Spongecell

There seems to be a ton happening in NYC tonight for the Web/Entrepreneurial community tonight. We’ll be attending and presenting at Web2NewYork, then there’s the NY Tech Meetup as well as a Startup Alpha event. Our NY office will be well represented at each of these events. It should be a fun and busy night and we’re looking forward to meeting a bunch of folks and of course talking about Spongecell.

Park Ave Cd’s of Orlando Florida has built a following of over three thousand fans on MySpace and even more on their store website, and it’s not difficult to see why. They have a packed schedule of performances, listening parties, midnight sales, meet-n-greets; the list goes on.

They stumbled onto our site a few months ago and began managing their busy schedule of events with a list widget. After they published the list on both their store website and MySpace page, they blogged about how our application has helped them get the word out, further and easier. All events are managed from the same account (big time saver when you have so many events), and are aggregated into one list so fans can easily navigate . Read below, or check it out on their blog!

Howdy, everyone! This blog is a special blog for us (read: me) here at PARK AVE CDs because we want to share with you a very special Website and Promotion Utility we think you’ll love! WE LOVE IT!

It’s called SPONGECELL and it’s awesome. We use it to post store events and other PACD happenings, too. Best part, aside from being super easy to use and very powerful… it’s FREE! You just have to check it out for yourself, honestly. People can add our events to Myspace, Facebook, iCal, and numerous other places. Another awesome feature is folks can set “reminders” about events, and receive them via email or TXT Message!

Hey, it’s free and, as far as i’m concerned, (yeah, i’m a little dorky with this kind of stuff) totally badass.

Take a look at how awesome the Hip Hop Association’s homepage looks with a new event list widget. Every event added to Spongecell receives it’s own live web page, and they took their event page customization to the max:

• Designed a creative hip hop header image.
• Provide a link to buy tickets to the event.
• Uploaded the official flyer for each different event.
• A google map (so you don’t get lost)
• RSVP widget, to gauge the turnout.
• Post comments, so people can talk up the event (just like your Facebook wall)
• Actions widget for users to spread the event around the web to blogs, websites, social networks MySpace/Facebook, set reminders or add to calendar.

Great way to bring the hip hop community around the country, a little closer together. Check out the list widget for upcoming events, Erykah Badu and the Roots anyone?

Last Friday Spongecell attended Podcamp NYC 2.0, a first & rewarding experience all around. The day kicked off with two Spongecell lectures given by CEO Ben Kartzman, and by days end our three Spongecell representatives were making tons of new introductions and networking with a wide range of professionals, eager to learn about new media tools. The range of participants was most impressive including firemen from the NYFD, educators, media & music industry professionals, and CEO Ben Kartzman even got to deliver his first live podcast with podcaster Johnny Goldstein !

We’re very thankful to the organizers of Podcamp for allowing us to set up a table at the last minute, which allowed us to take advantage of meeting participants between sessions throughout the day. The day turned out to be as much about relationship building as skill building; and the wide turnout reaffirms the need for easy to use interactive tools, across industries. We look forward to attending future Podcamp’s, and working with Podcamp participants to simplify and streamline their online marketing, as the demand for interactive continues to grow universally.

If anyone from Podcamp NYC was unable to attend this week’s Webinar, you can register here for next Wednesday at 2 pm EST.

Spongecell founder and CSO Marc Guldimann was featured in an interview this week on the Carnegie Mellon University website.

“Guldimann and his colleagues are the founders of Spongecell, a firm specializing in calendar technology established in 2005. Spongecell aims to be be the best way to communicate about events online. It offers attendees tools to easily move email and web-based event information to other media, like calendars and Facebook, increasing the probability they will attend.”

Read the full interview here!

A critical question for anyone looking to get involved with the growing opportunities in the world of Web 2.0: how much does it cost? Financial concern is a given, but companies who are supplementing existing marketing efforts already in place are also rightfully concerned about the cost of time. The truth is, you don’t need a lot of time, money, or technical skill to jump head first into the world of Web 2.0. So in the interest of time, here’s a rundown on the most time efficient ways to build a presence with a variety of Web 2.0 tools. Short and sweet.

Twitter- Think of this as a public instant message to the world about what’s on your mind.

Yelp/ Technorati- Find our what people are saying about you

Flickr- Humanize your company.

