URGENT: Hiring a tele-person

Oct 112011
 

As you’ve known from my previous emo post, I’m still having bad throat. But I’m having a lot of new requests, so I’m hiring a tele-person to help tide me through this week.

 

Job scope

I’ll provide you with a list and you’ll need to call them up to ask and:

1. Tell them about Learnemy

2. Ask them if they can offer my users a class

 

Nitty gritty stuffs

I’ll need you this week and I’ll have no idea if I’ll need you for the next. As such, I’ll be paying you above market rate. The market rate for a tele-person is anywhere from $5 to $15 per hour. I’ll pay you $15 – $20 per hour, depending on your experiences.

You’ll work everyday this week, from 2pm – 6pm, from home.

 

Apply

This job takes a pretty good amount of trust (because I’m paying you by the hour and you can do nothing) so I’ll only take you if you’re somehow connected me (a friend, a friend of my friends etc).

Email elisha@learnemy.com to say hello!

I build Learnemy, an online marketplace that finds you the right instructors and classes in Singapore. Follow us on Facebook or Twitter    
 Posted by Elisha Tan at 1:10 am  Starting up  No Responses »  Tagged with:

Not happy

Oct 092011
 

It’s lonely to fight my own battles even though I’m more than capable of handling what comes my way.

But it’s an entirely low shitty feeling to not be able to help myself.

I had a spike in number of requests today. I reply a lot on my voice for Learnemy, and I’ve completely it.

Not happy, not happy at all.

 

 

Maybe tmr will be a better day. 

I build Learnemy, an online marketplace that finds you the right instructors and classes in Singapore. Follow us on Facebook or Twitter    
 Posted by Elisha Tan at 12:19 am  Personal, Starting up  No Responses »  Tagged with:

Productive vs Useful

Sep 232011
 

If you can churn out 10 apps in 2 days, you are super productive.

But if no one uses them, you aren’t being that useful.

I’ve realized that being useful is so much more rewarding than being productive. It’s a joy to know that people find Learnemy’s idea useful enough to try it, even though it’s really unproductive to get offers manually.

I build Learnemy, an online marketplace that finds you the right instructors and classes in Singapore. Follow us on Facebook or Twitter    
 Posted by Elisha Tan at 10:10 pm  Starting up, Thoughts  No Responses »  Tagged with:

Now you can learn programming

Sep 212011
 

People who have heard my talk at the recent Barcamp 7 would know that my advice to any non-tech founders who wished to pick up a programming language is to…..

 

Learn whatever from anyone who’s willing to lend a helping hand.

 

In my case, the access to coaching came earlier for Ruby on Rails than for Python which is why Ruby became my choice of bling. I used the method of coach + online resources, I liked it and I would advocate it. I’ve also seen such success on a fellow non-tech founder, Clarence, for Bandwagon (he was introduced to Angular.js and coached by Tom.

 

Here’s why you need a coach:

You get answers to stupid questions, and you’re very likely not able to articulate your stupid question well enough to ask it on stackoverflow because of tech speak is slightly different from normal speech.

You get explanation for the explanation on why your code doesn’t work. Error messages can be non-intuitive to understand.

After the error messages, you get to know the solution without wanting to bang your head against the wall.

 

How do you find a coach?

I’m super stoked (so super stoked I’m about to fall off my chair, convulse and foam in the mouth) to tell you that Learnemy now does matching for programming!!!

 

I took so long to start because I was targeting the verticals with more demand. But I wondered if it will be a good idea to focus on the long-tail keywords (aka less demand, less competition) since I already have some really talented tech instructors in my database beforehand. The trigger came when I read this post about me and Learnemy where the blogger mentioned he would want to learn coding using Learnemy (although he later mentioned that he has no time now, sighs). So I thought no harm trying it out.

And the results shocked me. I realized that it’s much easier to use social media for the tech vertical, plus I’ve gotten 2 requests in a single day.

Moral of the story:

LEARN PROGRAMMING NOW! http://tech.learnemy.com/

I build Learnemy, an online marketplace that finds you the right instructors and classes in Singapore. Follow us on Facebook or Twitter    
 Posted by Elisha Tan at 2:08 am  Starting up  No Responses »  Tagged with: ,

Sleep is….

Sep 052011
 

For the guiltless.

Being a founder is like being a student – there’re no proper working hours and there’s always something to do. An hour spend not studying is an hour wasted for a better grade. Similarly, an hour spent not working on the startup is an hour slower to get to a milestone, which is not cool.

So where do I squeeze out the extra hours? I cut my sleep. Then I wake up tired. But I’m too guilty to go sleep or take a nap. So I spend time doing crap to perk myself up. In doing so, I get less time to do my work. So I cut my sleep. Then I wake up tired.

See the vicious cycle?

I build Learnemy, an online marketplace that finds you the right instructors and classes in Singapore. Follow us on Facebook or Twitter    
 Posted by Elisha Tan at 1:18 am  Starting up, Thoughts  3 Responses »  Tagged with: ,
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