I found this paste-up yesterday:
Blog
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Duck
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How to rank in 2013
I found a good summary of SEO. Good practical framework to guide you through the 200+ rank factors. Recommended.
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Keep this link: “How to launch anything”
I enjoyed reading this article by Nathan Barry:
Recommended read.
My summary in my own words:
Start marketing early – even before the product is developed. This helps to identify your audience and to write a marketing plan.
Write with a purpose. Set a goal and work towards the goal.
Analyze your starting point. Who do you have in your network? Who and what can help you reach your goal?
No marketing budget to buy ads? Start teaching. Teach everything you know. It’s a way to start building trust and building a relationship.
Create a good landing page with an email opt-in form.
Write educational blog posts. Focus on creating high quality blog entries that teach the reader. Re-write and edit your blog entries until you feel they could be part of a book.
Mention your product. Include an email opt-in form in each blog post. But don’t write to sell, write to teach.Collect email addresses and send out a regular newsletter. Remember contacts go cold.
Plan your launch sequence. Communicate all details well in advance. Send a pitch email one day before the launch. On the launch day, send a simple announcement email. Publish your sales page. Consider offering a discount on launch day.
Say thank you to everyone who helped you on the launch.
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A flower snapshot
A poppy for the boring flower set.
Poppies are associated with Remembrance Day.
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Malawi on Twitter – Version June 2013
Twitter lists are its most powerful and least-used feature.
(Source)While I am fully aware, that Twitter lists have lost significance in the past years, I still maintain a list on Malawi.
Since the early days of Twitter, Malawian content has increased many fold.
Social media content about Malawi during general election time, or about President Mutharika’s death, proved to be fairly accurate.
Obviously, a tweet on its own is just raw material. It needs further analysing and fact-checking.
Why Twitter? There is still lots of misunderstanding and one-sided reporting regarding African countries. Largely due to ignorance and the way mainstream media continue to report about the African continent.
Best way to change this perception? Well, one way is to tweet and share your views and opinions. Some ideas:
- Share your technical innovations and solutions.
- Tweet about your business idea and find partners for business and trade opportunities.
- Build networks and become a trusted citizen journalist.
- Show the positive and beautiful aspects of the country.
- Write about societal and linguistic changes.
- Write about mobile technology and its daily usage and fast adoption in Malawi.
- Provide a realistic view of the challenges a small country like Malawi faces in a globalized world.
Tweet streams included in the list encompass:
- Malawians living in Malawi 😉
- Expats living in Malawi
- Malawians living abroad
- Organizations based in Malawi (e.g. business companies, media companies, governmental channels, charities and NGOs)
- Organization outside of Malawi, but in some way connected to Malawi (usually charities or NGOs)
- Journalists or academics writing about Malawi
In my humble opinion, Paper.li is a great way to visualize articles. E.g. Malawi Tribune by Mabvuto Banda
Other Twitter lists on Malawi:
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Because writing helps
Sometimes I wish I had developed Chiperoni.ch into a confessional blog. You know the kind where you write about your worries and sorrow and challenges.
Why? Because writing helps.
I noticed yesterday that writing helped me to sort through a difficult web navigational problem that I am encountering. It helps me to reflect.
The benefits of writing daily. Which i don’t manage to do. Yet. Weekly would be a first, reachable goal.
My head is buzzing with lots of questions and ideas. This is where I can list them and then return at leisure. Still in line with my blog definition of 2004.
Some articles on web and social media content that I’d like to mention here:
The first is not new for bloggers. We noticed this long ago. In addition to quality content, frequency matters.
Here’s an interesting entry on link building and local SEO. In a nutshell: Focus on developing good content and engaging with your community on social media rather than spending $$$ on dubious SEO providers that add links from low-quality sites.
Writing tip via Seth Godin: Say the opposite. This also works for ideas. Try and think of your worst idea ever. So
stupid and dumb, nobody would ever use it. Often this helps you to find original ideas.I am hearing a lot about Kaizen and I have questions:
- Aren’t Kaizen and Scrum related? What are the differences?
- And a dumb question – If Kaizen is a way to improve continuously, and Kaizen originated in Japan, why is the Japanese economy stagnating for so many years? Is it not used as much in Japanese business?
I found a great website that rates the Terms of Service of various web and mobile apps.
http://t.co/tFZttJrekP reminds me of https://t.co/NYOfV7qHnA
— âœ___CollectThisTweet (@nchenga) June 17, 2013
This morning I remembered some ancient poetry that we used to sing at school assembly in Blantyre.
Enjoy the warm weather.
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Summer time
Finally summer is here. With a big bang. At least that’s my perception. After weeks and weeks of rain. Today temperatures may cross the 30 degree mark in Basel.
