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Thanks to Week 18 SOBs

February 25, 2006 by Liz

Successful and Outstanding Bloggers

Let me introduce the bloggers
who have earned this official badge of achievement,

and the right to call themselves
Successful Blog SOBs.

I invite them to take a badge home to display on their blogs.

muddy teal strip A

They take the conversation to their readers,
contribute great ideas, challenge us, make us better, and make our businesses stronger.

I thank all of our SOBs for thinking what we say is worth passing on.
Good conversation shared can only improve the blogging community.

Should anyone question this badge’s validity, send him or her directly to me. This award comes with a full “Liz said so” guarantee. It is endorsed by Kings of the Hemispheres, Martin and Michael, and backed by my brothers, Angelo and Pasquale.

Want to become an SOB?

If you’re an SO-Wanna-B, you can see the whole list of SOBs and learn how to be one by visiting the SOB Hall of Fame. Click the link or visit the What IS an SOB?! page in the sidebar.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

What Makes a Great SOB?!

February 24, 2006 by Liz

Recently a new reader asked me about SOBs, what they stood for, and how the whole thing worked. So I’ve made a new page, much like this post, so that all new readers will know in the future. And so that you would know about SOBs where they came from and why people actually want to be one.

No, No, It’s not THAT!

When the SOB program started, I was looking for a way to encourage the sense of community that Successful-Blog stood for. The conversations were fun, fast, and sometimes irreverent. Discussions on the blog often brought up good ideas, and I wanted to make sure those ideas continued and become more out in the blogosphere–everyone making everyone a little bit better. It’s the only way that we can make ourselves strong here in what they call “The Magic Middle.” We talk to each other.

What the SOB Program Is and Is Not

The idea was that anyone who took the discussion back to their blog would let me know. Then I would give that blog recognition on Successful-Blog for extending the conversation into the blogosphere–making the community larger, the dialogue bigger, all of us smarter, better and our businesses stronger. Most folks forgot the part about letting me know. So I kept watch and found out on my own.

Every week I make copies of their logos and add them to the list of Successful and Outstanding bloggers who understand that the strength of the blogosphere comes from relationships, interconnectedness, and community. Not all of these folks have all of the links you might expect, but they will, because they show the key traits of a succesful blogger.

Soon enough it became apparent that having a blog didn’t need to be a criteria either. Some of the best ideas came from blog readers who added value to the dialogue, but had no blog to bring the conversation back to. I felt strongly they should be included as SOBs too. Which tells you what the progam is not, i.e. a link exchange. That’s also why, though they’re appreciated, blogrolls do not make SOBs.

The Badges

If you’ve been through a few pages on Successful-Blog you’ve seen these badges.

and wondered about them. Those are the official badges awarded each week to those who are named Successful and Outstanding Bloggers of Successful Blog.

It was Mike Sigers who thought of the blog badges, and Mike Rundle of 9rules who designed them. The SOB for Successful and Outstanding Blogger was my own– a bit of mischief to underscore our sense of irreverence and openness in discussions. It’s become quite a symbol of what the blog stands for. Every now and then a fun post goes up titled “Liz called me an SOB,” those are my favorite.

People don’t have to put the badges on their blogs. They don’t need to link back. Most of them do and I’m grateful for the sense of community that shows. More that than, I’m glad that they extend the community further out.

If You Want to Be an SOB

Find a way to start a dialogue about how blogging helps business, or carry the dialogue here back to your blog. Offer a great feature, post, idea, or an article that will shed new light for the blogosphere. Contribute something that demonstrates you think like a Successful and Outstanding Blogger. Then just tell me about it. I’m pretty easy to persuade, if you’re truly committed to being one.

Every SOB is automatically included in the SOB directory. Stop in there when you’re looking for a great read.

Can’t wait until I can call you an SOB too.

ME “Liz” Strauss

Great Photo Resources to Support Readers

February 23, 2006 by Liz

When it comes to dressing up a blog visually, great photos go a long toward class and style–if they are well-chosen and well placed to support your message. Photos can draw in an undecided reader and can communicate a message faster and more deeply than words. In that way they can be underscore what you are trying to say, making it more powerful and give it more emotion.

The advantages of using photos with readers have been researched by educators.

Photos involve the reader more interactively. Therefore your message gets “heard” more deeply.
Visual learners are drawn in by photos. They find the information in instructional photos more easily accessible. They pick up the information there first and process it, then the words on the page make more sense to them.
Decorative photos make an article more appealing and inviting. Blocks of text don’t seem intimidating to readers when illustrated by photos.

Well-placed photos also can take an unremarkable template and “kick it up a notch,” giving it the feel of a more sophisticated design. If you have no experience, do give it a try, but read up on design basics before you begin. Add photos slowly and be careful not to have them overwhelm the text in size. Then ask a customer-reader or designer friend to give you feedback on your choices until you feel confident.

