Just before Christmas, I was delighted to receive a copy of this book, produced by No Starch Press, as part of a drawing on Facebook run by Boxcar Marketing.

I’ve already delved into what looks like will be a fantastic resource for social media marketing, and although I typically read books the old-fashioned way, by starting with chapter one, this time I couldn’t resist flipping through and just stopping to read whatever caught my eye. 

The table of contents is rich with promising tips and guides.  For the beginner social media marketer, this book should prove to be fantastically helpful.  And although I’m no newbie into the forays of social media, I know it will also be very beneficial for me, as I work to help my clients—mainly small businesses and organizations—begin & maintain social media campaigns and also continue marketing my web design business. 

One thing I noticed right off the bat, was the way the authors intorduce the reader to social media  and how it kind of all started.  For someone who’s been online since 1998, I know that things have come a long way since the old chat rooms and usenet boards of the pre-dot.com boom.  For those who haven’t been online as long as I have (dinosaur alert!), this will be a very interesting part to read.

As a fairly active participant in social media sites like LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and a formerly more active MySpace user, I’ve seen and done a lot.  I have used LinkedIn to help people find jobs and connect small business owners with prospective leads and other networkers.  I had successfully created and managed a Facebook Group and Fan Page for a prominent member of an organization as part of a political campaign, and have used Twitter to meet some really fun people with common interests and tons of resources.

Sometimes I feel overwhelmed with all the social media I have my fingers dipped into over the past few years, and have the urge to want to “start over” with a fresh, clean slate—and by starting over, doing things the right way—or at least with some measurable goals in mind.  This book will most likely help me to grasp some of the important fundamentals of what social media marketing is really about, what it’s supposed to do, what to expect, and how to measure results/data.

I am still reading this, and every time I finish a page or two, I’m inspired to want to “start over” in many ways.

When I finish this book, I will provide a complete review, and perhaps some of things I started doing as a result.  I’m very excited to read it!

Among the many various and sundry websites and tools I’ve tried over the past year, two really stand out lately, as my own amazing “finds”.

Aardvark - Ask questions and get answers
I myself can vouch for Aardvark as being a bit worthwhile…have used it for about 2 months or less.

Users can answer questions about more than 1 million topics. Anyone in the world can ask a question and get a helpful (and usually intelligent), response in under 5 minutes. You can use it on the website as well as via IM, iPhone, Twitter and email. It’s also fun for us know-it-alls (hee hee).

I’ve answered questions about Google, cooking, things to do/places to visit in the Mpls/St. Paul area, and more. So far, I’ve asked questions about cats and Joomla. I’ve been vary happy with the fast response and helpful answers!

If you get bothered by an IM pop up or an e-mail asking you about stuff you don’t have time to answer or are not able to answer (maybe because you aren’t really an expert on the topic, or whatever reason), you can answer with quick one-word answers to help improve the experience.  For example, typing a reply with just the word, “pass” or “skip” means Aardvark knows you can’t answer that question.  Replying “busy” will give Aardvark the clear message you don’t want to answer questions right now, and it will leave you alone for pretty much the rest of the day.  Saying “mute” makes it clear to Aardvark that you don’t care about the topic or aren’t interested, and won’t ask you questions about that topic in the future.

And now that the ‘Vark has a new community online, it means even more connecting with folks to get and give help with/to!

Alice - Everyone needs an Alice
The slogan above is Alice.com’s and they have been soo right!  I have needed an Alice.  How many bags of dog food, bundles of paper towels, packs of razors, bottles of aspirin, and books of stamps are you tired of buying when you run out, having to wait in line and drive around to go get?

This service has been saving me trips to various places all summer, and really is simply a lifesaver! For me, anyway I LOVE Alice! I don’t drive a car, and shopping for me, is a huge hassle. So being able to just click on what I want and get it delivered to my door is a big blessing in that respect, vs. hauling my butt around town on buses and having to limit what I can carry home.

Plus, the prices are very competitive, there are automatic coupons, and you can set up automatic reminders for yourself. For example, say you always buy an 8 pack of paper towels every 2 months, you can say so on your account, then Alice will remind you and in one click you can add the exact product and quantity to your cart in order to get the stuff before you run out!

