Archive for August, 2008
Tuesday, August 26th, 2008
Every day we have to make choices, whether we want to or not. Sometimes it is easy. Sleep for another 30 more minutes or get up and exercise. Eat oatmeal or bacon and eggs for breakfast. Get mad at the taxi drivers or listen to your favourite radio station on your way to work.
Then it gets harder! Obama or McCain (if you are American), Zuma or anarchy (for us South Africans). Watch another Springbok rugby match or have root canal (dentist wins hands down!)
Oh yes those sticky moral decisions raises its ugly head once in a while. For instance – Do you go back into a shop and pay after unconsciously walking out and only realising your mistake in the parking lot.
So my moral decision came about today while surfing the internet. I always wondered how bloggers make their money through Adsense. Those of us who are not as Adsense savvy are always looking for the answers.
We get roped in by websites and bloggers showing off their 4 figure Adsense invoices, but have 1 or 2 Adsense adverts on their websites or blogs.
Of course there are bloggers and website owners who write profusely and offer great content, but my guess is more than just a few bloggers use ethical means.
Fair enough, but then how about not making it seem like it’s all content and clever positioning?
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Monday, August 25th, 2008
Not too long ago Beijing was but a distant event and China was either your grandma’s delicate dishes or your best mate. The poor Tibetans barely had time to organise their protests when the whole thing was over.
This past Olympics will be known for the fantastic Usain Bolt and Michael Phelps and as much as for cliches like – bolt from the blue. It will be remembered for the well run events as well as for the Chinese almost over-eagerness to please.
Who can forget the image of the little girl in a red dress who floated around the stadium while miming a song, only to find out the original singer was replaced on the last minute for not having the right look? In our image conscious society did we doth protest too much or too little?
The big question today though is…what on earth do we do with our time now that the 2008 Beijing Olympics is over and done with for another four years, what is left with to fill the hours with?
There’s always that other 4 yearly spectacle knows as the US elections that even us non-Americans get a bit interested in.
Let the games begin!
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Thursday, August 21st, 2008
Media companies are discovering that we women are making our voices heard on the great information highway.
Advertisers are taking notice. Their spending power is going directly to sites and blogs focused on topics geared towards women.
We women are natural conversationalists and communication is our forte (not that all men would agree!), which makes blogging perfect for us gabbers out there.
Just take a look at blogs such sites as blogs.24.com. Their top 10 most read lists are dominated by female bloggers.
What better place can there be to share information, chat with old friends, make new friends, find recipes and even practice our professions than from the comfort of our own homes?
Many of us women are out there on the internet, earning a living from with our skills. Even so, there is so much space for more female entrepreneurs.
The internet is more than just a level playing field for us women, it is tilted in our favour. There is just the small matter of learning how to turn what comes naturally to us into profit!
Posted in internet, marketing, media | No Comments »
Wednesday, August 20th, 2008
In the world of blogging, is content always king?
During my recent time off work, I had the opportunity to read many blogs I don’t usually have the time to read.
It made me wonder what makes a good blog and if professional writers are more likely to have popular blogs. For instance does the Mail and Guardian’s ThoughtLeader blogs have more merit than someone like Madmom on blogs.24.com?
As a relatively new blogger and non-professional writer, I am interested in what makes a blog worth reading. I would actually like to improve my own writing and I realise that it takes time to find my blogging voice.
The only real way to find that voice is to keep writing regularly! But then I wonder if that is enough?
Maybe sometimes content is king, but maybe sometimes it’s more than that. It’s the same thing that makes one book more interesting to read than others. Who can actually account for the success and mania surrounding the The Da Vinci code a few years ago?
Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments »
Monday, August 18th, 2008
For the past two weeks I have been on leave from my day job. I used some of my free time during the first week to read a few other blogs and downloaded marketing related material like the a href=”www.quirk.biz/emarketingtextbook eQuirk Marketing Text Book (which I will review later).
It didn’t take too long before my data bundle kicked the bucket. Instead of topping up, the library came in handy. I went and got 7 books to read – one about blogging, written in 2006. It seemed quite a bit outdated. How time flies on the internet!
It reminded me to never buy a book about internet marketing. By the time those things go to print, much newer technology and techniques would have hit the www. I have taken out a few internet related books before and each time the feeling of staleness was the same.
By the second week of my leave I had relaxed sufficiently to put away my computer. No writing, no working on website, no stockpiling of blog articles.
I read novel after novel. I realised why working from home would never work for me. It is far too comfortable here – if you disregard the maintenance men in the complex I reside in. Somehow they always have urgent things to do under my window while I try to get in a few late mornings after a few late nights.
Now it is time for hard work again. There is surely no rest for the wicked.
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