SOB Business Cafe 09-03-09
Filed Under SOB Business, Successful Blog | 1 Comment
Welcome to the SOB Cafe
We offer the best in thinking — articles, books, podcasts, and videos about business online written by the Successful and Outstanding Bloggers of Successful Blog. Click on the titles to enjoy each selection.
The Specials this Week are
Copyblogger
To avoid this awful fate, you probably try to keep your posts short, chopping up longer ideas into a series of posts. No need to scare away readers by dumping too much information on them all at once, right?
Makes sense, but what’s weird is it doesn’t work that way.
Freelance Folder
If you’ve ever faced a client who has tried to low-ball you on a project, then you know that it’s not much fun. Your excitement at finding a potential new client quickly fades when you discover that he or she is merely trying to take advantage of you.
How to Save the World
Last week I had a fascinating chat with Mark Brady, marketing/design guru extraordinaire, whose Alchemy model of business elements, using the metaphor of the periodic table of elements, is so achingly beautiful and original that I don’t really care whether it makes sense or not.
Photo Matt
I often get asked something along the line of, “If you weren’t leading Automattic, what would you work on?” There’s not a single answer to this question; the answer changes day to day. But I think if you asked me today, I’d say I would like to start a bank.
problogger
I should say that while this post contains 9 ways to promote a blog post - that I rarely use all of them at once. Keep in mind that the idea of ’seeding’ is not about forcing things but rather it is about getting things going and then letting something organic happen.
Related ala carte selections include
AdRants
People always pay more for the paranormal.
Sit back. Enjoy your read. Nachos and drinks will be right over. Stay as long as you like. No tips required. Comments appreciated.
–ME “Liz” Strauss
SOB Business Cafe 08-21-09
Filed Under Successful Blog | Leave a Comment
Welcome to the SOB Cafe
We offer the best in thinking — articles, books, podcasts, and videos about business online written by the Successful and Outstanding Bloggers of Successful Blog. Click on the titles to enjoy each selection.
The Specials this Week are
Problogger
My arms were out in front of me, I was taking baby steps, and I was sure that I had been doing everything right. So how could this happen to me?
Painfully lying in bed, I made a startling realization. I was doing it all wrong.
Dumb Little Man
There are millions of brilliant people who pursue aggressive career paths and have their sights set on great achievement. While their ability is nothing short of genius, many lack the soft skills that could put them over the top. These are the traits, qualities and understandings are what make good people great.
Small Biz Survival
One of them said in the last five years, I was the second person to ask about wi-fi. (I may have been the first guy, too, as I go to this place regularly.) My takeaway here is that if you expect a autoshop to do good auto work, chances are that you may have to forfeit other “conveniences”.
As I sat in this shop, I listened to the guys ordering spares. Sometime I would hear them give out a fax number, and then it happened – the fax machine broke.
Prevential
In 2003, I dressed up as an AIM Buddy List for a college Halloween party. I dangled a piece of blank cardboard from my neck that said “I have no friends.”
When I walked into the party, people actually LINED UP to sign it. I didn’t know half of them, but they all wanted their name on my piece of cardboard.
Levite Chronicles
I say “just” a lot. If I don’t say it, I think it.
Related ala carte selections include
Constructing Social
The Constructing Social Genealogical Research division has uncovered the following amazing similarities between social media and mass media mega stars – pure coincidence? We think not!
Sit back. Enjoy your read. Nachos and drinks will be right over. Stay as long as you like. No tips required. Comments appreciated.
–ME “Liz” Strauss
SOB Business Cafe 05-29-09
Filed Under Great Finds, Successful Blog | Leave a Comment
Welcome to the SOB Cafe
We offer the best in thinking — articles, books, podcasts, and videos about business online written by the Successful and Outstanding Bloggers of Successful Blog. Click on the titles to enjoy each selection.
The Specials this Week are
Art of Nonconformity
The title of this post is deliberately provocative. First of all, I know that marketers are people too, and most people are marketers of one kind or another.
But when I talk about hating marketers, you probably know what kind of marketers I’m talking about. I’m talking about car salesmen marketers who play on our emotions to get our money.
Riding Dragons
A small middle-aged woman wearing a white sleeveless shirt and khaki cargo pants appeared a few yards to my right. She raised a point-and-shoot camera to a foot or so in front of her face, aimed it at the mountain, snapped a photo, then retreated to her car and left.
IttyBiz
“Win-win” is one of those annoying buzzwords that you hear over and over and over again until you just get so mad that you want to punch Ashton Kutcher repeatedly in the face. But as I’m building these new little businesses of mine, I’m coming to realize why people say “win-win” so often.
