If you’re looking for printing needs, you don’t actually have to be an offline person to find something. You can go online and find great websites to buy your paper supplies and order printing from them.

These days, instead of offline supplies running out of popular demand, it is easier than ever before to get and collect offline items like paper from online sources. With every purchase only a click away, paper is actually surviving and thriving in many areas. Paper consumption is expected to reach its highest point in over 5 years this holiday season.

There are many websites out there which give you a ton of home and office supplies, including paper supplies. One of the more famous ones and in the top 10 list is PrintRunner.

PrintRunner

PrintRunner has been around for a while and provides you with just that: printing and other supplies. While offline printing companies are running into issues because of not adapting to the online business model, PrintRunner is one of the few online retailers who are not only surviving on the print paper model, but also thriving and succeeding in it.

It has gained kind of like a cult status with its range of coupons and discounts, great support and an increasing number of products which seem to keep on complementing the online needs of both individuals and enterprises. With tons of fans online and so many people writing great reviews about them. PrintRunner is one of the few sites you can trust (like many Etsy sellers!) when it comes to ordering online stuff.

From business cards, calendars, catalogs and booklets to books, postcards, brochure printing and custom printed stickers, PrintRunner has everything you need for the holidays.

Free Shipping for the holidays!

PrintRunner is currently running a free Holiday Shipping promotion, where you can order as few or as many items as you wish and get free shipping.

Considering the fact that the months of November and December are when people print the most paper to send out letters, photos, gift cards, printouts, posters, images, drawings, coupons, certificates and more to other people, this is a great deal.

Even social networks like Facebook are attracting an increasing number of companies which allow you to mail printer letters, greeting cards and gift certificates to your Facebook friends. You do this from the simplicity of your home, and your friends, family or contacts get your gift or other printer items at their homes or offices via the mail.

Printing in an Online World

The online world still depends on the paper in the offline world. In fact, for the next 5 years, we’ll still be dependant on paper in almost every form of communication: the post office, local businesses, legal and business documents, receipts, etc. Faxes are still in use by millions of folks, and every restaurant you eat in still prints your receipt and check on paper. Even the online items you buy from places like Amazon and PrintRunner get sent to you in a box with printed receipt, sticker, label and a summary of your order.

Want to return any online item to any online website? You’ll need to print out the return receipt or your original shipping receipt with your returned order. How’s that for a paperless world!

If you’re looking for printing supplies, print paper, stickers, brochures and anything else related to paper, including all the office and related supplies, PrintRunner has what you need. Give them a try, and see how the online world has made items like paper and paper supplies part of the digital future.

So, what if you could make your day job work for you?

With the growing innovations on the Internet, it has become easier and easier to monetize aspects of one’s life that would have otherwise been completely “worthless.” Let’s take Craigslist and eBay, as a couple examples. With these sites, millions have been able to sell their junk that would’ve otherwise ended up in the junkyard.

People make full time salaries now selling old stuff on eBay. Boxes collecting dust in the attic turn into cash collecting interest in the bank. With Airbnb, people can even monetize their family room couch.

Now, with Flevy, a new site in its pre-launch stage, you can monetize your business documents. Flevy is a marketplace for selling business documents–specifically, documents used by folks who work in a business function (e.g. IT, marketing, accounting, human resources, etc.). These documents can range from Excel Financial Models to customizable PowerPoint Templates to “How-To” Business Frameworks.

Think about all the tools you have created to make your job easier.
How many others would benefit from your tool?
How much would companies pay to save employees a few hours of work?
How much would they pay to save employees several weeks of work?

Over the course of our careers, we are always coming up with clever tricks or tools to increase our work efficiency. These tools aren’t openly shared, even though a lot of people would benefit from them.

Just like those boxes in the attic, there’s no reason to let your IP collect dust, when it can be making you recurring income. Best of all, business documents are digital and have unlimited inventory. You just need to create it once, but can sell it a thousand times.

Currently, in its pre-launch stage, Flevy is actively inviting business professionals like yourself to join and list your documents for sale. Flevy also have a generous commission-based referral program, so that you can tap into and monetize your professional network. Now, what else can we monetize, that we haven’t yet?

