Thanks to everyone who made this event a success! Here is a list of the winning teams and their prizes:

1st Prize: StartupsN.com
• 6 month incubation at Mohawk College

Runner Up Prize: PassageU
• $1000 credit from enthuzr

Runner Up Prize: Nervu
• server package from Net@cccess

Runner Up Prize: Honey Badger Automation
• Private SEO Seminar with KKTI

Stay tuned for updates on the next SW HAMILTON!

Here are some of the presentations from Friday night and Saturday!

Welcome to Startup Weekend Hamilton – Tammy Hwang

Thoughts on ownership for Startup Weekend – Rideout & Maybe

User interface design crash course – Kevin Browne

Market validation – Robin Hopper

- Kevin Bronwe

40+ UI Design Tools and Resources
Cacoo
DENIM
Interface2
iPhoneMockup
Lumzy
MockFlow
MockupBuilder
Pencil Project
Prototyper

Landing page

A landing page will let you get the word out about your startup and begin collecting customer information right away.

LaunchRock
unbounce.com

CMS

A CMS will let you get a professional looking website up in one day.

drupal.org
joomla.org
wordpress.org

There are various e-Commerce plug-ins for the most popular CMS’ that let you get an e-commece website up just as fast.

Testing tools

10 tools to test website load time
22 tools for testing website usability
Browser shots – check browser compatibility
Demonstrating Responsive Design

- Kevin Browne

Here’s a tip about startup weekend, PITCH your idea! It doesn’t matter if it’s good or bad! Last time round, I came up with an idea while eating pizza on the Friday and I pitched it, “I want to be able to take a picture of the food I’m eating with my cellphone and it should tell me how many calories was in it” that was it and Caltrakr was born! Met an amazing team, worked together on Caltrakr and still continue to keep in touch.

Here’s the next tip, like any good startup when you put your team together make sure that the skills of the team are complementary, no point having a team full of developers if there is no-one that can develop a business strategy for the idea! As much as we all want to be the next picture taking app with filters (cough… cough…) having a solid business strategy will help with your pitches at the end of the weekend. And that goes both ways if you have a team full of business people, you won’t be able to build a proof-of-concept so make sure your team is well rounded.

STARTUP FOUNDERS NEED USER FEEDBACK

If there’s one thing that any startup founders need to know it’s how to get that oh-so-valuable user feedback to help fine-tune their business model….and it’s this single item that seems to cause such  a lack of foresight among startup founders too!

Here’s what I mean by way of an example. Let’s say you have built a brand new mobile application and you launch same with as much fanfare as you can build…and you wait for new users to find your website, signup and then download and install the app and then you hope they’ll use your site flow exactly as you’ve imagined. Simply put – this seldom happens as what our experience has shown, is that when it comes to users, they use the signup process in ways you could never have imagined – or in many cases, planned for either.

Look at the simple process of getting users to your website to signup and register as a new user and download/install the software. That may appear to be a basic startup staple that we all use but in fact, do the users you attract “do” just that?

To find out how that works for your own website functionality, we learned to use a feedback tool that can help you gauge exactly how your potential users are “using” your site to signup, register and download and run your startup app.

Our own experience is with a great online tool called GoSquared.com – just such a tool to help you monitor all visitors when they arrive at your website to become users. We signed up for their Standard package that provides us with tons of feedback and numbers for $9 a month, but they do have larger plans at higher costs too. And what does GoSquared provide us with? You get features like immediate visitor numbers, what page they’re on right now, trends to help you gauge what works for visitors, traffic sources, your popular content, your visitors preferences and profiles too….it’s all there. And all is delivered in real time too so you’re not “reacting” to old data but “seeing” real time data as it’s created. That helps, and as we’ve found, it can help big time to show you how your own signup/Register process works for your potential users!

But that’s not all you can monitor for feedback and in fact there are a host of items that you can choose from for real time user feedback. Kissmetrics.com, Wingify.com, Chartbeat.com were some of the ones we looked at…but in the end we decided on Mixpanel.com for our user feedback tool. We chose their Free plan at the start as our numbers are so small…but their plans do grow to encompass much larger sites too.

This tool has an API, that allows you to add to your own code via Properties that make call outs to their server, that show you some great basics for learning about how your users “use” your app. Funnels are my own favourites and they let you build funnels using events you already track with Mixpanel on the fly so you can find where your greatest drop off rates are. To enable funnels you have to track multiple events and build a funnel report using those events and that will require some small coding work by your CTO, but it in fact is a pretty easy system to incorporate in your user feedback functionality.

