I made Google

Got my first hit from Google yesterday. I'm number nine for searching "marketing blog". Check it out!
Google Search: "marketing blog"

Getting rid of that silly "image" bar in IE6

Got this hint to add to your webpages from weekly newsletter from www.sitepoint.com

This week's tip comes to us courtesy of Richard Hayes, of http://www.tm3design.co.uk .

The latest version of Internet Explorer has an image toolbar that appears whenever the mouse is hovered over an image for more than a few seconds. The toolbar presents options for saving, emailing, and printing pictures.

To stop IE's annoying image toolbar appearing over your images, place the following code between the head & /head tags on your page:

[meta http-equiv="imagetoolbar" content="no"] (use GT and LT symbols, not brackets of course)

The above code will disable the image toolbar for every single image on that page. And if you want to disable the image toolbar only for specific images, use the galleryimg attribute for the IMG tag. For example:

[img src="myPic.gif" galleryimg="no"]

Getting listed is good

My site's been listed for years on all the major places. But as I help others (and promote this blog), I need to have a plan on how to get listed. Some kind person has writen the following website.
Free website promotion tutorial - A Promotion Guide

Friday's Links

This is what I served for dinner tonight. Maybe I was just lucky to have two mangoes and two tomatoes on hand. Well worth it!
Mango Salsa Salmon

INGREDIENTS:
4 (6 ounce) salmon steaks
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 large red onion, diced
2 cloves garlic, peeled and minced
2 tomatoes, diced
1 sprig fresh cilantro, chopped
2 mangos - peeled, seeded, and diced

Directions
1 Preheat the oven broiler. Line a broiler pan with foil.
2 Broil salmon steaks on the prepared pan 12 minutes, or until easily flaked with a fork.
3 Heat olive oil in a medium saucepan over medium heat, and saute onion until tender. Stir in garlic, tomatoes, and cilantro. Cook until heated through, 1 to 2 minutes, and remove from heat. Mix in the mangos. Serve over the salmon steaks.

More about drawing away from print ads

The Ordinary Marketer

The power of blog

Was doing homework for my ecommerce class and found my citing three different blogs. Thought that was pretty cool. I was asked to write about three opportunities and three threats ecommerce has as the internet grows and becomes global. See the entire assignment.

Opportunities:
1. Reach to more markets and more people
2. Potential to reduce costs
3. Ability to get closer to the customer

Threats:
1. Who will pay for information or services?
2. Will an expanding marketplace stretch companies too thin?
3. Will certain competitors be dominant despite a plethora of alternate sellers?

I'm now listed on DMOZ! Google should start listing my blog soon. Cool!
Open Directory - Regional: North America: United States: Michigan: Localities: G: Grand Rapids: Society and Culture: Personal Homepages

Winning

Read a simple, but potentially life changing article in Men's Health Magazine over the weekend. The May issue had an article about how "winners" think and act. Winners act as though they are winning, seems to be the core fact. This intimidates others and they allow this person to win. The corralary is also true...that loses are willing to take on that role at the first sign of trouble.

My mind and behavior is already set, although I will be much more concious of when I am winning and losing, and how I am acting. The greater reach is how I can bring the "winning" mindset to my children, without them using it against me!

(Don't bother going to their website, it is obnoxious and articles are sold, not shared! I wrote comments to the "Web Guy" complaining. We'll see what happens.)

Friday's links

Today I will hit on blogs. Hurray, I am now listed on AltaVista, and #1 for the term "marketing blog".

Seth Godin
I wanted to comment or talk back on his last post, but there is no way to do it. He stews on subscriptions to support websites, but doesn't come up with a aha idea like he usually has. I've generated a discussion here at GVSU regarding this issue. Why can't we bid against the web advertiser's for our screens? If they are paying $100 per 10,000 impressions, can I pay 11 cents instead to not see the ad?

Micro Content News
I just found this one today. Need to study closer, but it is designed with multiple pages. Innovative for a blog.