If you wish to free up time to write, advertise, guest blog or promote your site on the web, then you might be interested in automating certain aspects of Twitter such as blog post site updates, status updates and so on. Or maybe you’re interested in managing several Twitter accounts all under one centralized roof. If that’s the case, then a solution that manages multiple accounts is what you’ll be on the lookout for.

With that in mind, we wanted to showcase and discuss a few good and free or low cost productivity tools for smart Twitter use. See our top picks below.

1. Twitter WordPress Plugins

If your blog is on the WordPress platform, then consider yourself lucky as there are many good WordPress plugins which enable you to use Twitter more effectively. You can use a plugin to directly send your latest articles to Twitter without having to manually go in and do it. There are a few net gurus on the web who expound on the virtues of manual entry, but these gurus also have assistants that help them with their social media accounts and or do it for them, so until you’re in the position to hire such assistants, automation is your friend.

2. HootSuite

Let me first say that HootSuite has two versions, a free and a paid version. The free version allows you to schedule tweets in advance, great for when you know you will be on vacation or simply will not be online at a given time frame and want certain tweets to go out to your followers. The app itself is a simple web based tool that you register with and add your Twitter account to, then configure as needed. Simple, free and works like a charm.

For more advanced features and to manage more than three Twitter accounts, you will need to go PRO and sign up for the premium monthly pay option.

3. Buffer

You might have seen or heard of Buffer mentioned around the web, as the guy who founded the app (Leo) is quite active on Twitter and other social media platforms and on his blog. He does a good job of getting the word out on his Buffer.

The cool thing about this tool versus HootSuite is that along with scheduling your tweets, it does so at times it determines is most optimal for you based on patterns in your account. It has smart technology which sends tweets out based on when your followers tend to be on the most. A great tool for engaging your Twitter base when they just happen be on.

4. Foller.Me

Foller.me, a free tool, is a Twitter analytic app which will help you to gather data about your account and see when it’s most optimal for you to tweet, schedule tweets and otherwise engage your followers. You get a word cloud of your most frequently used terms, you get a list of good stats including how many times (on average) you tweet, use a hashtag, retweet others, include a link in your tweets, media and more. It’s a simple and effective tool for gauging your overall performance on Twitter over a period of time.

Summary

When you take advantage of free Twitter tools and apps, your time can be spent doing other more productive things such as retaining and or getting more clients. Take a look at the three mentioned above and see how they can save you more time today.

In today’s world, almost everything and everyone is going paperless. Or at least headed in that direction. Evernote helps with that goal: becoming completely digital.

Email accounts. Images. Saved pages. Bookmarks. Facebook messages. Tweets. Blog comments. Online accounts. Digital files. Photos. And more.

There are so many things we do online, we have a more massive amount of online information to remember on a regular basis than what we have to remember offline.

Evernote is simply the best life information organization tool and service out there, allowing you (and me) to manage all those digital pieces of information, and other things, more reliably and all in one place.

PDF files are one of the many things you can store and work with, awesomely, in Evernote. With Evernote, you can store all your PDF files in the cloud, and have instant access to them on any online device.

Let’s go through some of the things you can store as PDF files in Evernote, and see why Evernote excels at handling all your PDF files.

Manage all your PDF files in one place: Evernote

PDF documents allow you to store information very neatly in a file. PDF files also allow for interactive content, resulting in your content having almost universal compatibility via any PDF viewer in the world.

I save all my PDF files into the appropriate sections in Evernote. I simply drag the PDF files into the appropriate section, and then I delete the original PDF file from my computer.

Done! My files are then in the cloud, and not dependent on the computer I’m on.

Evernote saves the PDF file into the cloud, and it becomes a permanent part of my Evernote account. I can then read, download, move or even edit my PDF files, right from within Evernote.

Viewing and Editing PDF files, from within Evernote, requires any compatible PDF reading/editing software installed, by the way.

