Would you eat gummy bears made from wind turbines? 🍬
Yo teams,
How are you guys doing?
The Sparkmates have been back in our own hubs since the weekend from Thailand 🥳🇹🇭 it’s business as usual - just with even more inspiration, energy and clarity!
This week is a fun one: Researchers have made a material that can “think” on its own, and gummy bears can now be made from wind turbines (would you try it?). More about all of these below!
Here’s what we’ve put together for your weekly Spark reads:
#Firesidechat with Andy on Team Incentive Plans 🪙
Grab and share video reviews with Testimonial 🎥
A material that can …think and sense? 🤯
Would you eat gummy bears made from wind turbines? 🍬
SparkTrip 2022: All wrapped up 💥🇹🇭🎉
💙 NEWS FROM OUR MATES#Firesidechat with Andy on Team Incentive Plans 🪙
How else can you motivate and retain your team, while boosting your culture?
The answer: Incentive Plans - such as ESOP (Employee Stock Option Plans)
So how do you set it up, and what options are there?
Get all your questions answered in our #firesidechat with our mates:
👋 Andy Lee, Co-Founder & CEO at Sprout
👋 Morgan Pelissier, Co-Founder & CEO at Sparkmate (Yes, he’s back! 💥)
Andy will go through:
- 💰 Why bring in Incentive Plans
- 📈 WTF is ESOP?
- 🪙 Tokens
- 🤾 Connecting Incentive Plans to your culture
& anything you want to ask!
📣 Event Details:
Date: 5th October, Wednesday
Time: 18:30 - 19:30
Location: 8/F Fashion Studio, The Hive Kennedy Town, Hong Kong 🇭🇰
RSVP to let us know you're coming 😉
🤸 FUN PRODUCT WE LOVEGrab and share video reviews with Testimonial 🎥
With everything moving to video, why not have your clients/users also submit their testimonials via video? 🎞 Testimonial is here to make collecting, managing and distributing them even easier:
Features:
Dedicated page
For each of your businesses, it will have a dedicated space page with a unique link. Your customers can directly go there to submit a text or a video testimonial!
Embeddable Wall of love
It's a page to show all your selected testimonials. You can even add the whole wall to your own site with an iframe embed code.
Dashboard page
You will have a dashboard page to manage all your spaces. You can add/update/remove the space as you want.
Video download
You will have the access to download the video in the MP4 format with its original resolution.
Video embed
One-line embed code is available for each video. You can paste it in any no-code platform. We take care of all hosting and streaming.
Your video message
You can add your own video in the space page. It's more personal and may help encourage customers send you their best shoutouts.
Custom domain
You can add the custom domain for each space. The link can be testimonial.your-product.com, or whatever you like.
Custom colors and themes
You can add a custom color for buttons to make it more fit into your own brand.
Who it’s for: Teams who want more social proof/reviews shown on video - and manage all of them easier!
Price: FREE ⭐️ Until you need to more than 2 video testimonials. Pricings then start at US$60/month (/$50/month/year) - It has a 7-day free trial as well!
💭 TECH FOOD FOR THOUGHTA material that can …think and sense? 🤯
Yup.
Researchers at the US Air Force and Penn State University have engineered a material that can “think” and “sense”, using mechanical information processing (which was built on research from 1938)!
The material is soft polymer and acts like a human brain - it receives digital strings of information, which are then processed and generates sequences of data that can control reactions.
The material can be used to detect radio frequencies to i.e. send light signals for apps like search-and-rescue systems, or even be included in bio-hybrid materials to locate, separate and eliminate airborne infections!
🌱 TECH FOR SUSTAINABILITYWould you eat gummy bears made from wind turbines? 🍬
Wind power is one of the most popular forms of renewable energy today, but getting rid of them is -really- not as sustainable. The blades can be as long as half a football field, and are usually made of fibreglass - which can’t be recycled and are just discarded in landfills!
To prevent the waste, researchers at Michigan State University created a composite resin for the blades, combining glass fibres with a plant-derived polymer and a synthetic one. So after the blades have done their service, they can be turned to other products or chewy sweets like gummy bears!
💥 WHAT’S ON @ SPARKMATESparkTrip 2022: All wrapped up 💥🇹🇭🎉
After a week in Phuket, Thailand, the teams are back in their hubs - inspired, energized and replenished ✅
It was a remarkable experience for our teams in Hong Kong 🇭🇰, Paris 🇫🇷, Bucharest 🇷🇴 and Sydney 🇦🇺 to meet and work/explore together - we’ll let Morgan tell you:
“What makes a great team is Competences, Characters, Chemistry.
Read it in reverse. 😈
That's the right ranking.
It matters less who is in the team but rather how the team works together.
Although we make it a point to hire incredible people at Sparkmate.
How we are able to work together at Sparkmate is the most important.
Since day one I took pride in cultivating our uniqueness, developing the bond between our Sparkmates, protecting our spirit.
As an entrepreneur your biggest asset is your team of legends.
Act accordingly!
Invest heavily into it.
Throwing this offsite trip in Thailand was a big investment
But from my experience the ROI of offsite trips are HUGE.”
We’re putting together a bunch of different throwbacks of the trip - make sure to follow us on Instagram to stay updated on all the great shots we took!
Exciting things are happening every day ⚡️ Follow us on social media to stay tuned!