reflected in the attention to detail we have put toward every element of our products and their packaging.  
 
Though it’s not a top three, an undeniable element of success in the snack business is a little bit of luck. Sometimes the stars are aligned and all of the pieces fall in to place, just like a perfect bag of popcorn.

Claire Cretors serves as president of Cornfields Inc., a leading, healthy-foods private label company and creator of the G.H. Cretors and Hi I’m Skinny retail brands. After joining the company in 2006, Claire became executive vice president in 2007 and president in January 2012.

Every year, Memorial Day is the gateway to an ominous time frame known as "The 100 Deadliest Days for Teens."

But this year, competitors in the wireless industry have joined forces to combat a major source of deadly accidents: texting and driving.

"Unfortunately what we see with texting is it's hitting the good kids. It's the ones who are well-adjusted, well-connected, [and] involved in their schools and communities. They’re the good kids. That's why they have the reward of having a cell phone. .... This is the epidemic for them," said a spokesperson who knows too well the dangers of texting and driving.

Merry Dye came to Chicago this month on the fourth anniversary of a terrible tragedy in her life. In May of 2009, her daughter Mariah West died in a crash caused by texting. Three words cost her life and changed her mother's forever.

"It is not a matter of if you’re going to have an accident, but when. If you engage in this behavior, it will catch up to you. Texting and driving... is like a game of Russian Roulette," said Dye.

• Teens Admit: Texting, Driving Not Easy
• Gov. Quinn Signs Texting-While-Driving Ban

West died just as her home state was passing a ban on texting and driving. Four years later, the world has changed so much: 40 states now have bans in place and major companies have  invested big money in the campaign to stop the reckless behavior,

Dye joined forces with AT&T in the company’s "It Can Wait" campaign. This month, AT&T’s efforts got a major boost from a surprising place: its wireless competitors. Along with 200 other companies, Sprint, Verizon and T-Mobile joined in to fight the epidemic plaguing the industry. 

• ItCanWait.com: Take The Driving Pledge
  
• Distraction.gov: Official U.S. Government website for distracted driving
  
• Dangers of Distraction: Non-Profit Organization Seeking to Raise Awareness

Groupon’s March quarter was better than expected — to the tune of the stock now hovering around $7.50. As Mashable crunches the numbers, “most of that revenue growth came from North America, where sales increased by 42 percent year-over-year. However, Groupon is still handicapped by its international operations, where sales decreased by 18 percent year-over-year.”

That’s a new wrinkle on the Groupon story.

Elsewhere, though, we’re hearing familiar things. For example, Groupon South Africa’s CEO, Wayne Gosling, has just come forward admitting that his region has “had huge mess-ups in terms of our products and delivery, which has been well documented... we were handling stuff, but not as dynamically as we could be.”

That’s why Groupon SA has recently appointed a new head of customer services, Katja Alves. In a very PR-ish statement, Alves said “consistency of excellence [is what] I am looking to foster and continue to drive here at Groupon in co-operation with the international push to standardize our processes and consumer expectations.”

Groupon is also facing challenges elsewhere around the globe. In India, competitor Snapdeal told the press that it represents “the pivot Groupon always wanted to make.” The company, you see, started off as a deal-lister but now sells “everything from consumer electronics to women’s shoes — all from third parties, akin to the Amazon Marketplace.” There’s a full interview with the company over at allthingsd.com.

Other international challenges for Groupon: Groupon Taiwan has been hacked. More than four million registered users were compromised as a result, but reportedly no credit cards have been affected. So, that’s something, right?

On the Andrew Mason front, “Hardly Workin’,” the former Groupon CEO’s planned “seven song album of motivational business music targeted at people newly entering the workforce” is still forthcoming. 

David Wolinsky is a freelance writer and a lifelong Chicagoan. In addition to currently serving as IFC’s comedy, film, and TV blogger, he's also a comedy-writing instructor for Second City and an adjunct professor in DePaul’s College of Computing and Digital Media. (He also co-runs a blog behind the DePaul class, DIY Game Dev.) He was the Chicago city editor for The Onion A.V. Club where he provided in-depth daily coverage of this city's bustling arts/entertainment scene for half a decade. His first career aspirations were to be a game-show host.

