Breaking News: Jerusalem Post Purchases Israpreneur
By · CommentsI am very excited to announce that The Jerusalem Post has purchased our blog, Israpreneur. According to our agreement I will not be able to disclose the purchase amount, but it is in the seven figure mark. I will continue to write for the blog and posts will be integrated into the Jerusalem Post website.
It makes perfect sense for Jpost as they will get high quality writing from the view of an entrepreneur on the ground in Israel and it makes sense for me as it gives me wider circulation. It’s also great for the readers as we will be producing more quality content including a weekly video show. There are a lof exciting things coming down the pipe.
Happy Purim Everyone! 
I am very excited to announce that my company, Qoof, is a Red Herring Global 100 winner. When starting a company you often dream about being recognized amongst the other big companies if the world. This award is the most prestigious one we have won to date since we were up against thousands of other private Hi-Tech companies around the world who have won awards in their location over the past three years. The Red Herring Global 100 is a huge achievement for our company and I again want to commend the awesome job our team has been and continues to do. We won’t stop till the top 
Mazel Tov to the other three Israeli companies that also won!
Below if the official Press Release:
Qoof, The Video Commerce Company, Wins Prestigious Red Herring Global 100 Award
January 19, 2010, Laguna Niguel, California – Red Herring on Friday announced its Global 100 award in recognition of the leading private companies from North America, Europe, and Asia, celebrating these startups’ innovations and technologies across their respective industries.
Red Herring’s Global 100 list has become a mark of distinction for identifying promising new companies and entrepreneurs. Red Herring editors were among the first to recognize that companies such as Google, Yahoo, Skype, Netscape, Salesforce.com, YouTube, and eBay would change the way we live and work.
“Choosing the best out of the previous three years was by no means a small feat,” said Alex Vieux, publisher and CEO of Red Herring. “After rigorous contemplation and discussion, we narrowed down our list from 1,200 potential companies to 200 finalists. Trying to get it down to 100 companies was a task upon itself. The top 100 companies who were chosen should be extremely proud, the competition was difficult.”
Red Herring’s editorial staff evaluated the companies on both quantitative and qualitative criteria, such as financial performance, technology innovation, management quality, strategy, and market penetration. This assessment of potential is complemented by a review of the track record and standing of startups relative to their sector peers, allowing Red Herring to see past the “buzz” and make the list an invaluable instrument of discovery and advocacy for the greatest business opportunities from around the world.
“This is a huge honor for us and shows off the hard work and quality of the entire Qoof team”, says Richard Kligman, Qoof’s Founder. “While this reward recognizes the team and the powerful technology behind our platform, the real reward for us is the ROI we are bringing our clients.” 
“Video Commerce is an arrow that has just been shot in the air”, states Jonathan Stefansky, Qoof’s CEO. “2010 will be a break out year for Video Commerce and Qoof has been the leading video commerce platform since we coined the term back in 2006. We look forward to releasing new technologies in the coming months which will continue our fast paced growth.
About Red Herring
Red Herring is a global media company uniting the world’s best high-technology innovators, venture investors, and business decision-makers in a variety of forums: a leading innovation magazine, an online daily technology news service, technology newsletters, and major events for technology leaders around the globe. Red Herring provides an insider’s view of the global innovation ecosystem, featuring unparalleled insights on the emerging technologies driving the economy.
For more information contact Anam Alpenia at: aalpenia@redherring.com
About Qoof Ltd.
Qoof is revolutionizing the way companies use video, transforming a branding tool into a fully interactive commerce experience. They are taking the world of rich media advertising, to the next level. Qoof’s unique platform and technology merges video and commerce with analytical reporting and multivariate testing to optimize performance driving higher click throughs and conversions. Given the dominant role that video will play in the future of web advertising, Qoof is well positioned to head that transformation with its industry leading solution.
For more information visit us at http://qoof.com or follow us at http://twitter.com/qoof
Thinking outside of the Box
By · CommentsIt drives me crazy when I see businesses in Israel conduct business like everyone else. Meaning just doing what everyone else is doing. There is a severe lack of creativity and of “metooisms”. What’s meetooisms? Metooisms is creating a business like someone else because they are already doing it. I was thinking about this rescently when I heard that yet another candy store is opening up in Bet Shemesh.
