Wednesday 30 January 2013

Wordpress tutorial

Hi everyone, this post is not me giving a Wordpress tutorial but just a recap on what we did in our Business Feasibility Planning (BFP) class. A class mate asked me if I could blog about it as he couldn't keep up lol. So I agreed to do it. I'm glad to hear that I have readers and they are using my blog as a guide? lol

Last week and this week's BFP lesson were just about building a minimal viable product (MVP) using Wordpress. Itxaso invited Chris Skitch, CEO of Didgeroo, a web design agency, to teach us how to use Wordpress.

A brief guide

To choose your desired landing page
Settings--> Reading--> Select Static page--> Choose the front page--> choose the page you want your posts to appear---> save changes

Create a category
Posts--->Category-->Enter the name of the category--> Add new Category

Posts to appear on specific pages
Add new posts--->fill the title and content---> on the right, Categories box, tick the category/ies you want the posts to appear in--->publish


Menu (The tab pages)
Appearance---> Menu-->delete default--> create menu (+)--> bottom left look for pages box and select the pages you want on the menu--> to change the order just drag the bars-->select category if you want--> save menu

Widgets
Appearance--> Widgets-->Main side bar is what you have on your page, drag and drop what you want.

If you can't find the widget you want, go to pluggins.

SEO
 Setting--->Permalink--> select the format you want your link to appear (post is probably the best one)---> Save changes

SEO- Headspace

Pluggins---> Search for Headspace 2--> install---> activate--> you should find it under setting--> click on head space---> site module (at the top)---> tick google webmaster-->on a new page open google.com/webmaster--> sign in-->on the right there should be a red button "add a site"click on it-->add your site url-->

Then I sort of forgot what happened after lol. but I think you go back to

wordpress-->pluggins--> search for sitemap.xml--> select simple sitemap--> go back to google webmaster---> select the site you added-->you are now on the the dashboard, on the top right click on "add site map"-->enter "sitemap.xml-->submit sitemap-->you should then have a tracking ID which is at the top--->copy that and paste it to wordpress- google analytics, account ID--> Save.

I think that's it. lol. Bryan was doing all the work during the lesson and I was just taking notes. Hope this helps people.

Monday 28 January 2013

Decision Decision Decision



Hi guys, this is going to be a short post. In the last two weeks I have made quite a few decisions.

Decision 1
I am no longer a co-founder of Share & Wear. I have left. Cut the long story short. Not sure if I've mentioned in my previous post about the modules this semester, basically this semester the modules aim to help us to work on a real business idea. Roxy and Nele obviously wanted to use Share & Wear but I wanted to work on another idea at the same time for the course but the girls said it doesn't make sense for me to be a co-founder of two start-ups. So they made a generous offer to me. Instead of being a co-founder, they will pay me to be the marketing manager in exchange for their knowledge (e.g. how to use photoshop, illustrator,etc) and other professional knowledge.  And no, I didn't take on the offer. Why? (or maybe you're thinking 'nor would I')Well, after asking a couple of UCL mentors, they said if you don't enjoy working with the team its better to leave early. I didn't enjoy working with them because there were quite a few things we couldn't agree on. We have totally different tastes. Anyways, yes I allowed them to have my ideas for free- name, logo and other little bits and pieces- Lol. =p

Decision 2
Bryan, Benjamin and I (BCB is what I'm going to call us lol) changed our business idea from the online Oriental games to cycle phone dock. We decided that the online game market is too difficult and competitive. We felt that not many people would commit to a game for a long time. The cycle phone dock will have a charging feature, and will be placed on the handle bars in front of the cyclists. The idea is to try to aim at Barclays Cycle Hire customers.

Decision 3
We changed the business idea again, from cycle phone dock to online education platform. iEducase. This is Benjamin's idea. We changed it because our lecturer Chris said he can't see the pain point and it is not doable. I hope we won't change our idea again as it is week 4 now lol. Seriously, all these coming up with a an idea that solves a problem, coming up with hypotheses, etc are a lot harder than I thought it would be.

I will update you guys with our progress on iEducase and I will tell you guys later what exactly iEducase is. Stayed tuneddddd!!

Sunday 13 January 2013

Back to school!

Hi guys, hope you all had a lovely Christmas and New Year's. I did, this year was the best ever!

Before Uni started...

The break was so good, and I have gotten so lazy. I planned to revise all the lecture notes and start reading the Strategy Safari book but never got round to it lol. After all the hard work the break was like heaven. It was so hard for me and my Finance group to start the group assignment which was given to complete over the holidays. We met up after New Year's, on the 3rd (this assignment was meant to be due on 7th) to discuss about the work, we were chatting more than working and taking our time. Lol.


On Friday night (4th January) Nele texted me and Roxy that she is making a video for the Seedcamp application and the deadline is 8th January... Ermm ok I would have thought an earlier notice would be good lol but never mind.