One more note too…that while it may be fairly easy to incorporate some of the online user feedback tools for your own startup app – the real challenge is in monitoring same and then providing modifications to your user experience to take advantage of this feedback.

Anything else is a true non-starter as founders who look at users who “fall off the cliff” at a certain point in the signup/Register process and then do nothing about it, should keep their day job.

Jim Rudnick is CEO of KKT INTERACTIVE Inc. one of the StartupWeekendHamilton:2 Sponsors who is offering up a full SEO/SEM Seminar entitled “ EXECUTING YOUR GO-TO-MARKET ONLINE STRATEGY ~ A Strategy for Start-Ups” as well as attending the full weekend as a Mentor to help one and all too!

 So now you are curious about the logistics are you? Well let me lift the curtain and show you what the awesome startup weekend team has done for you!

 GET TO STARTUP WEEKEND?

 By bus, train or car… Startup Weekend Hamilton 2 is at the best location in Hamilton at Mohawk College! Serviced by Public Transit and with Parking for a nominal fee, Mohawk College can be found at 135 Fennell Avenue West, for more info. & directions check your favourite search engine or visit (http://www.mohawkcollege.ca/maps-directions/fennell.html). And don’t forget you can always carpool once you’ve formed teams!

 EAT AT STARTUP WEEKEND?

 Ok I admit it! I love to snack while working there I said it!  At startup weekend there is an open snack bar, yes I know! Oh and the food, there are will be seven free meals provided from a fine mix of Hamilton’s finest so that you can focus on your snackup… I mean startup.
ps. If you have any dietary restrictions, please contact us!

 SLEEP AT STARTUP WEEKEND?

 Unfortunately you can’t stay up all night and work on your start up at the venue! Yes we know you would love to keep going, who needs sleep right? So that means at Midnight you will be kicked out so you can go home and grab some sleep. Then you can come back fresh, bright and early at 9am to keep on rocking!
ps. If you would like to relive the college days you may be able to book a room at the Mohawk College dorms.  Contact Patricia at palencar@stayrcc.com  and be sure to mention SWH2!

 WORK AT STARTUP WEEKEND?

 Just like you will find a hammer in (almost) every toolbox, in every entrepreneur’s toolkit you will find a laptop. So bring yours to Startup weekend! SWH2 will provide you with a sweet selection of pens, paper and the greatest invention since sliced bread – post-its! We’ve got extension cords and such…just don’t forget your laptop’s power supply!

1.       I’M NOT A STUDENT?

Of course, you should be at startup weekend, anyone with a passion for an idea should join startup weekend! Where else can you test the feasibility of your theories and ideas, it’s those little conversations that you have with mentors who have done it before and the atmosphere of working with other people with amazing ideas that really helps you understand what it means to launch your own company. One of the world’s best entrepreneurs, Jeff Bezos started Amazon when he was 30 and according to the BDC 40% of Canadian entrepreneurs are over 35. At startup weekend we welcome everyone between the ages of 18 and 65 from all walks of life, because at the end of the day if you truly have the passion to build an amazing startup age doesn’t make any difference!

2.       I DON’T HAVE A START-UP COMPANY?

Well neither will more than half the people at startup weekend! The idea is to learn is in a short period of time what it actually takes to launch a company, it doesn’t matter whether you are a computer engineering who’s been working for years in a company or if you are a student with a great idea, just come by and see if your skills can help develop tomorrow’s amazing ideas!

3.       I DON’T WANT TO GO INTO BUSINESS FOR MYSELF?

Where else in the Hamilton area are you going to get so many like-minded and skilled individuals with expertise ranging from business to technology in one place? This is the perfect opportunity for you to network and see if anyone needs your expertise, maybe even work with a startup in the future and push the boundaries of innovation in Ontario.

4.       MY START-UP IS ALREADY UP?

Awesome! As with any new fast growing startup you need highly motivated and like-minded people to help grow your startup. What does a resume or an interview tell you about how someone will work under the pressures of a startup? Startup weekend is one of the best proving grounds for talented people and an opportunity for startup founders to mingle and get to know each other, because believe me it’s tough being a founder! Meet new people and see what value they can add to your startup or see how you can collaborate in the future!

5.       I DON’T EVEN REALLY UNDERSTAND WHAT A STARTUP IS?

Well, every company in the world today at one point or another was a startup. Yes, even Dofasco was a startup in 1912! Startup weekend is the best place to learn the differences between a startup and an established corporation, and there are huge differences like the speed of development, the level of collaboration and your opinion matters in a startup! More and more corporations are trying to become like startups lean, priority oriented and efficient – learn what this actually feels like at startup weekend and see if your company could use a little bit of the startup magic.