Archive for February, 2009
Written by Mhairi Petrovic, February 27th, 2009
Scribd - document upload and sharing site, explore books, magazines, manuals, spreadsheets and more.
SocialMention – a social media search engine that searches blogs, websites, microblogs and news sites amongst others for your keywords.
LoadedBow – I love this blog aimed at young women entreprenuers. Packed with handy advice, interviews and links its definately one to subscribe to.
Biznik - a new business networking site allowing you to network, share events, publish articles and promote your business.
ResizeIt – a handy tool that allows you to easily resize, crop and edit images for free online.
And on the lighter side, find out about: The State of the Web – Winter 2009
Written by Mhairi Petrovic, February 26th, 2009
We’re celebrating our first year of podcasting with the Out-Smarts podcast, and what better way to do so that by going back to the source of inspiration for one of our first posts: Northern Voice.
This year’s Northern Voice conference for social media and personal bloggers was another resounding success. We talk with attendees to get their take on the highlights of the 2 days, why they attended and what they liked most. Contributors include Ruth Seeley, Tzaddi Gordon, Bruce Sharpe, Raul Pacheco aka Hummingbird604, Gus Fasarolli, Louise Desmarais and the very drole Christine Rondeau.
Thanks to all who contributed and thanks also to the folks at Northern Voice for organizing another great event.
[audio:http://www.out-smarts.com/podcast21.mp3]
Podcast: Download
Written by Mhairi Petrovic, February 24th, 2009
President and Founder of Imagex Media, Glenn Hilton had a great post on his personal blog the other day where he shared his experience when trying to change his Twitter name and the solution that worked for him. Its a very valuable piece (and its something we’ve been asked about more than once) so we decided to share an excerpt of the post with you. Here it is:
Steps to Change Your Twitter Handle:
1. Pick a new handle that will work best for the brand that you want to create. Check out Hubspotss Twitter Handles Dos and Donts and Strategy for Creating a Twitter Handle for input on this.
2. Log into your Twitter account and click on “Settingsâ€.
3. Enter your new handle into the “username†field and then wait for Twitter to check for the availability of that username. If its not available then you may need to try your second or third choice.
4. As soon as you find your choice available, then enter your “Password†(in the grey box that should have appeared below) and then click on “Saveâ€.
5. Immediately “Sign Out†of Twitter and then sign up for a new Twitter account by clicking on the “Get Started – Join†button.
6. During the setup of your new account make sure to use the OLD handle that you were using in your main account.
Once thats done youll now have 2 accounts. Your main account will have your new handle (ie. @glennhilton) and will have retained all your followers. Your new account will have your old handle (ie @canuckfan82) and you can use that account if you want for a secondary purpose or to retain it to catch any direct messages or @replies that your followers or others may respond to. You can then get back to them from your main account and give a notification of the change. I also suggest making a clear statement in the bio of your new account, that your main account has moved. This is especially helpful for new people who may come across your account and want to follow you as it will send them on to your new account saving you both time in you not having to get back to them to notify them personally, and them having to later waste time in changing the account they want to follow. I actually added a note in all caps in the bio of my new account that says in “IVE MOVED MY MAIN TWITTER ACCOUNT TO @glennhiltonâ€
Thanks Glenn for solving this quandary!
Written by Mhairi Petrovic, February 20th, 2009
Liveblogging from Northern Voice afternoon session on Friday. This session is aimed at beginners but there will be tips for people who are professionals at this.
Aims of the presentation:
Get started at audio and video
Get better at it
Bruce is actually a rocket scientist -formerly from MacDonald Dettwiller. Now with Singular Software.
Podcasting – a blog + audio and video – like having your own radio or TV show boradcast over the Internet. Also things you would put up on YouTube
Why do it? – Because the audience wants it. Every minute there’s 10 hours of video uploaded to YouTube. People will be more interested in your blog. Its a new medium of expression for you. (Mhairi – For me I podcast because it drives traffic but mainly because I was bitten by the bug and love doing it and it helps me to learn). This presentations will cover: 5 W’s: Why, what content; where; how and recommendations etc.
Lots of steps in producing audio and video – can be very daunting. Bruce will tell us one way to do each thing.
Video Examples:
- Now Public
- Underground News
- Unboxing on YouTube
- Live events – Bruce Sharpe.com
There is no end to the interesting things you can do.
