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Do Something Today

May 8, 2012 by · Leave a Comment

Underwater Bubbles
Creative Commons License Photo Credit: Duncan Rawlinson via Compfight

Defining Success

What makes you feel like you’ve had a successful, productive day? For me, it’s finishing something. Not just a to-do item, but something more substantial… like finishing up a client project or launching a new feature. I have a hard time feeling productive if something tangible like that doesn’t get done by the end of the day. I have to DO something to feel good about the day of work I’ve put in.

Whenever I need a little extra motivation I always go back to this video. You won’t want to go to bed tonight after watching this.

If you can’t see the video then click here.

Homework

Do whatever it takes to make today productive. Be so eager to get things done that you can’t possibly sit still. Your competitors might be taking the day off or only putting forth a half-hearted effort – don’t make the same mistake.

How do you define success for any given day? What do you do to keep yourself motivated?

Filed Under: Entrepreneur, Misc, Tips and Tools · Tagged With: , ,

Revisiting Your Blog Topics Backlog

March 29, 2012 by · Leave a Comment

Sprint Board

I can’t speak for all bloggers, but if you’re anything like me you have dozens or hundreds of topics ready to go at any time. I’ve written about my blogging workflow before, but any time I have an idea for a post I log into WordPress, create a new post and save it as a Pitch (via the awesome Edit Flow plugin). That way it’s there and waiting for me when I get ready to fill out the post.

I noticed a few days ago that my backlog of topics was getting really long, so I decided to do a little editing. Looking through the list I found that many of the posts I had pitched or stubbed out didn’t make sense any more. Many were related to some then-current event. Needless to say those aren’t going to be of any value going forward, so I deleted them. If the post had some merit then I tried to come up with a way to make the topic more evergreen. (Evergreen is blogger-speak for content that is always timely and helpful).

Today’s a good day to take a few minutes and browse through the unpublished articles and pitches you have and do some paring down. Start doing some writing for the topics that you still really like. Delete the ideas that don’t make sense any more. At the end of the day you’ll have a leaner, tighter blog.

Image credit: roolrool on Flickr

Filed Under: Blogging, Tips and Tools · Tagged With: , , , , ,

Scheduling SM Content Is Perfectly Fine

March 2, 2012 by · Leave a Comment

Someone's Lost Schedule Book

Many social media marketing (SMM) pro’s consider it bad form to schedule content in advance. The theory is something like this: if you schedule content then you’re not necessarily going to be around to have conversations about it, making you less authentic. Or maybe it will make you look like a spammy scumbag. I completely disagree.

Scheduling content in advance is fine. In fact, I think that it’s almost a necessity as we marketers get busier, have more networks to update, have more followers to communicate with, etc. It’s only logical and practical.

I would say that putting out content at times that it’s most likely to be impactful for your audience is more important than putting it out only when you’re at the keyboard. If you need to promote something in the afternoon today, but you know that you’re going to be away from the keyboard until this evening then you should absolutely schedule it.

My mission for you today is to go out and schedule something today. If you’re looking for a way to schedule something then take a look at Hootsuite. If you want to promote an event or something with a specific date then you should check out a neat little project that we’ve been working on called ItStarts. It’s a great way to promote your events.

Image credit: ASurroca on Flickr

Filed Under: Social, Tips and Tools, Uncategorized · Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Why Relationships > Followers

January 31, 2012 by · Leave a Comment

Coffee break

I know that it’s been said many times before, but you shouldn’t worry about the number of followers you have on Twitter, fans on Facebook, or whatever other social metric you’re tracking. Relationships matter more. It’s quality over quantity in a certain sense.

I think that most everyone tends to increase the number of Twitter users that they follow over time, which necessarily increases the number of posts in their stream. The perpetual stream growth means that your posts are getting squeezed out, or they will be soon. Relationships, however, will survive the stream squeeze. Taking the time to create genuine relationships with your Twitter friends will get you added to lists of favorite users or get your posts noticed more. Personally, I pay much more attention to tweets from users that I recognize and have had conversations with.

Take a few minutes today to start creating some true relationships. Pick a few of the Twitter users that you follow and strike up a convo with them and see what results you get. I’m sure you’ll be pleasantly surprised at the number of people looking to interact with you. Then you should take the users that care enough about you to respond and put them in their own list so that you can always give them extra attention… they’ve earned it. That’s why relationships trump followers.

