My Favorite Reads from 2009

Make Better Presentations: The Anatomy of a Good Speech – Chris Brogan
I consider myself a pretty solid speaker (at least in the past, it’s been 6 months or so now since one), but I’m always looking to improve and learn from others, and the framework they approach speeches with. Chris offers some solid tips to get you started, but the real value for me was in his examples and using those to think a little different and/or hone your approach.

7 Ways to Land Great Consulting Work While in Between Jobs – Monica O’Brien (Personal Branding Blog)
It’s no secret I do consulting on the side of my full-time gig. Some of you probably do to. If that’s the case Monica provides some solid, applicable advice you can put into action today. It’s quick, dirty and honest and if you can do all seven, chances are you’ll succeed. In fact, she’s doing so well she’s turned down full-time job offers and just kept her consulting LLC.

Can we Figure out What the Rules are First Before we Start Breaking Them – Mack Collier (The Viral Garden)
Mack brings up some excellent and salient points about how everyone is jumping to conclusions about “new things” occurring in the social media space. It’s a great piece because he pushes back on these people by tactfully explaining that the space is still to new, and all the people moaning are the same ones wanting these companies to dip their toes in the water. Interesting collision here.

The Marketing of Unmarketing, A History & Primer – Jason Falls (Social Media Explorer)
This is a longer post, but possibly my favorite of the month. Jason gives a quick history of the transition from old marketing to new marketing, shares some great quotes from some thought leaders like Jeremiah Owyang, Hugh MacLeod, and Chris Heuer, and offers some great tips for becoming an unmarketer. Finally, he concludes with some great tips of his own and the slides from a presentation he did on the subject.

Walls of Seperation – David Armano (Logic + Emotion)
Really intuitive post from David about 7 different walls of separation business inadvertently put up between themselves and their customers. If you’re living the in the corporate space it would do you could to make sure you’re not letting any of these walls hinder your companies’ ability to be in tune with customers. I think most often I witness ROI infatuation and Ivory Tower Syndrome.

Four Old-School Reasons Why You Can Thrive in this Recession – Sonia Simone (Copyblogger)
A lot of my friends are finishing up school and worried about the recession. Some are having a tough time finding jobs, others are opting to get another degree. Sonia offers some great examples of why we can (and should) succeed with social tools and an entrepreneurial approach. “The human being is an inherently creative, flexible, resilient creature.”

20 Blog Topics to Get You Unstuck – Chris Brogan
I don’t write unless the inspiration strikes and I feel I have something to say, but some people adhere to strict schedules where they publish a certain amount each week. Either way, most people get stuck from time to time and Chris’ questions and fill-in-the-blanks should help spur an idea or two.

How to Really Kick Ass – Valeria Maltoni (Conversation Agent)
10 great reminders on how to kick ass, and you won’t be surprised to find that most of them deal directly with your audience/readers/consumers/fans, but there’s a few gems like “stay curious and interesting,” and “get out of your comfort zone” aimed specifically at you as well. Reading these and learning from Valeria and the others she mentioned will help you ascend the ass-kicking ladder.

Why Aren’t You Really Good at Graphic Design? – Seth Godin
No, in fact I’m awful at graphic design. If you’re like me and you have trouble with spacial relations, are borderline color blind, etc. and graphical design, creating power points, etc. is your weak spot consider checking out the resources Seth’s put together. Let’s stop making excuses, okay?

April

Beyond Life Hacks: Reusable Solutions to Common Productivity Problems – Gina Trapani (Lifehacker)
Procrastination = story of my life. We’ve all experienced it at some point. Gina diagnosis a number of problems (e.g lack of focus, repetitive tasks, interruptions, etc.), and then explains how to remedy each one. Some of these are extremely simple, but they all work.

Facebook Week: Facebook Resources, Analysis and Insights Ben Parr (Mashable)
If you’re trending towards Facebook, here are nine articles from the talented crew at Mashable covering everything from creating successful fan pages, to optimizing your brands presence on the platform.

Four Copywriting Techniques for Engaging Podcasts and Audio Presentations – Brian Clark (Copyblogger)
Most of us haven’t even mastered the written word yet, but if you’re like me an you’re always exploring new ways to deliver content to your readers Brian provides great insights on structuring your podcast and how each of the 4 techniques fits within that structure. I found that some of this could also cross over to video, making it extra valuable for me.

