Web Tech and Media services for all
Google Adsense only lets you display their ads three times on one page (I actually don’t have a verified source on that). But what if you display 3 Google ads, and then other advertisments from other sources?
Apparently this is also okay to do so long as the ads are displayed as ads and not as something else, I think to be safe you should follow Google’s guidelines even with non-google ads. Am I completely off-base on this one?
I got an opportunity to visit with John Chow and Debra Faris at Costa Mesa Connectors recently, and I captured John’s talk. You can watch it below. It’s about blogging. The video is long, but it really gives you a great idea on how you could make a living from your blog.
If you don’t know about John Chow, I recommend you take a look at his site http://www.johnchow.com. John makes his living from his blog, he blogs daily, sometimes twice a day about tech, about blogging, or about whatever he’s up to with his gadgets and stuff.
I love that QR Codes are getting traction, I see them pretty much everywhere I go now. I almost venture to say that I see at least one new QR code each day. I think that’s quite a bit, frankly.
The thing that saddens me is the missed opportunities in the use of these QR Codes. The codes are often used without a purpose, without tying back into the context in which the code could be used. If the total gain from a QR code is 100%, then these examples I’m goign to show you are tapping into maybe the 5% of the potential.
See my commentary under each one. By the way, the images actually work so you can try them yourself with your own scanner.
I got these in the mail, in one day.
Shows all four of the QR Codes I found today. Can you spot them all?
Albertsons QR Code - Large View
Albertsons QR code failed because it comes up empty. .
Close up of the QR Code for the Albertsons flyer
This is the close-up so you can scan it if you’d like.
Another flyer for Albertsons with a QR Code in it
This one is a little better. It’s in a great contextual location and it actually asks you to do something other than visit the website. Plan your St. Patrick’s Day Party, that’s a call to action, and they tell you “scan here”. Whether you realize or not, that will help to get people to scan. I did, and I would have even if I wasn’t writing this post. Let’s look at the close-up
Scan the Albertson's St Patrick's QR Code up close
This is much better than other ones I’ve seen for the reasons I described above, but it goes a step further and actually takes you to the page where you can plan your party! It’s good and focused and it gives me as the consumer, a good reason to scan it. I get tips and recipes and ideas for my St. Patricks’ Day party.
Flyer for Unleashsolar with QR Code
This one is boring more than anything. “Register your interest” ::yawns:: And then the QR code takes me to just the website for unleashsolar.com more yawns. This would have been good to link to a calculator of some sort where you can see how much they could save you by installing their product. Or perhaps they could send you to a page to take $100 off your purchase if you requested an appointment today. Something like that, but linking to the website only is mostly unappealing.
Showing the Unleashsolar QR Code Up Close
Here it is if you want to scan it.
The only Realestate QR Code I got
Even though this is the only Realestate QR code I got today (from 3 or 4 real estate related flyers), I think it’s at least got something going for it. It’s attractive and the information on the page makes you want to scan it to see if you can find out more. That part is a winner. I’m on the fence about the actual location of the link. It’s good, but it could be better.
Up close real estate QR Code
What’s interesting about this one is that the code is printed twice on the flyer and as expected, both codes take you to the same spot. The reason why I said I’m on the fence about this one is that the code takes you to the agent’s facebook page Diane Merassa. So it’s personal and lets you connect to the person, but I would have rather it take me to her website where I can see a digital & interactive version of this information. Then of course the ability to contact her and find her Facebook, email, etcetera on there.
Flyer without QR codes by Vons
I added this in here as the failure of the day. I consider this a total failure, of course because there is no QR code here. Imagine the potential. You could link to the bottle of wine pictured, the fish that is used in that picture or even a list of recipes you could do with today’s specials or the items pictured on this flyer. The options! “Join Vons club and receive this recipe and more like it” “scan and join our vip club to receive discounts when you buy all the ingredients for a recipe we sent you”.
The options and creativity in which to use QR codes is unlimited. They’re simply a bridge between the physical world and the online world. Easy to use, easy to understand and easy to create and integrate into your strategy today. What are you waiting for?
The key here is to think of the context in which the ad is being presented. I’ve just picked this up from my PO Box, others might go to their mailbox and pick up the mail. In my case, you have even less time to make an impression. As I get my mail from the PO Box, I sort through it on the spot and throw away junk before I get back in my car. Guess which mailings made it home with me? The ones I wanted to know more about, the ones that caught my attention, or the ones I scanned.
Offering something quick and easy to do on the spot is your best bet with QR codes. Make the offer irresistible, and obliterate all barriers of entry, direct us how to do it and then make it dead simple to do.
In case you missed my tweets, facebook posts and meetup invitation, I thought I’d let you know that I will be speaking about Social Media for business tonight during Tech Talks at the Microsoft Store in South Coast Plaza. Session is FREE and starts at 6:30, you just need to RSVP at meetup.com.
If you know others that would benefit from attending, please share this invitation with them.
OK Go, about to start their Needing/Getting Song & Video
After many massive hits with many previous songs, OK GO teamed up with Chevy and took this video to the next level. Very cleverly based off another already viral video (Mario Theme Played with RC Car and Bottles)
This is what Social Media is all about, collaboration and strategic partnerships. Very smart move by Chevy to partner up with these super-creative guys and produce this video.