Image credit: marianNYC on Flickr

Filed Under: Social, Tips and Tools · Tagged With: , , , , , ,

How To Stop Worrying About Building An Audience And Just Get Started

October 24, 2011 by · Leave a Comment

Descending the summit ridge

Have you ever thought about starting some sort of venture and found yourself wishing that you had done it five years earlier? I certainly have, and I’m willing to bet that you have too. That’s what I  was thinking when I was in the process of starting this blog. I knew that growth would be slow and that it would be discouraging at times. I thought that if I had just started this blog five years ago when I first entertained the idea then I could potentially have a huge following by now and have surefire international fame and notoriety.

The best motivation I’ve found to combat the five year remorse is to just get started. If you don’t get started now then you could regret it five years from now, wishing that you had finally acted upon your idea. Just do it. If it’s going to take years to get where you want to go then there’s never a better time to start than the present.

Your Homework

What have you been putting off doing because it seems daunting or because you know that success is years away? Go ahead and put that idea into motion. Get started by doing something concrete that will help push the idea to fruition. Start that blog, contact that lead, just do something. Let me know what you’ve done in the comments.

Image credit: mikep on Flickr

Filed Under: Blogging, CEO, Entrepreneur, Features, Tips and Tools · Tagged With: , , , ,

Discussion: What Metrics Do You Track?

October 21, 2011 by · Leave a Comment

I was recently looking at the tracking charts that I have setup for one of my sites. I looked at charts regarding membership counts, revenue, etc. That got me to thinking about all sorts of things related to metrics and charting. Let’s have a discussion about what you track, what you get the most value from, and what advice you have for others.

  • What metrics do you track and review?
  • Do you have a dashboard collection of charts that you review daily?
  • Do your charts update daily, hourly, or in real-time?
  •  Do you still have charts in spreadsheet software like Excel or Google Docs?
Leave your comments below and let’s talk about it.
Filed Under: CEO, Tips and Tools · Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Web Apps That We Currently Pay For

September 21, 2011 by · Leave a Comment

monopoly-outsource

I use a lot of different web apps to manage things at MediaLeaf. We try to use 3rd-party apps whenever we can to avoid reinventing the wheel. We don’t have the manpower to be spending time duplicating the functionality of others, so I typically don’t have a problem paying monthly for tools that are useful to us.

I love promoting the great work of others, so I’m going to give you a rundown of all the great apps that we use regularly. The list only includes the apps that I currently have paid accounts to. I have free accounts for many other apps. I’m probably also gonna forget a couple of apps. Here goes (in no particular order):

  • Mailchimp – The best marketing email platform around
  • Followup.cc – I’ve written about Followup.cc before.
  • Tout – Simplifies the process of sending repetitive emails. I use this for finding leads.
  • Basecamp and Highrise from 37signals – All of the 37s products are exceptional and need no introduction.
  • Endicia – Handles all of my mailing needs
  • ThinkVitamin Membership – Great set of training resources. I haven’t used TVM anywhere near as much as I need to.
  • Zendesk – I should get a volume discount at Zendesk due to the number of helpdesks I have setup with them.
  • SEOmoz.org and DIYSEO – I have 2 different apps for tracking/optimizing SEO. One day I’ll condense these down into just 1 app.
  • Beanstalk – Hosted SVN solution that works really well for us.
  • Postmark – Great system for handling all of our transactional emails.
  • Hootsuite – The best social media management console.

If you have an app that you’d like me to consider then feel free to email me.

Image credit: Scott Ingram Photography on Flickr

Filed Under: CEO, Reviews, Tips and Tools · Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,

Time is Your Most Precious Asset

September 19, 2011 by · Leave a Comment

Couldn't resist it!

Never has the title of this post bene more true than in the last few weeks. I’m juggling a lot of MediaLeaf projects and I’ve recently purchased a new home, so time has definitely been a diminishing resource lately.

Times like this are a good opportunity to take a step back and look at everything you’re doing. Is everything that you’re working on directly related to your bottom line? When you’re pressed for time, as all of us are, it’s hard to justify spending your work time on anything that isn’t directly related to your bottom line or charitable pursuits. Here are a few ways to make sure that you’re focusing your energy and time most effectively.

Record Everything

For a few days, or even a whole week, keep a notepad with you and record all of the tasks that you spend your time on. You don’t have to keep diligent records of how long you’re actually spending on a task, just record what the task is. At the end of your experiment look through the list and see what unnecessary items you’re doing. There’s bound to be a few things that can either be delegated or ignored altogether.

Delegate More

Many founder and CEO types have problems delegating, especially in smaller companies. You’re used to doing all of the work yourself and feel most comfortable that way. I used to have that same problem, but over the years I’ve realized that there just isn’t enough of my time to go around and that I have to delegate low level tasks.

Delegating also means not spinning your wheels trying to figure something out. If you’re working on a project and run into a problem then it’s OK to get someone else to help you. You don’t have to waste time just so that you can figure it out yourself.

