Tell us a little about yourself and what you do.

Indiloop is the Instagram of music software. We developed a technology that lives in the cloud which allows anyone to mash up music from their favorite artists in minutes, and then share it through FB or Twitter with their friends

What makes your company different or special?

Aside from the fact that our mom’s think we’re special (which is all that really matters in this world anyways) our software lives in the cloud, and unlike other types of music software doesn’t require any desktop space. The learning curve is minimal and in less than 5 minutes someone who has never made music before can make an awesome song that they would be want to share with everyone they’ve ever met. Indiloop also provides the songs for users to mix together from a variety of Indie and high profile artists. So its not like your making beats from scratch but are simply re-arranging songs in a way that makes you smile.

How did you get started?

I wanted to be a DJ but the software was too hard, the learning curve was too steep, and all I REALLY wanted to do was mash together a Notorious BIG with Daft Punk. So I met my co-founder (who works at another office) and the rest is history.

What are you currently working on?

We’re currently looking to find those early adopters who really understand what we’re trying to build. We’ve spoken to a bunch of record labels and artists who really dig what we’re doing so we know we’ve got some good going on. So we’re really working on building a user base, and connecting with artists who want to get exposure by being involved at the early stages of a company like ours.

What made you decide to cowork at The Network Hub?

We have another office with for the dev team, but I’m constantly on the phone so I was told I couldn’t be in the same work space because I’m disruptive. The Network Hub has really worked out for the best though. There are tons of smart people working in all sorts of industries. Coming here was definitely a blessing in disguise.

Any advice you have for other entrepreneurs and small business owners?

Think big… Think so big that people think your crazy and talk about you behind your back. ALSO sign up to Indiloop and you’ll have a chance to win Jay-Z and Justin Timberlake tickets.

If you’d like to sign in and make some music the beta key is: CMW

The post Friend Friday: Erik Ashdown of Indiloop appeared first on The Network Hub | Explore.

Click here http://create.visual.ly/graphic/facebook-insights, link it to your Facebook account and select the page you want to convert into an infographic.

The post Turn your Facebook Page Insights into a fun infographic for FREE appeared first on The Network Hub | Explore.

For the data nerds, raw data is a beautiful thing but if you’re not a data nerd… it’s just a plain ol’ headache to figure out what is what. To put the ‘WOW’ or the ‘OOOH LA LA’ factor into your Google Analytics presentation – turn it into an infographic!

It’s free and it’s pretty darn awesome! https://create.visual.ly/graphic/google-analytics/

This is what is created for us.

Got tips on a cool tool or want us to do a tool evaluation! Tweet us at @thenetworkhub!

The post Turn your Google Analytics data into infographics appeared first on The Network Hub | Explore.

Currently, we’re powered by the following services:

• Freshbooks is used for all our invoicing and accounting. We’re specifically in love with the recurring profile and Stripe/Paypal integration.

• Paypal is still one of the most preferred payment methods out there for freelancers and startups. We love it for its recurring subscription function, but we do not love its interface. Searching for a transaction in Paypal is pure punishment.

• Stripe is used for our online payment processing. Its simple and elegant interface for taking payment wins us over. Note: you do have to have understanding of code to integrate it into your website.

• SumAll is an analytic dashboard that pulls in data from Paypal and Stripe and layers it over our Google Analytics, Facebook and Twitter traffic. Social, financial, payment and site traffic all intersect on one interface to help you make critical decisions. This service may require a post all on its own.

• WordPress powers our website because, well, not everyone on our staff is technically proficient, so the simple interface for editing and adding content wooed us since 2006.

• Hermes (our very first iPad app!) is a result of us wanting to go paperless but making sure we keep track of things coming in and out of our system – it’s a simple signature app that tracks time, date, IP address and picture of signature.  All the data is then stored in dashboard for searchability & verification.

• Meeting Room Manager (fancy name I know!) is an online coworking space booking service we created internally after we realized everything is either super expensive or a little too clunky for us and we especially didn’t like linking out to someone else’s domain or going to a directory where other spaces are listed. We have opened it up for anyone who wants to use it.