So, you’re ready to get a loan to help enhance and grow your small business, but you aren’t quite sure where to start. Here are three basic questions you should ask yourself:

1. Is now the best time? Just because a loan sounds like a good idea doesn’t mean it’s the best time for one. Do your homework.
2. How much do I need? Of course extra money can help, but have you figured out exactly how much those upgrades cost?
3. Will I be able to repay the loan? This is critically important as defaulting on your payments will not only affect your relationship with the lender, but your credit will suffer as well.

Don’t worry if you are unable to answer these questions, because a meeting with a small business banker can help assess the best solution for your business.

During the assessment you should expect the banker to:

1. Ask a lot of questions. Your banker will want to learn as much as possible about your business and its history.
2. Request to see financial statements. Your banker will want to see several years of personal and business financial statements to understand the health of your business.
3. Visit your business. Your banker may want to visit your place of business to observe operations, meet key decision makers and evaluate potential collateral.

The application process for a business loan varies by bank and customer. No two situations are the same. Four primary elements that banks consider during the loan process:

1. Good credit. Banks review the credit history of the owner(s) of the small business.
2. Ability to repay. Banks want to make sure the business has the cash flow to repay the loan.
3. Collateral. What collateral will be offered to back up the loan?
4. Experience. Generally banks want to see a few years of profitable business operations.

New business owners who may not currently qualify for a direct loan from a bank should consider exploring small business grant programs offered through the city or local community organizations. Organizations like, the Women’s Business Development Center provide small businesses with advice, support and connections with lenders who specialize in new and emerging businesses. Recently Citi partnered with the City of Chicago and ACCION to support the Chicago Microlending Initiative as a way to provide capital to small business owners.

Mindy Mercaldo is the Illinois president and Chicago market president for Citibank. Mercaldo has over 24 years of experience in retail and small business Banking.

The story of the entrepreneur is an almost mythological one in American society. Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg and Bill Gates are rightly revered by many because of their ingenuity, tenacity and ability to succeed despite the odds. Less known are their friends and family, who bear a tremendous amount of the burden to allow these visionaries to succeed.

Want to be an entrepreneur? Your most important early conversations should not be with your co-founder or investors but rather your significant other. As a profession, entrepreneurship can bring out the absolute worst in a person. There are the material challenges -- I know very few “startup folks” who haven’t worried about making a rent or mortgage payment. But, more challenging than material concerns are the time and emotional considerations. Running an early stage company takes tremendous amounts of work, with weeks of 70 to 90 hours not being terribly uncommon. Oftentimes the work includes the obligatory cocktail parties, dinners and networking events that may not seem like traditional “work”, but are still both required and exhausting.

Unfortunately, all of that time takes a significant emotional toll. After the blood, sweat and tears, you may end up feeling further behind than at the beginning. I’ll admit to feeling occasional pangs of envy for folks who delivered pizzas to my apartment, because at least they knew they were getting paid for their time. There are many moments in the life of an entrepreneur when we have no such certainty.

So who has to deal with those challenges and carry that burden? Well, first and foremost the entrepreneur. But, at least as the entrepreneur, you have some sense of control and direction. Those who love you must first deal with seeing much less of you, and when you do get to enjoy time together the entrepreneur may very well be stressed, irritable, or exhausted.

My advice? Be as open and transparent with those who are closest to you before and during the process. Let them know this will be hard, that you’ll be less available, and that it will undoubtedly take its toll. Make sure they’re prepared for what’s ahead, and do your best to help them understand what’s happening in your life. The difference between being able to survive and iterate long enough to make your company successful and the runway ending before your exit may very well be the help and support that they offer you.

Erik Severinghaus is a Chicago-based serial entrepreneur and business leader. Erik was part of the founding team for iContact (a leader in email marketing) and spent six years as a consultant in IBM’s IT Optimization Practice before founding his current company, SimpleRelevance. SimpleRelevance specializes in marketing personalization and helps companies easily send the right email content to the right person at the right time, leading to revenue increases of 30-300 percent per email campaign. Learn more at SimpleRelevance.com, Find Erik on Google+ and follow him on Twitter.