Camera update:
In case you’re wondering about the EXIF data. I swapped my Canon Powershot S90 with my mom’s Ricoh CX 6. And I bought a Lumix.I love the wild flowers that are growing along the road curbs. This traffic refuge was full of buzzing bees.
Have a good week.
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Successful blogging?
I love reading list articles. Here’s one that appeared on my radar today:
6 Pillars of a Successful Blog
And just for fun, I’ll run thru the list and assess my own private blogging chez moi.
So let’s get started…
Purpose/Message/Mission
This is a private blog. The main purpose is to learn and reflect.It’s an ever-evolving mix of learning, reflection, discovery and knowledge management. I’ve always said it’s like a scrap book. Chiperoni.ch will no longer do well from an SEO point-of-view, because the topics are too diverse, too sporadic. I write about the Internet and online marketing. I link to my huge Flickr collection of snapshots. I write about architecture and travel. I post Youtube videos. I try out WordPress plugins and themes.
If you’re setting up a blog for business purposes, think about your purpose. Brainstorm ideas. Put together an editorial calendar. This will help you stand out from the crowd.
Email Newsletter
I don’t send out an email newsletter for this blog. While this Google service still exists, you can get an email notification via Feedburner:There are some pretty cool email newsletter plugins for WordPress. I briefly tried Wysija. There’s also Sendpress and Email Newsletter to try. And yes, I wholeheartedly agree… if you want your blog to grow, send out a regular email newsletter.
I do have a cool WordPress plugin called Thank me later, which sends auto-sends thank you messages to people that leave a comment.
A Free E-Book/Manifesto
There is no free e-book to download. There is no manifesto to link to at Chiperoni.ch. Yet. I have plans to write a book or two. Maybe. Some day.David Meerman-Scott uses e-books very effectively for his topics.
I am a regular reader of the e-books at Hubspot.
IMHO, you should spend some $$ on your e-book layout to get a better return.
A Product/Business Model
There is no business model at Chiperoni.ch. I am here for fun. This is a private, non-profit blog. There is no advertising. So far I have not published any paid blog entries here. If this changes, I will publish a disclosure statement.Again if you’re planning to offer a product or service, put some thought into your business model. A good starter is this business model generation canvas. It leads you through various business questions.
Site Design
I like minimal blog designs. Currently I am using themes by Elma.If you’re building a business, test your site design using a poor man’s usability test. Ideally before coding; using a paper test. Find 5 people that fit your site’s target audience. Think of some site tasks you would like to test, e.g. how to contact you; how to ask for a quote. Ask your test person to think out loud while performing the tasks. And then sit next to them and quietly observe how your test person navigates through your site.
Check your site design from an SEO point of view. Are there enough text areas for your key phrases on your main landing pages? I would avoid overusing fancy carousel and slider plugins. Do you have one sentence explaining your main mission, written in HTML?
Effective Self Promotion
It’s 2013. You need to find creative ways to promote your business blog. The Internet is a vast ocean of data. Nobody is waiting for your cool product or service. If your self promotion is too low-key, nobody will notice you. If your self promotion is too heavy and your service offering doesn’t match, you will put people off.I am stating the obvious. My only advice is to try various ideas and find a marketing mix that works for you. Trial and error.
Or build a private, non-profit blog like Chiperoni.ch. And as such I don’t need to join the success theater.
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For the boring flower snapshot gallery
Another addition for my boring flower snapshot set:
Carpe diem. Enjoy today. Don’t fight and argue. Meditate on beautiful and worthy things. Create something. Relax. Life is very short and fragile.
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Is there life after death?
Just heard very sad news via Skype about a tragic traffic accident.
Is there life after death? How will you measure your life?
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It’s ok to hate Twitter
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Identity and culture
Somewhere deep inside of me, I have this blog post bubbling up and forming about identity. It is influenced by my own state of being an eternal foreigner, an Auslandsdeutsche. But also influenced by other observations on organizational cultures and the changes within the internet.
I started watching this talk by Anil Dash:
He says being a blogger in the early years (a decade ago, from approximately 1999 to 2006) was an identity. Bloggers had a shared set of values. There was a culture and a common understanding.
Nobody calls themselves a Facebooker.
I recommend viewing this video and reflecting on the thoughts.
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Murten walk
I followed another recommended walk from the little yellow booklet, published by the Swiss heritage society.
This time I headed to Murten to see the city wall.
It was snowing quite heavily. The lake was invisible in grey clouds. But still fun.
Especially with a cup of hot chocolate.
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Banana Bread Recipe
Squishy bananas.
So I tried to make this:
Banana Bread Recipe by Simply Recipes.
But unfortunately, I added a lot of variations. Such as nuts and dried apricots and cocoa. So I can’t really recommend the recipe or write a review. But despite the odds, the result is delicious.
