How would you describe Flippa in under 50 words?

It's a markplace that allows people to buy & sell revenue generating websites through an auction model. We've sold $70 million worth of websites to date, with millions more in monthly transactions.

Your entrepreneurial journey began aged 14 in 1998 with Webmaster-Resources.com, which eventually became SitePoint. When did you start getting attention from the press?

Within 2 weeks of launching Webmaster-Resources.com, the site got featured in USA Today. Further coverage in LA Times, Washington Post and WINDOWS Magazine (which at the time had a million subscribers) quickly followed within a year.

What were the main influences that led you to start Webmaster-Resources.com at such a young age?

I was learning web design and internet marketing as a hobby, and I was finding there was a huge lack of resources and information available. So I started doing a lot of the legwork myself, finding out how to register a domain name, which webhosting company I should use, how to submit to the top search engines, what HTML Editing software to buy, etc. I was confident that I'm not the only person who had so many unanswered questions, so I started compiling all the information & resources I found into a website to help others. It turns out, my timing was impeccable.

How did SitePoint make it through the dot-com bubble?

Initially, our business was 100% advertising supported. When that market collapsed, we had a look at what else people were doing on our website - and it turns out that the "PRINT THIS ARTICLE" link on any given page was immensely popular. It made a lot of sense. Back in 2000/2001, few people had two monitors on their desks (remember, this is back before flat-panel LCD monitors), so when they were learning to code, they would print out our tutorials and have them sitting next to their keyword so they could follow along. We came up with the theory that people would pay us for the privilege of printing out content on their behalf, so we took our most popular tutorial about PHP & MySQL, written by Kevin Yank, and turned it into a print-on-demand book that we sold for $35. It was a very quick and easy test, and the book sold like hotcakes despite all of the content being available for free online.

In June 2009 the SitePoint Marketplace moved to Flippa.com. Why?

A brand can online stand for one thing. SitePoint is about education for web designers and web developers, not an auction marketplace for buying and selling websites.

What have been the main advantages building a separate identity?

By creating a new company, with a new brand, with a dedicated team, and its own budgets and P&L statements, we allowed the business to stand on its own two feet and flourish on its own. People can only associate one thing with a name. Aside from Virgin, few companies have been able to serve a multitude of different markets and customers using a single name. That's why Toyota launched Lexus.

Flippa has become the leading website marketplace with over $70 million in overall sales. What are the main factors that have led to this success?

Critical mass in a marketplace is very hard to displace... just look at Craigslist, numerous companies have built much better, prettier, more user-friendly, better organized local marketplaces, but at the end of the day, if you're looking to rent an apartment, or get rid of some old furniture, you still go to Craigslist. We're not sitting on our hands though, we're constantly looking to innovate, improve the user interface, roll out anti-fraud features (mandatory credit card verification for large bids, verified Google Analytics stats) and requested improvements such as instant alerts based on custom criteria.

In March 2010 Retweet.com sold at auction on Flippa for $250,000, were there any complications with the sale? Do you know what plans, if any are in mind for the domain?

The sale went through successfully, and we've had many sales since then that are even bigger.

Have you passed up any opportunities which you now regret?

I wish I bought more domain names in 1999, and got into PPC arbitrage back when GoTo.com was around and you could buy clicks for 1 cent with no quality score issues and there was virtually no competition.

Can you convince the reader to buy or sell a website using Flippa in under 80 words?

Buying high-traffic websites on Flippa is relatively bargain compared to buying traffic through channels like pay-per-click. Imagine working with a $2000 budget, what would you rather have, 2000 clicks @ $1 each, or a website with 2000 unique visitors, each and every month, that you can mine for a profit -- and at the end of 3 months, 6 months or 12 months you're still able to resell it and get all of your money back, and perhaps even more?

How would you describe Dabble in under 50 words?

Dabble (www.dabble.co) is a marketplace for classes. From welding to pasta making to watercolor painting and everything in between, all classes are $20, are held in person and are a one-time thing. Dabble allows people to try out their interests without over-extending themselves or their wallets.

What led you to co-found Dabble?

My partner, Jess, and I had a consulting business before Dabble. One day, it dawned on us that what we really wanted was a product of our own. Something that we could build from the ground up and be super passionate about. And so, we began a big brainstorming session where we tossed around different pain points we have - problems where we felt there weren't adequate solutions. The idea that it's difficult to explore your interests without committing yourself more fully to longer-term classes was the insight that led to Dabble.

How did you come up with the name?

"Dabble" quite literally refers to what our classes allow people to do - dip their toes in the water to see if they want to pursue something further or simply come back next week to dabble in another subject.

Who do you see as your target audience?

Right now, our primary focus is on young professionals - demographically, people who are out of college through to their mid-30s. They're people who are curious, get tired of the same old routine and are looking for alternative ways to spend a week night or weekend.

