Greg Isaacs' Weblog

Conflict of Interest?

Greg — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 11:37:00 -0700

Now that the first phone powered by Android is out, I'd love to be a fly on the wall for an Apple board meeting. Since Eric Schmidt sits on Apple's board I wonder how comfortable Steve Jobs feels about disclosing future iPhone plans given Google's mobile ambitions. My prediction is Eric Schmidt gives up his board seat in the next 12-18 months to avoid any further conflict of interest.

Jeff Tamborlane (9/28/1972 - 8/10/2007)

Greg — Sun, 12 Aug 2007 18:18:00 -0700

The world is a sadder place as we mourn the passing of Jeff Tamborlane. Jeff was a lifelong friend - the person, besides my parents, that has been a major part of my life the longest. Jeff was literally one of a kind. He was an amazing athlete (literally any sport he tried to conquer he did), a gifted surgeon, a tireless volunteer (he did multiple surgical missions to third world countries) and a dedicated selfless friend. There are so many things I now realize I wanted to share with Jeff about how I admired him in so many ways. I'm hoping he is listening to my thoughts as this is the only way he can now hear all the things left unsaid. I'm glad I got to see Jeff less than 3 weeks ago and that he had the chance to meet my daughter (Julia).

To make sure Jeff's wonderful memory lives on, please share your thoughts below.

Update 8/15:

Jeffrey treated underprivileged people around the work with "SIGN"

Send Memorial Donations in Jeffreys Name to:

"SIGN"
Surgical Implant Generation Network
451 Hills Street - Suite B
Richland, WA 99354
Tel- 509-371-1107

If anyone has any pictures of Jeffrey they'd like to share, please email me at gisaacs@vantagemedia.com and I will upload them here:

Who wants to be a millionaire?

Greg — Sun, 05 Aug 2007 11:33:00 -0700

This is crazy....

Sports leagues in trouble

Greg — Wed, 25 Jul 2007 12:18:00 -0700

As a long time Yankee fan, I've enjoyed watching The Bronx is Burning. The Bronx is Burning covers the tumultuous 1977 season of the Yankees. I was pretty young in 1977 and wasn't even living in America yet so I can't say I recall much about this season. However, the problems with the Yankees seem minuscule in comparison with today's current sports issues. Specifically, you have betting on the NBA, dog fighting in the NFL, steroids in MLB and no one watches hockey. Oh how I miss the days of Reggie going at it with Billy.

Avoiding accidents on the way to work

Greg — Mon, 23 Jul 2007 09:44:00 -0700

On my way to work today, I almost had 3 accidents. No, not the kind with other cars. The accidents I am talking about came from the radio.

Every station I listened to (ESPN, CNBC, Howard Stern) all talked about the last Harry Potter book and the "ending". Each time I heard the name Harry Potter, I quickly turned the station as I wanted to avoid hearing if Harry lives or dies. I don't plan to read the last book, but will see the movie when it comes out in a few years. I doubt I will remind blissfully ignorant about the ending that long, but I'm going to try!

What Fox is saying about MySpace

Greg — Mon, 02 Jul 2007 17:51:00 -0700

The rumors around Fox's recent offer to swap their stake in MySpace for a piece of Yahoo got me thinking...

Essentially Fox sees the writing on the wall. They are going to be overtaken by MySpace! Maybe not tomorrow, but within the next 12-18 months. Fox is realizing they can get out of an overpriced asset (MySpace) with a massive return and trade up for an arguably fairer priced asset with more diversification. If I'm in Yahoo's shoes, I'd be very cautious. At this point, acquiring FaceBook might be a better play for Yahoo, but that price tag goes up daily.

What AT&T Should Do

Greg — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 21:16:00 -0700

In order to capitalize on the launch of the iPhone, AT&T should offer to pay the early termination costs for customers who leave other carriers (e.g. Verizon, SprintPCS, etc) and sign up for an extended agreement with AT&T. Given AT&T's experience in understanding churn rate plus their knowledge of ARPU (average revenue per unit or subscriber), AT&T should be able to easily put a solid offer together to help bring customers over. Although the iPhone will bring customers into the store, the termination fee consumers will need to absorb to switch to AT&T may impact overall customer acquisition.