Comment on Blogs- Post a comment and link back to your blog/site.

Facebook group- Build a following and broadcast news to social networkers.

MySpace page-Slightly more work than Facebook, but lots of opportunity to extend your reach.

Blog- Share a unique point of view on your industry.

Run a Site- If you build it, people will come.

Spongecell- Give your new Web 2.0 presence an interactive facelift. Spongecell applications can live on your website, blog, MySpace, Facebook, Flickr, Twitter. And what does it cost? A few simple steps that can be done on a busy schedule, a short fuse, and a tight budget. There’s really no excuse not to check it out.

Next Friday April 25-26 our CEO Ben Kartzman will be speaking at Podcamp NYC 2.0 at Brooklyn Polytechnic University about using widgets and social media to market events, generate sales and stimulate sign ups.

This is Podcamp NYC’s second “unconference”, which brings together leaders in new media to educate participants on how to use, implement, and share all the cutting edge new media tools: Podcasts, videocasts, blogs, Second Life, Facebook, You Tube, and Spongecell. The goal is to help participants learn about the great tools out there that are transforming the way we communicate in a multimedia world.

The conference is free to attend, and if you have any interest in learning about the value of integrating new media into online marketing strategies, you’ll want to take a look at the scheduled speakers and topics.If you want to attend, you can email PCNYC2@gmail.com

Watch Spongecell CEO Ben Kartzman and VP of Business Development Mikhail LaPushner discuss the potential of social media with IPG’s Bant Breen.

Anyone familiar with Squidoo? The Squidoo community is composed of unique pages of info (called lenses). You can create a lens about ANYTHING, and they range from insightful global warming solutions,to the cowabunga blog (ninja turtles anyone?), all the way to (and I quote) “would you trade your daughter for a cow?”

Squidoo’s founder is none other than the marketing genius, Seth Godin and the general premise of the site is that anyone can get creative about a passion or expertise, share their knowledge, and make a little money for yourself and/or charity. The holy grail for any lens, is to make it to the #1 spot (either on all of Squidoo, or within a specific category). The top 100 list is also highly coveted, which means there are many lensmasters out there looking for ways to plug their lens: adding it to del.icio.us, favoring it on StumbleUpon, and thoughtfully selecting tags.

With so many lensmasters looking for the magic touch (similair to all you bloggers), and some are truly mastering the art of making a lens (with over a 100 each) an interactive list widget to promote your lens on your blog or website, will help circulate word about the lens both inside and outside the Squidoo community, and launch your lens and blog to the top. Check out our new lens, we’d love to get your feedback, and if you’re feeling inspired..why not write a lens yourself and put the power of the sponge to work!

Whether you’re the owner of a local business or a large organization, there’s a lot to be gained from establishing an online presence. Last weekend, as I was wandering around my local farmer’s market, I overheard a woman upset that the fresh produce was cleaned out, and the web-savvy farmer slipped her his card and suggested placing an order in advance on the site.

A farm with a website; isn’t that some kind of oxymoron? The fact is, local internet marketing isn’t difficult, expensive, or time consuming, so why shouldn’t farmers and everyone else be marketing their business online?

Local businesses realize their customers are going online in greater numbers to search for local products and services. However, there is considerable confusion and frustration on the part of local businesses on how to reach customers on the Net. They don’t know where to start, or whom to turn to. –Fred Waters, President Local Online Marketing Association
If you’re sitting at your computer reading this blog, brainstorm some local businesses you visit on a weekly basis, who could benefit from simple, easy to use (free) online tools to spread word about what’s going on in their business:

- Libraries: calendar to promote the weekly schedule of children’s book reading.

- Grocery Stores: calendar to promote weekly specials, or a list of special events.

- Gyms: online calendar to promote weekly schedule of exercise classes.

- Restaurants: online calendar promoting weekly specials, or list of events -maybe promoting a wine tasting

-Clothing Stores: online calendar/list of events to promote sales, arrival of new inventory.

Next time you stop in, it’s worth taking a few minutes to extend yourself and share with them a package of online marketing tools that will help to more effectively reach their community. And then, next time you check back at their website, you’ll learn something new (maybe Sunday-1/2 priced wine night) and probably share that with someone you know..and they’ll share with friends and family..(and that is the secret behind Spongecell’s reach!)