She said we need to come up with a logo to put in our video. So that night when I went to bed, my mind was just trying to create a logo. And *DING!* the great idea popped up- well I think it's good anyway lol. I had an idea of a hanger with 'SW' hanging on it. I instantly jumped out of my bed and drew it out to see how it looked and texted the girls about it. They liked it and we are now using it. =D See below.

Share & Wear Logo
Nele created it using Illustrator. The font style and the colours used were not my idea, just the concept. You like? I don't like the font style though. I don't know about you but it somehow reminds me of Jurassic Park and Warner Bros, lol! I showed my brother and he said the writing seems like a title of a horror movie. With the choice of colour, I did a mini survey on Facebook asking people what colour they felt that represents chic, social and fun. Purple was the most popular one so maybe that's why Nele used it otherwise I believe she would have used dark grey as she feels grey is elegant, the title Share & Wear is also grey. See below,.

New logo title

Old logo title

Back to school...

This semester the modules we will be studying are; Entrepreneurial marketing, New Venture Analytics, Business Feasibility Planning (BFP) and Managing high tech organisations.

 Marketing and BFP will be focusing on a real business idea; the modules will help and guide us towards execution. You might have thought I would be doing Share & Wear but no. I don't want to be restricted to one idea so I decided to team up with different people to work on another idea. I want to make the most of my time at UCL and learn more things. Different business idea will allow an individual learn and experience different things. Share & Wear would be a project I'm working on the side. So what about Roxy and Nele? They are going to do it as part of the course and are recruiting another person to work on it.

As it is the first week back, nothing special happened. Speak to you later...well blog later.

Wednesday 2 January 2013

Share N Wear- Our Business Idea

Hi everyone, as promised this post is about the business idea I am working on with Roxy and Nele who both are from my TE class. As this is the first post about it I will start from the very beginning, and I will update you guys on this blog as we progress.

Logo

The logo title above was designed and created by Nele. What do you think? You like? I don't like the colour grey. To me grey makes things look dull and boring but Nele said she thinks it looks elegant. Ok then. Well I guess Share n Wear are still in its early stages, we can always re-brand.

What is it?
Share N Wear is a social fashion network, where users can give and receive styling advise from friends. Each user will have a virtual wardrobe where they can upload images of the clothes that they own in their real wardrobe. Share N Wear will be based on a mobile and web platform.

How did it all happen?
This is Roxy's idea and as I said in my previous posts I teamed up with her to work on this idea for the E-challenge. Nele joined us a couple of weeks later. It is so weird how I ended up working with Roxy. I remember just before university started, Roxy posted on the TE Facebook group saying she is looking for co-founders to work on a fashion idea. I saw it and ignored it because I was lacking confident at the time even though fashion is one of my passion. But I don't think she mentioned that it was virtual wardrobe idea. She told me about this idea later on when we officially met and started talking in university.

An example of the avatar-by Nele
 At first I didn't want to take part in the E-challenge because I didn't have an idea or a team and no confident. With encouragement from the lecturers and the things I've learnt from the course, my confident was building up. I thought to myself, I have got to make the most of my time here and I will learn a lot from taking part in this E-challenge whether the business idea will be a success or not. I decided to ask Roxy if she was happy to work with me on her idea. She was overwhelmed. Originally she wasn't working on Share N Wear, she teamed up with a few people in our class to work on a business idea based on smart home technology (for the E-challenge). So she obviously left that group and worked on this idea.








The Name
Share N Wear wasn't the first name we came up with. There were a few; Style Me, Me & my Wardrobe, Dress me and some others which I've forgotten.

I told my boyfriend about this idea and that we were struggling to think of a good name for it. As usual my boyfriend used his creativity and came up with Wear and Share. I thought that was a great name and the girls liked it too. We later changed it to Share N Wear because the order of the concept is sharing the clothes first then the user will wear it.

E-challenge
E-challenge was split into two phases; first was to do a 5 minute pitch which took place in October and second was to write a business plan and pitch about it which took place in December. We took part in both and didn't win any of the phases =(

However, we did better in the second phase as we were more prepared and made an effort with our outfits. Nele made some really good mock ups; she made an avatar of each of us and we dressed exactly same as them at the 2nd phase. Tim Barnes (the judge) noticed it, he was like "you're wearing what the avatars are wearing" Lol.. See below (there's an error, I couldn't find the one Nele made for me. I didn't wear that red jacket and those brown boots. I was wearing a cream blazer and black thigh high boots.);


A shot of our temporary website with mock ups
Nele has set up a Facebook page and website for Share N Wear.
Please check them out:




Post E-challenge/ our next steps
We have found a developer to create his social network so watch this space!
We are negotiating with fashion brands to use our platform and promote their clothes.