What a crap few weeks! Been quiet here due to sorting out other things, offline and online (like I mentioned in the last post) which set me back a bit but hey ho, no harm done…

But I got bloody man flu now too which is making me feel like shit in general, ah well, life ain’t meant to be all plain sailing, but being ill sucks, thankfully I am now on the tail end of it.

Still, a break can be good for many reasons, funnily enough I noticed a few interesting things that you might like to know, might not, but anyway, I thought I’d share a few things… at least get a bloody post up and get back into my rhythm again.

For one thing I get NO SPAM comments anymore…  Aye, a good thing, it’s freed up some time to do other stuff for sure… and I’ll share about that too.

It might help you, might not, I’m sharing anyway…

No posting does not mean no traffic, more so when using commentluv

It’s good to see the traffic still coming here daily, shows that the work and effort put in over the months is always worth it in the long run and interesting to note that much of the traffic is through commentluv links on comments left elsewhere, something else to note, it’s the better comments left that get the biggest hits…  whodathunkit!?

Another thing about it is blog post titles matter… a good reason for it’s (commentluv) success is the fact it changes the whole concept of comments adding to a conversation, whatever the said blog and comments conversation is.

The old way was just a link in the name field to our main url, (as it still is) and the comment alone was the only added benefit to both sides but now with commentluv allowing you to have specific post (which is also keyworded, ie related, if you done it right) linked to after adding the good comment as well as the main url in the name field, it’s easy to add another dimension to the post comments conversation, IE, leaving a link related to the post itself is benefiting everyone, so you benefit others twice, once with the good comment, and once with a related link, and that link is much more likely to get clicked than a name field url… it’s more appealing for a start.

As these links vary as much as you vary them, you can have related links to several different post on several different blogs, depending on what you wrote about, and it means traffic is still coming regardless of whether I post or not, from several different places… stop posting and it doesn’t mean traffic dies, or course it will be less than if you do post, that’s just common sense and no-one needs to tell anyone that…

Commentluv allows you to have up to 10 of your post linked to, so you have enough to scatter within decent comments on decent blogs to keep the juice flowing.

I see people saying they MUST post daily to keep traffic and I think for myself it’s not true, only you know – if you test it.

Posting more often will increase traffic some I admit, but so would marketing the damn blog more without having to write daily… swings and roundabouts. And leaving good comments on blogs IS marketing.

Good comments, not spam!

Want less spam? Of course you do

Spam is not marketing, though it’s pushers are persistent!

Or… they were until they come up to more blogs (like mine!) with the great new antispam plug in which is working… a treat!

This antispam plug in (G.A.S.P) is created by the same person as the commentluv one, Andy Bailey. Though also brought about with Gail from growmap, who shared it with me.

No more spam, bye bye bots.

The one good thing about blogger was the sheer lack of spamming, but hey ho, wordpress is just too good to leave and go back to blogger (for now at least) ok… maybe for good, so it’s something wordpress users just have to deal with, combat, get pissed off over,  and things have just took a great leap forward with this new plug in I think.

You can see it’s set up below, having a tickable box which only humans can do, not bot’s means 99% of the spam crap is getting nowhere!

Now we can stop relying on askimet, – (even though it was and is a good plug in to use) – though I have yet to turn that off, I am seeing almost nothing of spam anyway, askimet was never perfect as Gail documents, it often wrongly labeled people as spammers, heck it’s happened to one commenter here on numerous occasions even though he had already posted good comments here several times before. He needs me to turn askimet off… I know Jason… I will.

WordPress users would do well to add this new antispam plug in to their armoury, seeing as it’s outperformed all the others I have tried so far. If anything it will just free up your time, time not wasted dealing with 100′s or more of spammy crap daily.

It’s also helped in removing the captcha code crap, which is easy to get wrong, or just play up… a ticked box is infinitely easier to deal with and better understood by everyone.

So, that’s a 10 out of 10, on the 10.10.10. to Andy for creating two fantastic plug ins that have massively benefited me as a wordpress user.

What next? Well, add them if you use wordpress, if not, please share this post, leave a comment, or “like it” below, or subscribe, buy me a beer, or something … thanks.

A common thought!