Now I wish the owners success, but do we really need a new candy store? There is already two of them in Ramat Bet Shemesh and a big one in the industrial area. So does that mean they can’t succeed? Of course not, they can succeed if they decide to think out of the box! Make themselves stand out. Be different!
One idea I had is to be in touch with all the schools in the neighborhood and offer big lollipops with a ribbon around it for teachers to give out to kids who learn the best each week or for when finishing a book of the Torah or many other reasons. Or even smaller treats to hand out. Just make sure that each ribbon has the name of your store and these 2 words “10% Off”.
Now you will stick out! Now you are creating incentives for kids to do well and the schools/teachers are happy with the free gift to give out and you get parents that now have two good reasons to come into your store. The first is because they feel appreciation for the free gift and second because they now have a 10% off coupon to use.
So will the new store do this? Unfortunately I doubt it. It’s hard to break out of the box of Metooisims.
First I need to say thanks to Avi Fine for sending this my way. Have you ever watched a video that just made you throw your hands up and say “I Give Up” or “You Win”. I am an entrepreneur and I love coming up with great ideas and seeing them come to fruition and I have lots of great ideas, but then I watched this video and said to myself why am I even bothering. This guy is the future. I told Avi that Micosoft or the like should buy him for $25 million a year and that would probably be a bargain. Watch this video, but don’t give up, get inspired!
>>NOTE: This teleseminar happened a week ago, but now you can download the recording.
Conflicts between marketing and operations are legion, even
legendary. And you can spend hours mediating only to have the
conflict resurface the next week.
OR, you can resolve the issue at the STRUCTURAL level and resolve
it for GOOD.
When one CEO got tired of mediating between marketing and
operations, he realized how to resolve it PERMANENTLY: He
manipulated the underlying structure causing the problems.
The result? Marketing started selling products they previously
said couldn’t be sold. Operations now produced what marketing
wanted to sell and the CEO suddenly had FREE TIME to do what really
moved his company forward.
This IS NOT just about marketing and sales. Nor is it only for
large companies. These are just examples. It IS for all of us who
realize that “the best way to move ahead is to make myself better.”
Join me for a free teleseminar called:
“The Critical 10% of Management Skills that Make You Look
Brilliant 90% of the Time.”
Register here: http://www.dovgordon.biz/the-10-percent.htm
In this teleseminar, I’ll share this story and others to help
you understand how to see the STRUCTURES that lie beneath whatever
you’re doing so you can begin to MANIPULATE them.
When you change things on the structural level, they change FOR
GOOD. Which sure beats revisiting the same issues week after week, doesn’t it?
If you believe in the 90-10 Law, (or 80-20) the Pareto Principle, which says
that 90% of your results flow from 10% of your activities, then you
understand that 10% of your management know-how will be responsible
for 90% of your results.
And in my experience working with CEOs and owners of small and mid-sized
companies there are a small number of STRUCTURES, that when you
learn and master them, directly bump up your results as a business
owner or executive.
Join me. You’ll see IMMEDIATE RESULTS. Dina did:
“I have a details-oriented client who knows what she wants but not
how to articulate it to others (i.e. me). On hearing about the
management structures in Dov’s 10-90 seminar, I realized the
invaluable information he gave was immediately applicable to my
situation.
“Since I knew the management structures thanks to Dov’s seminar, I
knew to ask leading questions, keep us from getting sidetracked,
and to determine what she wanted done. We are both happier with our
working relationship now.”
Dina Gaines, Business to business and fundraising copywriter
—
And listen to Dan Barak:
“I would like to take a moment and recommend that you listen in on
this teleseminar with Dov.
“Dov delivers high quality sessions, filled with great insights and
fascinating examples. I’ve listened to his talks before and got great value out of them.
“I think that if you choose to devote the time (and only time since
it’s free) to this session, you’ll see Dov is really set out to deliver
value to his audience and will make sure you have the chance to start
improving yourselves immediately.”
Best regards,
-Dan Barak, CEO Bloggersbase.com
Register now: “The Critical 10% of Management Skills that Make You
Look Brilliant 90% of the Time.”
Register here now: http://www.dovgordon.biz/the-10-percent.htm
Questions?
Email or call.
Dov Gordon
+972-2-992-0396
+972-54-790-2740
dovgordon@gmail.com
http://www.GordonGroupEC.com
PS: Anyone who joins the live call will ALSO receive a free GIFT copy
of a seminar I did recently on “How to Strengthen Your Negotiating
Position.” It’s about practical things you can do to substantially
strengthen your position in your market.