This interesting data point was from the WSJ today:

A survey by research firm IDC found that while 60% of respondents were interested in the iPhone, only 10% wanted to pay full price and sign a contract with AT&T.

LeadPoint opens Payday/Cash Advance Marketplace

Greg — Tue, 19 Jun 2007 08:51:00 -0700

One of the things I've been working on at LeadPoint is the launch of our Payday marketplace. Building this product, which is quite sophisticated given all the real time interaction that is needed between publishers and Payday lenders, has been a ton of fun. Congrats to the LeadPoint Payday team for making this product a success.

Game on!

Greg — Wed, 13 Jun 2007 16:45:00 -0700

From CNN.

Everyman Jack

Greg — Thu, 07 Jun 2007 21:14:00 -0700

Congrats to my friend, Ritch Viola, for launching a new men's grooming product line called Everyman Jack. Ritch helped build Method and is now bringing his talent to his own new venture. You can find Everyman Jack products at Target.

I miss Tivo

Greg — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 19:40:00 -0700

Om had an interesting post regarding Tivo working more closely with Comcast. A while ago I blogged about Tivo being toast as the cable and satellite companies would embed Tivo functionality into their DVRs.

I'm a prime example of why Tivo is in trouble and will continue to be marginalized. I recently opted for Time Warner Cable over DirecTV (cable offered far better pricing for the combination of TV and Internet access - but that is another story). I also opted for Time Warner's DVR instead of Tivo mainly because I wanted everything in one unit. I actually have a Tivo unit that doesn't even require a monthly subscription, but the thought of having another unit wasn't that appealing. In addition, as far as I know, you lose some of the dual tuner capabilities when you use Tivo with a cable box.

After using Time Warner's DVR for a few months, I miss Tivo. The Time Warner DVR is very clunky and lacks some very basic features I would have expected the unit to have like skipping 15 minutes with the click of the button (hint: conflict of interest is probably the reason her since cable companies sell ad space and don't want you skipping through commercials).

Now that Tivo is showing up on cable boxes, I'm excited. I'll definitely pay a reasonable premium to have Tivo. However, I'm not holding my breath it will show up anytime soon on Time Warner. I guess I'll have to watch my Yanks give up another lead on a crappy cable DVR.

Ask.com - I don't get it

Greg — Fri, 01 Jun 2007 14:50:00 -0700

When I was on the East coast recently, I noticed a bunch of Ask.com billboards. The ads featured Ask's "algorithm" with taglines like "The Algorithm constantly find Jesus".

I have two issues with their marketing approach: 1) an average consumer doesn't care about the algorithm. Algorithms are complex and consumers like simplicity and 2) it is really necessary to use Jesus to help you market? I don't get their approach at all. Odd!!!!

Taking eBay to the edge

Greg — Fri, 01 Jun 2007 14:32:00 -0700

When I was at eBay, I was a big advocate of eBay enabling more commerce on the edges of the Internet. I was excited to see eBay To Go. The app is pretty slick, but I only wish more functionality, especially bidding (not sniping), was enabled in eBay To Go. Check it out.

This is why I left Silicon Valley

Greg — Tue, 22 May 2007 12:12:00 -0700

Interesting post by Michael Arrington. This is why I moved to LA...a far less pretentious town. ;-)

Seriously, SocalTech has a good post re: activity down in LA.

Facebook

Greg — Mon, 21 May 2007 11:40:00 -0700

Looks like Facebook is getting the open platform religion.

Popping of the Lead Generation Bubble

Greg — Mon, 21 May 2007 11:39:00 -0700

Good post by my colleague, John Challis.

Congrats to ChannelAdvisor

Greg — Fri, 11 May 2007 08:20:00 -0700

It has been a good week for my old friends at ChannelAdvisor. First, they raised a ton of cash and then Michael Jones appeared on CNN (love the sweater, MJ). Looks like ChannelAdvisor is on a roll.

