Just Another SEO Manifesto

seo manifesto

If I had only one thing to say about search engine optimization, it’d be this: don’t chase the search engines, instead chase what the search engines are chasing. Search engines are in the business of getting people what they want. In an ideal world, people ask search engines an honest question and receive an honest [...]

Give Me One Reason to Share It and I’ll Spread Your Post Around

reasons to share content

There are a lot of blips on our daily radars. We check our Twitter stream. We drop in on Google+. We comb through our RSS feeds. And for the most part, we ignore most of the content we see. Why? Because we’ve read it before. Because it sounds too familiar. Because it’s obvious. Because it’s [...]

3 Questions to Ask Before Jumping on a Marketing Bandwagon

3 Questions to Ask Before Jumping on a Marketing Bandwagon

It’s tough not to fall victim to me-tooism in our competitive media landscape. There are oohs and ahhs to reap, awards to win, client and board expectations to exceed and egos to stroke. So we see something shiny and we chase it. We see a toy and call it a tool, and make it part of our marketing [...]

Magazine ‘App’-titude

Magazine ‘App’-titude

When CNN announced plans earlier last week to acquire Zite, an upstart creator of magazine apps for Apple’s iPad, it wasn’t exactly Earth-shattering news. The East Coast was still sweeping up after Irene. In the wake of a disaster that almost was, the acquisition caused nary a ripple in the blogosphere. Understandable. The announcement didn’t [...]

3 Things the Top 10 Viral Videos of All Time Have in Common

Old Spice Guy

Want to watch a baby do flips on rollerblades? How about people playing the piano with their feet? Maybe you’d rather see a biker riding on the tops of stores and jumping off bridges? Well I’m sure I have your attention now…or maybe you’ve already seen the videos I’m talking about on YouTube or some [...]

How Google Reads Your Blog

google magnifying glass on sites

Smart businesses know that in order to truly serve their customer, they need to put themselves in their customers shoes and learn to think like them. They need to feel their pain, understand their needs and figure out how they can serve people efficiently and effectively. Which is why it makes sense that when Google [...]

Mr. Editor, Tear Down This Wall

Advertorial Wall

You know what word I hate? Advertorial. I’m not alone. For those of us who cut our journalistic chops in the newsroom, the division of editorial and advertising is as sacred as the constitutional separation of church and state. My first reporting gig out of college was covering the use of technology in education. Eager [...]

3 Unrealistic Promises Made About Social Media

boardroom hot tub

It’s easy to get overly ambitious when making the case for social media. When the board room is finally ready to listen, we breathlessly explain the social media sea change and how our organization can ride the wave. And in our excitement, we sometimes make the case too well. We make it seem too easy. [...]

7 Common Reasons Email Subscribers Stop Subscribing

7 reasons email subscribers stop subscribing

The email inbox is a battleground. There’s a lot of competition in the marketplace – nearly a quarter of a trillion emails are sent per day – and keeping subscribers happy is a challenge. Every email you send is a potential invitation for someone to unsubscribe. Here are seven commons reasons subscribers choose to end [...]

4 Tips for Developing a Blog Comment Policy

soap in mouth

If you’ve spent much in social media, you’ve probably been warned not to “feed the trolls.” Trolls, as Wikipedia will tell you, are defined as “someone who posts inflammatory, extraneous, or off-topic messages in an online community, such as an online discussion forum, chat room, or blog, with the primary intent of provoking readers into [...]

Lessons Learned from a Twitter Robot

lessons learned from a twitter robot, contentasaurus pictured

A robot didn’t write this post. But if technology continues at the current pace, a future with bot-authored posts may not be too far off on the horizon. Depressing? Definitely. Crazy? Maybe not. Automation is alive and well in the world of social media and the debate rages on whether social media automation defeats the [...]

Is Your Content Worth Stealing?

is your content worth stealing, picture of a burglar alarm

I hope you steal this blog post. There won’t be an alarm that goes off. The Feds won’t come to get you, and no one will probably ever know that you did. It’s not a trick, it’s not a trap, and it’s not a lure. I actually want you to. Because that means I’ve done [...]

If This Post Were a Search Engine Results Page

search engine result page

And each phrase was a result (18.2%) With a percentage next to it (10.1%)

4 Ways to Get More Mileage Out of Old Content

nickelodeon old content all that, picture of a girl getting slimed

I’m a ’90s baby. I grew up during, at least what I believe to be, the peak of Nickelodeon’s programming. These classic Nick shows represented an iconic part of tv’s pop culture and had everything from talking babies (Rugrats), a dog and cat conjoined (Catdog), action shows (Legends of the Hidden Temple) and pretty much [...]

If Your Website Burst into Flames, What Would You Keep?

If Your Website Burst into Flames, What Would You Keep?

Like an attic in an old house, websites tend to be a place where we set something down for the time-being, and that time-being turns into eternity. And it ends up being very cluttered. It’s the web, after all. It’s virtually limitless. We can upload as much as we want, we can trick out navigational [...]

Kenny Powers, K-Swiss, and the Ramifications of Viral Success

kenny powers viral video

By now, you’ve probably seen the radical campaign from K-Swiss where Kenny Powers (a fictional character played by Danny McBride) takes over as CEO (ahem, mother***king CEO) of the company and reinvents their image via profanity-laced one-liners and no shortage of comic gold. (If you haven’t, scroll down for the video. Make sure you’re wearing [...]

An Unglamorous Website Maintenance Checklist

web maintenance checklist, maintenance workers pictured

Many of us were drawn to the world of digital media because of the promise of creativity. We liked the sound of coming up with catchy headlines that resulted in clicks. We liked the idea of thinking up ideas for infographics that would garner links. We were drawn in by the challenge to create content [...]

The Joe Paterno Guide to Branding

joe paterno guide to branding

Whether you bleed blue and white or boo when you see it, it’s hard to deny that Penn State football has a strong brand. And most of the credit for that is probably due to the life work of Joe Paterno – the de facto face of Penn State football and the winningest coach in [...]

5 Tips for Successful Magazine Covers

great magazine covers successful

You know it when you see it. It might catch your eye and prompt you to flip the pages. It might capture a famous person or an iconic moment and ask all the right questions. And sometimes … it might even make your jaw drop. Could it be the typography, the image, the colors, the [...]

← Previous Entries

Next Entries →