What has been the most popular class?

Some of the most popular classes are Beer Brewing, culinary (i.e., Cupcake Decorating), anything web development (i.e., Intro to Wordpress) and BYOB Painting.

Is Dabble likely to expand into any more countries?

Yes, and we've received a number of requests for Dabble in countries outside the U.S.

Who handles the technical side of Dabble, and what challenges do they face?

We're working with a new development team. Our biggest challenge right now is simply introducing new features to the site at a fast pace. If we had our druthers, we'd be able to roll out new features, test them and quickly move on at a much faster pace.

How long did it take to put together Dabble?

We focused on building a minimum viable product at the outset. So, from idea conception to launch, it was about 10 weeks.

I see you are responsible for driving the vision. Has the vision changed since launch?

The overall vision hasn't changed, but we've certainly learned a lot and have ideas of where Dabble could go and how it can only get better for our users. I'd say the vision has expanded while remaining true to our original inspiration.

Has Dabble got the growth you expected since launch?

To be honest, since we pushed the product out within just 10 weeks, we didn't set crazy goals to meet. Instead, we wanted to focus on user feedback and see where the potential was. We've been thrilled with the overwhelmingly positive response to Dabble, and are really happy about sales and the inherent virality of the product.

Who is your biggest competitor?

We actually believe our biggest "competitor" to be people's own inaction. We've really struck a chord with people in that they nod their heads in agreement that many of their interests are left unexplored because of lack of time, money, etc. So they're super excited about what Dabble offers. It's simply overcoming people's tendencies to say, "I'll do that next week... or next month..."

What is the biggest hurdle you have faced or are still facing?

Awareness. As I mentioned, the people who know about Dabble are embracing us with unbridled excitement. We simply need to get out in front of more people. It becomes a numbers game at some point.

Where do you see Dabble in 5 years time?

We want to flip the notion of traditional education on its head and make the sharing of knowledge social, accessible and enjoyable. We envision Dabble to become part of the lexicon, where “let’s Dabble” becomes an obvious alternative to drinks with friends or the like.

Can you convince the reader to start using Dabble in under 50 words?

How often have you thought, “I really want to learn how to _____ ”? Or “I'm sick of doing the same ole’ thing with friends.” Dabble is unique: it’s learning but done in a social environment. No final exams, no dipping into savings to afford a new skill.

How would you describe Pusher in under 50 words?

Pusher is a hosted service for quickly and easily adding realtime functionality (notifications, activity streams, games, collaboration etc) to web and mobile apps.

What made you decide to start working on Pusher?

Like many founders, Damien Tanner and I started our route into our product-focused startup after first spending many years building up a successful services business. This first company is called New Bamboo, and is one of the leading Ruby On Rails shops in the UK. At the beginning of 2010, we had an opportunity of utilising our awesome team and spending some of our capital on developing products. This was an area we had always been interested in so we were eager to make the most of it. Pusher wasn't the first product we built, our main focus was on a couple of tools that we had built internally for managing our consultancy. We soon found a need to keep data synchronised between the users of these apps, and built a piece of standalone infrastructure that made use of the new WebSocket spec in HTML5. After implementing realtime updates in under an hour, we decided that this was probably a much bigger market opportunity than our management tools!

How did you come up with the name?

Personally, I love the subversiveness of our name. When wearing my Pusher tshirt in the US, a surprising number of people inform me that 'Pusher' means drug dealer. For fun, I often feign ignorance. The whole 'pushing data' thing provides plausible deniability though. I think the original git repo was called "thingamagig", and was obviously not a name that could stick around for long. We also went through a stage where people referred to us as "Pushr" (yuck). Enforcing what you want people to call you is very difficult though. Our first domain was pusherapp.com, and we had the @pusherapp Twitter handle. This led a lot of people to call us PusherApp, which is a little frustrating. Finally getting the pusher.com domain name and Twitter handle has made a big difference though.

How different is the current version of Pusher compared to your initial launch?

Our first beta launch was a pretty flaky MVP in the tradition of the Lean Startup. I firmly believe that testing the market fit is incredibly important at the early stage, and putting anything you can that demonstrates fit is crucial. Once we saw that demand, we were able to pump more time and energy into building the scalable and resilient platform we have now.

Do you have any new features in the pipeline?

We've recently launched webhooks as a feature, which we are really excited about. We also have an alpha feature called the 'Pipe' which allows some really interesting possibilities for people who are using NodeJS. We have a ton of ideas for things we'd like to build, the trick is in finding the time.

Has Pusher got the feedback and growth you expected since launch?

I think our growth has probably exceeded our initial expectations by now. I'd say that the scope of your ambition widens as you continue down a successful avenue, so I am never satisfied with our growth, and always feel we could do more. In terms of feedback, I'm always immensely proud when our users praise us publicly. They build such awesome applications, which continue to amaze and delight us.