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Moving from Google Reader to WordPress.com
Even though Google Reader showed up prominently in yesterday’s SERPs for “best free RSS reader”, someone at Google has decided to end the product life of Google Reader.
It’s time to move on to a new RSS reader.
Several RSS readers managed to survive despite Google Reader’s dominance. And some new ones emerged. These tools are getting frequent mentions:
- Feedly
- NewsBlur
- RSSOwl
- Zite
- The old reader
Digg decided to build a new reader the day Google announced the end of its Reader. In some ways, that’s the silver lining. RSS readers are getting more attention than in the past years combined.
WordPress.com
This is how you can import your RSS subscriptions into WordPress.com.
First, go to Google Takeout to download your Google Reader data:
The process is fairly straightforward.
Click Download and save the zip file on your computer.
Voilà . Saved the data for future use. Who knew! I’ve got 6.5 MB of shared Google Reader articles.
WordPress.com offers an RSS reader. I don’t know if I’ll make WordPress.com my RSS Reader, but there’s one advantage. I already have a login for WordPress.com. And it’s easy to try out. This is what I did to add my RSS subscriptions (not my past shared articles!) to WordPress.com:
Click Import your subscriptions.
I used the special service: Import your Google Reader sunscriptions directly.
I allowed WordPress.com to access Google Reader.
That’s it. Done.
The challenge: so far WordPress.com isn’t in my regular flow of news sites that I visit. I use it for special photo projects, Akismet and Jetpack.
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e-bike rage, i haz it
I think i am developing a bad case of e-bike rage. Two days in a row, the same two e-bikes (bicycles powered by an electric engine) overtook me (cycling on a regular, muscle-powered bicycle) so closely, I thought they’d hit my bicycle handlebar.
This morning I was waiting at a red light. A car was standing in the lane next to me. Just when the robot lights changed to green, and i started to pedal away, an e-bike hurtled thru from behind between my bicycle and the car.
Next, just 2 minutes later, another e-biker on a black and white Cannondale had to overtake me in a small roundabout; while I was entering and exiting a roundabout. Kind of risky. Cos if i had taken the next exit, we would have collided.
And I am pretty certain I saw the same two e-bikers yesterday….
E-bikes are very popular here.
Please don’t overtake at junctions, robots or in roundabouts.
OK, thx bai.
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Sunday photo walk
I went photo walking again.
I took the S3 from Basel to Saint-Ursanne today. It was beautifully sunny.
BTW, I am planning to work my way thru this little guide by the Swiss Heritage Society.
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Integrated
For future reference:
Better SEO through Integrated Content Marketing
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Cafés in Basel
Via Tageswoche, a list of cafés to visit in Basel:
“Das sind die acht schönsten Cafés” in Basel und Umgebung bit.ly/Wrpfr2
— âœ___CollectThisTweet (@nchenga) February 27, 2013
Your faves?
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How to spend more time on the important tasks?
Multi-tasking between several assigned projects can lead to situations where project team members can’t spend enough on their prio 1 tasks. Obviously the best remedy is to assign enough time resources for a project. But in reality, lots of big and small tasks pile on. Urgent. Last minute. And your strategically important project gets sidelined.
The question is:
How do you allocate enough time to your prio 1 tasks? Some things that work for me:- Schedule and block time in your calendar for important projects
- Start your work day with the important tasks
- Set yourself reminders
- Seek active collaboration with other project members
Your tips?
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Khachapuri
Inspired by a., I tried making khachapuri, Georgian cheese bread. It was a fun project and very tasty.
There are lots of recipes.
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WP Jetpack comments blocked
If you get a message like this on your WordPress site:
Error 403
We’re sorry, but we could not fulfill your request for /wordpress/wp-comments-post.php?for=jetpack on this server.
You do not have permission to access this server. Data may not be posted from offsite forms.
Your technical support key is:
The security plugin Bad Behavior is preventing the comment from being published.
You can either 1) go to Settings > Bad Behavior and select this option:
Allow form postings from other web sites (required for OpenID; increases spam received)Or 2) you can simply deactivate Jetpack Comments.
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Content curator’s future
Everybody’s pumping content into the Internet ocean. The ratio of good, useful content vs me-toos will most likely decrease even further. But how will we discern the high quality content from the rest? One recipe is to look at the social signals.
I am not sure this path will provide such great results, cos it depends on me as a user *liking a post* and *following* the right kind of content creators. That’s a difficult and time-consuming task. Most likely I’ll follow friends and influencers in my small niche. And rely on corporations and news organisations.
In the long run, will this ensure democratic, free access to information?
“The single biggest threat to content marketing is content marketing”
I’m wondering if there’s a new approach to this / a new web app?