There are many types of documents you can store as PDF files, including:

• Scanned Books
• Ebooks
• Documents
• Bills
• Insurance Documents
• Legal Documents
• Collection of images
• Resumes
• All Signed Documents
• All business documents
• and much, much, more! Anything that can be converted into a PDF file.

I try to convert as many non-popular file format documents into PDF as possible. You can Google “convert to pdf file” to find out different free and paid ways to convert files into PDF files.

5 Reasons Evernote is Your One-Stop PDF Storage

Why should you store your PDF files in Evernote? Here are 5 of the many reasons that help me daily:

1. Internal Reader/Viewer on any PDF-enabled device

   I use the term “PDF-enabled” here as a way of saying the device already has a PDF viewer/reader installed. Evernote allows you to read and browse PDF files if the device you’re one, whether it’s a laptop or the phone, has internet connection.

2. Powerful and Flexible Organization System

   Organizing in Evernote is extremely easy, and versatile. You can organize your PDF files based on a tree structure, folders, tags, notes, or simply keep everything organized based on your search habits. Managing files has never been so much for (at least for me).

3. Universal Access

   Anything in your Evernote is accessible on all popular mobile platforms for any mobile device, any computer with any operating system via the different desktop clients, and even online via any browser. Every PDF file in your Evernote can be read, managed and downloaded from any device, anywhere.

   I have Android Evernote – every file I have, including all my PDF files, are always accessible to me.

4. Unlimited Storage Space

   Evernote only limits the total size of uploads you can have for free have each month. You can purchase extra total upload size limits at any time, as much as you want. The total amount of storage space you consume, after you’ve uploaded for that month, is not limited in any manner.

   So you can upload up to a certain size of information/files online every month for free, and pay a one-time fee for anything beyond it. The total amount of information stored and used forever, permanently, is unlimited and never decreases. When I upload something online, it becomes a permanent part of my Evernote forever, for free.

5. Search Text Inside PDF Files

   One of the best things about Evernote is its OCR search feature, which extends to PDF files for Premium users. Once you upload any PDF file to Evernote, you can search your entire Evernote, including the actual contents of all your PDF file pages, for any text.

   Got a pdf file and want to search for text inside of it? Evernote allows you to do so very easily!

How do You Manage PDF Documents?

Evernote is one of the most efficient ways to organize all your PDF documents. I actually like and prefer PDF documents a lot these days, now that managing them has become easier with Evernote.

From viewing those files to searching them, you can have your entire PDF collection saved, organized, and available from any device on the go. Evernote saves everything on its servers, so even without an Evernote client you can use any browser to access your pdf files via your Evernote account.

What do you think of PDF files and Evernote? How do you organize your PDF files?

Please share your comments, tips or any other ways of managing PDF files in the comments below.

Thanks for reading! I now have to go add another PDF document, which I just got via email, into my Evernote.

Google Drive is an upgrade and complete replacement of Google Docs, designed to help you store any of your files and folders online.

In addition to that, you can share your files and folders publicly or private. You can also collaborate with others on such shared files.

Some people say Google Drive is the Dropbox killer, while others say that it has arrived too late to the scene.

To help you decide whether Google Drive is for you, let’s go through the details and full feature list of Google Drive.

Whether or not Google Drive can fight Dropbox or other services successfully, one thing is for sure: Google Drive has entered the online storage market, and it’s going to stick around for a long time.

How to get Google Drive?

If you already have a Google account, or will create a new one, you can get or request Google Drive right away.

To get started, head on over to the Google Drive start page, where you’ll find out if your account is ready to start using Google Drive.

If your account is not yet ready to be activated, Google will notify you via e-mail when it will be.

Click here to view the embedded video.

It seems there is a very short waiting list for many of the users to get Google Drive on their accounts. The Docs services of users are being upgraded to Google Drive randomly, and according to online reports, fast.

Since Google Drive is not being announced as a Beta, like so many other Google services have been in the past, it is expected that hopefully everyone with a Google Account will have access to Google Drive within a few days.

Google Drive – Full Features List

Here are the full specs of everything currently seen and experienced by all Google Drive users.