Who is your biggest competitor?

I'm not giving them free PR! Suffice to say they exist, and we know all of them pretty well. We believe that the trend towards realtime applications is going to create a market that is big enough to sustain several players with different approaches and products. Things are still pretty friendly between the pioneers :)

What is the biggest hurdle you have faced or are still facing?

People. Finding the right people to recruit is really hard.

What are you most excited about at the moment?

The realtime web in general is fantastically exciting. We believe that we're on the cusp of a massive change in how applications are built and communicate with each other. The impact of WebSockets is yet to be fully felt, and we can't wait until it becomes the standard for application development.

Can you convince the reader to start using Pusher in under 50 words?

I feel I should be better at this considering what our company is called! All I can say is that not many people who have tried our service want to break the habit...

How would you describe Buyosphere in under 50 words?

Buyosphere is a Q&A shopping platform where people help people shop. Looking for something in particular and don't know where to begin? Just ask and we'll route your question to people who have already done the research for you. Know stuff about stuff? Answer and build your reputation.

What made you decide to co-found Buyosphere?

For me, it was to solve a personal pain point. Shopping online is great for deals and discoveries, but when you need to find something in particular, it is a time-sucking nightmare. The desire to start Buyosphere started with a 3.5 hour search for a simple black skirt in 2007 and finally brought me to Montreal and coming together with my co-founders, Jerome Paradis and Cassandra Girard in 2010 to start working on it.

I understand that 'Buyosphere' wasn't the first choice of name for the site! Can you tell us the story behind the name?

I don't like to talk about the previous name...it was THAT BAD! We actually had the 'name-we-shall-not-speak-of' previously because of convenience. Jerome, my co-founder owned it. We always knew we'd come up with a better name, but didn't have a budget to buy something really good, so we just kept using the bad one. In January of 2011, we were awarded with the distinction of having the Worst Brand Name of the Year by EatMyWords (a professional branding/naming company in San Francisco). We realized then that we could no longer ignore the need to change the name. We held a contest to help us rename the company. We had over 1200 entries in about 5 hours, but then Alexandra Watkins of EatMyWords emailed me to tell me how impressed she was that we were acting so quickly and offered to help me. She gave me a list of alternatives that included Buyosphere. I fell in love instantly and looked it up. Someone owned it already, but I thought I'd give it a shot and offer the owner $500. He accepted and we rebranded everything in a couple of months.

How did you spread the word about the change in name?

We made the renaming an entire rebranding exercise. We made all sorts of UI improvements to the site and changed everything, not just the name. This gave us the opportunity to go to bigger Tech publishers like TechCrunch and pitch it as a big announcement. The great thing was that most people hated the previous name so much that they really celebrated the new one. I couldn't have thought of a better marketing strategy!

How long did it take to put together Buyosphere?

We've been through a few pivots in the idea and, of course, a couple of rebrands and a renaming. From the time the first line of code was written until now, it's been a year and a half. But the site has been rewritten from scratch several times. We started coding and designing the Buyosphere you see today in July 2011. We launched in late November 2011. But it's improving and morphing into our vision more and more every day. Is any website ever complete? I don't know! I've never worked on a startup that is finished.

You are CEO & co-founder of Buyosphere, a public speaker, author of 'The Whuffie Factor', blogger, co-founder of the worldwide Coworking Movement, a marathon runner, a mother, a karaoke addict, a Flickr Fan, and a Twitter-holic! What is a typical day in the life of Tara Hunt?

There is no such thing as typical in my life. :) Every day is different. Every day is about moving the needle a little more.

How much time a day do you spend on social networks?

Not as much as I used to. I always have Facebook and Twitter open. I always have Buyosphere open. But I spend more time in GMail, Illustrator, Photoshop, Google Docs, GCal and Codebase than anything else. I used to tweet about 15x per day on average. Now I'm lucky if I squeeze out 3 or 4 and all of those are tweets are pushing out news about Buyosphere.

Fast Company Magazine named you as one of the 25 Women-led Startups to Watch for 2011, and as one of the most Influential Women in Technology in 2009. If you could give one piece of advice to women starting a startup, what would it be?

I have several pieces of advice, actually. I hope that's okay! 1. Don't wait for the perfect moment to do it...it doesn't exist. You make it happen when you make it happen. 2. Get a champion. Someone who will introduce you to the right people and toot your horn for you. 3. Remember that nobody is qualified for this job. There is nothing in the universe that can prepare you for it. It's on the job training. Everyone is in the same boat.

What do you wish you'd have known 5 years ago that you know now?

Everything I just gave as advice! Actually, I'm glad I waited. My co-founders are amazing. I needed to meet them. I don't know, really. Of course I wish I knew pretty much everything I know now. But in 5 years I'll say the same. And then 5 years later. I like that I still have lots to learn. Life would be boring without the challenge.

Has Buyosphere got the feedback and growth you expected since launch?

Yes and no. Regarding the growth, I'm really happy with how we're growing and progressing. No crazy hockey stick stats yet, but we aren't ready for it anyway. Our roadmap allows for scaling as we learn. Regarding the feedback, we thought we'd face the challenges we are facing, but didn't realize we'd be as popular with a male audience as we are with a female audience. It makes intuitive sense, of course. Men don't like to shop, so it makes sense they would like the concept of asking and having someone else find stuff for them. But we just didn't imagine that they would lead many of the questions.

Where do you see Buyosphere in 5 years time?

As the main place that people go when they want to search for any product. You will Google information, but Buyo your product searches. Peer to peer recommendations mixed with algorithms solve lots of search issues when it comes to products. Taste is so nuanced.

What is the biggest hurdle you have faced or are still facing?

Getting in front of people at the point of stimulus. When they are thinking to themselves, "I need to get a new suit, where do I start?" or "I'd like to buy a new bed, but don't know what is out there in my price range," or "What is the lipgloss that Blair wore on Gossip Girls last night?" Search marketing is the best bet, but it gets pricey and you have to guess what people are thinking. Right now we are just trying to get out there as far as possible with branding so that people get familiarized with us. Then when they think, "I need to find that thing..." their minds turn to Buyosphere to get the answer. Then we get to show them how awesome it works. :)

What are you most excited about at the moment?

Watching how things unfold mostly. I'm excited about how we'll be rolling out participation rewards and a mobile/local version and how we can really personalize people's experience on Buyosphere and all of the ways the product is improving day after day. But I'm also excited to see where the users take us. It's great to have people really excited about Buyosphere and sending us all sorts of great suggestions and stories. We try not to get thrown off our path too far, but quite frequently, we'll switch gears when we hear a killer idea.

Can you convince the reader to start using Buyosphere in under 50 words?

Searching for that perfect something is about the technology understanding who you are and what your taste is. Computers and algorithms can't do that, but people can. Buyosphere leverages human talents to help you find that perfect something. That's the promise of the social web.

What made you decide to found Bablingo!?

Gaining and managing significant publicity is a challenge for any organization. As founders, we have experienced this with our own startups, prompting a series of discussions with PR agencies and organizations of varying sizes. The results demonstrated a need for a solution that offered highly targeted press release distribution, reaction monitoring and media list management.

How did you come up with the name?

Bablingo! is a play on babble and lingo. Its one of those memorable, nonsensical web 2.0 names!

What technologies have you used to build Bablingo!?

Bablingo! is a drupal build. I can't add much more to that but I can say we have some of the top Drupal engineers in Vancouver on our team.

What was technically the most challenging part of developing Bablingo!?

The most challenging (and satisfying) is the identification process we use for locating relevant journalists, bloggers and industry influencers to whom we distribute a release.

How long did it take to put together Bablingo!?

12 months.

You have quite a background in startups! Tell us how you got to be where you are now.

I've had hits and I've had misses. You definitely need the misses to enable the hits. Never dread or lament a miss, it will be your biggest learning experience.

What do you wish you'd have known 5 years ago that you know now?

This response won't fit with Bablingo! because it was a lengthy R+D and developmental process. But I love the 30 day 1.0 Ha! I love a 24 hour 1.0! Agile is the only way to go with developing an app or solution. Its such a simple concept. Throw something out there and let your users finesse your product cycle. I've been caught in a couple of waterfall development nightmares with never ending billing. So agile.. wish I had embraced agile.

Where do you see Bablingo! in 5 years time?

Bablingo! would have played a pivotal role in the evolution of PR distribution from email and phone (or even fax believe it or not) to social media, primarily Twitter with smart distribution. Gone are they days where you choose distribution from perhaps the 100 top US cities or South Eastern Canadian cities etc. Bablingo! doesn't work on pre-formatted distribution lists, it builds a list tailored to the content of the release. Simple and effective.

Has Bablingo! got the feedback and growth you expected during beta?

We are still in closed beta with a handful of users as we work out kinks. Bablingo! has a lot of moving parts and while we'd love to bring a ton of users in to use Bablingo! from the get go, it makes sense to roll out slowly. We have no shortage of interest and request for beta keys though which is a good problem to have.

Who would you say is your biggest competitor?

There are a few when it comes to press and social media release distribution and hosting in general. Our strength lies in the technological experience of our team and our ability to take a evolutionary approach resulting in a faster/better solution.

You say you eat, breathe and sleep product strategy! But what do you do to relax!?

I work out, I read, I cook, I spend quality time with my family. I actually trade equities from 4.30am every morning so quite often by the end of the day, I am zapped!

What is the biggest hurdle you have faced or are still facing?

Time management.

What are you most excited about at the moment?