What’s Wrong with Corporate Social Media and How to Fix It – Jeremiah Owyang (Web Strategist)
I suspect you’ll get even more value out of this if you read all links Jeremiah provided (I’ve been meaning to), but I found value in just thinking about the ‘four major challenges of social media today.’ If you or your company can solve one or more of these definitively, I suspect you’ll be compensated nicely.

Stoicism 101: A Practical Guide for Entrepreneurs – Tim Ferriss/Ryan Holiday (4 Hour Work Week)
It’s important for me to hone both humility and self-control. Stoicism helps me with both and Ryan Holiday does a tremendous job explaining how the philosophy helps us overcome destructive emotions, and take action. He also touches on 3 other important exercises that will benefit any entrepreneur, business man, or just someone trying to improve their own life.

Use the Gifts You’re Given – David Armano (Logic + Emotion)
I subscribe to the same theory –> “This is something I have to remind myself. You’re given a select set of abilities in this world which you can either nurture or ignore. You have to work with what you have, this is a moment of clarity that can make all the difference. And what about the things you wish you could do? That’s where you surround yourself with the people who complement you.”

50 Content Ideas that Create Buzz – Valeria Maltoni (Conversation Agent)
What makes this post so powerful is that Valeria doesn’t just share applicable ideas for buzz-worthy content creation. She takes those ideas and illustrates each one with an example of how specific, familar marketers, entrepreneurs, etc. use these ideas for success.

27 Must Read Tips and Tutorials for Bloggers – Darren Rowse (Problogger)
As an intermediate blogger, I read Darren’s entire month long challenge for building a better blog, and got a lot out of it. This post was a valuable resource because it features 3 posts each from 9 uber talented bloggers chosen based on what they thought would be most helpful Darren’s readers looking to improve their blog.

50 Trigger Words and Phrases for
Powerful Multimedia Content – Brian Clark (Copyblogger)
You’re competing with too many other people to get satisfied and complacent in your writing. In the never-ending search to incite more emotion and enhance your writing, check out these 50 words (separated by category) that will help your content stand out, and get your readers to take action.

Marketing In A Post-Consumer Era – David Armano (Logic+Emotion)
David explains, with help from the Economist that the face of marketing is changing, and now “the most successful social initiatives look less like marketing and more like some type of service or value add.” This isn’t anything we don’t know, but something we have to be sharing with our clients, our bosses ,etc.

An Industry Viewpoint: Social Media Services – Jermiah Owyang (Web Strategist)
With social media quickly becoming completely over saturated it’s necessary to stay in tune with the emerging trends. Jeremiah provides a great overview of the industry featuring service offerings, social media packages, considerations you should evaluate before hiring someone, and much more. Informative overview.

49 Creative Ways You Can Profit From Content Marketing – Sonia Simone (Copyblogger)
I enjoy participating in this space and learning new things, sharing them with you and having conversations, but at some point I will want to leverage all my content and work for monetary gain aside from consulting gigs. If you’ve ever thought about monetizing some of your content (or creating new content for that purpose) Sonia’s post is a great resource full of ideas and approaches that might work for you.

You’re Nuts if You Believe Me – Seth Godin
This is something I’ve been thinking a lot about. It’s about taking the content others provide, asking the really hard questions, and then applying the knowledge we acquire from that thought process. It’s not about trying to do exactly what (insert big wig blogger here) is doing.

Extraordinary Impact – Valeria Maltoni (Conversation Agent)
Everyone is tired of being bombarded by marketing messages, and sometimes we get carried away and talk to much. Valeria provides 3 tips for changing our approach and bringing it back down for the customer. She also brings up an interesting point, “We connect with others so that we can reconnect with ourselves.” If you’re doing this, people will discover if they should be connecting to you.

May

Shut the Hell up you Self Promoting Turd – Chris Brogan
I loved this post because Chris sternly stated something I’m very passionate about. The cliffnotes = stop bragging about yourself and your company and give empower people, give customers the mic, and make them the center of your world. If you have to tell someone you’re the best, you’re not.

Saying ‘No’ – Seth Godin
I work with and associate with a lot of talented people in this space. On a rare occasion people mistake me for talented. This post is a great reminder that it’s okay to say no to some requests, in fact, sometime it’s a game changer.

