This is my slideset from two interactive seminars I did in Midland, MI courtesy of Caryn Shick and the Entrepreneurship Meetups going on there.
It references my previous post: Ultimate Guide to Self-Hosting WordPress
A quick thought hit me as I was reading some posts on different operating systems… It will matter less and less what OS you choose. Here’s why…
I do most of my computing online or “in the cloud.” I imagine many of you do also.
Google Docs, Zoho, and Office (soon) all have terrific online suites that do word processing, spreadsheets, PowerPoints presentations, etc. My files, docs, pictures, videos all can live online. This means I am no longer tied to one computer and if it gets lost/stolen no big deal.
My communication: email, instant messenger, social media, all online of course. Research, banking, news, TV, movies all are trending towards being provided entirely online. Gaming is even joining, although not to a great extent yet.
Here is the point, these are all browser-centric activities. Whether you are using Windows, Mac, or Linux, it will matter less and less.
Where the real magic and innovation needs to happen is in the browser. This is evidenced by the fact that the so-called “browser wars” are starting to heat up.
My powerhouse of choice, Firefox, has been a leading the battle. Chrome has made a justly deserved big splash recently. (it is very fast I must say. If it had FF’s add-ons I’d be all over it) Internet Explorer 8 also was recently released.
Browsers that are faster, more stable, more compatible, and more innovative (game-changing) are going to be the one(s) that win.
TechCrunch has almost pulled together their tablet which is a lightweight computer that only runs a browser. Do they see it coming?
I think we are moving towards the browser really taking center stage. It is the “OS” of the future!
Have I been staring at a screen too long? Agree or disagree, give me flame in the comments!
So you’d like to start a blog or site using WordPress and hosting it yourself. It is easier than you think. In a previous post I highlighted why you should host WordPress on your own domain. 
This is the next step. How.
This is a very extensive and thorough guide, click the link below to view the entire thing in all its glory.,,
At PodCamp3 I co-presented on LinkedIn and we only had 45 minutes to share ways to use LinkedIn better and how to make your profile stronger. Here are some tips we shared and some we didn’t have time to share.
Use this list to take your usage of LinkedIn up a couple levels.
1. Change the standard URL from linkedin.com/in/13?3a&3d to a "vanity URL" so instead change it to this style: linkedin.com/in/blakeimeson This will allow you to rank for your name in the SERPs.
2. Use keywords you want to show up in LinkedIn search results for. Use these keywords naturally in your "summary" and list them in your "specialties".
3. Great tips from Chris Brogan: For your summary…
4. Put your LinkedIn URL in your email and forum signatures.
5 Have the LinkedIn icon in your email signatures.
6. Print a LinkedIn symbol on your business cards 
7. Add a LinkedIn widget/button to your blog or website.
8. Don’t ever use the standard message LinkedIn gives you. Whether connecting with someone, asking for a recommendation. Make it personal.
9. Export your LinkedIn contacts occasionally in case your account gets deleted or banned.Go to "Connections" and click export at the bottom.
10. Use a string of operators to search for people on LinkedIn through Google.
| site:www.linkedin.com intitle:linkedin YOUR KEYWORDS HERE -intitle:answers -intitle:updated -intitle:blog -intitle:directory -inurl:jobs -inurl:megite.com |
Or for Yahoo…
| linkdomain:linkedin.com -site:linkedin.com JOB TITLE "at COMPANY NAME" |
11. Add a LinkedIn widget to your Facebook profile.
12. Join groups to increase the amount of people who’s profile you can see.
13. Use a creative headline for your profile. If working for a company use that in the title.
14. Add a few "power users" to vastly increase who you can directly contact. Use this list.
15. Put your email and phone number in your contact settings at the bottom of your profile.
16. Add all the email addresses people might search for you with, including previous work email addresses.
17. Recommend only people you can honestly recommend and ask people who know you well to recommend you. Mention specific things about working with them and the projects you worked on. Don’t just say “John was a hard worker”, instead give a specific example of how John worked hard on a specific project.
18. If you have a blog add it as an application.
19. Create a brief PowerPoint of your skills/work experience or portfolio and upload it to SlideShare or Google Presentation. Add this into an application.
20. Use specific adjectives, colorful verbs, active construction (”managed project team,” not “responsible for project team management”). (from 901am)
21. List your blog and other websites. Don’t just use the option “My Website” instead describe it well so people know where they are going. “Visit John’s Blog on SEO” or John’s SEO firm”
Hope this list gave you some concrete ways to use LinkedIn better. Please add your brilliant tips below in the comments!
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This is a follow-up post to the question of what kind of site is this where you name is the URL? Thanks for the great questions Brittany!
1. Free – Use WordPress.com and register a site as yourname.wordpress.com
Downsides: you don’t have as much control over adding other features (Plugins) or changing the appearance (themes). Looks less professional due to being a .wordpress.com domain. (Also, can’t put ads on it)
Upsides: Free, quick and easy to start. Some exposure benefit to being in the WordPress system. You can export posts to self-hosted if need be.
2. Self-hosted – This is the best option. You have the software on hosting you rent. Downloaded from WordPress.org – domain can be yourname.com
Downsides: This will cost $10 a year to buy the domain. And for good hosting $5-7/month. There are places that have Wordpress specific hosting for $10/year! I wouldn’t use the $10 option if you plan on getting large amounts of traffic. (you can always switch hosts) It is also a bit of a learning curve to install. However most hosts offer “Fantastico” which allows pretty much 2 click install and configuring of Wordpress.
Tubu.net – $10/year + domain registration.
HostGator.com – $5/month and up (aff link)
Upsides: You have complete control over Wordpress. Change the appearance and functionality to your heart’s content. Can be at yourname.com You can usually create email addresses @yourname.com You can have ads if you like. Can rank more easily for your name.
My site is self-hosted and that is the route I would recommend. I have started many WordPress sites and would be glad to answer questions about the process or help someone start their own.
I started a few sites on WordPress.com and regret it now as one of them gets over 3000 visits a day and I cannot monetize that without moving it to self-hosted (thus losing some of the SEO value it has built up).
Resources:
This is in response to a question from a fellow student after I gave a lecture on blogging. I thought it was a good question so I decided to answer it on here.
Question: What kind of blog is this, where your name is the site?
Answer: blakeimeson.com contrary to first look is not just me on some ego trip rambling (most of the time ahha) It is an online representation of me and my skills. I generally blog about ideas related to:
Entrepreneurship and businessSEO and Social MediaBlogging and internet technologyPersonal events and things happening in my lifeMy goal is to provide value to people and not just “add to the noise”.
1. Prospective client or employer. I would expect them to come to the site from a link I have given them, or by Googling my name. The goal is for them to get a more intimate glimpse of how I think, what I know and where I’ve been. A job interview can only tell you so much about me. Several years of posts can, however, give a different and more in depth view of who I am/where I have been. In some sense it is an interactive portfolio, or perhaps, an online resume.
2. Friends and colleagues. People I am friends with from various stages of my life. If they are interested in this type of content I would love for them to follow me and keep up personally and offer feedback professionally. Also, colleagues in the same industry, people I have worked with, and of course the search engine traffic looking for a specific idea. For example, I get a pretty good amount of traffic from the presentation I did on LinkedIn a while back at the PodCamp3 conference.
I have friends and colleagues who blog and I really enjoy seeing the kinds of interesting things they are doing in life and their unique perspectives on the world. A few off the top of my head… profitablesignals.com chrisandrew.tv gonzo-seo.com timhindes.com
I may narrow the focus at some point as it is pretty broad. But it represents me right now, my focus is still spread around. I am still trying to figure out what I want to be doing exactly. The blog reflects me, where I am at professionally and my stage in life. (broke college student at the moment lol)
I would strongly recommend most everyone who is or wants to make a living to buy their name domain. Whether you’re a musician, graphic designer, businessman public speaker, or student working your way up.
Further Reading:
Entrepreneurs thrive on market imbalance and chaos. Profit comes from inequalities and disorder in the marketplace. Entrepreneurs make money by bringing balance to these disorders.
Price of a good is high in one area of the world and low in another. Entrepreneurs will buy in the one and sell in the other. Producers may be creating brilliant products in a place like India but have no idea how to effectively market and sell their product in a market like the US.
Chaos, disarray, disorder, inequilibrium, discord, disharmony, variance: these are golden-ticket words for the entrepreneur.
Where the most profit happens is when an entrepreneur finds a particularly bad inequality or unmet need in the marketplace and fills it. If he does this and is successful, of course more entrepreneurs will come flocking to make a profit. Eventually it will become less profitable, more competitive and the consumer will rejoice as they are the victors.