Mark O’Donnell usually books his family’s summer vacation in January. For the last dozen years, that meant reserving an oceanfront house for a week in Long Beach Island, a quiet cluster of beach towns on the New Jersey shore. But this January, he didn’t book the trip. He had Sandy on his mind.

The storm ripped through LBI in late October, but for months he watched the scenes of destruction replay on TV—the whitecaps lapping storefronts on the boulevard, the houses shifted and battered. So he put off vacation planning, too wary to book a trip to a place that might be nursing gaping wounds.

Each summer, families, couples, and carloads of friends migrate to one of the 40 shore towns that dot the coast of New Jersey for brief escapes to the ocean or bay. But this year, many people who have devotedly returned to the Jersey Shore each summer are grappling with the same question that conflicted the O'Donnells: Will it be the same as it used to be?

With Memorial Day around the corner, it's a question that has taken on more urgency for prospective visitors finalizing their summer plans, and for those on the shore who depend on the seasonal influx of vacationers.

On Long Beach Island, one of the shore's marquee summer destinations, the problem is playing out in the realm of summer real estate, a key industry for much of the Shore. Realtors and homeowners on the island say they’re seeing more rental vacancies than usual for this time of year and worry that the damage from Sandy got more attention than the cleanup.

“People think we’re Seaside Heights and we’re not,” says Joe Mancini, the mayor of Long Beach, the island’s largest township. Like others on LBI, he believes that images of lingering damage in Seaside and Mantoloking, LBI’s neighbors to the north, have sowed the flawed notion that the entire Jersey shore is still damaged.

“This was a horrific storm,” Mancini adds, “but we were aggressive in cleaning it up.”

Certainly, much of the island appears to be in good shape. Fresh signs and flags adorn shops and restaurants along the island’s main drag, letting passersby know they’ve re-opened. A hilltop of debris that was parked outside the Acme supermaket, a symbol of the island's devestation, has been hauled away. The island’s main attractions, the pale sandy beaches, have been restored and will be open for the summer.

But some property owners are having trouble relaying that message to seasonal renters, still clinging to the images of flooding and mayhem. 

Todd Cohan, a 46-year-old entrepreneur who has rented out properties on LBI since 1997, cannot remember a slower summer. Neither of his two luxury oceanfront homes suffered any flooding or damage and still, with just two weeks until Memorial Day, Cohan had vacancies for 40 percent of the season.

To attract prospective guests, he’s posted current images of his properties to real estate websites Homeaway.com and Beachrentals.net. He's added a “pay by credit card” option to his listings, which is something he has never done before, and he estimates that he has emailed about 2,000 people—anyone who has ever inquired about either of his 5-bedroom properties—to see if they’d like to book a few nights.

So far, he’s gotten few positive responses. “They write back to say, ‘due to the devastation and destruction from Sandy’—What destruction? I want them to come down here and show me what they think the destruction is,” Cohan says.

Since the rentals are not his only source of income, he doesn’t expect the vacancies to cripple him, though he says he’ll certainly feel the impact. Each home goes for about $9,000 a week—money he puts toward his mortgages.

Weekly rates for rentals on LBI range in price from the high triple digits for inland cottages to more than $12,000 for exclusive oceanfront properties. While realtors say that the dip in demand has been seen across all price levels, luxury homes have taken it particularly hard.

"Normally, they go first," said Matt Kulinski from the G. Anderson real estate agency. "The way the market works, in January and February, the high-end properties go." But this year, he says, "it's been the other way around."

Vacancies are a concern for both homeowners and local businesses, which depend on a surge of summer income to last them through the slower season. LBI, an island with less than 12,000 residents, has more than 17,000 rental homes, which fill up each summer with visitors. In 2011, summertime tourists generated more than $1.2 billion in spending at restaurants, retail shops and other businesses in southern Ocean County, according to a report commissioned by the LBI Chamber of Commerce.

John Franzoni a realtor at Oceanside Realty who has been in the real estate business for the last 30 years, acknowledges that the storm was worse than any that has hit the island in generations, but doesn’t attribute the dip in rental demand to any real storm damage.

“It’s really because of the perception out there,” he said, noting that just 5 percent of his properties had to be delisted after the storm. “We’re in really good shape, we’re ready to go.”

Still, his rentals are down 20 percent from this time last year—a figure repeated at many agencies along the island—and he says the internet is partially to blame.

