Connecting Businesses One By One
This week I have been deemed a SOB by Liz Strauss at Successful-Blog.com. She points out some of the outstanding bloggers that make a contribution, and apparently I was part of a conversation or made some contribution to the world of blogging. I’ll wear this badge with honor…I think.
Liz (or is it ME?) blogs in a number of places, but she is a member of the b5media.com network. Thanks Liz for including me in the fine group of SOB’s.
I have made some nice contacts with some great bloggers in the UK. One of these bloggers, Mark White, author of Better Business Blogging has a post up now called the 5 R’s of blogging. His first of the series of of the 5 R’s is “Read”. Mark mentions that it is necessary for people to actually visit your blog and read it. This may seem basic, but sometimes it’s good to start with the basics.
The key elements of this post are listed out by Mark:
“Key elements: consistent quality content, attractive title, optimised posts, good blog promotion”
I would add to those elements that “readability” I suppose a subset of read. Design and the look of a blog can also attract readers. If the design of a blog is one that makes it easy to read and navigate, chances are those readers will return to see what you have produced and published again. Poorly designed or tough to read blogs usually get passed over even if their content is of good quality.
I can’t wait to read the next 4 in the series. Thanks Mark.
A while back I wrote about Wendi Friesen needing a Hypnoblog. Well she as outdone that by starting her own podcasting. Some people would rather talk than write. This is a perfect example of what podcasting can do for you if blogging is not your style. I know I am a self proclaimed blog evangelist, but I am firm believer in doing what works best and for Wendi it’s podcasting. Way to go Wendi I give you two thumbs up!
Thanks to Niall Cook at Positive Impact, I was made aware of a local company here in the Boulder area, a data mining company, that has launched a “blog.” I put the quotations there because I’m not sold that this is actually a blog in the true sense of the word. Sure they have used the Typepad blogging application and yes it has permalinks and archives (although only one post) but I get the feel that this is more of a news page or a press release page. No comments are available, and I can’t even ping the post for lack of trackbacks.
Umbria has an about portion at the bottom of the post that could and should probably go on an “About Page”.  They don’t have much to go on about the writer or the blogger that is providing content, although they do have an “email me” link. It could be done by their PR department and released, but again, that makes it a press release page not a blog. The post is written in a press release fashion which leads me to believe that is what has happened.
On their main site they have failed anywhere in the sitemap or otherwise to point us to the conversation on their blog. No link is shown on how to read their latest post. I’m not even sure the post that is there is a true blog post. It could be more of a whitepaper or merely a written study paid for by CNN. The title of the site itself is confusing. Is it an Umbria blog or a site dedicated to speak about gasoline prices? Is this a CNN blog? CNN.com has better real estate and exposure on this blog than does Umbria.
Umbria if you are listening, and if you are data mining, you should find this post fairly quick, give us a buzz, we can help make Umbria Speaks into something that is more in tune with the blogosphere. Besides, I’m only a 1/2 hour away. I won’t even charge you for the gas.
In the meantime since you did put an RSS feed on your site, I guess I will follow along and see how things progress.
[Hat Tip also to Matthew Hurst]
First we hear of Scoble leaving, now Bill is jumping ship as well. They say bad things happen in threes. That’s it, I’m selling all my Microsoft stock. Oh wait…I don’t own any. Bill can I have your job and salary for about 4 minutes?
It saddens me to see a company that had such great promise slowly die away due to the failure of its leadership to have the proper vision and focus. Pubsub is such a company that had great promise and was on track to become a major player in the industry.
It seems from at least Bob Wyman’s point of view that the business is on it’s last leg and the bugler is warming up to play taps.
“Our days are numbered. A recent attempt to execute a merger has been blocked and we’ve been blocked from raising equity financing that would allow us to continue to pay salaries and pay off our $3 million in debt. Thus, our “doors” will close soon if we can’t find someone to pull us out of the current situation. Persons with fast access to cash and a desire for some of the industry’s best technology are advised to contact us rapidly…”
Bob I wish for your success, but the debt I’m already trying to pay off has me a little low on cash flow at the moment.
I’m not sure where the strife begins in this sad tale but according to Bob:
“I believe firmly that the cause of our difficulties is not the team we have built nor is it the technology we’ve developed. Both are great. What has prevented us moving forward is a battle with a group of minority shareholders, some of whom claim to be lead by our ex-CEO Salim Ismail and are, in any case, primarily his “friends and family.” This group is using very unusual clauses in our Shareholder’s agreements to block mergers or financings. We’ve found it difficult to determine their motives, however, some have said that they believe that it is in their interest to drive the company into bankruptcy so that they can buy our software and start a new company. Of course, I believe that by the time we go through bankruptcy proceedings, we won’t have any employees and frankly, a software company without the employees that developed its software is worthless. Our assets will have a much higher value if we have the employees available, thus, the best course at this time is to sell our assets, trademarks, etc. to cover the outstanding debt and make our employees available to the purchaser.”
For a company to thrive and be successful, their leaders must make hard decisions and be on the same page or else you get a political nightmare that can cause the ultimate demise of something special. I applaud Bob for his openess in posting his thoughts on his blog, and I also wish the company well through what must be horrible stress. Good luck!
UPDATE: I just ran across Michael Arrington’s post about the Wyman blog post. It seems he too feels that this is a sad waste.