How to Hit the Enterprise 2.0 Bullseye – Andrew McAfee
This is a very in-depth look at the different enterprise 2.0 tools people can use to connect with their constituents, from strong ties to someone without any connection (weak and potential ties in between.) It’s a great framework to understand the best way (and technology) to approach people, once you’ve determined which ring of the bullseye you’re targeting.

*Note: The article was written in Nov 2007, but I found it via David Armano during the month of May ’09. It’s still very relevant 1.5 years later.

35+ Examples of Corporate Social Media in Action – Aaron Uhrmacher
Let’s face it. Sometimes it gets hard to think up a brilliant new marketing strategy using these social tools; one that fits the brand you’re working with, but hasn’t been over done yet. These 35 corporate examples should spark some ideas as it represents a wide variety of businesses, industries and social media tools.

The Biggest Opportunity of All – Valeria Maltoni
I suspect this post resonated because it touched on three things I’ve been preaching a lot at RSM. 1.) “The biggest opportunity in fact is in listening for and finding those people who want and need your services.” 2.) “Too many focus on the tools – give me a blog, fan cast me on Facebook, I’ll raise you a Twitter.” 3.) “Remember it’s social. It allows you to more easily join or build a conversation that is about your customers – and not about you.”

Why Messages Aren’t Enough – Amber Naslund
Very insightful post about the differences in messages (which you can gather from the title aren’t enough) and the experiences we should create that will enable awareness and said messages to translate. Perhaps we want the consumer to create their own messages, and communicate it in their own way?

Getting Back to Your Desk – Chris Brogan
Starting to see a theme here? The dialogue HAS to start evolving, and thankfully Chris and others are taking the lead. This post basically explains that the shiny tool stage is over, and that we have to start measuring things that matter, and stop taking titles named after tools. (social media tools, not people that are tools) It’s a good wake up call.

Deeper or Wider – Seth Godin
This is a great analogy featuring buffets that really simplify two different business approaches that could significantly impact your business and attract more customers.

June

Why People Talk About Products … And Why They Don’t – Jason Falls (Social Media Explorer)
“But, for the most part, if a social media ‘campaign’ doesn’t turn heads in the course of a single quarter on the calendar, brand managers are most likely to can it and buy more print ads… …So you have to make your product stand out. And in the world of social media, having a Facebook page, a Twitter account, some silly attempt at a ‘viral video’ and a company blog make you more and more like everyone else.” (Be sure you check out Xerox’s Information Overload Syndrome Example.)

The New Detroit Isn’t Detroit – Jeff Jarvis (Buzz Machine)
“…the most important hire a company can make today is a CCO, chief community officer. This isn’t anarchy or democracy. Rogers coins a rather high-fallutin’ phrase for what he advocated: bimodal intelligence. That is, everyone has a voice but at the end of the day, the company has a role to guide the process and product; that is the value the company adds but that works only if the company listens well.”

The Hand Carried Letter – Chris Brogan
“Too much too read means much more goes unread. We need ‘the hand-carried letter.’ A hand-carried letter means to me that the person choosing to share information with me believes in what she is sharing, and believes that it’s something I want to know about.”

5 Things Sesame Street Can Teach You About Breakthrough Blogging – Sonia Simone (Copyblogger)
“Embrace your inner Grover. Be a character on your blog. That character can be quiet or loud, smart or dopey, brave or cowardly. Don’t be afraid to be yourself, with all your strengths and weaknesses. Even if you’re a little bit goofy. Or furry. Or blue.”

A Post College Memorandum – Alex Mann
“We all are creatures of habit feeling especially safe with repetitive starts and ends of the work day. However, I’ve found that the true hustlers, strivers and leaders, are the ones who practice when the game ends. If you’re doing it right, you won’t notice the game ever ended. Don’t mistake hard work for intelligence, but don’t discount it either.” (Also really liked ‘Experience reigns over theory. Simplicity reigns over complexity.’)

The Key to Developing a Social Media Strategy – Jason Falls (Social Media Explorer)
“Corporate messaging — talking points — are precisely why people have turned to online communities and social networks for information about products and services. Social media exists to provide trusted, third party information to consumers looking for something other than a sales pitch. Thus, diving into a social media effort with your talking points in tow is a great strategy if you’re hoping to fail.The key to developing a social media strategy is not talking points, but parameters of conversation.”