“Twenty years ago, on a Saturday or Sunday anytime after the Super Bowl, you’d have people lined up outside to look at rental properties,” he said, referring to the early February weekends when the wave of summer rental bookings begin. “Now, we do 80 or 90 percent of the rentals right over the internet. So that’s been a big change. If people were coming down, they would see the condition, but they only know what they’ve heard. And they’ve gotten a lot of bad reports.”

The island surely wasn’t spared. More than 3,300 applications for residential federal disaster assistance were submitted from Long Beach township alone—a township with just over 8,000 homes. And while the clean-up was aggressive, LBI still bears distinct Sandy scars. Oceanfront homes at the southern end of the island jut out of sand dunes on skinny trunks of exposed pilings. Dumpsters and construction signs still dot the island, particularly in the community of Holgate, which buzzes with the sounds of construction.

But for the most part, the sort of damage that might matter most to tourists has largely been repaired: The beaches have been cleaned and restored and Mayor Mancini says that 95 percent of LBI’s stores and restaurants will be open for business by Memorial Day.

To combat whatever negative impressions would-be visitors may be harboring, a group of LBI devotees organized a commercial aimed at New Jersey residents who may not have seen the island post-recovery. It began airing in early May on about a dozen networks, including Bravo, CNBC, Fox News and Nat Geo, after local businesses and the mayor’s office raised $50,000 for airtime.



While there’s no way to predict the impact the commercial and other publicity may have on wary visitors, rental prices point to optimism. Real estate agents say that homeowners have not lowered their prices just yet. (Cohan hasn't either.)

Kulinski from the G. Anderson Agency predicts that warmer weather will bring more business to the rental market. "When it's cold and windy and not really beach-like weather, [beach vacations] are put on the back burner." He also thinks that prospective renters are waiting to see how much progress the island makes and will eventually commit.

O'Donnell did. After four months of vacillating, he took a daytrip to LBI to assess the storm damage for himself.  He found his usual summer home in Holgate badly beaten, as he had expected. But he found plenty of other homes to choose from and settled on a 4-bedroom in Beach Haven, which he booked for a week in July.

“I was pleasantly pleased. The rest of the island seemed to be in decent shape," he said, adding that he was happy to contribute to the island's summer economy. "They’re working like demons to get it ready.”

As an entrepreneur, the most precious commodity you have is time. It's enough just to be CEO, accounts receivable/payable, secretary and janitor, but throw in public relations efforts and it feels as if one ball must fall in order to keep a new one in the air.

Truth is that in the beginning stages you most likely don't have the funding to pay for professional PR help. However you desperately need to get the word out, generate interest and sales in order to create a PR budget. It's the chicken and the egg. So what do you do?

I am here to tell you that DIY PR is totally possible with some time management tips. And, when you're ready to work with a pro, you will be more knowledgeable about PR, your story/message and your audience.

• Keep it highly targeted. I call it the Bowl of Spaghetti Theory: You throw a bowl of spaghetti up on the wall and watch to see what sticks. Some use this theory in PR by blast emailing press releases to media/bloggers and it never works. The best approach is a highly targeted one where you go directly where your audience is. Know your audience and you will know where to target your press release.

• Research the media you want to be in. Do they even cover your industry or business? You might want the "Oprah Effect" by being highlighted in "O" magazine, but editors are mostly interested only in lifestyle consumer products and services, not your computer software program. It's important to find the right media outlet that will not only reach your target audience, but will also be interested in what you have to offer. You wouldn't pitch your energy drink to the local magazine's theater editor, would you?

• Break it down. You see an opportunity for your product/service with 500 media outlets and bloggers, but with limited time that seems entirely too daunting a task so, paralyzed by the enormity, you choose to do nothing. My suggestion: Pick your top 10 or 25 media outlets (depending on your time) and chip away at the long list slowly but surely, with a focus on those that will definitely be interested to create quick hits. Give each grouping about a month and then move on to the next grouping, only following up with those media that showed previous interest.

• Make the time. Schedule out time in your week, about two to three hours, to work on your PR efforts. That means developing a media list, writing your press release, pitching media and follow up. If you stay focused and really commit during that time, you will be happy to see how much you can accomplish. It may take some time to get started, but once you get rolling and generate interest, it will be easier and worth it!

