The Bodega, Cornmarket St, Friday 13 January at 10:15am
There are no presentations or demos lined up this week, just open networking.

And at the Rubicon Centre, CIT, Bishopstown on Friday 27th January at 10:15am
To get OCC of to an inspiring start in 2012, Stephen Bean, photographer, movie maker, lecturer and media producer for UCC is going to give us a talk.

Come along for coffee and the talk will start at 10:30. More about Stephen here: and photography at UCC here: https://www.facebook.com/pages/New-Photography-at-UCC/143207142438614 . Stephen has an astonishing breadth of experience from war photography to photographing silver tea pots (do you know how hard that is?!) to filming interviews and caves so bring along you image media questions for him.

Want to talk at Open Coffee?
If you would like to give a talk or show off a new product for some feedback
at an upcoming Cork Open Coffee, please get in touch by emailing

corkopencoffee@gmail.com

Yanky will have copies of his book with him for anyone to buy.

Fire in the Belly, An exploration of the entrepreneurial mindset

EXCERPTS FROM THE BOOK:

• Fire in the belly is the fuel that drives you. With fire in your belly, you’re invincible
• With so many people now considering self-employment, it’s critical to make the emotional transition from employee to self-employed.
• Every entrepreneur has chutzpah – it’s in our DNA. Encourage your chutzpah genie to escape.
• The goal of the education system is to produce employable people who will fill society’s jobs.
• Families are incapable of giving “Recovering Employees” emotional support.
• Feeling lonely can be the number one challenge.
• To be your own boss, you must undergo deprogramming to ditch your employee mindset.
• People say that unless you are prepared to work hard, you should not start a company. Wrong. Unless you already work hard, don’t even think of starting your own business.
• Some employees should never be tempted to leave the employment world. Others should never have been employed in the first place. Asking whether entrepreneurship is for you is the wrong question. The real question is whether you are right for entrepreneurship.
• You’re never too old or too young to start a business.

WHAT THEY ARE SAYING ABOUT THE BOOK:

• Essential reading. Ruari Glenn, amazon.co.uk
• My business bible. Briain Smyth, Irish Independent
• Fire in the Belly tells anyone still beholden to employers how to discover whether they have what it takes to be an entrepreneur. Sandra O’Connell, Sunday Times
• A truly comprehensive treatment of the topic. I read things that no one mentioned in all the years I studied entrepreneurship. Feargal Byrne Lostjobstartbusiness.com
• I have witnessed this book’s ability to change peoples’ lives. David Harrington, amazon.com
• I learned more from your book than from 4 years in college. Trevor Gillespie
• Reading your book gave me the confidence to start up my business with my eyes wide open. Everything you said was true. Cathie Clifford, Clifford Marketing & Associates
• Sorry to phone you at midnight. I’ve just finished the book. Now I know that in the morning I will give in my notice. CR
• The best book I have ever read on the neglected subject of entrepreneurial values. This will now be essential reading for all our business advisors. Gerry Moan
• It’s ironic and absurd that the issues tackled in the book were never even touched on during my MBA studies. What planet are these business schools on? Gaby Posen

Retail price: €15.99 + p&p

SPECIAL DISCOUNT FOR BUSINESS NETWORKS: €10 +  €1.50 p&p

10+ copies: €10 including p&p

ORDERS: yanky@eircom.net, 086 8575162

The topic of the morning was Cork Open Coffee itself, to see if any members would like to make any changes to how OCC has been working over the past 2 years or so.

There was some great feedback and I took plenty of notes while we all talked. Thank you everyone for all the feedback.

In general, it looks like people want things to stay much the same with just a little more notice about events, some time keeping when talks are going on and keep it tech-based.

Below are my notes in no particular order. I will be working on lining up speakers to demo products and services for the next several open coffees so please get in touch if you would like to give a talk, even if you have given a talk in the past.

If anyone would like to sponsor 1 or more Open Coffees, which pays for Coffee and nibbles for 20ish people, please get in touch by emailing corkopencoffee@gmail.com. The cost of sponsoring a meeting is only 60 Euro. €30 for a coffee urn and €30 for some little cakes.

