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Wayfair

Willy Franzen — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 16:03:50 +0000

I’ve made a point of being more active in Cornell’s entrepreneurship community, so I like to think that I do a good job of keeping tabs on which other companies have been started by fellow alums. That’s why I was shocked to learn that the #2 online retailer of home furnishings and housewares was not only a company that I’d never heard of before, but a company founded by two Cornell grads. It’s called Wayfair–they’re based in Boston, MA and did $500 million in sales last year. The reason I hadn’t heard of them is that they were known as CSN Stores until last year (they were founded in 2002). CSN Stores was focused on building out 200+ product specific properties with generic domain names like Bedroomfurniture.com, Cookware.com, AirHockeyTables.com, and AllBarstools.com. Last year they decided to get serious about branding and started pulling all of their sites into the Wayfair brand.

Find Your Way

If you’d like to read a more in-depth version of the Wayfair story, check out this write up from GigaOm. It provides a lot of interesting details, but I actually think the Wayfair site is even better. Their About page is beautifully designed and packed with information, and the same can be said for the company’s Careers page. It’s also nice that they have a Campus Recruiting section that includes this video (you may need to click through to view it):

The campus recruiting page also includes four positions targeted towards 2012 grads: Business Analyst, Business Intelligence Analyst, Category Management Associate, and Software Engineer. Additionally, they have a ton of job postings for immediate hire:

Category Analyst / Entry Level Buyer (Sydney, Australia)
Jr. Designer/Web Production Artist
Customer Service Consultant (Sydney, Australia)
Bilingual Sales & Service Consultant (Galway, Ireland)
Customer Service Consultant (Ogden, UT)
Email Sales and Service Consultant (Ogden, UT)
Inbound Sales Consultant (Ogden, UT)
Sales Consultant (Ogden, UT)
Junior Web Operations Engineer
Software Engineer
Analyst, Email Marketing – Private Sale

There are a ton of great opportunities at Wayfair, which was named one of Glassdoor’s 2012 Best Places to Work, so browse through the postings and see if any of them are appropriate for you.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Have you purchased anything from Wayfair?

Internet Brands

Willy Franzen — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 18:07:03 +0000

In case you missed our e-mail from last week, Kembrel loved the response from our post about them so they’re offering a free VIP card (usually 20 bucks) to all ODOJ readers and $5 in store credit. Sign up here.

On Monday we took a look at Vertive, a company that builds internet properties to help people save money. Today we’re going to look at a company with a similar model of building and buying websites, but a much broader approach. Internet Brands is based in El Segundo, CA and started as CarsDirect.com in 1998. It was a successful brand for them, but in 2005 they realized that the platform they had built could be applied to other verticals. Now Internet Brands operates more than 100 websites that reach over a billion visitors every year. Amazingly, they’ve been able to generate almost all of this traffic organically (without buying advertising). This is all because of the platform that they’ve developed and the ability to share resources across brands. Internet Brands is a case study of how economies of scale can work on the web.

Get Branded

The best way to get a better feel for Internet Brands is to explore their… brands. There are a lot of them, but they typically fit into one of nine verticals: Automotive, Careers, Health, Home, Legal, Licensing, Money, Shopping, and Travel. Chances are that most of the brands will be new to you, but I found a few that I was familiar with. Unlike Vertive, Internet Brands doesn’t shed much light on how they operate. Even the Internet Brands Careers page is filled with mostly generic stuff like “Do you have energy, drive and ambition?” and “Do you have a strong sense of where you are going and how to get there?” Would any job seeker answer no to those rhetorical questions? At least Internet Brands makes up for it with a ton of job postings. Here are the ones that look well suited for an entry level job seeker:

That’s a lot of jobs. Hopefully a few of them will catch your interest.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about Internet Brands?

Underground Elephant

Willy Franzen — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 17:42:53 +0000

Nearly 500,000 teaching jobs will be added in the next decade. If you’re considering a career in education, take a look at our guide to entry level teaching jobs.

Company names usually take one of two directions. They either explain exactly what the company does (i.e. Accuweather), or they tell you absolutely nothing about what the company does (i.e. Benzinga). There’s a third type that sounds totally random but actually has a significant meaning, and those tend to be my favorite. Underground Elephant is one of those names. The company is based in San Diego, CA, and they offer “a complete turnkey solution” for customer acquisition in “a wide range of vertical markets.” How is this relevant to their name? Underground Elephant plays a huge role in their clients’ businesses, yet their participation is essentially invisible to everyone but insiders.

The Elephant in the Room

If you’re not familiar with the performance marketing industry, you probably have no idea what I’m talking about. How can a company that delivers tons of customers to their clients do so without being noticed? Watch this video on Underground Elephant to get a better idea of how their business works.

While what Underground Elephant does a good job of keeping a low profile when working for clients, they haven’t been able to do the same in the San Diego media. Their CEO was named a Most Admired CEO Finalist for the third consecutive year by San Diego Business Journal, and they’re also one of San Diego’s fastest growing private companies. I guess an elephant can only hide underground so long. Now that you’ve found them, you need to take a look at their Careers page. Right now they have some great openings for new or recent grads including:

There are a ton of great entry level or near entry level job opportunities at Underground Elephant, so don’t look past them. Not only does Underground Elephant look like a really cool company to work for, but they’re based in San Diego.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard bout Underground Elephant?

Bluefin Labs

Willy Franzen — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 17:58:16 +0000

When I first learned about Google Trends, I was shocked to see how much Internet search traffic is driven by television. It’s pretty clear that browsing the web and watching the tube go hand in hand, which is great news for both marketers and tv content producers. Since its inception tv’s biggest problem has been that it is a one way medium with no real feedback loop. That’s changed, and Bluefin Labs “has accomplished a breakthrough in this field by applying cognitive science research combined with large scale computing techniques to successfully and automatically link TV to social media.” If all goes as planned, the Cambridge, MA will make traditional tv ratings obsolete. Who cares how many people are watching when you can know who’s watching and what they’re saying?

Hook a Bluefin

While there’s no doubt about what Bluefin Labs does, they don’t really emphasize their business on the website. You have to scroll down on their home page to learn that their “clients span TV networks, advertising agencies, and brand advertisers” and include AMC Networks, CBS, MTV Networks, Mars, PepsiCo, MediaCom, and lots more. The solution that they sell to these clients is called Bluefin Signals, and you can read about the science behind it here. If you want to get a very basic sense of the kind of data that Bluefin Labs offers, you can check out their sample dashboard. Last night’s hottest show was the Heat vs. Hawks game, which was closely followed up by Jersey Shore (I know which one I would have preferred to watch). I found out about Bluefin Labs from a reader who landed a job there recently. They don’t post specific positions on their Jobs page, but it mentions that they’re looking for people in the following areas:

Machine learning
Natural language processing
Computer vision
Social network analysis
Data analysis
Information visualization
Interaction design
Large scale data storage and analytics
Sales
Account management
Marketing
Product development

That covers a wide range of interests, so don’t be afraid to reach out to careers@bluefinlabs.com and apply for a position in one of those areas.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about Bluefin Labs?