Work wise, obviously Bablingo! Family wise, we're just starting the adoption process. That will be my biggest success to date!

Can you convince the reader to start using Bablingo! in under 50 words?

That's easy, user feedback. We've had one user who says their release got more coverage than they have ever had. We also had another release picked up and shared by a journalist on Good Morning America. At $19.06 per release, its a pretty fabulous service.

How would you describe Zartis in under 80 words?

Zartis helps companies grow by making it easier for them to attract and hire the best talent - including ones who aren’t actively looking. By pushing your jobs to Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and other popular social media, your jobs will be found by the best candidates. Zartis also helps you manage the application process, making it easy to narrow your search from a pool of top candidates to one great new hire.

What made you decide to found Zartis?

I've hired over 140 people in startups over the past decade. I don't use recruitment agencies. I prefer to think that a direct link between an employer and a job seeker is best. Social media is making it easier to connect. But it's time consuming and difficult to manage the recruitment process. So we built Zartis to help. We also think that thousands of small to medium sized companies want help with recruitment and don't want to pay out huge fees to agencies. I guess that's a big motivator for us.

What was technically the most challenging part of developing Zartis?

Integrating with LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, WordPress and client web sites poses a whole bunch of challenges. We've got a really strong internal development team. They're up for the challenge.

How long did it take to put together Zartis?

We decided to build the product over lunch on May 8th, 2011. We didn't have a spec or brand name or anything. We launched with our first client, a Lufthansa subsidiary, on July 25th - ten weeks after the lunch.

Where do you see Zartis in 5 years time?

Our crystal ball has a range of only five months. We need an upgrade.

Do you have any new features in the pipeline?

We're totally focused on making Zartis a global success. We have a ton of integrations with third party companies we need to get complete. We all subscribe to the Japanese philosophy of kaizen - constant improvement involving everybody. Mashing that up with Eric Reis' lean methodology is pretty much how most of our new features become features. Using social media for recruitment, or "social recruiting" is going through a massive growth phase at the moment. We'll continue to make it easier for our clients to take advantage of it. Mobile recruiting another growth area we're focused on and already have some early success stories to tell.

Has Zartis got the feedback and growth you expected since launch?

Hmmm. We've had about 1,000 customers signup for the free trial in the past 3 months. The difficulty is converting more of them into paying customers. We spend a lot of time trying to make the onboarding experience better and better. Once people start using Zartis they seem to love it and get value out of it (so they tell us anyway). We just need to get more people using it. I think if more B2B SaaS companies were honest they'd say the same. Privately most CEOs I've spoken to have all said that building the SaaS business is tough and takes time. We all hear the "overnight successes" but most of the really big SaaS success stories have been around a long time and generally have pretty high funding.

You have had a string of successful tech startups in the last ten years. What do you wish you'd have known ten years ago that you know now?

Apparently it was Oscar Wilde that said: "Nothing that is worth knowing can be taught." Some things you've just got to learn the hard way.

Who would you say is your biggest competitor?

Our biggest competitor is inertia: people doing the same dingdong that they've always done. There's always a time lag, that we always underestimate, between when something can and should be done and when it actually starts getting done. Social media has incredible potential for putting employers in direct contact with employees. It's dramatically changing the way companies attract and hire employees. But the mass market will be slow to embrace the potential.

Any big clients on your list?

Our first customer was a subsidiary of Lufthansa in Dublin. They're fantastic to deal with. All of our cilents are hiring. Which means they're all growth companies. Some of them will make it very big. A few really exciting ones to watch are Graze, a food company in London; IdealBinary and We R Interactive, in the digital entertainment sector; Ovation, a Sunday Times Tech 100 company; and GiggleGarage an animation company in Kuala Lumpar.

What is the biggest hurdle you personally have faced or are still facing?

Working in a startup is tough. It's a constant challenge for everybody to keep focused on the ongoing development of the company rather than getting carried away with the ups or running away from the lows. That's the biggest challenge (I think) every startup faces.

If you could only give one piece of advice to someone starting up a startup, what would it be?

Launch your product.

What are you most excited about at the moment?

Social media and the transformative effect it's having. It's a similar feeling to what was happening in the late nineties but now there's critical mass of users.

Can you convince the reader to start using Zartis in under 40 words?

Do you want to hire the best people without spending a fortune on recruitment fees? If yes, goto Zartis.com. Else, throw away your money.

How would you describe mob.is.it in under 50 words?

It's an awesome online tool that in a couple of clicks lets anybody build mobile websites that look really beautiful on a huge variety of mobile phones, from iPhones and Androids to BB and even older Nokias.

What made you decide to start working on mob.is.it?

I've always been fascinated by mobile phones - I created an online Blackjack game using WAP back in 2001 - so the mobile web revolution we are living today seemed like the "perfect storm" where I could put my skills and passion to the test.

