Misc - I Am Charlie Graham

Prediction #12: The Rise Of The Bootstrap Entrepreneur

We are in the early stages of a new era and type of entrepreneurship. The Covid situation has opened up a whole new set of needs in terms of managing remote workforces, sanitation, telehealth, and other areas many of which will not fully go away. In addition to these new

Misc

Prediction 8: Dine-in “Experiences” will be significantly curtailed as 30% of restaurants go out of business.

NOTE: this was written in May but I got around to posting it now. Still, much of it is relevant. Currently, approximately 3% of restaurants have closed down due to the pandemic. Expect that to grow to 20-30% by the time we are done. As restrictions open up, restaurants are

Apple Watch

Observations and 5 Predictions for the Apple Watch

I’ve now owned an Apple Watch for around 4 months. I bought it because a) I wanted to live in the future (and I think we will all be wearing some type of wearable in the future) and b) because I am testing out a few new ideas on

Misc

Shop It To Me In Forbes and Hacker News

Two fun news pieces for Shop It To Me today! 1) Forbes just posted a great Q&A about myself and Shop It To Me as part of their designer spotlight series. Check it out! 2) We just announced in our blog that we recently removed passwords completely from

Misc

It's Time To Get Emotional

At Shop It To Me we are customer-driven so we think about product a lot. We’ve noticed that too many Internet companies today think about their product almost exclusively in terms of a functional experience. What need are we serving? What solution do we provide? What features should

Misc

Building An Indispensable Product

At Shop It To Me, we believe a key way companies disrupt a market and have long term loyalty is by building not just a great product or a insanely fun product, but an indispensable product. Look at some of the services today with the most avid users — Google

Misc

What our customers say vs what they mean

My latest article on what customers say vs what they mean and what you should do about itwas just posted at Inc.com! Here’s a snippet… You know this meme: You hear one thing, but it probably means something else entirely. (Like when my wife says “

Misc

How to build a culture of experimentation

As you have probably noticed from my blog — at Shop It To Me, we are big fans of experimentation. I believe to succeed you can’t just treat experimentation with lip-service. It needs to be ingrained in your culture. For those of you who want to start experimenting

Misc

Why you should be user-testing...now.

If you are developing a new product, chances are you want to wait to show it to anyone to critique until you have it mostly in place. Why? You have a great vision as to where the product is going and you want them to see the final realized product

Misc

Business Lessons from my 10-month Old

Just in time for Father’s day, I wrote a new article for Inc.com called “Business Lessons from my 10-month old”. Enjoy! http://www.inc.com/charlie-graham/business-lessons-10-month-old.html

Misc

Customize Your E-Mails and You'll Avoid Getting the Spam Treatment

I just had an article about why and how retailers should be personalizing emails posted on Ad Age. Comments are appreciated!