QuinStreet

Willy Franzen — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 14:03:36 +0000

In March of 2009 I got an e-mail that looked a lot like the spam you typically see when you’re a webmaster with a publicly listed e-mail address. When someone refers to my site as onedayonejob.com, it gives me the hint that the e-mail was probably automated and that I should send it to my Junk folder. But I was still intrigued by the following sentence: “I am reaching out to see if you will be interested in selling your site and would like to discuss potential acquisition opportunities with us,” so I followed up. Over the next few months I traded e-mails with a guy who works at QuinStreet about potentially selling the site, but we never even made it to the offer stage. The reason that the Foster City, CA based company was interested in One Day One Job is that they’re one of the leaders in vertical marketing and online media. They have tons of online properties, and they use them to market and generate leads for other businesses. They’ve been at it since 1999, so they’ve been around the block a time or two.

Take a Ride Down QuinStreet

QuinStreet’s main areas of focus are in Education and Financial Services (two extremely lucrative markets for lead generation), but they also work in Home Services, B2B, Medicine/Health, and Premium Brand Advertising. You won’t see QuinStreet promote their properties on their home page like some other online media companies do, and you won’t get too many details about what they actually do. Online lead generation is extremely competitive, so secrecy is really important. They do have a What We Do, but it’s extremely limited in its explanation of QuinStreet’s business (you’ll find a little more on their How We Do It page). If you really want to learn more about QuinStreet’s business, their Investor Relations site is probably the place to go. What might even give you a better sense of what they’re working is their Jobs page. By investigating the positions they’re hiring for, I’ll bet you’ll get even more insight into the business. You’ll also see some great opportunities for new or recent grads including:

Employee Benefits and Compliance Assistant
Client Strategy & Development Associate
Data Services Associate (Reno, NV)
Inside Sales Rep
Inside Sales Rep – Home Services (Portland, OR)
Jr. Java Developer
Jr. Vertical Manager (Sao Paulo, Brazil)
Jr. Web Producer (Sao Paulo, Brazil)
Marketing Analyst
PPC Media Associate
SEM/PPC Media Associate (Sao Paulo, Brazil)
Media Associate
Media Associate – Home Services
PHP Developer
Vertical Manager – Online Marketing
Web Designer

If you’re interested in online marketing, QuinStreet would be a great place to learn, so give these positions a look and see what appeals to you.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about QuinStreet?

Public Health Solutions

Willy Franzen — Sun, 27 Nov 2011 17:03:54 +0000

For most people health is a deeply personal issue that is only to be talked about with close friends, family, and medical professionals, yet “public health” is a term that you hear used more and more. It’s because health isn’t an independent outcome–it’s closely tied to the health of others in your community. You’re better off if your peers are healthy, which is why governments and non-profits direct so many resources to improving public health. One of the organizations that does this work in New York, NY is Public Health Solutions. They are an “organization that develops, implements and advocates dynamic solutions to prevent disease and improve community health.” They were founded in 1957, and since then they’ve been building upon a “foundation of rigorous scientific research to link research and practice in dynamic ways to improve the health of communities.”

What’s Your Solution?

Public Health Solutions’ programs focus on addressing “critical public health needs such as maternal and child health, nutrition, access to health insurance, HIV prevention and care, and smoking cessation.” You can read up on their current programs here. All together the programs serve more than 200,000 low-income New Yorkers every year. Remember that everything that Public Health Solutions does is based on rigorous research, so you may want to read over some of their their publications to get a better feel for their work. If you find yourself lost in the research, then you may want to consider a job with Public Health Solutions. Their Jobs page has some positions posted, but I think you’ll find the jobs they have posted on Idealist more interesting–the most suitable position for a new or recent grad is Data Coordinator. Check that one out as well as Public Health Solutions’ other positions, and see what works for you.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about Public Health Solutions?

Refinery29

Willy Franzen — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 17:38:05 +0000

Keeping up with fashion isn’t a priority for me, but I still like to dress well. That’s why I trust Bonobos and Gilt Groupe to do the curation for me, and then I just buy what I like from them (it also helps that I’ve accrued a lot of credits from both of them). I know that a lot of people are far more active in keeping up with fashion, which is probably why Refinery29 is growing so quickly. The New York, NY based company is aiming to be “the cornerstone of fashion, beauty, and shopping for a new generation” as they offer “the only 360-degree source for shopping, exclusive deals, trends, beauty news, local hot-spots, and at-home sneak-peeks of fashion’s finest.” That’s ridiculously ambitious, but the results so far indicate that they’re pretty much killing it.

Show Your Refinement

I learned about Refinery29 from a blog post by my friend Charlie O’Donnell. The post touches on something really cool that Refinery29 is doing that I think more companies should do. They started out by focusing on editorial and grabbing attention to sell to advertisers. That’s what most companies in this space do, and it works, but why not take the extra step? Refinery29 has built it’s own e-commerce product called Reserve, and it’s essentially built on the daily deal model. It’s smart because it allows Refinery29 to capture even more value from their users than they do by selling advertising. I think we’ll see more and more companies do this–build media products as channels to promote their own products (I guess it’s nothing new considering the same idea is where Soap Operas got their start). I highly recommend that you dig into Refinery29′s content and get a better feel for who they are. If you like what you see, then you should probably check out their Careers page. They have a bunch of cool opportunities that might appeal to new or recent grads including:

Account Manager
Miami Editor (Miami, FL)
Los Angeles Editor (Los Angeles, CA)
Marketing Data Analyst
UX + Interaction Designer

There are a bunch of other positions, but they generally have more significant experience requirements. Hopefully something at Refinery29 will catch your eye and be a great fit.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about Refinery29?

Crain Communications

Willy Franzen — Thu, 03 Nov 2011 17:35:49 +0000

Now that I’ve lived in Chicago for three years, I’m starting to feel more like a part of the Chicago business community. And a big piece of being a part of a community is keeping up on your local news. I rely a lot of sources, but I’ve found that Crain’s Chicago Business consistently does great reporting on the Chicago business scene. Crain’s Chicago Business is published by Crain Communications, which is “one of the largest privately owned business publishers in the U.S., with more than 27 leading business, trade and consumer publications and related websites in North America, Europe and Asia.” Crain is headquartered in Detroit, MI, but their publications are headquartered in a variety of places. Crain was founded in 1916 by GD Crain Jr., and it remains a family owned business to this day despite a few bumps in the road that would be expected for any company in the publishing industry (like layoffs a couple of years ago).

Crain Your Neck

What I really like about Crain Communications is that their lineup of brands serves a lot of different interests. They cover broader business news in Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, and New York, and they cover the Advertising and Media Industry with titles like Advertising Age and TelevisionWeek. They publish Waste & Recycling News, and they have 7 publications focused on the Plastics and Rubber industries. High quality publications that target specific niches are great for advertisers, which is why Crain has an advantage over more general business publications. If you’re digging Crain’s approach to niches and you like their “Readers First” mentality, then you should definitely give their Jobs page a look. Right now they have a variety of great opportunities for new or recent grads including:

Assistant Web Producer – Ad Age (New York, NY)
Digital Assistant Managing Editor – Investment News (New York, NY)
Digital Media Analyst – Pensions & Investments (New York, NY)
Digital Reporter – Ad Age (San Francisco, CA)
Editorial Assistant – Pensions & Investments (Chicago, IL)
Editorial Assistant – Business Insurance (Chicago, IL)
Freelance Reporter – Ad Age (Washington, DC)
Marketing Database Administrator (Detroit, MI)
Part-time Editorial Researcher – Tire Business (Akron, OH)
Research Analyst – Staffing Industry Analysts (Mountain View, CA)
Staff Reporter – Plastics News (Akron, OH)
Video Editor – Crain’s Chicago Business (Chicago, IL)
Web Developer – Ad Age (New York, NY)

There are all kinds of cool opportunities at Crain, so hopefully one of them will appeal to you. Ad Age may be a sexy name because you heard about it in Mad Men, but don’t overlook writing for Plastics News or Tire Business–sometimes things that seem mundane are actually pretty interesting.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Do you read any of Crain’s publications?

