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If You Post It, They Will Come

Trying to get people to participate on your Facebook or Myspace pages doesn’t just happen, it takes effort on your part. The same is true as far as getting people to read your articles (if you write them) or visiting your website. One way to pull people in, though, is to post comments in various places. You may have seen the movie Field of Dreams where the line “If you build it, they will come” is heard in Kevin Costner’s head throughout the film. It might have been true in the movie but it’s not necessarily true regarding websites or social networking profile pages. If you build them, people don’t necessarily come. It’s more like if you post it, they will come.

On Facebook or Myspace, getting people to comment on your posts doesn’t come automatically. So you must be the initiator. The first step is to comment on the posts of others. This will make them more inclined to weigh in on your posts. Before you know it, they will comment on your posts with regularity. Also, not only will they be more inclined to comment on your posts, but you will create a higher level of visibility for yourself. As a result, you should also see an increase in friend requests from the poster’s friends that see your comments. It really serves two purposes.
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Monetize Before You Advertise

I don’t know how many times I’ve seen people make the mistake of spending massive amounts of money on advertising for a website, only to discover that they didn’t make much money after they finally got people to visit the site. This, among other things, proves that they should monetized their site before they advertised their site. To monetize a site means that a site is optimized to make as much money as possible from its visitors.

There really is no cheap form of advertising that is effective. It’s going to cost you no matter what. Whether it’s a print advertising campaign or online advertising campaign. So why not maximize the return on your investment? The best way to do that is to monetize your site as much as possible before you incur the expense of any ad campaign. There are a number of ways of doing that.
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Internet Money Making Scams and How to Spot Them

Wouldn’t it be great to work at home and set your own hours? How about if you make $200 a day while only working just two hours a day? Sounds too good to be true doesn’t it? Most likely because it is. Welcome to the world of internet money making scams. Let me tell you, there are a lot of them out there. Some are easier to spot than others and some are just so damn obvious they are a scam, that they are an outright insult to your intelligence.

Let’s face it, if money was that easy to make, everyone would be rich. Yet for some reason, not everyone is. Huh. Go figure. Lets’ go over some of the scamming techniques:
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Pop Up Trade Show Displays

Pop up trade show displays are used at trade shows, events, job fairs, retail stores and anywhere a large portable display wall is needed. Pop up displays come in a variety of shapes and sizes and you can add graphics to them or order them graphic ready. If graphic ready, you velcro graphics onto the fabric skin of the display.

Pop up booths are easy to set up and transport. The frame opens up like a EZ UP canopy or an accordion. You then hang either fabric or graphic panels to the frame and you are all set up. Also, the case can convert to a podium stand by using either a graphic or fabric wrap to surround the case. A plastic or wood top is added to finish off the podium.

Custom pop ups are available with internal shelving, back lighting, different shapes, monitors, dye cut graphics and more.

Backlit pop ups are like a giant light box. Special panels and lights are hung behind the display and a large transparency graphic is hung on the front.

Table top pop ups are available for budget conscious end users and are built in miniature.

Graphic mural pop up trade show displays feature graphic “skins”. Their fabric counterparts feature velcro receptive fabric to allow users to attach detachable graphics to the face.

Bubble kits allow back lit graphics to extend in front of the wall to give a different look.

3D pop up displays offer a unique way of displaying graphics and are the easiest to set up.

Visit a trade show and you will see tons of trade show pop up displays being used in the various forms. The most uique ones exhibit custom designed graphics for higher impact and better results. Picture pop ups at a trade show sort of like a billboard along a freeway. It only has a fraction of an instant to attract attention.

Youtube, Google, Yahoo, Bing, Myspace and Facebook: Why They Chose Their Names!

