• Flickr – to search for Creative Commons Licensed images to use on blog posts
• WordPress.org Codex – to search for code snippets, functions and template tags
• WordPress forum – to look up solutions to problems
• Youtube – to find videos that I can blog about or add to my site/resources etc
• Internet marketing forums – to see what people are saying about a topic I want to write about and question they are asking

Each one of those web sites have their very own search feature so what is the problem? No problem. I just like to cut out a few steps and clicks if possible because some of these sites especially WordPress, I search several times a day. Bookmarking and navigating to these sites take time.

So, I installed this cool little Firefox plugin called Add to Search Bar. This lets me add the search function for any web site to my Firefox Search Bar. Which means less looking up for a web site in the overloaded bookmarks folder and less clicking to get to the right page to search.

Many new entrepreneurs make the mistake of choosing based on price alone.  I was guilty of this and it burned me bad in my first year of business.  Fortunately a fellow work at home mom rescued me from ‘closed down web host’ hell and helped me get set up on more reliable web server.  That was the year I met Scott.

Scott, who would from then on forever be known as ‘the awesome Scott‘ for his unending patience and reliable, skillful support to me and my friends.

I trusted Scott so much that I eventually went into business with him, launching Mom Webs as an affordable, mom friendly, web hosting option.  That went so well, we went on to launch Reliable Webs in 2008.  Reliable Webs is branded for small business owners and entreprenuers and has enjoyed quite steady growth so far – something I’d like to boost to be up front about it!

I’d like to know what you look for in a web host.  If you’ll leave a comment below telling us what you care about most when it comes to choosing a quality web host and you’ll be entered for 12 months of free multi-domain web hosting from Reliable Webs.

You can transfer an existing website over or use it as an opportunity to launch something new!  This prize is worth $300 – a nice chunk of savings for you if you win.  A winner will be chosen at random on the morning of Tuesday, September 8th, 2009.  You can comment anytime between now and then to be entered.

I look forward to reading your comments!

Password manager – I use Roboform on the PC and 1Password on the Mac, others I know use LastPass and Xmarks. Whatever you decide on, a password manager really helps logging in and out of those many affiliate accounts a breeze.

Affiliate link plugin for WordPress – there are a few out there. What does it do? You set a keyword for example “SparkplugU” and tell it to link to your affiliate URL each time SparkplugU is found. All automatic and works for older posts too.

Zemanta – this is a Firefox plugin that will make photo, books, DVD and website resources suggestions for you based on what you are writing about. You can link it up to Amazon – if you’re still their affiliate – and make it easy to add links to products found in Amazon.

A macro utility – Tired of typing your affiliate URL again and again? Copying and pasting is OK but still takes time to open your file, look it up, copy and paste. Too many actions. Use a macro utility. I use something called DirectAccess that helps me do a bunch of things, but one of my favorite uses is for it to help me type in URLs. Instead of typing, I enter a short code and hit ‘End’ the software types the links for me, reducing the amount of typing I do.

Lynette enjoys discovering new ways to use technology or new technologies to use in a business and in turn help her clients apply them. You can find also Lynette at her blog, Twitter and Facebook

To chat, anyone who has Skype installed simply clicks on the button or link. A new Skype chat window launches and you can start chatting. My community is forum based so having the ability to do live chats without installing yet another script and having to manage it myself is a big selling point for me. Also, having the option for scheduled live chats is nice.

The down side, as a public chat room creator, you cannot leave the chat or what – Skype doesn’t give much documentation on that but I suppose the room would not be available. So definitely not a 24-7 solution but good for scheduled chats. Later, I found out that the latest version (Skype version4) does not support this feature The above instructions is based on Skype version 3 which is what I still have.

After digging around a little bit in the forum, it seems that there is a work around to make this work on both Skype 3 and Skype 4. It is a little more technical in Skype 4 though but if this is something you want to try, here are instructions to set up chat links or buttons on Skype 4.

My favorite is Genbook. This is a pretty complete system. They offer a free basic account where you can take advantage of most of their features. You can start scheduling appointments online in a matter of minutes. I love the ability to assign staff to certain services. It is super simple to use but not lacking in customization. Just tons of features for free. Premium accounts start at $39.99 a month and you also get the ability to take payments before scheduling the appointment. Perfect for any offline service who doesn’t have an e-commerce component yet.