Spartz Media

Willy Franzen — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 17:28:29 +0000

Life isn’t nearly as exciting with no new Harry Potter books or movies coming out. I’m pretty bummed about it, but probably not nearly as bummed as the people who hang out on MuggleNet. In case you’ve never heard of it, MuggleNet is “the world’s #1 Harry Potter site.” It was started by Emerson Spartz when he was 12 years old, and it quickly started generating a ton of traffic. And with that traffic came some serious revenue opportunities. As MuggleNet turned into a real business, Emerson rolled it into a company called Spartz Media and started launching new entertainment focused sites. Some of the bigger names include OMG Facts, Gives Me Hope, and SmartphOWNED. Spartz Media is located in Chicago, IL (about 3 blocks from me), and they’re reaching more than 8.5 million people every month through their web properties. They’ve been at it since 2009, though MuggleNet has actually been around since 1999.

OMG Jobs

I actually learned about Spartz Media from a guy I occasionally play volleyball with who works there (though I’d heard of MuggleNet before that). He made it sound like a pretty cool place to work, and how can it not be when your business is all about making websites that entertain people? You can check out all of Spartz Media’s brand here, just make sure that you don’t end up wasting a few hours. What’s cool about Spartz Media is that it’s not all fun and games–there’s a science to what they do. Whether you want to be part of the fun, the science, or both, you should take a look at Spartz Media’s jobs. Right now they’re looking for a Business Analyst and a PHP Developer, and if you look at their Team page you’ll see that there may be other potential opportunities in Design, Web Development, Project Management, Editorial, Community Management, Business Intelligence, Analytics, and more. If you do end up applying, be sure to let them know that we sent you (and if you want an intro to my fried, just e-mail me at willy@onedayonejob.com). It’s a really young company, so I bet it’s a great place for new grads.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Which of Spartz Media’s sites is your favorite?

National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency

Willy Franzen — Mon, 10 Oct 2011 17:01:25 +0000

Columbus Day isn’t much of a holiday anymore–it’s become yet another regular work and school day for many. It makes sense considering Christopher Columbus wasn’t really the guy that my 1st grade teacher taught me that he was. Still, I’m amazed by the feats of guys like Columbus (which is why I’ve written about Garmin and Facet Technology on past Columbus Days). Getting in a boat with an uncertain route to a far away destination still seems crazy to me, and these guys did it in a time when navigation equipment was quite basic. Their minds would be blown if they knew what kind of information the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (formerly the National Imagery and Mapping Agency) has. The agency is headquartered in Springfield, VA and has major facilities in St. Louis, MO (I learned about them from one of my awesome interns whose boyfriend works for the NGA). They are part of the Department of Defense, and they are tasked with providing “timely, relevant, and accurate geospatial intelligence in support of national security.”

Do You Have Geospatial Intelligence?

If you want an example of what the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency does, you’re not going to get a full answer because a lot of what they do is classified. However, they have been identified as playing a “critical role” in Operation Neptune’s Spear, which was the raid that killed Osama Bin Laden. The agency’s employees operate in a number of areas including aeronautical analysis, cartography, geospatial analysis, imagery analysis, marine analysis, the physical sciences, geodesy, computer and telecommunication engineering, photogrammetry, and more. The NGA website is ok, but I highly recommend that you check out Wikipedia’s entry on the agency for a really good overview of the organization’s history and what it does.

If you like what you read, then you’ll want to take a look at the NGA’s Careers page. (Remember that we’re dealing with the federal government, so this isn’t going to be simple.) First, you’ll probably want to visit the Occupations page, where you’ll see that the NGA offers the following positions:

Accountants
Aeronautical Analyst
Bathymetrist
Contract Specialist
Counterintelligence Officers
Enterprise Account Managers
Geodetic Surveyors
Geospatial Data Stewards
Geospatial Intelligence Analysts
HD Consultants
Imagery Scientists
Imagery Intelligence Analysts
Information Assurance Officers
Maritime Analysts
Open Source Analysts
Police Officers
Political Geographers
Program Management Execution Officers
Project Scientists
Recruiters
Regional Geographers
Regional Source Analysts
Scientific and Technial Program Managers
Source Strategies Analysts
Systems Engineers

You won’t see most of these positions in the NGA’s Current Opportunities, so you may be better off meeting them at one of their On-Campus Recruiting Events or by reaching out to them at recruitment@nga.mil. You may also want to read through the NGA’s Recruitment FAQs and looking at their Application Process. It’s all complicated, but that’s to be expected with one of our country’s intelligence agencies.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Are you amazed by what the NGA does?

Care.com

Willy Franzen — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 15:58:13 +0000

When you’re young your biggest responsibility is taking care of yourself. But eventually you get a dog, buy a house, have kids, and even have to start caring for your aging parents. As the responsibilities pile up, many people have to seek professional help to handle it all. I’m not talking about mental health professionals–I’m talking about babysitters, nannies, dog walkers, senior caregivers, and other people who can take on some of your daily responsibilities. Care.com is a Waltham, MA based company that makes “it easier for families to find reliable, trustworthy care for their loved ones.” Care.com does this by providing a closed community for matching up caregivers with people who are looking to hire them. By keeping the community closed, Care.com is able to ensure quality with features like background checks, reviews, and reference.

Show That You Care

The biggest impediment to finding a caregiver is trust. Whether you’re looking for someone to bring in your mail or babysit your first born, you don’t want to have any doubts about the person that you hire. Usually people use their real world social networks to find people for these jobs, but where do you go if you can’t find anyone you already know? Care.com wants to be that place. By combining an easy to use online experience with a team of experts, Care.com has positioned itself as the place to go to find caregivers or caregiving jobs. From what I can tell, Care.com is growing at a really good rate and they’re extremely well funded by venture capitalists. That must be why Care.com’s Jobs page has so many opportunities posted. The jobs that look like they might be good fits for new or recent grads include Data Analyst, E-mail Producer, Inside Sales Representative, Marketing Associate, Member Care Call Center Representative, Online Marketing Analyst, Operations Analyst, and Software Engineer. These look like really cool opportunities, so don’t pass them up.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Do you care for anyone?

