Archive - February, 2007

TedRap: The Gospel Tract on Blogging

By on February 28, 2007 in Books with 7 Comments

There are a lot of contagious evangelists for blogging, one of which is my friend Ted Demopoulos. Ted just published what I’ll call a gospel tract for business bloggers with Secrets of Successful Blogging – a 39-page booklet that can fit in your pocket.

For such a small amount of pages, there sure are plenty of tips (101+) including tips and quotes on:

  • Getting Started
  • Building Traffic
  • Supporting Your Business
  • Miscellaneous Tips like this one: "Blog as if it matters, because it does!"

In some ways, I wish I might have written this, but since I didn’t – I can pass it around.

Get yours today by clicking on the book:

Successfulbloggingbook

“But It’s Just a Blog”

By on February 27, 2007 in Blogging with 12 Comments

You’ve probably seen them in your area – the super-duper markets with a convenience store/gas station in front of the actual store.  Hy-Vee or Safeway. Wal-Mart or BJs. They’re all over the place.

Recently, I was talking with someone, trying to compare differences between a blog site and a web site. I pointed to our Hy-Vee complex down the street (super-duper market with a convenience store out front), asking which would be the blog and which would be the web.

You know my answer (blogs are web sites on vitamin juice)

Many blog sites are *just* blogs — for now. For that matter, many web sites are *just* web sites — for now. Convergence is already happening.

Someday – and I hope soon – we’ll all realize that you can include blog (or other social media) functionality into your corporate site (if you choose to blog).

  • Have the last single post or the last 15 posts appear on a web page
  • Interact with your customers
  • Have a RSS feed available on your web presence
  • Publish shareable content so your fans can spread your message

The reason some business folks aren’t getting this yet? They don’t want to. And it’s okay. Social Media isn’t going away.

BlogTalkRadio: Nuts and BlogBolts, Tuesday Night

By on February 26, 2007 in Blogging with 4 Comments

On Tuesday night, February 27 at 8:30 Eastern (compare your time), the BlogTalkRadio Nuts & BlogBolts show will focus on Business Names and Branding. We have an all-star lineup for this one!

Creating a name for your business and a brand name to go to market with is still a very hot topic. Just today, Chris Brown and Guy Kawasaki each had resourceful posts on the subject.  Guy points to The Name Inspector, a great read (think I’ll study up before the show).

You can listen to the show live here.

Blogging to an Internal Community

By on February 26, 2007 in Blog Coach with 3 Comments

With more companies discovering that blogs are a fantastic communication tool internally, they should keep in mind the tone, the message — the purpose.

Pith and Vinegar’s post, Making Communities Inside the Corporation, provides some insight that could be used as a springboard to building your internal blog. I’ve taken P&Vs outline in a bit of a different direction, so I encourage you to check out the original post (link above):

  • Make it easy to understand for me to know if I want to be here or not (the site): Are your employees going to find value in visiting your internal blog, or is this just another corporate exercise to show you’re trying. Are you trying to build a community or is this another rote communique?
  • Help me to find an answer to my question, or to find the information I’m looking for: An internal blog could drive traffic to the other intranet resources you have — and stop wondering why nobody uses those resources. Re-introduce and explain why they’re there in the first place.
  • Thought leadership: Kick-start the culture you want in your company.
  • Farming and sustaining processes: Introduce ideas across teams, knock down cubicles separating departments, put faces with names.

The two worst moves you can make with an Internal Blog:

  1. Launch it and let it go ghost. If you launch the blog and don’t use it, your silence will be a message to your employees (You don’t have time for them).
  2. JMCR or Just More Corporate Redundancy

Other solid reads on Internal Blogging:
- Cut Down on Email and More with an Internal Blog by Ken Yarmosh
- Blog for Real Employee Communication by Sterling Hager

Quotes n Notes: Extraordinary

By on February 26, 2007 in Quotes n Notes with 0 Comments

Quotenote_4 "Don’t wait for extraordinary opportunities. Seize common occasions and make them great. Weak men wait for opportunities; strong men make them.” - Orison Swett Marden

Mike Sigers at Simplenomics (RSS Feed) asks Is Extraordinary as Good as Remarkable? Based on Mike’s post, it may be as rare, hmm?

I see too many folks waiting for the extraordinary or remarkable situations where they can step in and…what…ride on the situation’s coat tails? Can we not take an ordinary opportunity and amplify it into an extraordinary experience?

Do we get trapped into asking these questions:

  • Is the timing right?
  • Who else is doing it?
  • What’s in it for me?
  • What if I fail?

Yuch! Enough middle-minded mental makeup. Every day we do a lot of ordinary somethings. Today – turn one of those somethings (or three) into extraordinary!

