• Monitoring Solutions for Social Media and Twitter
• Recipes for the Modern Business -
• Google Gets Real-time Search -
• Relationship Manager Gist Opens Public Beta -
• Home Grown E-business: Basecamp is a simple and elegant way to keep everyone on the same page -

• Mastering Customer Capture Online
• Engagement Starts With Asking
• Redesigning Your Own Site

Who does the quality make a difference to? Is it the business looking to display itself with professionalism.

Does the end user want only content and the quality doesn’t matter? Where is the world of web video heading and how will it effect web marketing and social connections?

Our company revenflo.com specializes in web marketing, content marketing and web technologies, I’m the new guy experiencing the web in this way for the first time as are many of the new social converts surfing the internet these days. We have been using written content, pictures and some video to serve clients and help them get their message out on the web. We set up blogs for them, expose them to social media for business uses, design email newsletters, you get the point. Where we haven’t taken a plunge yet is offering video to clients as a service because we are grappling with the model and what that service is worth to business.

We have done some video ourselves (Jason has done lots) on the webcam which does a good job capturing the essence of the conversation, here is our youtube channel. Now in the Youtube generation ages (13-28) I’m not really sure quality of video on the web makes a difference to them as long as it’s not a video game or a movie. They just don’t experience web video with a discriminating eye. They are just looking for content, they could care less about showing it in 1080p! But what about the MTV or VHS generation?

Our market really is targeted at the MTV & VHS generation. Our clients own businesses that target individuals between 35-55 , I’m just taking a feel from the projects that I have worked on so far. Now this generation grew up with grainy bad quality video, tv and games as the norm, this generation also saw all of that change.They went through all of the progression cycles of the next best thing. From the 80’s til today is a miracle of technology, isn’t it? Ever tried to watch an old VHS cassette, it’s crap. The difference is so dramatic that I personally have do desire to watch a show if it’s not shown in HD on my TV, unless it’s the Carolina Panthers playing, then my square TV at my parents house will be the best picture in the world. Theater movies of course are all in HD.

Many of our clients now have LCD or Plasma screen TV mounted to their wall at the house. This age group of people want a rich experience because they have matured in their video viewing habits to associate clarity, dimension, and production with the quality of the product. Seems right so far. Now if you tell them just to shoot their video or that you are going to shoot their video with a webcam or non HD video recorder will they associate it with poor quality and will their clients think the exact same thing about their business if veiwing on their website?

Now we aren’t talking about professional production that costs tens of thousands of bucks like an infomercial, we’re not bringing Kevin Trudeau to your business to sell but not sell you something. We are talking about youtube type videos somewhere between 3-10 minutes long. These would be located on clients sites, lets say there may be four to six on any one website. So this is where I need your comments, how important to 35-55 year old clients to present their business in HD and how important is it for their clients to watch the video’s in HD. How much difference do you think it makes?

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This is a quick and basic review and recommendation for the Google Reader. I absolutly love this app. While there are several readers out there that you can use I chose Google’s because it is fast and easy and linked with all of the other Google apps that I use. There are some great blogs out there that I enjoy following and the reader makes it easy to put all of your favorite information in the same place.

While Google may be the behemoth out there they just make it easy to access the information. My favorite way to access my reader is on my iphone. Google has an app for the iphone that allows quick access that formats well to the phone.

Readers use RSS (really simple syndication) to bring the information to one place. When looking on your favorite sites to see if they syndicate their content look for a chicklet (typically orange) in your address bar, click on it and you will be given a choice of where to put the RSS feed.

Sharing of your Google Reader is allowed, you can share it with the general public with a link on your website, or share it privately to friends and family. This is a great way to show people what you are interested in and share knowledge or a good laugh. Hope you find this interesting, let me know how you are using your reader.

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My Firefox add-ons for the week of July 30th.

Read it Later
http://readitlaterlist.com/

This little add-on has been great. I bookmark lots of sites to return to when I have time. I manage bookmarks on my computer and on delicious, a great social bookmarking site that you can access from anywhere on the web. I also send some sites that I want to follow to my Google Reader.

But what I seemed to be missing was an aggergating little app that I could store pages on the fly. These might be particular pages that I find interesting while clicking around the web during the day that I want to revisit. This add-on works great and is simple to use, Give it a try and tell me what you think.

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So I have become like a Wordpress genius during the past 6 weeks (maybe not quite a genius but close) bringing up 5 different sites for release and now I’m off to Drupal! We have a new project scheduled for start this week and I couldn’t be more pleased to finally get to work in Drupal. Our company has worked in Drupal for a while but since I’m on the new side this is my first!

For those of you that don’t know Drupal is this amazing content management platform that is like so very robust that you can do almost anything inside of it or added onto it, not sure which term is correct but this new application is going to contain a membership component, a monthly data upload with search feature and a sick feature that adds into this drupal application, A SOCIAL COMMUNITY.

So this is my first large project, until now I have been working on small Wordpress sites, training administrators on how to load content, create pages and such but now I headed to the big leagues, getting called up , having my cup of coffee and you can have a sideline seat.