• Be available and attentive. It's important to make sure you are available to media who do show interest in your business. This means getting back to them right away when they call or email, even if they can only do an interview with you in the next hour. This is what you wanted, right? So make sure you are responsive to their requests, meet their needs, answer their questions all in as timely a fashion as possible. Otherwise, you might miss out and your efforts will all be for naught.

Jennifer Fortney is president of Cascade Communications, a boutique virtual PR and marketing communications company in Chicago focusing on small business and startups. In her 15+ year career she has worked with some of the top Fortune 500 companies and a wide variety of small businesses and startups across the country. A journalism major with music minor from the University of Kansas, she is also the PR Instructor at SCORE Chicago and founder of @MyStorySource live media pitch feed on Twitter and Facebook. @SmallBizPRXpert

Thanks to TV, it seems that pitching investors for funding or for a chance to win prize money to launch or boost startups has become more and more mainstream, and desirable. If you are looking for a chance to get in front of potential investors and pitch your business in Chicagoland, here is a list of must-attend events:

BNC Venture Capital Group

A smaller, selective event, BNC Venture Capital meets the first Tuesday of each month to introduce three early-stage companies seeking capital from accredited investors (angels, VCs and private equity firms). Companies make a 10-minute pitch to a mixed audience of investors, service providers and entrepreneurs followed by 15 minutes of Q&A. They encourage coaching prior to the pitch to ensure you make the best presentation possible.

Submissions: Send your executive summary and PowerPoint pitch deck for consideration (an email is provided on the website).

Event dates: The first Tuesday of each month. Suggest signing up for event invitations.

Our Recommendation: A more casual environment and great opportunity for startups that have fine-tuned their pitch but need opportunities to practice and get valuable feedback. It is definitely worth it to attend a few events beforehand to enhance your pitch prior to submitting, as well as meeting and talking with attendees.

Technori Pitch

Technori Pitch is a monthly showcase of innovative starters launching their brand new company, and has loads of local sponsorship and support. It has quickly become the hub for impassioned entrepreneurs, developers, designers, tech companies, investors and general tech enthusiasts.

Designed to be a showcase of launching startups, Technori Pitch gathers 550 people together in Chicago, every single month, to watch as five startups demo their company on-stage. To date, more than 100 companies have presented on their stage.

Submissions: Technori does require all hopefuls to apply for the one of five slots available at each event. The more exciting and innovative the better. The application process is pretty simple online but not everyone is selected.

Next Event: May 28, 6 p.m.

Our Recommendation: Definitely for well-practiced startups and not the faint of heart. Technori looks for startups that truly disrupt the market or create an entirely new niche or trend, and the process is highly selective. You really must attend a few events prior to applying to pitch to see if your business is a fit. And, if you don’t get selected, the after party is always fun and offers the opportunity to rub elbows with some leading Chicago innovators, investors and startup experts.

Funding Feeding Frenzy

They call it “Shark Tank Meets the Apprentice.” Next to Technori, VentureSHOT’s Funding Feeding Frenzy is the grand daddy of them all when it comes to pitch events and the potential for getting real funding for your startup -- now.

Held twice a year, this event attracts the best of the best startups and pitches in front of a panel of top investors, VCs and entrepreneurs who provide valuable feedback to make your pitch better. In the audience are a number of potential investors looking to add to their portfolios and coming to hear pitches. An exhibition area allows many more companies the chance to present their businesses to attendees, even if not selected to present. A number of awards for top Best in Show winners, decided upon by the panelists and investors, including a complimentary mentoring session at VentureSHOT, one of Chicago’s top incubators.

Submissions: There is a small application fee to submit online. Although not required you can provide a video (three minutes or less) that shows off your company. A team of judges will sift through all the applications to choose 10 final presenters. There is an additional charge if you choose to have a table in the demo/exhibition area. Each finalist will be allowed 10 minutes to present and 15 minutes of Q &.

Next event: June 18 and December 2013, TBD.

Our recommendation: This event is for those businesses that are well-practiced, had some mentorship and truly ready for funding to take them to the next level. Best to attend the day-long event to experience it and understand why they call it the Funding Feeding Frenzy. Great opportunity to network, watch and learn. Totally worth getting a demo table and purchasing a ticket for the VIP luncheon called “Meet the Money."