Dear Mr. Kent:
A while back I wrote about your company and a problem you were having with an employee/employer issue with one of the Rug Doctor workers. Since that time, I have noticed in my own site stats that I have been getting many referrals from searches for your company name. I also noticed, at the time of writing this post, by using Google’s search engine, my small trafficked blog shows on page one when searching the phrase “Rug Doctor.†I did notice that your company also shows on page 1 of those organic search results.
My site is merely a blog about the blogging business and has nothing to do with carpet cleaning. I talk about blogging and consulting, marketing, advertising and many other things related to the technical field of businesses and their online campaigns. I notice that your site does not have a blog, but your site is complete with lots of carpet cleaning related keywords. I was disappointed to see your site redesign not include a blog as you may know because of my advocacy of blogging related to your PR problem as above.Â
I noticed that NetSuccess recently redesigned your site. NetSuccess has done a great job in providing you with an easy to use and well designed web site but have not added a company blog. I did notice that they themselves have started a company blog so there may be some possibilities in the works or something on the drawing board. They may be learning about the benefits of blogging themselves and are not sure of its value.
I thought of writing this letter because I am seeing a recent increase in these searches involving your company and an increase in my traffic. I was curious as to why that may be the case so I did some looking around at some of the other results of the search and performed a search of my own. What I didn’t see was anyone in your company joining in the conversations I came across about your product. The mining that I performed took very little time or effort, and there seemed to be a large amount of mentions just within the 2 minutes I looked at the list of links. These conversations are very valuable and should be followed and analyzed.
If you don’t have a blogger or if you are not hooked into the blogosphere as part of your online campaign, I would love to talk to you about the benefits and the wisdom of implementing a blog in your online campaign. Thank you for your time.
Sincerely,
Jim Turner
P.S. Let’s set up a blog and topple Stanley Steamer from the number 1 organic search result for “Carpet Cleaning.”
My wife and I recently planted a rose garden out in front of our house. Yes, it is true, I am not the vampire that my wife has accused me of, as sometimes I do get out into the sunlight to do something other than blogging and working on the computer. We built the flower bed using man made stones purchased at the local building supply store, and sooner or later we were able to make it all straight and level, and the box was done. I can handle these types of projects. I’m handy enough to run a power tool or such and not end up looking like “Three Fingers Willy.” What I don’t have is a green thumb. In fact, I am certain that given a chance I could kill most silk flowers or plastic plants. Like many of the do-it-yourselfers I decided I would check out how to plant a rose garden from the Internet. Afterall, I’m sure most surgeries could be learned from research on the Internet, not that I will be performing any organ transplants in the near future, but for home projects it is a great resource.
Off to Google I went with plenty of time and lots of questions. My first search was a jackpot on “How to Plant Roses.” Then I needed to search out what type of roses to plant, and finally I found a little site talking about “Extreme Rose Garden.” That is the rose garden for me, so I decided to click through to see what this was and how I could get me one of them extreme rose gardens. As it turns out, the site is on the DIY network website.
I’m sure by this time you are asking yourself, “Jim is there a point to this post?” Yes, I was not geared up to teach about the proper planting of rose bushes, but I wanted to point to a great example of a company using blogs to their advantage. The DIY Network has a place specifically used for their “Blogs.” Joe Lamp’l the DIY gardening expert has a blog and his first entry is very inviting:
Welcome everyone! Finally, an opportunity to fill you in on all kinds of information that I don’t have the time or opportunity to share each week on Fresh From the Garden. It’s always encouraging to hear from you also. I’m so glad to know that so many have benefited from the information I’ve been able to provide on the show. Along the way, I hope I’ve played a role in making you a new or better gardener. So as I keep you in the know between shows, feel free to ask questions or share you comments too. I’ll check in and contribute as often as possible. I’m looking forward to this new way of connecting with you and hope you enjoy it as well. Check back soon and check back often!
JL
Let the conversation begin! Many more variety shows would do well to keep an eye out for the DIY group as they continue to blog. I’m wondering when the likes of the Food Network and others will sign on for this type of communication with their followers, audience and customers.
They just recently began the blogging project it appears, so there is not much of a long tail to search for the archives about planting my roses, but I bet since they allow comments and such, I could just ask right on the blog. I’ll let you know how it turns out.
I mention in my last post about the lack of time I have for actually making money. It was meant to be a tongue in cheek post, but after a while it started making more sense to me. It seems that lately I have not had enough time to do those things that are most important to me. I get caught up in the small and mundane things in the day and by the time I crawl to bed, I can’t figure out whether I have accomplished what I set out to do or if I accomplished anything at all.
I came across an article written a while back by the author of Blog Marketing, Jeremy Wright. He writes about the Pickle Jar Theory. I have heard this theory before as it relates to being a parent. Sort of a “don’t sweat the small stuff theory”. Suddenly, things began to come into focus for me. I need to make sure I list those things that are a priority in the day, and make sure those are done before I tackle the not so big things, until I finally reach the mundane that has no priority. The problem for me is prioritizing. What are the big things and what are the little things? Every task at hand seems to be a big thing that must go into my pickle jar first.
Jeremy it was an inspiring article that help me realize my time management problem and my needs. Now if you could just write that article on prioritizing to help me decide what big things don’t get done today.
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