Google Drive Features - Announced and confirmed info at launch
Signup Process	Start the Google Drive activation process
Free Storage	5 GB
Max File Size	10 GB
Public API	Yes
Integration	Gmail, Google Docs, Several external services (increasing)
Desktop Client	Windows, Mac, Linux coming soon
Browser Management (file editing, uploading, managing, etc'0	Yes
Mobile Apps	Andoid, iOS/iPhone/iPad coming soon
Can share files and folders with others securely via password	Yes
Version tracking (can revert back to older version of files)	Yes - unlimited revision history
Collaboration (allowed users can discuss, edit and comment on files/folders)	Yes
Ability to increase disk space for free (like Dropbox does for referrals)	No
Upgrade Prices	+25 GB - $2.49 +100 GB - $4.99 +200 GB - $9.99 +400 GB - $19.99 +1 TB - $49.99 +2 TB - $99.99 +4 TB - $199.99 +8 TB - $399.99 +16 TB - $799.99
Integrated Docs (All the features of Google Docs)	Yes
Publicly shared folders feature (no password required)	Yes
Link directly to files to share	Yes
Link directly to folders to share	Yes
File Format supported for uploads	Any/all
File Formats supported for Docs/previews/views/editing right inside Google Drive	Microsoft Word (.DOC and .DOCX) Microsoft Excel (.XLS and .XLSX) Microsoft PowerPoint (.PPT and .PPTX) Adobe Portable Document Format (.PDF) Apple Pages (.PAGES) Adobe Illustrator (.AI) Adobe Photoshop (.PSD) Tagged Image File Format (.TIFF) Autodesk AutoCad (.DXF) Scalable Vector Graphics (.SVG) PostScript (.EPS, .PS) TrueType (.TTF) XML Paper Specification (.XPS) Archive file types (.ZIP and .RAR)
OCR (text recognition in images, PDF files, etc)	Yes
Sync files/folders outside of the Google Drive folder on your computer?	No - you have to move any files/folders you want synced, into the Google Drive folder on your computer

We’re going to compare Google Drive with Dropbox, Box and other services very soon.

Will You Use Google Drive Over Dropbox and Others?

What do you think of Google Drive? Do you have a Google account?

Will you be using Google Drive and give up your existing online storage/sharing service?

Or will you stick to the competitors, like Dropbox? Do you think Google Drive is not a strong service?

Please share your thoughts and comments below. Thanks for reading!

Is it the only Photo App, though? No, it’s not. On Android, there have been dozens of alternatives.

You should have choices, so that you can figure out on your own what works for you, and why. While Instagram is cool, it doesn’t have all the bells and whistles that other apps have.

Instagram also does not have the simplicity of many other Android photo apps.

Here are 5 popular alternatives to Instagram that Android users have loved since way before Instagram ever thought of coming to Android.

Unlike Instagram, none of these apps collect any personal data from you. None of these apps require any registration or your email address, or name, from you either.

5 Alternatives to Instagram on Android

1. Camera ZOOM FX

   Camera Zoom FX is one of the most widely used Android Photo apps, and for a good reason.

   It offers a ton of customization features, filters, and also allows one to work the magic on existing albums from your gallery.

   Camera ZOOM FX is available on Google Play or Amazon Appstore for only $2.99.

   Check out the reviews and ratings to see why thousands of people prefer it over Instagram. I use this currently.

2. Vignette

   Vignette is a powerhouse of a photo app.

   It offers 76 different photo effects and 57 frame types, allowing for combinations also.

   This literally gives you more options than probably all other apps in this article, and Instagram, combined.

   Vignette is available for $3.99 in >Google Play or Amazon Appstore.

   If you get Vignette, you probably don’t need any other app combined with it at the moment. It’s that feature rich! I used it before and really liked it. It has way many more things than what I need, so I uninstalled it to focus on having less complexity around.

3. Paper Camera

   Paper Camera offers several stunning paper art transformations for your photos.

   That makes your pics look as if they were drawn, in different ways, on paper.

   Paper Camera is available for only $1.99 in Google Play or Amazon Appstore.