Audio Format Examples:
- News
- Commentary
- Interviews
- Education
- Conference Presentations
- Sports
- Whatever You Want.
TOOLS -You need an audio recorder of some kind.
- Video – you can use the audio recorder on your camcorder.
- Audio – record it on the phone using your PC’s recording device
- Or: Olympus Voice Recorder, Zoom H4
Microphones – You need one. Don’t use the built in one as the quality is really bad on a laptop. So you should buy one:
- Clip On Microphone thast plugs into camera
- Recording to computer – buy USB mic that plugs into your ports – i.e. BlueMic Snowball or Better USB $125
Cameras
- Cell phone cameras aren’t good for this.
- Still camera’s are surprisingly good.
- Brand Name Camcorder – Sony, Canon and Panasonic are all good as are Mic input, flash memory or HDD.
- HD – Go for it!
Question – Flip is it good?
Not great for video podcasting – 2 versions of the Flip very compact, easy to use, selling like crazy (affordable). If the nature of your podcast is serendpitously finding stuff about life. But the quality isn’t that great – a still camera has better quality. Flip is okay depending on what you are doing – if not great quality is okay with you then go for it.
Tripod – Oh yeah – get one! Usually about $60 -$100 for a reasonable one – much more for a great one.
Check out review sites: dpreview.com and camcorderinfo.com
Lights -are the number one way to make your video look better. Don’t do halogen. Instead Bruce recommends:
- Natural/practical light
- Got to a camera store and ask
- Flouresecent, daylight balanced, diffused 9cost more but worth it!)
Green Screen - not really for beginners but so much fun. Check out tubetape.com and you tube tutorials. You can be in your basement recording and make it look like you are in NY.
Time to Record – plug in your mic and start up your editing software.
Prepare – If you are interviewing – prepare your questions in advance and prep the person being interviewed so that they can prepare (give them context).
You can use phone or Skype
Using Skype – free – good to use. Better quality than the phone. To record on Skype, use:
- Pamela
- Audiohijack
- Others were mentioned but connection was lost and memory is shot
).
If you have to record over the phone buy a recording device (but these tend to be dear)
Screencast Software
- Camtasia Studio
- Mac SnapZProX
- Screenflow
Editing
You should listen/watch and edit before you post. There is a lot of debate about this. Bruce likes it when people edit right – take the stupid stuff out. Take the ums and aahhs out. At the very least you should:
- Trim the ends -the deep breath before your start and so on.
- Cut the dead air – strange pauses
- Adjust levels (please, please, please)
- Add intro, outro and music.
- Add music, reduce noise, add sound effects
Levels – adjust the levels and take pity on peoples eardrums. Use Levelator to this easily.
Audio Editors:
- Audacity
- Garageband
- GoldWave
- Audition
- Soundtrack Pro
Video Editors
- Windows Movie Maker
- iMovie
- Pinnacle Studio
- Final Cut Express
- Sony Vegas
Resources:
Music thats safe to use:
- 17 Places to Find PodSafe Music blog post on blog talk radio by Deb Ng
- Magic
- Garageband
- Pinnacle Studio
- 99 Designs
- Audio needs to be in MP3 format. Download LAME from Audacity
Where to Host:
BlipTV – free, high quality better than YouTube, Ads are optional.
Show notes: Highly recommended, link resources.
Bruce provided a tonne of info and so far provided the most valuable presentation of the day. Thanks Bruce!
Written by Mhairi Petrovic, February 20th, 2009
Chris has been talking about the death of advertising since 1994.
4 Areas:
- Is it really dead?
- What killed it (did it kill itself)?
- What works?
- The rebirth.
Marketing has become a 4 letter word. Consumers have created a backlash and don’t want to be sold anymore.
Chris Asks – is advertising dead?
Traditional is dying/dead but advertising is evolving i.e. blog outreach, ads on social networks. Reality is reviews have taken place of advertising. When we want to find out about hotels or restaurants we go to sites where real people review.
What killed advertising?
Choice killed it. Power: shifting power and our ability to make decisions. Bombardment from direct mail helped. We have more information available to us now to make educated decisions. Tivo etc allows you to filter it out. People have more choices – they are spending more time doing other things i.e. on social media. We get zoned out and stopped noticing stuff because we are bombarded with shit we don’t need. Search killed it – we can find things for ourselves now.