Last month, I just spent another $100 w/these guys! Ordered paper towels, cereal, health & beauty and laundry & cleaning stuff on a Wednesday, came to my door on Friday (FREE shipping, by the way).  Then, this month I noticed I was getting close to running out of cat food.  Kitty’s quite a picky eater–she only eats one type and brand, so I have to either go to the other end of town to get it for the best price, or I know I can order it online through Alice and get it in two days, right to my door.

Over the summer, I got some smaller orders of stuff–household goods, coffee filters, shampoo, dental floss, and Ibuprofen. Pop-Tarts were on sale, so I got a box of those, too.

Shipping is trackable, takes about 2-3 days, and comes in a very clean, well-packed box.   Most products are less or same as Target & I don’t have to go shop & stand in line!

If you sign up like I did, and pass it on to friends, you get $10 from their first order!

Stompernet’s web spy tool has been promoted left and right on the web since earlier this summer. In case you haven’t checked it out yet, it allows you to access a report not only on your own website, but the websites of your competitors.

I checked into it recently. There doesn’t seem to be too much that’s unique about the reports they generate for your site, in comparing to other tools, but it may prove useful tool for those who need help walking through how search engines see your site and how your competition fares, SEO-wise.

I found a video on YouTube which was put up by a man who used the Stompernet Site Seer tool and reported his experience.

I have use similar tools in the past, successfully.  They are:

Web CEO
http://www.webceo.com

Silktide Sitescore
http://www.silktide.com

Silktide’s sitescore product is based out of the UK, so where they report a warning if your site is not accessibility/standards-compliant and they fault you for being unlawful, here in the U.S. it is not yet illegal to not code your website to be accessible/standards-compliant. But in the UK, it is

I use WebCEO to generate reports on not only keyword analysis (just like Google’s sandbox does), but also it tells me:

a) How my pages in my site checks out against SEO rules (use of appropriate title tags, heading tags, whether there are “stop” words in any of them, etc.)

b) It generates a weighted list of the most common/weighted words I’m using in each page’s content and checks them against the key words/phrases I’m trying to target (keyword density monitoring and suggestions)

c) it submits my site to 100’s of search engines worldwide as well as checks for relevent press release and article sites that the site content can be submitted to.

d) it can automatically perform reports and email them to my clients after each task is done.

e) It generates link popularity rankings and suggests where I fit in as well as how I can improve it

f) It searches for and matches my site up with potential linking partner sites, plus it gives me comprehensive META information about each site I may want to contact (gives Google PR, traffic rank, presence in directories etc., all in one report)

These report results help me to quickly identify what I need to do to fix any flaws in my website’s content. When it comes to keyword/key phrase density, I do not encourage anyone to write their content by using density scales. The density report simply points out whether the heavier-weighted key words/phrases are the *correct* ones that you want to target in your site, so the the subject matter is not misunderstood by the search engines.

I use Silktide Sitescore to do a general check to:

a) View and search through all Metadata on your site, include meta tags

b) See how sites rank, for Readability. This test checks to see how easily your website’s content is to understand by the average reader.

c) Check effective pageload time on each page

d) Check for WC3 compliance to ensure your website is going to perform and play equally nicely in all major browsers, Firefox, IE6/7/8 and Safari).

…and those feature lists for both apps are just the tip of the iceberg. Actually Sitescore is totally 3rd party hosted, so it’s all online.

The services both provide all-in-one reporting which is easy to understand, plus they are free and fairly simple and helpful, walking me through each process/task if I need guiding or being intuitive and knowing what I expect it to do, when I don’t need help.

Plus Silktide’s Sitescore is a great way for me to run a fairly quick discovery for quoting a new prospect’s website redesign. Often folks come to me and they say they know their site needs improving, but they’re not sure what is wrong with their site, or they aren’t getting the traffic or sales they want. They know they need a rehaul but come to me as an expert.

If you spend about an hour or so doing some stuff with these tools to get a basic rundown of what needs to be done to your site, based on the reports you get, then fix the problem spots, your site will be more search engine-friendly in no time.