Other services in this area include

• Acuity who also offer a free account have have two other levels at $10 and $19 a month.
• Schedulicity at $29/month for one user and $49/month for 2-20 users.
• Appointment-plus who has three plans beginning at $39/month.

Prefer to do it yourself? Whenever there are fully hosted software, you will usually find standalone software that you can pay for a one time fee, get it installed on your own web site and managed yourself. Here are a few I came across.

• Schedule Organizer
• hitAppoint
• A Plus Appointment

Lynette enjoys discovering new ways to use technology or new technologies to use in a business and in turn help her clients apply them. You can find also Lynette at her blog, Twitter and Facebook

Great examples of this is how opensource software have formed communities where everyone tries to help each other out. Technically, this is not something brand new, but the tools can be. Traditionally, forums have been the tool of choice. But these days, you have great tools like Get Satisfaction and UserVoice.

These are very well built tools that allow users to post their questions, let other users to chirp in to say “me too” or answer questions. As a business, you can set up your company and use it like your official help desk. It is kind of like a merge between a forum, a personal Yahoo Answers system and a help desk.

The pros:

• You don’t have to maintain the software
• You get the ability to tap into the knowledge of the masses – since there’s already a user base there, if they are familiar with your product, others can answer your customer support issues for you, alleviating your work burden
• You get to use a pretty cool and well built piece of software that would cost you to build or set up on your own and you get started quickly
• You get to establish a professional support system where you can manage requests and provide support in an orderly and organized method
• You get to see what the people actually think and feel, granted, you already see this using your own system but user sentiment and feedback is better captured by these systems which means you can get a better overview or what people are actually saying.

The cons:

• If you’re using the free option, you do not get to moderate any posts made by others. This is good and bad. Good in the sense that it encourages transparency but bad in a sense because even if you upgrade and get moderation turned on, you have to provide a reason. To me, it’s like having a ‘boss’ over your shoulder – not exactly my preference.
• It can get pricey. Get Satisfaction starts at $99/month. UserVoice does have a much more affordable starting point at $19/month but if your system is pretty busy, you may find yourself hitting the limit pretty quickly.
• You can lose your branding. Branding options only come with paid accounts and for that, refer to con #2. Your customers are directed to a site where they can quickly get distracted with other things. On your own system, you can better control what you present.

What’s the verdict?

I’m not entirely sure. I think it is great if you don’t already have a system in place but want to setup something where you can organize and respond to people effectively. But if you already have a system, then you fragment your support by also setting up on these sites. While I love the idea of crowdsourcing, it is very enticing to me, including the transparency, I’m not sure I like having someone looking over my shoulder when it comes to support issues.

Also, crowdsourcing works a lot better if you actually do have a big following and user base. For smaller companies with limited exposure and user base, at the end of the day, you or your staff will still end up providing the bulk of the support. I’ve decided not to take advantage at this time.

Lynette enjoys discovering new ways to use technology or new technologies to use in a business and in turn help her clients apply them. You can find also Lynette at her blog, Twitter and Facebook

The NFIB Virtual Summit is an exciting, informal online conference we are hosting on September 15, 2009.  No travel arrangements are necessary – you can attend from the convenience of your home or office!    In case you are not familiar with NFIB – we are the nation’s leading small business association, with offices in Washington, D.C. and all 50 state capitals. We are a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization.  NFIB’s mission is to promote and protect the right of our members to own, operate and grow their businesses.

NFIB is proud to be the host of the Virtual Summit because now – more than ever, it is important for small businesses and entrepreneurs to come together to participate in open dialogues about critical issues that are directly affecting your business.

Who should attend the summit and why will it be beneficial to them?

This virtual conference is focused on entrepreneurs and small business owners.  It will give them a chance to meet and network with peers and industry experts.  This conference format is an exciting new way to connect, discuss the issues, learn from experts, and most importantly – find solutions to better your business.

What features/topics will be discussed at the NFIB Virtual Summit?

Inside the virtual “Auditorium” – NFIB, eBay, Google and Facebook will present webcasts on topics including:  “The Keys to Success for Your eBay Sales”, “Digital Marketing and Social Networking”, “Healthcare for Small Business”, and “Focus on the Economy”.

Will there be any Q & A sessions available for those attending that may have questions about topics talked about?

Each of the webcasts in the “Auditorium” will be followed by a scheduled chat session in the “Networking Café”.  Attendees will have the opportunity to ask industry experts questions – live!

