San Francisco Chronicle Hot Spot Dolce Amore Article Framed

What can happen when you reach out directly to the right journalist and express your wish that everyone in San Francisco should know about this cafe. Dolce Amore Miniature Art Cafe.

What: Boy meets girl. Boy pursues girl. Boy and girl fall in love and open gelato and miniature-art cafe. That’s how it went for Kevin Cooper and Chi Cooper, who fell in love at first taste over a cone of gelato.

Kevin left his jobs as a real estate appraiser and car technician in October to open this quirky cafe, gallery and romantic homage to his muse. “I talked to a lot of other business owners, and their advice was ‘Go big. Just go for it.’ And that’s what we did,” he says.

Dolce Amore offers gourmet sweet treats, breakfast, lunch and dinner, and wine and beer. Coffee beverages are made from Illy beans, and signature drinks, such as Lavender Chi Tea Latte and Spicy Maya Hot Chocolate, have gained a cult following.

The one area where Dolce Amore decided to keep it small was art. Chi, who studied fashion design at the Academy of Art, curates and exhibits miniature art in resourceful fashion. Clear acrylic cubes protrude from the wall presenting Champagne muselets twisted into elegant chairs small enough to rock in the palm of your hand. Glass bubbles suspend from the ceiling, cradling handmade Italian shoes; and tiny figurines delight customers beneath custom-made glass-top tables and counters. Magnifying glasses are scattered throughout the cafe so the hyperopic don’t miss any minuscule details. “It’s an experience rather than just a cafe,” Chi says.

Who’s there: Situated on the cusp of Lower Pacific Heights and the Tenderloin, the customers are as idiosyncratic as the neighborhoods the cafe straddles: business types meeting with clients, eccentric locals, and European tourists lured from nearby hotels by the Illy coffee.

Details: Dolce Amore, 1477 Van Ness Ave., San Francisco. 8 a.m.-10 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday, 9 a.m.-8 p.m. Sunday.

See the online article here.

Photo: Liz Hafalia, The Chronicle

Pinterest

Pinterest is a virtual pin board for organizing and sharing stuff people come across on the Internet. Pinners (Pinterest users) can pin up the things they like and have an interest in and use Pinterest for organizing, planning, and saving. Pinterest brings people with shared interests and preferences together. These people can find inspiration from each other and also repin posts.

So how can companies and organizations take advantage of this and use Pinterest as a marketing tool?

First of all, let’s take a look at the people using Pinterest. Pinners around the world might look different, but the average user in the U.S. is:

• a woman
• 35-44 yours old (the group of 25-34-year olds is almost as large)
• has some college education
• $25,000-49,999 as the household income
• has crafts, gifts & special events items, interior design, fashion, and blogging as interests

(See the specifics and some info about the British pinners here.)

If that sounds like your target audience you have no excuses not to be on the hottest new social network.

Here are some tips for creating a Pinterest presence and to further build your brand:

1. Get started

Choose a profile name that matches your brand and your other social media names. Your profile pictures and information from Facebook, Twitter, YouTube etc. can be used on Pinterest as well. Create many boards to cover a broad range of pinners’ interests (e.g. Whole Foods has twenty nine).

2. Center Around Interests

Make sure that you show the idea behind your brand on your Pinterest boards. Express your companies’ products, but also display your core values. Say that your company sells products that are made with reused materials by people in developing countries working under fair trade practices. People are likely to not only be interested in your products, but also in the environment, sustainability, and social issues. Have your boards reflect all these topics in order to emotionally connect with the pinners around your shared interests with them.

3. Be Inspirational

Don’t try to use Pinterest as an outlet for sales and self-promotion only – it’s not an advertising board. Pinners come to Pinterest to get inspiration. Instead, post a healthy balance of promotion and a variety of content that is inspirational, educational and most importantly – related to your business. Be natural and pinners will come to you and see you as a resource of information. You can also post products from other companies. E.g. if you sell tea you can promote a company that sells cups and mugs and its products.

4. Use Visuals

Just as I recently wrote in my blog post on Facebook’s Timeline for Pages: A picture is worth a thousand words. Pinterest is about images and not about long blocks of text. Also, pay attention to what users repin and give them more of this, it’s also cheaper than a focus group.