Hailing from whence I do, slang is very much a part of every day language. Just the other day for example a mucker of mine did something daft; on hearing this, my only retort was to say ‘ya tube’ to him. In Scottish slang ‘tube’ is a noun that means ‘a contemptible or idiotic person’. Calling someone ‘ya tube’ is like saying ‘you idiot’. It got me thinking whether or not the minds behind the creation of the website YouTube were aware of the slang meaning. Perhaps they did and that is what makes it ironic – YouTube, a site where people can upload videos of themselves doing idiotic things and showing the whole wide world how much of a ‘tube’ they actually are. For our perpetual enjoyment no less!

Image via CrunchBase
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Social Share Site “Propeller” is No More

I took a screengrab image of the splash screen that Propeller has up, thanking its users for their patronage, and submitted that image to Triond for publication on Picable. I did not really expect it to be published, truth be told. -Professional courtesy to another in the business and all. We don’t laugh when someone in the allied business fails, ‘goes under’ or otherwise bows-out.

Well this is not it…

But it conveys the message clearly enough.

(image by author)
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What Exactly is Spam?

Most people would define spam as unwanted or unsolicited e-mails. However, these days, there are lot more things that could be categorized as spam. In fact, anymore, anything that might be considered as annoying would fall within the definition of spam and, let’s face it, there are a lot of things online that annoy us. This is especially true when dealing with social media sites like Twitter, Myspace and Facebook.

One example is excessive tweets. Think about it. Who really wants to hear about everything you do throughout the day? The truth is that a lot of people will stop following you on twitter if you send out too many tweets. Too many follows is also frowned upon by the people at Twitter, They will lock your account if you do too many follows in one day. They figure that you are just following a bunch of people just to get them to follow you back. So they consider that as a form of spam and generally try to nip that in the bud. Twitter is actually one of the stricter sites regarding that sort of thing.
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Six Quick Tips for Writing on Line

  1. Write what you know.  If you know nothing about Justin Bieber, don’t write about Just Bieber.  If you know about Tibetan Mastiffs, write about Tibetan Mastiffs.  However, with a  little research, one can write about anything.  DON’T PLAGERIZE! This means that when you research you DO NOT cut and paste or just copy someone else’s work.  List your sources.  Don’t be a jerk.
  2. Write what people want to know about.  Justin Bieber seems to be popular at the moment.  So is facebook.  Look into what is popularly searched on Google, http://www.google.com/trends/hottrends if you are just looking for the quick in.  See number one though.  Don’t write about a bunch of crap that you don’t actually know about.
    Image via Wikipedia
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4 Tips That Will Increase Your Success as a Blogger

Here are four helpful, yet simple tips that I think will help increase your success as a blogger. These tips are very easy to follow and will leave you asking yourself, “why didn’t I think of that?” The reason why is because sometimes things that appear to be obvious are not always so obvious. Fortunately for you, you can get these tips right away and immediately apply what you have learned on your blog.

Be Informative: When you post something on your blog, it should be informative. Not all of your posts need to be instructional or educational. Many of your posts can simply be something useful, or something that people can take from it. The latest post from Inside AdSense is a great example. In about 150 words, the AdSense team talk about the new look for AdSense Ad Units. In this post, they explain some details about the update, provide a few screen shots, and leave the floor open for your comments and feedback.
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Advice on Managing Your Google Reader RSS Feed Subscriptions

It’s been awhile since I last logged into Google Reader. Now, here’s the thing about Google Reader. I like it! I like it a lot. However, it can become very overwhelming if you have subscribed to a lot of feeds.

RSS Feeds are like many things in life that you feel is important. Things that you say, “Oh, this is important to me, I need to save it for later.” Things like receipts, notes from friends, particular articles in magazines, an extra screw found on the floor, twist ties, etc.

If you’re like me, then you SAVE everything! But here’s the problem with that. 9 out of 10 times, the things that you save in your JUNK DRAWER at home, you’ll never use! And here’s another thing… when you finally realize that you need something (i.e. missing bolt on the lawn mower, missing screw holding an arm on a chair, etc.) you tend to forget that you have it in your junk drawer. What happens, is you go to Lowes and buy the hardware, or whatever you need, and repair the item.
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