Boomerang Your Message

By on February 25, 2007 in Conversations, Marketing with 3 Comments

I still hear business and civic leaders here in Iowa talk way too much about people moving out of Iowa. My advice: Let them go, watch them return, count how many they bring back.

One reason I decided to move my family to Iowa is because everyone I’d ever met from here made a lasting impression to the character and work habits of Iowans. Since moving here, I haven’t been disappointed.

Smart businesses would do the same with their content, whether its text, video or audio. Provide your audience ways to share and spread your message. Boomerang your content.

Panera Bread: An Update on Our Relationship

By on February 25, 2007 in Brain Stew with 1 Comment

The other day, I noticed an intersting referral incoming from Google: Panera. ConverStations is in the top ten (results may vary based on geography).

Just Panera. Not a search on Married to Panera (the page listed in the search results). Not a search on Starbucks is Looking and Tasting Better (which created a stir here in Iowa). Just Panera.

For those wondering, I still visit Panera U – just not as much as I once did.

The reason we moved the location of our Iowa Business Blog Workshops is because we outgrew Panera. As the audience grew larger, I was aware that we might be impending on the comfortability of other customers.

Panera (the corporate/franchise offices – not the team at the restaurant) could’ve handled the situation better (anything is better than nothing). Maybe I could’ve also.

While the relationship has taken a hit – it’s the front office that delivered the blow. Not the team at the restaurant. Definitely not the dining room community (the real reason I go in the first place).

So yes, if you’re wondering, I’ll still occasionally see you in the bread aisle.

Warm Up to a FeedBurner TotalStatsPro Account

By on February 25, 2007 in RSS Feeds with 5 Comments

Feedhero TechBrew and FeedBurner are teaming up on a contest where fans of FeedBurner can win a TotalStatsPro account. Frankly, I use TotalStatsPro on every account I create – but I still may enter just for fun. The details:

The Contest

To enter the contest, submit one of the following as a comment on at this TechBrew post:

  • A) A real-life photograph of the FeedBurner logo that you’ve made somehow. Tattoos, pumpkin carvings, sand castles, sky writing, whatever. The photo needs to be au natural – no photochopping, please. The submission should briefly describe what you did and include a link to the photo. Creativity is a must, humor is a bonus. Magnetic LED displays in Boston are probably a bad idea, and our lawyers ask that you don’t do anything illegal.

OR

  • B) The opening sentence to what would be a really bad pulp fiction novel, somehow encorporating RSS, Atom, feeds, blogging, or FeedBurner. You know, “It was a dark and stormy night…” kind of stuff. For inspiration, read winners of the Bulwer-Lytton parody contest, but don’t forget to work in something about blogging or feeds. (At last a contest where bloggers actually get rewarded for bad writing!) The more obnoxious, the better.

The rules, deadline and submission info can be found at TechBrew

Are You a Photopreneur?

By on February 24, 2007 in Brain Stew with 4 Comments

I’ve been part of laying a foundation of conversation and community for Photopreneur – even though we’re still weeks away from seeing the tool and marketplace what will be Photopreneur.com.

A while back, I asked Are you a photoblogger? and will be responding to the emails and comments received from that – but Photopreneur is more than just photoblogging, more than photo sharing. It’s a marketplace that will connect the media buyer with the photographer in a unique manner.

If you’re a Photoblogger or Photopreneur (Wikipedia def) and you’re interested in assisting us build a community, let me know.

Porch Your Elevator Pitch

By on February 23, 2007 in Marketing with 15 Comments

When it comes to building a team of contagious customers, don’t expect them to sneeze out your Elevator Pitch. Give them a Porch Pitch.

These days, elevator pitches are long-winded (see Wikipedia’s definition). They’re rarely transferable. If you’re going to build an army of contagious customers, you need to equip them with something they can remember.

Example:

Last year, on Brian Clark’s post How to Sell RSS (Or Where the Feed Fanboys Drop the Ball), I left this comment:

Elevator Pitch: If Knowledge is Power and Time is Money, think of Content Feeds as a way to gain Knowledge without wasting Time.

Porch Pitch: Gain Knowledge. Save Time.

Yesterday, I heard someone turn my porch pitch for RSS back into an elevator pitch – but that the length didn’t matter. What matters is he remembered it and delivered a rock-solid pitch on the benefits of Search Once and Subscribe.

Guy Kawasaki prefers Mantras Over Missions. Anita Campbell asks Can You Describe Your Business Strategy in Two Words? Your customers and prospects would probably applaud both articles.

Can you deliver your pitch on a porch? Can visitors to your blog or website immediately pick up on your porch pitch? Is your pitch something your customers and "sneezers" can redeliver to their audience?

 

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