Here are the notes, if anyone would like to add, please comment below or email us at corkopencoffee@gmail.com

• Fortnightly is good, don’t change to once a month for meetings.
• Needs a little more structure for talks, a moderator for talks being given to prevent topics going on and on
• Every now and then, when doing the initial round-table introduction, give an individual in the audience a few minutes to explain a little more about their business, similar to BNI but not formal.
• A person/business doing a presentation to show their product or service could pay for the coffee?
• 10 – 15 minute presentations, 10- 15 minutes for discussion
• Have Topics for meetings such as SEO, Sales. It doesn’t need a presentation to be made, just a topic for discussion with a person to start it off.
• Send out the email notifications 1 week in advance, Mondays and possibly a reminder again on Wednesday
• Have some more conventional talks such as Sales / Marketing with a tech slant
• Leave behind the Open Coffee’s that take place in coffee shops in the city.
• Try out other venues such as the National Software Centre / Web Works with a board room type environment like the Rubicon.
• Possibly take in donations to pay for coffee & nibbles
• Possibly a Linked-In group for discussions
• If people are looking for someone at a meeting, perhaps have a minute when introducing oneself to say what they are looking for eg: A developer for a project, A designer for a logo
• A page on the website to list profiles of regular members.
• Perhaps recurring talks about relevant topics such as Sales/ Investment/Funding
• Looking into funding to pay for Coffee & Nibbles?
• Try to make resources available to OCC such as access to libraries.
• Have events trough out the year, such as Summer BBQ/Christmas Party events to break up the year.
• Invite in Kieran Moynihan (The new Entrepreneur in Residence at the Rubicon) to talk about his new role in CIT/The Rubicon.

One of our new members, Karl took some excellent photos in and around the castle.

A huge thank you to the hard working people of the Observatory, especially Clair McSweeney who took some time out to give us a 3 hour tour in around 30 minutes.

The castle is an excellent place, full of information and I imagine everyone attending that morning would highly recommend taking a tour.

View from Blackrock Castle Observatory

For anyone not familiar with the area, here is a link to the Blackrock castle on Google Maps http://short.ie/
bcomap. There is parking around the corner from the castle gates.

Clair McSweeney, Facilities Manager of the Blackrock Castle Observatory has kindly invited us to gather in the The Castle Bar and Trattoria, which is on the right as you enter the castle gates.

Clair will also give a tour of the castle at noon for anyone interested and would also like to highlight some of the great upcoming events in the castle including:

• Tweet in to Blade Runner (Movies by Moonlight Film Club) Saturday the 29th
• Space Camp 2010 (Summer Camp July and August)
• The Castle Bar and Trattoria Summer Bar-B-Qs

Any blogging / Tweeting / Foursquare’ing about BCO or any of its event is greatly appreciated! Further events in the BCO can be seen on their events page or sign up their newsletter.

Cork Open Coffee Sponsorship

David Reilly, from Reilly & Co. Solicitors in Cork has generously offered to sponsor several of the upcoming Open Coffees which means we can bring in some excellent Coffee from Mr. Cotton coffee for a few of the upcoming Open Coffees in the Rubicon. If youd like to Thank David (or maybe get some legal advice!) you can follow him on Twitter.

Cork Open Coffee E28093 After Dark

Also taking place this coming Friday is Cork Open Coffee E28093 After Dark. This is an evening version of the Open Coffee for those who cant make it in the mornings.

It is very informal and takes place in The Bodega from 8pm onwards. Follow Ronald on Twitter for more details or questions.

Bizcamp

Bizcamp Dublin takes place this Saturday in the Guinness Storehouse. Check out their line up of speakers (PDF) C2A0and others attending the event. A fantastic event for businesses.

If you are among the many that aspire to starting your own business but don’t know where to start, then the Discovery Zone could be just the launching pad you need.  The programme has been specifically developed to assist experienced professionals, who for a variety of reasons find themselves at a crossroads in their career.

You may be a middle to senior manager who has a wealth of experience running a business for someone else, but would now like the chance to run your own business! You may not possess a business idea, but have the experience and motivation to successfully establish and run a new business, with some training and guidance.  The programme will encourage new idea generation and will also explore commercial opportunities, through partnership with other entrepreneurs or academic institutions.

Run as a full-time twelve week programme in the Rubicon Centre, located on campus within CIT, the Discovery Zone will harness the ability of participants as they immerse themselves in the programme. A number of key topics will be discussed, including idea generation, viability testing and the various routes to commercialisation. Practical guidance will be on hand from individuals on how they successfully changed from manager to entrepreneur.

Not only will they examine in depth the potential of their own idea, but upon completion, participants will also acquire an understanding of what will be required should they wish to convert their idea into a viable business.  Alternatively, if their preference is partnership, they will be equipped with the knowledge of how to develop successful partnership arrangements.

The Programme will commence in March 2010 and places will be offered to 10 suitable participants, selection by means of an interview. The participants will be based in the Rubicon Centre, for the duration of the programme. Each participant will be expected to attend the Centre 5 days per week where they will receive guidance both individually and in groups to assist in the progression of their ideas.

A dedicated Programme Manager will act as a resource for the participants. Additionally they will have access to the expertise of Rubicon staff, CIT Researchers and the CIT Technology Transfer Office. As the Discovery Zone is part funded by Enterprise Ireland, each project will be allocated the services of an Enterprise Ireland Mentor who will provide specific guidance to all projects.

