So, I’m always on the lookout for cool new Web 2.0 stuff, right?
Today, I’m over at GotoWeb20 and I found “Twesents,” a whole bunch of cute, funny, rude, and otherwise interesting virtual presents that you can send to your Twitter friends. I just sent my pal Carrie Wilkerson, the Barefoot Executive, a pair of baby seals, just to try the service out. She posted a pic of me on Facebook yesterday, and I wanted to thank her. This was just a fun way to let her know I appreciate her, right?
The downside is that if you have a lot of friends, you have to sift through them all until you find the one(s) you want to send things to. It took me a good 5 minutes just to find her. Or so I thought. I went back and found the “search” function after the fact… duh. I have a tendency to half read instructions, to just blunder ahead on my own, and I often pay for it. Grr…
Anyway, it’s just a fun site that I thought my Tweeple would like to know about.
However, GotoWeb20.net is a much more fascinating site than you can imagine. I heard about it a couple of years back from Jack Humphrey at a Stomper Net conference and have been a huge fan ever since.
You can find any number of interesting and cool things there that have nothing whatsoever to do with Twitter. I can’t tell you how many of them I use and have accumulated over time. The Web just gets more and more fun all the time.
Check out both of these sites. I know you’ll love ‘em.
So, yesterday, I had a question from one of our 411 clients about a template for a thank you page that told folks how to whitelist email addresses. I wasn’t sure if we had one or not, so I just plugged “whitelisting” into Google, and came up with something incredibly powerful!
You feed in the title of your newsletter, product, whatever; the “from” email address; and a static line of text in your subject line, and this spits back a pretty sweet list of “how-to whitelist” information.
I mean, it give specific instructions for Hotmail, GMail, Outlook, and a whole bunch of other mail programs on how to whitelist an address. This is really HUGE if you’re working with people who are Internet marketing newbies. They don’t usually know what whitelisting is, let alone how to do it.
Here’s an example:
How To Whitelist Blogging4Boomers.com in your Spam Filter
With the advent of outrageous volumes of unwanted email these days,
it’s unfortunate that legitimate email publications are not being
seen by some of the readers who enjoy those publications. There
is much fear today that the email publishing / marketing industry
is in serious trouble, due to mistakes in filtering when legitimate
email is erroneously tagged as unwanted email.
While we applaud the anti-spam industry for removing the plethora of
unwanted email from many of our mailboxes, from time to time, some
legitimate email publications are mistaken as unwanted.
Sometimes, this results in our mailings bouncing back, with requests
for us to respond to challenge/response messages to prevent future
filtering. However, due to the size of our list, it’s nearly impossible
for us handle the volume of such requests.
To that end, please realize that we want our readers to always
anticipate and enjoy the valuable information that our publication
delivers.
If you currently use an anti-spam program or service, we ask that you
take just a minute or two to add our publication to your “safe” or permitted
email sender list. This usually involves simply adding our sending address
(From:) to your whitelist, safelist, or list of priviledged senders.
This is commonly known as whitelisting a publication.
Please refer to the following whitelisting instructions you can use to
whitelist Blogging4Boomers.com, depending on the filtering solution you use:
AOL
Go to keyword: Mail Controls.
Select the screen name we’re sending your Blogging4Boomers.com to.
Click Customize Mail Controls For This Screen Name.
Version 9.0:
Open your latest Blogging4Boomers.com e-mail.
Click the Add Address button (on the right) to add to your “People I Know” list.
Alternatively, you can just send an e-mail to: support@blogging4boomers.com, and that
will add us to your “People I Know” list automatically. To do this:
Open your latest Blogging4Boomers.com e-mail.
Click the Reply button (it’s in the top right corner).
A new email window opens with the wrong address in the “Send To” box.
Replace the address in the Send To box with: support@blogging4boomers.com
Click Send Now (in the top right corner).
Even if the e-mail you send doesn’t get through to us, the act of sending it does
the job of putting us into your “People I Know” list.
Earthlink:
Click on Address Book (it’s over on the left, below your Folders).
When your Address Book opens, click the Add button.
On the Add Contact screen, find the Internet Information box.
Enter support@blogging4boomers.com into the top Email box.
Click Save.
