First out was Entreprenörsskapsjakten, by Gustaf Josefsson, where I together with KVD.se (Kvarndammen) was judging a section when the competitors tried to come up with creative solutions to use social media for attracting new customers. The results were in great variety but overall very good and creative! The winners were Entreprenörspartiet with Lisa Lindgren, Ludwig Jonsson & Adrian Swartz.

Later at the night it was time for celebration with Idéfestivalen and Idégalan.

The day after I was spontaneously invited by my friend Johannes Hansen to attend and coach competitors in Hjärna, Hjärta, Cash, a competition that last for 48 hours and was about creating social entrepreneurship. The ideas were great and I’m looking forward to follow them to real business ideas.

After that it was time for Stockholm and SM in Ung Företagsamhet. A two day long event with incredible ideas and energy that refreshed your whole body. One of the days was meant for a national board meeting which I was attending. The winner was Bolsa UF.

One of the speakers for the opening ceremony was the Swedish prime minister, Fredrik Reinfeldt, which I, Viktor Nord, offcourse had to say a few words to.

Young Entrepreneurs of Sweden was represented by former UF-students Joakim Bank, Emma Knaggård Wendt, Erik Fjellborg and Per Anderberg Almhorn. Unfortunately I, Viktor Nord, am not a former UF student.

After that I went to Örebro to my friends Mikael Blix and Johan Berglund at Sportion to attend their yearly office party with a lot of familiar faces.

Then it was time for the 17 of may celebration in Oslo which last for a couple of days. I envy the Norwegian passion for the national day!

Here is my partner and better half Christian Josefsson and me Viktor Nord in the middle of Oslo. Take care so long!

Right now we have a lot of things going on with Sverige-Norge.se. We are closing some big new clients, upgrading our system and making our existing customers pleased. One new method to attract a certain group of people is by using social media. Instead of putting out money to ordinary commercial we made a new campaign webpage that we called “Jobba som sjuksköterska i Norge“.

Then we were asking our network on Facebook, Twitter, Ning, LinkedIN and so on to do us a favor by posting up a link to their networks. This worked out quite well for us. In a couple of days we got around 10 qualified nurses and a lot of tips. That is more than you will get from traditional marketing, we tried that to. Hopefully this campaign site will reach a good place in Google search results as well. Here is a snapshot of the site. If you like to please share the link www.sverige-norge.se/ssk

JESS3 / The State of The Internet from JESS3 on Vimeo.

Last month I was doing a lot of meetings, between 5-6 every day. To have success in a meeting you have to be well prepared which takes quite some time of planning. After the meetings you also have to remember every single one so you can follow them up. My strategy is to take as much notes as possible during the meeting and directly after or in the evening do a summery.

Then try do schedule all my obligations so nothing is forgotten. So far my strategy have been working out pretty well with a high percentage of closings.

Business cards gathered from the last month meetings.

This is an amazing TED presentation from the 12 year old Adora Svitak about the world needs to learn from children. 8:13 seconds worth watching!

This video won a contest for best commercial in Entreprenörsjakten. I really like it! What do you think?

The national conference with Young Entrepreneurs of Sweden was as successful as usually. Here are some pictures and a slide show.

Today my alarm went of 05:45 in the morning because I was invited to a breakfast meeting within BNI in Oslo. This network is for business professionals who are looking to expand their network and do business together. Every member gets 60 seconds to pitch their business idea. So it’s very important to have a great elevator speech or do something more different. One of the members, Jørn A. Jensen – FRAM Arrangement AS, really stand out by wearing a chicken-suit and due to that I’m now writing and talking about him.

I’m not saying that you should wear a chicken-suit to stick out but at this meeting it was perfect. Now everyone knows that Jørn is using unconventional methods to reach great results which of course is a good thing since he’s running a business in the event sector.

After running my business for a couple of years now I’ve realized the importance of listening to our customers. Instead of assuming that you know what your customers want you have a talk to them and let them into the development of the product. That’s why I moved to Oslo for a while. The last two weeks have been busy, up to six meetings per day.

To be successful in this strategy you have to be open minded. Try to think together with your clients and aim for a win-win situation. It´s quite easy to get new customers to buy our product but getting them to use it in the right way and reach the potential is the hard part. Unfortunately many companies are slow to adapt to new products. You need to be helpful and patient. It takes time.

This strategy of letting my clients into the process have resulted in that they often feel us like a part of their own company which lower their instinctive guard down. At this level you really feel the connection between you and your clients and you are now building up a trust that are very important when you are looking for long business relations.

Viktor Nord at Oslo opera house.

Just a few minutes ago www.Sverige-Norge.se reached 24.000 members, which means we now have 24000 swedish people looking for work in Norway. So do you know any Norwegian company that are expaning. Give me a hint.