I’ve been doing a lot of research in the area of using Facebook to promote a group or business, so I’ve got quite a few tips to share.

In the coming months, I’ll be posting about promoting your business on Facebook.  The first post in the Facebook for business series will likely be about one of the following:

* Why it’s important to create a “Page” at Facebook vs. using your personal Facebook profile,

* Keeping them seperate,

* Ways to promote your page including creating ads in Facebook and sharing your page with your Facebook contacts and getting “Fans”,

* Adding photos, events, discussion, and more.

I’ve been asked this question several times (and in several different ways):

“With so many out there claiming to be the best website solution out there–how do you stay ahead of everyone?”

Truth is, there are many out there touting the *best solution* and quite of few of them are great solutions, however there are many which only claim to be but have no reputation of such to back it up.

I have found there is a combination of things that really can help one get the edge in a very tight industry.

* Find out what your customers want and need, by asking them. 

* Work smart, not hard.  Don’t try to pull off something difficult or not “tried and true” on your customers’ dime.

* Make good on your promises.  Be upfront if you come across or anticipate any struggles or delays.

Keep your word
Truly competing with this industry is very tough. To actually garner a good reputation is hard when starting out. I try to be honest and upfront with my clients and offered them not only a good product but also good service, and frequent communication–also key.  

Make them happy
After providing a service for them, I asked past customers in six (or three) months  if a) they are happy with the job that was done and b) if there is anything I can do to help them out. Sometimes, they call me before I have the chance to ask, because they might need something done that’s really simple and quick, and in some cases, I just do it and don’t always charge them (just if it’s something that takse 2 minutes to do).  I go the extra mile and give customer something to be happy about, more often than not, and it’s not because I screwed up or something.

Give some “extras”
When developing websites for clients, I often find myself tossing in an extra ditty here and there such as adding a CAPTCHA on a contact form or I’ll toss in a quick script that makes it so that the copyright/year notice on the bottom changes every year without any action from anyone. These are just examples of giving a little extra to please people.

Trying to actually be the “best solution”
To stay afloat can be difficult in such a saturated market (seems everyone and their grandma is doing web design these days!).

There are many out there touting that they are “best solution”  How do you know they really are? 

To find out if the person you are considering hiring is not ideal can be hard to do, but most prospective clients will be keen enough to try doing the following: 

* Check out your portfolio and contacting the owners of the sites you designed, to get an opinion/reference.  If you are new or just starting out however, you may not have much to show as far as work done/reputation and probably should be given a fair shot.

* They may call you up and have a chat with you.  They may ask you if they can work out something on a trial basis or can do a mockup for them (though they pay you for a mockup if they insist on it, and many designers/developer agree that mockups or “design drafts” or “spec work” done before an actual contract are a no-no and the topic has been a controversial one for years). 

* Have a guarantee.  Although it sounds silly, my satisfaction guarantee is that it is done right until the client is happy.  I’ve actually turned down a number of jobs because the prospective client was not comfortable with the idea that my guarantee consisted of the promise that if the job wasn’t done to his satisfaction, that I’d continue to work on it until he was happy.

The good firms/providers that stay standing are the ones people have referred to time and again, and continue to get business through the dot-com era and beyond. B. Woods Design is an example of one of these companies (even though my business was established in 2002, I started actually getting paid a little for web stuff here and there as early as 1998).

I think the reason my company has staying power in the industry is because I believe in it, and I care about the success of my clients’ businesses, bottom line. I’m not just asking clients what size site or color they want their website to be, and how much their budget is and then whipping up something in a matter of days. I actually do my research on them as much as I expect they do on me. Which leads me to the answer to your next possible query…

“Have a majority of small business owners become so inundated with best services and webby speak that they are running in circles for any solution? or is it just lack of research on the client who spends a wad of $ on a site and now is stuck with a hunk of crap for a website?”

I often get approached by such customers who have had bad experiences and are basically stuck with a website they aren’t happy with. Sometimes I can help them, but other times, in all honesty, the customer has essentially shot him/herself in the foot. He/she may have paid a great deal of dough for something but didn’t fully research what they were wanting or perhaps didn’t perform enough reserach with their web person.

