Monthly Archives: February 2009

Thesis WordPress Template Product Review

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Chris Pearson is a smart designer/developer who’s latched on to the emerging trend in publishing – the move away from elaborate, bandwidth-heavy, ornate websites to the more subtle, clean design that’s seeing its way on more progressive blogs.

Is this an influence of the minimalist style micro-blogging platforms like Twitter? It’s hard to say, but having a simple, yet intuitive design will give blog visitors easier access to your content and reduce the distraction that a cluttered blog template can create.

Chris’ Thesis WordPress template has been around since last year, so it’s not exactly a new kid on the block. In that time, it’s made its way on a number of blogs, especially based on its strengths.

I’d been looking for a clean and SEO-optimized template for use on a number of new content sites I’m in the process of developing and after reading a Thesis review by Rae Hoffman AKA SugarRae, it sealed the deal for me.

Here’s what the default installation looks like:

thesis

As you can see, it consists of a text area on the left and a prominent Continue reading →

Taking Twitter To The Next Level With TweetDeck

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I typically for the simplest approach when it comes to using web services. If a browser interface is available, I prefer to use that over download and installing an external program – I already have enough “stuff” on my computer.

If you are a Twitter user, you might want to take a close look at TweetDeck, especially with their recent feature upgrade.

Having gone through a couple of other Twitter clients (they essentially bring Twitter updates to your desktop via the API and provide additional functions) like Twhirl, I will be using TweetDeck for a long time.

For starters, with the recent v0.21.5b upgrade, the client includes the option of a 4th column, you’re also able to perform a search within TweetDeck and setup groups and follow friends more easily.

tweetdeck

Unless you’re a strict stickler to talking to 1 person at a time, the multi-threaded approach to managing conversations makes Twitter more managable, especially once Continue reading →

Friday Podcast: Personal Producitivty And Business Growth Strategies With Lisa Riolo

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I’d been talking briefly with industry veteran Lisa Riolo at some of the affiliate events over the past year and inviting her on the Friday Podcast was the first opportunity I’d been able to speak with her at some length.

lisa rioloLisa’s one of the best resources in the affiliate industry, having a blend of brick-and-mortar business operations experience, together with her stints in the online world. Lisa previous experience includes a senior vice president of business development role at Commission Junction and managerial roles at Peet’s Coffee & Tea and Bank of America.

During our call, we discussed:

  • How she got involved in the world of affiliate marketing
  • The growth of CJ’s account development team from a headcount of 4 initially to its exponential growth phase involving hundreds of people
  • Her focus on accountability and being able to quantitatively measure results in order to grow a business rapidly
  • Her milestone projects in internet marketing, including stints with Eben Pagan
  • Her system for getting things done and enhancing your personal productivity
  • How to balance growing your business with a healthy work-life balance
  • Defining value as growth factor for your business and how to deliver it to customers

Business owners and successful affiliates will get several actionable takeaways from this session.

Check out the podcast below:

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And the resources:

The “Is Blogging Dead” Meme and Other Navel-Gazing Nonsense

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It seems like it’s becoming an annual tradition for a blogger or reporter on a slow news day to observe that a trend of “a-lister” bloggers are retiring from the blogging scene and one of the informal golden rules in reporting is:

  • If it happens once, it’s an accident.
  • If it happens twice, it’s a coincidence.
  • If it happens three times, you have a “trend” story on your hands.

So 3 prominent bloggers quitting the scene within a period of 1-2 years = trend?

The one thing about the “golden rule” was that it generally applied to the brick-and-mortar context, not as much when you’re talking about 3 or more bloggers out of the hundreds of millions of blogs out there.

Statistically, even 100 top bloggers out of a universe of 100 million blogs would be 1 / 1,000,000. In decimal points that would be 0.000001% of the blogging population.

is blogging dead

So wondering if “blogging is dead” is akin to wondering if fixed-line telephones are dead or if the fax machine is dead. Nice linkbait, but I don’t think there’s much substance or value to that argument.

