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My Top 5 List of Top Whatever Lists: Happy New Tech New Year 2010

Monday, January 4th, 2010

Tis the season of lists. Too many lists? Maybe or maybe not, depending on whether or not you are looking for some perspective, or maybe some bottom line insights about trends and/or tips on how you or your organization’s tech, social media or just plain ole marketing priorities should be focused for the coming year.

My high hopes are that the following list of lists (and grand perspectives) will help you make 2010 the best yet:

5. Super Geek David Pogue’s Pogie Awards
My favorite NYTimes tech writer’s picks for gadgets, apps & such include the killer Firefox extension READABILITY and a very funny (to me) iPhone app that let’s you safely text while walking, by using the iPhone’s built-in camera.

4. Google’s 2009: A Glimpse of the Web’s Next Decade
At least at the moment, as Google goes, so goes the Web. And, if you haven’t noticed, Google is hardly standing still. In fact, they have been innovating their butts off. So, if you’re not tuned in, you should be; and this post by Mashable is packed with eye-candy charts that help make staying up to date more fun.

3. YouTube Is the Top Social Media Innovation of the Decade
Also, via Mashable, and also not technically a Top Whatever list, I’m including this post because I think the importance of YouTube is about as important as it gets. For one thing, YouTube is frequently omitted from lists of social networking sites. Come on! This thoughtful article explains why I’m going to be posting a whole lot more video in 2010 and why I think you should too.

2. 8 Things Every Geek Needs to Do Before 2010
This post is beyond practical, it could literally save your life (technologically speaking). No kidding. Have you backed up lately? Have you edited your privacy settings and pruned your feeds? This is important stuff (via leading tech blog ReadWriteWeb) that can help make your whole year better.

1. 2000s Decade Recap – Business and Technology (video below)
Originally called to my attention by the TechCrunch post Video: A Decade Of Tech Highs And Business Lows, the 3:22 video below puts the past unprecedented decade in perspective, and given the magnitude of the changes, from the dot-bomb implosion through ground-breaking iPhone innovations and social media explosions, I think it’s worth taking at least 3 minutes or so to reflect. Don’t you?

As the Grateful Dead sang, “What a long strange trip it’s been.”

May the Tech Highs continue, and the Business Lows not so much.

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Posted in Google, iphone, small biz e-biz, social media marketing, technology, video, youtube | 5 Comments »

Google Gets Simple, Elegant in New Tech Videos (Google Real Time Search & Google Goggles)

Tuesday, December 8th, 2009

I like clear and simple. I heard Steve Jobs quoted today as saying that simplicity is “the ultimate elegance.” I especially like simplicity when it’s used to describe complex new technologies, and so much the better if that simplicity is being offered on YouTube, via video clips that are less than two minutes in length.

Thus, the two-clip salute below to Google and two major new (complex) technologies that are designed to make our lives simpler.

The first is real time search. A hot new trend that’s featured in the #1 spot on the American Express OPEN Forum post, “5 Trends That Will Shape Small Business in 2010.” Don’t look now, but the web has taken on a whole new dimension:

The second video demonstrates something even more powerful, Google Goggles, which searches by objects using your cell phone’s camera rather than text or voice to initiate the search. I like the tweet description that I just read by @faris: “Seriously – no messin’ – Google Goggles is an entirely new paradigm of human computer interaction – ‘hey Internet – what’s that?’ ”

Let’s let Google explain it visually in two minutes:

Yes, I hear that Google Goggles WILL be coming out for the iPhone.

And, come to think of it, Google always did get simple. Just think of their home page.

What do you think? Are these exciting new technologies? Are these videos any good? I’d love to hear your opinion, view and/or feedback.

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Posted in Google, cell phones, iphone, video, youtube | No Comments »

Major Trend Alert: Shared Links Can Trump SEO for Internet Marketing

Sunday, September 27th, 2009

NYTimes "share this" imageLink sharing inspired by social networking sites like Twitter, Facebook and/or LinkedIn is nothing new. But fresh data published in Sunday’s New York Times by Brad Stone in his article, “Share The Moment And Spread the Wealth” reinforces the fact that this trend is continuing to gather momentum. It is doing so even to the extent that it has become equally important and now sits side-by-side with SEO (the historically dominant technique for building website traffic via Google) as a strategy for increasing the visibility for your website.

This underscores the powerful points made by some of my favorite thought leaders. Whether you call it building your “Tribe” as Seth Godin does or creating a “World Wide Rave” as David Meerman Scott articulates the opportunity, I have to say that whether you are a marketer or just a business owner, social networking has now crossed a major trend line. If you didn’t consider it essential before, now there is no doubt (at least in my mind) that social networking that encourages link sharing must now be considered a mission critical component of every company’s marketing plan.

For this reason, ComBridges’ is increasingly offering more social media marketing services in a variety of formats, including contract, consulting and even mentoring/coaching. Click here to request a free consultation.

FYI, I’m also very excited to let you know that I will be covering social media marketing and related topics in our upcoming EBiz Express Teleseminar series. Be sure to subscribe to our “It’s a Wonderful Web” enewsletter if you want to be invited. The guests/co-presenters will be awesome, and we are keeping this educational series very affordable.

Posted in Google, facebook, internet marketing, twitter | 12 Comments »