Hotmail:
Click the Options link, on the main menu tabs, then Safe List.
Type: support@blogging4boomers.com in your Safe List.
If you see a message that should not be in your Junk Mail folder, click
‘This is not Junk Mail’ to avoid having e-mail from the same source sent to
the Junk Mail folder in the future.
MailShield:
Click Friends from the toolbar.
Click Add.
Type: support@blogging4boomers.com
Click OK.
MailWasher:
Click Tools, then Blacklist & Friends.
Click Add… on the right, the Friends list side.
Make sure Plain email address is selected.
Type: support@blogging4boomers.com
Click OK.
Click OK.
McAfee Spamkiller:
Click Friends from the sidebar.
Click Add.
Type: support@blogging4boomers.com
Click OK.
MSN:
Click on Settings: E-mail | Junk e-mail (it’s at the bottom left of the screen, just above Calendar)
On the E-mail settings screen, click Junk E-Mail Guard.
Select Safe List.
In the space provided under “Add people to the safe list”, enter support@blogging4boomers.com.
Click Add.
Other providers:
If Blogging4Boomers.com is being filtered, try adding support@blogging4boomers.com to your Address Book or Contact list.
If this option is not available, try moving the message to your ‘inbox’ or forwarding the message to yourself.
If subsequent messages continue to be filtered, call or e-mail your ISP’s technical support
and ask how you can be sure to receive all e-mail from support@blogging4boomers.com.
Domain: If they need to know the domain we’re mailing from, tell them: blogging4boomers.com
That’s just a sample. I truncated the message for obvious reasons, but I hope you can see the value in this. There are a lot more services included, and you can add the IP address for where the mail is originating. Since mine’s sent via AWeber, I just didn’t fill that in. So, if you wanted to leave out a specific subject line, for example, it will work, just not as well.
The coolest part is that they actually provide the HTML for you. All you have to do is cut & paste and upload to your server. I’d want to make some changes, but really, this saves tons of time. Customize it your way and then…
Ever look through a ton of blog themes and think that none of them really suit your vision?
I know I have.
I find themes I like, but they have a left-hand sidebar, or the colors aren’t right or for whatever other reason, I just can’t hang with it.
In steps Artisteer from http://artisteer.com, which allows you to create your own WordPress, Drupal, or Joomla theme in a matter of minutes.
The way Artisteer works is very simple. The software will suggest elements for you, or you can choose your color template, the way the header is shaped and colored, whether or not to use photographs, and all of the other stuff that you want your blog to do. The combinations are myriad.
I’ve used Artisteer to create a few themes for my free website EasyBlogTricks.com where I give people the technical aspects of blogging in video. I show folks how to install a WordPress blog from scratch, how to use plugins, how to upgrade, and so on. I need to go back in and upadate for WordPress 2.7, but the operations are fundamentally the same in most instances. Still, I wanted to give members a bit more, and so, I’ve been having fun creating themes with Artisteer.
Brian Terry, of BigSellingWebsiteDesign.com who’s an incredible graphics designer without Artisteer, even gave the software the thumbs up. I can only imagine the very cool stuff he’s doing with it. (And if you’re not subscribed to his blog, you should be.) But the point is, you don’t have to be a graphics designer to make Artisteer work for you in some very professional ways.
I’m in the process of downloading version 2.0.2.150 right now, which is still in beta, but the awesome thing about buying the software is that you get free upgrades for a full year. I bought it a few months ago, so I’m good to go. Wish Camtasia worked that way.
Anyway, you can get a trial version that will allow you to play with the software, but not download the pages for your new theme, unless you cough up the dough. The Home edition is only $49.95, but the pro version comes with a lot more and you can use it commercially for only $129.95. If you buy blog themes, it’s totally worth the price.
Here’s the thing: You really don’t want your blog to look like everyone else’s, do you? Artisteer gives you a very cool way to have a totally unique theme, and you can create one any time you wish. It’s worth a try.
When you ask a group what a landing page is, you might come back with many different ideas. Some will say it’s a squeeze page. Some, a sales letter, while others have no freakin’ clue whatsoever and are still scratching their heads.