Octopart

Willy Franzen — Mon, 03 Oct 2011 16:06:23 +0000

Ever since I was a kid I’ve liked building stuff. That’s why there’s a part of me that wishes that I had majored in Engineering. I’m ok with building non-physical things like a community, a website, and a business, but I still have an urge to actually use my hands to make something. There are a lot of people with that same urge, and luckily many of them are actually building stuff in their jobs or on their own. Octopart is a New York, NY based company that helps these people find the parts that they need to build what they’re building. In other words, Octopart has developed “search technology to help engineers and scientists build the next generation of electronic devices.”

Are You the Part Octopart Needs?

Most of us have become accustomed to finding what we want, whether it’s information or a product, by searching online. Surprisingly, many of the parts that are used in the devices that power our ability to search the Internet are extremely hard to track down. And if you want to compare prices and availability, it’s even harder. That’s why two Physics grad students started Octopart to help “you compare the prices and availability of electronic parts across different distributors.” Whether you need a solid state relay or a red LED, they’ll help you comparison shop as if you were buying something a little more common like a television or a flight. Octopart is still a very small company, but their Jobs page shows that they have three positions open. They’re hiring a Frontend Software Engineer, an Analytics Software Engineer, and their first person in Business Operations (Business Development, Sales, Marketing, Customer Service, and more). These look like awesome jobs, and according to the posting, every new hire gets a pony.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Do you build stuff?

ShopAtHome.com

Willy Franzen — Tue, 20 Sep 2011 15:35:05 +0000

It’s not often that you see 25-year old companies on the Inc. 5000, but that’s exactly what ShopAtHome.com is. They got their start as a husband and wife team, and they’ve growing consistently since 1986. It seems that the growth has accelerated over the past few years, as ShopAtHome.com, which is based in Greenwood Village, CO, has a 442% three-year growth rate and generated $35.4 million in revenue last year. Now, ShopAtHome.com isn’t really what it sounds like. It’s not an online version of QVC. It’s a coupons site; in fact, it’s “one of the largest websites offering free online coupons, grocery coupons, cash back rewards, free samples, restaurant coupons and contests.” Their site had 37 million visits last year, which is a staggering number. What’s even more staggering is that they appear to have generated about $1 in revenue for every visitor.

Shop at Home, Work at Shop at Home

Although ShopAtHome.com does offer some forms of daily deals, they’ve really stuck to the traditional coupon model. It’s proven, and it obviously generates a ton of money. Essentially, ShopAtHome.com has built the ultimate audience (median age 35 with a household income more than $75K per year) for distribution of coupons, contests, and other types of deals. The killer feature is ShopAtHome.com’s Cash Back program, which rewards people with cash for shopping through the site. So far they’ve delivered $50 million back to consumers, so it’s been pretty effective. If you’re interested in what ShopAtHome.com is doing to save people money, then give their Jobs page a look. Right now they’re hiring an Online Marketing Data Analyst, and the position looks like a great fit for a new or recent grad. You may also want to check out their internships in Sales Support, Site Marketing, and Paid Search Marketing.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Have you used ShopAtHome.com?

Levelwing

Willy Franzen — Fri, 09 Sep 2011 14:16:14 +0000

The fun thing about going through the Inc. 5000 looking for companies that offer interesting entry level jobs is that the list just keeps getting better as you move down the rankings. The companies may be growing a little more slowly than those at the top, but it’s often because they’ve reached a size where quadruple-digit growth is nearly impossible (so they have to settle for triple-digit growth). One company that has grown large quickly is Levelwing. They’re a full-service digital advertising agency based in New York, NY and Charleston, SC. Their big focus is on making data-driven decisions and using technology to measure the effectiveness of their work on a constant basis. They’ve grown at a 720% rate over the past three years, which brought them to $44.8 million in revenue last year.

Be Level Headed

Levelwing does pretty much everything that you’d expect an advertising agency to do, though the focus is definitely online. You can get a full rundown of the services that they offer here. They provide those services to a wide range of big name clients including the Bahamas Ministry of Tourism, BMW, Le Creuset, Nickelodeon, Thrillist, and many more major companies. If you want to take a closer look at the kind of work that they’ve done for these companies, you can take a look at Levelwing’s Case Studies. If their work speaks to you, then you might want to head over the the Levelwing Jobs page. Right now they have a number of positions that might be suitable for new or recent grads including Account Analyst (Charleston, SC and New York, NY), Account Coordinator (Charleston, SC), Data and Reporting Analyst (Charleston, SC), Inside Sales Representative (Charleston, SC and New York, NY), Social Research Analyst (Charleston, SC), and SQL Database Developer (Charleston, SC). Give the jobs a look and see what gets you excited.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about Levelwing?

SurveyGizmo

Willy Franzen — Thu, 01 Sep 2011 16:25:45 +0000

It’s been a while since I did a survey of One Day, One Job readers. There’s really no excuse for that considering how useful survey data can be and how easy it is to run a survey online. (So watch out for a survey sometime in the next month or two.) When I see online surveys, they’re usually run on SurveyMonkey or Google Docs, but I’ve also seen a few surveys driven by SurveyGizmo. They’re based in Boulder, CO, and they offer “a web-based software company giving researchers, and small and enterprise companies powerful tools to create online surveys, questionnaires and forms – allowing capture and analysis of virtually any type of data essential for business.” It’s working for them. SurveyGizmo came in at #144 on the Inc. 5000 with 1,940% three-year growth to $3.3 million in revenue.

Survey Says…

If you look at all of the online survey platforms out there, you’ll see a huge range of features. There’s a ton of overlap, but some companies offer a killer feature that enables them to serve a certain group of needs really well. SurveyGizmo definitely puts a big emphasis on product development and delivering new and useful features for their customers, but it seems that they put a bigger emphasis on customer service. There can be a lot of complexities when it comes to running surveys online, and SurveyGizmo has invested in making sure that they deliver the ultimate customer experience. That’s why they can name companies like Adobe, Apple, Gulfstream, General Mills,Hershey’s, and Disney as clients. If you like SurveyGizmo’s approach, head over to their Jobs page. They have a bunch of opportunities available including Technical Programming Genius, Sales Representative, Technical Writer/Product Writer, Web Designer, Accounting/Billing Clerk, and Customer Software Support Hero.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Do you respond to surveys?

Smashburger

Willy Franzen — Thu, 25 Aug 2011 16:03:10 +0000

I love hamburgers, but I wouldn’t eat a fast food burger even if it could make me fly. Luckily, better burger places are popping up all over the place. Some are local joints and some are chains, but they’re all working to remind us what a burger is supposed to be. Smashburger is taking a leading role in restoring dignity to hamburgers, although I can’t fully support a burger chain that won’t cook a burger medium-rare or even medium. They’re another Inc. 5000 company with 2,673% three-year growth from $1.4 million to $39.4 million in annual revenue. Smashburger is based out of Denver, CO and they have locations all across the country. They “start with 100% Angus Beef, smashed, seared and seasoned on the grill, placed on a butter-toasted artisan bun and topped with the highest-quality cheeses, freshest produce and condiments.”