So, sorry to say, but I’d attribute it to lack of research on the part of the customer/business owner. As an example, here is a bit about a recent case that I am in the middle of… I talked to a customer a couple of weeks ago who paid a web programming outfit $3k (a firm that was out of state no less, as opposed to locally) before meeting with them and fully researching their reputation for a custom developed website, which the web firm only developed partially left it dead in its tracks, partially done. That was over a year ago. The programmer I talked to a couple of days ago, about helping get this guy’s site “fixed” to what it really should be, noted that it’s possible that due to the size and complexity of the project, the programmer probably hit a wall and stopped working on the site because he underestimated the project and thusly the project was under-funded. According to the scope of the work, I could easily see that it was going to cost at least $5k more to finish the job.

To avoid this in the first place, a customer seeking a “best solution”, good track record and reputation should be the formost goal and quality can be found aplenty if you do the following (in no real order of importance):

* Research! Go online to see the web guru’s site and look at their portfolio. Don’t just look at the pictures of the websites. A) look the site up in Google to see if it’s still online and b) Look to see that it’s the same design and designer as previously linked on the site you found it at. b) Does the website look good/professional? Does it have errors? Does it look like it’s something you would consider paying at least $1,000 or more for? (whether it means you need to request a grant or business loan to accomplish the investment.

* Ask other businesses (who have had trackable SUCCESS with their websites) what company they used/service they purchased

* Ask whoever you are prospecting, for website work for the names and contact details of several recent customers who they have done sites/website work for

* Ask those customers how they were treated, if they feel the price was well worth the end result, and how likely they would be to HIGHLY recommend that web guru for their own site?

The above may sound ridiculous, but consider the following:

* People think that they can go to Office Depot and buy software to do their own website and have it be great, but essentially it winds up looking very amateur and like you purchased a copy of “My First Website” on CD because you don’t have the knowledge/training and it will not result in a professional image of you or your business.

* Same with hiring your nephew/kid brother just because he is “tinkering” around on web design or did a home page for his soccer team. Unless you can guarantee the quality, anyway.

* People also consider price over actual quality and perceive that since web gurus/designers must be a dime a dozen nowadays, there’s bound to be someone out there who will get them a site that’s as large and complex as eBay for a song and a dance.

* Same with those thinking about hiring overseas tech people to do the job. Although there is nothing wrong with it, and certainly someone earning $10/hr per project may be able to feed a family in Bangalore, it won’t cut it here in the U.S., no disrespect to anyone in Bangalore! I’ve got clients and encountered some which I can count on one hand who’ve tried this, and wound up needing expert local help getting their site reverted to a different solution just so they can make some quick updates. One in particular, we had to basically rebuild the site from the ground up all over again because, the guy they hired in Thailand was no longer available and the client wanted to add more photos to his gallery (he’s a photographer).

“I’ve worked with many software engineers , designers and developers - these people have their own language and often times have great difficulty “dumbing” stuff down for the novice. So how are you, the web designer communicating to someone your services?”

Communication is definitely important, but as Kurt mentioned–and I’ll echo his sentiments–it’s very unnecessary to even go down the road of talking “tech” to anyone. Here’s how/why I feel this way…

In all my initial dealings with clients, I have converstations with them about…

- what they want their site to DO
- who their audience is
- what the value or perceived value of their services/products is
- what the desired action is that they want from visitors
- and whether they want to be able to manage the site on their own or need updates done for them on an ongoing basis.

The rest is up to me to simply get across to the client what tasks are involved, and a schedule of cost and timelines.

And as for dumbing anything down? It’s often not necessary. But if a client cares to know the boring details, I certainly make them transparent to them (with plain English explanations). Nine times out of ten, unless they are worried about it, they don’t as and don’t care to know the “webby” stuff, per se.

I still fully believe that tech speak is very unnecessary, even in an effort to show you’re qualified and/or make the client fully aware of why X costs Z, and so on. Again, the web guru/firm’s track record should fully expose them for what they are, and if you are in doubt, don’t hire them!

Like someone I know posted at a network I belong to, if someone really wants to know what something means, they can “bloody well Google it!”

