Business Archives - Page 4 of 4

May

A Fever of Painting

You may have noticed a few sliiiight changes around here. Like a totally new website, an intern, some new business cards, and….drumroll please, we’re moving beyond the home office to a legit office (that may actually be smaller than our home one, but at least it’s not 5 feet from the rest of the living quarters).

LunarLincoln 2.0 peoples. The past few months have been absolutely breakneck. When people speak of famine or feast in small businesses, it’s been all feast over here. So much feasting. No more, not even a little wafer please. We are looking for some help, we are ready to grow, and man it’s exciting – if not a little nerve wrecking.

We spent the last few weeks touring various offices about town. There was a lot of goldilocks impressions going on “too old” “too big” “too hard to reach, sheesh return my call, worst office manager ever”. But we finally found the “just right”. Or at least just right – for now. We’ll see what the future holds.

So office-search-2014 finally over, last weekend we got in there to paint. Wiley was coming down from a fever which he promptly gave to me and we both had what sounded like the plague. So we painted in an unwindowed, 125 sq ft space, completely out of our minds on fumes, dayquil, and exhaustion. And did I mention we didn’t get enough paint? Yeaaaaaah. Maybe we should stick to our desk jobs – it’s more our forte.

It’s a great start to a new adventure. We’ll keep you posted on future developments. For now, I’ll just leave you with this:

Apr

Let’s Just Make The Intern Do This

LunarLincoln has added a mini-minion. A helper, a student, an aspiring developer. Intern Logan. Here are some questions to help you better get to know the man behind the current tweaks to LunarLincoln.com.

Q1: What made you initially interested in coding?
The first thing that got me interested in coding was probably engineering my tenth grade year. Principals of Engineering. It was an dreadful class that I despised because it dealt a little with every branch of engineering, which meant lots of physics, which meant a lot of trusses. Oh those wretched trusses. In this class we came upon a unit that dealt with Vex kits and C++. To me at the time this foreign type of code just sounded like a grade on a test, but as we got into it I really enjoyed how rewarding it was to type a bunch of parameters into a computer and have it follow it exactly. Seeing the little motor turn on because a ultrasonic sensor had told it a marble had passed in front of it made school suddenly not feel like school, and that was when I first became interested.

Q2: What have you done to explore that interest?
Outside of school the first thing I did was go on codeacademy.com, and look around at java and html code some. I didn’t get into things there though. Right now I’ve signed up for an AP Computer Science course at school next year, and of course I started interning here at LunarLincoln.

Q3: Any advice for fellow beginning developers?
The one major thing is to take advantage of all of the resources and opportunities given to you. There are tons of resources on the internet to learn about coding. Some cost money, but most are free. A few I went to were Code.org and CodeAcademy. In terms of opportunities recently I was presented with the opportunity to become an intern in the ISIS program at Vanderbilt where there might not be a lot of coding, but there might have been some and I would have definitely gotten my hands on some cool high-tech stuff. I ended up passing it up because I was starting a job, and I was too lazy to put together a portfolio. This decision is now regretted.

Q4: Favorite apps? Why?
I’m not really an app connoisseur or anything, and I don’t have many apps people haven’t heard about. I was really addicted to Clash of Clans, but it is wearing off and will probably soon be deleted. The Sportscenter app gets a lot of use from me. There is one app called YikYak that is getting popular at school. It is pretty much anonymous local twitter, and it is pretty entertaining to watch local Vanderbilt frats talk smack on it. I also like an incredibly useful app called Case Collage. I recommend everyone downloads it, and buys all the premiums. (Ed. note..haaa haaaa – ps. There’s no space in CaseCollage, get it right or pay the price.)

Q5: What you hope to learn from all this? What are you going to do with it?
I hope to enhance my coding abilities, and learn what all goes into apps. The skills that I learn here will hopefully give me a leg up on other people when I get to college. I haven’t learned enough at all to create something like an app on my own, but that would be something in the future that I might like to do.

Q6: What do you think of LunarLincoln thus far?
LunarLincoln has definitely been fun so far. Learning all the stuff about what goes into the website was interesting. The only way I knew how to make a website was to go on one of those websites you see commercials for, where you choose a bunch of premade options. Overall my time here has been useful and enjoyable.

Jan

The. End.

You’ve had the idea. You’ve built the app. You’ve marketed the hell out of it. You’ve seen results. You’ve made updates and improvements.

But now what?

Are you done? Close the lid, package it up, never look at it again? You could. For CaseCollage, this app did achieve what we set out to do. We got widespread exposure. We got to practice the whole app launch process from start to finish on an app that wasn’t really “our baby”. We learned more about working processes and how to run more efficiently in the future.