How many times do we think that? When it comes to the understanding the opposite sex, pretty often I’ll bet!

Regardless…

Online, I think some people really are living in cloud cuckoo land.

I added a contact form on this blog, mainly so you readers could contact me anytime, with questions, thoughts, ideas, whatever, and it’s been good in the sense a few of you have emailed, I did notice a few of you had never left a comment on any post itself, so guessed you are more private, therefore that form is better for you, great, glad it helps, don’t stop if you have anything to say.

I did NOT put it there to be spammed by assholes who think they may get a result! You won’t! You will most likely get a short two word response… or maybe I”l just not even do that, something else instead!

Never guess what? …

Spamming never works.

Any spamming is not worth the time it takes, granted some spammers get lucky by sheer numbers and the fact there are gullible people out there.

Spamming is hopeles really, any spam, comments, email, whatever, it more often than not pisses people off.

Me?

Getting sick of seeing the stupid spammy comments and emails via the contact form on here, mainly SEO firms that email spam, say’s alot eh … is spam part of their SEO work? (I tell you now, you have NO HOPE of getting anywhere doing that crap! But I might just rip the piss out of you, if I feel like it. )

I said it to myself the other morning, when I saw another stupid request to do a a JV (joint venture) with some spammer who claims to make £10,000 a month doing sod all from facebook! Yeeeah right! Another punk unicorn juice seller! Hopeless! … any rainbows to go with that?

I got another two days ago with promises of “getting me ranked 1st in google” … well that ain’t hard, google the phrase “baby fed vultures”  oh look… mine is number one of over 250,000 results!!

And it got there within HOURS.

Pat on the back time for me, right? Well, no…

Because, who in the world will search for that phrase? No-one!

In the future I am just going to rip the piss out of these people, post their email address only so they can be spammed silly!! Unless they stop! I won’t reply to you, just take the piss, while sharing your email address for the spam bots to pick up.

As for the lame comment spam, they ain’t gonna get through no matter how often you try, it annoys me when one person who almost always leaves decent comments, has already been approved by me (by way of me approving his many comments up to now) keeps getting caught in the spam folder!

I know, stupid really, that’s due to askimet ignoring these things, sadly.

Nevertheless, what makes it worse is some of the lame comments that askimet miss, which are clearly spam to my eyes, these go to the “pending” folder… why? They are worse than any comment the aforementioned decent commenter (Jason)  has ever left!

Askimet needs to improve what they do and soon, if another comment spam plug-in pops up which does as good a job as askimet, while dealing with any issues faster, better, which is also improving the plug in itself.

If it has it’s own way of whitelisting and blacklisting people which WE control, then people will leave askimet behind, I for one would at least try it.

Comment the right way because it’s worth it.

Thanks!

Email subscribers, awesome people! >> Pic’s clickable!

I have myself been getting back into reading feeds more in my Greader since turning off the “community” side of it if with comments and shares being a nuisance rather than a good thing… much better silent, the authors sole “view” and having any “commenting” and discussions going on in buzz.

Just be nice to add any buzz conversation onto this blog directly, if it revolves around the post itself.

More subscribers are always welcome

Have you subscribed to this blog yet? Like those smart people ->

Once you have subbed by email, I’ll send you a free pdf that you may find interesting … if you are already subbed, use the contact form and ADD the email address you subbed with so I can verify, I will send it to you as soon as I see and verify your request.

Who doesn’t like a great freebie?

And email format is just… nice. Which is what I use for the ones I like most, mainly because by email I get it once a day, regardless of how many post were created, it all comes in one nice email.

With the bonus of being… Formatted nicely, at least by feedburner and gmail it is. Just content…

But …

I also lose eyeballs on the sidebar… That’s where the ads are etc. I hear ya! Ironical… Well, this blog looks good on a kindle no doubt … so, go ahead and check the ad out. ->

Back, or were you reading the feed and missed it?

RSS reader or email?

The thing with feed readers is you can consume far more content in the time used, no clicking out of the window from one blog to the next, just read it right there, then read the next blogs fresh post, then the next all in the same window… unless you have short feeds, those of you who do, you miss out on readers.

The odd thing is that not as many people use readers as we think, I am talking about the real friends you have in your everyday life, unless a geek!

