Effective Classy Websites

Social media has overtaken porn as the number one activity on the web. If Facebook were a country, it would be the world’s fourth largest, with over 350 million users.

It took radio 38 years to reach 50 million people; TV 13 years; the internet four years; and the iPod three years. It took Facebook only 9 months to reach 100 million users. (mashable.com)

According to trendsspotting.com, 96 percent of Generation Ys (who now outnumber the baby boomers) have joined an online social network.

A revolution in people power is going on as we speak and for the first time in modern history, we can choose our news instead of having it fed to us by a third party. This has huge implications for creating the kinds of grassroots movements needed to spark widespread social change. Read the rest of this entry »

The crew over at Commoncraft understand the shift that is going on. We are more and more needing to find trusted sources and people that can save us TIME by filtering out the dross and giving information to us in a simple form.

Twitter represents yet another move towards this ideal state of information filtering. It’s not perfect but with the right tools it can be awesome.

So here, for those people that haven’t had an experience of Twitter is a simple video explanation. And for those that have, perhaps we can soak up some of the easy-to-follow language to incorporate into our online communication. Read the rest of this entry »

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We can't seem to get enough

From the outset I want to say I am probably going to offend some people in this article. I am simply fed up with the lying and pretending that goes on with marketers online.

And I’m not just referring to the little guys either.

Sure there are plenty of them, but it’s some of the big guys that are the biggest promoters of the bull.

See, before I joined the online scene I had been reading material by people like Jay Abraham, Stephen Covey (self-help), Bryce Courtenay, Michael Hewitt-Gleeson, Allan Pease and Michael E Gerber. Oh and an awesome crew based in Brisbane called The Results Corporation.

My association to the word “marketing” was based on things like testing, research, honest appraisal of the current marketplace, asking questions, utilizing untapped resources, and creative ways of finding people that want what you have to offer. Read the rest of this entry »

The developers at WordPress have been working tirelessly as usual and this release we are seeing some very practical user friendly features. This highlights the power of an open source project that encourages open discussion and sharing.

A summary of the new features are:

1. Global trash/undo feature that allows you to rescue files and posts that are deleted. WordPress empties the trash after 30 days in the same way your computer does.
2. The Built-in image editor lets you to crop, edit, rotate, flip, and scale your images. Very cool!
3. Go to the Tools >> Upgrade menu to update all the plugins with one click.
4. Easy video embed support that converts a video URL into the correct embed code. Support for YouTube, Daily Motion, Blip.tv, Flickr, Hulu, Viddler, Qik, Revision3, Scribd, Google Video, Photobucket, PollDaddy, and WordPress.tv with more to come. Read the rest of this entry »

If you are a technician starting a business you will tend to structure it to require your presence for it to work at all. The eMyth is the myth that an entrepreneur starts a business.

“The entrepreneur builds an enterprise; the technician builds a job.”

Most businesses don’t work because the people that start them don’t know what they are doing. They know how to make widgets, or install plumbing or create a website but have no idea how to create a business that works.

Michael E Gerber is the author of the best selling book, The E-Myth. He has been working with small businesses for over 30 years and challenges us to start reviewing the way we think about what we do and what our roles are. Read the rest of this entry »

It think it is safe to say that Steve Jobs is god in the IT world. His contribution to the world of computers, beautiful text and great products like the Mac, iPod and iPhone are unique in our world. Not to mention Pixar, the coolest animation studio in the world!

It is always instructive though to hear some of the real world stories and struggles that great achievers go through. What stands out for me is their ability to take adversity and turn it into more drive, more creativity and more decision power that moves them inevitably towards their vision. Read the rest of this entry »

The rate of growth that social media is experiencing on the web is unprecedented. Sure people love to chat and share ideas but few would have predicted the kind of adoption rate that we are seeing at the moment.

Much of it has to do with the growing younger demographic, but it seems more older people are getting into Facebook as a way to connect with family and friends. Prepare to experience a presentation of the new social media revolution! Read the rest of this entry »