MyPunchblog

This post was written by Matt Douglas, Founder & CEO

Thanks to everyone who has commented on the posts about the MyPunchbowl intern. It’s been informative, entertaining, and most importantly very interactive. I continue to surprised by the number of comments the original blog post received. After almost two weeks, not a single day goes by without numerous emails in my inbox about the intern candidate.

Of course, the one question that everyone asks is “Are you going to hire the intern candidate?”

So I’ve made my decision, and it’s really quite simple. I’m not going to be the one that makes the decision. That’s right, I’ve decided that Stephanie (our Marketing Manager) is going to make the decision. Am I passing the buck? Perhaps. But allow me to list the key reasons that I’ve decided to let Stephanie make the decision:

1. As the CEO, my job is to hire people around me who can make great decisions. I know that Stephanie will make the best decision for the company.
2. This position is for a marketing intern, who will work directly for Stephanie. She wrote the job description, interviewed, and interacted with all of the candidates. She is best suited to make the final call.
3. She’s smart: As one of our Twitter followers pointed out, Stephanie is a very smart woman capable of making smart decisions. Whatever she decides, I know she’ll have great logic and substance behind the decision.
4. It’s empowering: one of my jobs in the company is to empower our employees to make decisions. I believe that this is the kind of decision that Stephanie should be empowered to make.
5. Stephanie loves to remind me that it wasn’t that long ago that she was in college (coyly pointing out that it was a few years ago for me). I know that as a (somewhat) recent student she’s much more suited to ‘get inside the head’ of a college-aged student.
6. Stephanie remains objective about the decision. She’s reminded me multiple times that regardless of the prior blog interaction we need an intern who will help her accomplish marketing tasks. I feel confident that Stephanie will make her decision objectively.

So there you have it. Stephanie will make the decision. She’s asked for 24 hours to think it over and make the final call.

What decision do you think she’ll make?

This post written by Stephanie Fader, Marketing & PR Manager

For some, Valentine’s Day is a wonderful excuse to go to dinner with a significant other, give each other chocolates, flowers, jewelry, and who knows what else? Others would argue that couples should be doing these things all year long, but we’ll let that slide.

With the anticipation of Valentine’s Day building for weeks if not months, what are all of the singles out there to do? Trust me, it’s pretty damn near impossible to ignore Valentine’s Day — it’s everywhere!

Even on MyPunchbowl we’ve got beautiful free eCards that you can customize for your sweetie with photos and video. People also used our site to plan Valentine’s dinners and brunches as well. Couples only?

So what’s a singleton to do? I’m very happy to say that MyPunchbowl’s got something for you too! You can grab all of your girls (or boys) and plan a fun night out. With Valentine’s Day on a Saturday this year, don’t stay home but embrace the single life with a night on the town. I will be!

We also have the perfect outlet for your Valentine’s Day disdain: Anti-Valentine’s eCards! Send them to your girlfriends, the guy who wronged you, or to someone you know that just loves to hate Valentine’s Day!

This post written by Stephanie Fader, Marketing & PR Manager

Yesterday I ran into a friend at the gym. We chatted a bit and I told her about the latest and greatest from MyPunchbowl. She told me that she used to get “fairly regular” emails from MyPunchbowl but that she hadn’t gotten one recently. And she actually sounded disappointed about it.

I know for a fact that she last received an email in mid-January about the Super Bowl. But here we are three and a half weeks later and she couldn’t remember the last email she received from us.

Email marketing is a tricky thing. How much is too much? Or not enough? Once a month? Once a week? We don’t want to bombard people with unnecessary emails. We do, however, want to give them useful and timely information about upcoming holidays and new product features.

We face another challenge with email marketing. Because of the nature of our business, our users don’t necessarily need our service any time but rather at specific times (when they’re ready to start planning a birthday party or baby shower). Unless they’re planning a holiday party (which most people plan around the same times), we probably don’t know when they’ll need MyPunchbowl so how do we know when to reach out to them?

This year we’ve mapped out our email marketing strategy for the entire year with dates, content, and calls to action. I’m really excited about our ability to look ahead and see how many emails we’ve planned and to work together as a team to execute this strategy.

But I have a feeling I’ll still probably ask myself, “Is it too much? Or not enough?”

I’d love to hear your thoughts!

