Photo Credits: Tony George
All social networks are not created equal. While we normally use different social networks, the way we use them is different. We use Facebook mostly to connect with friends, LinkedIn for our professional networking, and Twitter… well, there are hundreds of ways to use Twitter.
This being the case, wouldn’t […]

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Some time ago I mentioned that favicons and avatars (or profile pictures) are important branding elements on the web. This time I’ll talk about how to create and manage your avatars.
As we participate in different social media sites, we notice that each one requires a different size of profile picture. This means that […]

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A few months ago Google rolled out new, consolidated Google profiles for its members. This profile replaced all the different user profiles you previously needed to create for different Google services (Blogger, Picassa, Google Groups, etc.). This not only made it easier to manage your contact information, but enabled you to show a […]

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What is LinkedIn?

LinkedIn is a social network of more than 20 million professionals from around the world, representing 150 industries.

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When you join, you create a profile that summarizes your professional accomplishments, pretty much like an online resume, but with important social networking elements baked into it.
Here are some personal branding and marketing tips […]

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Photo Credits: tedkerwin
You Can’t Ignore Search Engine Traffic

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With all the hype around social media it is easy to overlook the potential of search engines to deliver targeted traffic. Search engines are probably the best source of targeted traffic and, as such, they should not be ignored.
While social media sites like Stumbleupon or […]

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Photo Credits: spcummings
As social media grow in popularity, more small business owners are getting interested in blogging. Once they decide to have a blog the next question is: what tools to use, and how much do they cost?

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The cost of operating a blog is virtually negligible. Around $100/year will buy you […]

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Having many links pointing to your blog from reputable sites is the best way to get found by people interested in what you have to say. Since links are like votes, they also help lift the authority of your site. Furthermore, the amount and quality of inbound links are the most important criteria […]

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I just finished reading Meatball Sundae, Seth Godin’s latest book. It is mainly an account of what happens when old school companies try to use social media to sell commodity products.
Commodity products (the meatballs) and social media (the frosting and the cherry) don’t mix very well and the result is a mess (a meatball […]

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This morning I was going through some small business feeds in Alltop and received the pleasant surprise that Shoestring Branding is now featured in Alltop’s Small Business section, next to the likes of Inc., Entrepreneur, Seth’s Blog, Fast Company, Duct Tape Marketing and Escape from Cubicle Nation.

Alltop, as you may already know, is Guy Kawasaki’s […]

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For quite some time, I have been using Gmail as my email program. Recently, I discovered a great Gmail feature that lets you brand your email address. For example, if you have a Gmail account and your email address is johnsmith@gmail.com, you can now use your own domain to create an email address […]

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