Socal VC Activity

Greg — Wed, 25 Apr 2007 09:04:00 -0700

One of the knocks about LA is there isn't a lot of VC activity down here. Now that I'm down in LA, I'm starting to find out this is pretty far from the accurate. See here.

The curse of Madden

Greg — Thu, 19 Apr 2007 17:24:00 -0700

Finally, someone figured this out.

eBay and StumbleUpon

Greg — Thu, 19 Apr 2007 13:27:00 -0700

According to TechCrunch, eBay is in talks to acquire StumbleUpon. While this could be great news for my former colleague, Dave Feller, I'm not sure I understand the strategic rationale. Om has some insight into potential reasons for such an acquisition. IMHO, it seems like eBay would be better served in partnering with SU and other companies like it via eBay's Developers and Affiliate Programs (Skype has similar programs as well). That way eBay can test multiple companies/concepts like SU without needing to spend the money (granted $45 million isn't a lot of money for eBay).

*Side note: Dave has been on a hot streak lately - first Florida (his Alma Mater) won 2 basketball and one football national championships and now StumbleUpon, where Dave works, may be acquired).

Imus....

Greg — Sun, 15 Apr 2007 20:17:00 -0700

A former colleague who shall be nameless, gave me a hard time for not blogging enough. Sorry about that! :-)

In any event, while satellite radio channel surfing last week, I came across an interesting interview with Jason Whitlock of the Kansas City Star. The interview was on ESPN, but you can get the gist of his thoughts here.

Congrats to Jason Steinhorn

Greg — Thu, 15 Mar 2007 08:36:00 -0700

Congrats to my friends and former colleagues, Jason Steinhorn and Mike Dougherty, on TellMe's purchase by MSFT. For Jason, the acquisition is a bit of a going home party as he worked for MSFT prior to working at eBay. Congrats guys!

Making things happen at eBay

Greg — Wed, 21 Feb 2007 16:30:00 -0800

Two of my favorite execs at eBay are John Donahoe and Matt Carey. Both are honest and good guys. Both were mentioned in an interesting NYTimes article.

How 24 is impacting America's global political standing

Greg — Sun, 11 Feb 2007 09:15:00 -0800

I love the show 24. Although it is fairly unrealistic and predictable, 24 is utterly compelling. I've never considered 24 as an "influencer" show, but according to The New Yorker apparently some in the government and military are concerned with 24's depiction of torture.

Although the practice of torture is illegal in the US, 24's portrayal of torture by counterterrorist agencies makes it seem like the US actually condones torture thereby negatively impacting our image internationally. In addition, some are questioning why America doesn't make torture a more common practice. For example, a West Point cadet asked his teacher, "If torture is wrong, what about 24?".

So it seems like 24 is much more of an influencer show than I originally thought...

Q1 and Q2 misses due to the iPhone

Greg — Fri, 12 Jan 2007 15:16:00 -0800

One of the oldest tricks in the tech product launch book is pre-announcing a product well in advance of actual launch. This tactic is used to freeze potential customers from buying competing products. Apple recently utilized this tactic with the launch of the iPhone. In announcing the iPhone six months in advance of launch, customers of competing products (e.g. Treo, Blackberry Pearl) may put off a purchase and wait until the iPhone hits the market. Apple’s tactic also has a benefit to Cingular as wireless customers may be more inclined to hold off on switching away from Cingular or more rapidly leave a competitor (e.g. Verizon).

This got me thinking...when all these companies (e.g. Nokia, Motorola, Sprint, etc) start missing their Q1 and Q2 Wall Street estimates, will they blame the iPhone. Public companies like to point the finger at uncontrollable factors (e.g. price of oil, natural disaster, etc) that caused them to miss their estimates. I wonder how many are going to point to Steve Jobs as causing their anti-halo Apple effect.

Bad day in the press for eBay

Greg — Thu, 21 Dec 2006 10:32:00 -0800

The WSJ and NYT yesterday both ran fairly negative articles on eBay.