It’s simple…
A landing page is where you LAND after clicking on a link. It can be any of the above, or it can be totally unrelated to commercial enterprise. It’s just where you end up, no matter what the link says or what the page includes.
You can make mistakes when setting up a landing page, though, so you should keep some things in mind:
The anchor text in your link must match the page. If you hyperlink the phrase “dog training,” then the page that people land on when they click that link best be about training your dog.
The keywords on your page must match your link. When you’re link says, “used golf balls,” your page should have words like “used golf balls,” “used bridgestone golf balls,” or “cheap used golf balls.” The page should be not just about “golf,” but indeed, “used golf balls.”
If you have an online store, and you’re selling video cameras, when your anchor text says, “Mino Flip video Camera,” then that specific product had better appear on the page after a person clicks on that link. It’s best when it’s the only thing on the page, but worst when it’s not on the page at all.
There are a couple of reasons that you want to be heed these warnings.
First, especially if you’re using pay-per-click to advertise your link, you’ll have a huge tiff with the Google ghods. Your page quality will be “poor” unless your link actually matches what’s on your page.
Secondly, have you ever gone shopping online and clicked a link and didn’t find what you thought you would when you got to the landing page? Did it tick you off? How likely are you to go back to that page or even that company again?
Remember that anchor text delivers page reputation. Don’t advertise what you don’t intend to deliver.
It’s like a chihuahua growling at a pit bull. Could mean trouble.
Thanks to Brian Edmondson, who makes all the videos for Overcome Everything’s ListBuilding Club, I found a new flash player for my EasyBlogTricks.com blog. I need to do an overhaul there because of the changes to WordPress 2.7, but haven’t had the time. Still, this new player will really make things easier for me. I’ve had lots of trouble keeping the videos (especially the video on the front door) working.
There are complete installation instructions, and you can download the player free, as long as you’re not using it for commercial gain. Since EasyBlogTricks.com is just an information site, I can use it with the non-commercial license. But if it works as well as I think it will, I’ll definitely buy a commercial license for only 39 Euros, which translates to about $50. You may think that’s a lot for a video player, but this one is very customizable. It rocks!
There are plugins for things like:
Running rolling ads in the player. Stick one into your blog’s sidebar.
WordTube converts your site to a “YouTube” type environment in a WordPress blog. Neat.
Viral allows you to have a share function and will allow viewers to see other videos you have created
There are different skins you can choose from, as well, from simple to insane.
The add-ons are quite interesting, too. Here’s one made just for my specific purpose:
“The Simple Flash Video Plugin builds on the plugins that already allow easy posting of .flv or .mp4 files on the popular Wordpress platform. It also enables advanced stats tracking of your viewership via Simple Stats.”
Sweet! Tracking stats and a cool player, too!
If you’re into video, and you should be, this is a site you should definitely check out. I’m learning more about video and all the cool things you can do with it every day, and it’s becoming the medium of choice online. Think of these things:
People are used to watching TV. It’s only natural that since the speed of our connections continues to improve that video will become more and more popular with the Internet audience. Just look at YouTube and how fast it’s grown over the past 3 years.
Creating video is often easier than writing. Many people hate to write, and video is a perfect solution. Video products will become the norm, rather than the exception.
Video is fun to create and to edit. Making short films and editing them to show to an audience is getter easier and more fun to do all the time.
So, it’s time you jumped into video. If you’re already there, trust me… you need to check out LongTail and their very cool product.
We’ve done it again. Well, Tellman has done it again actually, and I’m pretty excited by this new coaching program we have going — ListBuilding 411.
How’s it work?
Members are able to ask one question per day, either in writing or on video, and a member of the Overcome Everything staff responds to each question with a video answer. It’s actually an upgrade to The ListBuilding Club, so that’s also included in the price, which is really sweet.
So far, we’ve been getting rave reviews for 411. It’s really cool to be able to help all these people, too. I’m managing the program, so I see all the questions that come in and am able to assign answering to the people that make the most sense. With 14 of us with varying levels of expertise on every topic from copywriting to tech, there’s nothing we can’t handle.
I’ve found a couple of drawbacks from a customer standpoint. Some aren’t able to get their question posed clearly enough to be understood on video or we don’t get what they’re trying to say. So, we have to go back to them and get additional information, which delays their answer, or we try to answer the question, but it’s not the answer they wanted. But everyone in the program is very nice and we love working with them. Everyone gets their issues aired and fixed in a very short time.