While this may be elementary economics, it represents a huge opportunity to e-neurs. (heck, you can only write entrepreneur so many times)
The USA is heading straight into what are going to be some very turbulent times. Major changes are already taking place. How can an e-neur look at these changes and make money by providing value to the market?
Financial institutions are being taken over by the federal government. Is there a easier way in this Web 2.0 World to pair willing lenders with eager borrowers? Have we learned anything about reputation and rating systems online?
Newspapers are going the way of the buggy whip. (also asking for a bailout – who isn’t?) Are there parts of a newspaper best served online? Can they refocus and still have a physical paper?
There is an obvious trend towards online entertainment ala TV and movies being served through online channels. How can you make this transition easier? What will happen to your TV?
Intellectual Property law is being strained by the online distribution channels. Music, TV, Movies, these all need to adjust their business models instead of constant warring with their customer. Hulu, iTunes, Pandora – these companies are charting a new course in unfamiliar waters. Where will you go? How can you appease content providers and contentsumers?
The world is flat. Global trade is changing the rules. Shift Happens. Are you going to sell globally? Buy globally? Or even better help both those groups and facilitate trade.
Cell phones. If this change isn’t obvious and you haven’t heard of the iPhone, go back to your pleasant slumber under your rock.
These are a few quick examples of the huge amount of chaos/change happening now. The question is, how will you take advantage of this, make the world better and turn a profit?
Inspired by the venerable Mike Arrington of TechCrunch and his post, 2009: Products I Can’t Live Without I decided it would be fun to just jot down a short list of the types of technology I depend on daily to be efficient. 
I don’t usually like to do too many of these kinds of posts but I know sometimes people get a kick out of a post that is a bit more personal. I have some posts coming down the line that are going to be more helpful. 
Here goes. Rough order from most important to least…
| 2008 Technology | |
| 1. Firefox (App) | Best browser period. I have too many plugins to admit to. |
| 2. Wordpress (Code) | Best blog platform – holds its own as a CMS too. |
| 3. Google Reader (Site) | Great feed reader, add a little Greasemonkey and it rocks. Handles the plethora of reading I have to wade through. |
| 4. Windows Live Writer (App) | Whoa, hold up. Yes it is Windows but it is a terrific blog editor. I use it linked up to multiple blogs and post directly from it. |
| 5. Google Analytics (Site) | Stats for all my sites. Free. Powerful. |
| 6. OneNote (App) | I really like Office 2007. I use OneNote with its many tabs to keep organized with all my projects/classes info and to-do lists. |
| 7. WinAmp (App) | Good music player, controlled by FoxyTunes in Firefox. |
| 8. FileZilla (App) | Show me a better, more lightweight FTP program… |
| 9. Meebo (Plugin) | Both allow me to consolidate all my instant message accounts and Facebook chat. Meebo resides in Firefox.. Trying Digsby, not sold yet. |
| 10. NotePad++ (App) | Notepad on steroids. Highlights code syntax. Tabbed. |
| 11. FireShot (Plugin) | Powerful FF plugin for screenshots. I also use Jing and SnagIt on occasion. |
| 12. ColorZIlla (Plugin) | Color picker for FF. Allows quick sampling of a web pages color. |
| 13. MeasureIt (Plugin) | FF plugin that lets you measure onscreen elements. Very simple. |
| 13. Firebug (Plugin) | Terrific tool to examine a website’s architecture, especially CSS. |
| 14. Delicious (Site) | Social bookmarking. I have over 1300 bookmarks and 800+ tags. Handy for tagging a site to come back to as a reference. |
| 15. LinkedIn (Site) | I can live without Facebook but LinkedIn keeps me connected to people I need to stay connected with. |
(All of these are free except OneNote.)
Tool I am most excited about, new in 2008: EtherPad. This is like a live version of Google Docs and lets several people work on a simple text doc and see the text instantaneously. It is in closed beta due to overwhelming demand.
If you really want to try it and can’t get in LMK and I may be able to help you.
I decided to exercise some self-control and only bore you with 15. You’re welcome lol.Watch out for 2009. Have any favorites you want to share?
The best humor is that which not only makes us laugh but also makes a point. This comic from XKCD made a point that I feel has been true for me.
BTW Perl is a programming language.
Except for writing skills, grammar and the crazy amounts of reading, the skills that have helped me most with my job marketability are those that I have taught myself in my free time.
Besides being educated for the sake of being a well-rounded individual… what do you think the most important parts of a traditional education are?
Are the things you learned on your own, the things that have helped you the most?