“I’m going too the movies with (so-and-so) on Friday night [...] I heard your going, to.”

I am such a snob about English (though I admit, I am guilty of some goofs now and then), that when I get messages like the one above, I have to stifle the urge to write back with a sharp tongue. Though it would be very satisfying to reply, “I’m not going anywhere with a dolt like you! Don’t you know how to use English correctly?”, I could bet they would reconsider our friendship!

But it’s not just taking place in words we write or type.  It’s also rampant in our conversations with one another on the phone, and in person.

Now, we’re not all perfect when it comes to grammar.   However, I think things have gotten ridiculously out of hand when it comes to folks uttering even the most simple sentences.  I have formed a strong opinion that modern Standard English has been beaten nearly to death these past few decades!

With the Internet being more readily available to us at home, at work and in our place of business, coupled with the millions of choices we have in other media such as television and radio, the widespread misuse of English has lead us to see and hear others writing and speaking incorrectly all too frequently, and it becomes very easy to simply parrot and repeat commonly misused words and phrases.

I have this odd fantasy, where generations of long-dead English teachers, professors, writers and linguists are spinning in their graves every time someone says they are “heading towards” something, or when someone asks a telemarketer on the phone what their call is “in regards to”! This has got to stop!

The good news is, there are some easy rules in place about certain words and phrases in Standard English, and if you remember and practice them when writing and speaking, you can become a stronger communicator no matter the situation, whether it’s in business communications (i.e., e-mails, phone calls, meetings), or simply while taking part in casual, everyday conversation.

Let’s make it so that 21st century is remembered as one full of correct and graceful speakers and writers!

Farther vs. further
Farther is talking about physical distance.  Further is talking about an extension of time or degree.

Wrong: “Let’s take this conversation farther, in my office.”
Right: “Let’s take this conversation further, in my office”

Wrong: “How much further are we going to travel?”
Right: “How much farther are we going to travel?”

Lose vs. loose
Lose is when you lose something or someone.  Loose, is the opposite of tight,  when something has gotten away, or is unattached.

Wrong: John will loose his coverage if he doesn’t pay his insurance bill.
Right: John will lose his coverage if he doesn’t pay his insurance bill.

Wrong: I need to tighten this belt, it’s too lose.
Right: I need to tighten this belt, it’s too loose.

Averse vs. adverse
Adverse is not favorable, averse is reluctance (when you don’t want to do something).

Wrong: Stacy is not adverse to socializing while at work
Right: Stacy is not averse to socializing while at work.

Wrong: My stomach had an averse reaction to eating eggs.
Right: My stomach had an adverse reaction to eating eggs.

Peak/peek/pique
Peak is a mountain top, or the top of the height of something.  Peek is to take a glance or quick look.  Pique is when something might grab attention.

Wrong: My interest was peaked after I took a pique at the brochure showcasing Pike’s Peek.
Right: My interest was piqued after I took a peek at the brochure showcasing Pike’s Peak.

Complement vs. compliment
Complement is when one thing makes another thing appear/taste good, or be better than it already is.  Compliment is a pleasant remark to give to someone about something they did, something about them, or on what they’re wearing, bought, etc.

Wrong: Bill complemented Ann on her new dress.  It complimented her eyes.
Right: Bill complimented Ann on her new dress.  It complemented her eyes.

Wrong: The waiter served a complementary Pinot Noir to compliment our meal.
Right: The waiter served a complimentary Pinot Noir to complement our meal.

Fewer vs. less
Fewer is used in reference to something that can be counted.  Use less when you can’t count it.

Wrong: There are less clouds in the sky, now that the rain has gone.
Right: There are fewer clouds in the sky, now that the rain has gone.

There are plenty more of these to come, in the next post for this series!

These are just a few reasons why I find Mozilla Firefox to be a better browser than Internet Explorer:

* There are literally thousands of totally free ways to customize your Firefox to fit exactly what you like to do online.