They simply don’t read lots of stuff, they don’t need a reader, at all.

Which is why I feel email subscription works best for the everyday friend, many of whom don’t even know what an RSS reader is!

If they only check their email once a day, they will see the subscription and get all the fresh post(s) made since the last email.

Email for the good stuff and reader for the rest

I am starting to read more of the blogs post I have subscribed to by email than I have before and I am starting to think the stats in the reader are going to be interesting in how they show which blogs I always read and it’s only those I sub to by email.

Soon it will be all email subs and the reader used for “everything else” – Gmail is already a big central for me, so why not use it better and having “labels” and filters makes it simple, now gmail have added a “priority inbox” too … which knowing Gmail will get more intuitive over time.

As I’ve mentioned previously, newsletters for me are being read less, while blog feeds for me are on the rise, yet there are a few newsletters I always read, these newsletters I have read for years and they will still show up as important in gmail, so I miss nothing I want to see.

Gmail is becoming the central portal to my online experience more, it’s email. Email works. Email is universally understood.

All habits change, if we change them

Habits are changing for me. On and offline.

Habits, breaking bad ones and creating good ones, hard to break, easy to make.

We all have them… online as much as off, some get up, turn on their pc, check emails, then stats for overnight, then feeds, whatever …

Some do their site work if needed, then read news, then check forums, then twitter … etc

Others fire up facebook … not much else

For me it’s about cutting out the mix of habits that connect, overlap, smoking I have to give up and I often light one up while … reading!

Not good, hence me wanting to change some habits, create new ones, and generally improve things all around, as it’s this collection of habits that make up the experience.

Email subs for me are making an improvement, the reader just fills up with feeds just a mess really, auto filling as and when things are posted … most not so important that I need to dive in and pruning and filtering that lot out will make a massive difference, simple with the stats telling you all you need to know … then email sub to the best, done. I can then read at leisure any/all post within one email and when I am less likely to smoke anyway.

If I judge by that criteria, then if you have, or do sub to this blog by email, I am flattered. As a thanks, I’ll send you that free book.

… in my back yard, but you are always welcome to comment! )

Comments, the community around any blog is built there, nurtured there and in some cases censored too.
Those that seem to censor the comments, there are a few, also say transparency is important to them… yeah right!

Anyway, reading feeds in Greader I am missing out on some great communities in the blogs comments, far to easy to just read the feed and move onto another…

While it’s ok to keep the noise level down to a manageable one it’s a shame to miss out on the communities on the blogosphere and the great characters within them.

You don’t need to join a cult though.

For this reason I am starting to choose the RSS feeds to read in the reader and visiting the blogs I feel have good comments and a good community to them, like one puts it… why your comment section should be like a forum

People need people.

That’s the bottom line, sitting here all day typing shit and doing this that and the other can get pretty boring and at times lonely, may sound odd with the millions within reach…but it happens.
People need people to have any sense of connection in the world…
Being deaf I know what a great thing it is to be able to do, if you can’t use a phone this is the phone!

If you have a blog do what James does and interact well with the commenters, after all, it’s your blog! )
If you’re like me and naturally social online then it shouldn’t be hard.

I’d swap all my almost 2000 twitter followers for a regular 100 commenter’s on a blog any day of the week.

What about you?

Your writing is as good as your readers.

I have great readers…

The job or your writing is to be read but it’s important to realise you will never please everyone, so never try to please everyone, just write more because those who do like reading your content will come back for more and hopefully tell others, the more readers you get the better your writing must be, right?

If you really want to write, start reading more as well, reading is, as you know, so important in the communication progress and it does matter, I would have struggled to talk without reading lots and in turn writing.

The Internet has created a generation of great writers according to Penelope Trunk, maybe, maybe not too but it’s certainly changed the way communication is made, improved in some ways as people are more often connected than not, but it has also got worse with the written word being txt speak a little to often and basic grammar often being ignored altogether.

Maybe it has it’s place…um, yeah, phones? …Twitter?

You could say twitter has the argument of creating brevity with the limited 140 character count, which hints at the reality that twitter was started with phones in mind.

Granted the Internet has unearthed some good and great writers, no doubt they were already good storytellers, communicators, after all that is good writing – great writing. (I’d hope, humbly, that I would fall into the middle of them  somewhere!)

