TechArt by BeFunky is OMG2Fun
I leaned over yesterday to pick up something and a sudden searing pain shot down down my back, followed by what felt like an electrical shock. I haven’t let it stiffen up and will be heading to my doctor later today, but in the meantime, while resting and trying to keep my muscles relaxed, I’ve been trying out BeFunky.com. This is an awesome, playful online application! What surprises me is that it’s so easy to figure out how to use. Sure, there are some usability bumps...
Read MoreA Somebody Nobody
I was talking to some folks at an art gallery last weekend where I knew one of the artists being featured. The topic of what I do came up and how long I’ve been doing it. When I mentioned Cre8asiteforums, its being a global community and the huge membership, it sounded really impressive and cool. I saw their eyebrows go up. There was that familiar, “Wow, she must be famous” look on their faces. I explained that while I’ve been around since 1995 and in the Internet...
Read MoreThe User Experience of Humor; Accessibility Finds; Spring Crazies
Shari Thurow wrote a two-part articles series called What SEO/SEM Professionals Should Know About Website Usability. In part two, she devotes the entire piece to comments by myself and Jakob Nielsen. Rather than give her own opinions and perspective on the merging together of search engine optimization and marketing techniques with user experience and usability design, of which she is a speaker, writer, business owner, book author and trained practitioner of both, she let’s others do...
Read MoreSEO Blogger Fights for Axis Deer
There are countless reasons why someone from the search engine marketing industry operates a blog. It can be to share news, promote one’s services, create community, converse with clients and the public or raise awareness of issues. I seek out positive thinking people and those who, in the face of negativity or peer pressure, continue to do their thing with class and integrity. Their reasons for doing whatever they do are often deeply personal and self fulfilling to them. For example, ...
Read MoreHey Blog Scrapers! Take This Post Too
Every day my blog posts are ripped off, cannibalized, reposted and credit is not given to me as the original writer. It’s done by “scraping” content, scripts that insert keywords and a new form of my post is spit out, either in full or in part. In many cases credit to this blog, the original source, is not given. Not my name, not my domain. No link. But my sentences are there on their blog. A fellow blogger has inquired about this practice at Cre8asiteforums, in a thread...
Read MoreWhy I Volunteer to “Live Blog” Search Marketing Conferences
As a volunteer reporter for Barry Schwartz’s Search Engine Roundtable blog, I’m often asked, “Why do you do it?” My consulting work is focused on usability and Internet application testing. Why am I out chasing sessions at search engine marketing conferences? To begin with, my work began in web design and consulting/online teaching search engine optimization in the 1990′s. Therefore, I know many “long-timers” in the SEO/M industry. It remains an area...
Read MoreBlogs and Social Media: The Freedom of Voice
For those of you interested in some of the topics on blogs and journalism or the influence and study of social media behavior, here is lead I got to a blog post that digs into some of it. Weinberger NCF keynote: users take back power are Paul Gillin’s notes on a talk that sounds like it was fascinating and filled with food for thought. The Web is a permission-free zone. Marketing, business and media are all about fake, phony voices. Conversations are open and honest. Blogs aren’t...
Read MoreThere’s Something More to Blogging
What brings people together isn’t always understood, but I’m starting to believe that when we’re touched deeply, there is a hook of some sort, even if we can’t label it. It’s something we feel but can’t always put into words. What keeps us together, returning, or tied to each other may be something unique, confusing, private and unexplainable. The incentive to hold on can change, even on a whim. It’s this way with relationships of any kind. It’s this way with blogs, forums,...
Read MoreHanding Over the Keys To Your Blog
As a parent with a teenager who runs a quick errand with my car and returns 4 hours later, I understand how difficult it is to hand over your beloved “thing” to somebody. There are trust issues. There’s learning how to share. One of the first lessons we taught our kids as toddlers was how to share their toys. It’s a code we instill from early on. Sharing toy trucks and stuffed bunnies is far easier than an automobile or a blog, however. By the time we’re grown...
Read MoreSelf Worth for Bloggers (and Mothers Who Blog)
I hate to admit it, but there are days when I take a look around at my so-called presence on the Internet to see how I measure up and, truth be told, I suck. One good Digg does not a famous person make. Usually I won’t be caught dead checking data, graphs, or incoming links. Why ruin a perfectly good day? Alexa is worthless, and yet now that the arrows are going in the down direction, I wonder that if worthless Alexa contributes to making me feel worthless, than I have a serious problem...
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