* It’s 100% open-source, which means that if you don’t like the way something in Firefox works, you can crack open the hook and make changes to it. To learn how to make Firefox your very own personalized web browser, go to Google.com and try a search on “Firefox addons” or “customize Firefox”. Explore the possibilities! Ever tried customizing Internet Explorer to make it work exactly how you want it? Not exactly possible. You CAN make some changes to the way Internet Explorer works, but you will find you are limited to a few things. That’s it.

* It’s more secure than Internet Explorer (this is my big reason to use Firefox). Internet Explorer is a window into your computer’s operating system, if you are a Microsoft Windows user, since Internet Explorer is built in as part of your computer’s proprietary file explorer/handler and operating shell. Ever notice how, when you are browsing your “My Documents” folder (or any other computer folder, for that matter), you can type in a web address into the file’s address bar, and boom! You are now browsing that web page on the Internet? That’s one simple example of how Internet Explorer is like having the blinds up on one of the windows in your house at night, with all the lights on. Everyone driving or walking by your house can see what’s inside and what you are doing. With Firefox (or other browsers like Opera), they are not part of your computer’s system, and so they remain separate from it, allowing you to have more privacy and security.

* Protection against web forgery and phishing. Firefox has built-in protection tools to show you when you are visiting a site that is trying desperately to steal your identity, your passwords or financial information. Whenever you happen to visit sites trying to do this, a fake bank sites, fake eBay site or forged PayPal login pages, for example, you will see a large red bar at the top from Firefox, warning you that they have detected the site as a forgery or phishing site.

There are many more reasons why Firefox is better, plus it is a just plain more enjoyable way to surf and use the Internet!

Get Firefox for free and switch to it as your main browser now!

Read more about the benefits of Firefox, plus tips & tricks.

PS - Yes, the word “Internet” is supposed to always be capitalized.

You are probably familiar with at least a few of the services available, which can be used to assist you in your campaign and list management, as well as mailing out the newsletters for your business.

Here are just some of the more popular e-mail marketing service providers:

MailChimp - Constant Contact - Mad Mimi - Campaign Monitor - CakeMail - iContact

When folks share experiences with me about having so many bounces/spam reports after sending out a newsletter, it frustrate me, because many times, they are mostly unaware that much of the data collected isn’t always accurate. Which is why flinging an e-mail newsletter to 1,000 folks out of the clear blue sky, is not good. People change jobs, companies, emails constantly.

If your company has been collecting many e-mails over a long period (a few months or more) you will find many bounces/spam reports after sending out your very first newsletter.  Especially if they haven’t heard from you a) ever, or b) for the first time in a long while (a couple months or more).

The best way to avoid too many people clicking “mark as spam” after reading, would be to ask your list members to confirm their subscription in the first place (long before you decide to place the list on hold and wait until you send out your company’s first e-mail).

E-mail marketing service providers (including the ones we’ve been discussing so far) have very strict policies about getting your e-mail list to be as clean as a whistle, and in my experince with MailChimp and Campaign Monitor, as I go through the steps to start a new list/campaign for a client, I’m asked multiple times to either ensure my list complies with the non-spam policies and/or review them again before proceeding to be sure. It should be assumed that ANY company providing e-mail marketing services has these in place, as well.

The first time you send a newsletter campaign to a big list without checking it twice—puts you at risk of having the message marked as spam, getting unsubscribes/drops, and bounces*. When this happens, your service provider will likely let you know with reports you can view to see the number of occurrences. They may, based on a high number of bad results, decide to put your account under suspension or simply give a warning. Just knowing there is even a handful of unsubscribes or spam complaints can be jarring, even make you feel rejected and hurt.

Some companies may not even contact you the first time this happens, they might just suspend you or put you in their “suspicious” list, then watch every move you make, under a microscope.

The reasons many companies won’t—and—shouldn’t contact you to let you know you screwed up—have nothing to do with how good they are, vs. other companies. It’s simply something that these companies want to have universally understood—which is that your list needs to be rock-solid, completely opt-in.

The problem occurs when businesses think that just because they pay money for a list rather than spend lots of time collecting subscribers the old-fashioned way, means they get an easy A+. Many of these list vendors have old data, etc., and although they will swear up and down that the folks in the lists they sell are interested (100% opt-in is usually the phrase they use), they are typically and historically known to NOT be.