5. Add a Pin It Button

Make it easy for pinners to pin items on your website by adding a Pin It button.

Keep these five tips in mind when you’re starting and maintaining your Pinterest presence for a smoother experience. And as always, if you have any questions or want to know more – we’re here for you!

Anna

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Until then, a sparkling Spotify playlist for you –March Madness– to enjoy whether you are tidying and organizing or outside enjoying the sunshine. What is your favorite spring activity?

 Happy listening!

 Anna

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After almost five years since its launch, Tumblr has more than 42 million individual blogs. When I checked a few minutes ago over 56 million posts have been published – today!

Microblogs and Tumblr might not be any news to you, but why do people like it so much? One of the popular features is the “reblog button.” On the microblog site a Tumblr user can “reblog” other users’ blog posts, which means that in a rapid pace content can go viral and users are always in the loop. A user can also follow other users to make sure she knows what’s happening – an important criterion for the largest user group, which is teenagers and young adults aged 18-24. And of course, the fact that users can customize their own pages doesn’t hurt Tumblr’s popularity either.

Among celebrities using Tumblr, e.g. John Legend and Joseph Gordon-Levitt, maybe President Obama is the most famous one. People are also becoming famous through Tumblr. Seventeen-year-old Taylor-Ruth Baldwin created Hanging Rock Comics with her own comics and illustrations. Taylor-Ruth has over 32,000 Tumblr followers and has been mentioned in various media.

Earlier today, TIME published 30 Must-See Tumblr Blogs that is definitely worth checking out. At the office we like Awesome People Hanging Out Together, which contains photos of celebrities doing just that – hanging out together.

Are you using Tumblr? What do you think about it? Is it only for a younger crowd or will it soon be a household name?

Anna

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At Herringbone we find the app extremely convenient, as many other people do as well. For no money at all, the CardMunch app lets you scan business cards, just by taking pictures of them, and turns them into iPhone and LinkedIn contacts. Social networking has never been easier. The service requires that you have a LinkedIn account, but who doesn’t have one already? The CardMunch app also lets you add notes in the app, which can be useful for follow-up.

Say good-bye to all the times you’ve spent trying to find someone’s business card when you need to contact her and join the CardMunch party here.

Anna

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Wrapp has been tested in the Swedish market and offers gift cards from Swedish retailers such as Cervera, JC, and Stadium.

So, how does it work?

Let me inform you with an example. Let’s say that Lisa has the Wrapp app on her smartphone. When she installed Wrapp she signed in through her Facebook account. Next week it is Lisa’s friend Victor’s birthday. Lisa buys him a digital gift card through the app at a store she knows Victor likes and offers gift cards via Wrapp. Immediately, the gift card shows up on Facebook and everybody (both Lisa’s and Victor’s friends), except for Victor, can see Lisa’s gift. Mandy and Maria see it on their newsfeed and decide to add on to the gift card. On Victor’s birthday the gift card shows up on his wall and a few more friends have added on to it. Victor can either install the Wrapp app, which is for free, on his phone to redeem the gift card or log in on a friend’s smartphone. Everybody is happy.

Wrapp is a fun and easy way for users to celebrate friends and family, but what’s in it for brands? Among other things, by offering digital gift cards through Wrapp, companies benefit from unique branding in a friend-to-friend environment without having to discount their brands (forget Groupon).

Wrapp has raised $5.5 million in funding led by a venture capital firm formed by Niklas Zennström, who is also a Skype co-founder. Other impressive names involved with the company are co-founders Hjalmar Winbladh (Rebtel, Send It) and Andreas Ehn (Spotify), and Fabian Månsson (H&M, Eddie Bauer) et al.

Get the Wrapp app here.

Herringbone wishes Wrapp lots of success in the US market.

Anna

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People are tweeting movie titles such as “Gone in 60 Seconds” and “No Strings Attached,” and according to Jack Werner (yes, the @Sweden Jack Werner), it all started when Gurgîn Bakircioglu aka @Gurgin, a Swedish radio host googled movie titles before his radio show to describe his mood. He noticed a blog post called ”Describe Your Sex Life with a Movie Title” and decided to start a hashtag. Apparently, the hashtag has been tweeted before, but not to this extent.