Two things struck me about these articles:

1) Both lacked any real hard data and relied on the opinions of a very small sample size. When I worked at eBay, I was continually frustrated by negative articles based on little data. Even though I no longer work at eBay, I couldn't help feel irritated by these articles since they didn't seem to cover any new ground (full disclosure: I still own eBay stock so any article that impacts eBay's share price generally bothers me).

2) I found it very odd that both articles literally hit the same day. Call me a conspiracy theorist, but it feels like these stories were planted.

Podcast with Leadpoint's Founders

Greg — Mon, 20 Nov 2006 17:23:00 -0800

Jeff Molander recently did a podcast with the founders of Leadpoint. Check it out.

Here is the article:

Talkin’ Bout Lead Generation Revolution: LeadPoint.com

by Jeff Molander
November 20, 2006

Where is the lead generation business going? A fast-growing start-up called LeadPoint.com is aiming to shake things up. How? They’re giving just about anyone who can generate a business lead the opportunity to meet up with those needing leads in a seller-buyer exchange. Think eBay for leads and you’ve got the jist.

What’s the promise? A better, faster soup-to-nuts experience for everyone by creating a fluid environment where high quality leads are rewarded by the market. In fact, all levels of lead quality are settled upon by buyers. In the end this amounts to better pricing of various kinds and quality of business leads.

Per Pettersen (left) is Chief Technology Officer and co-founder of LeadPoint. Does that name sound familiar? It should as Mr. Petterson served as senior vice president and chief technology officer of Commission Junction, a global online advertising company known as a pioneer in Web affiliate marketing.

Marc Diana (right) is no stranger to the industry and brings business and corporate development experience from lead generation powerhouse LowerMyBills.com. In forming LeadPoint he pioneered the patent-pending exchange platform that powers the company—allowing for the buying and selling of leads in a free market environment and, of in turn, ensuring fair-market pricing and fraud protection. Mr. Diana is no stranger to start-ups either with years of experience in early stage investing at firms like Innovent Group and business development experience for interactive firm iXL.

Ro, we will miss you so!!!!

Greg — Sat, 18 Nov 2006 21:11:00 -0800

My man, Ro Choy, is leaving eBay. I have a lot of great things to say about Ro, but I don't want his head to get any bigger. :-)

Seriously, Ro has been a great friend and colleague. He is one of the most talented and dedicated people I've ever met. I hope we can work together again...

I'm hiring

Greg — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 11:03:00 -0800

I'm looking to fill 3 key roles on my team. Please send any great candidates my way.

1) Job 1 - General Manager of Consumer Lending

Primary function

The General Manager of Consumer Lending is responsible for contributing to the success of the company by defining and implementing a strategy and objectives for Leadpoint's Consumer Lending vertical (home equity, refinance, new home, student loan consolidation, private student loans & payday loans) with the goal of ensuring Leadpoint's success in this category. This is done by creating and maintaining Leadpoint's Consumer Lending vision, defining category objectives and high level plans, and ensuring that these objectives are met. It is also critical to leverage streamlined processes for the flow of information between and to direct service groups supporting the Consumer Lending vertical within leadpoint including Marketing, Sales, Business Development, Business Intelligence, Quality Assurance and Account Management.
Accountability, Responsibility Boundaries, and Decision Authority

* General Manager of Consumer Lending is accountable for delivering a streamlined yet comprehensive category plan at the beginning of each Quarter.
* General Manager of Consumer Lending is accountable for the prioritization of initiatives in this category and to provide clear direction of prioritized initiatives to VP of Marketplaces and all cross functional supporting departments

Essential Duties and Responsibilities

* Achieve Key Metrics Targets
* Define quarterly Objectives
* Perform market, competitive and SWOT analysis
* Lead Consumer Lending discussion in weekly Marketplaces Meeting
* Conduct weekly scrums
* Solicit feedback from customers (buyers and sellers) regarding new products and enhancements
* Define and prioritize the roll out of new products within the Consumer Lending category
* Define and prioritize existing product enhancements within the Consumer Lending category
* Ensure new and enhanced products are launched and work to specification by following New Product Development and Launch Process
* Direct buyer acquisition initiatives (Sales)
* Direct buyer retention and growth initiatives (Account Management)
* Direct seller acquisition initiatives (Business Development)
* Direct seller retention and growth initiatives (Business Development)
* Determine supporting sales programs to grow category
* Determine supporting marketing and promotional programs to grow category
* Maintain relationships with key buyer and seller market maker accounts