Experienced or not, you’re going to need to get some photos–not everyone is a photographer with a great library to pull from. Here are some resources on basic design, places to find free and inexpensive stock photos, and photoshop tutorials.

The first is
Photoshop Tutorials Blog, and not just the blog, but the page with the listing that shows where you might find some smashing images to spice up your blog posts. To access the listing, click this logo

You’ll find a few more if you visit Presentation Zen and get Garr’s tips on using stock photos.

If you’re up for taking your own photos, you might check out this series from Kodak on The Top 10 Tips for Taking Pictures.

Photos are an integral part of any design and add to the “curb appeal” of a any blog or online business. How might you use photos to strengthen your brand, your blog, your business?

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Turning Reluctant Readers into Loyal Fans
Blog Promotion: Checking Out Curb Appeal

Turning Reluctant Readers into Loyal Fans

February 23, 2006 by Liz

In just a brief one-twentieth of a second–less than half the time it takes to blink–people make aesthetic judgments that influence the rest of their experience with an Internet site.

–Kamakshi Tandon
REUTERS, Internet users judge Web sites in less than a blink
Jan. 17, 2006

We’ve got less than a blink to grab a reader’s attention. The reader clicks in. Looks. Decides and then . . . and then what? . . . Do they stay or do they leave? If they stay, did what they see lend our words more credibility or did it take some away?

Design, curb appeal, packaging–whatever you call it–it’s what brings customer-readers further into our businesses and our blogs. They recognize what works for them and what doesn’t. If it doesn’t, they’re gone so quickly that even our stats programs don’t know. Try the Blink Test if you want a baseline idea of what your readers are seeing before they blink.

What about reluctant readers, undecideds who decide to stay a little longer? What can we do to convince them to stay? Better yet, how can we turn them into fans?

Capturing the Attention of Reluctant Readers

In educational publishing, we have a euphemism, “reluctant readers.” It’s used to describe kids who, when they see a textbook, they turn away to find their inline skates. When I write on literacy, they are my favorite customers to write for and about.

I don’t much like that euphemism applied only to those kids because I’m constantly having to remind other teachers that,

. . . we’re all reluctant readers and becoming more and more so. If you’re a skeptic on this point, try reading the tax code–or any “have-to” document on your least favorite subject. You’ll wish that there were something more to see than long columns of endless text, something to break up the boring words.

With more and more ways to spend our leisure time, even television shows are becoming bulleted lists.

Reader Support as Part of Your Brand

Those kids we call reluctant readers do leave their inline skates to read what they’re interested in–things like books on extreme sports and the latest gaming websites and blogs–if they’re made right. Here’s what you can take from educational research to catch the attention of normal, everday reluctant readers. You can use it to brand your blog as a worthwhile source of quality content. It’s one more way, that you can make customer-reader support a resounding part of your niche brand.

Use sub-heads liberally. Sub-heads break the text into shorter bits. Subconsciously that not only tells me what this bit is about. It also says I only have to read this far and then I get to breathe again. People not only like subheads, search engines like them too.
Use everyday words. A big vocabulary doesn’t bring us closer together, it sets you apart. The word use is a fine one, use it. Don’t set it aside for utilize. That makes me, as a reader, stop to wonder whether you mean something different from the what use would have said. Anything that stops a reader works against your message being heard.
Use pictures, images, art, and color to enhance your message. Do this with care. It’s easy to distract. Place only one or two images. Place them where they add value to the text. Try to put images where you’d expect to find them. If you’re not sure ask a customer-reader to give you feedback on how you’re doing. Remember that design seems easy, but it’s not.
Take the time to write something short. The point here is to make every word count. Read your post over to take out all of the words that you don’t need. Be lethal. It’s amazing how many extra words you can find when your quest is to go looking for them. A few sentences ago, I turned this into two posts instead of one.
Use typographic cues, such as bold and italic, to show what’s important. Be consistent and try not to make everything important. If you use underlined text to show what is a link, don’t use an underline for anything else. If you make everything important, then you’ve really said that nothing is.

Each of these points are about helping reluctant readers like me figure out quickly what’s important and what’s not, so that when I’m done reading what you wrote. I feel like we’re both smart.

Reluctant Readers to Loyal Fans

Ever read something that made you feel like the writer was saying something you always thought? . . . or something that just made you feel smart for reading it? Bet you went back to see what else that writer had to say . . . .

But then, you knew all this. You have a favorites list. You know what it takes to make a fan. I’m just offering some hints on how to get the undecideds to come in, so that you get a chance to do just that.