Smashing Jobs

It used to be that chain restaurants were indelibly linked to low quality food, but that has definitely changed. Smashburger is a perfect example of how combining higher quality food with the fast food business model can lead to rapid success. In 2007 there was one Smashburger in the Denver area. Then they opened a few around town. Now there are dozens of Smashburgers all across the country. If you don’t have one in your neighborhood yet, it’s only a matter of time (they plan to grow from 70 restaurants to 500 restaurants over the next 4 years). With this rapid growth, Smashburger is hiring a ton of people. Most of them are obviously in the restaurants, but they’re also growing on the Corporate side. If you look at Smashburger’s Jobs page, you’ll see a few opportunities that are suitable for new or recent grads including Strategy Analyst, Real Estate Analyst, Data Analyst, FP&A Analyst, and Field Marketing Coordinator (Minneapolis/St. Paul, MN).

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Have you ever had a Smashburger?

Leadnomics

Willy Franzen — Tue, 23 Aug 2011 16:20:54 +0000

Today is my favorite day of the year, at least when it comes to writing daily company profiles. Why? Inc. Magazine just released the 2011 Inc. 5000 List. It’s a ranking of the 5,000 fastest growing privately held companies in the United States. It includes all kind of businesses in locations all across the country. It’s one of the best job seeker resources out there. As I looked through the list I saw a lot of companies that I’ve already written about and a lot of new ones that don’t have any jobs posted. Then I saw Leadnomics–they came in at #48 with 3,932% 3-year revenue growth to $5.8 million in revenue last year. The lead generation and performance marketing company is based in Philadelphia, PA, and they’ve been growing rapidly in terms of both revenue and headcount.

Take the Lead

A lead is nothing more than contact information for someone who may be interested in a product or service. Leads are the lifeblood of businesses in which the sales process isn’t as simple as checking someone out at the cash register (or the online equivalent). Some industries where lead generation is essential include Financial Services, Education, Insurance, and Consumer Offers. In most scenarios the quality of the lead is extremely important–some people are far more likely to buy than others, and you want to focus on the easiest sales. The web has become an amazing lead generation tool, but finding quality can be difficult. Leadnomics is all about taking the entire lead generation process and optimizing each part of “the consumer purchasing decision.” That means that they take a scientific approach to how they “acquire traffic, capture leads, analyze and filter for quality and deliver leads in real-time.” Considering that Leadnomics’ business is entirely performance based and that they’re growing rapidly, it looks like they must have figured a few things out. If you want to work with them, check out their Jobs page. They have an open call for people interested in Performance/Internet Marketing, while they are also looking for a PHP Web Developer, a Paid Search Manager, a Web Application Developer (PHP/LAMP), and a Flash Web Graphic Designer. You can lead the way.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about Leadnomics?

Apparel Media

Willy Franzen — Mon, 15 Aug 2011 14:00:58 +0000

A lot of people hate all of the advertising in sports. They get irritated by NASCAR cars, billboards in center field, and logos on jerseys. I kind of think it’s cool that sports teams are maximizing their revenue potential. But if I ever saw ads on the Yankees’ uniforms… well that will never happen… right? Advertising on sports apparel has actually been happening for a long time. Local business have been sponsoring teams and plastering their names on jerseys forever. Apparel Media is a Chicago, IL based company that is working to forever change the custom apparel and sports marketing industries at the same time. By working out deals with national advertisers and local custom apparel print shops, Apparel Media is able to give teams access to significantly discounted (20-80% off) merchandise.

Be a Running/Kicking/Throwing Advertisement

The idea of using advertising to subsidize uniform purchases isn’t anything new. What’s new is the way Apparel Media is doing it. Not only are they linking up local teams with national advertisers, but they’ve built an infrastructure that enables them to create these links through the local custom apparel print shops that teams would typically go to get their jerseys. This is an interesting choice, because I could easily see Apparel Media’s trying to do all of the printing and delivery themselves. What’s also cool about Apparel Media is that they enable advertisers to get the exact kind of targeting that they want. If you want to reach ultimate frisbee players in Des Moines with your brand, IA, Apparel Media can help you do that. Or you can get your brand on thousands of little league jerseys. The opportunities are pretty much endless. Additionally, Apparel Media is building out an analytics platform so that advertisers can measure the success of their campaigns. If you’re excited about what Apparel Media is doing, check out their Jobs page. Right now they’re looking for people in UI Design/Development, Program Management, and Account Management. This looks like an amazing opportunity to get in early on something that could be really big.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What do you think of Apparel Media?

New Balance

Willy Franzen — Mon, 08 Aug 2011 16:39:50 +0000

I’m not big on shoes during the summer. I try to wear flip flops as much as I can, and most of the exercise that I get is from beach volleyball where wearing shoes looks about as dorky as you can get. When I do go to the gym, I typically wear my Vibram Five Fingers (which you may also consider dorky looking). So I have no idea why New Balance popped into my head–I don’t even own a pair of New Balance shoes. In case you don’t know, New Balance is a Boston, MA based company that “began as an arch support company in the early 1900′s, developed into a specialized shoe manufacturer in the 1970′s, and has grown to become a leading global athletic products company.” They also own some other brands that you may be familiar with including Aravon, Brine, Dunham, PF Flyers, and Warrior.

Work Life Balance

I don’t know when New Balance got so big, but their “worldwide sales have increased from $210 million in 1991 to $1.64 billion in 2008.” That sounds like a long period of sustained growth. What’s also cool is that they have 5 New England factories, which makes them the “only athletic shoe manufacturer still making shoes in the US.” It’s only 25% of their shoes, but it’s still impressive. It’s pretty cool to see a business like New Balance that has been around for over a century, yet continues to find new ways to grow in a principled way. If you think the New Balance shoe would fit, then check out their Careers page. While most of the jobs that they have posted are in Retail, there are a few positions that seem like good fits for new grads who want to work at corporate. These include CAD Designer, Product Data Specialist – SRT & Merchandising, Trim Coordinator (New York, NY), and Product Developer – DryDock Footwear.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Do you wear New Balances?

ngmoco

Willy Franzen — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 16:31:56 +0000

While I’m not a serious gamer, I definitely enjoy playing casual games on my iPhone and iPad. Although the App Store does offer recommendations, I find that it’s still hard to find good games. Instead I rely on getting recommendations from people I know–namely my girlfriend’s 10 year old sister. I watch what she’s playing, and if it looks fun, I buy the app. Then I can try to top her score and talk smack even though I can’t come close. Games are inherently social (even though gaming can become super anti-social), so it’s no surprise that gaming companies are bringing mobile and social gaming together. One of the big players in the industry is ngmoco. They’re based in San Francisco, CA, and their name is pronounced “en-gee mo-ko” (apparently it’s an acronym for Next Generation Mobile Company). ngmoco is all about building a social entertainment company in a time when “there will be more iOS/Android devices shipped than PCs/notebooks.” It makes sense.

Be a Mofo!

I’ve heard of companies calling their employees ninjas, rockstars, geniuses, and a bunch of other endearing terms. Until I came across ngmoco, I’d never heard the term “mofo” used for an employee (at least one that was still employed by the company). But that’s exactly what ngmoco will call you if you work for them. There’s an explanation here, and I think you’ll like what they have to say. Now, ngmoco has an amazing Careers site, but before you jump into that, you should probably get familiar with their games and read through their blog. Then you can visit their Careers page and see how awesome they make working for them look. You can browse through all of the positions here, and you should not that there are plenty of jobs for both techies and non-techies. Here’s what seems most appropriate for new grads:

There appear to be some amazing opportunities at ngmoco, so you better act on them now. Otherwise, you’ll never be a mofo.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What games do you play?