True Transparency? – David Spinks (The Spinks Blog)
“Are we becoming overly kind and complimentary just to appeal/conform to the community? Has the concept of sharing and contributing to the community committed us to sharing and contributing things that are not actually worthy of such promotion? … … The problem is it’s laying a veil of falsities over the people and content we share, placing value on things that are not actually valuable.”

On the Road to Mediocrity – Seth Godin
“Along the way, we settle. We settle for something not quite right, or an outfit that isn’t our best look, or a job that doesn’t quite maximize our talents. We settle for relationships that don’t give us joy, or a website that’s, ‘good enough.’ The only way to get mediocre is one step at a time.”

Social Media is Rife with Experts but Starved of Authorities – Brian Solis (PR 2.0)
“We’re intrigued and infatuated with ‘social media’ and we’re lured into the illusion of expertise through experimentation when we’re not quite sure of how our personal endeavors translate into the unique cultures, business climates, market challenges, competitor history, state of customer perception, an understanding of customer pains and requirements, and where they seek guidance. We’re usually missing the “day in the life of” viewpoint and the “why should I listen to you” perspective in our strategy and execution, yet it’s supposed to serve as the core of anything and everything we do and should be doing.” (Frankly, this post is -really- long, but it’s a very valuable read if you play in the ‘social’ sandbox.)

Is the Hub and Spoke Model Adaptable? – David Armano (Logic + Emotion)
“Essentially, hubs and spokes still exist, but multiple nodes are introduced which are connected to other nodes as well as hubs and even individual constituents. Constituents can be any participant in your ecosystem—the iteration means that they can be directly linked to a hub, but also connected to other parts of the ecosystem including other constituents who may be organized in different departments of the organization. Here is where a collective begins to form.” (Click through, David’s visual will help immensely.)

The Courage to be Wrong – Jon Morrow (Copyblogger)
“The people we pay attention to aren’t the masters of doing what’s ‘right;’ they’re the misfits who have the courage to be wrong. They take whatever everyone else is doing in their industry and turn it inside out. It’s not just about differentiation; it’s about perverting the norm, destroying sacred traditions, and screwing with the way people think. It’s about doing, saying, or living something that’s so completely unexpected that people can’t help but pay attention.”

How Social Media can Make History – Clay Shirky (TED Talks)
“Here are 17 minutes that just might help you understand the true power of everything we’re experimenting with online, and give you a small glimpse into how technology is connecting us all. Clay Shirky looks at “how Facebook, Twitter and TXTs help citizens in repressive regimes to report on real news, bypassing censors (however briefly). The end of top-down control of news is changing the nature of politics.” (Blip courtesy of Mitch Joel, Six Degree of Separation Blog

July

First and foremost, I want to call attention to my good friend Charlie Hoehn’s First Ebook, “Recession Proof Graduate.” It’s a phenomenal read for anyone who’s currently job seeking, whether you’re fresh out of school or stuck in a dead in career. The ebook explains why the methods you’re using are outdated, and Charlie’s alternative approach that’s enabled him to obtain awesome gigs with Ramit Sethi, Tim Ferriss, and Tucker Max (among others.)

I realize these first few posts are from June, but I discovered them in July and didn’t want you to miss them.

The Pyramid Method: A Simple Strategy For Becoming Exceptionally Good – Cal Newport (Study Hacks)
“I think Steve Martin put it best when he noted that the key to breaking into a competitive and desirable field is to “become so good, they can’t ignore you. In other words, there’s no shortcut. If you want the world to pay attention to you, you have to provide a compelling reason. It doesn’t care about your life goals.”

Success & Motivation – 2009 – Mark Cuban (Blog Maverick)
“The new job you just took that you thought would be amazing, will be amazing. Most probably it will be amazing for about 3 months. Then you will realize its not so amazing and you will need to find something else that is amazing. Thats ok. You don’t have to be right everytime. You just have to be right one time.”

Calling Bullshit on Social Media – Scott Berkun (The Berkun Blog)
“It’s hard to come across as authentic if you promote a revolution that you personally stand to benefit the most from. Much writing about social media is PR people writing about the importance of PR – see a problem of authenticity here?” and “Recognize good marketing will not make up for bad products or incompetent services.”