How did you come up with the name?

Well, I wanted a name with a little bit of Italian spice along with a reference to mobile, keeping it short and easy to remember. The first idea was "mobile.is.it" but that sounded a bit too long hence: "mob.is.it".

What technologies have you used to build mob.is.it?

The front-end and the CMS heavily rely on jQuery while we built the 1.0 version of our mobile websites using Sencha Touch. For a various set of reasons we then decided to switch to jQuery Mobile also for our mobile websites so it is fair to say that all of mob.is.it heavily relies on jQuery and HTML5.

What was technically the most challenging part of developing mob.is.it?

Balancing ease of use with flexibility and power. We wanted to build a CMS that could be used by literally anyone - we strongly believe the mobile web is and needs to be for everybody - but at the same time we need to give our partners and power users freedom and maximum control over their mobile sites. Finding the right balance is a challenge that requires you to truly master the technology you are using.

Are websites built with mob.is.it compatible with all mobile devices?

Yes, we put a lot of effort in continuously testing all our mobile websites in a very wide variety of mobile devices: in my office I have an iPhone 4S, an iPhone 3GS, a couple of Androids, a BlackBerry Curve, an LG Windows Phone, a Nokia C6 and a Nokia 5000 - and I always test our sites on all these phones. The other day I received a Nokia 3510: that's or next frontier.

How long did it take to put together mob.is.it?

Well, it started as an experiment in Sencha Touch back in March 2011 and the official launch date was September 21st, 2011 (yes, the autumnal equinox...) so it took us about 6 months to put everything together. Obviously since then we never stopped coding and testing and deploying and testing and coding...

You don't need not be a coding expert to use mob.is.it. Is this your USP?

Our main USP is: the mobile web is yours. This is what we strongly believe in and this is the way we want to achieve it: by building a tool so easy that anybody can use it, by allowing people to create mobile websites that work and render perfectly on a huge variety of phones, and by doing all this at a very affordable price.

Who do you see as your target audience?

The audience of mob.is it are small/medium businesses who want to quickly and easily build their mobile website (B2C) along with marketing and web agencies who are looking for an advanced and reliable technological partner that will fulfil all their mobile web needs (B2B).

Do you have any new features in the pipeline?

The main focus in our current development pipeline is m-commerce: we do already have a couple of widgets for selling products and services but our goal is to offer our customers a complete and flexible mobile commerce solution at a very reasonable price.

Has mob.is.it got the feedback and growth you expected since launch just a few months ago?

That's the main thing I would like to thank our customers and users for: the awesome and incredibly useful amount of feedback we get every day, which is the perfect fuel for our development engine. In terms of growth, we are a bootstrapped company with a tight budget so having 500 active users in less than 4 months, well, doesn't sound too bad!

What are you most excited about at the moment?

When you have a baby you are very excited when he gives you his first smile or the first time he grabs and holds his favorite toy. Little things, but for you the biggest events in the world. Well, with a startup, your startup, it's more or less the same thing: the first paying customer, when somebody writes you "hey guys, your product is awesome" or a call from a big marketing agency. Watching my creature grow, day by day, that's what excites me the most.

Can you convince the reader to start using mob.is.it in under 50 words?

If you haven't lived under a rock for the last couple of years you know the mobile web is The Next Big Thing. Come and grab your piece right now at mob.is.it. Free (to try), easy (to use), awesome (to enjoy).

How would you describe revolution.is in under 50 words?

At revolution.is, we tell stories of remarkable people living unconventional lives. Our aim is to motivate you to trust your gut, break rules that don’t matter, and be bold in the pursuit of your dreams.

What made you decide to start working on revolution.is?

I was the young girl who stayed up late with a flashlight, reading Chicken Soup for the Soul books. Inspiring stories of overcoming challenges and doing what's meaningful always deeply resonated with me. The idea for revolution.is came when I began my own personal journey. I quit my stable and comfortable job, sold all my belongings, gave nearly all my clothes away to charity, and booked a one-way flight from San Francisco to New York. I knew there was more for me to give, do, and learn in the world, and I set out to experience the answers. When I wrote about the experience, hundreds of people emailed me to tell me that my story had inspired them to take action toward something that mattered. This deeply moved me. In parallel with this, I was meeting a ton of incredibly inspiring people with remarkable stories and diverse journeys. I wondered how many more people I could inspire to take action through these stories. That's when the idea was born.

What's the most inspiring story you have come across so far?

This is such a hard question! Moses Sanga is definitely near the top of the list. He grew up in one of the poorest villages in the world. He didn't have shoes until he was 13 and he didn't see a television until he was 15. Despite this, he's invented a technology that will give 40 million Africans clean energy by 2020. His story moved me to tears. If he can create change, so can you.

You believe that in order to change the world, we must first change ourselves. Give us an example of how you have changed yourself.

