Taking cue from The One Minute Manager, Zapp!, Fish! and Who Moved My Cheese?, The Hamster Revolution uses a parable to show how to better manage and organize e-mail and information. The hamster represents people endlessly running on the wheel of e-mail. Right away, I start using concepts from the 90-minute book. Considering I’m an … Read more
Every new release of an application adds more features, but not always for the better. Get ten tips for getting feature frenzy under control. In writing an article about social network sites, I looked at over two dozen sites like MySpace, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, Sermo, TravBuddy, MyCreativeCommunity. Wikipedia provides a list of many social networking … Read more
It doesn’t matter how long the Internet has been around anymore… the argument of what makes a good link continues. Often when I write a blog post and want to reference another blog, site, resource… sometimes, I struggle to figure out what text to use as the link and what it should say. Plus, I … Read more
Smashing Magazine provided a wealth of expert tips, advice and suggestions in its popular and valuable 35 designers x 5 questions article. To celebrate its one year anniversary, the magazine found more experts and asked new questions. The result is 50 designers x 6 questions, which contains over 170 new tips answering the following six … Read more
Samantha Krieger of Just Say Yes asked if editors prefer to receive press releases by e-mail or by mail. The following is my response: It depends on the editor. My recommendation is to create a column in your editor contact list for “Preference” or something like a “Notes” column. Then go to their Web sites … Read more
Writer Mama provided a great discussion topic in asking readers if they are rule breakers or rule followers in terms of working as writers. Plus, my family ran into an issue where someone who may have broken rules that affected an entire team. Breaking a rule can be a minor thing that only affects the … Read more
The previous post discussed the value of saying, “Thank you.” But it’s possible to overdo it especially when it comes to e-mail. “Here’s your weekly report.” “Thank you,” said the reply. Add up all the thank you e-mails for things like that and it makes for a cluttered inbox. Sometimes a thank you e-mail has … Read more
Children enjoy receiving recognition — whether it be at school, in a sport, in a hobby or a comment from Mom and Dad about something positive they did. I’ve always believed that for every negative thing a parent says, she must say 10 positive things. Unfortunately, the reverse is true for adults. As we grow … Read more
Freelance Folder has an insightful interview with SJ Yee, a freelance writer from Singapore. Yee’s answers will help those interested in writing know what to expect and how it’s different working as a freelancer as opposed for a corporation or publication. I like Yee’s 10 things to do when becoming a freelance writer – I’ve … Read more
Marcia Yudkin’s Marketing Minute newsletter references Jakob Nielsen’s research that says shoppers leave 10 percent of the time because the site didn’t provide enough information. She discusses how some sites don’t make it clear whether the product is a CD, book or download. Funny thing is that I experienced this recently. I was looking up … Read more