Looking at the site I see an auditorium, exhibit hall, networking cafe, resource center and information. Can you explain what those areas are for and how they will work during the conference?

From the main lobby, there are numerous rooms to explore.  You can download free resources into your “virtual tote bag” in the “Resource Center”.  The “Exhibit Hall” will feature sponsor booths including eBay, Google, Solveras, Dun & Bradstreet, as well as our media sponsor, SBTV.  The booths will include prize giveaways, free small business resources, and will be staffed by company representatives to answer any questions you may have.  The Networking Café will be open for people to connect and network, exchange virtual business cards, participate in live schedules chats, as well as contribute to the “Hot Topics” message boards.

Registration is free with the promo code bgg737.   Register online at:  www.NFIB.com/VirtualSummit

We have all heard them and know that they ring true. So why are some online retailers risking sales by providing less than stellar product images?

Don’t they know that when it comes to online retail, a picture can be worth 1000’s of sales! When consumers shop online they are only able to use one of their 5 senses, sight. You have to show them that your blanket is the softest around, that walking in those shoes is like walking on clouds. Your pictures need to tell a story to draw the consumer to the buy.

To do that you need high-quality, detail specific images. Look at the example below.

What is so amazing about this bag? What information are you getting from this image? Does this image make you want to click that”Add to Cart” button?

Now here we have a series of pictures of a similar bag. You can see inside, you can see the sides and the back and best of ALL you can see how the bag looks on! When it comes to bags this is the one MOST important image for me. I’m a petite girl so big bags look silly on my arm but this single image shows me how it will look.

Here’s another example, which of the two images below grabs your attention. The product alone or the one with the adorable baby!

The product photo with the adorable baby, right? It appeals to your emotions and draws you closer to that “ADD to Cart” button.

You want consumers to click that button and buy your products, so why not take the time to entice them with high-quality, detail-specific images.

In today’s high-tech world, it’s not hard to find a high quality camera that will take stellar pictures. Even the digital point and shoot cameras come equipped with more than 10 mega pixels and most are under $300.

So what if you are not the best photographer? With digital technology you can take 100’s of pictures without spending an extra dime. Invest in quality product images and turn those visitors into buyers.

For more posts like this, visit our eCommerce Blog and don’t miss visiting Stephanie’s BizzieMommy.com

Did you know that it’s possible to see what people are saying about you on the internet?  There are a number of automated tools that will allow you to monitor your name, your company, and other words related to your brand.

If you are in sales or you own a business, monitoring your reputation is crucial.  People are talking about you online, whether you like it or not.  You need to be aware of what’s being said.

There are a few things you can do to set up an automatic monitor that lets you know whenever anyone talks about you online.

iGoogle – Awesome free monitoring dashboard

my iGoogle dashboard for Netbiz

iGoogle is a property that doesn’t get quite the love that it deserves.  While a personalized dashboard is something that the average consumer doesn’t really care about, a customized dashboard that allows you to easily drag & drop tools is extremely useful as a free tool.

We’re going to use this as your reputation monitoring home page.  If you don’t have one yet, go to iGoogle.com and create an account (it will link to any existing Google Account you have like Gmail or Google Calendar).  The default dashboard comes with a bunch of junk that you don’t want, like games & a calendar.  Delete the items that you don’t want by clicking on the little down arrow on the top right of each little biz.

Adding reputation feeds.  On the right side of the page, click on ‘Add Stuff.’  On the next page you’ll be given a bunch of pre-made widgets to add.  Ignore those.  On the left side of the page, below the categories, there’s a link that says ‘Add Feed or Gadget.’

Remember where that is.  We’re going to come back to it.

Next, I’ll go over some automated tools that will track your information.

Google Alerts

Google has a service that monitors news sites, blogs, and a host of other websites and will notify you when anyone mentions whatever words you have set up the monitoring service to listen to.  Go to Google.com/alerts and put your name in for the search terms.  If you have a really common name like John Smith, you might want to add an identifier, like the city you live in or what you do (ex. John Smith Realtor Crossville).  Make sure you put the name in quotes when you do the search so that it doesn’t return people with similar names.  It should look something like this:

“Cor Huff”

“Cory Huff” Blogger

“Cory Huff” Portland

The next screen is where you manage your alerts.  Next to your newly created alert, click ‘Edit’ and change the ‘Deliver To’ column from email to feed.  After that’s done, right click on the little orange icon and copy the link.  Paste that link into the Add Feed or Gadget space in your iGoogle page.