Focus

This one goes without saying, but it’s particularly hard for me. I have a tremendously short attention span, so it’s hard for me to concentrate on one task for more than 3-4 minutes at a time. I’m constantly playing with new methods and tricks to lengthen my attention span. If you have focus and attention problems then keep trying to make improvements. I’d love to hear your suggestions in the comments.

Image credit: blinkingidiot on Flickr

Filed Under: CEO, Features, Misc, Tips and Tools · Tagged With: , , , ,

Why You Should Ignore Bad Press

August 9, 2011 by · Leave a Comment

042810Pave-11

Time for a little against the grain advice. The common response to bad press and criticism now is to face it head on, own up to the problem, take responsibility, and be as transparent as possible. The utopian approach is all well and good, but I believe that in many situations the proper response is to simply ignore the bad press and criticism.

Don’t Validate the small issues

Any time that you (your company) responds to a criticism you are validating it. If there is a criticism that is definitively unfounded then it’s OK to say that, but if the criticism is valid then the best response, at least initially, is to ignore. When you make a public response to a criticism you are validating the issue and giving the party making the allegation all the power. Unless the criticism is coming from an outlet with a huge following then ignoring will usually lead to the problem just going away.

Here’s an example: If your app has a bug that’s being discussed on a forum then you should work as quickly as possible to fix the problem, without trying to join the conversation. Once you fix the problem the forum’s users will see that and the tone of the conversation will change. They will suspect that you’ve heard their complaint and addressed the issue, but they won’t be sure. For all they know it could’ve been a temporary issue or something maintenance related. If the issue continues to spread to other forums, blogs, or social channels then it may be time to start rolling out the public relations campaign to respond The goal is to act quickly to resolve the issue to keep it from ever reaching the masses in the first place.

This Isn’t Always The Solution

If you have an issue that’s gaining widespread attention then you should immediately seek to gain control of the issue. If there’s a bug to be fixed then fix it and respond. If you have a business practice that others are maligning (right or wrong) then you should wait a couple of days, and if the issue is still there, you should formally respond. It’s OK to defend yourself. In today’s uber-politically-correct world people forget that they actually have the right to defend themselves. You don’t have to just sit back and take the criticism. If you want to fight the allegations then you absolutely should do that.

Bringing It Home

What’s your response when you start receiving bad press? Do you immediately respond? I’d love to hear your experiences!

Image credit: HPUPhotogStudent on Flickr

Filed Under: CEO, Marketing, Misc, Tips and Tools · Tagged With: , ,

Yep, We Still Heart PHP

August 4, 2011 by · Leave a Comment

elePHPant

Ah, PHP. It’s been endlessly scorned by cool developers everywhere, but it’s still the backbone for the vast majority of websites. PHP is kind of like the boring accountant in the back room that no one really pays any attention to but is essential to running your company.  We all know the knocks that PHP has against it: weak OOP principles, syntax requirements, etc. I certainly don’t disagree with any of those facts, but they are minor issues to me compared to the benefits of using PHP.

Frameworks to the Rescue

The frameworks of the last 5 years have taken PHP to a new level. We use CakePHP for all development at MediaLeaf, but we’ve heard great things about Symfony 2 as well. Frameworks make it super-easy to build out a prototype app quickly. CakePHP has command line tools that will create your CRUD scaffolding (Create – Read – Update – Delete) for you. Frameworks take care of the chores that go into each and every development project, particularly items like database connectivity and interaction.

Huge Community of PHP’ers

The huge community of PHP developers makes it rather simple to solve any issue that you come across. A simple Google search usually will yield results. Failing that, you can turn to the countless PHP forums. The vast number of PHP devs nearly guarantees that someone has already solved your problem. The key is usually figuring out the best way to describe your issue so that you can efficiently search for a solution.

PHP is Standard

Most hosting solutions, both cloud and dedicated, have PHP as part of the standard installation. This usually means that your hosting provider will provide you support relating to the PHP install itself. For smaller companies without system admins (like us), this is ideal.

It’s Proven at the Highest Levels

PHP is the engine that runs Facebook, WordPress, and countless other very large apps. If it can work effectively and efficiently for those guys, then we shouldn’t worry about it at scale for our applications.

We’ve evaluated Rails several times and have yet to find a compelling reason to move. We’re certainly not interested in migrating any of our existing apps away from PHP, but if something clearly better comes along then maybe we would consider it for future dev projects.

Your Turn

What are your thoughts on good-ol’ PHP? Do you still use it or have you abandoned it? Which PHP frameworks do you prefer?

Image credit: drewm on Flickr

Filed Under: CEO, Tips and Tools · Tagged With: , , , ,
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