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

Brian Gardner Media explores real life action on the Internet.
Haven’t you ever seen that video clip, where the guy drops his camera at the zoo, and panics, because he just spent a lot of money on it? So he climbs over the fence and just when he thinks his life is bad enough, he realizes that he just entered the lion’s den?

Duct Tape Marketing explores tools we may have forgotten.
Having lots of channels and lots of ways for folks to receive relevant, education based content is a must.

While social media and other web based marketing tools are getting most of today’s hype, email marketing to a list of willing recipients is still a very powerful way to market.

Beth’s Blog explores insights of online experiences.
Last year at this time, I was in Austin, TX doing a keynote workshop for Legal ervices Corporation on the ROI of Nonprofit Technology. I interviewed technology practitioners from the poverty law community about how they approach ROI and significant technology systems investments like client databases, document assembly systems, or video conference systems.

CC Seed explores a finding a new place in time.
The empty aisles I found while visiting Binghamton, NY should not have surprised me, but they did.

Related ala carte selections include

PerkettPRsuasion explores do-it-yourself work of the wrong kind.

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

Welcome to the SOB Cafe

We offer the best in thinking–articles on the business of blogging written by the Successful and Outstanding Bloggers of Successful Blog. Click on the titles to enjoy each selection.

The Specials this Week are

Logic + Emotion is picturing how it should be.
Effective communication is everyone’s job—whether you are trying to sell in a concept or convince a client….

Levite Chronicles is a quick study.
For the past eight years, almost every month I’ve walked into a board meeting carrying a sheet with numbers on it. The numbers reflect the previous month’s income and expense.

Altitude Branding isn’t betting the farm.
We’ve a bit of this mindset that venturing into social media is an all-or-nothing proposition, or at least we have a tendency to sound that way sometimes. As if you must step forward, but never back.

social media explorer is moving the web.
According to Engadget, some studies are predicting 100% mobile phone penetration in the United States within 4 years; at present, it’s estimated at around 84%. Some research indicates that as of 2008, as much as 3-10% of all web traffic comes from mobile devices.

Related ala carte selections include

And at Middle Zone Musings

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

Welcome to the SOB Cafe

We offer the best in thinking–articles on the business of blogging written by the Successful and Outstanding Bloggers of Successful Blog. Click on the titles to enjoy each selection.

The Specials this Week are

CK’s Blog suggests that we ought to rethink how we think about thinking.
The greatest thinkers throughout history didn’t offer the same ideas. Nope. They offered different viewpoints.

Buzz Bin suggests that we should be better by now.
Well, it’s a new year, and yes, we’re having many of the same old conversations here and other places. Realistically speaking, the repetition is necessary because a great deal of the market still needs to come up to speed on social media communications (Viva Pinata by peasap).

Insights & Ingenuity suggests that we consider our standards.
The gist of the message was “I’m Satisfied with Mr. Carpet.” Mr. Carpet, presumably, is a retailer of floor coverings. The approach was a weak (an non-attributable) customer testimonial.

Social Media Explorer suggests that we take longer look before we ask folks to blog about us.
The simple fact of the matter is that, at least for now, there is no one tool, website or service that can help public relations professional identify blogs for their outreach.

Servant of Chaos suggests that we understand the meaning of trust.
Some of the questions that have been raised go directly to the heart of social media … what does it mean to be “connected”, where does responsibility overlap “connection” and what happens to our TRUST when money is involved?

Related ala carte selections include

Being Five suggests …

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

Welcome to the SOB Cafe

We offer the best in thinking–articles on the business of blogging written by the Successful and Outstanding Bloggers of Successful Blog. Click on the titles to enjoy each selection.

The Specials this Week are

Delightful Work has a clear take on achieving prosperity.
Many have experienced the emptiness of wealth without purpose. Others have experienced authenticity without prosperity. Fewer have experienced both financial abundance and authenticity, simultaneously.