The guys are off-roading in a car (Chevy of course), and similar to the Mario Brother’s theme song video above, they have these paddles and “drumsticks” hanging out of the side of the car. There are 1000 instruments placed strategically throughout the course and these get played to the beat of the song as the car drives by and smacks them.
This is the kind of collaboration that companies need in order to leverage their brand with social media. In this case, we see a music video by a band that came from Youtube, and it’s very clever, but at the same time it’s a 4 minute Chevy commercial. Already at 2.25Million views and counting. Even if you don’t have the budget that Chevrolet does, you can still find a way to make your brand collaborate with others and leverage social media channels to distribute the message.
Now that’s how you do social media, 2+ Million views, overnight and counting. Tons of people are and were tweeting about it too!
Interesting #Chevy commercial with Ok Go. Made me want to go to the site.
— Timothy Whalin (@TimothyWhalin) February 6, 2012
I totally agree, I went to the site…
Oh they did make it a commercial.I was commenting that Honda should’ve have worked w/ OK Go instead of Ferris.#chevy #sonic
— Christian Adams(@ChristianGAdams) February 6, 2012
I agree, Honda could have partnered up with OK Go and it would have been good too.
Ann in Indy for the #SuperBowl “@AnnCurry: Ok go ahead and laugh at me. I couldn’t resist. yfrog.com/mmk8wwej“
— Bridget Nurre (@BNurreTODAY) February 5, 2012
You just can’t get this kind of commentary from traditional approaches.
Ok Go’s Chevy Sonic commercial is my favorite so far. #SuperBowl
— Alexander Burgos (@signoralfie) February 6, 2012
This is pure #win!
Some called the commercial unforgettable.
So next time you have to come up with a new marketing campaign, use a social media channel, get creative and let it rip, but don’t forget to. Think. Outside. The. Box.
As you know I am really a fan of Foursquare. Recently I found this cool little app for the iPhone, called foursQR. Android users are out of luck for now, but hopefully the app soon will join the most widely used mobile platform.
The app lets you check into a venue by scanning a QR code. I think this is very good for business owners and event or venue managers.
The immediate use cases that come to mind for me are these:
I got wind of this app from Chris Thompson on his article: iPhone app uses a QR code to check you in on foursquare, and I thought it was a great find.
The app is $.99 and it should be a welcome additional tool in the arsenal of any Foursquare venue manager or business trying to maximize their geotargeted social media approach.
Yes, I know QR codes aren’t all that, in fact Chris points out some of the downsides of this app. I still like QR Codes and think they’re a good solution for businesses and for some people. And if they help get a few more eyeballs on your product, store or service, then why not use them?
(I originally posted this at my notagrouch.com blog, but the host there is having issues), so here it is:
With all the fuzz about Klout, I wonder how you feel. I could ask you to give me your two cents in the comments, and please do. But I also ask that you take a quick few seconds to answer this quick Survey. Thank you:
backing up 10 000+ sms messages
One flaw with Android devices, like the HTC Evo that I own is that you have your storage split into two different locations, unlike the iPhone, most Android devices have built-in storage space and an expansion slot to use an SD card.
In the case of the Evo, the built-in storage is –unfortunately– limited to 512mb. It’s a terrible choice by HTC but it’s what it is and here’s a quick way to clear up some space from there.
If you’re constantly getting warnings that your device is filling up or that you have very little space remaining, you can install an SMS backup app and then backup your text messages.
In my case, when I did this I had over 10,000 messages in my phone. Besides the space that these messages take up, whenever I open the messaging app, the phone would become slow. Clearing these messages really helped with that too.
I used SMS Backup + which takes the messages and backs them up to your Gmail account under a specific label; default is SMS but you can customize this. The app is really easy to configure and use so I won’t cover that here, but you just have to do the following:
If you’re like many people and don’t care to keep your text messages around, then just skip the backup app altogether and do a mass delete on all your messages. If you’re a heavy sms user, then this might help a little with your storage issues and it will certainly give you a slight boost in performance.
This should be a quick tip for you bloggers out there. I especially want to send this to people that are getting started with their blogs.
Often I find great lists of information, but unfortunately sometimes they are not formatted properly. To give you a simple example, I might find a list of the best cars to buy in 2011. And the writer or blog author makes their list it looks like this:
* Audi
* Mercedes Benz
* BMW
* Fiat
* Chevrolet
In the example shown above, I’ve simply typed an asterisk before each item, then a space and press return after each item. And well, there is nothing wrong with that except one thing, it isn’t really a list. You see, in the web, it is important to use the formatting tools that are provided to you and for this type of information (a list) there are proper ways of formatting them. Let’s take a look.
There are two main ways of making lists online, one is called an “unordered” list, and the other one is called an “ordered” list. Technically there is a third type of list, but we’ll cover that in another blogpost. The main difference between the unordered and ordered list is that an unordered list will add a bullet point in front of each of your items, while ordered lists will add a number and provide you with a count.
Take a look at the same items you see listed above, but in a proper unordered list:
Now take a look at the same items in an ordered list:
Buttons showing how to make an unordered or ordered list in WordPress