Darn Phones

Like may of you out there, I wear more than one hat. I am in charge of the phone system here (but not long distance service selection, thankfully) because it crosses customer communication and technology...not things that others want to touch here. I'd rather be done with it all, but no. In recent days I've been distracted by many minor problems with the phones like:

• Power outage
• Changing carriers
• Dropped calls
• New T1 lines

There are so many vendors and equipment that it is challenging to trackdown or support any one issue. Why are calls dropping? Have phone system checked by Expenets. No, its due to the T1 service. The T1 service company (AT&T) is taking forever to get back to me about why we can't fax overseas, so why call them again? Finally find out we can't dial overseas because the single-lines have been switched to our new carrier.

Jakob points the way

This article starts talking about making computing/internet designed around individuals and not machines. As a multi-location user, I can appreciate his thoughts.
Supporting Multiple-Location Users (Alertbox May 2002)

But what really strikes home is his final statement about usability:
The next decade will bring the usability challenge of making the Internet sufficiently easy for the other half of the population to use. Making something easy for a college graduate is a piece of cake compared to making it easy for a high-school drop-out, but that's both our challenge and opportunity in the days to come.

How many people are there out there like my neighbor who can't figure out how to see what's on the floppy disk I gave her, let alone copy the files to their hard drive. What will it take to get this type of person to the point that they can actually take advantage of the tool they are sitting in front of? I am starting to think I am a geek.

Friday Link

So this website needs a little maintenance, but the content is 100% cool. It's the Church of Tami. Here, try "Ask Tami"

No Animals Were Harmed While Making This Page

Stop Bullying

Must be getting lazy, but I found another worthwhile editorial. This time by Wes Iversen of Quality Magazine. It says, in part:
I remember hearing about a metrology equipment vendor last fall who had delivered an order to one of the Big Three automotive manufacturers. When the payment came in, the carmaker had arbitrarily chopped 10% off the invoice amount, and basically told the vendor that was all it would pay for the equipment. Though angry and exasperated, the vendor was reluctant to protest too loudly, for fear of being cut off from future business by the carmaker.
...The results could include a serious deterioration in U.S. vehicle quality.

It goes on to talk about rekindling partnerships between OEMs and the big three. I wonder if these relationships have gotten too toxic to rekindle. We are still suffering from occasional "auctions" to get business from Delphi. It is a painful experience that leaves everyone (including the winner, I image) with loathing.

Myself, I have stepped away from a lot of advertising I used to do and wonder how this is damaging these suppliers. I guess this is a lot more like natural selection (think Animal Planet) versus kill-or-be-killed (think BattleBots) style of the big three.

Here's something for the one-man department to think about. I always wondered who would tell my favorite discussion group that I was dead. My company is probably more concerned with making sure I have other things accessible. The article does link to a "Dead man's switch" program.

Lycos News | Dead Men Tell No Passwords

Wishful waiting won't work

Editorial from Test & Measurement World 6/2002 by Jon Titus struck a chord with me today. Thought I should share it with you:
The economic boom of the 90s has gone, and those who wait for business to "come back" to the level we experienced in the past decade might as well wait for Elvis to reappear at Graceland. Sorry, folks, but it just won't happen, No miracle .will occur to make the economy better. What we have now is the new economy.

I fear, though, many people will do little but hope business picks up. These people hesitate to spend money, start new projects, and boost their own enterprises. Instead, they whine about business and complain about the economy. But just as the stock market leaves "market timers" behind, so does the economy. We can't wait for someone else's first move to signal the time to recharge our businesses. We must listen to customers to find out how their businesses have changed, and we must accurately-and honestly-gauge our strengths and weaknesses. We have to forget about the past and take advantage of the business climate that exists now. Wishing and waiting won't strengthen the economy. No matter what the economic situation-boom or bust-we always can exploit weaknesses in competitors' positions, capitalize on our strengths, start projects that show promise, cut dead-end efforts, and take other actions that improve our businesses.

In many areas, business stinks, but that can't stop you from moving forward. The people who do something first or get someplace first make history. Who remembers the second developer of the microprocessor or the integrated circuit? And who will remember the companies that got a late start in the next economic growth cycle? Now's the time to decide if you want people to remember you as a winner or a whiner.

SherpaBlog has an interesting commentary about offering print catalogs that only duplicate your web content. Basic summation: people who request catalogs convert to sales at higher rates. Anne doesn't site any sources, but it seems obvious.

The interesting question is why I spend $20K (or more) on my main catalog and $35 a month on my company's website? Hmmm.