Why I Love Negative News

Allot of bloggers dislike negativity blogging. What I mean is that I tend to see more success stories than tales of failure and despair. When it comes to trashy criticisms of value judgments, I too don't like them and can do without.

I just finished reading an article entitled It Pays to Provide Support with Social Media. It covered customer service and social media. But, it only listed how great a tool this medium is for a business. I believe articles like this are, of course, useful and interesting; but, i'm concerned about the lack of articles about the negative impact or lack of ROI from social media and other internet marketing mediums.

The mass interest of the people is of "possibilities," not limitations, and seems to have caused bloggers to write about these possibilities. The final reaction in this positive-news-chain is a lack of realistic expectations about utilizing internet-marketing mediums. Many business owners are viewing it as indispensable to their marketing efforts, when, for many companies, this is far from the truth.

All I'm saying, is that I would love to read about internet marketing failures and disasters. And, our desires to only hear the positive isn't always helpful. Finally, these macabre stories could prove beneficial to companies. I love learning from others mistakes and, at times, place it at the foundation of the learning pyramid.

Cheers, Read More!

Driving Me Crazy: Experience causing unnecessary fear and doubt

Seasoned managers and employees can be overly cautious when developing or proposing a project, worrying about minuet details as if they were life or death situations. These "Gurus" sometimes develop theories about how situations should be handled, based on shallow (meaning one or two experiences) or negative experiences. The problem is they don't gauge the severity of the negative effects and the probability of it occurring.

This short and possibly familiar scenario, in a way, demonstrates the above concept.

Driving Me Crazy 

(Grandma and grandson are driving down a wide open road on their way to the granddaughter's ballet recital)

Grandson: Grandma... We're on an open road. Why are you driving so slow?

Grandma: Better safe than sorry

Grandson: Sorry for what?

Grandma: I don't want to get into an accident

Grandson: Ugh! We'll be fine Grandma

Grandma: You kids are never cautious

(The car pulls up to an intersection with a stop sign)

Grandson: Grandma! You can go now

Grandma: I'm waiting for that car

Grandson: It's not even close to us

Grandma: Better safe then sorry

Grandson: We've got to get to the recital before it starts

Grandma: Oh! We won't get there if we're dead

Grandson: GRANDMA! JUST GO!

Grandson: GO! GO! GO!

Grandma: I once hit a car because they rushed to pull out

Grandson: I doubt the car that you hit was this far back. You've got enough time to go

Grandma: Oh, don't worry about it

(Other car passes and they turn right onto the next road)

Grandma: See... We're ok. It wasn't worth the risk

Grandson: Grandma, I love ya, but you're driving me crazy

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Finding a Niche: My New Blog for Science Communication

You've heard it a million times over: find your niche for blogging. I've done just that. For my latest blog I've teamed up with a friend, Max Englander, a recent graduate from Cornell University in Philosophy, to write about topics in Science Communication: writing, presentations, journalism, editing. I have some experience in editing peer-reviewed articles and presentation design with a researcher from Cornell and Max is one of the smartest and most dedicated people I've meet at that University.

I've also been talking with a few friends from Cornell's science department about contributing articles. 

Check out the blog at allsciencecommunication.blogspot.com. Read More!

Keywords... Glorious Keywords: Tell a Story and a Little More

Search Engine Land posted a useful article suggesting a technique for brainstorming keywords. The premise behind the technique is that during the initial brainstorming session, some important words can be missed, with this comes missed opportunity.

This is glorious! "Tell a story," wrote Brad Geddes, founder of bgTheory, a company dedicated to PPC education & training. I think this idea is glorious because of it's simplicity and accuracy. When people are searching an entire context is amid. And, this context contains different words to describe what is needed for the solution.

Geddes states the story has four layers, or "keyword types:" Explicit, problem, solution and product name/number. Here is his a screen-shot from his article, explaining

Again, I think this is glorious. But, I want to add one category: "general solution." I know when I'm on the information hunt, many times I know the general solution to fix the problem, but not the specific. I believe there is some serious traffic potential from words found under these keywords/phrases. Read More!

Link Marketing for SEO: Getting Those .edu's:

Getting links to your website or specific pages is tricky. And, some strategies can be uncertain or costly: link bating, creating viral content and press releases are a few examples. 

I suggest volunteering for an educational institution. On-campus research facilities might find use for your companies resources. Obviously, one link isn't worth time-consuming volunteer work. If you are already contributing, ask for a link on their site.

Also, offer internships positions with as many Universities/colleges, and schools in those institutions, as you handle. Many times, they will create links to your website on the internship pages. You can take it further by making a section of your website giving students suggestions for getting internships and getting a job.

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new writing: screw those cap's

i've notice that many writers are nixing the capital letter. this isn't in all mediums, mainly, it seems prevalent in graphic designers' websites, blogs and some advertisements. i love how it changes the physical appearance of the piece. also, lower case letters are easier to read, decreasing reading time. but, what about clarity?

there are a wealth of situations when the cap' is useful: influencing word meaning and feeling.

first, proper nouns can get lost in a sentence. especially if the proper noun is also a verb, confusion can ring-in. an example is:

no caps:
he looked to grant dick for the young lady's guidance

caps:
He looked to Grant Dick for the young lady's guidance

ok, that might be extreme. but, please look past the lewd and see the concept.

using en dashes might reduce confusion with long proper nouns, letting the reader know that the words are all one part of a whole.

as for a word's feeling, a word with all caps can create a powerful emphasis: a written yell. it could be argued that quotation marks are a substite. but, quotes can be awkward when used too much. take a look at this site. it has examples of bad use of quotations. some hilarious, some stupid. 

overall, the confusion is minimal and not frequent. and, surely, creativity is important. the most frequent uses of capitals are heavily useful, but unnecessary: beginning of a sentence, after quotations, after a colon if it's an independent clause. so, i say, use this refreshing style.

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Motion Charting: How Long I can Tolerate Her Complaining

This is a motion chart from Google Documents, with four focal points: tolerance, annoyance shown, actual annoyance and length of time. And, each circle are different things i've heard girlfriends complain about: parents, friends, work, school. There's a correlation here! Notice that over a few year I seem to have less tolerance of all complaints, but some less than others.

Set the "colors" to Unique and the "size" to Annoyed Actual.

This was a fun way to learn motion charting
Read More!