To apply for a place on the programme, please log onto the Rubicon Centre website.  Closing date for receipt of application is 5pm on Friday 19th March 2010.

Further details on the Programme can be obtained by contacting Paul Healy, Rubicon Centre Manager – 021 4928901 or email paul.healy@cit.ie.

• Email sent to 167 email recipients. (+7 from last email)
• Subject length: 5 Words (29 characters, -8 characters from last email)
• Open Rate: 26.9% (down 5.6% from the last email)
• Bounce Rate: 1.2% (Down 0.1% from last email)
• Click Rate: 3.6% (down 10.3% from last email)
• Unsubscribe: 0
• New Subscriptions: 0

The open rate is down a little this time. This is to be expected I imagine because at 8pm in the evening most people are at home and away from their computer.

The click rate is down quite a bit too, over 10%.  This email had only 4 calls to action, 2 in the content and 2 footer links. The last email had 8 links with a resulting click rate of 13.9%. This email just didn’t have a lot for people to do.

Interestingly, it was one of the links towards the end of the email, the link to the Cork Open Coffee blog that got all the clicks, instead of the map link like I’d expect since that was up top.

The opens and clicks all peaked 1 hour after the email was sent and dropping off after that, someone opened the email at 3am! There were a couple of opens and clicks again the following morning after 9am with some small activity right through the working hours of Thursday.

Looking back over the past couple of campaigns, nearly all the open and click activity happens within the first hour after the campaign is sent.

This was an afternoon email compared to a mid morning email the last time.

As promised, here are its stats:

• Email sent to 160 email recipients. (+3 from last email)
• Subject length: 6 Words (37 characters, +1 character from  last email)
• Open Rate: 32.5% (up 2.9% from  last email)
• Bounce Rate: 1.3% (Down from last email)
• Click Rate: 13.9% (Up from last email)
• Unsubscribe: 0
• New Subscriptions: 0

The Open rate and Click rate have both improved from the last email with a drop in Bounce rate making it a more successful campaign overall.  Perhaps an afternoon email after 3pm to people is better than a mid morning after 10am email?

This time, the most popular links to be clicked were the link to the map (10.3%), the link showing the previous email stats (51.7%) and the link asking people to follow @corkopencoffee on Twitter (13.8%).

There is an email going out to Cork Open Coffee members this afternoon about Cork Open Coffee ‘After Dark’, an evening meeting of Open Coffee members that can’t make it for the morning meetings. The stats of that will be put up on this blog too.

This weeks Cork Open Coffee is taking place this Friday the 19th at 10am in The Bodega, Cornmarket street in Cork. No demos this week, just coffee and networking. The Bodega opens at 10am, they have free wifi and a map on their website for how to get there.

We have begun using MailChimp to send these email notifications to Cork Open Coffee members. The email list is currently 160 members strong and is growing on a regular basis thanks to existing members recommending the meetings to others, please keep it up! If you know of others that might like to receive the Open Coffee emails, there is a new Sign-up widget on the blog.

In keeping with the ‘Open’ in Cork Open Coffee, we will be publishing the email campaign stats on the Cork Open Coffee Blog. You can see the stats from the last email on the blog now. No ones email address will be displayed on the blog, just some overview information and hopefully some useful data that might be of interest to members sending their own email marketing campaigns.

If you think you’ll be attending, please let us know in the blog comments.

Talk to you all on Friday,

Conor, Ciara & Gordon

Cork Open Coffee Organisers.

http://www.corkopencoffee.org

Don’t forget to follow @corkopencoffee on Twitter!

• Email sent to 157 email recipients.
• Subject length: 6 Words (36 characters).
• Open Rate: 29.6%
• Bounce Rate: 3.2%. (Hard bounces, emails no longer exist)
• Click Rate: 11.8%
• Unsubscribe: 0
• New Subscriptions: 5

There were 7 links in the email. The most popular link clicked was the link to the Cork Open Coffee Blog. I wrote in the email that I would be publishing this email marketing information followed by this link to the blog which received 28.6% of the clicks.

In the image below, the percentage of clicks to each link can be seen. It is interesting to see the links with the most clicks were sort of in the middle of the email, I would have assumed the links towards the beginning of the email would have received a bit more attention.

The last time a recipient clicked on any of the links was almost exactly 48 hours later, 5 minutes before the beginning of Open Coffee that Friday morning. 21 people attended the Open Coffee morning that morning, a ‘bum-on-seat’ rate of 13.4%.

Most people opened the email only once or twice. A couple of people opened the email as many as 15-20 times! I wonder why that that figure is so high.

Most of the email activity was in the first two hours after the email was sent with the most clicks happening in the first hour.

The Cork Open Coffee email was sent using MailChimp and the Stats were taken from MailChimps dashboard.