If you’re working in a vacuum and don’t have anyone to talk to about this Internet marketing stuff (which only we IMers understand, right?), it has to be cool to know that there are people ready and able to help. Wish I’d had that support when I was first starting out. If you’re like me, you struggle to find the right stuff to concentrate on and you spin your wheels a lot. Getting someone who knows what to do and how to help you get things going in the right direction fast has to be relieving.
Anyway, if you’re one of those folks, I’m not selling here, just writing about a cool service. Nobody else is doing this! You can check it out at http://ListBuildingClub.com/411
I just wish I’d had the LBC 5 years ago when I started this incredible journey.
Found a cool site today, thanks to one of my Tweeple. The bad part is that I went to check out this site, and lost the person who recommended it. Argh. Hate when that happens. The Tweets are just coming faster and furiouser these days, you know? If that person would like to speak up… I’d love to give people your “follow” address. DM me: @PatMarcello
Anyway, good news for you, my readers…
Have some PowerPoint presentations hanging around that you don’t know what to do with?
You upload the slides, and just add audio to make a pre-recorded type webinar.
But with SlideShare, I can put this stuff on my website or even use it for a call with my members. I can prepare a presentation for a call, assign it to my listeners as “pre-call homework” and then, do a Q&A from that presentation. I want to do stuff like that now because my folks are running out of questions, and it’s really important to me that I help them push their businesses forward. Sometimes, people just don’t know the right questions to ask, right?
Just by putting the slideshow up on SlideShare, you’ll get traffic to whatever site or blog you want to direct them to, as well–if they like your show. Pretty sweet.
I’ll be trying out this service very soon. Let you know my results!
And thank you for the recommendation, whomever you are. Let me know, K?
Well, there are no free passes are there? I mean, yesterday (or at least I first heard of it yesterday), the major search engines came up with this cool link tag, called a “canonical tag,” which tells the spiders not to worry about duplicate content and points them to the proper page, or the canonical, where the original content sits, right?
I thought, Wow! That will solve a lot of problems. You just add this:
and Google will understand that the duplicates all refer to the canonical URL: http://www.example.com/product.php?item=swedish-fish. Additional URL properties, like PageRank and related signals, are transferred as well.”
So before I got too excited about the possibility, I found that this tag only applies in connection with dupe content on the same website. Oh, sure. They couldn’t possibly make it easy for us original content providers, now could they?
I mean, think about how that works. You write an article and put it into a directory. Lots of folks post it to their sites, newsletters, what have you. Does your original article get the credit? Maybe, maybe not. I’d love for there to be a way that I could tag my content as original, wouldn’t you? But I have no clue how they could make it happen. Anyone could tag a piece of content, original or not. Still, would be nice to be able to brand your work, eh?
So, this canonical tag is good for what it does, but it only applies to dupe content within a single website. If you’re an e-commerce site, it’s quite probable that you have duplicate content on your site, so this new tag will be a good thing for you. All of the search engines are supposed to recognize it.
For the rest of us… There may be applications, but it’s not as cool as I had hoped. Oh, I dared to dream, anyway.
Everyone is all about Twitter these days. It’s all anyone was talking about last weekend.
I like Twitter, too, as you know, and what’s totally cool is that since JV Alert, I’ve picked up almost 300 new followers. Wahoo!
Yesterday, Andrew Devine (@adevine1) posted an awesome tweet about 14 cool Twitter tools from Kenny Hyder. Some of them I’ve not heard about before, and I thought I’d share. Check this out: 14 Tools of Highly Effective Twitter Users
Post to Twitter from your Firefox address bar (I like TwiterFox for that better, really.)
Post to your Google Calendar by sending direct messages
Find stats on your Twitter relationships
Grade yourself as a Tweep
Schedule and post Tweets
All there!
I started this yesterday, so sorry I’m behind. We started a new program at Overcome Everything — ListBuilding 411, where members can ask one question per day and a member of our crack OE staff will answer in video. It’s pretty cool for the members, but we’re experiencing some growning pains and guess who gets to manage all that?