   This literally makes each photo look different than the original. If you want to completely (and literally) transform your digital pic visuals to a paper-type version, Paper Camera is it.

4. PicsArt – Photo Studio

   PicsArt Photo Studio is the freebie on this list, and the amount of reviews it gets will make you want to download it immediately.

   It’s probably the most reviewed and highest rated Photo Apps in the market. One of the biggest reasons behind that is simple: PicsArt Photo Studio is completely free.

   Browsing through the recent reviews of PicsArt will show you why so many people think Instagram will never be anything like PicsArt.

   PicsArt Photo Studio is available for free in Google Play or Amazon Appstore

5. FxCamera

   FxCamera is famous on Google Play, though it hasn’t gained wide stream attention from Amazon or other places because of one probably reason: it’s completely free.

   FxCamera has ToyCam, Polaroid, Fisheye, and other lenses which transform your pictures into something much cooler, or artsy.

   For many people, FxCamera was the answer to Instagram, back when (3+ weeks ago) Instagram was an iPhone-only app.

   FX Camera is available for free in Google Play.

6. BONUS: PicSay Photo Editor and PicSay Pro

   PicSay Pro is considered the first Android app of its kind, and is still one of the most widely used Android apps out there.

   When the first Google phone, the HTC Dream G1, came out on T-mobile, PicSay Pro was the craze on it. Almost every G1 user was going crazy with photo edited pics and sharing those pics.

   The free PicSay Photo Editor version of PicSay Pro is available on Google Play.

   PicSay Pro is available for only $3.99 on Google Play and Amazon Appstore.

Do you like Instagram or the Alternatives?

Find tons of more free and paid alternatives to Instagram for your Android in the Google Play Photography section.

Which Android Photo App is your favorite? Do you prefer Instagram? Or do you like something else?

Please share your comments, photos or app links/suggestions below. Thank you.

You are sharing a message and also showing your personality to the entire online world. You have to make sure you succeed with each try.

“Do my sentences look good? Am I clear in my message? Am I forgetting anything? Did I talk too much? Do I sound convincing?”

You want your writing to bring satisfaction to your life, both online and offline. We have a special treat today to help you with that.

One of the best things to do to thrive in the world of writing and blogging online is to learn from others who are good at tweeting, writing and blogging.

Ashley Barron is one such popular person, and we are lucky to present to you an exclusive interview we did of Ashley.

She is one of the most active Networkers on Twitter and many other platforms today. In addition to being a full-time writer and author, she also blogs, networks with other bloggers, and is writing another book which you will be able to find in bookstores soon. (tweet this)

Ashley Barron Bio

• Social Media
  • Twitter @dcPriya
  • Ashley Barron Facebook Page
  • Facebook SelfPubEBooks Group
  • The Priyas Blog
• Published work
  • Ava (A Priya Novel)
  • Amazon
  • Barnes & Noble

The interview covers many important topics like writing your first draft, the declining market of offline literary agents, self-publishing your book on Amazon and Barnes & Noble, mastering your writing, blogging online, networking online via social media and with other writers, and more.

If you’re looking for writing or blogging advice from someone who writes and networks every day, this interview is for you.

Interview with Ashley Barron

Who is Ashley, and what is The Priyas?

1. Can you tell us a bit about yourself? What is your blog about? What’s “A Priya in Washington”, and what got you started in writing?

   Hi, Bes! Thanks for having me here today.

   Hmm…about me. I come from a music-loving family and yet I can’t carry a tune. I love, love, love flowers. I went through a pretty intense “glue gunning” phase about ten years ago and I’m still trying to live it down. Two of the places I hope to visit in the next year are Tahiti and Graceland. When it comes to books, relationships, and life, given the option, I’ll choose the happy ending one hundred times out of one hundred.

   “A Priya in Washington” refers to the main characters in my upcoming book, Ava. It is the first in a series of novels about a group of best friends who have grown up together in Washington, D.C. They call themselves “The Priyas.”

   Though they are fictional characters, and I’m a living, breathing human, I still consider myself an honorary Priya. A little nutty I suppose, but when you’ve spent several years in close (brain) quarters with your characters, they begin to feel more alive than rational thought might first allow.

