MyFitnessPalv2

A follow up to the previous post - I've been using MyFitnessPal for the last two weeks. It's made a noticeable difference in conscious eating. It's also helpful to see how much concentration is needed to maintain the level of protein consumption I'm working on.

Hot Chocolate 15k

Why you should be careful about putting on a terrible road race in the era of social media. Many reviews, including several from friends, of the Hot Chocolate 15k.

MyFitnessPal

I've been using MyFitnessPal.com for the last week or so for tracking meals. it's been great. There's a Blackberry app, as well as a web page, and it's been really useful for seeing what the actual nutritional content of things I'm eating are. The two takeaways have been that I'm eating considerably more carbs than I think, and that getting over 200g of protein a day requires a concerted effort, and several whey protein/water shakes.

BNX, pt. 2

BNX release earnings for Q3.  While not great, the main takeaway (and I'll post more later) was that they've got enough money to get to Q1, that's when they tend to get cash flow positive given the emphasis or their business on tax season.  So, even it they get delisted, they should be able to continue on, while holding on to their portfolio of domain names.  It appears one of their bigger holders is going to get out regardless of price, which seems to be the reason for the rapid decline over the last two days.
If you've got some mad money laying around, it looks even better at 4 cents/share, than it did a 8.

If you're interested in SEO, PubCon always has some good information.  Good liveblog information linked below:

Pubcon Day 2:
Pubcon event takeaway: Some fascinating thoughts on how to avoid having to use captchas
Pubcon Day 3:

BNX

Occasionally, I'll see a teeny, tiny stock I'm curious about.  Currently, that stock is BNX.  At a recent price of $.08, the entire company is valued around $2.1MM.  It's traded on the Amex, and is about two to three weeks away from being delisted, unless they can get an exception.

Looking at the financial numbers, as of June 2010, they had 147k in cash.  On a yearly run rate, their finance related business (based on about 700K in Q2) is probably about 2.5MM/year.

They just announced they sold Look.com for $400k on Friday.  If assuming their cash position really didn’t change much in Q3 (they’re exiting the search business, so the business will look smaller, presumably they’re rightsizing for that, it’s after the tax season, etc), they probably will have about 500k in cash to start November.

They’ve done a variety of things to raise cash (they borrowed 600k against Banks.com for working capital, the CEO’s loaned the company money, etc.)

They have 9MM in intangible assets, which they’re gradually depreciating.  If they were forced to liquidate, it’s my belief you could sell 3 of their domains (irs.com, banks.com, and filelater.com) for 3 to 5MM.  Given the market cap is 2MM, the stock could potentially pay out 100%, even if it was forced to liquidate off the pink sheets.  Obviously, if you bought it higher anytime over the last few years, you’d be unhappy.  However, if you can buy shares for $.08, it seems relatively low risk, even if you’re going to end up holding an unlisted stock for a while.

There may be an opportunity to pick up more low cost shares between now and year end, as any existing holders take the tax loss - so definitely worth putting this one on your radar screen.

More to come...

Food Trucks

Last night, I attended the SMCDC event at Edelman downtown

in DC. The focus was on food trucks.

 

Observations:

• From the marketing standpoint, they seem to be surfing the wave of
being first.
• No formal marketing program - "currating" the community that they have.
• Partnerships only if beneficial.
• They don’t want to feel too corporate.
• Don’t use too much in tools.
• Key element appears to be managing/growing community.

I asked a question about saturation - is there a network effect of having more food trucks apear, or is there a limited market?

The Big Cheese and Cupcake truck synergistic, goingsomewhere together.

Reference to owners with 4 trucks (taco truck) starting to have overlap.

Traditional media will be tougher as there are trucks - is there a novelty in the third cupcake truck?

Truckeroo "activates spaces" 25k people to a location.

 

 

Bad Customer service alert

Reposting for my brother: Doubletree hotel in downers grove, il refused to extend our wedding rate an extra night when we got in early - then I gave them a low score on their online survey - they called to "resolve" the issue - and told me they refused to do anything for us! For $30 they could have had a fan for life - instead I will make sure I never stay there again!

Wachovia's transition

Wachovia's in the process of rebranding as Wells Fargo. For the past three or four weeks, it appears that the signs outside of every Wachovia have been replaced by vinyl Wachovia signs. Clearly, this is because of the need to install thousands of permanent Wells Fargo signs in advance of the changeover. So, those signs have been installed, and thousands of vinyl signs with the current Wachovia logo are in place until the changeover, when, presumably, they'll be recycled or trashed.

Wachovia ATMs also currently end transactions with the equivalent of "We know that many banks would be delighted to have you as a customer, and we appreciate you banking with us." This violates one of the key marketing tenets, which is, "don't give people a reason to think about going elsewhere." My initial, and not-unique reaction was something along the lines of "why, yes, I'm an important customer. Is there somewhere else that would like my business?".

Traditionally, with big bank mergers, 1+1 equals 2.5. With this start, Wells Fargo-Wachovia looks unlikely to buck the trend.

Socks from Switzerland

In a sign that the group shopping craze continues to spread, and is now rapidly approaching the ridiculous "we're giving away free money, to get you to sign up with us" stage of things, two recent examples.

The Living Social "get $20 on Amazon for $10" deal.

And, a deal from Black Socks.com that wound up with me getting a pair of cashmere socks, shipped from Switzerland, for essentially $7.

Nice as a consumer, but clearly getting to be tougher to build a business moving forward, if that's the kind of promos you need.

Slow slide of blogging?

Good article in the NY Times yesterday on the slow decline of blogging. Also, a good counter reaction in Marketing Pilgrim as well. Not sure if there's really a trend, but personally I definitely get more reaction off Facebook posts, so I tend to gravitate there for sharing information / getting feedback.

Samsung HLS- 4666W

Jeremy's always talking about raving fans. Well, Samsung earned themselves one last week. I had bought a 46" DLP TV - Model HLS- 4666W about four years ago. It's an unusual type of TV, and I was aware that the "bulb" would eventually need to be replaced down the road.
A few weeks ago, the screen started developing white dots. I'd heard this could be an issue with this model.

I checked online, and saw it was a common issue, and apparently there was a recall on the chip in the TV. I called Samsung, and a week later, a service tech showed up, on time, no charge, took apart the back of the TV, replaced the parts, and 18 white dots vanished off the screen.

Extremely happy with the customer service. The only downside is my excuse for buying a new TV is gone for the time being.