Innovations for Poverty Action

Willy Franzen — Sat, 23 Jul 2011 16:20:05 +0000

Want to be part of the One Day, One Job/Internship team? Here’s your chance!

When I hear the word innovation, I usually think high-tech. It’s really just about finding new things that work, even if they’re old ideas. Innovations for Poverty Action is a New Haven, CT based non-profit organization that is “dedicated to discovering what works to help the world’s poor.” By using the scientific method in everything that they do, Innovations for Poverty Action is able to optimize their programs for maximum return on investment. That means they’re able to help more people with less money, which is absolutely essential when you’re fighting poverty. It’s pretty cool that they’ve been able to create a system for reliably developing new innovations.

Be An Innovator

Innovations for Poverty Action describes itself as bridging “the gap between cutting-edge academic research and action by nonprofits, governments, and firms.” That’s an important role because theory and practice can often be far apart. The best way to get a feel for what Innovations for Poverty Action actually does is to look at their work. You can read about in-depth studies like their project evaluations of a Girls Scholarship Program in Kenya and The Impact of Microcredit in the Philippines. You’ll also want to take a look at their blog post on zero-energy lights, which are the perfect example of low-tech innovation. Once Innovations for Poverty Action figures out what works, they shift their focus to Scaling It Up. It’s all about making the most of the resources available. If you like what IPA is doing, check out their Jobs page. They have a ton of opportunities posted and some seem appropriate for new grads including:

Data Coordinator (New Haven, CT)
Fall Research Assistant (Washington, DC)
Human Resources Associate (New Haven, CT)
Survey Programmer – Part-Time Independent Contractor
Project Associate (New Haven, CT)
Project Associate – Analysis on Agriculture, Savings and Social Networks (Evanston, IL )
Project Associate – Researcher Outreach & Communications (New Haven, CT)
Project Associate – Survey Programming (New Haven, CT)
Project Associate – Various Projects (New Haven, CT)

They also have positions in Africa, the Middle East, Asia, and Latin America. If you’re analytically minded and want to put your skills towards erasing poverty, then Innovations for Poverty Action would be a great place for you to work.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about Innovations for Poverty Action?

Opera Solutions

Willy Franzen — Wed, 20 Jul 2011 15:34:56 +0000

I guess I could have done today’s post about how we’re hiring, but I already wrote a post about that on our blog. So today we’re going to talk about something completely different. Big Data Analytics. It’s exactly what it sounds like. Opera Solutions is a company that “combines human expertise with advanced capabilities in analytics, technology and data management to offer Big Data Analytics as an ongoing service to leading organizations in industry and government.” They’re located in New York, NY; Jersey City, NJ; San Diego, CA; London, UK; Paris, France; New Delhi, India; and Shanghai, China. I know it’s kind of hard to get a grasp on the kind of problems that Opera Solutions solves, but luckily they’ve provided an awesome example. They put together a team to work on the Netflix Prize, a contest that offered a $1 million prize for a solution that would “substantially improve the accuracy of predictions about how much someone is going to enjoy a movie based on their movie preferences.” Opera Solutions’ team ended up tying for first, but just barely missed out on winning the prize.

Join the Opera

Not a lot of what Opera Solutions does is as fun as improving movie recommendations, but the problems that they work on are often extremely important. They focus on a number of specific Solution Areas including Marketing Services, Credit and Risk Services, Supply Chain Services, Global Markets Analytics, Data Transformation Services, and Custom Analytics. Their work even touches crucial areas like Security and Defense. I was introduced to Opera Solutions by a reader named Katharine Bierce. She landed a job with them a while back, and she offered to make herself available via e-mail to anyone who is interested in working at Opera Solutions. You can reach her at: kbierce@operasolutions.com. Before you ping her, you should definitely check out their Careers page, Roles, and Current Opportunities. None of the current opportunities look quite right for a new grad, but they do offer entry level roles like Business Analyst and Analytics Specialist. There are also roles for Master’s and Ph.D. level grads. Anyway, if you’re interested, your best bet is probably to e-mail Katharine and have her give you the inside scoop.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about Opera Solutions?

Yammer

Willy Franzen — Thu, 14 Jul 2011 16:40:57 +0000

Communication in the workplace can be a major hassle, especially considering the fact that a lot of people who work together are doing so from different locations these days. E-mail was an amazing step forward, but it still has a ton of flaws. (I’m dying for an e-mail client that is built for how I think and work–nothing comes close.) Now that I’m starting to consider hiring interns or part-timers (more on that soon!), I need to come up with a way to communicate with them and manage projects. Social networks like Twitter and Facebook are on to something with their interfaces, but they are most certainly not for communicating about work. I’ve played around with the the WordPress P2 Theme, which turns blogging software into something Twitter-like, but I’m not completely sold on it. I’ve also heard some good things about San Francisco, CA based Yammer, which seems to be a pretty sweet solution. Yammer enables “people to create private enterprise social networks.” It’s more collaborative than e-mail, and it allows you to open up conversations to a wider audience without annoying them.

Communicate Your Skills

Most major companies have Intranets. They’re moderately useful, but they are often completely lifeless. Yammer brings life to internal networks. They’re already working with major clients like Deloitte, Groupon, PayPal, and lots of other big names. The product looks like it’s super simple to use, and it has a ton of useful features. What may be the coolest thing about Yammer is that you only need an e-mail address to set up your own network. I put in my e-mail, and in a matter of a few seconds I had my own Yammer network set up (but nobody to Yammer with). There’s still a lot of progress to be made in the area of communication in the workplace, but Yammer has taken some major leaps. If you like what they’re doing, take a look at their Jobs page. They have great some great opportunities for new grads including:

Implementation Engineer (San Francisco, CA)
Implementation Engineer (United Kingdom)
Android Developer (San Francisco, CA)
Data/Analytics Engineer (San Francisco, CA)
iPhone Developer (San Francisco, CA)
Tools Engineer (San Francisco, CA)
Web Software Engineer (San Francisco, CA)
Technical Recruiter (San Francisco, CA)
IT and Corporate Applications Support Engineer (San Francisco, CA)
Associate Product Manager (San Francisco, CA)
Associate Product Marketing Manager (San Francisco, CA)
Quantitative Product Analyst (San Francisco, CA)
UX/Information Architect (San Francisco, CA)
Enterprise Business Representative (San Francisco, CA)
International Enterprise Business Representative – Spanish or Korean Language (San Francisco, CA)
Technical Support Representative (San Francisco, CA)

While most of the options are tech oriented, there are a few at Yammer for the not-so-technical. They’re doing some really cool stuff, so give them a nice long look.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Have you ever used Yammer?

Morningstar

Willy Franzen — Tue, 12 Jul 2011 16:01:41 +0000

Want to land a job and save the world at the same time? This week’s sponsor is Samaritan’s Purse, a non-profit organization with some amazing entry level career opportunities.

