Tomasz Kozlowski

I was talking about viral marketing at the e-business seminar few days ago. Someone said that viral marketing is great but available for big corporations only. Few people agreed. I didn’t. Here is a great example that you don’t need 10 developers and/or milions of $ to get great viral-marketing-based coverage on the internet. All you need is… refrigerator :-) Follow the link http://NoOneBelongsHereMoreThanYou.com/

Few weeks ago Google made a decision - Research and Development department for Central and Eastern Europe will be based in Krakow, in south Poland. As far as I know Google is going to hire 25-30 developers who will work on Google’s new products and services.

What should be noticed is that Krakow becomes a polish “silicon valley”. Not only Google, Hosting365 and GeekMines decided to set up in Krakow. Motorola already has few buildings here and I’ve also heard about the IT company from India considering Krakow as their polish HQ. What is so special about Poland that so many companies decide to set-up here? Few facts:

1. Relatively low costs (in comparison with western Europe or US)
2. Excellent IT skills (forgive me the lack of modesty)
3. Very good english (as oppose to China / India where costs are lower but communication might be a problem)
4. Good connection (esp. from Europe). For example - you can get a low fare flight from Dublin (Ireland) to Krakow for €25. Flight takes 2h40min.

What’s so special about Krakow that it’s so popular among foreign investors?

1. Beautiful city… I know you don’t choose the business HQ basing on the beauty of the city (even if it has a lovely market square, royal castle, nice river with few ships-restaurants and the highest factor of beautiful women per square meter), but still… Once you’re here - you’ll keep thinking about the reasons to come back here.
2. Good connection - Krakow has a direct connection with most of the bigger cities in Europe. Also - 80km from Krakow (50mins by car) there is another airport - Katowice. Those two airports together can get you almost everywhere.
3. Universities - Krakow has few really good universities which educate highly-qualified engineers and IT-oriented Bachelors.

I will post more about setting up a company in Poland, etc. However - if you have any urgent qestions - contact me at tomasz [at] geekmines [dot] com

Technorati Tags: business in poland, google, poland, outsourcing

Hosting365
As some of you know I helped hosting365 to set up in Poland. Today (6 Nov 2006) I joined Hosting365 Poland as Sales and Marketing Manager or rather Hosting365 Evangelist if you like. My role here is almost-full-time so my internet consultancy service is on-hold for the moment. And that will be a LONG moment I hope! However outsource-consultancy is still available (read on).

GeekMines
GeekMines is an international outsource company. I joined GeekMines Poland as a kind of local (polish) co-ordinator. That’s where I spend the rest of my working-hours. If you’re interested in moving to Poland or just getting few freelancers / full-time employees here - contact me at tomasz [at] geekmines.com

I started my “internet adventure” with flash. I quickly realized it’s not the best environment for websites development (at least not 100% flash websites, because of SEO) but I still think that flash is a great environment for web applications. Especially now, with flash 8 version. Many people seem to recognize flash as a “designer tool”. It was a designer tool - agree, but it was fair few years ago… ActionScript 2.0 allows you to develop REALLY cool stuff.

Three most important advantages of flash based apps:

1 - Non-reload. The most important advantage of flash based apps is/was that you don’t need to reload the page to have a server-side action executed. We now have ajax - ok, so that one is covered.

2 - Design. CSS allows you to do a lot - agree. But you’ll never get as smooth and nice interaction between user and your app using CSS.

3 - Browser/Platform compatibility. Unless you use RubyOnRails for AJAX implementation - you probably spend a loooong time on browser compatibility. Flash looks and works exactly the same on every browser and every platform. It doesn’t matter if you use FireFox on PC or Safari on Mac.

I don’t want to say that all web-based apps should be flash apps. I just want to say that flash sometimes is really a better environment for some projects. Below is a great example - youtube video presenting a really nice flash based application. iScrybe - flash based iCal.

Here is a speech made by Steve Jobs at Stanford University during a Graduation Ceremony.

Okay - my blog wasn’t busy recently but that will change. Speaking of changes - I’m also going to change the track a bit. Since today my blog will more about marketing and e-marketing in Poland - just to let you know how does it work in Poland. I will also concentrate on “business in Poland”. That Category will be dedicated to IT/web companies but other branches are also welcome to have a look.

Let me know if there is something that you’d like to know about business / marketing in Poland - I’ll keep you updated.

In previous post I told you about Dog in the fog - young brand among polish beers. Here is a part of their startup marketing campaign.

Downtown. Nice summer day. You’re doing some shopping. You notice a young, normally looking guy. He holdes a dog-lead in his hand. He cares a lot about his dog. He talks to it all the time. He asks people if they like his dog. He ask people to hold his dog for him for a while as he would like to get a hamburger from McDonald, etc.

The only thing that makes you confused is that… there is no dog at the end of a dog-lead. You think to yourself “OK, just an insane guy.” Few minutes later you see a girl who tries to calm down her dog, which is very aggresive. She shouts, everyone is watching her, she has a terrible battle with a huge aggresive dog. But again, there is no dog…

If you are lucky you see more “dogs”. Each owner acts his/her role perfectly. It doesn’t matter what happened to you earlier this day. First thing you say when you meet your friend / wife / husband / boss / etc. is “You won’t believe it!” You share your history with everyone you meet. Few days later someone else will share a similar history with you, etc.

Some time later there are few billboards explaining what the hell was that. And again - you meet your friend and you say “Hey! I know what’s going on! It’s a new beer!”

To sum up: Let few people see something strange. Let them share this story with their friends. Tell them what it was. Let them spread the word about your company.

Technorati Tags: whisper marketing, poland, beer, advertising

Short introduction
There is a young (few years) brand among polish beers. It’s called “Dog in the fog”. All marketing and advertising activities connected with Dog in the fog are amazing. I’ll share more details with you in another posts. Current campaign is based on “being temperate” (hope it’s a proper phrase).

Main part
We all hate top-layer ads. They are annoying, they cover the main content so we can’t see it, etc. But imagine you see the banner like this:

Covering the area you are reading is:
a) acceptable
b) unacceptable

If you select answer “b” you get:

So you need help. Learn how to be temperate. Watch Dog in the fog movies.

What’s so special about it? Well - I don’t remember when was the last time I didn’t close the banner like that in the same second it appeared. I smiled when I saw the suggestion and I followed the link. To be honest - I did it to check this campaign out (as the marketing person), but I’m sure that many people followed the link simply because they liked the Ad.

Technorati Tags: Advertising, Polish marketing, Beer

I’m currently reading Guy Kawasaki’s book about startups - The Art of the Start. The book is absolutely brilliant! I recommend it to everyone. Doesn’t matter if you are going to launch your own company, or you run your company for X years, or you’re not an entrepreneur at all! I realize that it might be hard to convince you to read a book. But it should be easier to convince you to watch a 40mins video. As Piaras Kelly said on his blog - People should be forced to watch this video.

Technorati Tags: Guy Kawasaki, The Art of the Start, Business

First computers worked with text interface. Then we had a 2D graphic interface with windows, files and icons. What will be next? DGP lab has developed a 3D desktop prototype called “BumpTop”. You can pile up documents, throw them around, mark them, fold them, etc.

Have a look:

Technorati Tags: 3d desktop, technology