Sweetmantra: Internet Marketing Advice

My Marketing Martini Podcast is Now Being Served

In my final blog post of 2006, Will 2007 be the Year of the Podcast?, I predicted that we're going to see a lot of growth in the podcasting space this year. While it's too early to know if my prediction will come true, I'm certainly going to do my part to add to the podcast momentum.

Today I am pleased to announce the launch of my first podcast, Marketing Martini, and its tagline, "Internet Marketing Advice Served Straight Up".

Marketing Martini is a free weekly business podcast for busy professionals that serves up a condensed shot of practical Internet marketing advice from yours truly, Bill Sweetman.

Listeners to the Marketing Martini podcast will learn how to market their products and services on the Internet using Internet marketing solutions that are practical, measurable, and effective.

Because I know everyone's time is precious, each weekly episode will be kept to less than 10 minutes in length and will honour what I am calling The Marketing Martini Promise.

I invite you to take a sip of the Marketing Martini, served straight up every week at www.marketingmartini.com.

Marketing Martini would not have been possible without the inspirational musings of Mitch Joel and C.C. Chapman as well as the expert advice of Leesa Barnes. Special thanks to Miss Yvonne for her voiceover work, Mouth Media for the logo design, and Eugene, Oregon's Mofessor for the use of their music.

The Biggest Domain Name Myth

I hear it all the time. And it drives me nuts.

By "it" I am referring to the statement: "all the best domain names are taken."

Not by a long shot.

While it is true that most (English language) dictionary words were scooped up long ago, there are still lots of opportunities to get your hands on a catchy and memorable .com domain name.

For starters, you can always turn to the domain name re-sale market where thousands of previously-owned (previously-loved?) domain names exchange hands every day.

Spend a few minutes poking around on The Domain Name Aftermarket and Afternic and you will find thousands of desirable domain names ready to be scooped up for under $500, and many for far, far less. (I paid a whopping $5 - yes, five bucks - for the last .com domain name I bought on the re-sale market.)

The other way to get a great domain name is to - pardon my bluntness - be a bit more creative.

True, croissant.com is not available, and you probably can't afford to buy it, but (at the time of me writing this) flakypastries.com and frenchtreats.com are available. (I'm not saying that these are the greatest domain names ever, but you could do a lot worse, and they took me all of two minutes to come up with.)

Play around with a thesaurus, rhyming dictionary, and domain name research tools and you should be able to find a great domain name just waiting to be registered.

Seven Fast Tips for Using Blogger

Now that I've established that Blogger doesn't suck anymore, I thought it would be helpful to share a few quick and easy tips to help you get the most out of Blogger, Google's free blogging software.

1. Tweak the Navbar
   The Blogger navigation bar at the top of every page doesn't have to be a 'loud' blue and orange. While you can't eliminate the navigation bar entirely, you can make it less obvious and tie it closer to the look and feel of your blog. To do so, simply log in to your Blogger account, then navigate to Dashboard > Layout, then click on "Edit" on the Navbar. In addition to the default blue colour scheme for the Navbar, you can also choose tan, black, or silver.
2. Finesse Your Photo
   For the photo of you, the blogger, use a JPEG that is exactly 88x88 pixels in size. This size will look best both on your blog (where more people are likely to see it) and your User Profile page. To change your photo, navigate to Dashboard > Edit Profile.
3. Create Search Engine-Friendly Tags
   Since page titles are very important to search engines, and since Blogger automatically incorporates tags into page titles, make sure you create tags that accurately reflect the content of your blog. This will help increase the traffic you get from search engines.
4. Use a Compelling Description
   The description you use for your blog in the top header section will likely be used by search engines when they display your blog in search results. Make sure you craft your description to be compelling to readers (to motivate them to click) and search engines by including the most important keywords here. Go to Dashboard > Settings to add or modify your blog description.
5. Use Your Own Domain Name
   Just because your blog's URL is likely to be some variation of yourblog.blogspot.com this doesn't mean you can't have a snappier and more memorable URL for marketing purposes. Simply register a domain name like TheBestBlogEver.com (for $10 or less at registrars like GoDaddy) and forward this to your blogspot.com URL. (Blogger also now supports using a custom domain for serving your blog, however configuring this is not for the faint of heart.)
6. Protect Yourself From Spammers
   If you want to provide your email address to your blog visitors but don't want to get bombarded by spammers using email address harvesting software, modify the way you display your email on your blog as follows: billgates[at]sympatico[dot]ca or billgatesNOSPAM@NOSPAMsymptico.ca.
7. Measure Your Traffic
   Blogger doesn't offer any Website traffic statistics (yet), but that doesn't mean you can't measure your blog traffic. Use a free and basic service like Site Meter or, if you're a data junkie, try Google Analytics.

Who Said Lawyers Don't Have a Sense of Humour?

If you're as fascinated as I am by the high stakes (and sometimes bizarre) machinations of the domain name dispute world, then I think you'll be interested in what I stumbled across recently.

It's called the Gowlings Domain Name Portal, and it's a lot more fun than its bland name might imply. Honest.

Launched in April 2006 by Gowlings, one of Canada's largest national law firms, GowlingsOnDomains.com provides a detailed review of Canadian and International domain name law, with a particular emphasis on .CA domains. It's the best source of legal information on this topic that I've come across to date, and a must-read if you've got questions or concerns about domain name law in Canada.

My favourite part of the site is its CDRP Summaries, which provides summaries of all cases regarding .CA domain names and trademarks decided under the CIRA Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy. Finally, a fast and easy way to get a taste of the legal jockeying behind dozens of domain name disputes such as belll.ca (note the third "l"), fordcanada.ca, and (my personal favourite) mtv.ca.

You see, the cybersquatter who originally registered mtv.ca claimed he, rather than Viacom, had a legitimate interest in the domain name because it actually stood for "Melanie and Todd's Vacations". I am not making this stuff up, folks.

Kudos to Gowlings for taking the initiative to put together this valuable, educational, and surprisingly entertaining resource.

Blogger Doesn't Suck Anymore or: How I Spent My Christmas Holiday

Until recently, if you were an aspiring blogger and you asked me my opinion of the blogging software Blogger, I would have gone into a mini rant about how surprisingly clunky and user-unfriendly it is, especially considering it is hugely popular and owned by Google.

Then I would have added that, of course, you get what you pay for. (Blogger is free.) And finally I would have suggested that you'd be better off paying $5 a month for a service like TypePad instead.

That was until this past Christmas.

In December, Blogger officially launched their new - and vastly improved - software, and I had a really good chance to give it a workout since I spent some of my Christmas holiday helping my Dad set up his first blog, In A Mellow Tone. (He prefers to call it a Website, but that's another story...)

The new Blogger is much easier to use (especially for non-technical folks) and offers some customization and configuration features that rival those of paid services like TypePad. Best of all, it's still free.

For full-blown professional or corporate blogs, I still recommend more robust and configurable paid services like TypePad and Movable Type (along with WordPress, which is 'free' but requires considerable technical prowess). However, for personal or modest little blogs like my Dad's, the new Blogger offers more than enough bells and whistles and is extremely easy to use.

If you haven't played around with the new Blogger yet, I highly recommend it. It's a great way to start the New Year.