On the other side of the coin…
Even having a well-built, old-fashioned permission-based list, collecting data from folks as recently as six months, to as far out as one year (a 2-year old list is a HUGE risk) can be a burden, since people are fickle and change their minds about who they want to hear from, as they are allowed to—which results in angry vibes from folks who forget who you are, or are no longer interested, and promptly hit the “unsubscribe” link or worse, the “mark as spam” link. It’s a tough row to hoe, this mailing list business.

Some folks see e-mail marketing rules and list policies as hassles. The reason that these companies keep reminding customers about list policies is because they are protecting themselves, as well as us, the customers. I had a client say to me recently, “Now that you have the newsletter designed and the list set up, why don’t you forward me a copy of the template and news articles and I will copy and paste it, then forward to everyone in my address book?” Um… no! One could easily send out a big mailing through their Outlook program or Yahoo! Mail on their own, but what would that get them? A lot of undelivered messages, complaints to your hosting provider/email service about spam, and possibly even having your e-mail account shut down forever, regardless of whether you sent it through Outlook Internet mail, Yahoo! Mail, Hotmail, etc.

E-mail marketing services are hosted solutions, and when we pay these companies, we are in fact lending their servers for the time it takes to send out our messages, therefore reducing risk to our own servers/hosts, however, you can certainly tarnish your business’s name by having multiple occurrences of undesirable results, bad links, unsubscribes and bounces. These companies are putting their good name and reputation on the line every day when folks like us send out mass e-mails with their services. They are also protecting us when they remind us time and again, that the list we are using is to be 100% opt-in, and nothing less. It’s not a hassle. They are not liable for our actions, so that’s why they suspend those who continue to ignore the list policies.

There’s a reason why sending out newsletters is a form of permission-based marketing. I cringe whenever people use the term “e-mail blast” or “mass e-mail” because it gives me clues as to how they perceive this type of marketing. I also really hate when someone I’ve only met once or twice (or heck, more than that) has decided to throw me into their e-mailing list without my permission, in the hopes that I give enough of a crap to consider reading their silly e-mail. I have no qualms about un-subscribing in a heartbeat, followed by a slam-dunk on the [DEL] key. If they really cared and followed the rules, their first e-mail to me would have been one containing a mailing list invite, followed by another e-mail with a link to confirm (if I chose to subscribe). Period.

Here are some links to manifestos from the companies mentioned herein, on what each service has to say about lists…

iContact List Policy - 100% opt-in:
http://www.icontact.com/help/question.php?ID=157

MailChimp - Is my e-mail list OK to use?
http://tinyurl.com/ljzgvs

Constant Contact’s Anti-Spam & List policy:
http://www.constantcontact.com/uidocs/CCSpamPolicy.jsp

Mad Mimi’s Terms of service:
http://madmimi.com/legal/terms

Campaign Monitor Help topic - What is your permission policy?
http://www.campaignmonitor.com/anti-spam/

CakeMail - Anti-Spam policy:
http://www.cakemail.com/antispam-policy

Once you’ve read through these, explore each service’s offerings, features, pricing, and get reviews from others using the services. When it’s time to start your own campaign list and get ready to send out your first e-mail, you will be well-prepared to do it.

Before you get ready, though, follow this checklist:

Ensuring you follow this checklist will go a long way to not only ensure that 100% of the members of your list have given you permission to e-mail them, but will also show your intent, and that you care—which not only reduces a lot of the negative vibes they might get from you just throwing them an email that they weren’t expecting—it also might garner some trust and appreciation toward your company.

* Explanation of bounces
A hard bounce happens when the recipient’s address is invalid and not in service. It happens when the domain name doesn’t exist, the e-mail recipient is unknown, or some kind of network problem on the recipient’s end has happened.

A soft bounce happens when an e-mail is bounced back before it reaches the recipient, and the recipient does exist on the server. There are usually two reasons for soft bounces: the recipient’s mailbox is full (if they have a limit on it); the recipient is on vacation/out of the office/away from receiving e-mails, and have an auto-reply set up to say so.

First, a little background on Facebook Pages.