I imagine a world without a speed limit. Where human potential is not governed by what we're told to be, the only fear is not giving enough, and the urge to share your gift cannot be restricted. This is the world I imagine because this is the self I've created. To realize and actualize this, I've quit jobs, moved around the world, flown to cities on a whim without a place to sleep, cut off negative relationships, practiced meditation, done things I've hated to discover things I love, dated people who treated me poorly to realize what it feels like to be appreciated. And the list goes on (and is only getting started.) I'm obsessed with self-awareness and behavior change. And I believe it starts with me. If I want to teach others how to unleash their full potential, I first have to unleash my own.

In the last year you have been up to alot! Tell us about some of your achievements.

Yeah, this year was realllly intense. Intensely amazing. A year ago this month, I was selected to help Seth Godin launch a new publishing experiment, the Domino Project. That was a wild ride. As the "Chief Evangelist," I helped figure out how to get our ideas to spread as far as possible. I also had the opportunity to "CEO" Derek Sivers' book, Anything you Want, which shot to #1 on all of its Amazon categories. In parallel to working with Seth, I launched two passion projects: revolution.is and The Passion Experiment. I was getting hundreds and hundreds of emails from 'successful' people each week telling me how they hated their jobs, felt stuck, and were unsure how to make change. They had gotten to a point where they said, "Shit. Is this what I'm really doing with my life?" That's when I realized there was a need and business opportunity to help these people. As an experiment for myself, I came up with a 4-week program, called it "The Passion Experiment," and launched the opportunity on my blog. Hundreds of people applied, are still applying, and it's now my main source of revenue. Unexpected but awesome. From July to October I worked with Ryan Allis, CEO and founder of iContact, to launch a new social media division of his business, iConnect. And from November to December, I helped the Unreasonable Institute figure out some internal communications type stuff. Both experiences validated that I was made to work for myself. Now I'm working 100% on my own projects.

What's next for Amber Rae?

Scaling the message and impact. I have over 50 stories at revolution.is. I've been writing and sharing content for years at Hey Amber Rae. In the last nine months, I've helped over 30 people make massive positive changes in their life. This is only the beginning. I want to positively impact the lives of millions. I want to create a paradigm shift in terms of what's possible, what matters, and what "work" even means. I want to show people how to align their natural talents and true passions with what the world needs. I want to encourage people to create their own rules, live naked, and go make something meaningful happen.

Can you convince the reader to click on revolution.is right now in under 50 words?

If you want to wake up motivated and fall asleep fulfilled because you're fearlessly giving your gifts to the world, start here at revolution.is. These stories will inspire you and make you think.

How would you describe 500px in under 50 words?

500px is a photo discovery and photo sharing community with the focus on the highest quality photography in the world.

What made you decide to start working on 500px?

In the early days of digital photography (circa 2003) Evgeny and I were looking for a platform to share our photos and discover great photographers, see their work and learn and get better at taking photos, but we could not find anything. So we decided to build it.

How did you come up with the name?

It all started with the Livejournal community, which had two rules for photo submissions: your works had to be of the highest quality (the best photos you ever produced) and the photos had to be 500 pixels wide. At that time (2003-2005) the monitors were smaller resolution, so this width was adequate. Since then the monitors got better, but we kept the name, because we liked it and it stuck with our users too.

What was technically the most challenging part of developing 500px?

I think the algorithm to determine the best photos from all the photos uploaded was the most challenging task. Also, as the site grew, we had some scalability issues.

How long did it take to put together 500px?

We had several iterations of the site. In the current form — it took about 6-8 months of active development to complete.

Do you have plans to develop a mobile app considering the popularity of phone photography?

We developed an iPad app in 2011 and saw a few apps created by third party developers using our API. We are considering developing an iPhone app ourselves. This is probably all the details I can share at the moment.

Do you have any new features in the pipeline?

Yes! However, I would like to keep quiet about them for now. What I can say is that I have been waiting for these things to come to existence for a number of years and they are mostly done, so I am super excited.

Has 500px got the feedback and growth you expected since launch?

Yes, but I think we are still largely unknown to North American users.

How many users do you currently have?

This is the information we are not sharing at the moment as well, but I can tell you that the number of users is growing fast.

How many photographs are uploaded on an average day?

Last time I checked we had 20-30K photos uploaded a day.

Do photographers keep the copyright to their work?

Yes, absolutely.

Who do you see as your target audience?

Anybody interested in photography.

Who is your biggest competitor?

People say it is Flickr, but I don't think Flickr is a direct competitor to 500px. I think there is no real competitor in our space (yet), since I have not seen any company doing exactly what we are doing.

What advantages does 500px have over its competitors?

Quality of photos.

What is the biggest hurdle you have faced or are still facing?

Growing the company from 2 people a year ago to 16 people at the moment (and it will probably need another 10 soon).