• Google Maps API helps our members and guests find us, because with three different locations, you don’t want to accidentally venture to a different city while you have a booking in another. For non-developers, Google Maps can also be embedded in your website simply by copying & pasting a small snippet of code.

• Google Analytics is what we use to understand our online marketing traffic and to help us find opportunities to create online campaigns. Tip: Turn your Google Analytics into an infographic for a more interesting presentation

• ThinkUp helps us track, analyze and archive all our social media channels. Here’s a more in-depth post about this specific tool.

• Socialcast keeps everyone in the loop on what goes on in each location. It is our internal communications tool and it notifies relevant people in the company when any action is required of them.

• Zopim helps us embed online chat for our website. We absolutely love this tool. It really helps convert people when they have issues right on the site as they are trying to subscribe to a service.
• OTRS is our help desk software of choice, it’s a little more intense and not as pretty as say Zendesk, UserVoice or Desk.com but it is open source, we can tinker with it by developing our own plugins and more importantly, we host it ourselves – our data on our own server.
• Google Translate helps us communicate with our various clients from different parts of the world. Once in a while, if you follow us on Twitter, you might see our account tweeting in French, Spanish or Chinese. Warning: DO NOT use it for complicated translation, basic twitter conversation is OK but don’t try to get fancy, you’ll just embarrass yourself – we sure have! 
• CIRS is our own internal coworking management system that we developed ourselves to manage booking of coworking & meeting room space, members, tasks and our mailing service.
• Signnow has supported us in our effort to go paper-less with all our contracts now securely signed electronically.

• Sift Science keeps our payment form simple but we are able to fight fraudsters with real time monitoring and alerts of fraudulent activities.
• Pingdom helps us monitor up-time and performance of our website. You bet we want an email and SMS alert if our site is down!
• Dead Man’s Snitch is definitely a weird name for a service, but it is supremely useful to ensure our cron jobs are running. We have automatic booking notifications that, if it fails, no one makes it to their meeting… okay we’re exaggerating here just a bit.
• World Time Buddy is probably THE best tool out there to figure out meeting times across multiple time zones. Our clients come from all over the world, so we frequently use this to schedule calls. Just for funsies, here’s a map of where our clients are from
• Finally, Lastpass is on our list because it helps us generate incredibly hard to hack passwords and it lets us all store these passwords away securely. Really, how does one remember a password like @#548aH(83*^70? It’s safe from hackers and it can save us from ourselves.

Before you go ahead and hire a team of developers to create something custom, there’s likely an app or service out there already created for you! This then brings me to the last indispensable tool that makes all of this possible – GOOGLE! Use it!

The post Our coworking space is powered by these technologies appeared first on The Network Hub | Explore.

Tell us about the event you host at the Hub.

Our event is called “Spring into Health Fair” – Saturday May 25, 2013 11-3

“Spring into your health by learning how to achieve balance through nutrition.”

Our blurb is:

Take back control of your health by discovering more about the growing field of Holistic Nutrition. Meet and connect with a panel of local nutritionists who can answer your health questions and concerns. There will be door prizes, tasty snacks, games and more. Come see what a Registered Holistic Nutritionist (RHN) can offer you!

What personally motivated you into organizing it?

I felt there was a huge need to get our profession out there. The word ‘nutrition’ is used so generally and I feel it is being misrepresented. We are trained to teach and educate what, how and why nutrition plays a huge role in your body. RHN’s uses food as a means of preventing disease and makes sure the body can heal itself by providing it with necessary nutrients. I want the public to be aware of who we are, what we are and how we can be of service to them. We can help with digestive, hormonal, nervous, emotional issues. Just to name a few.

What are you hoping to achieve with it?

We want to create awareness for our field. Registered Holistic Nutritionists can help people to navigate through the mountain of information about diets… low fat, paleo, vegetarian, raw… the list
of books on how we should eat is long and the information is often conflicting. People are more confused than ever when it comes to food choices. We can help our clients discover the types of foods that they require to fit their individual needs, bringing their bodies into balance. Many of the diseases that are so prevalent today, digestive problems, diabetes and hypoglycemia, obesity, hormonal imbalances, allergies, etc etc can be helped by making the right food choices. I feel the reason for these deficiencies and what is lacking is that they do take the time to ‘nourish’ their bodies or even know what it means to do so. This is where we can help and make it simple to implement.

