Mike Abasov

The finals are coming up. Can you feel them? I can. 

Over the years of epicly failing and wining on exams, I have developed a list of tools and tips that I use to get through any test. Today I want to share them with you, and I encourage you to post your own advice in the comments!

Tools

1. To-Do lists. 
I use these a lot. For every assignment, textbook chapter or test, I have a task, a due date and other details. 

I also tend to divide chapters into subtasks like 13.1, 13.2, and 13.3 instead of “Ch. 13.” This gives me the satisfaction of crossing out something without competing the whole chapter.

2. iTunes U and Academic Earth. 
These apps save me time trying to figure out concepts that I’d missed in class (I blame it on you, Facebook!).

3. Double-sided highlighter.
Makes reading textbooks twice as productive! One side is red — for terms; the opposite one is yellow — for explanations. Mine is handmade, but you will probably look less weird, if you buy one.

4. iPod, Last.fm. 
I can study only with music. iPod for listening at a coffee shop, Last.fm for a perfect shuffle.

5. Coffee Shops. 
Starbucks, Blenz, Waves, whatever. Remember to check for free Internet access, good coffee, large enough single tables, and hours of operation (24/7 all the way).

6. Grades.
An awesome iPhone app that allows me to track my performance in every class. Replaced a lot of calculations I used to do myself every time.

Tips

1. First test is your  reconnoiter. 
Yes, I said reconnoiter. It doesn’t matter that much how well you do on your first midterm, but it matters a lot what you find out. See how the test is structured, what types of questions are there, how multiple choices work, how is the whole thing marked. 

The more data you collect, the better you’ll be able to do in the future by adjusting your learning style.

2. Raise the stakes. 
If I fail a course at UBC, I will waste 4 months, $2,000 of my parents’ dollars, get my ass kicked by the same parents and might as well loose my chance to immigrate. Surprisingly, I try my hardest not to fail or even get anything lower than a B+.

Raise your loss in case of failing. I don’t know, give a $100 to a good friend and and ask them to burn them, if you don’t get an A. Make a bet with another friend. Whatever you do, don’t leave yourself the power to change your mind — you will always cheat.

Good luck!

Only you decide what you get on your tests. Not a mean prof, not a crappy textbook, only you. Get used to this fact and show them how badass a student can be!

So what are your tips and tools for getting through the finals?

Starbucks. Love it.

Safeway Starbucks. Looks like a Starbucks. But not quite a Starbucks. It just doesn’t feel right: the quality, the service, the level, everything in not the same.

In my humble opinion, franchising and licensing your brand like this might be good in terms of revenues, but is no good in terms of branding. It creates inconsistencies, which ruin all emotions accumulated throughout the years of great performance.

Be consistent.

This post is a part of the “Twitter Monitoring Series.”

There is no brand that people don’t talk about on Twitter. You might not know it yet, but it is most probable that there are at least few tweets that mention your company or products, and you can you these tweets to get profit (not only in terms of money but also relationships and exposure).

There are 3 good techniques that can help you set up super-effective streams in HootSuite:

1. Search for your brand name. Search for your company’s name, your products’ names and your public people’s names. Use Twitter Search Operators like “OR” to combine different variations of the names in one stream.
2. Search for common misspellings. Sometimes people will misspell your name, but it doesn’t mean you have to loose those tweets. Search for common misspellings to get much more results and combine them in one stream to save space. For example, here are 2 different ways to search for Starbucks and 2 different results that you get:
   
   Note: Usually, it is not the best idea to correct misspellings of the people you don’t know, so I don’t advise you to tell every single person how to spell your brand name correctly. 
3. Search for you domain name. This wouldn’t work for everyone, but sometimes it is good to search for your domain name. Sometimes, people won’t write your name but will give a link to your website, and if your domain name is different from your company’s name, you can search for it too. On the image below, I’ve highlighted 2 tweets that would not have showed up in a regular “hootsuite” search stream: 
    
4. Specify language. Sometimes you might want to see only tweets in English. In this case, add “a” or “the” to the query which are distinctive elements of the language. 
5. Monitor the customers. Create a list of your customers and a tab with their tweets. See what they are interested in and get into discussions.

Tomorrow I’ll talk about monitoring your topic, so don’t forget to come by!

A huge, enormous and awesome, in my opinion, change made by Starbucks is switching to completely unlimited free WiFi in their stores. This is an important sign that shows how new mobile devices are shaping and penetrating our life.

There was no reason to make this change before, when 2 hours per day seamed to be enough to keep geeks, students and businesspeople satisfied. Their laptops and, occasionally, smart-phones were not such a big deal. But now a new epoch comes.

The epoch of tablets, mobile Internet and geo-location services is here. And when your clients not only work, study and socialize but also read books, watch videos, listen to music and promote your place at the same time—all with a constant need for being connected to the Net,—there is no other choice but to give them complete freedom. Yet, Tim Hortons doesn’t quite get it; they don’t have WiFi in their stores at all.