CaseCollage definitely has more we could do. In fact we have pages of “future plans”: Refining UI to add a copy/paste element, implementing in-app printing and delivery with third-party companies, additional templates for other hole-designed cases or case company partnership. But all of this requires significant additional time commitment. And we all know time=money. Whether its time for client work or time for new ideas – the current rate of income for this app doesn’t work out for future CaseCollage development.

It is hard for many to decide when is your app finished. It isn’t always as simple as profits. There are a lot of questions to weigh: Is the app something you are passionate about? Is it something that could see leaps and bounds of improvement with some updates? Is there a dedicated user base and room for growth? What about your current user base? Do you want to leave them in the lurch for future OS updates? If we had deeper, more complex answers to some of these questions, maybe we would pause and devote some more hours to the project. But, as stated above, it did what we wanted, and we’re happy with the final results (and app).

We aren’t completely shuttering CaseCollage and never looking at it again. Rest assured, I will still be coddling my instagram audience with daily/weekly new designs, and providing basic customer service (for the millionth time, please print “fit to page” do not print a screen shot, no shit, that isn’t going to be sized right). It is just time to devote the majority of our brain power to new exciting endeavors.

Just like the Internet and their goldfish attention span, we have one as well.

If you’re late to this rodeo, you may not know, we built an app and wanted to share some of the details. You can find related articles below:
Part 1: The Ah-Ha Moment And What Comes After – The idea for the CaseCollage app

Part 2: Building an App in 2 Weeks – App development process, Wiley’s analytical take

Part 3: Roller Coaster App Store Review – App store submission hurdles

Part 4: Becoming “Internet-Famous” – Prepping for launch and app marketing 101

Part 5: Squashing the Bugs and App Maintenance – When things invariably go wrong

Part 6: A+ Work: Analytics and Ad Tracking – What are all these chart thingys?

Part 7: The. End. – The lifecycle of an app

Sep

Lookin’ Professional

The #1 very, ultimately, most, most, most important thing for any company to do is to put out great work. But, lurking a close second to this in importants is to put a good face on. People DO judge a book by its cover. If you have some sad-ass microsoft word/mspaint logo, oftentimes a potential client is not going to give you a second look and won’t even see your great work.

And now I’m going to use the marketing buzzword. The b-word. The one word I retained from my past advertising experience after I threw everything else in the trash…Your foot in the door is your branding.

It’s amazing how some simple branding can convey so much about a company, its goals, skills, and culture. Do they pay attention to detail? (Website is precisely built). Do they have a serious investment in this venture? (The business cards are on nice paper, two-sided, letterhead, the works) Can they have fun? Or conversely are they appropriately serious? (How do they talk about themselves in social media?)

Whether they realize it or not, clients are taking all of this in. It is making an impression. And who doesn’t want to make a good impression?

That said, even we here at LunarLincoln, were a little behind when it came to some of the bigger elements of the “B-word”. We had the website, we had the lovingly crafted copy, but we needed the logo and the business cards for real world interaction. So….drumroll please…I present you with.

And our business cards…which…we did something a little different. We went with a service called Moo. Moo does a thing called “Printfinity” which means – INFINITE BACKS! I can totally give in to my inability to make final choices and have it all. So, you can now take your pick or collect them all. Below are all 10 wonderful versions. 5 Lunars and 5 Lincolns.

I really loved making the Lincolns and they will be used frequently in the future.

Aug

Do your homework

In the beginning stage of building an app and even in the later stages – its always important to “do your homework”. What is your homework exactly? Checking out the scene, the market, other peoples work.

Really “your homework” is actually asking to see a copy of your friend’s homework right before first period because you weren’t sure how to do yours, or maybe you were too lazy to do the initial parts or maybe they just had better answers. Or…maybe that analogy got off the tracks there.

A little story to explain clearer. Wiley loves Kerbal. A. Lot. If Wiley could actually be in space like the Kerbal’s he would. But for now he has to settle for entire Sunday’s of stranding Kerbal’s in orbit around Mun INSTEAD OF FINISHING UP LUNCHTIMER *ahem*. Shipping dude, shipping.

A while back we got into a discussion about a simpler form of Kerbal. A physics game with planets and exploration and lots of nerdy easter eggs. We got excited. Really excited. We started planning our rocketship game. We drew pictures and argued about rewards systems. We named our levels/planets – Tyson, Sagan, Hadfield.

Then we looked in the app store to see what was out there already – surely nothing as awesome as what we were planning. But…Angry Birds Space had launched the day before….we had just spent two hours subconciously recreating all of Angry Birds Space. That was some crappy homework discovery.

But it was important. Sometimes homework doesn’t kill your app, but makes it stronger – gives you a broader view. You’re building a to-do app? What about to-do’s for kids? for elderly people? to-do for a specific industry? for everyone? for super anal people (who are honestly the only ones who actually use to-do apps beyond the first few weeks)?