   I grew up in a household that values books, creative pursuits, and history. I’ve been writing stories for the simple pleasure of it since I was a child. I think even my family knew from the earliest of times that it was never a question of if I would write books, but when.

2. What are you trying to achieve through your blog?

   This is an interesting question. The answer has changed several times since I began my blog nine months ago, and I’m certain it will continue to evolve going forward.

   In the very beginning, when I realized I needed one, I simply wanted to prove to myself I could blog. As I came to find out, starting a blog is a serious undertaking when you have no prior related experience of any kind. In the past, I’ve launched websites as components of businesses I’ve been involved in, and I thought launching a blog wouldn’t be that different. How wrong I was!

   Websites and blogs are worlds apart in purpose, methodology, pace, and style.

   Once I had gained confidence with the technical side of blogging, I thought of focusing the blog exclusively on my characters and my books. Fortunately, I soon realized that’s a very limited view. A blog offers a writer nearly endless possibilities. Writing a blog post is a good workout for the brain; it’s exercise for the creative mind.

   Over the last nine months, I’ve come to understand how blogs connect us to one another, and how important they are for sharing ideas and information. For me, immersion into the blogosphere has been the most unexpected development to stem from my seemingly simple decision to self-publish a novel.

   If you are a writer, branching out beyond promoting your own books is also helpful for the long-term viability of your blog. Learning how to blog, getting one up and running, is far less complicated than maintaining an active presence in the blogosphere for years to come. My goal is to create an enduring blog that is helpful and interesting to writers and readers alike. (tweet this)

3. That’s amazing! So you’re basically an actual writer, and are blogging also. Do you think all bloggers should focus a lot on writing also, outside of their blogs? What is your advice for bloggers who want to be better writers?

   Absolutely! Think about it this way. A professional football player doesn’t limit his athletic activities to that one sport. Odds are he plays golf, tennis, basketball, etc. Maybe he doesn’t play them competitively, but he is still improving his main talent, football, by challenging his body and leading his skills in new directions. It’s a win-win.

   I feel the same way about a blogger pursuing other forms of writing.

   For a blogger, when the words are flowing, and the interest and motivation is there, let those blogging skills spill over into writing fiction. When finished with a short story or novel, consider self-publishing your work in an e-book format to add a new revenue stream to your income.

   If it’s your first time writing anything other than blog posts, think about starting with a short story. Get your blog readers involved by hosting a contest or running a poll to have them help pick elements for the story.

   For example, if you’re a humorous blogger, readers could vote on individual story elements and decide that they want you to 1) write a science fiction story featuring 2) aliens, 3) a red balloon, and 4) chunky peanut butter.

   You could then blog about each step you take as you write the story, format it, invite your readers to vote on a cover, and load the finished product up into Amazon/Barnes & Noble/Smashwords.

   Make the story free. At this point, it’s really intended as a marketing strategy. If you find out you have a talent for writing fiction, the followers you’ve gained from your blogging will give you a real leg up when your first novel debuts.

Self-Publishing vs Publishing via Literary Agents

4. You recently released your well-rated book Love+Family online on Amazon and BN.com in digital formats (congrats!).
   What do you think of eBooks versus paper books? Should all writers focus on having their books available in a digital format in today’s digital age? Did you choose the digital format over paperback format for any specific reasons other than ease of use and faster publishing process?

   My original intent was to write a novel, find a literary agent, then a publisher, secure a book contract, and keep my role as the writer separate from their roles as negotiators, packagers, and marketers.

   I purchased some guidebooks, read them a little too eagerly, and began the time-honored process of finding a literary agent. I happily sent out my first three query letters, which are like a job application and resume for your novel, and innocently believed I would be hearing something positive back.

   My first draft of Ava, the one I based my queries on, weighed-in at 165,000 words. It was far too long a novel for an unknown writer, which, all by itself, severely dampened any reasonable expectation of being picked up by a literary agent. Obviously, I didn’t know that at the time because I didn’t yet know anything about publishing.