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=84b19e8f-e385-44ed-965f-0bfa7f53e9e1 "Teleseminar Invitation: How One CEO Resolved an Unresolvable Conflict The Critical 10% of Management Skills that Make You Look Brilliant 90% of the Time")
See if you recognize this treacherous
thought pattern because like ants in the summer,
it finds a tiny opening, squeezes in and takes over.
This is the first in a series in which we’ll
look at the many ways we unwittingly
over-complicate our businesses – and how to stop
and SIMPLIFY.
—
AND – since you registered for the 10-90 teleseminar recently,
there’s a special offer for you below.
—
“The medicine doesn’t work in our house.”
My 3 year old daughter complained that her ear hurt.
My wife dripped some drops into her ear and gave
her some Tylenol. “It still hurts,” she said
after swallowing the medicine.
“Give it some time,” said my wife.
An hour later, while at a neighbor’s house, my
wife asked how her ear was feeling. “Now it’s
better,” she said. “The medicine doesn’t
work in our house.”
One of those precious “from the mouth of babes” moments.
And yet that’s a mistake we often make in our
own businesses: We draw conclusions that REALITY
will refuse to support.
—
Here are some random examples:
An important prospect doesn’t reply to your
email and you worry he’s not interested.
Maybe. Maybe not. All we know is that we
didn’t RECEIVE a reply. We can’t even be sure
he didn’t reply. Perhaps his reply was snatched
as a tithe by the great cyber email-eater. Or,
thanks to the email program’s autocomplete
feature, it sped off to someone else who shares
your first name without your prospect realizing.
When we look at the EVIDENCE – the cold, hard
facts – all we see is that we expected a reply
and it hasn’t come. If we start ADDING MEANING
to the evidence, we abandon common sense and
distort reality.
—
Consider this scenario: Did you ever hire
someone you HOPED would do the job? You knew they
could to part of the job, and you HOPED they’d
do it all. But you really didn’t have a good
reason to believe it.
This is just another example of over-complicating
what really is simple. We don’t have evidence to
support what we want to believe and yet we march
forward in hopes that we can defy a natural law.
—
But WHY do we do this?
The first reason is we’re under a LOT of
pressure. Stress and pressure dumbs-down your
innate intelligence. We have an urgent need to
add an employee to our team. And so we let the
ants march right in…
The second reason lies at the STRUCTURAL level.
You need to train your mind to SEPARATE ISSUES.
Yes, you may have a desperate need for a new
employee. But that is one issue. Whether or not
you should hire THIS employee, is a decision of
its own.
—
The bottom line is that when you permit yourself
to only worry and fear things supported by the
cold hard facts, your business life will simplify.
That’s just REALITY.
—
DO THIS NOW because it’ll save you at least an
hour today. Think of a worrying situation and ask
yourself:
- “What conclusions am I tempted to draw?”
“What am I afraid will happen, or has
happened?” List them.
- For each item listed, ask: “Do I have
OBSERVABLE EVIDENCE to support this conclusion?”
- If the answer is “yes,” plan appropriate
preventive and contingent steps. If the answer is
“no,” then REFUSE to worry about it and
continue as before.
This five minute exercise will probably save you
days or weeks of worry and indecision.
And the medicine will work – also in your house.
—
As always, I invite you to reply with your
reactions.
Dov Gordon
dovgordon@gmail.com
+972-2-992-0396
www.DovGordon.biz/the-10-percent.htm
Happy 1 Year Anniversary to Israpreneur
By · Comments
Today marks the one year anniversary to the very first post on this blog! When I first launched this blog the goal was to become a sort of forum where english speaking entrepreneurs can come together and give advice and help each other out because of the current economic situation. If you read the very first post you will see that I was hoping to have a lot of participation and to have many people writing articles and to share their wealth of knowledge. What actually ended up happenning is that 99% of the posts are written by me and just a tiny fraction by Dov Gordon and others.
The Good news is is that in just a year we have seen some nice growth in terms of subscribers to the blog as well as monthly readers and this continues to grow.
The fact that we don’t have more people writing articles for this blog is mainly my fault since I haven’t been actively going after other writers, but in the next 12 months I would love to see this blog grow from just me abnd Dov to 6-8 writers. So if you have something you feel would add to our readers then please send me an email at editor@israpreneur.com and I would love to post it! And who knows, maybe you will become a weekly writer for us.