Jennifer Fortney is president of Cascade Communications, a boutique virtual PR and marketing communications company in Chicago focusing on small business and startups. In her 15+ year career she has worked with some of the top Fortune 500 companies and a wide variety of small businesses and startups across the country. A journalism major with music minor from the University of Kansas, she is also the PR Instructor at SCORE Chicago and founder of @MyStorySource live media pitch feed on Twitter and Facebook. @SmallBizPRXpert

Thanks to TV, it seems that pitching investors for funding or for a chance to win prize money to launch or boost startups has become more and more mainstream, and desirable. If you are looking for a chance to get in front of potential investors and pitch your business in Chicagoland, here is a list of must-attend events:

Chicago Startup Pitch Night
Focused in some of the world’s key startup cities, Startup Pitch Night provides the platform for early stage startups to practice, refine and perfect their pitch. It provides anonymous, peer-based feedback and encourages trial and error without the formal application process. It's a vibrant and fun event with high variety, speed and brevity at its core, coupled with a short talk on the next steps after the refinement of the pitch, from a startup industry leader.

Event dates: Launching in Chicago this July. Join the Meetup group for more information.

Selection process: Stay tuned to its website, or join the Meetup group, for details.

Our recommendation: I spoke to an organizer of the group who is excited about Startup Pitch Night launching in Chicago. Definitely worth attending to learn more about their process and for networking. Looks like a good practice opportunity for beginners.

SCORE Chicago Annual Elevator Pitch Contest 

If you are unfamiliar with SCORE, it is the mentoring and learning arm of the Small Business Administration. Long known for offering up a collection of highly experienced, retired executives to small businesses looking for mentorship, it has begun to expand in recent years with more offerings. The Annual Elevator Pitch Contest is presented by the Office of City Treasurer Stephanie D. Neely in coordination with SCORE Chicago and offers a First Place Award of $5,000, plus additional prizes and opportunities.

Submissions: Ends June 9, 2013.

Requirements:
• Round 1: Written 60-second elevator pitch
• Round 2: 60-second YouTube video of your written pitch
o Must attend a free SCORE Chicago Workshop on Elevator Pitch and Compelling Video Message
o Automatically entered into “Snipitch” Contest aimed at helping to create the most “buzz” for the contest on social media. Winner receives a complimentary booth at the Small Business Expo 2013.
• Third round: Businesses will receive a time slot on Chicago CAN-TV for a more in-depth look at their business proposition.

Our Recommendation: Ideal for first-timers who have never pitched before to learn and practice the initial qualities of a good pitch to investors.  

Jennifer Fortney is president of Cascade Communications, a boutique virtual PR and marketing communications company in Chicago focusing on small business and startups. In her 15+ year career she has worked with some of the top Fortune 500 companies and a wide variety of small businesses and startups across the country. A journalism major with music minor from the University of Kansas, she is also the PR Instructor at SCORE Chicago and founder of @MyStorySource live media pitch feed on Twitter and Facebook. @SmallBizPRXpert

Business partnerships are pseudo-marriages, and finding a cofounder who complements you can be as grueling as dating. However, the relationship between partners can be the deciding factor in a startup’s success. We credit four philosophies for our success and growth.

Don’t cofound with friends

We met in a business setting before becoming friends. Jeff was an intern at a software development company where Jim was a leader. By meeting in a professional manner first, we built a foundation on respect before becoming close friends. We have seen startups split because cofounders were friends first and took advantage of the friendship in business dealings. Now, our families vacation together, we go to Bears games and some weeks we talk more with each other than our spouses. However, mutual respect has always been the basis of our friendship.

Do have similar spending habits

Before we formed a startup together, we looked at how we both spent money personally. While there is arguably no right or wrong way to spend money, partners need to spend it in a similar way. Business partnerships break up over money issues just like marriages do. Since we both spend frugally, we don’t fight about finances.

Don’t be a carbon copy of your partner

Having a cofounder who complements your skills increases your competencies within the partnership. If both founders have the same experience and specialties, capability gaps will exist. Jeff had the technology brains, great ideas and existing clientele; Jim had the capital, management experience and professional network to start our company on a sound footing. Our mutual skill sets cover all the bases needed for our firm.