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Success in a Blink and a Blink Test
Business, Blogs, and Niche-Brand Marketing
How to Code Accessible Links–Part 1
What Is Content that Keeps Readers?
Audience is Your Destination

Business, Blogs, and Niche-Brand Marketing

February 21, 2006 by Liz

Just the Facts

These are the facts.

The blogosphere is doubling in size every 5 and a half months.

On average, a new weblog is created every second of every day.

Municipal Wi-Fi Networks are becoming a reality. Anaheim, CA; Arlington, VA; Brookline, MA; Chicago, IL; Denver, CO;, Miami, FL; Minneapolis, MN; Grand Rapids, MI; New York, NY; Philadelphi, PA; Pittsburgh, PA; San Francisco, CA; Tempe, AZ; and others are already planning or building Wi-Fi networks to be ready in the next 2-3 years.

The Technorati Filter By Authority slider gives readers the power to filter out all but the most important blogs in any niche. Will other Search Engine follow?

Business Meet Blogs, Blogs Meet Business

Sounds great. Doesn’t it? Bloggers read blogs. I’ll have more readers. Right? But those readers will have more blogs to read. With new blogs coming at such a stunning rate, it’s reasonable to think that blogs in the Magic Middle might be pushed aside as younger, shinier blogs appear. It’s also fair to assume that readers will limit the searches to only important blogs, leaving me out. What’ll I do to capture their attention?

Niche-Brand Marketing

The wisdom of the Long Tail–that as business moves on line, less and less of what is offered needs to be “one size fits all” and delivered via giant outlet–leads me to niche-brand marketing. I review this list often for my blogs and for my business, or Liz Strauss Consulting wouldn’t be consulting much longer.

Define a niche for your business. Choose a niche you truly care about. Find a place to stand. Don’t try to be all things to all people. Do one or two things that play to your strengths and passions. Do those things better than anyone else.
Find out everything about the customers in your chosen niche. First and foremost, make sure that said customers exist. Then don’t just get information. Fall in love with everyone of them. Figure out how to crawl into their skin and feel their pain. Know their loves and their wishes. Find their needs and desires. Learn to read what they’re not saying.
Define your brand through your customers’ world view. In reality, you don’t define your brand, your customers do. When you understand your customers intimately, find a way to state your brand–what you and your customers stand for–in less than one sentence. Write those words everywhere your customer will see your name, your blog’s name, or your business name. Let them know you mean it.
Use your brand to test every decision you make–large or small. Be your brand. Live it. Make your brand show in every detail, every action, every move you make. If you live your brand, and test every decision against it by asking, Will this help my customers see my brand? your customers are more likely to buy into the brand you’ve chosen on their behalf.
Be authentic; never skimp on quality; never go against your brand; and you will set the standard. You won’t just be different; you will be unique, irreplaceable. Authenticity cannot be “knocked off and done more cheaply.” Attempts to copy you will only be poor facsimiles. Quality and authenticity are the birthplace of brand loyalty. Customers will know where to find the real thing. Once they find it. They stick with it.
When your customers recognize that you care about their needs, value them and the relationship that you have with them. Relationships will always be everything in any human endeavor. Never lose sight of the fact that you and they are people–not users, not clients, not numbers–but folks with thoughts, feelings, and ideas that make you and your business better.

Why Customers Love Niche-Brand Marketers

We are a fascinating species. When we don’t know where to go, we’ll go where everyone else goes. But give us one reason to come to you, and you’ve made a customer–a reader–possibly a friend forever.

We think that people who think the same way we do are smarter than other people. So when you choose a niche that we care about, we think that you’re highly intelligent. We trust your judgment in other things too.

When we find someone who tries to solve our problems and who values us. We’ll go out of our way to do business with you. It’s just not that often that we get that kind of service.

That’s how small niche-brand marketers get to be great niche marketers one customer at a time. That’s how I plan to make this a place where I can put down roots. I want want to be here for a long, long while, making relationships with some really great people.

How about you?

–ME “Liz” Strauss

Thanks to Week 17 SOBs

February 18, 2006 by Liz

Successful and Outstanding Bloggers

Let me introduce the bloggers
who have earned this official badge of achievement,

and the right to call themselves
Successful Blog SOBs.

I invite them to take a badge home to display on their blogs.

muddy teal strip A

They take the conversation to their readers,
contribute great ideas, challenge us, make us better, and make our businesses stronger.

I thank all of our SOBs for thinking what we say is worth passing on.
Good conversation shared can only improve the blogging community.

Want to become an SOB?

If you’re an SO-Wanna-B, you can see the whole list of SOBs and learn how to be one by visiting the SOB Hall of Fame. Click the link or visit the What IS an SOB?! page in the sidebar.

–ME “Liz” Strauss