Happy Chanukah and Happy Anniversary!
Nachum Kligman
Last year I wrote a chanukah complaint about the lack of donuts that had some serious cream inside and although there are more and new flavors coming out every year, there is still a lack of what I call the 80/20 donut rule and that is that 80% of the donut should be filling and 20% should be dough.
You can read my thoughts on this from last year here: http://israpreneur.com/i-want-my-custard-doughnut-filled-with-cream/
Now it could be that I didn’t get a chance to check out all the bakeries this year and my dream donut may still be available. If it is, can you please let me know in the comments? Also let me know if you have found the “perfect donut” and where you can get it and why.
To all my readers I want to wish you a Happy Chanukah!
Those that know me (ahem… My Wife) knows that I love gadgets. It’s true and it is not so painful to admit it. And for the last 3 years every technology blog and magazine has been talking about the iPhone and how great it is and how it’s a game changer (which it is) etc.. I never got one as I don’t believe in jail breaking it since I always feel you will lose out on some aspects and you can never get proper support. So I was very excited a few months ago when it was first reported that the iPhone will finally be coming to Israel.
And now, that day has finally arrived. Tonight at 12:01am or tomorrow morning if you are with Orange you will be able to buy the iPhone in all its glory here in Israel.
But I won’t be running out to get one and I am still unsure if I will get one at all as I have my eye on another phone which I will mention below.
Here are a few of the reasons why:
- Using an Apple product on an Orange network does not sit well with me (ok, that was a very bad joke)
- The Hype: The hype around the product I have no problem with as it is being done around the world and everyone knows that the iPhone is one of the best smartphones, if not the best smartphone on the market today. My problem is also not with the hype and marketing in Israel. My problem is with all the hype without knowing exactly how much it is going to cost, how long you need to be locked into a contract for, what your monthly data plans are going to cost etc. The big companies are all holding back pricing hoping to get the first 240,000 suckers to purchase the phone w/o caring what the costs will be. The fear of missing out on getting one and being one of the first to get one will be too strong for many people and many will be over paying for something they can not afford.
- The pricing: As above we don’t know what the pricing will be, but from what the rumor mill is saying it will cost 800NIS upfront and then 150nis/month for x amount of months plus the need to pay for data depending on how much you will use it. So even though they are selling you a product that seems to be discounted 2000nis, in the end if it is a three year plan you will have ended up paying 6200 NIS plus your data plan. That’s a lot of money to be stuck with one phone for.
- Being Stuck: As above you will be stuck with this iPhone for probably three years yet there will be a new iPhone coming out with even better and more amazing features way before that. As well as other great phones and operating systems that finally are catching up to Apple in terms of look and feel. Are you going to be able to last 3 years with the same phone? I start to get jittery after about 6 months.
- Will it Blend: Ok, I don’t really care if it will blend in a blender, but I do care about how well will it work here in Israel and if all the features work well. Does the GPS work properly? Is the keyboard both in English and Hebrew? Does the Visual Voice mail work well or at all? How is the phone call quality? What bugs will there be that will need ironing out?
- According to this article we won’t have access to iTunes http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1110801.html
- I have found a better phone that comes unlocked that is giving iPhone a run for it’s money. That phone is the HTC HD2. You can watch a video review of the phone here: http://smartphones.tv/category/htc/htchd2/ You can do your research, but this phone which runs on Windows Mobile 6.5 and has a larger screen then the iPhone is for me the phone to get. It will cost you a one time fee of about $800 and is really a great phone. The one thing that is holding me back is that I don’t want to get stuck with Windows Mobile 6.5 when Windows Mobile 7.0 should be coming out in 2010 and is suppose to be much better. I am just waiting for confirmation that the phone will be upgradeable.
But before I make a final decision I want to wait for feedback for the iPhone here in Israel and see if there are apps available or apps being developed that makes it a better phone to have here. If people are really raving over it and I can wait till the prices drop a bit or find out that they are not as expensive as I think they will be and there are no other hidden costs, then I may still get one. Time will tell.
So what are you going to do? Please comment and let me know if you will be standing online tomorrow and if you do get one let me know as I would love to share your thoughts with our readers.
Video: YouTube Co-Founder, Chad Hurley, Visits Israel
By · Comments
Had I known earlier he was coming, I would have made some room in our schedule to have him come down and take a close look at Qoof, The Video Commerce Company