Why host at the Network Hub?

It is a great location. It is where people come to meet, learn and exchange ideas.

What is the biggest challenge in organizing an event?

Good question… we are all very passionate about what we do, so we really didn’t have to struggle for ideas throughout the process of creating this event. Choosing the best few ways to engage with the public would be where most of our energy went into. We all have a deep love for the healing power of food and are anxious to share what we know with anyone who will listen!

Where can people find more information?

More information can be found on our Facebook page or you can email us at holisticnutritionistsbc@gmail.com.

The post Community Organizer – Janice Doerksen, Spring Into Health Fair appeared first on The Network Hub | Explore.

Tell us a little about yourself and what you do.

We are Ambassadors for Humanity.

Goddess Within You (GWY) is a movement committed to raising the vitality and vibration of all humanity through supporting women in the expression of their true nature and unique gifts. We offer a variety of workshops, specifically developed for women and girls, focusing on self-awareness, responsibility, intuition, creation, leadership, balance, and empowerment. When we are empowered to live our authentic lives, we thrive.

What makes your company different or special?

We believe that each one of us is responsible for creating the kind of world we want to live in. As we raise ourselves, we create space for those around us to do the same. Traditional learning focuses on the transference of knowledge from an external source. At GWY, we promote learning from the inside out — focusing on the inner self as the true source for all success. We are re-uniting tribes of women through the power and support of Sacred Women Circles. We utilized interactive and experiential tools and techniques to teach women how to release limiting beliefs and reveal the Goddess Within.

How did you get started?

After spending three years at home with her twin boys, Christine decided to re-focus on her career. She knew that she wanted to make a greater contribution by living her passion and purpose. Knowing that she always wanted to inspire women to live their best possible lives, Christine began offering free workshops. Women participating in the workshops were experiencing such breakthroughs and making drastic positive shifts in their lives. There was so much demand and support that she knew it was time to grow. In September, 21012, she partnered with her sister-in-law, Lisa. With collaborative experience and expertise in personal growth, working with women, and public speaking, Goddess Within You, Inc. was created.

What are you currently working on?

GWY is constantly growing and evolving. Locally, we are currently working on a variety of workshops, speaking engagements, and community projects throughout Burnaby, Coquitlam, and New Westminster. GWY is teaching a 6-week workshop series to mothers of Byrne Creek Secondary School from April 5 to May 17. We are sponsoring “Mother’s Helping Others” in a soup day at the New Westminster Food Bank, May 1. Along with New Westminster Community Coordinators, we are hosting a Mother and Daughter High Tea event at Glenbrook Middle School library in New Westminster on May 11 (contact Ashley Currie or Andrea Owen of School District 40 for tickets). We also continue to host free weekly workshops at the E-Fry Centre in New West.

Globally, we have partnered with P.O.W.E.R (Propagation of Women’s Empowerment Resources) in Cape Town, South Africa where we are positioned to teach our workshops early next year.

TBA – Our Goddess Campaign 2013 is under construction and will take place at a local venue this summer.

What made you decide to co-work at The Network Hub?

The Network Hub was the obvious place for us to be. We are close to many of our clients, have access to a boardroom to host our Team Goddess meetings and workshops, it’s convenient, reasonably priced, and has a great creative vibe. We love the collaborative concept of shared space and everyone is very respectful. The Hub aligns with the values we uphold.

Any advice you have for other entrepreneurs and small business owners?

Just do it. Trust yourself. What you have to offer is valuable. – Lisa

Keep your eyes on the prize. Always take steps forward, even if they are small steps. Keep believing. –Christine

The post Friend Fridays: Goddess Within You appeared first on The Network Hub | Explore.

In the Community Organizer series, we aim to highlight some of the great people who put together fantastic events and manage amazing groups at the Hub. This week, we take a look at New West Artists and Richard Armstrong.

Tell us about NWA.