This post written by Stephanie Fader, Marketing & PR Manager

As you probably know from Matt’s two previous posts, MyPunchbowl is looking for a Marketing & PR intern. I haven’t weighed in yet publicly regarding “A story about spunk and fight” because we’re still in the process of reviewing other candidate’s resumes and I’d like to remain fair and open-minded. I will admit that I have concerns about how this public debate is affecting our overall intern search. What do other candidates think? Will applicants be afraid to work here?

I finally had some time between a board meeting and a new site release to read through the emails from internship applicants waiting in my inbox. Trust me, there are plenty more typos and grammar mistakes. The thing that gets me is that most of the candidates aren’t following the instructions we gave them for applying!

Here’s the job posting as it appears on Craiglist:

Do you want to get solid marketing experience and be involved in a cutting-edge Web 2.0 company? Punchbowl Software, the developers of MyPunchbowl.com, is looking for an enthusiastic Marketing Intern to join our fun, software startup environment. MyPunchbowl is an award-winning site for event and party planning.

Who you are:
• You are intelligent and well organized
• You have excellent writing skills
• You are energetic and creative
• You have an excellent memory and attention to detail
• You are web savvy, particularly with social networking sites
• You have marketing experience from previous internships and/or coursework

Responsibilities:
• Represent and promote MyPunchbowl on social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook
• Expand MyPunchbowl’s presence in the blogosphere
• Implement a relationship management tool for keeping track of bloggers
• Assist with press announcements and other marketing activities
• Various writing tasks as needed
• Assist with office and administrative tasks

This is a semester-long internship; 15–20 hours per week. We are located in Framingham, so you must have a car. Compensation: $10–15 per hour, based on prior experience.

To apply for this internship:
1. Create a user account at MyPunchbowl and check it out.
2. Send a *one page* resume, your impressions of the site, and brief introductory email to jobs at punchbowlsoftware dot com

What I end up getting is an email from candidates telling me about themselves. Sometimes they don’t even do that, they just send the resume. No impressions of the site. No reference to signing up and trying out MyPunchbowl. Part of why we ask for this is to 1) see if they can follow instructions and 2) to evaluate their writing skills. By not following these simple instructions, they’re basically telling me that they aren’t either of the first two things we’re looking for on the job posting!

Unlike Matt, I haven’t written to anyone who didn’t follow instructions to make them aware of their errors or grammatical mistakes. But on the flipside, I probably won’t give their resumes much consideration either. Is it really that hard to follow instructions?

This post written by Eric Peden, Director of Operations & Analytics

It’s always instructive when a friend or relative uses MyPunchbowl for the first time. We typically hear very positive comments about how our site makes planning a party easier and more enjoyable.  But our friends are also quick to suggest features that they wish we offered.

This anecdotal feedback is very valuable. We collect and contemplate our friends’ suggestions, and they invariably find their way into internal product discussions: The friend who wants Feature X; the aunt who is confused by Feature Y.

These suggestions provide a great starting point for internal discussion. If a friend has identified a problem area, how would that manifest itself in customer behavior? Can we find evidence of that behavior in our tracking data? Is there another company that might face a similar issue? How do they handle it?

Resources are scarce at a startup, and it’s important to know how to incorporate an informal product suggestion into the data-gathering and product improvement processes. We have to remember that a single suggestion, while valuable, is anecdotal. There is no need to go overboard in implementing new features on the basis of a single comment.

On the other hand, the plural of anecdote is data. As MyPunchbowl’s numbers guy, I especially try to remember this aphorism, commonly attributed to Raymond Wolfinger. Anecdotes often give us ideas that we can’t get through customer surveys or other formal methods. When several members of our team report similar friendly suggestions, it usually means we’ve found a new way to improve our product.

This post was written by Matt Douglas, Founder & CEO

I was happily moving along in my day when Eric (our numbers guy) pulled me aside and asked “When was the date that you officially launched MyPunchbowl?” I didn’t hesitate to respond: we launched on January 15th, 2007 and we were featured on TechCrunch the night before we launched. Then he asked, “Matt, do you know what today’s date is?”

Wow. 2 years. It’s been quite a ride. If I could tell the Matt of 2 years ago some things about running an Internet startup, here are the top 5 things that I would tell him:

1. There’s no substitute for great employees. Find the best. Nurture them, help them grow, and your company will be rewarded more than you could ever imagine.
2. Always keep your pulse on your customers: 2 years later, I still take customer service calls on my cell phone. Yep, go ahead and try it. If I’m not in meeting, I will likely answer the phone.
3. Cash is king: Be very careful about how you spend cash. A dollar saved today is worth 10 tomorrow.
4. Great products win: Looking back, every time we decided to heavily invest in the product (like our great Design Studio feature), it’s always been worthwhile.
5. Be patient: There are very few startups that turn into overnight successes (like Facebook or Twitter). MyPunchbowl might take 5 years to really get off the ground. Be patient, and you’ll get there.

