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Soulati-'TUDE!

Google Outage A Business Wake Up

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Credit: Mashable

Credit: Mashable

Where were you when the lights went out in Georgia? How about when Princess Diana was killed? Or when Michael Jackson was pronounced dead?

In an unexpected show of the mighty servers, Google inadvertently strengthened its image of world power when an internal software bug shut down Gmail, calendars, Google+, and documents for an hour on Friday Jan. 24, 2014. Where were you and with what Google feature were you engaged?

Life as we knew it was disrupted.

For those among us who didn’t know a mishap was brewing and wanted to share a post, we continued to click and try to get G+ to obey only to see five different shares of the same thing eventually turn up. (That was my experience.)

If Gmail was your primary email, you were screwed just when you were doing the Friday scurry to the weekend. It’s a bit scary, isn’t it, to rely on a behemoth like Google which keeps growing and expanding into new sectors of innovation? Is your business 100 percent dependent on Google for email, social media, calendars and document sharing?

Wake Up Business

Do you remember the days of yore when there was no email. We relied on the phone, fax and snail mail to communicate and instant global engagement was nil.

What we experienced was a first-hand feel for the powerhouse Google has become. I have to think in a boardroom deep in the confines of Google HQ that some executives may be grinning along with the grimace — just a tad.

  • Does your company rely strictly on Google for email, calendars, document sharing, analytics, and many other services?
  • Do you rent space on Google servers for blogging?
  • Maybe you rent space on WordPress.com, Yahoo! or MSN for a website, blog, message board, or other shared-server situation?

Perhaps back in the day, it was easier to just go with what’s “free.” At the risk of your privacy, online security, hacking, and outages you cannot control, among other horrors we’ve yet to experience, your business is subjected to the new whims of the Internet, and you never know what’s coming.

How will you prepare?

7 Social Media Tools Reviews Via @TomPick

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As the use of social media marketing tactics have expanded and matured, two consistent challenges that remain are 1) finding enough time for all the tasks that need to be done, and 2) measuring the impact of social media marketing activities.

Into these voids have stepped all manner of developers and entrepreneurs with tools for social media monitoring, management, measurement, and more.

Need to find out how widely one of your links was shared on Twitter? Identify your most influential fans and followers for outreach efforts? Automate repetitive social marketing tasks? Find new industry influencers to engage with to help optimize your overall web presence?

Social Media Tools

Here are helpful reviews of tools to assist with all of those tasks and many more from half a dozen social media experts.

  • Nicole HarrisonNicole Harrison is “adamant” that, properly managed and executed, will deliver measurable financial results to a business, and provides brief reviews of 11 free social measurement tools including Facebook Insights, Twitter Analytics, and TweetReach, which she calls “a great tool for tracking a campaign or conversation on Twitter.”

Douglas KarrDouglas Karr shares an infographic which showcases 25 helpful social media marketing tools across five categories: social listening, social conversation, social marketing, social analytics, and social influencer identification. The infographic also identifies high-profile customers, strong points, and ideal users for each tool, as well as whether it is free or fee-based.

Nicholas ScaliceNicholas Scalice highlights his favorite social tools across eight categories, such as Social Report for analytics, Klout for Business for identifying “your most influential fans and followers,” and Bitly for link shortening.

Sheye Griffin reviews three social media management toolsóHootSuite, Agency Platform, and Sproutófor their value across three areas: ability to capture streams from multiple social networks; keyword search and geographical/trend analysis; and ease of engagement with followers.

Ian ClearyAsking “Do you struggle to get all your social media tasks done every day? Do you find that you perform repetitive tasks?,” (questions likely to elicit two “yeses” from many social media marketers), Ian Cleary reviews more than half a dozen time-saving social tools, including Social Oomph and Zapier (a tool similar to IFTTT).

Priit KallasPriit Kallas reviews 69 free social media tools, divided into two groups: “the services that I use regularly or seem interesting to check out immediately” and “an alphabetical list of tools for you to play with.” Included in the first group are popular tools like SocialBro, TwitterCounter and Klout.

About The Author

Tom-Pick.jpgTom Pick is a digital marketing consultant who helps clients increase their visibility, credibility, and business success online. His expertise in web presence optimization, SEO, search marketing, social media, content marketing and social PR has helped b2b technology clients ranging from single-person businesses to $1 billion+ corporations. Tom is managing editor of the Webbiquity b2b marketing blog, and a co-founder of: WPOinc, a provider of web presence optimization metrics; the B2BMarketingZone.com portal for B2B blogs; and the Social Media Informer social media content aggregation site. He can be found on Twitter, LinkedIn and .

Blog Owner’s Note: Here’s a perfect example that guest blogging is NOT dead! Thanks, Tom!

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I Married My Blog

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wedding-bouquet.jpgThis is a true story. I finally found my soul mate, and it wasn’t the opposite sex or even the same sex for that matter. It is my blog; hands down.