Sometimes you’ll discover that people have already built your app…but…they didn’t do it as well, or with this feature, or with nice colors, or they didn’t bother to build it for Android. (Android needs love too)!

Love the “description” for this one in the google play store:

Now don’t straight up “copy your homework” like the above. But get to googling, dribbbling, smashing, and browsing.

Get inspired. Get informed.

Jul

Necessity is the Mother of Invention

Ninety percent of LunarLincoln’s app ideas come while walking to get coffee. These idea’s usually come about like this: “I was so annoyed today when” and then usually end with “wouldn’t it be great if…” Working through problems. Making life easier. Or maybe not easier, but better, happier, certainly more convenient through apps is something we want to do, and CAN do here at LunarLincoln.

The list of app ideas is long, the market is fast, and let’s be real, some ideas are better, much better, than others. Luckily we have the tools, brains, and skills to make some of these into a reality. Our first foray into the world under our own banner is a little app called LunchTimer.

The app’s clothes are done, the guts are being built, and even now, I find myself wishing that it was done, merely to help my own scatter-brained self along. How, you ask?

I find myself running errands, lots of errands during lunch. Or grabbing food with friends, or sitting in interminably long business lunches, and in each of these situations, I don’t have the time, or forget, or it’s rude to continually check my phone to see if it’s time to head back to the office. Is lunchtime over yet?

Is it now?

Now?

How about now?

After looking at my phone 15 times in the last 20 minutes of lunch, only to see the time inching by and then later whizzing, LunchTimer was created.

The short and sweet: LunchTimer automatically knows when you leave work (with low-enegy gps tracking), and then begins the clock for the length of your lunchhour. It notifies you at a preset time (5 minutes/10 minutes) when its almost time to head back.

Voilà. No more being late getting back, no more sitting your phone on the table rudely, no more constant wrist checking. I hope you guys think this is a good of an idea as I do, and if not. Well, I’m still going to use the shit out of this app.

Jul

“The better we get at getting better, the faster we will get better.” – Engelbert

Have you ever had the battery die in your optical, wireless mouse and not had replacement batteries. Try getting anything done on your computer without a mouse. Pretty impossible eh?

Doug Engelbart, the inventor of the mouse, creator of early GUI elements, pioneer of ARPANET, and 1,000,000 other visionary, smart things you will never achieve died Tuesday.

He was even creating epic, future-predicting, keynote presentations, years before you were born. To steal from NPR, who said it best:

In a video from 1968, Engelbart demonstrated the capabilities of not only the mouse but also of the power of networked computing. Titled “A Research Center for Augmenting Human Intellect,” the presentation gained a more informal name over the years: “The Mother of All Demos“

I can only hope that we have more brilliant, passionate people like this in the future of engineering.

Jun

Ol’Honest Abe

More about the Lincoln half of LunarLincoln. Why Abe? Why not LunarTaft? Who has his own huuuuge rocket seat, for his impressively large posterior. Or LunarHarrison, who only get’s to be king of the moon for 32 days because he refused to wear a full spacesuit in order to “look cool” and catches a space-cold. Or LunarJackson, who takes 100,000 lunar aborigines on a death march. That guy, why the hell is he on our money, what a douche.

Aside from my general disdain for Andrew Jackson (Louisiana Purchase excepted), Abraham Lincoln was selected not only for his wonderfully alliterative name, and the fact that he has a bad ass line of cars named after him, but because he was such a complex and impressive president. Not as likeable back then, as he is today, Lincoln faced daunting challenges and rose to the occasion on many fronts.

Here at LunarLincoln, we only hope to be as progressive, inspiring and helpful to our fellow people as the 16th president was.

On a lighter note, when putting together the graphics for our website, we discovered older Lincoln is not suited to the space-look. A bit too grizzled once placed in a helmet, younger Lincoln made a much better/friendlier representative for our company. For your enjoyment, some initial versions can be found to the left.

Jun

Introducing LunarLincoln

LunarLincoln is live! Wiley was ready to lay down some endless rocket metaphors for you, but I stopped him. You can thank me later.

So why LunarLincoln? Other than being a wonderful alliterative combo, and very SEO friendly (ew SEO), it combines a love from each of us. The Wiley-Lunar side – an obsession with all things space (I have seriously listened to When We Left Earth THREE times while working in our office, thanks to him) and the Lincoln-Jennifer side which combines a long-standing love of history, and a particularly favorite halloween costume. Together this combo will send us TOOO THE MOOOOOOON. (Dammit, I already used that line in the footer of the website)

But really, our knowledge, skills, drive, and determination have no end in this venture. We are excited to begin, excited to help others, and excited bring new, fun ideas to app stores across the interwebs.

Commence mission launch in three, two one…

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