Blogging Without A Blog has a clear take on community building.
People innately desire to belong. It makes us feel safe, secure and wanted. The sense of belonging gives us the courage to speak up and share our thoughts and feelings.

The Harte of Marketing has a clear take on terminology and customer strategy.
The issue at hand, as I see it, is that a lot of people are adding Social Media Marketing as part of their service offerings, but they haven’t spent a day doing the marketing part and because of that they struggle with implementing social media as part of an overall marketing strategy.

ELITEBLOGGER has a clear take on getting traffic.
One of the easiest and best ways to get new traffic to your blog, is to write a guest post for another blog.

Harding & Company has a clear take on innovation.
. . . hunger spoils our judgment. Eager to avoid a financial crisis, professionals sometimes overreach, taking on business they shouldn’t.

Related ala carte selections include

Think Simple Now has a clear take on what’s attractive.
Just imagine the things we would accomplish if we had the belief that we could do absolutely anything, especially if we could maintain a level of self-esteem that no circumstance could shake. What would you be doing?

Gas Pedal is sponsoring a social media event.
Executives from 8 Fortune 150 companies are going to share insights, stories, and case studies on how they do corporate blogging and social media.

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

Welcome to the SOB Cafe

We offer the best in thinking–articles on the business of blogging written by the Successful and Outstanding Bloggers of Successful Blog. Click on the titles to enjoy each selection.

The Specials this Week are

COLOURlovers has a legendary gift.
Why does Santa wear red?

Believe it or not, present-day Santa owes his red robe not to an ancient legend or to an early myth but to …

How to Split an Atom has 33 gifts that worlk
Here are a few resources to help you out. This list focuses pretty heavily on design, development, marketing, advertising and “Social Media” jobs but there is something here for everyone.

mousewords has a gift for seeing things.
My synesthesia has been giving me troubles.

It’s not the sort of thing an aspirin will cure. Synesthesia—specifically, in my case, grapheme ? color synesthesia—is a neurological phenomenon that causes people to see letters and numbers in different colors.

Zocalo Group has a gift advice on behavior and a cool treehouse. One of the keys to successful social media for companies is to avoid being creepy.

The Viral Garden has a gift of intelligence.
Is he wrong? I would say his methods would work, at least in the short-term. But the idea that you ‘have to target the influencers’ is SO 2005.

Here is what I did; Instead of targeting ‘influencers’, I targeted smart people.

Related ala carte selections include

The Paisano has the gift of song …

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

Welcome to the SOB Cafe

We offer the best in thinking–articles on the business of blogging written by the Successful and Outstanding Bloggers of Successful Blog. Click on the titles to enjoy each selection.

The Specials this Week are

Greg Verdino shows how to get ahead of the curve in 2009.
As one of the contributors, I’ve had the opportunity to read everyone’s predictions and can say for sure that you’ll want to download a copy right away. Lots and lots of good stuff — from a great cross-section of the blogging community, representing a variety of different points of view.

Seth’s Blog shows how mixing the wrong things only gets you a bad and messy dessert.
Do people really want to follow P&G on Twitter so they can learn about the history of the soap operas they sponsored? Why? There are millions of people to friend or follow or interact with… why oh why are you going to spend time with Dunkin Donuts unless there is something in it for you?

Copyblogger shows how negativity bias runs through us.
Think about it, which post would you be more inclined to open?
“A-List Blogger Taken Down By Vicious Allegations Of Slander”
“Five Things Bloggers Should Know About Slander”

Remarkablogger shows how a great question starts a great conversation.
… And while for some people this may be true, that is a patronizing oversimplification. It’s not a matter of “getting it” or not.

SuccessCreeations shows the results of the Law of Unintended Consequences.
At their worst, shortcuts can be manipulative, destructive and downright counter productive. Especially when it comes to influencing others to take an action that benefits you.

Related ala carte selections include

Ari Herzog shows the power of rocking the status quo.
Imagine the potential if you ripped apart the status quo and challenged everything you knew. Your mind was blown away by that video above, right? And this ad campaign blew you away some more.

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