Girls In Tech

Next weekend, the tech community in Santa Cruz will be hosting TechRaising, a first-of-it’s-kind event, where entrepreneurs (big thinkers, developers, designers, business men and women, marketers, etc.) can get together to actually build and execute on the very ideas they have been stewing on for months, years or even just weeks.

This event is about collaboration, execution, accomplishment and showing what you’ve done.

Participants will gather on the evening of May 20 at Cruzio (downtown Santa Cruz) and have 90 seconds to pitch their idea for a product, service, or company to the group.  After pitches have been completed, everyone will have a chance to dialog with each other and form teams to build the the idea over the course of the weekend.

Scott McNealy, an industry icon and co-founder of Sun Microsystems, will be keynoting the event on Saturday morning.

Early bird tickets are $29.00 (if purchased by May 13th) and $49.00 after that and can be purchased at http://techraising.eventbrite.com. For more information please visit TechRaising.com.

So let’s get together and build something. How awesome would it be if this is where your startup was born?

Tags: designers, Developers, entrepreneurs, event, girls in tech, marketers, marketing, santa cruz, Silicon Valley, techraising, women in tech
Posted in San Francisco, santa cruz, Silicon Valley | No Comments »

Last nights “She’s Savvy: SEO” event with Chelsea Rustrum in Santa Cruz was a real success. I was so happy to see a packed room full of a lot of new faces.

I promised the group last night that we would publish Chelsea’s slides as they had a lot of great content in them and we wanted to share it with everyone who couldn’t make it. Chelsea did a great job of defining SEO and walking us through some best practices:

Tile Tags
- First, make sure they are unique and well researched
- Try and keep them to 65 characters or less because that will show up in Google
- In formatting them, put business name behind the keywords (example in slides)
- Remember: first words in tile tag are weighted more highly

Links lets search engines know you exist and how valuable they are. Are all links created equal? No – a link from your best friend’s blog isn’t weighted as heavily as CNN.

Link text is essentially the same as anchor text
- Create quality content
- Use social media icons to your benefit – Tools like Facebook and Twitter are free. Link to them and build your community that way.

“Text is why the search engines live breathe and consume.”
- Text needs to be unique – well written
- A great source for writing copy is: Copyblogger

Quotes to live by from Chelsea:
“What’s good for humans is good for the search engines.”
“Just build something cool.”

GOOGLE
Google Suggest is helpful with articles or blog posts to find out how many search queries are made each month – that information could be useful in writing and optimizing your article/post.

Google AdWords keyword tool is a FREE service and will help with title tags
Something to think about: the longtail – perhaps there is less competition when you are more specific

Google universal search integrates all different media sources

Did you know:

• 10% of NYTimes.com traffic is coming from Twitter
• Facebooks traffic surpassed Google’s last week

Tags: chelsea rustrum, girls in tech, Google, santa cruz, seo
Posted in All Chapters | 1 Comment »

Girls in Tech Santa Cruz is proud to present:
She’s Savvy: SEO
with Chelsea Rustrum

What is SEO? Who uses it? Who needs to know about it?
Please join us for some refreshments and a workshop aimed to help de-mystify SEO.
Chelsea Rustrum, an expert in SEO, is going to help us understand SEO and provide us with best practices on the subject.

RSVP: http://shessavvyseo.eventbrite.com/

Tags: NextSpace, santa cruz, seo
Posted in Events, santa cruz | 1 Comment »

If you haven’t had the chance to be present for one of Bronwyn Saglimbeni’s workshops, you must. Bronwyn is a seasoned communications professional and works with clients to improve their public speaking and media relations skills, challenging them to bring out more of themselves in their communications.

At the First Annual Girls in Tech Retreat for GIT Managing Directors, Bronwyn and Kristine Shaefer, lead a workshop on public speaking and it was such a success and so helpful that I invited her back down to Santa Cruz for a workshop on ‘perfecting your presentations’ – lucky for me she obliged and I thought I would share some of her key points and takeaways with those of you who weren’t in attendance:

Now, who hasn’t spent countless hours putting together an important presentation only to have your audiences eyes glaze over? Are you as guilty as I am for being one of those to get sleepy in the middle of a PowerPoint? I thought so.

So let’s change the game.