Do factor in morals

We had both been burned at past companies that did not treat their employees in a fair way, so it was important that we both had the same moral standards to run the company in an agreeable way. If there was one French fry left between us at the end of lunch, we would both push it to the other guy. We had no hesitations joining together in business.

Since our foundation was built on these four principles, all it took was a walk around the park and a handshake for us to form our 50/50 partnership. Seventeen years later, we haven’t changed a thing.

Jeff Scheper and Jim Lagattuta are the co-founders of Prescient Solutions, a Chicago-based IT outsourcing firm providing CIO-level advisory support and on-site IT services to organizations and government entities.

This one comes from Gamasutra, the games-industry-focused site, but it still has plenty of relevance to entrepreneurs and anyone who wants to make apps. There are plenty of legitimate complaints to be made against Apple’s service, but, unfortunately, or fortunately, however you look at it, it’s the best thing we got going. It’s centralized. Everyone’s there. But, yeah, there are a lot of problems.

Although, it should be stated, that Apple is aware of these problems and complaints. Since Steve Jobs’ death, there have been a number of huge Apple missteps (like the “continuously improving” Maps app, which infamously got an Apple product manager fired), and the App Store is no exception. Earlier this year, the App Store was hiring editorial people to help make that part of iTunes much more user-friendly. To add trailers of apps in use. To help improve what’s called “discoverability.”

That’s the problem with the store being successful, though: It gets harder and harder to find stuff in the store.

So, rather than gripe to Apple and be a digital drop in the e-bucket, there are things to do that are much more proactive.

There’s an infographic over at Gamasutra laying all this out. I won’t recite them here, but some are kind of interesting and aren’t super-common knowledge. For example:

• Don’t spell numbers.
• Use your company’s logo.
• Use URL-safe characters.
• Have friends and family rate your game.

Read the full list here.

David Wolinsky is a freelance writer and a lifelong Chicagoan. In addition to currently serving as IFC’s comedy, film, and TV blogger, he's also a comedy-writing instructor for Second City and an adjunct professor in DePaul’s College of Computing and Digital Media. (He also co-runs a blog behind the DePaul class, DIY Game Dev.) He was the Chicago city editor for The Onion A.V. Club where he provided in-depth daily coverage of this city's bustling arts/entertainment scene for half a decade. His first career aspirations were to be a game-show host.

I stumbled upon a post called “Why Images Matter to Your Content Marketing” over on networksolutions.com, so this must mean that there are some skeptics over there who think words and words alone are enough to get your message across in your marketing.

That might be true, if you’re an artful designer with some really inventive and unusual ideas to grab attention. But, even at a glance, it’s easy for words in ads alongside articles like this to blend in with the article. It’s like Google AdWords — whatever you think of them and their efficacy, our brains are conditioned to block them out or just ignore them. I forget the exact statistic, but I believe we are exposed to something like hundreds, if not thousands, of ads on a daily basis.

It’s a little like what going to Tokyo is like for most Americans: We’re struck by how neon the city is and all the activity and the unexpected “craziness” that city provides. For example: I vacationed there a few years back and will never forget the time I was passing through a mall and saw a mandrill in a sailor suit performing for fruit.

To everyone there, it was just an everyday occurrence. But me? I’ll remember that for the rest of my life.

All of this is a long way of saying that, yes, you definitely need images in your marketing to keep your content from disappearing into the periphery. There are other reasons, too, Network Solutions points out: “Images also provide an important way to improve your content’s rank in search engines. If you include images in a blog post, for example, be sure to tag the image with the keywords you want your business to be found for when customers do a search.”

If you’re still skeptical, read the full post here.  

David Wolinsky is a freelance writer and a lifelong Chicagoan. In addition to currently serving as IFC’s comedy, film, and TV blogger, he's also a comedy-writing instructor for Second City and an adjunct professor in DePaul’s College of Computing and Digital Media. (He also co-runs a blog behind the DePaul class, DIY Game Dev.) He was the Chicago city editor for The Onion A.V. Club where he provided in-depth daily coverage of this city's bustling arts/entertainment scene for half a decade. His first career aspirations were to be a game-show host.