What are you most excited about at the moment?

Our current product development — there are so many things we wanted to do over the past several years, but did not have the resources to do. Now we are much stronger and have the resources to finally implement all the ideas we had.

Can you convince the reader to start using 500px in under 50 words?

I think pictures speak much stronger than words, so just go to 500px.com/popular and see for yourself.

How would you describe KISSmetrics in under 50 words?

KISSmetrics is a customer analytics software that allows you to understand and optimize the user experience throughout your entire customer lifecycle from first click to the last conversion.

How did you come up with the name?

It was a team effort. We all thought that metrics should be simpler, hence the "K.I.S.S." part and "metrics" because we are an analytics company.

Has your initial vision changed since launching KISSmetrics?

It has. We first started out as an analytics tool that was based around Facebook applications and now we are a customer analytics platform.

You spent 6 months pitching Crazy Egg to investors. What did you learn?

If an investor doesn't give you money, it's because you did something wrong. In most cases you couldn't get them excited enough or you could help them understand how you were solving a big problem and creating a big enough company that they could get a good ROI from. In addition to that, investors typically like investing in people they know or people that their friends know. So get to know them.

How did you get True Ventures to fund KISSmetrics?

My business partner had a talk with Om Malik, and he highly recommend that we get funding from True. He brought us into the firm and helped us get the money. Because of him we were able to get funding from True, which has been a blessing for us.

You're working on creating a 100 million dollar company. If KISSmetrics becomes that company, what next?

I probably will end up working for someone else. As sooner or later we have to create an exit for our investors and ourselves (either go public or sell). In most cases, when you sell a company, you end up working for the acquirer. After that I probably will start another company. I just don't know what else I am good at and enjoy other than starting companies.

What does a typical day consist of?

I have a pretty hetictic schedule that is full of calls and meetings. My day is broken down here.

Which article on your blog (Quick Sprout) has received the most views?

I wrote an article about business quotes years ago and it still gets tons of visitors each day. To date it is the most popular article on Quick Sprout.

How do you find the time to respond to almost all of the comments on your blog?

I rarely sleep. ;-) To be honest I just work a lot of hours. At one point I responded to all comments and these days I just respond to new comments. As I still get comments on posts that I did a few years ago... at this point it is impossible for me to keep up with all comments so I just stick with new blog posts.

What do you love being most - a blogger, entrepreneur or investor?

I love blogging. For me it is a stress reliever and I enjoy teaching others. Plus I learn so much from readers of Quick Sprout... so it kind of is a win/win situation. I also do enjoy being an entrepreneur and investor, but I probably will always blog even if I am not an entrepreneur or investor.

You often push things to the limit. What's a good example of this working and another of it failing?

A good example of this is my personal brand. I push it to the limit by doing whatever it takes to brand myself. From speaking at over 50 conferences a year to blogging on Quick Sprout to participating on the social web... I do whatever it takes to create a strong personal brand. And over the years it has worked well. A good example of this not working is YouTube. I figured out how to game it and at one point I had a top 100 YouTube channel with 0 videos uploaded. Sooner or later I got caught and YouTube removed most of my subscribers.

What are the difficulties in working with big companies like AOL, General Motors and Hewlett-Packard?

They move REALLY SLOW. It's hard to get things implemented and there is a ton of bureaucracy. If I had my choice I would only work with startups... but big companies tend to pay a lot better.

How do you think formal education can be improved?

They can teach you more things that would be valuable in your career. I can't say I learned much in college... I kind of did the minimum amount of work and just cruised by, so it could be my fault.

You were a top influencer on the web according to the Wall Street Journal. How do you keep a zero inbox?

I have someone who works for me that helps me manage my inbox. That's all she does for 8 hours a day. Sadly, I still can't keep a zero inbox. :(

What's the biggest mistake you've made?

I lost over a million dollars into a hosting company. It was my worst investment to date. The idea we had was great, but the people who ran it weren't rockstars. The big lesson I learned... ideas are a dime a dozen, it is all about the people.

If you could only give one piece of advice, what would it be?

Learn from your mistakes. The number one reasons I see entrepreneurs failing isn't because they make mistakes, but they keep on making the same ones over and over again. Learn from them and avoid making the same ones over again.

Are you where you expected to be 10 years ago when you were 17?

I am not. I was hoping I would be much further along, but there isn't much I can do other than to keep on pushing forward. :)

What are you most excited about at the moment?

I am really excited about KISSmetrics. We are making some cool product changes in the next few months. I can't say what they are... but stay tuned.

Can you convince the reader to start using KISSmetrics in under 50 words?

What do you use your analytics for? To see how you can boost your traffic, right? But does more traffic mean more income? In most cases, it doesn't. KISSmetrics helps you see what causes your revenue to go up and down so you can focus on boosting your income.