Go back to the iGoogle page home. You should see a little box showing the most recent three notifications.  You can mouse over them to get the full text.

Repeat this same process with the name of your company, the name of key executives, trademarks, and anything else you want to monitor.  Tip: Do the same thing with your competitors.  Knowing what the Interweb has to say about your competitors is enlightening.  You can also do it with important customers, vendors, suppliers, etc, etc….

Tweetbeep

There are several different Twitter monitoring services.  I choose to use Tweetbeep.

Tweetbeep can be set up to send you a daily email with a list of all the mentions of your defined brand on Twitter.  Using the same search terms that you defined above, set up a Tweetbeep alert.

You can also set up Tweetbeep as an RSS feed and add it to your iGoogle homepage just like we did with Google Alerts.  That way you have all of them set up in one place.

Why monitor Twitter?

Twitter is a real time conversation between thousands of people in a public forum.  Even if YOU don’t use Twitter, your customers do.  If you don’t monitor these conversations, it can become a huge headache.  Just ask Johnson & Johnson about the Motrin Moms fiasco.

On the other hand, you can also be proactively grateful when people say appreciative things about you.  If someone says that you rock, you can give them a very public virtual high five – which lets them and everybody else watching know that you are participating in the digital community and that you care what happens.

]]> http://www.sparkplugging.com/sparkplug-ceo/how-to-find-out-what-people-saying-about-you-online/feed/ 6 http://www.sparkplugging.com/sparkplug-ceo/how-to-conduct-a-website-self-evaluation/ http://www.sparkplugging.com/sparkplug-ceo/how-to-conduct-a-website-self-evaluation/#comments Wed, 17 Jun 2009 03:24:11 +0000 Nick Bostic http://www.sparkplugging.com/sparkplug-ceo/?p=2462

My wife now knows not to ask me “Have you seen that web site?” since my response the majority of the time is usually similar to “It’s terrible”.

Here’s my problem: I started coding HTML right around the same time it became a standard. I gamed Google successfully when they were just starting out (I’ve since learned a much more honest approach to SEO). I happily switched from tables to CSS ages ago. I’ve studied usability and web analytics just as long. So I have a bit of a bias.

So what is a small or independent business owner to do? I’ll give you my top tips to conduct a site self-evaluation.

Usability:

If your site is not easy to use, the people who are willing to stick around are going to become frustrated. People I work with frequently complain that all web sites start to look the same, it’s because there is an expected standard of usability that makes them appear similar. Most consumers expect navigation to be either across the top or down the left.

Contact information should be near the top, either side is fine, but it needs to stand out. Contact links should go to a web based form instead of forcing an email client to open. The page should also render virtually identically across Firefox, Internet Explorer, Safari, Chrome and Opera since there is no need to force people into using a different browser.

Graphics:

Do all of your graphics load? Have they been optimized for fast load times? I personally use Adobe Fireworks since it has some great export options. Sitepoint has a great article explaining the difference between GIF, JPG and PNG for web design that everyone should read.

A personal pet peeve of mine, and many will argue, is the use of Flash. It still can’t be 100% indexed like text can be. Also, with mobile browsing growing dramatically and mobile Flash support being extremely limited, you may be hiding important information from your visitors.

On-site SEO:

This is actually easier than most people would think. META tags are far less important than they used to be, so simple “borrowing” tends to work well. Find the sites that rank in the top 5 for your desired search term, view their page source (CTRL+U in Firefox) then look at their Title, Description and Keyword tags. See what is repeated and make sure you use those in your tags. Then add the specific keywords that makes your site stand out even more.

Use your Heading tags correctly: H1 tells search engines those words are THE MOST important on the page, so use your targeted keywords there if possible, but try to use only one set of H1 tags. H2 is next most important and can be used a few times safely. H3 is next most and can be used even more. H4-H6 I try to use only for formatting, not SEO. Make sure to link back to yourself or other articles on your site with important keywords, but not so frequently to appear spammy.

Keyword targeting:

Use the Google Keyword Tool to find keywords that people are actually searching for. Leave the box checked to search synonyms, then find keywords that have a good balance between reasonably high search volume and low advertiser competition. What that means to me is that people are searching for those keywords, yet not too many publishers are competing for them, meaning you get something of a captive audience to start with.