Jason Lee Miller notes in his WebProNews piece that fame (or the price of it) might be the cause of Continue reading →

Affiliate Summit West 2009 In Pics and Words (Part 2)

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If you missed it, check out: Affiliate Summit West 2009 in Pics and Words (Part 1).

Here’s more goodness from the Affiliate Summit:

carolyn tang

ShareASale’s Director of Client Services Carolyn Tang AKA Catango is one of the most pleasant and knowledgeable individuals in the industry and it was a pleasure to talk to her at the SaS booth, even though there were lots of people there.

As a tradeshow visitor, I’ve got more than my fair share of t-shirts, notepads, pens, paper weights and stationery to last 2.5 lifetimes. I liked how SaS did a little out of the box thinking to provide a photobooth where affiliates took some crazy pics (I’ll post mine later), and thoughtfully gave out baby T-shirts and bears. For affiliates with families or significant others, they’ll likely be seeing the SaS logo on a teddy bear or baby T for some time to come. (a good thing).

Check out the Friday Podcast interview on Affiliate Program Strategies with Carolyn Tang.

colin mcdougall ros gardner

It was cool hanging out with top affiliates Colin “Google” McDougall and Ros Gardner over dinner at the Nobu Japanese restaurant at the Hard Rock for the private launch of Jim Lillig’s Offeratti network.

Considering that Colin doesn’t take raw food, it’s a testament to the great food at Nobu that Colin was enjoying the sashimi with the rest of us during the meal. It was also interesting to hear Colin tell his stories about his towed trailer that he rolls out for holidays. And if you’re looking for inspiration as you’re working towards your ideal affiliate lifestyle, Ros has bought a lot of nice toys/trinkets to enjoy the fruits of her labor.

dina riccobono

It was great to meet affiliate network Market Leverage‘s marketing manager Dina Riccobono after talking to her over IM and being interviewed for MLTV late last year.

Market Leverage has a proactive outreach and affiliate recruitment program and it’s refreshing to see a network take the intiative in getting to know affiliates. They hosted a dinner at Switch at the Encore hotel, with Market Leverage CEO Mike Jenkins in attendance. It was a great opportunity to talk to affiliate managers Mike Kelly and Jen Fluker to get insight into how affiliate managers operate.

At the dinner, Mike announced the launch of Market Leverage’s greenlinks program, which provides links to video-based affiliate training from the ML website interface.

Here’s an earlier Friday Podcast with Market Leverage CEO Mike Jenkins

jen goode

Jen Goode, better known as JGoode, headed the Affiliate Summit mentors program and did a great job (I believe there were more than 100 mentees in the program). I also had a picture taken with the penguin and nearly kidnapped him. Ah well, maybe next time.

In the meantime, check out the Friday Podcast with Jen talking about Print-On-Demand product strategies

jon fisher

With Jon Fisher AKA AOJon , founder of the WickedFire affiliate marketing forum. I started making these “gang signs” because a number of the “affiliate gangstas” started making them.

miles baker geordie carswell nickycakes

Before the panel discussion on Affiliate Strategies for Traffic Generation and Sales Conversion on the first day of the summit with Miles Baker, Geordie Carswell, Nickycakes.

The session went well with positive Continue reading →

Friday Podcast: Print-On-Demand Business Strategies With JGoode

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jen goodeI met Jen Goode better known as JGoode at the recent Affiliate Summit where she was helming the mentors program.

Jen is one of the nicest people you will meet in internet marketing and she’s gone out of her way to help people.

As a designer and a programmer, Jen has a unique set of skills which gives her an advantage when it comes to marketing her fine art and t-shirt designs.

Her move to print-on-demand (POD) services to develop her own products such as t-shirts is a great primer for aspiring marketers looking at the POD market.

During the Friday Podcast, we talked about:

  • Jen’s background and how she got started on the Internet
  • How she developed her skills in both the design element of internet marketing and programming
  • The benefits of print-on-demand services
  • How to get started on POD services
  • How to determine which products sell and how to generate traffic and sales for your products
  • Tips for establishing your niche within the POD marketplace
  • How to use customer follow up strategies to increase your sales and profits

New and experienced marketers will get something out of the podcast accessible below:

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Links: