Yesterday Google finally announced why the heck we want a Google profile. Well for those of us who want additional search results on the web this is great news. For the average person this probably doesn’t matter too much because your friends can already find you but for those of us looking for some more of that good Google juice this is great news.
I will walk you through what you need to know to get this baby up and running.
The first thing you should know is that by default this is not a public profile. The reason for this of course that you might not want people to spam you but those of us who want a bigger internet presence then this is the price we pay. So yes you will get your Gmail account spammed if it’s not already (and it probably is.) Anyways there are a few things you need to do to make it go public.
I don’t know where each of you is at as far as filling this section out. If you were good boys and girls this part was already filled out in case you wanted people to find you from your Google Blogger profile but for those of you who are naughty start filling this out. I would suggest that you use your real name. Some of the big areas here are going to be location of course because we want this profile to be seen on Google maps (it is probably just a matter of time for this to happen.)
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It takes some time to get the profile to appear in search results. I put mine up last night and am still waiting for it to be indexed. I don’t know how long this will take but I can’t say what other areas you should be focusing on to maximize this profile for SEO purposes. One thing I will assume is that this profile will carry some serious weight and if it does have a lot of weight the sites that you link to will of course be sent some serious link juice. If you notice how it’s set up you can choose the title of the link which I am again assuming acts as anchor text for the link. Anchor text is what you are telling Google the site you are linking to is about so choosing good keywords that make sense to humans as well as targeting your niche is important. I would target interior pages as well as your blogs and any other site that you want more links built to (I would assume this is every site you have) I don’t know what limits are imposed here so I would pick and choose carefully for now. Google has some suggestions as well and they are good ideas. Choose wisely and if they let you put in more keep going. Once my profile is indexed I should be able to provide more information as to what you should be optimizing but the same rules should apply.
Some final notes.
Make sure your full name is listed so that it appears in search results. Google should guide you through the steps necessary to make sure your profile goes public.
If you have something to say please leave a comment.
If you would like to work with an agent who is leading the way call 715-894-1001today or send me an email.
Buy or Sell, I’ll Treat You Well! (In case you do not agree with something I said or feel that my blog or my beliefs could be construed as libelous I hereby declare that my entire blog is meant as a joke. I consider myself to be a comedian and everything I say or have said should be considered comedy. I want nothing I say to be taken seriously and if you do take it seriously take a break. If you do not think what I said is funny then that is your opinion. But for anyone who wants to sue me everything I said or say is meant purely as satire.The only thing that is not a joke is this disclaimer.)
I saw a different version of this article a while back and thought it was pretty interesting. It probably has to be the funniest example ever of something you can buy from an artist. This goes way beyond buying a CD of the band and even beyond getting front row tickets to see a show. Josh Freese might not be a name you are familiar with but the bands he has played in probably are, A Perfect Circle, The Vandals, The Nine Inch Nails and Devo. So what is he doing differently that is getting a lot of attention? Well I have seen a few different versions of what you can buy from him and some have argued that maybe this is an elaborate joke but it does seem real.
A signed DVD or CD is pretty tame but his list gets better.
He will take you on a day mini golfing with Mike Mothersbaugh another member of Devo and a brilliant artist as well. He will also go on tour with your band. The funniest thing is he will take you to his house and you can go through his closet and pick out any 3 things.
So what does this mean for you and me? The lesson is innovate. Business models all over are dying off. This is our society evolving and adapting to technology. If you can’t think of something new or conduct business in a different way you might not be able to do business in the future. Another new concept is the idea of a $0.00 business model. You can see that here.
If you have something to say please leave a comment.
If you would like to work with an agent who is leading the way call 715-894-1001today or send me an email.
Buy or Sell, I’ll Treat You Well! (In case you do not agree with something I said or feel that my blog or my beliefs could be construed as libelous I hereby declare that my entire blog is meant as a joke. I consider myself to be a comedian and everything I say or have said should be considered comedy. I want nothing I say to be taken seriously and if you do take it seriously take a break. If you do not think what I said is funny then that is your opinion. But for anyone who wants to sue me everything I said or say is meant purely as satire.The only thing that is not a joke is this disclaimer.)
I came across this article yesterday and thought it was pretty crazy. Apparently Kodak has changed its TOS (Terms of Service) and now wants to basically strong arm you into paying. Long story short if you have a lot of photos on their site and you don’t pay to have them developed Kodak might delete your entire collection! Not only is this an extremely crappy thing to do on many levels it’s not exactly fair either. First of all when you signed up for your free account probably because you bought one of their cameras you agreed to those TOS probably without knowing it and probably without even being aware of your rights. Now as ridiculous as those TOS were they apparently can without notice just change the deal at will. This is bad on many levels because like I said before you probably already purchased a Kodak camera to even be using their site so to insinuate that you are not a customer or have not paid is ridiculous. Furthermore they are making the assumption that you will never be a customer in the future because who is to say that maybe you don’t order prints this year but you do next year? Well in the mean time your account would be deleted.
Not to mention there are dozens of other sites and better sites that you can share your photos with family and friends so strong arming you into using their services or worse yet deleting your account and your photos with it is simply begging you to migrate to another service. Worse still is that after hearing about this news or finding out your family photo album is destroyed simply because you didn’t buy a few dozen prints from them. I tell you what I will never buy another Kodak product. I don’t support companies that resort to tactics like this especially companies that rely on cornering the market and then forcing you into paying for further services. They got rid of Kodachrome already and Paul Simon is probably crying.
If you have something to say please leave a comment.
If you would like to work with an agent who is leading the way call 715-894-1001today or send me an email.
Buy or Sell, I’ll Treat You Well! (In case you do not agree with something I said or feel that my blog or my beliefs could be construed as libelous I hereby declare that my entire blog is meant as a joke. I consider myself to be a comedian and everything I say or have said should be considered comedy. I want nothing I say to be taken seriously and if you do take it seriously take a break. If you do not think what I said is funny then that is your opinion. But for anyone who wants to sue me everything I said or say is meant purely as satire.The only thing that is not a joke is this disclaimer.)
Ok for the most part I have stayed out of the talk surrounding the bailout(s) and the rest of the fallout. Not that I am not interested but for the most part I have little or no control over what is going to happen anyways. I don’t have stocks and I just have a strong belief in the old saying if it’s something you can’t control then there is no need to worry about it. I prefer to worry about the things I can directly control.
But this AIG thing is really starting to well not starting to it’s just completely out of control. I don’t even know what to think anymore. Literally not just every day but every hour there is a new story out about something else they are doing. It just doesn’t seem like it could get much worse until I just read this story. Apparently the bailout hasn’t been quite enough and now AIG is suing the government for more money. While that doesn’t seem like much on the surface you see the thing is that they are using our money to do it! Yes it’s the taxpayer money that we gave them that now they are using to sue us! I just can’t even believe this anymore. While I think some people have been a bit violent in their reactions to AIG such as threatening to kill them and burn it down, at the same time I can’t feel anything but anger. I don’t even know who to be angry at anymore but I do feel that this is way beyond simply out of control. I don’t think there is a word to describe this anymore.
If you have something to say please leave a comment. I will try to comment on your blog as well. If you really like this story flag it for a feature! If you would like to work with an agent who is leading the way call 715-894-1001today or send me an email.
You know it’s hard to explain what it feels like when you consider that most people know little about computers so the smallest computer feats make you seem like you are some sort of computer genius. The reality of computers is that most of this stuff is pretty easy it just takes time to learn. Most people are not inherently good at working with computers; they have merely spent more time learning all the nuances. I am often approached by people who are just amazed at what I can do and yet I always say that I am self taught. It’s true. I did take a few programming courses but I am no computer programmer. I designed a few websites but this time last year I had never designed a website in my life. That’s why I keep telling people that anyone can do this no matter if you are young or old. In fact I think it’s so important that you do learn how to do this. Some very simple skills learned in how to tinker with your website could save you thousands of dollars over the years. All it takes is some time and dedication. Trust me it gets better as you go and it is very rewarding. While it might seem hard or frustrating at first but it’s well worth it.
So I came across this picture today and I think it sums up how I feel. It’s pretty funny. But I guess you have to be a geek to get it.
If you have something to say please leave a comment. I will try to comment on your blog as well. If you really like this story flag it for a feature! If you would like to work with an agent who is leading the way call 715-894-1001today or send me an email.
I guess you can only praise Apple for their marketing efforts because they have done the impossible, take an insecure computer platform and market it to the masses as infallible. How else can you look at it when anyone even reading the words I just wrote is already calling me a liar? In fact the last time I even suggested something to this effect I was practically run out of town by an angry mob with burning torches screaming at me for even suggesting that a Windows pc could be more secure than an Apple computer. Yet Iprovided proof and people wouldn’t even bother to click on the articles and read them. It’s no wonder because when you show people that a machine running Vista was more secure than a Mac you probably seem to sound like an idiot but it was true and the truth is very powerful.
So the contest is running again this year and within seconds the Safari Macbook fell to a hacker. Before you say oh but the Windows machine must have been even quicker just take a look at this “Several hackers are currently attempting exploits against Internet Explorer 8 and Firefox but those browsers are still standing.”
The point is that while a Mac may on the surface be secure so is a Windows machine and without knowing about security one is not necessarily safer than the other. Almost any security expert will tell you that while a Mac may run a UNIX kernel it’s not UNIX. Nor is any computer completely safe from hackers, viruses or a variety of other exploits. A lot of people argue that the myth of the “safe Mac” is not only perpetuated by a lot of misleading advertising but really the safety lies in the numbers and the fact that the majority of computers are Windows. Although there is a great push to hack Macs and the sheer joy of accomplishing that is what could lead to many more exploits. But when you present people with the truth sometimes it hurts and just like last time when I showed how a Mac can have viruses, I am sure that people will disbelieve this as well.
The legend of free marketing and offering your services for free certainly seems like a gimmick. But is it? Think about this for a moment because as strange as this sounds it’s not really a gimmick at all but a fact of marketing that a lot of people might overlook but not Chris Anderson. If you don’t know who that is he is the head of Wired magazine as well “the guy behind the long tail theory.” You can just do a search for long tail if you aren’t sure how important that is to marketing and websites.
So can you run a business and make money when your services are free? Maybe. In fact it works all the time. You can check out this article here for some interesting ideas as well as some historical facts around this marketing oddity.
I have actually been doing this idea with my website for some time and not even realizing it. I have tried offering the most information and capabilities absolutely free. I try making it the easiest to use and basically ask for nothing in return. If I provide this valuable of a service for free then I can be paid for other services I offer. Makes sense to me.
If you have something to say please leave a comment.
If you would like to work with an agent who is leading the way call 715-894-1001today or send me an email.
I admire the power of capitalism but I also fear what it does to this world, the lives it has destroyed and the lives it will destroy. Why Billionaires are put on some pedestal in this country I can’t quite understand. I for one think Bill Gates probably deserves where he is at and I think he is a relatively modest person. He is also quite a philanthropist and I think that deserves mention. The same goes to Warren Buffet. But of that list few deserve praise. They squander their fortunes and give little in return. Who am I to judge but at the same time let’s think of the children for a moment? If we put these people on a pedestal then they certainly deserve some scrutiny. Everyone had a fit when Phelps was on video doing whatever it is he was doing screaming oh but think of the children. My question is why are sports heroes and billionaires people to look up to? When you put so much trust in someone it’s only going to lead to problems.
Now Forbes updated their billionaire list. It’s a who’s who of the rich and powerful. As if we the people are supposed to be on bended knee at the announcement and this time who makes the list? El Chapo a Mexican drug lord who runs the Sinaloa cartel. Nice guy I’m sure. So please remind me why people like that should be admired while ordinary people who work hard struggle to even get recognition?
I am sure many people have been following the Madoff scandal. It seemed like every day there was a new piece to the puzzle from him still living in the lap of luxury but with armed guards to apparently have been doing this close to 10 years without even a glimpse of getting caught. I even read many news stories that said he might not even go to jail!!! Apparently stealing millions and billions from everyday people isn’t enough to warrant a crime. I honestly don’t know what suddenly changed but something did because now he is facing 150 years behind bars.
But surely there is more to this story than meets the eye because anyone who has lived in this country for the past 25 years or so knows that if you steal millions of dollars from poor people most likely you won’t even go to jail and even if you do you probably get to play golf every day. Most likely you will just get a presidential pardon or even a TV deal. So what is different here? All I see is that in this case a lot of really wealthy and powerful people lost millions of dollars because all things being equal this isn’t much different than any of the other dozens of banking scandals. In this case it wasn’t just 401ks that are now worthless and ordinary people being ripped off because that happens all the time but in this case it was some really powerful people who are now broke. Either way I am glad this guy is going away for a long time but it’s too bad that so many others walk with barely doing any time meanwhile our prison system is filled with innocent people, people who are there because of the color of their skin or a huge percentage for simple drug possession or just drugs in general while rich and powerful drug addicts are on the radio every day.
I don’t know what else to think about this case other than they must seriously be crazy. In fact I am definitely not trying to say anything bad about Re-max in general but this smells funny. If you read the story apparently they are suing a small local company basically for name infringement arguing that the two companies have similar logos. First of all the company in question is called rehava and remax is spelled remax. If you look at this in plain text do you see any similarities? I think you would have to be crazy to see anything on that level. So now if you apply any sort of styling or well basically anything if you are still using the exact spelling of these two phrases how on earth can you still have similar logos? Not unless rehava literally tried to fit their name into the Re-max logo. I can’t show you what I mean because I don’t really feel like a lawsuit either but this is over the line.
First of all, both names start with “r” and have logos with accent lines near the letter “e,” he said.
“It goes beyond that,” Scoville added. “If you chop the top off of the ‘h,’ you (almost) have the ‘m’ in Re/Max. The next letter is an ‘a,’ and if you take the ‘v’ then you have half of an ‘x.’ “”
I don’t know what this company did to bring down the hammer of god but this is pretty ridiculous and I would hope the judge just tosses it out.
In the defense of Rehava they claim that “Steve deGuzman, Rehava’s broker-in-charge, said he doesn’t buy it. He said the trademark challenge is harassment and a form of corporate bullying that will cost his firm thousands of dollars.”
This is the same sort of patent trolling that a lot of large corporations in this country are doing. The basics of trolling are when you pretty much say everything on earth is patented and you own the rights to everything. I mean that literally because companies are literally patenting everything. Next someone will patent the air we breathe and I wouldn’t be surprised if someone does. Our IP system in this country stinks and it is us against them, us being the little guy and them being these large corporations. I don’t know that Re-max falls into that category specifically but they are certainly taking a page from some of these companies.
By the way if you don’t know what I mean by this patent war or what IP (Intellectual Property) is then here is something that I would hope would scare the pants off of you. Our food is at the center of this war and it’s a silent war you probably don’t know about. Monsanto is currently destroying all seeds of crops on the planet forcing people to use their genetically engineered stuff. It’s not engineered in a good way rather it works hand in hand with certain pesticides, herbicides and fertilizers. Basically one is the key to the other. You need both to grow a crop and you effectively corner the market. I can’t explain it well so please just read the article. It’s very scary that a company would be allowed to patent a life form or a gene for that matter.