Interactivity:

If your site is just sitting there doing nothing to invite people to interact with you, they won’t. Simple calls to action, downloadable whitepapers, email newsletters and the option to comment or share on social bookmarking sites are all basic tools that can be implemented easily. If it’s not easy to interact, how can they interact in a way that makes you money?

Recommendation:

Go with Wordpress for your web site. All of these features can be implemented incredibly easily through a variety of plugins and as Matt Cutts said Wordpress takes care of 80-90% of SEO automatically.

Those are some of the basics I recommend everyone consider when looking at their site. Even with this tips and tricks, good, relevant, frequently updated content will help your site move up steadily through the search engines with minimal effort, these tips will just help increase the pace and help the odds of converting your visitors into customers.

Nick Bostic has been an entrepreneur and internet marketer for the majority of his life. He currently works in corporate America helping independent business people be more successful and has been blogging to some degree for close to 8 years.

Follow Nick on Twitter: @nbostic

While Mashable was able to play with Google Wave and put out a fantastic review, there is still a lot left to be developed in the interface, and a few features that many have clamored for are yet to be implemented. So, it’s a bit premature to say exactly how small business will benefit from Google Wave, but I want to hear from you, readers, how you would implement this potentially game changing platform.

Most successful freelancers and small businesses depend on collaboration to get their work done. Whether it’s collaboration with their clients, suppliers, vendors, or other relationships, collaboration on a global scale is key.

If Wave works like it is supposed to then it will be a better version of IM, email, presentation software, and document sharing all rolled into one platform. Imagine being able to do all of those things without any need to purchase expensive software and have multiple things running on your computer at the same time.

If you don’t want to read the reviews that are out there, here’s a short list of Wave’s key features:

1. Collaborative editing. Any part of the communication can be edited by anyone participating in the wave.
2. Extensions. Applications and software robots can be built that will add functionality to your Wave.
3. Drag & Drop file uploads. Drag that video, picture, or important file and drop it into the wave which will then instantaneously share it with everyone involved in the conversation.
4. Embedding. Wave can be embedded as part of your existing website and add new communication features to your site.
5. Playback. Rewind and watch any editing or communicating that happened. Now you know what order it happened in, just in case you were confused.
6. Open source. Free, and able to be changed however you’d like.

So, as small business owners & entrepreneurs, I’m curious to hear how all of you would use Google Wave.

• What ideas come to mind?
• What problems does it help you solve?
• What problems can you solve for others by using this solution?

Leave your answers in the comments below.  We look foward to seeing your thoughts!

For further study:  Read more reviews on Techcrunch, CNET, and the Google I/O Wave release video

This is a review of Outright, a free bookkeeping service geared to solo entrepreneurs.  Sparkplugging has not been paid to write this review and will not profit should you decide to use their service.

Our interns, Leigh Anne Wilkes and Sherra Humphreys took Outright for a spin and this is what they have to share with you:

Bookkeeping can be the obstacle that keeps people from jumping in and starting their own business. It’s overwhelming. It’s tedious. It’s not fun.  If a service like Outright.com had been available when we started our homebased businesses, accounting and bookkeeping would not have been such a dreaded task.

This site has everything a new or existing sole proprietor or single-member LLC needs to keep track of income and expenses.  Plus it helps you with your quarterly estimated taxes. Right now, it’s only available for the U.S. tax system.

We both set up an account and in minutes we were entering transactions and looking at reports. Clicking tabs and entering data was very simple. Bookkeeping avoidance mode is something we are pros at – this site actually made it a little fun!

Some of the things that we like about Outright:

• Navigation is simple and straightforward.
• You see your profit at a glance when you log in.
• You can customize your income and expense categories to match your business needs.
• Reports are detailed, concise and easy-to-read.
• It interfaces with other popular existing sites like Freshbooks, Shoeboxed and oDesk.
• It’s Mac compatible.

Some things we’re not so sure of:

• Customer service – they say they’ll get back to you in 24 hours but we did ask a question and almost 48 hours later, still no response.
• Like all cloud based tools,  if the site goes away, so does all your data. Outright states that their site is safe, secure and backed up hourly.  Still, a smart business owner will keep their own regular backups.
• The fine print – at any time they reserve the right to start charging for this free service and they also state that they may “modify or discontinue, temporarily or permanently, the Service (or any part thereof) with or without notice.”

Should you give Outright a try?