1. Honor the way adults learn
   1. Show, don’t tell
   2. Novelty
   3. Relevance
   4. Emotion
2. Master the art of storytelling
   1. Turn off your computer.
   2. Decide what kind of story works best given the subject and your goals.
   3. What do I want them to… Feel? Think? Do?
   4. What do they need to remember?
3. Practice restraint
4. Be yourself

Now, next time you go to put together a slide deck, think about these simple, but key, points. If you still can’t get it right then maybe you should reach out to Bronwyn for some additional direction

Tags: bronwyn communications, communications, girls in tech, powerpoint, presentations, santa cruz
Posted in All Chapters, Girls In Tech | 3 Comments »

Girls in Tech sponsor, NextSpace Coworking + Innovation, UC Santa Cruz and the City of Santa Cruz have come together to create the ‘What’s Next Lecture Series‘ and is kicking off its five part Innovation program with a look at “Sustainability and Social Innovation: Doing Well by Doing Good,” on February 18, 2010 from 7:00 – 9:00 pm at the Kuumbwa Jazz Center in Downtown Santa Cruz.

The panel will feature Peter Meehan, CEO of Newman’s Own Organics, KoAnn Skrzyniarz, CEO of Sustainable Life Media, and Joshua Levine, Vice President of Socially Responsible Investing at RBC Wealth Management.   Sandy Skees, CEO of Communications4Good, will moderate the panel as it explores trends and success factors in companies with a social and environmental mission.

These outstanding speakers will provide the audience with current thinking, best practices and trends in sustainability and social innovation, examining how brands and the media are framing this business shift.  Topics will include an exploration of how businesses are responding to the social, environmental and economic challenges of today’s world with innovation and entrepreneurial opportunities.

Future topics in the year-long series will feature topics that include Energy, The New Workplace, Innovation in Research & Development, and Gaming & Social Media.

If you live in Santa Cruz or will be in the area be sure to check it out. Tickets are $15 for the general public.  Students are free but must register in advance.  For more information or to purchase tickets, see http://www.whatsnextlectures.com.

Tags: Events, NextSpace, santa cruz, social innovation, sustainability
Posted in santa cruz | 2 Comments »

November is National Novel Writers Month, NaNoWriMo.

Have you ever thought you had a book in you? NaNoWriMo is a great opportunity to finally bang that project out, although it is no easy task. The object of NaNoWriMo is to sit down and write a 175-page(50,000-word) novel by midnight, November 30. Last year NaNoWriMo had over 100,000 participants and over 20,000 completed their novel. If you complete your novel within the time window you win the contest.

Recently FastPencil Co-Founder, Michael Ashley, posted his thoughts on “How to Win Big at NaNoWriMo” and I thought he had a few great points.

When writing a novel at anytime you shouldn’t be afraid to invite friends in to help you review and edit your material. Your friends and family are the people who want to see you succeed and can prove to be extremely helpful in making sure that you get some quality feedback. He also touches on how to avoid procrastination and think about your novel as a “sculpture” a bit hunk of material that over time will be whittled away into what you envision. The key is to just start writing.

What about writers block? I recently read a few great tips from CopyBlogger in “Why Writer’s Block is Your Secret Weapon.” As simple as it sounds they recommend you just take a blank sheet of paper and answer “what am I supposed to be writing now?” Sound simple enough? Then just start scribbling down thoughts, ideas, comments, etc. that relate to that project. That will get you going.

If you have ever thought about writing a book, now might be a great time to get started. I highly recommend taking a look at the two blog posts I mentioned here to give you a few other great ideas. FastPencil.com is a great place to write your book. They will help you by hosting the content (so it never gets lost), they will walk you through formatting and provide you with the tools you need to invite friends in to comment on or help you with your novel. FastPencil also has a marketplace where you can find professional editors, illustrators, graphic designers, etc. if you need them. They will also publish your book for a fraction of the cost of others as well as help you promote it. If you decide to write a novel for NaNoWriMo and complete the task, they will also offer you a copy of your printed book for free.

Happy writing.

Tags: Fast Pencil, girls in tech, Literature, National Novel Writers Month, santa cruz, Seana Norvell, women in tech
Posted in All Chapters | No Comments »

On October 10th we will be inviting all of the Chapter Managing Directors and Advisory Board Members from all over the world to Santa Cruz for our Retreat where we will be working together to foster the growth of the organization.

The agenda for the retreat is shaping up very nicely and we wanted to share our progress. The event location is currently TBD but we plan on making a decision this week! We are very excited about the program we are putting together and look forward to making the retreat an annual event. If you are interested in assisting in the planning of the event, would like to sponsor or would like to attend, please email seana at girlsintech dot net.