I get told I am a good writer, while flattered and pleased it’s hard to see in yourself what you do well, without being ego-influenced, but I have also always written, and I am even more of a reader, as I always have been, I mentioned it earlier I had to in order to talk properly and also to keep me from “falling behind” at school as I grew up… It helps!

Nowadays though young people are doing it even more, they are growing up without knowing any different, IMing, txt’ing, twittering, blogging, using facebook, etc etc…also reading more online.

Nevertheless it’s hard to escape the fact today’s young people are writing and reading at times most in my generation didn’t when we were young (pre mobile phones!) that is, usually at school for us and only then…these days the youngsters are online, using iphones or similar.

It matters because its changing alot of society, good and bad, communication on the whole is changing at a rapid rate, let’s not forget never before has everyone had the opportunity to share with so many, so easily and at anytime they like, hence there are more people writing overall.

I mean, it’s now 3.30AM* I have been writing lots over the evening, not only here, and yet, it’s ok, nothing stopping me from doing so, I can still click publish and share it… I could just save it and crash out in bed, get up and carry on…millions of people are doing the same! (*I will “publish” it later today, timing counts!)

That is the beauty of the internet and having the platform to share whatever, it has emboldened people to do so, while not everyone gets great results they do have the same basic opportunity, and they take it.

It just so happens as more and more do so, your writing will have to matter and stand out to rise above the noise and be noticed.

“Ah”… the marketers cry, “but the write it and they come is BS” … um yes, marketing is fundamental to anything being spread on or offline of course, but if the writing is good, better still, great, then more people will find it anyway, people share good stuff and it only takes one person to start that ball rolling, yourself or someone who shares it the first time.

It’s no coincidence Penelope is a good writer and although probably not seeing herself as one but she is a very smart internet marketer too, that combination is always going to get you somewhere.

The underlying thing I have realised (and it’s just this way with most things) is intent.

Without intent, it’s all pointless. Just words.

Friendfeed is really growing on me since joining a month or so ago after seeing it mentioned on twitter, the twitter conversation was centred around “missed” conversation around tweets, ie where the tweets were fed by RSS into other platforms like friendfeed and facebook, the discussion around them I noticed was being missed by the tweeters.

The tweets were getting hardly any repsonse themselves on twitter yet the same tweet showing in facebook by said tweeter had lots of comments which were being missed by said tweeter.

That useful conversation was missed completely for however long until the said tweeter logged into facebook. That’s when and how I heard of friendfeed, on twitter, while discussing facebook!

Friendfeed is now like an RSS Artist row!

I haven’t posted here yet about friendfeed mainly because I waned to least use it for a while first to understand it and give a fair opinion of the experience.

I can’t see myself NOT using it now to be blunt. )

Thomas made a great post where he shared “10 reasons to use friendfeed” on his blog, which utilises friendfeed itself pretty well as you see. Nice to see the benefits of friendfeed through a photographers perspective.

It was this post that made me realise it was like an artist central.

It’s not just twitters, bloggers, writers etc using friendfeed, there are a few members who only use friendfeed…which surprised me, nice surprise mind. )

At first for maybe a hour or so I seemed a little confused, lost with it but was made welcome and given some good tips, as soon as I “got it” I was hooked in a sense that twitter couldn’t do, I like twitter but was at a complete loss upon joining it way back when.

The recent function of adding twitter followers etc to friendfeed makes it a great central RSS to use and I can see people using twitter itself less and friendfeed more due to the extra use and benefit it gives you.

The simple fact of being able to keep track of the conversations started in twitter better in friendfeed is worth thinking about….you still use twitter just less and better.

Friendfeed is so much better overall and because it utilises so many RSS feeds it’s rich with interesting things I simply wouldn’t have seen elsewhere.

Amazing pictures and lots of interesting blogs, smart savvy people and diverse conversation that happens faster than anywhere else.

So much to….like!

Louis shares some useful tips on utilising the “like” function in friendfeed, it almost functions like your own friendfeed bookmark.
Louis has a few good friendfeed tips on his blog which are worth checking out too.