Well, it’s free so there’s nothing standing in your way.  Our interns liked the service – but they’re not bookkeeping pros by any means.  They’re real life entrepreneurs like you.  We recommend that you consult with your accounting professional to see if this service can meet your business bookkeeping needs.

When it comes to recommending a vendor’s services, I am all about the quality of their work and their long term reliability.  It’s a beautiful thing when you can recommend a high quality person AND earn a commission at the same time, right?

These Are Must Have Graphics

If you want to sell an eProduct or you simply want to get something you’ve written in front of a lot of eyeballs for free – you really do need to have an attractive, expressive web graphic representing what you have to offer.

If you’ve tried to take the DIY route with an eCover, how has it worked out for you?

Web users are visually pleasured on a regular basis by some of the most talented designers in the world.   If you have a true talent for web graphics, you may have been able to create something nice.  Unfortunately, on many occassions the DIY graphics I see are not doing the job.

If the graphic that represents your writing is poorly made, what does it say about the actual content?

A Great Graphic Helps You Sell The Content

Take a look at these excellent eCover graphics made by GeteCovers:

Wouldn’t you love to have a beautiful graphic like this for your next digital product project?  The good news is that you can

Win an eCover Graphic!

Just leave a comment below and tell us about your upcoming project.  Is it an eBook? A Special Report? A full Information Product?  Who is it for?  Is it something you plan to sell or give away to grow your mailing list?

Tell me all about it – and I’ll draw one random entry for a free eCover from GeteCovers on Monday, May 25th.

Disclosure:  Sparkplugging has not been paid to offer this giveaway.  However, we will earn commissions on any sales generated through our affiliate links.

Echo-Sign – I found out about this from my online business manager, Jennifer Smith of Eco-Office Gals. This program allows you to fax a document via email and receive e-signatures. The program is free for up to 5 documents per month. After that, the cost is $12.95 per month for unlimited documents. Each party receives a PDF copy of the document that can be stored on your computer.
This service allows the confidentiality and legality of your business documents to stay in tact, while helping reduce unnecessary paper usage.
Follow her on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/ecoofficegals

Free Conference Call – This program I found out about from (New Media Mavens) Alison Woo and Lena Claxton, authors of How to Say it! Marketing with New Media.
They also offer many other great services such as simple toll free, simple voice box, international conferencing and simple event.

Audacity – I was reintroduced to this program by Alison and Lena. Audacity™ is a free downloadable software to take care of your recording and editing needs. It works with Mac OS X, Microsoft Windows, GNU/Linux, and other operating systems
You can do so many things with this program:
• Record on air audio
• Convert tapes and records into digital recordings or CDs. (I didn’t even realize you could do this)
• Edit various versions (such as MP3, WAV or AIFF) sound files.
• Cut, copy, splice or mix sounds together.
• Change the speed or pitch of a recording.
You can read more here at their list of features.

About Free Software (this is from Audacity’s site and I wanted to share it with you). Audacity is free software, developed by a group of volunteers and distributed under the GNU General Public License (GPL). Free software is not just free of cost (like “free beer”). It is free as in freedom (like “free speech”). Free software gives you the freedom to use a program, study how it works, improve it and share it with others. For more information, visit the Free Software Foundation.

Color Cop
Color Cop comes with a built-in color picker, color preview screen, an (one of my favorite features) eyedropper to choose colors from anywhere on the screen. The eyedropper feature allows you to take a color you find and it will give you the “code” so you can use it on your site if you want.

Inside Area codes – During a interview on Beverly Mahone’s internet radio show, Passions, I found out about inside area codes and the different networks located throughout the United States. The idea of inside areas codes is to help develop micro business networks within certain area codes. The first one to take off was inside919 (Beverly’s area) in NC. Other networks are catching up each day. So check this out if you would like to expand your local networking efforts.

Full calendar – This little gem I just found out about yesterday from Donna Gunter on Twitter. Full Calendar is a event promotion service for some major metro areas such as New York, Chicago, Atlanta, Boston and part of California.
Now, I found this pretty darn fascinating because you can choose to categorize how you wish your event to be focused…by city, by type, or by name. I am so bummed because they don’t have Tampa listed as a metro city.
You can follow Donna on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/donnagunter

For me, Twitter has been one of the most beneficial connecting tools on the internet. It provides me the opportunity to find out about news, resources, tips and events quickly and efficiently. This post was about sharing a few business resources I received from just a few people I connect with on Twitter.
If you wish to follow me on Twitter, you can find me at http://www.twitter.com/teresamorrow. Tweet with you soon!