I’m humbled and honored by everyone who has put their faith in me and Punchbowl Software. To our investors, our board members, our partners, our employees, and our customers: thank you for a thrilling 2 years.

Happy Birthday MyPunchbowl.

This post written by Stephanie Fader, Marketing & PR Manager

With Barack Obama’s historic inauguration just a week away, there’s still time to host your own presidential celebration. While the idea of organizing a party in less than a week may be daunting, just look at what Obama is up against. Feel better?

So whether you invite just a few trusted advisors or your whole cabinet, your first order of business is to design and send party invitations like this one:

Once you’ve sent your invitations, order patriotic party supplies and have them delivered right to your door. This will leave more time to focus on the really important things like food and drinks!

MyPunchbowl’s resident party planning expert, Penelope, has some great ideas for how to make your inauguration party one-of-a-kind. Check out the “Party Planning” section of our site where you can search for themes, food/drink ideas, and more.

With everything covered, you’ll be able to celebrate the inauguration presidential-style: with everyone cheering your name.

Next task: world peace.

I do a fair amount of traveling. Like most business people, I usually fear getting stuck next to someone chatty on an airplane or a train. The last thing I want on a cross-country flight is to have some random person tell me all about their kids and their latest vacation. My motto when traveling: you ignore me, and I’ll ignore you.

However, even with this philosophy, I try to maintain a high level of civility with my seatmates. I will typically say hello, and do whatever I need to do to make their journey comfortable. For example, I carefully watch where I place my elbows and I make sure that my bag doesn’t impede on their space. I’m cordial and friendly, and try to treat others how I want to be treated.

Just this evening, I took a train from New York City back home to Boston. As I boarded the train, I spotted a seat open in one of those 4 seater areas (Amtrak Acela trains have a nice “desk” area where you can sit with three other people). As I was starting to get settled, it became readily apparent that I had just chosen a seat next to Chatty Cathy and her friend. After about 1 minute of listening to how much they loved Rockefeller Center, I high-tailed it to another seat. I said hello to the man in the seat and asked if I could sit in the seat next to him. He smiled, said hello, and I sat down. I immediately apologized for the pizza I had carried onto the train (note to people who bring pungent foods on airplanes: please stop). He laughed appreciatively. And that was that.

Over the next hour and a half, he ignored me, and I ignored him. Traveling bliss. However, on the train you can use your cell phone so it’s hard to ignore the conversation that’s happening two feet from your ears. He heard my conversations, and I heard his. Shortly after our phone calls ended, I took out my laptop to get a little bit of work done. As soon as he saw me do this, he quickly mentioned that he was about to get up. After a brief exchange, we decided to switch seats. We exchanged some small talk, and that was it.

After he came back, I decided to continue our small talk with a more substantive question — and from there we launched into a conversation about our respective businesses. What transpired over the next hour was a conversation that was informative, thought-provoking, and very useful to me. We talked about a broad range of topics and realized that we know a lot of people in common in the startup world.

The specifics of what we talked about aren’t important. But here is what IS important: with a quick and cordial hello a conversation blossomed. We found out that we could actually help each other and potentially do some business together. I learned a bunch, and I’m hoping he did too. I left the conversation feeling both energized and more connected to the business world around me. It didn’t take much to start the conversation — and I’m glad I did.

So next time you’re on a train or plane, say hello to the person sitting next to you. Be cordial and respectful, and listen for cues to figure out whether they want to continue the conversation. You never know where it might lead.

Hey Jeff D: Thanks for saying hello. It was a pleasure to meet you.

MyPunchbowl, a critically acclaimed website to organize and plan parties and events, today announced the launch of MyPunchbowl eCard
Studio. MyPunchbowl eCard Studio offers beautiful, customizable and free eCards that are perfect for the holiday greeting card season.

MyPunchbowl eCard Studio enables users to create eCards that have the look and feel of traditional paper greeting cards. With complete customization controls, users can modify color, text, fonts, or upload their own photo to create a truly personalized design. MyPunchbowl eCard Studio offers hundreds of designs and provides an eco-friendly alternative for those who want to send beautiful holiday eCards, attractive birthday eCards, or thoughtful thank you eCards.