Friendfeed is really worth trying out if you haven’t yet tried it and is so adaptable with so many features you can tailor it to suit you perfectly…something I am still honing myself. )

It is the ultimate “outpost” for your outposts.

An interesting conversation I had recently, I won’t say who with obviously or where, simply because it’s not relevant but what we discussed was.

This reader of my blog, friend on social sites, and a real offline friend just emailed me in general chatter mode really.

The conversation came to a point where they mentioned having difficulties, just like the rest of the people with the economy taking a downturn etc.

Obviously anyone with work is worried about one main thing, “security” of that job.
No real “jobs for life” anymore as they say, which is probably 80% true.

They mentioned they are actually looking for a job as the 3 kids are all at school, hubby is working but worried like most are.

I just mentioned why not start “doing something online” while looking for work?

“Like what?” she asked, “what you do? blogging or whatever it is?”

“Could do” I replied, or any number of things really, it depends what you could do.

“All I want is to simplify life lol” she said.
“I can’t do a blog and look after the kids and do the house work! And what the hell would I even blog about, goddamit”

I remembered something I had seen a few days earlier, told her I will get back to her.

Funny where Valuable connections can be made and how.

So, I messaged her…I said…

“I’ll blog about it, but send you an email first”, both happy that both of us get the value, but me sharing lets you take the value of it to do whatever with as you will.

I realised that ALL of the above issues she had could be the very things to blog about.

Here we go…

You are rushed off your feet, kids, housework all taking your time and energy, so what could you really do about that?

You think…”Rob says, blogaboutit!! But how???”

I was browsing a very interesting site when I came across a perfectly good way to learn how to Simplify your life, indeed someone like my friend here is the perfect match in some ways.

Cheaper than fish and chips! Simplify your life

Then you can start applying these to your life, simplifying it, you can blog about how you are applying it to your life, what it’s doing for you what works, what doesn’t etc, posting maybe daily when you have a spare 20 Min’s etc to write it.

Your friends start to read your blog, they tell others and you start getting more readers, all the while you continue posting what YOU learn from YOUR actions.

You are not teaching directly, but indirectly by sharing, sharing YOUR experiences, this is you creating social proof, after a few weeks, you get more time due to the success of applying it, writing better posts, all the while you actual writing is improving.

You continue to apply and grow, your friends start asking “where they can get that book?”

You then realise you are an affiliate, you can post a link to the book while anyone who buys it will be contributing to YOU earning money, and they will buy it because of the social proof you have provided.

They may apply it but not blog about it like you did, so they will just continue reading your blog, sharing it with others, and this buying cycle will happen again.

You realise you are succeeding here, then you go check out the book writers blog, and see a great new way you can also grow your blog content, writing less at times.

Then your friends start to email you, commenting on your blog, sharing things that are working for them.

You could then ask a few to be “guest writers” on your blog, maybe let two people write a post once a week, that two days less blogging for you and you still have the content and further social proof…leading the cycle again, more eyeballs, more book sales.

You then start to see how you can add other valuable streams of income to your blog, like related products or complementing products.

Then you see how you can start to build an email list from your blog, which you can develop a better and more closed conversational relationship with your community.

It’s only showing in those who subscribe to the list, not on the blog.

Maybe do better things with the list, provide even more value to them than on the blog….doable if all your post are by guest bloggers. ;o)

Other ideas start to become visible with your growing learning curve which you know will help your community.

You can’t believe how far you have come just for taking action, life is simplified, calmer and you are in control, creating your own “security”.

You started to see how you can turn your best content into a….book!

Then sell that, get an army of fans selling it for you too.

All it took was that you realised “if he can do it, with more on his plate than me, I can do it too.”

One of you may just go for it…

Valuable connections, it’s all links, new ones, invisible ones and life changing ones.

(o? ¡s?????? ?o ??os ?? s? ????sod ?s?? ??? o? ?p?s d??? ??? uo

I have been meaning to write this for a few days. Something got under my skin, bothered me and I couldn’t put my finger on it at all, so I forgot about it.

Boy am I glad!! )

I had to disconnect to make the connection but it not only made that connection…it connected everything else for me.

Some connections were great, some not so, I digress, they are all valuable connections.