In late 2010, NWA was founded by a few local artists who thought that by working together they would collectively have a better chance to show their work to the public. We have grown to 73 members as of March 2013. We have three continuous exhibitions in New Westminster; The Network Hub at The River Market, The Senior Services Society at 750 Carnarvon and 5Stones Church at 632 Columbia St. NWA, besides hosting six, four-person shows at the Network Hub, has also organized three large group shows at The River Market. Perfect Strangers, a portrait show was held in Nov 2011 and a combination Art Squared/Visual Verse show was held in May 2012. We have sold some 110 pictures so far.

What personally motivated you into organizing it?

Andrea Fergusson was our first President and the actual founder of NWA. When she became unable to lead the group, I stepped forward in early 2012, not knowing what I was getting myself into. Now I feel like I am surfing along the top of an avalanche that is roaring down a mountainside.

What are you hoping to achieve with it?

It is true that artists working together have more impact than going solo. I have met many artists who have never shown their work, much less sold a piece, and their joy at finally being recognized is quite rewarding to view. We all want our efforts to be valued; selling art is of course great but the positive feedback is just as important if not more so. I would like to help the group form an even stronger identity and further bring their work to a larger audience.

For example, we have 20 electrical boxes and recycling bins emblazoned with NWA pictures and logos stationed around New West, courtesy of our arrangement with the City of New Westminster. We are further working with the City on a potential mural project at Timber Wharf. We will also have a strong presence at the Hyack Festival in May and will host a huge Art Squared/ Visual Verse 2 in June at the Hub and River Market.

Why host at the Network Hub?

It is a high ceiling room with fabulous light in the summer. It is large enough to exhibit around 45 pictures and spacious enough to have a social gathering. Combined with the friendly personas of Jay Catalan and Minna Van, who have been so good to us, the art work hub is a natural environment to showcase art both small and large.

What is the biggest challenge in organizing an event?

Details have to be thought of beforehand.
One solution often leads to another problem.
You have to be adaptable and above all, patience is a must.

Where can people find out more information about NWA?

Our website, www.newwestartists.com and info@newwestartists.com.

The post Community Organizer – Richard Armstrong of New West Artists appeared first on The Network Hub | Explore.

In the Community Organizer series, we aim to highlight some of the great people who put together fantastic events and manage amazing groups at the Hub. For this edition, we turn to the terrific trio of Flynn O’Connor, Brian Pearce and Wes Koopmans from SaturHack.

Tell us about SaturHack.

Flynn (@thoronas): SaturHack provides a space for developers/designers to code socially. We encourage people to talk and collaborate, to share their knowledge of tech and the industry.

Brian (@brian_pearce): The group came about as a natural progression of smaller social gatherings organized on Twitter; it is made up of people we had met at local conferences and meetups in Vancouver. It formed pretty naturally and has grown over time.

Wes (@weskoop): We also make an effort to support the craft beer industry.

What personally motivated you into organizing it?

Brian: I frequently work alone. Working with other people around in a relaxed environment is much more enjoyable — Especially with a pint. As more people wanted to attend we actually started scheduling the event instead of being so “on the fly” with dates and times.

Flynn: I enjoy working with code but find it can be somewhat isolating. There is an energy involved in a work space that fuels my productivity. I wanted to encourage friends of mine to come and work alongside me.

Wes: I joined up with Brian and Flynn after the first couple meetups, but bringing an idea to SaturHack and having it flushed out in person, rather than on something like Twitter, is great. There is always an interesting conversation to pop your head into.

What are you hoping to achieve with it?

Brian: I’d like to continue to build a solid group of people that you can really consider friends. People to bounce ideas off of and people you would turn to for advice or answers outside of SaturHack. As much as SaturHack is about a great place to work, it’s about a great place to make connections with like minded people.

Flynn: We are hoping to provide a social environment for the Vancouver tech community to come together and share. We don’t want speakers or presentations, we want camaraderie and an interest in sharing and discussion. But mostly we want people to code in a casual environment.

Why host at the Network Hub?

Brian: While offering a great atmosphere, we had been having space and power outlet issues at bars/cafes.

