branding

Here's a fantastic article about how small businesses can use social media in their marketing: 10 Small Business Social Media Marketing Tips. What I think makes this article stand out is that the author gives both a basic strategy and an advanced strategy for each social media tool. Most articles I've read give only more advanced strategies. However, the basic strategies are especially helpful for those who are just getting their feet wet. With these basic strategies, you know you're starting out on the right foot.

What do you do when you're faced with filling in an online profile? Perhaps you are just registering on a site to comment on someone's blog posting, or to post a question in a user forum. Are you prepared with a cool screen name and a line of information about yourself? Or do you just skip that section, with a vague intention in the back of your mind to come back later?

This is a great article I came across today, Ten Stories That Can Sell Anything. Simply put, there are basically 10 angles you can take to market your product or services. And they are all related to Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Any marketing or psychology class will all tell you about Maslow's hierarchy of needs. However, this article puts the marketing and psychology together in a simple, straightforward package. Here's a summary:

Ok, I have a confession to make: I allowed my domain name to expire. Not on purpose, mind you -- accidentally. Others have told me dreadful stories of what happened when their domain expired, and now I, too, got caught. Thankfully, my story ended up being a minor problem. And so, here is a list of things I've learned:

I found out that Microsoft launched a court action against cybersquatters. Well, I'm not normally too interested in Microsoft's legal stuff because I don't think I could ever keep up with it all anyway. But this one caught my eye because it touched on an issue that I've talked about before (See the The Challenge of Domain Names).