Five Myths of Community Management – Amber Naslund (Altitude Branding)
“Community management as a discipline is evolving. It’s not just moderating boards and forums anymore. It’s becoming a pivotal and cross-disciplinary role inside companies that are bridging a social communications presence with their offline world.”

How to Have More Self Discipline – Penelope Trunk (Brazen Careerist)
“Most of our happiness is actually dependent on our self-discipline. For example, we are happier if we exercise, but the barriers to getting to the gym are so high that it takes a lot more than missives from the Hedonic Psychology Lab to get us there. When it comes to success, self-discipline is much more important than self-esteem.”

The Generation M Manifesto – Umair Haque (Harvard Business Blog)
“What do the ‘M’s in Generation M stand for? The first is for a movement. It’s a little bit about age — but mostly about a growing number of people who are acting very differently. Gen M is about passion, responsibility, authenticity, and challenging yesterday’s way of everything.”

300 Opinions – Mark Twight (Gym Jones)
“If you weren’t given the gift you can’t get the gift so the best you can do – if your goal is important – is work as hard as you possibly can, pay attention every hour of every day and then maybe, maybe if you’ve done enough and been smart enough you’ll emerge from the muck of mediocrity to shine a bit brighter than you shone before.”

Grit, Grinds and Living the Low Stress Life – Cal Newport (Study Hacks)
“The grind lifestyle involves filling most days with an unhealthily large amount of work. It treats the overwork itself as the goal, not its results. This chronic overwork, in turn, generates stress and deep procrastination. Grit, on the other hand, is about persistently accomplishing a reasonable amount of hard work.”

Content is a Service Business – Andrew Savikas (O’Reily Media)
“Whether they realize it or not, media companies are in the service business, not the content business. Look at iTunes: if people paid for content, then it would follow that better content would cost more money. But every song costs the same. Why would people pay the same price for goods of (often vastly) different quality? Because they’re not paying for the goods they’re paying Apple for the service of providing a selection of convenient options easy to pay for and easy to download.”

How to Start a Business that Works – Al Pittampalli (SAMBA Blog)
“Most businesses fail. Not because the product wasn’t any good. They failed because not enough people knew about it. In other words, the marketing failed. Not only is marketing important, it’s pretty much everything.”

Shrinking the Stuff I Really Care About into a Box – Ben Casnocha
“Be intense about things that matter, super laid back about everything else. Maybe one part of growing up is picking your battles, winning the ones that matter, and seeing the others as much as possible as non-zero sum endeavors.”

The Agency Side of Business: Shiv Singh, Razorfish – Valeria Maltoni (Conversation Agent)
“I seek out mentors who provide me with valuable advice and guidance. I also follow their careers so that I can understand not only how they think but what decisions they make and why.Secondly, I try to practice what I preach and get my hands as dirty as possible.
And thirdly, I believe in the Woody Allen philosophy that 80% of success is showing up.”

Do You Have These 11 Traits of Highly Creative People? – Dean Rieck (Copy Blogger)
“Creative people Like to PLAY, since humor and fun are the ultimate creative act. We all have goals, and quotas, and deadlines, but it’s not life and death. When you enjoy yourself, your brain relaxes and is able to produce more and better ideas. One of those ideas may be just what you’re looking for.”

Yes, Your Social Media Strategy Needs Design – David Armano (Harvard Business Blog)
“It may be time to approach social business by design. This means moving beyond our current definition of ‘social media’ as a PR tool and thinking of it as something that can evolve the way we work, communicate, interact and collaborate at a core business level.”

The Big Question: Are You Better Than Yesterday? – Chad Fowler (The Blog of Tim Ferriss)
“The secret is to focus on making whatever it is you’re trying to improve and make better today than it was yesterday. That’s it. It’s easy. It’s possible to be enthusiastic about taking real, tangible steps toward a distant goal. So, make your improvements small and incremental but daily. Small improvements also decrease the cost of failure. If you miss a day, you have a new baseline for tomorrow.”

What They Say About Winners – Chris Guillebeau (The Art of Noncomformity)
“Criticism is often motivated by the discomfort some people feel when others succeed. It’s easier to bring winners down a notch than it is to rise to their level. Winners who possess self-confidence and focus are often labeled as arrogant by those who lack both qualities.”