Sadly…I had to also had to face up to something I didn’t really expect. It pissed me off to a point!

As she sang…

“Sometimes it hard…to make things clear…

Or know when to face… the truth, and I know,

That the moment is here…”

No prizes to the right guess in comments! ;o)

I’ll never make it really big as a blogger, as it stands!!!

I had been given it thought in the past…
I knew it was going to be an issue, but that issue is something you probably won’t face…

Yeah… my crap ears!!!

The idiot!!? ;o)

This just confirmed it in some ways, but I would do a disservice not sharing it with you, as there’s nothing stopping you following the fantastic and well explained FREE: Time Tested And Proven Roadmap To Blogging Success… because NOW IS the time to read that if you are in any way considering starting one…even if not, there is some good insights to where things are going on this “landscape”.

One I wont be able to fully maximise.

So am I saying this blog is…dying?

NO… certainly not, I just realised where it IS going, how it effects other things in the “big picture”, the book above just helped me realise with a little more clarity…connected things in a way.

Furthermore these other connections, in my head, also had an impact on things…in a huge way.

Linking the connections was what did it, but it’s only now they connect!

It was 1980…

Summer in flow, thumping feelings to my head…and here I woke, at the bottom of a pot hole in a quarry, dazed, confused, almost 9 years old…

I took a brief look around, a twin pair of holes above me, shafts of light pouring down, peeked to left, right…darkish but it clearly looked like I was in a “slab space” like a wall of mud in font of me and a wall of mud behind me.

I tried to climb up, no used, slipping and sliding, I stopped, ran my hand through my hair…caked in mud and knotted…”where’s me hearing aid??, my coat?, my shoe?” rapidly flying through my head…

I looked around, I realised I was on a small ledge, the very real fear of falling down there kicked in.
At a guess I was about 30 ft down from the top.

Looked down saw real darkness, spotted a stone, a good handful sized and threw it down.

For a brief moment I completely forgot I couldn’t hear shit!

I smiled, no-one can ever take that off me. )

“Lee, help” I suddenly screamed, not quite realising I remembered what happened.

“He has to be there” I told myself, “LEE!!!” I screamed out, we were only playing football a minute ago…or was it hours ago…. “argggh LEEEEEE”"…a face flickered into the light…it was my mums best friend, Anna…”sigh” A memory that has never faded. )

She said clearly so could lipread… “firemen on the way, DON’T move”

I never moved a muscle… the fireman arrived, Anna said, “tie the rope round your waist”…In my innocent confusion i started to try and tie an inch and half fat rope around my wrist… /

Donut…”Waist” Anna said…”of course, what an idiot” I said, did that, got pulled up slowly and nicely.

That connection was valuable! It saved my life.

I suddenly had my head slowly out of the hole, to see half the streets residents lined up on the bank a good 7, 8 ft above us.

A sight I was glad to see. Some of you will be reading this no doubt. ) It would be interesting to hear your memory of that day, its’ the other side of the coin, watching one of ya daft mates looking like worzel gummage climbing out of a pot hole! )

The firemen asked if I was ok… yeah I said, stood up, there were all well intentionally worried…but I started to walk off towards my home, climbing up the bank, not sure if people were clapping, can’t hear at this point lol, over the top, I saw mum, my brothers, 7 and 5 at the time…all crying, shocked…the magnitude of what happened hit me and we all hugged.

I was ok, that’s what mattered, I only had a few bruises, split eyelid, bruised ego, lost hearing aid, and an upset family. /

Oh and one shoe!

So, we all walked to the ambulance, I climbed in, I remember the paramedic taking my trousers off to check my legs, stood there in my pants and the “girl next door”, literally, Sarah, my age, stood there upset, smiling, looking at me!!

“Oi bugger off” I said with a smile, while trying hard to hide the “y fronts” Yikes!!!!

She laughed, I laughed… )

I was let out and went home, a night not to forget, sat in mums bed, all of us, mum, me and brothers, dad was in middle east, working as a diver, we were watching tv…the news!!

“Eh, that’s me”!! ) Damn I looked rough! )

I was safe and well.

I had a valuable connection that day.