I had lots of great excuses as to why I hadn’t done it yet. ‘Time’ was the convenient one, but my perfectionistic tendencies were the real roadblock. I have friends that have made their careers in market research. I know how important it is to ask the right question in just the right way – but I now had to admit it was more important to ask the questions at all instead of waiting for the money to hire someone with 30 years of agency experience to write my questions for me.

Please Do a Demographic Survey!

Whatever my (or your) excuse is for not collecting demographics, it is just that – an excuse. Immediately when I got back from BlogWorld, I set about getting my survey up and running. All perfectionistic tendencies aside, I found the cheapest (free!) solution and went with it: 10 questions on Survey Monkey.

As data started coming in I had a OMFG moment. I had NO IDEA of the gold mine I was sitting on – and I already thought I was sitting on a gold mine.

Here’s what I found. Sparkplugging readers are:

70% Female

63% 26-45 Years old

69% Married

80% Parents

78% Business owners

88% College educated

69% Come to us for home business/lifestyle advice or to read our opinion articles

98% Shop online

71% Read other blogs

–> and 90% of our readers create content online.

So why is this important to a web publishing business?

While some of these stats I already knew (I was spot on with gender and parenting percentages of our readers), some of these things I didn’t know. This kind of information is critical as I create future plans for content expansion. But most of all, this is my bargaining chip with direct advertisers.

Sometimes I get down on myself for not having the traffic numbers I wish we had – and to be fair, I will probably feel that way no matter what our traffic numbers are. But when I can tell advertisers that our readers are some of the most vocal people on the internet and we are influencing the influencers, suddenly every one visitor could be worth hundreds of visitors. And I’m in a much sweeter position as a business owner than I thought I was before I did this survey.

So here is where I beg you as a fellow web publisher to go out and do a survey. I don’t care if you have 10 visitors a day – those ten people could be the exact ten people that ‘Advertiser X’ wants to know. And this data can drastically change your advertising strategy and impact your bottom line.

But click here is seldom the best option for linked text. Take a look at these two examples:

To find out more about how I can help you grow your business, click here.

or

Find out more about how I can help you grow your business.

Which link tells you, as the site’s visitor, where you’ll go when you click the link? Isn’t it clearer in the second example that the link will lead you to how I can help you grow your business?

This may seem like splitting hairs a bit. But really, it’s not. There are a number of reasons to use descriptive linked text rather than click here. Here’s a few:

• Clarity – Descriptive linked text makes it much clearer where the link will you while click here basically just offers the command – click here. There’s no real clarity of why you’d click here or where you’ll end up.
• Scannable – If you scan most website pages, the links will stand out. They’re usually colored and styled differently than the text around them. So when you use descriptive linked text your visitors can scan your page for where they’d like to go next. Click here simply doesn’t offer the same advantage.
• SEO – If you care the least bit about search engine optimization, and you should, adding keywords in the links is one method of optimizing your text for search engines. Think about the 1.7 billion instances on websites that are using click here. Is that really what they’re hoping to rank for?
• Usability – As a big fan of the ‘don’t make me think’ principle of website design, I don’t want my users to have to interpret, guess or consider where my links will lead them. And that’s exactly what click here does – forces my visitors to think.
• Accessibility – Remember, not all your visitors will be using beautiful, graphics browsers to view your site. Some will use braille, aural or text browsers. Think about how visitors that are blind or have reading disabilities will use your site. Asking them to ‘click here’ gives them no idea where they’re going to end up.
• Readability – Isn’t it simply nicer to read content where the links have been crafted into the content rather than breaking it up with the old click here?
• Printability - More people print out your web pages than you might realize. Click here just doesn’t mean anything on a printed page and often breaks up the flow of text.

That said, you can use whatever linking strategies you like. Sometimes you can get higher response rates by directing people to click on a link. I suggest, however, not making a habit out of it. Use terms like ‘click to continue’ or ‘read on’ sparingly and only when you really need too. Otherwise, let your visitors know where they’re heading when then select a link.

So, how are you using click here. And what’s your overall in content link strategy?

Celebrity Business – Celebrity Gossip and News for Entrepreneurs, Geeks & Smart People

I’ve never much been into celebrity gossip. I could care less about Mary Kate’s bad dress or J Lo’s latest divorce. But I have always been fascinated with the entrepreneurial businesses run by celebrities – and I think there’s a lot to be learned from the ventures that celebs start up on the side.

