In addition, Google has added Creator and Credit metadata support to image search: New Google Image Search desktop design is now rolling out – Search Engine Land
New Google Image Search desktop design is now rolling out
10 Digital Marketing Trends Every Entrepreneur Should Watch
Today’s brands are reaching their audiences thanks to the rise of mobile technology: 10 Digital Marketing Trends Every Entrepreneur Should Watch
Are you looking for someone to blame?
Stop it. It doesn’t work! I just saw this tweet from my buddy Jeff Strommen:
You can try that and see if it works or, you can think about these 3.5 books and how they might change your approach to life and business:
And these two together if you’re in business for yourself or just the first one if you’re not…
Tune Up Utilities 2014
Tune Up Utilities is the only utility I use to keep my Windows computer running like new every day. Each year I gladly pay the $29.95 to update to the latest version. This year, however, it’s cheaper to install it as a trial version and click the ‘buy now’ button – you’ll save yourself $5.00! So, whether you’ve never used Tune Up or it’s time to renew save yourself the 5 bucks and have a good pint on me…
Unroll.me!
The folks at unroll.me write:
Your inbox is a mess — admit it. You are constantly bombarded with irrelevant emails throughout your extremely busy day. It doesn’t have to be this way, though. Luckily, you’ve come to the right place.
On the radar; Friends+Me beta
My mate in Australia, Brian Clark, found this little gem and passed along to me, asking for my opinion. I thought it might be a good opportunity to weigh in not only on the product, but the evaluation process I go through when looking at a new tool…
In order for product to receive my recommendation, it has to meet the following criteria [in addition to others]:
- it must be best of class
- it must be free or freemium
- it must be completely cross-platform
This product belongs to a very small group of products that can actually auto post content from Google+ to other social networks and that really puts it in a class almost by itself!
Secondly, this is an affordable freemium product that allows you to auto post 40 times before paying a reasonable annual fee of $2.99 per month or $29.99 per year. Over the years I’ve become increasingly leery of great free products that appear one day and disappear the next — I’m happy to pay a reasonable price for a great product because it means that the products and services that I’m relying on may actually be there when I need them.
Lastly, because this product relies on Google+ sharing, it’s accessible from anywhere! Friends+Me is for people who are – or would like to be – using Google+ as their primary social network and I can see where it would be a valuable asset to people in both categories. I’ll be testing this product and let you know of a later date whether or not it becomes an approved part of my workflow…
How to become a thought leader on $137.88 per year…
A couple of days ago, Craig Badings of the Thought Leadership blog asked me to complete the following sentence: “Thought Leadership is _______”. My response? Fundamental. As in “thought leadership is fundamental”. Craig asked me if he could post my definition on his site with attribution and frankly I don’t know if it’s because he thought my response was stupid or brilliant or somewhere in between. Let me explain however, what I meant…
At a time in history when almost 90% of people search Google before making a buying decision you need to show up in search in a good way. To me a thought leader is someone who uses the incredible good, fast and cheap tools we have at our disposal to get found when people are looking for what they do, or, in what Google calls the Zero Moment of Truth. They use blogging and social media to attract and retain fans who either buy into their ideas or by their products.
It was Leonardo da Vinci who said “simplicity is the ultimate sophistication”. I maintain that if you aspire to thought leadership there are only two activities you must master: finding and sharing good information. When I teach my college classes, I call this deepening your expertise and documenting your expertise. Any person who aspires to thought leadership has probably done Malcolm Gladwell‘s 10,000 hours of work to gain their expertise but if you want to be a thought leader you must continue to nourish that expertise and stay current on the things that are important in your field of study. That’s what I called deepening your expertise. The second part, documenting your expertise, simply means to use the publishing tools available on the Internet to provide social proof of your work. If you’re a great thinker who aspire to thought leadership that’s all you need to know — hence my statement that thought leadership is fundamental.
I have developed a simple workflow that I call a ‘Me’cosystem which anyone can use to establish a thought leadership position over time. All of the tools are best of breed, free or freemium, and completely cross platform down to the smart phone level. There are nine different activities in which the thought leader must engage and I outline them here:
I’ll be going into more detail in each of these stages later on in the series. Organized efficiently from the beginning to the end of the process, it looks more like this:
And again, I’ll be going into more detail in subsequent posts. All I think you really need to know at this point is that the process really does work and that it’s simple enough and cost-effective enough that even someone who does TED talks can use my system. :-)
Next week I’ll start with the analysis phase in the flowchart. Questions? Feedback?
Related articles
- Twitter thought leadership definitions (thoughtleadershipstrategy.net)
- Is Your Thought Leadership Strategy Using Research Wisely? (business2community.com)
- 5 Ideas about creating thought leadership (theengagingbrand.com)
- How To Become A Thought Leader (twistimage.com)
- 5 Ways to Show Your Thought Leadership (theengagingbrand.com)
- How To Be A Thought Leader: A PR Perspective (crenshawcomm.com)
Google webmaster tools
Good, fast and free. What’s wrong with that? The only mistake you can make is to not use them…
My 5 favorite Gmail features…
Let me explain:
Here’s the link to the advanced search operatorsI promised you. Questions? Feedback?
Tips for getting content into WordPress; Remember ‘Homebase and Outpost’…
Before we start talking about all the easy ways to get content into WordPress, let’s talk some strategy basics:
I also posted a resource page on ‘homebase and outpost’ here.
Ever heard of ifttt?
It’s an indispensable tool for me. Here are the ‘recipes’ that I use to run my personal lifestream…
Rock your website with RebelMouse!
Want to capture all the content you share both as content and Search Engine Optimization [SEO]? You want to add RebelMouse to your site…
Things to think about when picking a WordPress.com theme
You want one that is responsive and has customs posts at the very least. Here’s how to find them…
My thought leadership workflow is so simple…
…that you can get great results from a $249 Chromebook and less than $25 per year*. Internet connection required… :-D
*Does not include training or consulting fees…
Beware of ‘extension creep’ in Chrome…
Chrome is powerful, but it’s a memory hog too! Unnecessary or inactive extensions can suck the life out of your internet experience. Do a clean up today! I’m going to…
Use as many tools as you need…
…and not one more!
Bright, shiny objects! 