The BS Bailout: Free Better Business Blog Writing Program Bonus

The BS Bailout: Free Better Business Blog Writing Program Bonus
I absolutely hate using my writing blog to promote a sale, so I ask your indulgence just this one time. Don't throw tomatoes. Actually, you may love me for this, especially if you want to get your business blog spiffed...

The 2008 Weblog Awards
The polls are now open for The 2008 Weblog Awards: Polls Archives. Even if you're not a fan of such competitions, you may find some worthwhile blogs in unexpected places.

The polls are now open for The 2008 Weblog Awards: Polls Archives. Even if you're not a fan of such competitions, you may find some worthwhile blogs in unexpected places.

Welcome to the White House—and the 21st Century (updated)
Back in 2002, giving a workshop in Sao Paulo, I showed my students the current White House website. It was pretty dull, but it did offer a page in Spanish. Politically smart, I guess, except that the links on the Spanish page were still in English. Politics on the web was still pretty primitive. Last year I wrote an article about the gorgeous Barack Obama campaign website. Clearly, the upstart...

Back in 2002, giving a workshop in Sao Paulo, I showed my students the current White House website. It was pretty dull, but it did offer a page in Spanish. Politically smart, I guess, except that the links on the Spanish page were still in English. Politics on the web was still pretty primitive.

Last year I wrote an article about the gorgeous Barack Obama campaign website. Clearly, the upstart understood the web far better than any other politician on the planet. 

Now, on the day of his inauguration, we have an invitation: Welcome to the White House.

Webwriters, take notes. Barack Obama has raised the standard. 

I've discussed the site in more detail on The Hook, the politics blog of The Tyee.

Update: Jimmy Orr at the Christian Science Monitor has a good article on the site, written from his perspective as W's original website guy.

Get aboard the Cluetrain again
Via Inspecht, an Australian blog: The Cluetrain rides again. Excerpt: Almost 10 years ago Chris Locke, Doc Searls, David Weinberger and Rick Levine published a book that was going to change the way we saw the world, The Cluetrain Manifesto. The basic premise in the book is that markets are conversations. Their members communicate in language that is natural, open, and honest, sometimes even direct. Basically you can’t fake it....

Via Inspecht, an Australian blog: The Cluetrain rides again. Excerpt:

Almost 10 years ago Chris Locke, Doc Searls, David Weinberger and Rick Levine published a book that was going to change the way we saw the world, The Cluetrain Manifesto.

The basic premise in the book is that markets are conversations. Their members communicate in language that is natural, open, and honest, sometimes even direct. Basically you can’t fake it.

Most corporations, on the other hand, only know how to engage in a corporate monotone of mission statements, product strategies and , marketing brochures.

However everything is now changing. People are connecting, and working together. The Internet is enabling these conversations and there is nothing corporations can do to stop it.

The blog post contain a slide show of the Cluetrain Manifesto's key points. Very much worth reviewing (for the old-timers) and discovering (for the newbies).

Thanks to Amy Gahran for the link.

The Layoffs Will Be Blogged
Via The New York Times, a article by Claire Cain Miller: The Layoffs Will Be Blogged. Excerpt:Elon Musk, chief executive of the electric-car company Tesla Motors in San Carlos, Calif., said that he had no choice other than to blog about the Oct. 15 layoffs at the closely watched company - even though some employees had not yet been told they were losing their jobs. Valleywag, a Silicon Valley gossip...

Via The New York Times, a article by Claire Cain Miller: The Layoffs Will Be Blogged. Excerpt:

Elon Musk, chief executive of the electric-car company Tesla Motors in San Carlos, Calif., said that he had no choice other than to blog about the Oct. 15 layoffs at the closely watched company - even though some employees had not yet been told they were losing their jobs. 

Valleywag, a Silicon Valley gossip blog owned by Gawker Media, had already published the news, and it was being picked up by traditional media reporters, Mr. Musk said. 

“We had to say something to prevent articles being written that were not accurate.” 

Blogging about staff cuts is particularly prevalent in Silicon Valley, where tech gossip sites pounce on every rumor and Web-savvy employees broadcast their every thought on personal blogs and Twitter feeds. 

Start-up companies in particular seem to the feel pressure to break bad news on their own blogs so that they can better control the message. 

Unlike more traditional firms, many of today’s Web companies were built on the mission of creating transparency for users. Executives have lived that mission, blogging about company successes. Now that bad times are coming, some of them feel the need to make that public, too. A blog post also comes across as more heartfelt than a press release with canned quotations.

Obama's wisdom about email
Via CNN Political Ticker: Obama thinks he can keep his blackberry. Excerpt:President-elect Barack Obama told CNN Friday he thinks he may be able to “hang onto” his BlackBerry after all. In an interview with CNN’s John King, he talked about the privacy issues that threaten his ability to maintain normal communications – and his optimism that, unlike his predecessor, he’s going to be able to keep using e-mail after he...

Via CNN Political Ticker: Obama thinks he can keep his blackberry. Excerpt:

President-elect Barack Obama told CNN Friday he thinks he may be able to “hang onto” his BlackBerry after all. 

In an interview with CNN’s John King, he talked about the privacy issues that threaten his ability to maintain normal communications – and his optimism that, unlike his predecessor, he’s going to be able to keep using e-mail after he enters the Oval Office. 

Then there’s the BlackBerry. “You like these,” said CNN’s John King. “I was just with you before this, and you had a couple of them. And there are a lot of people who say, because this will end up in the presidential library, because you don't have privacy any more. Your life's about to change Tuesday noon. You have to give this up.” 

“Yes,” conceded Obama. 

“You going to do it?” asked King. 

“I think we're going to be able to beat this back,” Obama responded. “….I think we're going to be able to hang onto one of these. Now, my working assumption, and this is not new, is that everything I write on e-mail could end up being on CNN. So I make sure that — to think before I press ‘send.’”

If only the rest of us would think before we press "send."

Content Delivery: Gated or Not Gated?
Is your content gated or not? This is a new term for me, but it captures this marketing tactic: When you offer an ebook, audio file, white paper or special report off your site, it's "gated" if you require a...

SEO 5 Consulting- Providing Top Internet Marketing Solutions To Advertisers
The Internet is a highly competitive, ever-changing marketplace. That means you need a marketing team like SEO 5 Consulting that knows the web from the inside out. For SEO 5 Consulting, Internet mar... [Author: Karen Elowitt - Site Promotion - April 12, 2009]

3 Rules for Writing Content for Your Business Blog
I just read a great post over on the Marketing Professor blog by Travis Campbell, 3 Rules for Using Twitter for Business. These same three rules should apply to all of your content marketing, but they are particularly relevant for...