Girls in Tech First Annual Retreat Agenda

October 9th, 2009
- 7 – 9 PM Welcome Mixer

October 10th, 2009
- 8:30 AM Coffee & Breakfast, Networking
- 9:00 AM Welcome remarks by Adriana Gascoigne (Founder)
- 9:15 AM  ‘Chapter Evolution’ Morning session round table on what works and what doesn’t
- 10:00 AM Keynote (Kara Swisher of the Wall Street Journal and AllThingsDigital)
- 10:30 AM Break
- 11:00 AM Public Speaking Workshop with Bronwyn Saglimbeni and Kristine Schaefer
- 1:00 PM Lunch
- 2:00 PM Social Media Scalability for Social Businesses with JD Lasica
– 3:00 PM Women in VC Panel
- 4:00 PM Fireside chat w/ Priya Ganapati (formerly of Red Herring, currently at TheStreet & WIRED)
- 5:00 PM Closing remarks: Where we are taking GIT from here
- 5:30 PM Beach BBQ & Bonfire!

Tags: girls in tech, Kara Swisher, public speaking, retreat, santa cruz, social media, venture capital, Wall Street Journal, women in tech, women in vc
Posted in All Chapters | 3 Comments »

A couple of weeks ago we had the lovely Veronica Belmont of Tekzilla and PlayStation Network’s Qore to Santa Cruz for a ‘Fireside Chat’.

We sat down with her to discuss how she found herself in broadcast, why she moved to Silicon Valley and which does she love more, gaming or consumer electronics.

Allan and Sun Lundell of Awake Media at NextSpace were generous enough to capture the chat on video, so we thought we would share it with you: click here.

The Santa Cruz Chapter’s next event will be a mixer at CAVA Wine Bar in Capitola on Wednesday, June 24th at 7 PM. We would like to take this opportunity to get feedback from our members and exchange ideas about what is coming up!!!

Tags: girls in tech, santa cruz, Seana Norvell, Veronica Belmont
Posted in Events, santa cruz | 1 Comment »

We are very excited about this weeks Girls in Tech – Santa Cruz event. Veronica Belmont will be coming to speak with us about community building, gaming, girls in technology and what she is currently working on. This event will be a very casual “fireside chat” where audience and group participation is encouraged. We are lucky enough to have the event hosted by the lovely people at NextSpace from 7 – 9 PM on Wednesday, May 13th.

In order to be admitted to the event, you must RSVP here: http://gitsantacruz.eventbrite.com/

Veronica (twitter) is the co-host of Revision3’s tech-centric show, Tekzilla, and Qore on the PlayStation Network. Previous to that, she hosted several other online video shows and podcasts, including Mahalo Daily, Buzz Out Loud, MP3 Insider, and Crave. She also created tech video content for CNET TV, including the popular series Prizefight.

Veronica frequently guest hosts other technology-related podcasts, and also speaks about technology, gaming, and social networking. In her spare time, she hosts the science fiction and fantasy-themed podcast / book club The Sword and Laser. She currently resides in San Francisco, with one technology writer and two cats. She attended Emerson College, B.A. in Audio/Radio, focus in New Media studies.

We can’t wait to see you there!

Tags: community, event, gaming, santa cruz, tech, twitter
Posted in Events, santa cruz | No Comments »

To be honest, when I reached out to Adriana about starting a chapter of Girls in Tech in Santa Cruz I wasn’t sure what kind of a response I was going to get from the local community. I knew we had a huge pool of talent who commutes over the hill into Silicon Valley every day but wondered if people would be interested in taking more time out of their day to “talk shop”.

The response from the community has been overwhelming. In addition to having a hot line-up of speakers for our events, like Sarah Lacy (TechCrunch, BusinessWeek, and Author of ‘Once You’re Lucky, Twice You’re Good‘), Tina Seelig (Executive Director, Stanford Technology Ventures Program and acclaimed Author), Veronica Belmont (Co-host of Revision3’s tech-centric show, Tekzilla, and Qore on the PlayStation Network) and Girls in Tech’s own lovely Adriana Gascoigne, small businesses and organizations around town have been rallying around us to assist the group with promotion or even venues for our events.

NextSpace, has offered to host our event with Sarah Lacy on April 9th as well as the event with Veronica Belmont on May 13th. NextSpace is an entrepreneurial catalyst located in Santa Cruz, CA. They have a mission to catalyze local talent, local ideas, and local capital to create products, services, and solutions for the global marketplace. They have been such a help in event planning and promoting the cause here in Santa Cruz! If you are working locally and are interested in finding a place to work rather then your second bedroom, check them out.

Bookshop Santa Cruz has also offered to help us organize book signings and has partnered with our local chapter to promote their events as well as ours. Bookshop is the group behind bringing Tina Seelig to Santa Cruz and we are really excited to be working with them on ‘An Evening with Tina Seelig‘ for April 29th as well as additional events in the future

The Santa Cruz Chapter of Girls in Tech has grown to almost 40 members in about a month and I look forward to seeing how high we can take this organization in our community and in the global community of women in tech.

Cheers, Girls!

Tags: community, Events, networking, santa cruz, women
Posted in santa cruz | No Comments »