Unconventional Thinking
In business, when we peel away all of the code, the rules, the myths, the jargon, the Harvard case studies, all we have to do is to find a code breaker: which is a single thing that if we do it over and over again, it will always be profitable.
The Fluent Self
Okay, so when people ask me about business-ey things, and — more specifically — how my own thing has gotten all biggified, I have to talk about the weird magical power of being yourself.
And not just being yourself, but being yourself out loud.
Even if that means that people know that I am a total mess talk to ducks, have monsters and completely fall apart sometimes.
Related ala carte selections include
From the Mind of Neenz
As I type this, I can hear my Mother’s voice as she delivered the news to me over the phone. As I type this, I recall the words of my dear friend Jan in an email, “Oh Neen, I almost want to ask…are you sure?” As I type this, I can hear his laughter as if he’s only down the hall in his bedroom. As I type this I am reminded, remembering is part of healing.
Sit back. Enjoy your read. Nachos and drinks will be right over. Stay as long as you like. No tips required. Comments appreciated.
–ME “Liz” Strauss
SOB Business Cafe 05-22-09
Filed Under Great Finds, Successful Blog | Leave a Comment
Welcome to the SOB Cafe
We offer the best in thinking — articles, books, podcasts, and videos about business online written by the Successful and Outstanding Bloggers of Successful Blog. Click on the titles to enjoy each selection.
The Specials this Week are
Dosh Dosh
Experts have talked about this before. How many times have you read about the importance of ‘adding value’ for your audience? How many times have you read about ‘building trust’ with your readers/prospects?
TwitTip
Now that Twitter has several million active users, it’s no surprise to see such a variety of people discussing a wide range of topics. But while the content of all those tweets may be so different, they ultimately fall roughly into five categories.
Less Ordinary
Most Tuesdays I pay my grandparents a visit, and while I’m there I tend to take quite a few pics in my grandad’s garden. When I was there last week, as well as taking lots more photos of the beautiful flowers growing in the borders, pots and window boxes, I also took some shots in the greenhouse:
ChrisG
The way that UsefulTools is differentiating is through focus. By sacrificing the news, gossip and editorial, and aiming just for the review slice of the pie, they will stand out. Also, and this is just my hope, they will avoid the echo-chamber and TechMeme chasing behavior of some of the other blogs out there!
Related ala carte selections include
White Trash Mom
Mikwright Cards & Gifts is sponsoring a weekly contest every Thursday here on whitetrashmom.com!
Sit back. Enjoy your read. Nachos and drinks will be right over. Stay as long as you like. No tips required. Comments appreciated.
–ME “Liz” Strauss
SOB Business Cafe 05-15-09
Filed Under Great Finds, Marketing, Successful Blog | 1 Comment
Welcome to the SOB Cafe
We offer the best in thinking — articles, books, podcasts, and videos about business online written by the Successful and Outstanding Bloggers of Successful Blog. Click on the titles to enjoy each selection.
The Specials this Week are
The Buzz Bin
Dale Carnegie’s principles have stood the test of time because they are about fostering better relations amongst people. And the classic mistake with social media is to treat it like a mass communications vehicle, when it’s a conversational form that builds relationships. Social media is about a larger community and its concerns, as opposed to a litany of messages. There is no better set of guidelines for this then “Friends.”
A VC
The WSJ gave its journalists some rules about conduct in social media this week according to Editor and Publisher.
Most of them are good common sense rules for everyone using social media. But there are several that I think are wrong and should be rethought. Here are four “rules” that I think should be reconsidered and why.
Mashable
But there’s so much info and chatter coming in through social media that it can overwhelm you, eat up your time, and ruin your productivity.
Simplifying will help you stay in touch, and continue to participate in the conversation, without losing sight of your mission and the important work you need to get done.
Social Media Explorer
Last week, David and I got the opportunity to hear Geno Church of Brains on Fire speak about word of mouth marketing and social media, courtesy the Louisville AMA and Social Media Club Louisville. He ended the presentation with the story of the role social media played in a pivotal, scary event in his own life as a parent. It got the gears turning in my head.
Marketing Pilgrim
Fizzle in 2009
If you’ve not stopped popping champagne since we published Forrester’s predictions for social media marketing, you might need the Alka-Seltzer after you see eMarketer’s contrary estimates.
Related ala carte selections include
Chrisg
All around the world people are very excited about Social Media Success Summit 2009 — the first major online event dedicated to helping you successfully market your business with sites like Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. More than 500 people have already registered. Now you have the exclusive chance to win two valuable seats to the event for no cost!
Sit back. Enjoy your read. Nachos and drinks will be right over. Stay as long as you like. No tips required. Comments appreciated.
–ME “Liz” Strauss
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