But a week later, sat at nans, all the family there, watching tv and it was the news, suddenly I took notice of what was happening, bearing in mind no subtitles then, it was a case in Italy, a young child fallen down a pot hole, alot further than I had and in a granite or marble quarry.

No matter how hard they tried, they couldn’t get to them.

Their last wish was to have coca cola… and that’s what they give them. As much as they wanted through a long pipe.

That was the last drink.

I cried my heart out.

That hurt and I never forgot that day.
I made a valuable connection with that child in my heart.

So, am I really going to let a silly thing my crap ears stop me, with anything?

Nope, you got that right. Then and now!

I won’t let a pair of crap ears stop me with this blog, I’ll just adapt it or I to it.

I got plans, and this blog is part of them.

I digress, whats all this got do with you?

Well, you read my blog, ;o)
Quite alot to do with you in fact.

If I am going to have issues with things like video, audio, using a webcam and mic, I can talk, not perfect but ok, I will never be able to benefit the other way, by listening. shame really, though till now I never rally saw any reason to have a webcam and mic.

Conversations, should be two way. )

I don’t miss out completely, thankfully I still have conversations that are creating valuable connections.

I got thinking about what I really wanted to achieve, what would I be happiest doing and that is interacting with more people, connecting, sharing, and learning and well as helping.

Which I realised I already do…just not well enough.

I know I do underestimate myself and what I have to share. I get told enough too!

Time to make that big improvement.

So I would love to see you join my new “Valuable connections” ezine.

Sign up to it using the form on the left sidebar.

You are going to be my main priority. )

You see, I realised every opportunity I ever wanted I have had.

Let me ask you, how many times has that door in your office, room, you are in now been opened by someone else, for you?

How about other doors?

My bet is most of the doors that have opened for you in life YOU opened, or chose not to go follow through.

I can only kick myself now for not opening the doors more often and trying, and kick myself again for not even bothering to open it and take a look!

Fast forward 5 years from now….

You come out of hairdressers with ya girlfriend, she is “pissed off”, not happy at all and you can feel it bristling on her, she starts to typing into her phone, five min’s later she calms down a bit, you ask “what ya done?”, she replies “tweeted everyone to not use that crap hairdressers”.

You realise, ya girl has something like 10,000 people following her on her twitter, 2000 of them “local”, mates who listen…

Damn that’s gonna hurt that hairdresser you think?

One small valuable connection, or in this case not so valuable!

The flip side, she came out. “Wow gotta show mates this, I feel GREAT” uploads a pic to twitpic and tweets it to all, free valuable word of mouth advertising for you!

Good very valuable connection for that hairdresser now eh? ;o)

“Ok, well, I got a shop, not hairdresser, so it wont matter to me, and anyway, it’s NOT 5 years time”… you say, right, but back to the present, there are phones now capable of scanning bar codes in the shops.

So someone scans a product in your shop, clicks the phone, says “I can get that 50p cheaper in the shop 30 yards up the rd”.

You stand there bewildered! / Another customer gone!

All these connections, big or small, who knows which one will make or break you?

For now, realise every connection you make, matters.

P.s there are really NO limits on the power of these connections. No barriers. You are at the most important moment in history. NOW.

My eldest is here…in bed now so I have another chance to post, albeit a quick one. ;o)

Been an interesting few days and partly due to a good friend sharing a book of great interest to me and one every man should read….and possibly the ladies for that matter. ;o)
(anyone wants to know what book just ask in comments)

What really got me thinking though was how I could see what the book tells of in life, real life and online too.

So… I ask you…Do women make better bloggers?

I believe they do and the reason is fairly simple, women connect better than us men, to themselves and each other and also to us fellas.
Women are more likely to write openly and that means other people can relate and connect to the meaning clearer and better, deeper.

It’s no coincidence that the post(s) I have written from the heart on this blog have had the better responses and more comments, in fact a few have sparked donations via the “beer” icon below the post(s). Always welcome they are! )

When you do write from the heart it is open, raw and meaningful…no matter what it’s about.

We are emotional beings…not robots! )

Inject some heartfelt writing in your blog and give people a better connection to you and your world.
After all blogs were and are still in some way online diaries, personal musings of the blogger.
A way to share your story.

I believe women share better than men do so make better bloggers!

What about you?
Whats your opinion?