Marginal Duties

None
Professional Qualification Requirements

* Category industry experience (2-5 years minimum)
* Category product management experience (2-5 years)
* Internet experience (2-5 years)
* BA required/MBA preferred
* Ability to analyze, develop and manage strategies to penetrate competitor markets.

Personal Qualification Requirements

* Demonstrated leadership ability
* Superior financial and analytical skills.
* Effectively uses tools, data and systems available
* Excellent communication and organizational skills
* A team player who is excited about working in a challenging, fast-paced, and fun environment

2) Job 2 - General Manager of Auto

Primary function

The General Manager of Auto is responsible for contributing to the success of the company by defining and implementing a strategy and objectives for Leadpoint's Auto category including, but not limited to new cars and auto warranty with the goal of ensuring Leadpoint's success in these categories. This is done by creating and maintaining Leadpoint's vision in the auto category, defining category objectives and high level plans, and ensuring that these objectives are met. In this role it will also be critical to ensure Leadpoint aggressively launches new auto products to secure its market position. It is also critical to leverage streamlined processes for the flow of information between and to direct service groups supporting the Autos vertical within leadpoint including Marketing, Sales, Business Development, Business Intelligence, Quality Assurance and Account Management.
Accountability, Responsibility Boundaries, and Decision Authority

* General Manager of Auto is accountable for delivering a streamlined yet comprehensive category plan at the beginning of each Quarter.
* General Manager of Auto is accountable for the prioritization of initiatives in this category and to provide clear direction of prioritized initiatives to VP of Marketplaces and all cross functional supporting departments

Essential Duties and Responsibilities

* Achieve Key Metrics Targets
* Define quarterly Objectives
* Perform market, competitive and SWOT analysis
* Lead Auto discussion in weekly Marketplaces Meeting
* Conduct weekly scrums
* Solicit feedback from customers (buyers and sellers) regarding new products and enhancements
* Define and prioritize the roll out of new products within the Auto category
* Define and prioritize existing product enhancements within the Auto category
* Ensure new and enhanced products are launched and work to specification by following New Product Development and Launch Process
* Direct buyer acquisition initiatives (Sales)
* Direct buyer retention and growth initiatives (Account Management)
* Direct seller acquisition initiatives (Business Development)
* Direct seller retention and growth initiatives (Business Development)
* Determine supporting sales programs to grow category
* Determine supporting marketing and promotional programs to grow category
* Maintain relationships with key buyer and seller market maker accounts

Marginal Duties

None
Professional Qualification Requirements

* Category industry experience (2-5 years minimum)
* Category product management experience (2-5 years)
* Internet experience (2-5 years)
* BA required/MBA preferred
* Ability to analyze, develop and manage strategies to penetrate competitor markets.

Personal Qualification Requirements

* Demonstrated leadership ability
* Superior financial and analytical skills.
* Effectively uses tools, data and systems available
* Excellent communication and organizational skills
* A team player who is excited about working in a challenging, fast-paced, and fun environment

3) Job 3 - General Manager of New Categories

Primary function

The General Manager of New Categories is responsible for contributing to the success of the company by defining and implementing a strategy and objectives for Leadpoint's newest categories including but not limited to credit card debt, tax debt relief, credit card terminals/processing, payroll/HR outsourcing & point of sale systems) with the goal of ensuring Leadpoint's success in these categories. This is done by creating and maintaining Leadpoint's vision in new categories, defining category objectives and high level plans, and ensuring that these objectives are met. In this role it will also be critical to ensure Leadpoint aggressively launches products in new categories, including those in Leadpoint's product category pipeline) to secure its market position. It is also critical to leverage streamlined processes for the flow of information between and to direct service groups supporting the Consumer Lending vertical within leadpoint including Marketing, Sales, Business Development, Business Intelligence, Quality Assurance and Account Management.
Accountability, Responsibility Boundaries, and Decision Authority