Sometimes during your job search a company name will keep popping up. You’ll ignore them because of assumptions that you’ve already made about them. Eventually you’ll give them a look, and you’ll realize that you didn’t know as much as you thought about them. That’s kind of how I’ve been with Morningstar. I knew of them well before I started this site. I have a friend who worked for them. They’re headquartered here in Chicago, IL, and they’re big supporters of the local startup and technology scene. They’re one of Fortune’s 100 Best Companies to Work For, and I’ve even had multiple people tell me to write about them. I guess it’s time to take a closer look at Morningstar, which is “a leading provider of independent investment research in North America, Europe, Australia, and Asia.” They serve all investors from individuals to financial advisors to institutions, and they do so with a wide range of products that includes services, software, online publications, and print publications.

Good Morning!

Morningstar is a big company. They have thousands of employees, and work all across the world–26 countries to be exact. They provide “data on approximately 380,000 investment offerings, including stocks, mutual funds, and similar vehicles, along with real-time global market data on more than 5 million equities, indexes, futures, options, commodities, and precious metals, in addition to foreign exchange and Treasury markets.” In other words, there are all kinds of job opportunities at Morningstar. Luckily, they do a great job with their Careers site. You should probably start with the Morningstar Story, and then read up on what it’s like to work at Morningstar (you may also want to check out their Employee Testimonials).

From there you will have two options. The first is to look at Morningstar’s Development Program, which is their formal entry level recruiting program. They’re actually having a Meet and Greet at their headquarters on August 4th for people interested in the program (you must register by e-mailing mdpresumes@morningstar.com before July 29th). The second option is to go straight to their Job postings. You can narrow it down to only Morningstar’s entry level listings, where you’ll see positions like Associate Municipal Credit Analyst, Data Analyst, Private Funds – Custom Software (Chicago, IL),
Data Management Analyst (Chicago, IL), Data Management Analyst (Oakland, MD), IFA Journalist (Australia), Investment Analyst – Morningstar Investment Management (Chicago, IL),
Operations Associate, Morningstar Investment Services (Chicago, IL), Product Consultant (United Kingdom), Product Consultant for Institutional Software (France), Product Support Specialist (Austin, TX), Quality Assurance Analyst – Custom Solutions (Chicago, IL), Research Analyst (Chicago, IL), and Sales Associate – Inside Sales (Chicago, IL). There’s a ton of opportunity at Morningstar, so don’t overlook them like I did.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What company have you been ignoring?

DNAnexus

Willy Franzen — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 16:29:43 +0000

The idea of having my genome sequenced kind of freaks me out. I’m certainly warming to it, but I don’t like the idea of finding out about a deep, dark family secret or the fact that I’m predisposed to some kind of cancer from a DNA test. I know it’s irrational, and I know that I’ll overcome it eventually. I fully expect that within 20 years every child born in the U.S. will have his or her genome sequenced at birth. So maybe I should just the bite the bullet and get my genome sequenced. But if I’m going to do that, I need your help. The other day I came across a post about Palo Alto, CA based DNAnexus on Hacker News (an awesome site for programmers and people interested in startups). The post was focused on the company’s referral program that offers $20,000 and a full genome sequencing to anyone who refers a software engineer that they hire. That clearly caught my attention (I am trying to run a business here), but, more importantly, it introduced me to what DNAnexus is doing. A single genome contains over 100 gigabytes of data. Storing and analyzing this data requires some serious hardware, especially if you want to do it on a large scale. DNAnexus is an “early-stage software technology company that aims to become the data platform of the genome era.”

You Are the Data

It’s mind blowing when you think about how much data is contained in every single cell of your body. When you multiply that out by the number of people in the world, you realize that computing is going to have to come a long way to be able to be able to crunch all of that data. DNAnexus wants to be the leader by “building the DNA operating system – a platform that will handle the data deluge coming from exponentially increasing whole human genome sequencing.” It’s hard to say what kind of things will be made possible as whole human genome sequencing becomes more common, but you can bet that it will lead to some amazing medical breakthroughs (see their testimonials here). For DNAnexus though, it’s really all about hardware and software breakthroughs. They have built their “infrastructure from the ground up to run on Amazon Web Services, the world’s leading cloud computing provider,” so that they can deliver “computing and storage infrastructure” with 100,000s of CPUs and 100s of petabytes of storage available.

If you’re interested in the intersection of computing technology and genetics, you have to take a look at jobs at DNAnexus. I’m not only saying that because they offer an amazing referral bonus; I really think that they’re doing something that has amazing potential for impact on the human race. DNAnexus is looking to hire Systems Engineers, Security Engineers, Web Services Engineers, Data Visualization and Interaction Engineers, UI/UX Engineers, and Computational Genomics, Algorithms, and Machine Learning Engineer. You can apply for any of these positions on your own if you’d like, but if you want to help support One Day, One Job (and help me overcome my fear of having my genome sequenced) then send me an e-mail to willy@onedayonejob.com with your résumé or LinkedIn profile and I’ll submit it according to the rules of the referral promotion.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Would you get your genome sequenced?

Urban Mapping

Willy Franzen — Thu, 23 Jun 2011 16:21:33 +0000

One of the most underrated trends in today’s wave of technology is the GPS-enabling of everything. I recently bought a waterproof digital camera with a GPS chip in it, and it has completely changed my perspective on taking photographs. I think that it’s so cool that I can visualize all of my photos across a map. As GPS shows up in more and more devices (it’s in pretty much every smartphone now), we’re going to see all kinds of cool applications come to fruition. Urban Mapping is a San Francisco, CA based company that plays a behind the scenes role in pushing forward mapping technology. As they put it, they provide “geographic data and services to businesses for bigger insights and better decisions.” Put more simply, Urban Mapping organizes all kinds of data around geography in a way that makes it easy to visualize and manipulate the data.

Where Are You Headed?

Urban Mapping’s flagship product is called Mapfluence, which is a “cloud-based mapping platform with thousands of content layers that can be visualized on maps, in tables and charts, or spatially analyzed to derive valuable location intelligence.” It has access to “more than 10,000 variables across dozens of data types, including demographics, educational performance, business analytics, religion, political affiliation, transportation infrastructure, weather, health and industry-specific data.” Just think how powerful that can be. With Mapfluence you could build an app that notifies you when you enter a sketchy neighborhood or helps you find parking spots. There are seemingly endless uses for the products and services that Urban Mapping offers. In addition to Mapfluence also offers a product called Urbanware and a number of Industry Solutions. If you’re excited about the future of mapping technology, take a look at Urban Mapping’s Jobs page. Right now they have a few positions that you might be interested in including Data Researcher, Python Engineer, Inside Sales Rep/Sales Ops, and Hacker in Residence. Some of the job postings appear to be a bit outdated, but don’t let that hold you back from applying. Good things happen to those who act.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Do you love maps?

Digital Sandbox

Willy Franzen — Wed, 18 May 2011 17:07:51 +0000

If you watch the news, it’s easy to believe that we’re all constantly at great risk of dying in some sort of disaster. Yes, there are a lot of threats out there, but most of us shouldn’t waste a lot of time worrying about them. There are, however, some people whose job it is to worry about and prepare for the worst. Public Safety Risk Management is a seemingly impossible task, but someone has to do it. Our local, state, and federal governments need to be prepared to deal with all kinds of things–some you could never even dream of if you spent your whole life trying. Digital Sandbox is a McLean, VA based company that helps these professionals by providing “them with the tools they need to mitigate the catastrophic and disruptive threats that can impact them.” Most of these tools are in the form of software, and they are based on strategies and “analytical frameworks essential to effective management, analysis, and assessment of terrorism, natural hazard, and technological accident risk.”