Wes: I work permanently out of the New West Network Hub. Saturhack has coders/designers living in Vancouver, Burnaby, Surrey, New West, even all the way out in Abbotsford. The SkyTrain access at the New West Network Hub made it the perfect fit. The food hall and pub downstairs doesn’t hurt either.

Flynn: We have hosted SaturHack in the Downtown Vancouver and New Westminster Network Hubs, and both were well received.

What is the biggest challenge in organizing an event?

Brian: Attracting new members. We get a fare amount of positive responses and “I’d love to come but…” on social media avenues. We do get new members every event but it’s a slow uptake.

Flynn: Learning how to manage connections with the people we meet who have become a part of our community. I am still new to event organizing, so it’s been eye opening to see the effort needed to maintain awareness of our events.

Wes: Keeping it monthly has been going well, but we had an event last year with 2 people (it was so productive!). A more regular schedule should keep the attendance up. And as Flynn said, staying in touch and keeping the conversation going between meeting will be key.

Where can people find more information?

Flynn: They can visit our website http://SaturHack.com/ for the latest date or follow us on Twitter @SaturHack if they have any questions.

Wes: Come to the next one on March 23rd in New West, see the website for directions.

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What is WordPress and what is the WordPress Meetup Group?

WordPress is becoming the dominant publishing application on the web powering everything from personal blogs to corporate websites and major news outlets. And not without reason: Its easy to use and understand user interface combined with a large and supportive following of open source developers makes it an agile and constantly evolving application that keeps you on the bleeding edge of what the web has to offer. And all you have to do to get started is install it!

The Vancouver WordPress Meetup Group was created by Gwyn Pritchett in 2009 and its organizing committee was expanded to include Vanessa Chu and Morten Rand-Hendriksen some time later. The membership of the group has surpassed 1000 and includes beginners taking their first steps with WordPress to professional designers and developers and several core contributors to WordPress itself. Presently meetings are held once a month and cover everything from setup and configuration to advanced design and development. The meetup also organizes workshops and events on an irregular basis and participates in the organization of the yearly WordCamp Vancouver conference.

What motivated you to lead the meetup?

Vanessa and Morten stepped up to oversee meetup planning in 2010 in response to an increasing demand in the community for more opportunities to network and share information. Developers and designers in their own right, they saw a need for a place where those in the city working with WordPress could come together and share their experiences and ideas.

What is the objective of the group?

The main goal of the meetup is simple: Help the community work and grow together. And over the years that is precisely what has happened. The Vancouver WordPress Meetup Group has become a place where those working with WordPress are able to exchange ideas and start new projects together.

What is the biggest challenge in organizing?

One of the many challenges organizing a meetup group is to find a good venue with the appropriate space, internet connection, and environment. The Network Hub has long been a supporter of Meetup groups of all shapes and sizes. Minna, co-founder of the Hub stepped up early on to allow our meetup to be counted as one of the groups to benefit from The Network Hub’s hospitality.

Because we have a home in The Network Hub, our biggest challenge is to provide quality and relevant content to our growing and ever more diverse group of members. Until now we have focused mainly on providing content for medium to advanced users with the occasional lower level talks to meet the demands of the beginners in the group. Moving forward we are looking at models to provide more content to all skill levels. How this will take shape will rely heavily on the involvement of our meetup members in the planning and organizing of future meetups.

Where can we learn more?

If you are interested in joining the Vancouver WordPress Meetup Group and/or if you want to present something at the group or collaborate in some other way you can find us at Meetup.com, on the meetup website, and on our Facebook Page. Reach out, contribute, and become part of a thriving and friendly community!

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My co-founders and friends know I LOVE analytics–a little too much sometimes–but hey, what’s the point of doing something if you have no feedback to let you know how you are doing? I recently heard about @ThinkUp from Twitter. I follow Gina Trapani (creator of @thinkup and also founder of Lifehacker) religiously. She’s great; if you don’t already, you need to follow her on Twitter at @GinaTrapani.

So, I downloaded and installed ThinkUp on January 2^nd, 2013 and so, after more than a solid month of using the tool, here are my thoughts.

