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.

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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.

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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

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

davidbullock has been thinking about where our content turns up without us.
Let’s face it. You can’t control the creation and distribution of user generated content. The tools are available and the web is too big to police it all. So what is a business owner to do?

Embrace it. Yes, embrace it. And work to really understand the mechanics of the web and social media.

Small Biz Survival has been thinking about how keep our businesses going and growing.
Ready for some help with your business? You can research online all day, read every book, even talk with friends and family, but sometimes you just need another experienced business person to sit down with you, face to face, and work on improving your business. No matter where you are, odds are that you are in the territory of some free business consulting sources.

Amrit Hallan has been thinking about manners and manners of doing business.
Being polite is good in general. One should always be polite. Politeness can be an invaluable asset to you if you work as a freelancer. But where do you draw the line? There is a big difference between being polite and being obsequious.

Catskill Cottage Seed has been thinking about who we are.
What does it all add up to? All this social media activity with our interactions and our presence across multiple platforms (or stages as I like to think of them), to what end

Related ala carte selections include

Shtikl

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

MZinga’s Jim Storer and Colin Browning talk with Liz.
In this podcast, Liz does what she does best, discussing strategies on how to become a better blogger and attract fiercely loyal fans.

The Buzz Bin talks about elegant communication.
It occurs to me that whether it’s in person, using traditional tools, or here in the echo chamber (a.k.a. social media) that great communications remain difficult. Why? Because it’s not the toolset; it’s not the ability to be friendly; and it’s definitely not a personal brand. On the contrary, simplicity matters more …

The Harte of Marketing talks what’s important as we grow.
But how about when the conversation is no longer touched by the person/company that created it? It could be because they just don’t have the time to engage in the conversation or that they just chose not to.

Biz Coach Deb talks about customer service as the “new marketing.”
Ordinarily when a business drops the ball, we’re not really surprised any more, and it appears to be the general sentiment with American consumers, especially in certain industries.

Train for Humanity talks marathons … again!
After approximately twelve weeks of Train for Humanity and with two events down (read about Dan’s race and Mark’s race), we have one more endurance event to go before closing out phase one.

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Crowdspring hopes you’ll lend some support with a vote!

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

Chris Brogan points out the power of Batman available to all of us.
Batman, no matter how amazing, is only one man. Crime is a large and amorphous thing, and it requires lots of people to fight. It requires a better Gotham Police Department, a more capable Commissioner Gordon, a Robin, a Batgirl, and more and more help from others. Oh, and let’s not forget Alfred.

Geek Mommy points out the silent gift that reaches out.
Sometimes, because I’m so chatty (or noisy as some would say) people make the mistake of thinking I’m not listening. Then I end up repeating something back to them they said a few hours or weeks earlier and they seem stunned. You see, as much as I love to talk, share and inform, well… I love learning even more. You learn from listening, observing, and paying attention.

Levite Chronicles points out that we can ask for a gift.
I love the idea, but I started to laugh. I thought, “if everyone is listening, who is going to talk?” And then I realized that this is a day addressed to those of us who always talk. It probably should be a doubly-named day, called both, “national day of shut up and let someone else talk already why don’t you.” and “national day of please, you, in the back, arranging the chairs, would you tell us a story? Please?”

Beth’s Blog points out that giving starts early.
When I was a kid, Lucy the Elephant, was in a state of disrepair. A community group worked hard to get her placed on the historic register and raise money to restore her to her mid-century glory. How? Bake sales organized by my third grade teacher, Josephine Harron, nicknamed “Cupcake.” Sitting by next to my mom in the kitchen, I mixed up a lot of cupcake batter and icing with my mom for those bake sales.

Related ala carte selections include

The Jeff Pulver Blog highlights giving that happened in near record time.
Tweetsgiving is a Twitter celebration of gratitude and giving created by Epic Change, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. The project aims to demonstrate the power of the social web by raising $10,000 in 48 hours to build a classroom in Tanzania.

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