August

Arguing Against Your Limitations – Chris Penn
“If you believe there’s a glass ceiling, there is. If you believe there’s someone holding you down, you will act as though there is. If you believe that life is unfair and that you’ll never succeed, you won’t. I guarantee it, because whatever success you have you’ll subconsciously sabotage anyway.”

David Meerman Scott – World Wide Rave – Valeria Maltoni/David Meerman Scott
“You can BUY attention. (This is called advertising). You can BEG for attention. (This is called Public Relations). You can BUG people one at a time to get attention. (This is called sales). You can EARN attention online. The idea is creating something interesting and publishing it online for free: A YouTube video, blog, research report, series of photos, twitter stream, ebook, Facebook fan page and the like.”

How to Get More People to Join Your Community – Richard Millington
“Encourage members to grow their own following. Every member is a gateway to dozens of new members. Ask members to invite their friends. Develop ego-centric tasks (e.g. vote for my idea in the community) which encourage every member to spread the word.” And tons of other ideas!

NetFlix Culture Slide Deck – Reed Hastings
Slide deck from Netflix outlines their employee strategy, how they do compensation, why they only aim for top performers, how their “vision statement” is different than Enron’s, etc. Probably my favorite thing I read/digested the entire month.

Video: Alain de Botton: A Kindler, Gentler Philosophy of Success – TED Videos
Examines our ideas of success and failure — and questions the assumptions underlying these two judgments. “Most people make a strict correlation between how much time and love and respect they’re willing to accord us based on our position in the social hierarchy. That’s why we care so much about our careers.”

Yosemite – Bob Lefsetz
Note: Originally published in July. Discovered in Aug.
“The question is, are you working with your head or heart? At some point you’ve got to stop being who your parents want you to be and start being who you are. … Would you rap if there was no Biggie, no Jay-Z? Would you play the guitar if there was no Eddie Van Halen? Would you be in the music business if David Geffen hadn’t made all that money? If not, give up. Please. You’re hurting yourself. And you’ll leave no lasting mark. But if you need to play, don’t lament that you’re not a millionaire. The music should be enough. If you’ve got a roof over your head, if you can pay the bills, you’re on the map. Affecting a coterie deeply is more important than being a momentary comet, burning brightly and then flaming out.”

Does Living a Remarkable Life Require Courage or Effort? – Cal Newport
“If you’re itching to make your life something amazing, consider spending less time daydreaming about defying the status quo and answering the critics of your decision, and spending more time gearing yourself up for the challenge of becoming so good that they can’t ignore you. Ultimately, it will probably be the latter that generates the remarkable results.”

Unconventional, Entrepreneurial Lives and the Challenge of Loneliness – Ben Casnocha
“One way to stave off the kind of envy that can consume high achievers — is to create a life so unique to you that it destroys reasonable comparisons. Conventional life paths are crowded with others, and there will always be someone of equal age or background walking ahead of you. Walk alone on your own path, and direct comparisons become harder. Envy goes down, genuine happiness for others’ achievements goes up, and success and progress becomes more about achieving individually defined goals and less about keeping up with the Joneses.”

Happiness: A buyer’s guide – Drake Bennett
“The problem isn’t money, it’s us. For deep-seated psychological reasons, when it comes to spending money, we tend to value goods over experiences, ourselves over others, things over people. When it comes to happiness, none of these decisions are right: The spending that make us happy, it turns out, is often spending where the money vanishes and leaves something ineffable in its place.”

Interview with Frank Kern and John Reese – Kern, Reese & Tony Robbins
Conditioning yourself to succeed, visualization. How Frank Kern, John Reese and Tony Robbins acquired their fortunes.

Dan Pink on the surprising science of motivation – Ted Videos
Incentives for tasks/jobs involving cognitive skill = poorer performance. People motivated by autonomy, mastery, and purpose. There’s a mismatch between what science knows and what business does. Examples: Wikipedia, Google’s 20% time, and ROWE business environments.

