It’s January 19th. Crack open the champagne, because it’s time to celebrate!
What’s so special about today? Today is Outspoken Media’s birthday. A birthday that comes a couple weeks after the New Year, which means Lisa and I have been in a period of intense introspection (or holiday food comas, who knows). But isn’t that what we do on birthdays and at New Years? We think about the past and how we got here and we think about where we’re going.
When you own a business, those are the most important questions to ask yourself:
[read the full post…]
Much of the Internet is going dark today in protest of the Stop Online Privacy Act (SOPA) and its counterpart Protect-IP Act (PIPA). SOPA was originally introduced as a way to stop copyright infringement, but it won’t do that. What SOPA will do is threaten the freedom and the stability of the Internet, as well as your ability to make a living off it. SOPA requires that sites like Google, Twitter, Facebook and other key Internet players monitor the Web and police content that may infringe on someone else’s copyright. Sites that are accused of violating SOPA will be shut down, without due process.
For example, if you tweet a link to a YouTube video, Twitter could be forcibly shut down. If you quote someone’s article on Facebook, Facebook must censor you or risk its own site. If YOUR SITE is accused of violating someone’s copyright, you could lose your livelihood. Again, with zero due process. It’s legislation that puts far too much power in the hands of the government.
Why are the online protests happening today? Because the Senate will begin voting on January 24th.
How can you fight SOPA/PIPA and protect the Web? [read the full post…]
QR codes are exploding. They’re on posters, window storefronts, coasters at the bar, and some businesses are even putting them on billboards (hi, your customer is DRIVING!). But what I’m noticing even more than the sheer explosion of QR codes is that often the QR code campaign is doing little more than embarrassing the brand it’s associated with.
As you may have guessed, I have an example!
Tech savvy as I may be, I’m not typically the type to scan a QR code. As a lady who can never find my phone in my purse, it just seems like a lot of work for very little pay out. However, I’m a sucker for Bill Cosby. He’s funny, he’s inspirational, and he brings back delicious childhood memories of pudding. So when I noticed that the back of his new book I Didn’t Ask To Be Born (But I’m Glad I Was) (no aff) had a QR code on the back I thought, what the heck? This has to be good.
Five minutes later after I finally found my phone in my purse, I scanned the bar code. What did I get for my troubles?
This. [read the full post…]
Welcome to Saturday morning and congrats on another solid week in the books. And, um, what a week, right? We had to sit a myriad of search-related fights. There was Google and Twitter, Google and the FTC, Google and Mocality Kenya, the list just went on and on. Okay, so maybe it was just Google being involved in fights. Poor, Goog. It must be so hard to be an unstoppable search giant.
But enough about that. It’s time for some awesome weekend coffee links. Are you ready? There’s some good stuff below. And don’t forget, feel free to share YOUR top link picks of the week in the comments. I’ll go first. [read the full post…]
Well, it’s official. Google’s succinctly-named Search Plus Your World is live. And right on schedule we have our first real Internet cat fight of 2012. Huzzah!
Here’s a score card of what’s gone down in case you were sleeping. Or…working.
- Google launched it’s, um, search enhancement Search Plus Your World and put “your personal content and the things you care about written by the people you care about” right into your search results. Even more adorable, they did it pretending like that didn’t already exist. You know on other sites. So cute!
- Twitter is upset because it feels like Google is using Search Plus to purposely favor its own content, making Twitter content harder to find in the search results and presenting a bad search experience for users. Boo.
- Google then took time away from snacking on our analytics data to respond that Twitter actually asked for Google to stop taking its content so, I guess, THERE, they did!
- Eric Schmidt went into evil overload mode chatting with Danny Sullivan about how they’d love to talk to Twitter and Facebook about using their data…only they haven’t. Maybe if they did, he says, they could come up with new permissions, but no one talked about it. And he won’t talk about why they won’t talk about it. Just that they won’t talk about it and Danny should stop asking. Okay.
- Singer and soon-to-be-divorcee Katy Perry hasn’t chimed in yet to tell us her opinion of things, but she might after she reads Danny Sullivan’s excellent piece detailing Real-Life Examples of How Google’s “Search Plus” Will Drive Facebook & Twitter Crazy and realizes her lack of a Google+ profile is making her Google-invisible.
So as it turns out, it’s not just Facebook and Twitter that this will drive crazy. It’s driving us all crazy and ruining search and social for everyone. [read the full post…]
Anyone who knows me will tell you: I’m completely commitment phobic. And nowhere is this more apparent than in the world of emerging social media networks. I cringe whenever a new one is released because I simply Can’t. Handle. Another. I’m on Twitter, I’m on Facebook – what else do I need? But every now and then a social network comes along that sweeps me off my feet and makes me believe in the amazingness of the Web all over again. And for me, the social network doing that right now is Pinterest.
Wait? Pinterest? Is that really anything more than an outlet for pictures of sleeping cats, fancy home décor and items deemed orange?
It is.
I’ll tell you why I love it and why, as a brand, you should love it too. [read the full post…]
The SEO audit is a beautiful phase in any relationship. Someone has their hands all up in your site as they diagnose what issues exists, what’s lacking and then gets to work creating a plan for how you can build the most kickass site the Internet has ever seen. But then the audit phase ends and you need to do that work. Or, often more accurately, you need to hire the SEO company that provided the audit to do that work. And then things can get a little messy.
And by “messy”, I mean something gets strangled. Usually your SEO efforts.
Client and vendor often share blame when SEO simply doesn’t work. Below are four common reasons your SEO efforts may find themselves strangled and some advice on what you can do to turn it around.
[read the full post…]
Hola, amigos. It’s the weekend. Glory be to the highest and all that jazz. To kick things off right, how about a steaming helping of weekend coffee links? Something to get your mind going on what’s probably a chilly day wherever you are.
Ready? Go grab some coffee or something. It’s the perfect way to begin a weekend morning. We’ll hop in.
[read the full post…]
It’s funny how clients’ needs evolve over time. For example, I’ve been noticing that most clients who come to Outspoken Media seeking blog consulting services these days aren’t asking whether or not they should take the plunge and create a corporate blog. In 2012, they’ve already got that. Now what they’re looking to do is get more from that blog. They’re looking to hire a social media agency to help them increase engagement, usability and the overall function of their blog. I’m lucky that many of these audits and strategy documents fall on my plate, which means I get to look at awesome blogs and make them even more awesome. Who wouldn’t love that?
When I’m creating recommendations for those blogs, below are a few of the features I keep an eye out for. While there’s obviously way more things that go into constructing a great blog, the ones mentioned below have a high bang-for-the-buck ratio. [read the full post…]
As we already told you, Outspoken Media has moved into a brand new office space. If you missed the glorious picture post, you can relive the memory over there. And, yes, I know, those orange Eames chairs in the entryway are awesome, especially considering we found them in a dusty basement and didn’t pay for them. Wheee!
But I digress.
We moved! There are lots of things that go into a business move, even beyond all the unboxing, the desk assembling, and the lifting of the heavy things up multiple flights of steps. And one of those things includes changing your business address. Everywhere. On the entire Internet. And then off the entire Internet.
Below are 31 places business owners should make sure they change their business address. And, no, I’m not at all writing this post because we’re in the process of doing it and I couldn’t find another list available online. Why would you even ask me that? [read the full post…]