Highlights of ThinkUp:

Free & open source: ThinkUp has open API that you can play around with. We haven’t done it yet, but when time permits, we will open up the source code to modify and build our own apps to run our own custom analysis. Source code is freely available on github.

We OWN it: We host ThinkUp ourselves at thinker.tnwh.ca, which means all the content we created on Twitter, Facebook,  Foursquare and Google+ are now pulled, stored and analyzed on our own server.  At a time where companies are acquired, acqui-hired and close down in a blink of an eye – having the ability to store and analyze your own data is huge!

Tracks, analyzes & ARCHIVES: ThinkUp gives us the ability to track our activities across multiple social network channels and analyze patterns, but more importantly, it also allows us to ARCHIVE it all on our own servers.

BIG data: We’re not a big corporation with multiple accounts and a large social media team, but I can see this is where the magic really happens: all the data pulled in from multiple channels and analyzed to find common trends and patterns. ThinkUp allows for each member of your team to create his or her own profile to pull in the channels they are responsible for. I drool at the ability to see the data from companies that operate globally with multiple brands and multiple social media channels for each brand or even products! FYI, the White House is also using ThinkUp.

Searchable data: Ever feel bugged out about finding a tweet you sent out that contained a brilliant link? Or that restaurant that served that fabulous dish, but you were there so long ago and you forgot where it was? ThinkUp allows you to search your tweets, status updates, check-ins, and more to find that long forgotten information.

Note: I only run the analytics once a week, but you have the option of leaving it running and updating on its own.

Another note: I purposely chose Twitter to present how ThinkUp works, because the other channels have minimal activity.

Here’s a quick run-through of ThinkUp’s Twitter dashboard:

This is the basic profile of the Twitter account. It’s nothing special, but it does get right to the point: what kind of Twitter person you are, the client you use and average number of tweets per day.

The summary of “Most Replied-To” and “Most Retweeted” is a powerful tool. If you are doing a product launch or are new at Twitter, you can get a really good snapshot of what content works and what doesn’t. More than that, you can assess how successful your Twitter campaign is according to the level of engagement. You can also drill down to certain demographics or get even more up-close-and-personal by drilling down to the individual tweet level.

Drilling down on the most replied tweet or the most retweeted can help you see the impact of that particular tweet, but more importantly, it will also let you figure out who are your brand’s influencers and ambassadors.

Note the ability to search your tweet in this screenshot; that’s a powerful tool. Imagine trying to go back to see how many times a certain user has retweeted you or trying to see all the follow-up tweets on a specific topic. This is very useful for customer service, identifying common problems and monitoring a product or service launch.

This is where it gets interesting: most retweeted of all time. Imagine accumulating two years’ worth of data and being able to see what appeals to your followers and how their taste in content that you produce changes over time.

The ability to analyze your followers is something that I haven’t seen before, other than in tools that cost $100+ per month and are aimed at agencies.

ThinkUp differentiates between the most popular and most discerning followers: popular followers are those with the most followers of all the accounts that follow you, while discerning followers are those who have a higher follower-to-following ratio. Imagine my surprise when I found out that Zagat and Norton follow us. Norton made our team raise an eyebrow a bit, as we wondered how we landed on their radar, especially when our account was one of the 250,000 Twitter accounts hacked a while back. (We’re not spreading spam, I swear!)

Here is another useful dashboard with analysis of who you follow and how popular and chatty (or not chatty) they are. This is especially useful for customer service. Wait for it… this sounds controversial…

… If someone is being a troll but they are on the quiet list, let’s not engage them.  However, if someone is popular and is being a troll, you have to contain it. A troll that’s also chatterbox? You can go through the thread to see if they are being a troll to ever one or just you. Then, you can choose containment or just to ignore them.

Note: Remember that a troll isn’t someone with a legitimate problem with your service or product; that’s called a customer with a problem, so go solve it! A troll is someone who acts like a jerk no matter what anyone does or says. They will never be satisfied and, MOST of the time, they are not even your customer.

Got a cool tool that you want me to review? Let me know and tweet me at @thenetworkhub!

The post Track, analyze and archive social networks with ThinkUp appeared first on The Network Hub | Explore.