The Idea Dude

CONNECTING THE DOTS ONE AT A TIME

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Making your blog viral - Step 2

Boo!

Think about how people will respond to your blog post. Ask why people will talk about it or, better still, why they will write about it.

Why are urban legends viral? They have a sense of incredulity. People can't believe it, it makes them sit up and they want to share it because of how they responded to them.

People love surprises. Remember how the office loved the fact you brought in doughnuts to the weekly meetings. Remember how they grumbled after 2 months that you're bringing doughnuts again to the weekly meetings?

The unexpected doesn't have to be fictional. It can be a piece of knowledge that people feel compelling to share. That is the power of gossip. The delight of communicating something you know that someone else doesn't.

Did you know there are almost 95,000 applications on the iPhone and you can only load 148 of them at any one time?

I'm willing to bet if you read this post, you'll tell someone in the next 24 hours!

Next time you write a blog post, think Boo!

Monday, October 26, 2009

It's been a while...

Sometimes we get caught up in our lives, our careers, our families, we forget to live in the moment. I was listening to some music today while I was coding. Got caught up by the voice, the inflections, the breath at the end of each phrase.

It made me stop and wonder.

When was the last time, I sat down in the quiet of the evening. Just a glass of wine, headphones and my favorite CD.

With eyes closed, I would focus on each instrument, anticipating the sigh, the breath of every well-known phase. Basking in the moment, letting the emotions wash over me. It made me feel complete, at one with the world. Nothing else mattered.

It's been a while...

We do ourselves injustice to have to share our moments with each other, when each moment deserves its own soapbox. It's like looking at your date with one eye on someone else in the room. But alas in our frenetic world, that's what we do. It's called multitasking.

In the end, it's like eating soup, entree and dessert all at the same time. It fills you up but you would hardly call it appetizing.

We should never have to say, "it's been a while..."

Monday, October 19, 2009

Making your blog sticky - step 1

TheGoodBlogs have been running for over 3 years. I've blogged for almost 4. I've seen a lot of good blogs and a lot of bad ones. Here's my first tip for making your blog posts sticky.

Step 1: Keep it simple

What does simple mean? One idea. One clear idea. For something to be sticky, it must be memorable. We all have short memories.

Bad example: How to make the ultimate 3 course meal. French Onion soup, Filet Mignon and New York Cheesecake.

Good example: Wowing them with the Killer New York Cheesecake.

Question. Which one do you think you will remember? Which one makes you want to share your information.

Blogs are great because they let us ramble, like our diaries. They let us put a lot of ideas in one place. Blogs are bad because most of us ramble and most of us put too many ideas in one blog post.

So rather than give you 6 steps to great blogging. This is all you get. Step 1.

Step 1: Simple means one idea. Make people want to remember it. That's it.

Stay tuned.

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Halloween Bunnies

Maybe a little early but the last time we added the Easter Bunny to our iPhone app, it was approved and released the day after Easter. So for Halloween, we didn't want risk being late. And as it so happens we way early. Nevertheless, if you're looking to send a cute bunny to someone for halloween, our iPhone Send a Bunny apps have one just for the occasion.





Shameless pleas for your support... if you like the bunny, download our free iPhone app for the bunny or collect all the bunnies for 99c.


Visit us and get your Halloween Bunny

Sunday, October 04, 2009

The subjectivity of value

I was watching a YouTube video about virtual communities called Another Perfect World. Philip Rosedale, founder of Second Life talked about how we have a perceived value of ourselves and others have a different value they place upon us. When the large number of people believe that value to be true then you have great wealth.

It's a sobering thought because that is equally applicable in the real world. It's a paradox really because we are taught not to care about what other people think but to be true to ourselves. Yet it the real world, for us to succeed we have to convince others to agree with our assessment of our value before we have a chance of success.

Think about an interview. On your resume you have state why you would be a valuable player and deserve a particular salary. On the other side, they have to agree with that assessment before they will hire you. Are baseball players more valuable than the president of the United States. Based on their salaries you would believe so. It is truly about market forces. Does it really cost $200,000 to build a sports car and is it really worth 20x that Toyota sitting in your driveway? It is because they made you believe it via marketing and scarcity.

So while it is not wrong to have a high esteem of oneself, it is important to remember that at the end of the day, our job in any interview or meeting is to be able to convey that value and what impact it has on the organization. Most of us do a terrible job at marketing ourselves because we are taught at a young age that is wrong and when we see others do it we think they are vain or precocious.

Sometimes letting our actions speak for ourselves is not enough. It is up to us to be heard and to be proactive in setting the price.

There are always two sides to a mirror, how we see ourselves and how others see us. Unfortunately, the latter in reality is what counts if we want to succeed. That is the absolute reality of charging what the market will bear.