What works?
Informative advertising works. If we learn from it and its appropriate then its not advertising, its helpful. If its timely and your in the market then it works. Building on the “social” of social media works. You have to stop selling and start helping people find what they want to buy.
We have to change our thinking about advertising. Traditional advertisers don’t understand the web medium.
How does it get reborn?
Mechanism for content distribution. Dell on TechCrunch – video ads of conversations with users. Nudey pictures of soccer hooligans with slogans on there bum?.
Creative media works i.e. Will It Blend - Blendtech ad budget is zero and yet when they blended an iPod it came up 5th in Google searches for iPods for a while. Resulted in 500% growth in sales.
Build on relationships rather than transactions.
The best marketing is what you do with the product before your start selling.
Real marketing is about matching your products and services with the actual people who really need them. We need to get back to real marketing, understanding our customers and giving them what they want.
Be who we are!
Written by Mhairi Petrovic, February 20th, 2009
Written by Mhairi Petrovic, February 19th, 2009
Tomorrow and Saturday I will be attending Northern Voice – the personal blogging and social media un/conference. I thought I’d post my top 10 reasons for going again (yes indeed my reasons do differ from last year – this is not a repost).
1. Number one reason is that I met so many fantastic people at last year’s event that I am dying to reconnect and meet some more.
2. Its such a social media lovefest with back slapping and all.
3. I hope to learn something new perhaps about podcasting, video content or the next big thing.
4. I like to learn some WordPress tricks so that I can in turn share my knowledge with you.
5. At only $60 a pop its well worth the money and that even includes lunch.
6. I am hoping to get the chance to macrame my own lanyard in the interests of reducing, reusing and recycling.
7. I intend to podcast, liveblog and even take some photos of the event.
8. I will be trawling for innocent future podcast contributors, partners and prospective clients (you have been warned!).
8. I see the conference is being sponsored by the BC Liberal party and I want to know why.
9. I also want to know what the hell EduBlogger Hootenanny means (methinks perhaps some kind of teacher/nanny/owl that blogs but I could well be wrong?!?!?).
10. And last but not least I always like a good excuse to get out of real work for the day.
Written by Mhairi Petrovic, February 16th, 2009
Here are 10 great ways you can easily improve your search engine positioning without putting your hands in your pocket and without having to be a SEO technodweeb.
1. Update your site regularly – this may seem obvious but many corporate sites rarely change.
2. Post a video – it can be short and sweet but has the added benefit of enhancing your image.
3. Add a podcast – our traffic peaks every time we podcast and by submitting the podcast to top pod sites, the effect ripples. Coincidence? I think not.
4. Label your images – most sites don’t bother but this is viable real estate on your site, use it. Image titles should relate back to your keywords and offering for maximum impact.
5. Use Google’s webmaster tools – make sure your site is crawled regularly, submit your sitemap (okay I concede you might need a technodweeb for that) and identify any problems so that you (or your technodweeb) can fix them. If you can’t work out how submit your sitemap do it page by page in Google.
6. Get bookmarks – book marks are like links the more you have the better. Hit on employees, partners and colleagues to bookmark your site. Good sites include Digg, or Stumble Upon.
7. Comment regularly on relevant blogs and always remember to insert your url correctly.
8. Spend some time developing a keyword map for your products and services so as to identify the most effective words to use and those to avoid.
9. Use bold and headings to identify key terms in your text.
10. This one should be first on the list but it seems so obvious I almost left it out. In case you haven’t done so, remember to submit your site to Google and other search engines otherwise there’s no hope whatsoever.
Written by Mhairi Petrovic, February 13th, 2009
This podcast is in conversation with Jess Sloss. Jess is the founder of SocialSquared.com and Strategist at Giant Ant Media, a local firm well known for their infectious buzz worthy video content. We talk to Jess about using video content for business development and other corporate applications, what makes for great video content and about some of the great projects they are working on at Giant Ant Media. Enjoy!
[audio:http://www.out-smarts.com/podcast20.mp3]
Podcast: Download
Written by Mhairi Petrovic, February 12th, 2009
Tonight’s Vancouver Twestival - the Twitter festival to raise awareness of charity: water. If you don’t have a ticket and want to go this great event, Hippo Water Roller is giving one away. Direct message @hipporoller if you are interested.