You know those fun, brightly-colored, interactive Facebook “fan” pages… you’ve seen?  Like Target, Coca-Cola, etc.?

I am going to shed some light on how they do it, and you can do it, yourself.

Here is my page - a work in progress of course.

So far, there’s not much there besides a brief intro of my business and what I do.  There also is two fan options - you can click on the button at the top “Become a fan” and invite other friends to become a fan, at the bottom.

Once someone becomes a fan, they will view my standard Facebook business page.  Before they do, they get this “Welcome” tab page.

As for mine, well…I don’t like it very much. Yet!  As I said, it’s a work in progress.

The application you want to use, to create more of a “fancy” page which adds a tab (in my case, it’s the “Welcome” tab that I used this on), is called Static FBML (FBML = Facebook markup language). Yes, folks.  Facebook has it’s very own markup language, much like Oprah has her own book section at Amazon.com.!

Some other (elaborate) examples of custom FBML-generated pages:

Mari Smith - Relationship and Buzz Marketing Specialist

Fern Thai Foundation

Great Hudson River Revival

To use the FBML application successfuly, here are the steps involved:

Go to this page:
Adding Widgets To Your Facebook Fan Pages

Follow those steps in the link above, and you are on your way to having just as fabulous a Facebook presence as the big guys!

Some caveats:

1) You either need to be familiar with HTML or have a way to generate HTML (such as FrontPage, Dreamweaver, etc.), in order to copy/paste the HTML into your new tab created with the Static FBML application. One could also create a draft blog post at their favorite blogging site (WordPress blog, Blogger.com) and copy the generated HTML code to the box.

2) You must have a Facebook PAGE (i.e. a business page on FB, to use this). You cannot use it on a standard profile…and in fact, Facebook discourages the use of personal profiles with ‘friends’ as a business page and has been known to take down accounts doing so.

Case in point:

At an online business networking group I belong to, someone posted a comment about Jones Soda Co. doing a promotion where you can send them your photos to be placed on their soda bottles and even on the case packaging.

This fellow member also commented on the fact that he recently discovered the soda on product shelves at his local store and never heard of them before.  This surprised me.  But I digress…The photo submissions stuff isn’t very new, in fact Jones has been doing this for some time.

But why do they do this?

They exist to be different. To be outrageous.

Their first exceptional difference is the quality of the product. They only sweeten the soda with real cane sugar, not high-fructose corn syrup, which most sodas contain. The cane sugar is more natural and probably better for us, anyway.  You don’t see Coca-Cola and Pepsico doing this with their sodas!

They also differentiate by not using cans or plastic bottles, but glass bottles for their products, which are more eco-friendly.

Finally, they are different in that they follow a very different beat, than many other soda companies (or any companies, for that matter) do.  For example.

This fellow at the online networking group, having never heard much about Jones before, found a YouTube video of people tasting the various strange flavors of soda that Jones created in the past, for Thanksgiving (turkey, gravy, etc.) and exclaimed in his post how absurd he thought it was for a soda company to do that, asking how that could even be  profitable.

Well, it certainly was.  When Jones Soda came out with the Thanksgiving holiday flavors, they not only pushed the envelope with the concept, but it also turned out to be a hot collector’s item, as they were a limited edition.  I’m sure the flavors were gross, but they were obviously safe to drink, or else they wouldn’t produce them.

But why would a soda company would purposely make atrocious flavors? Because they are a cutting-edge business.

The flavors were certainly different! But the bottling/packaging of the product, the photo submissions/marketing factor, the ingredients, even the attitude of the company…all stand out from the competition.

Being different, doing the unexpected, being unusual is good for business!  I’m surprised this fellow even had to ASK!

Differentiate yourself, be on the cutting edge! But make sure it’s true to who you are as a brand and product/service.

Call me crazy, but I would sooner buy a non-essential product or service (especially for fun or entertainment) from a guy who said goofy things and sported a blue mohawk, than someone who was straight-laced and bored me to death with his speil.

How do you, as a business owner, differentiate? Do you do things that are considered off-center, non-traditional, or even perhaps, strange, to be noticed and get business?