Below is a Twitter stream for #BeskrivDittSexLivMedEnFilmTitel using social media tool Twingly. Twingly is founded and based in Sweden and over 150 Twingly partners in 15 countries are using the company’s products for commercial purposes, especially in Europe where it is very popular. Anyone can set up a livestream for Twitter, blogs etc. on her/his website to capture keywords for certain topics or events.

What will be the next Twitter trend from Sweden?

Anna

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If you haven’t read my earlier blog post about Podio or if you’re not in the know, Copenhagen-based Podio is an online work platform for businesses with hundreds of specialized and flexible work apps with messaging, tasks, reporting, workflow and contact management.

The Europas took place in London as usual and 500 attendees where met with a recorded welcome video by the Mayor of London, Boris Johnson. Twenty two expert judges who chose their favorites from 400 entries picked the winners and there where about 40,000 public votes.

London is the Mecca of technology in Europe and where most of the nominated startups are based, but increasingly more and more startups are from other European locations, especially the Nordic countries and Germany.
Silicon Valley: Watch out for some fierce competition from Europe!

And hey, all students out there! Podio is not only for businesses anymore. It offers its services for free for students and student groups. Manage all your school work in one place. Check it out here.

-Anna

This was my last day attending Innovative Sweden. I’m sad it’s over, but happy to have had the chance to listen and learn from so many interesting speakers, been introduced to so many great innovations, and met so many fascinating and intelligent people.

Today’s topic was gamification and I have to admit that when I arrived at Stanford University this morning I had World of Warcraft and Lara Croft in mind. Now I now that gamification is so much more than that. E.g. Karin Ryding and Bobbi Augustine Sand from Ozma told us how they used gamification for change management. By using Ozma’s WeProject, staff at four Swedish hospitals were encouraged to change behaviors and communicate about power consumption.

Karin and Bobbi Augustine also had the audience participate in a workshop where their Gamification Implementation Chart was used. I can see many uses for this chart at Herringbone. Get it yourself here.

Good luck to the Swedish Institute and Innovative Sweden as you promote Sweden and Swedish innovation throughout the World. Next stop: Toronto, Canada, January 23-February 12, 2012.

-Anna

All my photos from Innovative Sweden are on Facebook.
Couldn’t you attend Innovative Sweden? Or is there a session you would like to see again? Check out Innovative Sweden’s Bambuser channel.

It’s hard to beat the remarkable opening day at Innovative Sweden, but this may have been my favorite day so far. Today’s topic was Cleantech and how to build sustainable cities for the future. Sponsor was ABB.

I learned so many new cool things today.
Did you know that:

- The City Hall building of San Jose, CA is LEED Platinum certified? Scott Green and Chris Burton from the City of San Jose shared “San Jose’s green vision.” They also said that 1/3 of all VC funds in the US are invested in the San Jose area.

- Swedes are the heaviest users of energy per capita in the EU –but also of bio energy? Tomas Kaberger from Chalmers University said so. Tomas also said Sweden is a leading country within Smart Grid.

- If everybody lived the Western lifestyle we would need three globes? – Tomas Dahlman, from Electrolux revealed this alarming fact.

- Outside Stockholm there is a new, upcoming vibrant district for sustainable living, business and recreation called Stockholm Royal Seaport? A former brownfield industrial area is being transformed into one of Europe’s largest urban development projects using modern architecture and environmentally adapted energy-efficient solutions.

- Electrolux organizes an annual global design competition for industrial design students – Electrolux Design Lab? The student who presents the most innovative idea for household appliances reflecting Scandinavian design values (being sensitive to the environment, providing intuitive ease of use and aesthetic appeal) wins 5,000 EURO and a 6-month paid internship at an Electrolux global design center. I can’t wait for the future to be here if that means I can have a Bio Robot Refrigerator – watch it in this video featuring the finalists in 2010.

Enjoy the weekend. I will have a new blog post from Innovative Sweden for you on Monday.

-Anna

Follow my tweets @herringbonefm. #InnovativeSweden
Check out photos on Herringbone’s Facebook page.
Innovative Sweden is livestreamed here.