It's Terribly Tasteful

Curiouser and Curiouser: Squidoo!

If you're looking for opportunities to expand your territory, a.k.a. online presence, here's a way to do it, and it's (my favorite price) free! Squidoo. Lenses (Squidoo's name of choice for the pages you create) are kind of like blogs but without time-stamped entries. You don't need programming knowledge; it's all done with preprogrammed modules.There are modules for individual expression, revenue-generating modules and a variety of modules being added all the time. It's all searchable, linkable, tagable and findable on the web.

What I like best about Squidoo is where it came from. Started by Seth Godin and staffed by an impressive group of leaders in publishing, marketing, technology, business, overall creativity, and the best part-- values. Because of this, you'll see many familiar names and organizations aligning themselves with Squidoo. Bonus--click on the Seth link to see his Squioo Lens, and download free ebooks!

I am not endorsing Squidoo because they selected me to attend the Innovative Marketing Conference at Columbia University (shameless self-promotion)--my lens came first.

Try it out. Squidoo.com.

 

 

The image is a retired racing greyhound enjoying his new home complete with front porch, couches and beds. His new responsibilities are welcome committee, loving, sleeping and being loved. They are great greyt dogs.

The print is 8x10 and matted to 11x14. Price includes shipping to Continental U.S.

Not Posting Enough!

When Seth Godin posted Done in his blog, I got emotional. I'm always trying to empty the inbox, and feeling all the negative energy generated by trying to dot every I and cross every T.

"The challenge is NOT to empty your inbox... The challenge is to ask a two part question: What next? What now? Asking is the hard part."

My what's next/what now is doing the blog thing right, or not doing it at all. Since Terribly Tasteful is about sharing what works and what doesn't, I'm sharing this: Frequent posting works. Short posts work. I haven't been posting enough.   

 

 

 

At 418 King Street in Downtown Charleston there used to be a wonderful shop called Cameron's Antiques, owned by Patricia Ahern. (Now it's The French Hare, equally as wonderful for different reasons). Antique stores suck me right in and the old building's light was as beautiful as the goodies inside. Patricia graciously humored my request to come back with my camera. The results were beautiful.

The print is 8x10 and I'm selecting a metallic paper and an oversized (16x20 mat) to make it more dramatic. Price includes shipping to Continental U.S.

Directories: A Rant

No, we're not in Kansas anymore, but as in the myth of the Wizard of Oz, we want to go home, enlightened by the strange and beautiful and scary journey we've been on. The internet is Oz, and paid directories are those evil flying monkeys.

Example: The Yellow Pages. Faced with loss of ad revenue in an increasingly online world, the classic yellow book is on the web. However, instead of publishing a partner version of the book--a real benefit to the user--the online version is a separate entity. IF the directory does list all book entries, it's only after the paid spaces, which come after the premium paid spaces, and there will be no link to your expensive and meticulously created online presence. I'm all for making money, but isn't The New World of Work about conducting business in a way that benefits the customers rather than sapping the life out of them? It's not just the yellow book, Toto, it's all paid directories.

Using the internet as the internet dictates, we Google. Or Yahool. Or occasionally MSN.  And we don't google "directoryname new york yoga studio," we google "yoga new york." Just because you're new at this does not mean you have to be scared into giving money to the for-profit directory du jour! "Use the Force, Luke" --or my case--the Luke Force: my own brave intuition. Here's my traffic, based on the last 5,000 hits.

#1 Links from email notification of blog posts, followed and sometimes surpassed by
#2 Links from search engines (generated by frequent blog posting and other unpaid techniques)
#3 Links from blog to web site or vice versa, which originated as No. 1 or No. 2

To quote Dennis Miller "Of course, that's just my opinion, I could be wrong."

Just say no.