Step into the Sandbox

I’m clearly not the person to analyze how effective Digital Sandbox’s software solutions are, but their client list certainly indicates that they’re a leader in the industry. They have worked with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation; the States of North Carolina, New Jersey, Maryland, Maine, and the District of Columbia; multiple directorates and agencies within the Department of Homeland Security, the Departments of Justice and Defense, and members of the Intelligence Community. Digital Sandbox’s software is cloud-based, and it is accessible from mobile devices like the iPhone and iPad (according to the images on the company’s site). To get a better feel for exactly what the software does, you should take a look at Digital Sandbox’s Products and Solutions. If you’re intrigued by what you see, check out Digital Sandbox’s Jobs page. Right now they have a Risk Analyst I position open that looks like a great opportunity for a new or recent grad.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about Digital Sandbox?

iParadigms

Willy Franzen — Mon, 09 May 2011 13:11:08 +0000

We’re right in the thick of finals season. A few of you lucky ones are already done with them and may even be back at home already, while most of you are probably studying up a storm. It’s certainly a stressful time, and it often leads to bad decisions of the cheating/plagiarism variety. It definitely seems that plagiarism is a bigger problem now than it was in the past, but I think that it has more to do with advances in technology than an overall decline in student morals. When you had to hand write a paper or type it on a typewriter, copying someone was almost as annoying as writing your own paper. Now copy and paste makes it way too easy. Luckily, technology is catching up. iParadigms is an Oakland, CA (I swear I’m not trying to make this Oakland only, it’s just what I’ve been finding lately) based company that has been developing software to fight plagiarism since 1996. It started with some UC Berkeley researchers who had built internal tools “to monitor the recycling of research papers in their large, undergraduate classes.” From there a company was born.

Cheaters Never Prosper

iParadigms launched with Plagiarism.org and has building products around plagiarism detection ever since. The cool thing about their approach is that they’ve developed different products for different user groups. There’s Turnitin for teachers and instructors, Ithenticate for publishers and researchers, Turnitin for Admissions for Admissions professionals, and WriteCheck for students. The first three are pretty obvious products, but you may be wondering why students would need plagiarism checking software. Well, a lot of plagiarism is actually accidental plagiarism. WriteCheck helps students identify these mistakes while also helping them improve their writing. Plagiarism poses a variety of threats to education, and iParadigms has built a really interesting business in preventing plagiarism. If you like what they’re doing, you should check out their Jobs page. Right now they’re only looking for a Front-end Engineer, but they invite anyone who is interested in working for them to reach out and apply–just make sure your cover letter is completely original.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Have you had any experience with iParadigms Software?

33Across

Willy Franzen — Tue, 03 May 2011 16:13:26 +0000

One of my favorite daily activities during college was doing the crossword puzzle in The Cornell Daily Sun. It was a nice diversion during lunch (or an especially boring class). One of the best things that you can do while working on a crossword puzzle is to get one of the large horizontal words in the middle of the puzzle. These words are often 32 or 33 across, which is where 33Across got their name. They’re a company that “uses social graph data to dramatically improve online marketing” and “unlock the puzzle of social connections.” In other words, they have built a platform that targets advertising to people whose online connections already use the products or services that are being advertised. 33Across is based in New York, NY, and they have another major office in Sunnyvale, CA. Social advertising really is a lot like 33 across on a crossword puzzle–it’s really tough to solve, but when you do it opens a world of opportunities.

Here’s a Clue

Word of mouth marketing has always been the holy grail of marketers. If you can get people to tell their friends about your product or service, you win. It seems like every “social advertising” company is trying to figure out how to influence and promote more word of mouth. 33Across has taken a different approach to merging advertising with the data in social graphs. They do a great job of explaining how their “SocialDNA” Platform works on their website, so here’s what they have to say:

In order to deliver relevant ads, we have developed technology which tries to predict what consumers might be interested in based on anonymous data collected from various web sites. Specifically, our technology focuses on social interaction data. How does this work? One example is that when two people post a comment on the same photo on a social network site, our technology might assume that these people are part of the same social circle, and therefore may have similar interests. Then, if one of those people clicks on an ad for running shoes (for example), our technology might deliver the same ad to the other person.

Even though it all feels a little creepy, I love how the science of online advertising is advancing these days. If I’m going to have to look at ads, they might as well be relevant to me. If you’re good at solving crosswords and interested in the connection between advertising and technology, then you should check out jobs at 33Across. They have a couple of options for new or recent grads right now including Campaign Analyst (New York, NY) and Assistant Operations Analyst (New York, NY). And for those with a little more experience, they’re also looking for a Junior Financial Analyst (New York, NY) and R&D Engineer/Scientist (Sunnyvale, CA). 33Across looks like a really cool company, so read up on them and see if they’re a place you might wan to start your career.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Do you do crosswords?

ASPCA

Willy Franzen — Sun, 24 Apr 2011 15:19:37 +0000

Sponsored Jobs: Love restaurants and looking for an entry level job? SinglePlatform has a ton of positions that are perfect for you. They’re our sponsor this week, and you can check out all of their positions here.

As I mentioned on Friday in our post on Russell Stover, I get pretty excited about Easter candy. There’s nothing better than a basket full of jelly beans, peanut butter eggs, marshmallow eggs, and chocolate bunnies. Some people prefer a little more reality in their Easter baskets though. In the past it wasn’t uncommon for people to give real bunnies, chicks, ducklings, and even lambs to their kids as Easter gifts, and I’m sure there are still some people doing it. It’s really cute, but it’s not a good idea unless the family is actually prepared to care for the properly as they grow up. That means most people should leave their bunnies chocolate, their chicks marshmallow, and their lambs… well we’re having lamb for dinner tonight. The The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals typically agrees (maybe not with the lamb part)–they even have a page on Rabbits as Easter Gifts that links to a site called MakeMineChocolate.org. The ASPCA is a New York, NY based non-profit that has aimed “to provide effective means for the prevention of cruelty to animals throughout the United States” since it was founded in 1866.

Calling All Animal Lovers

While the ASPCA may deal with the occasional chick, duckling, or bunny, the majority of their work centers around dogs and cats. These are obviously the most popular and most broadly loved types of pets, but they also are extremely likely to end up as victims of cruelty. The ASPCA not only works to protect these animals in a variety of ways, but they were actually the “first humane organization to be granted legal authority to investigate and make arrests for crimes against animals.” The range of services offered by the ASPCA is quite broad, and your best bet for getting to know them is to browse around their site. Once you get a better feel for the ASPCA, you can check out their Jobs page. They have a number of positions available including Administrative Assistant – Anti-Cruetly Group, Graphic Designer, Humane Law Enforcement, Marketing Assistant, Part Time Animal Care Technician, Part Time Data Verification Assistant, Veterinary Assistant, and Special Event Assistant. It’s like an Easter Egg Hunt! Go find something good.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What do you know about the ASPCA?