“In these challenging economic times, we’re excited to introduce a product that makes it possible to send high-quality online greeting cards without the cost of paper and stamps,” said Matt Douglas, CEO, Punchbowl Software. “MyPunchbowl eCard Studio surpasses what most people thought was possible for an eCard website.”

With MyPunchbowl eCard Studio, users can easily share their customized eCard over email or on social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter. These sharing features make it easy to send holiday greeting cards to your friends quickly and easily.

“I didn’t think it was possible to send high-quality Christmas eCards through the web,” said Laura Salafia, a MyPunchbowl user. “With unique designs and the ability to include a picture of my family, I’m turning to MyPunchbowl eCard Studio for my holiday cards this year.”

Key functionality of MyPunchbowl eCard Studio allows users to:
• Choose from hundreds of pre-made, customizable, free eCards for a variety of occasions
• Instantly customize the color of your eCard
• Upload your own photo to create your own eCard
• Add personalized text or include an additional note beside your eCard
• Send your eCards to multiple email addresses at the same time
• Share your eCard on social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter

MyPunchbowl eCard Studio is the perfect complement to the extensive event and party planning capabilities available on MyPunchbowl. With the addition of eCard Studio, MyPunchbowl adds another feature to enhance the end-to-end party planning experience. To try MyPunchbowl eCard Studio today, visit http://www.mypunchbowl.com/ecards

New MyPunchbowl Design Studio includes paperless papers and ribbons for eco-friendly save the dates and online invitations

Framingham, Mass. (PR Newswire) October 7, 2008 – MyPunchbowl, a critically acclaimed website to plan and organize parties and events, relaunched today and unveiled a groundbreaking new feature called Design Studio. MyPunchbowl Design Studio will enable hosts who crave customized save the dates and online invitations to replace their scissors and glue with the scroll of a mouse. Hosts can choose from a
variety of paperless paper options—invitation backgrounds that have the look of paper and envelopes—as well as ribbons and fonts, all of which can be personalized with the color of their choice. The result is elegant online save the dates and party invitations worthy of the biggest occasions.

“MyPunchbowl is turning the page on paper as the sole option for hosts who want to plan an important milestone event,” said Matt Douglas, CEO, Punchbowl Software. “The new Design Studio compliments MyPunchbowl’s existing party planning tools while providing a stylish
alternative to paper save the dates and invitations.” With party planners frequently looking for “green” alternatives, MyPunchbowl offers attractive, high quality save the dates and invitations for hosts who want to minimize their ecological footprint. By using MyPunchbowl Design Studio, hosts will see reductions in costs, paper consumption, and their personal impact on the environment.

“As a scrapbooker, I love that MyPunchbowl Design Studio gives me so many options to create an upscale theme for my event,” said Heather Woods, MyPunchbowl user. “It is so much fun to personalize a design to exactly what I want, and I’m glad I don’t have to spend money on stamps.”

Key features of MyPunchbowl include:

• Unique Pick a Date feature to drive group consensus to an event date
• “Save the Date” functionality to inform guests early in the planning process
• Design Studio with an attractive selection of paperless papers, ribbons, and fonts
• Ability to instantly customize the color and fade of any paperless paper, ribbon, or text
• Hundreds of pre-made free invitations that can be customized for any occasion, such as
birthday invitations and Halloween invitations
• Party checklist and potluck checklist to keep hosts on track
• Easy import of email addresses to manage guest lists
• Stress-free RSVP to ensure a more personal interaction between host and guest
• Party planning advice and tips from MyPunchbowl resident expert Penelope
• A party store locator to find local stores anywhere in the United States
• Numerous “after party” features to reminisce and share party memories

MyPunchbowl Design Studio culminates months of research and development and extensive customer input. This groundbreaking technology assures hosts won’t have to sacrifice quality to be eco-conscience when they want to organize and plan important parties and special events. MyPunchbowl Design Studio combines style and function allowing hosts to create a theme that matches their personal style.

The new Design Studio is the perfect complement to the extensive event planning capabilities available on MyPunchbowl. The “Pick a Date” feature helps drive group consensus and automates date selection for the host. The “Checklist” section offers an innovative way to organize party planning and a simple way to ask friends to bring something to a party. All of the features work together to help hosts plan events that matter with ease and confidence. With the relaunch of the site, MyPunchbowl secures its leadership position in the market as the most user friendly and sophisticated event and party planning site on the web.

To sign up for a free MyPunchbowl account, visit http://www.mypunchbowl.com.