Ok so here’s the goal, in three weeks our goal is to have the front/marketing section of the site up and running and the principles using the blog function to start population the content. We purchased a theme for this section but we’re going to have to do some major work on the interior pages. The goal is for this to turn out very WEB2.0ish so any feedback you want to give please have at it.

Week 6 – the data and search function is due to be released

Week 9 – the social component is set for release.

This is really going to push the envelope for devel time but everyone feels we are up to the task if the stars align just right. Just tune in and I’ll let you know how its going. Until then, write me!

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Hello all,
Just finished an impact-full hour and a half session of training on social media. I was supposed to be teaching on Wordpress posting and admin instruction but I had a little problem getting enough time with the theme first so this conversation just happened kinda organically…and it was great.

Yesterday we did a quick video on social media and how business can use it to suit their purposes and not intrude on everyone’s life and dang if today didn’t take the same kinda tone and we just went on and on. Understanding social media and how to best use it to contribute to the conversation is a key element in how we are proposing that our clients integrate their workflo and use their mobile devices and and such to provide a real time solution.

So I’m helping a team of 8 Realtors understand the wide escape of possibility that is before them and how to navigate it. So join me in our New World, Old Town framework to discover together. I’ll try and keep it simple and generic so everyone except the techies can follow. They will want too much specific info that I just don’t give just yet. I want the novice and the beginner to follow and understand so they will become engaged.

By the way congrats to Brandon Hargett for finally taking the plunge into Facebook, about dang time!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Go see him and say hello.

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Twitter paralysis is what I have termed the lack of ability to find something worthy of twittering. I see it in myself, buddies and clients everyday. As simple as twitter is you really need to have something worthwhile to say. I’m doing a local radio show tomorrow on WRHI in Rock Hill, SC where we will be talking about social media and how businesses can use it to communicate with clients and potential clients. This has become one of the most talked about subjects on the internet. Every business is asking the same question. And here is the fact, few have found great ways to consistently say something worthwile on social media. Thats why the topic is so interesting, everybody is trying to figure it out.

This brings me to my next point, what should you tweet about? Well content is king, and producing content may be the most paralyzing function on the web. Finding your voice and breaking through the barrier of putting it out there into the web stratosphere can effect would be bloggers or tweeters equally causing them not to do anything. Thats why over 60% of people that sign up for a twitter account never even tweet.

So here are my 3 cures to break thru twitter paralysis.

1. Turn off the TV – you can not think of compelling subjects and write complete sentences while watching a new episode of Burn Notice. So find yourself a quiet place once a day and sit down, get away with no distractions and fire up the computer.

2. Find 1 subject to consistently write about – you need to have interests before you twitter. Amazingly simple but true. Say gardening or baseball or social media. Doesn’t matter what it is but you need to be interested in your subject matter and enjoy it enough that you want to share it with others.

3. Write – put those fingers to work. You will never tweet anything without actually putting your fingers on the keys. There are cool tricks you can learn about including links to articles, pictures and video in your tweets but without writing something you won’t contribute much to the conversation.

TP isn’t going away anytime soon but if you practice those 3 simple steps you will be well on your way to conversing on twitter. Any other suggestions are welcome. I have been wiritng for a few months now and I’m just starting to find my voice, hope you find this helpful.

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Understanding Facebook is easy, you connect with people you know, maybe people you haven’t seen for a while. It’s very entertaining, you get to view their lifestream while contributing a little or a lot to the conversation. Everyone understands telling your friends that you had a great day or that you are looking for friends to meet up at the local coffee shop for a drink.

But…
Twitter is hard. Twitter terms are confusing. Twitter’s purpose isn’t clear.

Twitter is hard – the hardest part of twitter is content, what do you say. I wrote about this yesterday. The first and most important thing to understand about building a twitter presence is deciding what you will pass on in links and information. Will you write it in a blog or will you search the internet and find interesting articles to pass on to your followers. Once you decide on the subject you should commit to a schedule for tweeting. When people start to follow you they will be making a decision to listen to what you have to say. One of my favorites to follow is Mashable. They tweet about all things social media. It’s very informative and original content.

Twitter terms are confusing – try to explain to a boomer what a hash tag, micro blogging and tinyurl is in one sit down and their head will be spinning. That’s why there is so much attrition in the twitterverse. I myself had a hard time at first decimating all the info and putting it into a workflo. If you are tech savvy or an early adopter that can afford to invest the time now it will pay off in the end. Everyone else will come along, just slowly as the terminology becomes mainstream and the barriers come down.

Twitter’s purpose isn’t clear – what on earth does twitter allow me to do different than all the other stuff I do on the web? SEARCH! Google is great but twitter allows you to search in real time. Search specific topics that are happening now. Search quickly through your trusted sources or through all of the tweets from all over the world. As Jason Broadwater put it today, there was a recent event where twitter ruled the world in information exchange. The Iranian elections. Twitter was the only source that wasn’t able to be shut down by the dictator regime.

So thats my story today. Come join us on August the 11th @ Augello’s Coffee Shop in Old Town Rock Hill for Conversations with Revenflo. It will be a monthly conversation addressing social media, SEO, PPC, web marketing and whatever else you deem important. The discussion will be educational by nature and everyone is invited, so we hope to see you there.

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