This blog, named ever so rightly as Soulati-‘TUDE!, is approaching a birthday in March. It is turning the big 4, not the big 4-0, but the big 4. I’d hasten a guess that four years of straight blogging as a professional is akin to the big 4-0. You know, something like cats have nine lives or dog years are longer than one human year.

My blog has become:

  • My obsession (it tells me to write without even speaking)
  • My OCD (I have to write or else I succumb to the next bullet)
  • My guilt
  • My happiness (I’m thrilled when I know I’ve written a winner)
  • My sadness (I’m gloomy when I need a break and then force myself to write)
  • My investment (Uhmm, yeah, time is money)
  • My professionalism (It defines my read next bullet and competency)
  • My brand marketing (Indeed)
  • My influence building (Writing gives me influence, right?)
  • My authority (The content I write builds authority, authenticity and thus creates influence)
  • My emotion (Agony, pride, laughter, happiness as above)
  • My daily activity and neglect (It’s a totally consuming)
  • My love (Right?)

I am totally immersed eye-deep in this blog after 650+ posts, 10,000+ comments and four years of lessons to navigate the complexity and rewards of professional blogging. Add all the guest posting I’ve done and NOT captured here, and that post tally is likely up to 700 now.

Is It Time For A Divorce?

Do you think all marriages end in divorce? There’s a great piece of data somewhere that supports something like that, I’m sure. For a blogger to divest herself from blogging, the outcome would be much like a divorce – extreme sadness, too much time on hands, where to write and about what, how to keep the brand front and center and alive, and how to share with a community that’s invisible yet not.

After four years of blogging, I’ve learned this:

• I have mastered the content strategy – my content is my craft, and it’s NOT an echo chamber at all, ever.
• Data and analytics continue to plague me because I’m a creative, presenting creations via words for everyone to see.
• Digital marketing is more challenging than one thinks, and I’m unhappy having to make it happen.
• I write my best work for others and love guest posting for the ability to showcase talent in another’s house or use a different voice than how I pen for me.

Rocky Start to 2014

I’ve not been posting much; first time ever, and can’t say the guilt has consumed me…yet. This break was unplanned and it was necessary. As I continue to ponder what it means to be married to my blog, I came to the understanding that MY BLOG OWNS ME. It is in charge, top dog, drives the ship, dictates decisions and eats my money. But, with every unbalanced marriage where one partner holds the upper hand, there is some balance of give and take and partnership, too.

In this partnership of four years that is truly 10, I married my blog and continue to work through the kinks and experience every growing pain and emotion, whether happy or sad. One day soon, we will make money together (we’re already making music) and add more variations of bread for the table loaf by loaf. As blog and blogger continue to evolve, inspiration comes from bread crumbs and eventually loaves are baked until it becomes a bakery.

You know, If You Give A Mouse A Cookie.

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Author Rank Guidelines (Infographic)

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Google+ Author Rank is a topic that is not going away anytime soon. In fact, it’s heating up again. The folks at Vertical Measures have done a fabulous job with this infographic. Let’s start the conversation again with this:

The Author Rank Building Machine #verticalmeasures #Infographic #Authorrank
Data Graphic by Vertical Measures

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The Happy Friday Series: Celebrating One Year!

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thank-you.jpgToday, I am a proud blogger parent celebrating one full year of never-missed Fridays for this The Happy Friday Series.

My gushing and hoots and hollers are because of you, this wonderful community without whom a kernel of an idea could never have made it beyond 30 days. I heart you — the 40 guest authors who penned happiness thoughts here, the readers who came near weekly to see who was in the house, and the commenters who recognized the authors.

Did the series lose steam toward the tail end? Of course it did, and the tables turned when I began to recognize writers one by one and then in groups (I’m still not done) for their contributions.

Significance Of A Blogging Series

I’m not sure you realize just how significant a full year of a blogging series is. In this day and era of less engagement everywhere, our blogs are suffering huge. Few people come by and stick around, but they knew that on Friday they’d read something by someone oriented to happiness.

To never have missed a single Friday is also #RockHot. I nearly missed last Friday in the midst of kidlet’s birthday celebration; however, Jenn Whinnem rescued me late in the day. Thanks, Jenn!

If you’ve never considered a blog series that includes a majority of guest authors (some you never met), it’s an endeavor not for the feint of heart (tell me is it faint of heart?). It was like pulling teeth at times, and at other times, it was thrilling to see how many peeps so graciously offered up a post.

A blog series like this one not only builds steady traffic on one of the least-fave blogging days of the week, it provides the community with the opportunity to meet someone new and be supportive. The stories here were always special and oriented to something too personal to share on an individual’s blog. Because of the warmth in this house and the genuine nature of this community to be loving in general, writers volunteered to share a piece of their happy right here.

I’m so honored you honored me. Thank you to all of the above for helping me reach my one-year goal (which was adjusted a tad along the way, but accomplished nonetheless.

What will Fridays now have in store? Not sure…got any ideas?