Future Colin’s Servant – Colin Marshall (h/t to Aidan Nulman for sharing)
“As long I can remember, I’ve worked as a personal assistant. While I don’t know my boss, Future Colin, perfectly well, I’ve a reasonable idea of his habits, his ways, his likes and dislikes. It helps that we’re pretty similar guys, though differences between us do arise, often unpredictably. The fact that we’ve never met, let alone that we never will — I guess he’s something of a recluse — both simplifies and complicates matters. And while I can affect him, he can’t do anything to me: by the time he feels the effects of what I’ve done, I’m invariably long gone”

September

Slides: What’s the Future of Business – Jermiah Owyang (Web Strategist)
This is a short, but solid slide deck that will give you some insight into the role emerging technologies will play in the future of business. It includes how this affects leadership, communication, organizational structure, and more. And it also provides a nice introduction to the Altimeter Group.

Jim Collins & Charlie Rose Discuss Business & Great Companies – Mitch Joel (Twist Image)
I don’t watch many videos over 3 minutes long, but this one was definitely worth it. Collins discusses the undisciplined pursuit of more, how hubris leads to obsession of growth, and the truth about the ambition of those in power.

Essential Reading for Building Online Communities – Rich Millington (FeverBee)
Citing the fact that there’s not a definitive book out there yet on online communities, Rich recommends 10 of the best books regarding online community management.

Smart Targeting: Influencers or Fans? – Jeremy Epstein (Social Media Explorer)
Jeremy pushes back against traditional wisdom that going after influencers is the best strategy. He “humbly suggests that the ROI on identifying, cultivating, and activating your Raving Fans would be much higher.”

5 Ways to Market Like a Psychotherapist – Melissa Karnaze (Copyblogger)
“Don’t think in simplistic terms of selling products or services. Find the ideas and attitudes that you are really trying to sell. You’re not manipulating people to buy; you’re presenting them with ideas and attitudes that they can choose to adopt.”

My Icons – Ben Casnocha
Ben made a black-and-white portrait of nine people whose ideas or life-paths loom large in his life. I thought it was a cool exercise and enjoyed reading the quotes from the people who have influenced him along the way.

Hitting the Bullseye of Success – Christopher Penn (Awaken Your Super Hero)
Chris tells a great story with a metaphorical bow and arrow about how both luck/opportunity and skill/effort translate into success, as well as how to go about enhance skills and finding more targets.

I Know Kung Fu – Stuart Foster (The Lost Jacket)
“Direct marketing is pure offense. Inbound marketing is channeling people’s energy and using their input to your advantage. Each can be used effectively and will get you results. The effectiveness of direct marketing will eventually stagnate though, where as inbound marketing is a renewable resource.”

Bringing ‘Where the Wild Things Are’ to the Screen – Saki Knafo (New York Times)
Not exactly a blog post, but an awesome read if you’re interested in the movie: “I realized only then that it happens millimeter by millimeter,” he told me. “If you compromise what you’re trying to do just a little bit, you’ll end up compromising a little more the next day or the next week, and when you lift your head you’re suddenly really far away from where you’re trying to go.”

The Hierarchy of Success – Seth Godin
The hierarchy is as follows: 1.) Attitude 2.) Approach 3.) Goals 4.) Strategy 5.) Tactics 6.) Execution — How many people/companies do you know start with number or after? Read the post for the explanations.

Non-Obvious Guide to Finding a Great Job – Auren Hoffman (Summation)
10 pretty solid techniques for employing a proactive job search. Some of these include applying to the company as opposed to the job, dumbing down your resume, and doing something nutty and unorthodox.

A Fixed Income is a Sucker Bet – Steve Palina
“When you receive a fixed income, you’re actually creating a variable amount of value, but the income generated by your excess value is being siphoned off to line someone else’s pockets. They’re profiting from your ignorance.”

The Platform vs. The Eyeballs – Seth Godin
“Compared to the cost of renting eyeballs, buying a platform is cheap. Filling it with people eager to hear from you… that’s the expensive part. But if you don’t invest in the platform, you’ll be at a disadvantage, now and forever.”

And these two have nothing to do with marketing at all, but I stumbled across them and thought they were pretty funny and worth sharing. The latter is probably not safe for work. Cheers!

Love is Funny: Awesomely Bad Engagement Photos – the_mean_bean (Guidespot)

Weirdest Questions Asked on Yahoo Answers – Nimda (Wild Ammo)