* General Manager of New Categories is accountable for delivering a streamlined yet comprehensive category plan at the beginning of each Quarter.
* General Manager of New Categories is accountable for the prioritization of initiatives in this category and to provide clear direction of prioritized initiatives to VP of Marketplaces and all cross functional supporting departments

Essential Duties and Responsibilities

* Achieve Key Metrics Targets
* Define quarterly Objectives
* Perform market, competitive and SWOT analysis
* Lead New Categories discussion in weekly Marketplaces Meeting
* Conduct weekly scrums
* Solicit feedback from customers (buyers and sellers) regarding new products and enhancements
* Define and prioritize the roll out of new products within the New Categories category
* Define and prioritize existing product enhancements within the New Categories category
* Ensure new and enhanced products are launched and work to specification by following New Product Development and Launch Process
* Direct buyer acquisition initiatives (Sales)
* Direct buyer retention and growth initiatives (Account Management)
* Direct seller acquisition initiatives (Business Development)
* Direct seller retention and growth initiatives (Business Development)
* Determine supporting sales programs to grow category
* Determine supporting marketing and promotional programs to grow category
* Maintain relationships with key buyer and seller market maker accounts

Marginal Duties

None
Professional Qualification Requirements

* Category industry experience (2-5 years minimum)
* Category product management experience (2-5 years)
* Internet experience (2-5 years)
* BA required/MBA preferred
* Ability to analyze, develop and manage strategies to penetrate competitor markets.

Personal Qualification Requirements

* Demonstrated leadership ability
* Superior financial and analytical skills.
* Effectively uses tools, data and systems available
* Excellent communication and organizational skills
* A team player who is excited about working in a challenging, fast-paced, and fun environment

New role

Greg — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 09:22:00 -0800

As I mentioned in a prior post, I recently left eBay and joined Leadpoint as VP of Marketplaces. Leadpoint is the first B2B marketplace for lead generation – basically bringing efficiency and transparency to the lead generation business the way eBay brought it to business and consumer trading. I have to confess, before I started talking to the Leadpoint team, I didn’t have a ton of understanding about what lead generation actually was and how it worked (feel free to skip the next paragraph if you know all about lead generation already).

A lead is essentially the opportunity for a company to sell a consumer its products or services. Leads, especially online leads, are qualified by asking a potential customer a few questions. For example, in the case of the mortgage business, a consumer may be asked how much they want to borrow or information about their credit rating. On the Internet this qualification process usually takes place via forms. This is a big business, but prior to Leadpoint it was quite inefficient.

For example, buyers of leads (e.g. mortgage lenders) didn’t have the ability to openly bid for leads based on criteria (for example I only want consumers with excellent credit that live in Hawaii and I’m willing to pay up to $20 per lead). This meant buyers had to buy leads that just didn’t meet their needs. Also, the sellers of leads (e.g. aggregators) haven’t historically been interested in offering this type of flexibility and transparency as it would break their fixed price per lead model and therefore potentially impact the revenue they make.

The Leadpoint model changes all that: now buyers of leads can bid for exactly what they want and sellers of leads (e.g. portals, SEO/SEM players, bloggers) can focus on bringing traffic to their sites. Leadpoint will take care of the rest (platform, processing of payments, building demand, etc). We recently had our best day ever (no coincidence on the day I joined J) by working with a creative seller who secured placement on MSN.

In my role as VP of Marketplaces, I will be responsible for ensuring the success of our existing categories (e.g. mortgages, student loans, etc) as well as new categories (e.g automotive, education). I’m pretty excited to be working with a proven team including former executives from LowerMyBills (acquired by Experian), Commission Junction (acquired by ValueClick) and AutoByTel. I love the platform we’ve built and am especially excited about the launch of our voice product (more on this in another post).

I’ll keep everyone posted on our progress.