Our own Lorna Doone Brewer from Freelance Parent is heading up Celebrity Business. She’ll be reporting on things like Milla Jovovich’s new clothing line, Gwen Stefani’s partnership with HP and the empire built by Gene Simmons (he’s a flipping brilliant business man).

She’ll also be keeping tabs on some famous entrepreneurs – so look out Guy Kawasaki. We just might say good things about you.

SOHO Tools News & Technology – Products, Services & Tips to Help You Run a More Profitable Business

Long ago I started a blog called Shoestring Smarts – a place where I could share coupons, product recommendations, freebies, and other business tools with small business owners. SOHO Tools News & Technology is like Shoestring Smarts 2.0 – I’ll continue to share great business service and tool finds, but also move my own technology tips, blogging how-to’s, and other nuts & bolts articles from here to that blog.

Some of the most popular posts in the past have been:

Getting Started with Pay Per Click Search Engine Marketing

5 Free Meditation Resources for Mind-Clearing Productivity

The Top 5 Free Search Engine Optimization Tools

And don’t miss my post today on two free Firefox extensions that will increase conversation on your WordPress blog!

I’ve worked with most of these affiliate programs, and I’ve definitely chosen these merchants with care. I don’t think we want to sling around more baby products. Rather, these are programs that promote products you can easily fit into your content, because you are probably already blogging about things like childcare, entertainment, social networking, productivity, going green or cool parenting stuff.

In case you didn’t know, all affiliate programs are free, so you just need to join the networks below in order to get access to these programs. By the way, want to learn more about Affiliate Marketing? Funny you should ask!

Programs from the Commission Junction Affiliate Network

Tutor.com ($5 per lead and 100% of first sale [sweet!] )
I love programs that pay per lead – it’s much easier to make money off of leads than sales. And 100% of the first sale is rare and generous. It’s also new – last year they weren’t offering that.

CafeMom ($2 per lead)
Ditto from above on paying for leads – and just how hard do you think it is to get a blogging mom to sign up for a social network??

Angie’s List ($10-$20 per sale)
Ratings and reviews on local contractors and service companies. Word of mouth in action!

Green and More (10% of sale)
For an eco-friendly home – they even have a big selection of green appliances. I hate to imagine blogging about laundry – but I must admit that if anyone can make laundry interesting, parent bloggers can do it!

GameFly ($15 per lead)
That’s a seriously great payout on a brand that’s pretty much a household name.

From the PepperJam Affiliate Network

PepperJam was founded by Kris Jones, a super-fantastic guy who is working hard to improve transparency and ethics in the affiliate marketing industry. Any program run in their network will be run well. I don’t know one parent blogger that hasn’t mentioned at least one of the following TV shows/stations in a post:

Sesame Street Store (8% -10% of sale)

Cartoon Network Shop (7% of sale)

Warner Brothers Shop & Warner Brothers TV Shop (7% of sale)

From the Shareasale Affiliate Network

Shareasale has quite a few niche merchants you won’t find anywhere else. It’s because they have a more affordable merchant program that allows smaller mom and pop shops to run affiliate programs.

MomAgenda (10% of sale)
I’ve written about MomAgenda in the past; I really love their products. Glad to see they finally have an affiliate program!

Land of Nod (7% of sale and $5 per lead)
They are active communicators and some of their affiliates do very well.

FlipClips (10% of sale)
They turn videos into the most adorable little flip books. Their program manager is also very accessible and willing to help.

gDiapers (10% of sale, $0.25 per lead)
Earth-friendly diapers. I’ve heard rave reviews about them – but since my babies are big, I can’t speak from experience.

Tiny Prints (10% of sale)
They have the most adorable baby announcements and holiday cards. Seriously.

Nannies4hire ($40 per sale)
A nationwide online nanny and family database that matches families to nannies.

Programs from the LinkShare Affiliate Network

Although Linkshare has a clunky interface, they have some really premium advertisers, and most of them are exclusive to their network. That alone makes it worth it to join.

Nick Jr. Shop (6% – 10% of sale) & Nick Magazines (25% of sale)

HBO Store (10% of sale)

Turns out there is a problem with a greasemonkey script included in the Better GReader FireFox plugin. From what I understand, a fix has been released to solve the problem.

Please go update it so you can come back and visit me… I miss you so.