   I sent out a total of eleven query letters, and received eleven rejections. I know now it is because I hadn’t bothered to study and learn about the business end of publishing, about what was expected of me, what I could expect from them, the rules of marketplace, etc.

   The “method” laid out in those how-to-become-published guidebooks I had purchased was obsolete the minute Amazon rolled out Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP). I spent a few weeks studying everything I could find about KDP—which really wasn’t all that much in early 2011—then trusted my instincts and set out on my new path in this, my new world.

   I’ve never once looked back or second-guessed my decision to self-publish.

   The affordability of self-publishing, and the ingenious design of the overall business model, has pushed the e-book to center stage. Its very existence is motivating many businesses, in many industries, to explore new ways to increase their stake in their respective marketplaces by self-publishing books linked to their products or services.

   E-books are useful and practical, and almost any size business can afford to create and publish one as part of a larger strategy to attract more customers.

   I love books, stories, ideas, and knowledge, and I’ll take them any way I can get them. These days, I purchase e-books and printed books in equal measure. My Kindle is a useful, portable device that lets me keep the hundreds of books I’ve downloaded within reach at all times.

   But I’m always going to love to hold a printed book in my hands. (tweet this)

Blogs, E-Books and Paper Writing

5. You have a very active Twitter following, and you also post actively on your blog. Yet at the same time, you’re devoting tremendous amount of time to your non-blog writing, like for your upcoming book Ava. I always wonder about the future of books and the future of blogging.
   Do you think blogs can ever achieve the same amount of success, or return (income), as eBooks if writers start selling or sharing their entire books as blog posts online?

   It is an interesting question. Opportunities abound, but success comes down to the individual. I’ve read about authors who have taken a different route, and are self-publishing their novels a few chapters at a time. Their intent is to set it up as the e-publishing equivalent of a television series, with episodes, seasons, special features, etc.

   Each week, they drop new chapters, and charge .99 cents per installment. That revenue quickly adds up. Plus, they are building a dedicated, dependable following, which is a whole other kind of money in the bank. To my way of thinking, if those serialized novels continue to grow readership at a steady pace, their model could open the door to the development of a television series, with a ready-made following.

   And what do I think about that? It’s brilliant. (tweet this)

   The creative use of ordinary tools is the underpinning of successful commerce. Look around you. What are the everyday tools of your profession?

   I think a blogger could serialize a novel through his or her website instead of choosing to go the e-book publishing route. I would go about using my website by creating a paid subscription newsletter to distribute the new installments of my novel.

   Most important: keep the cost of the newsletter low and the content valuable. Distribute it every week, chock it full of extras, and work your blog to gain new subscribers. At the end of the year, once your subscribers have enjoyed first dibs on reading the story, repackage it as an e-book and sell it on Amazon.

   In any business, your goal is to figure out as many different ways as you can to legitimately earn income from the same product or idea. Selling a novel as a serial through your blog’s newsletter, then later as an e-book in online bookstores, let’s you earn double income from one source.

6. Do you think it helps writers to blog online, or bloggers to write elsewhere like for eBooks?

   No matter what profession you are in, every single thing you do to advance your skills, your knowledge and your experience matters. If your goal is to earn your living exclusively from writing, whether through blogs or books, then you need to create as many new revenue streams from your writing as possible.

   Look for ways to team up with other bloggers, especially those who blog about topics that differ from your main focus. For example, if your blog is primarily about cars, look to form alliances with bloggers who specialize in things like sports, gardening, or gossip. This way, you’re not in competition with each other, and you each benefit from the opportunity to be introduced to a whole new set of readers at one time.

   Have each blogger in your newly-formed “Revenue Stream” team write a 5,000 or 10,000-word story. Bring your readers into the process of genres, topics, special notes, character names, cover choices, etc. When it’s all ready, put the stories together into one e-book, set the price, self-publish it, and then coordinate a heavy cross-promotion on all the blogs. Think about how much marketing energy your newly-formed team will be sending out into the internet.

   Sometimes, the hardest part of being a blogger or a self-published author is feeling as though the entire weight of success rests only on your own shoulders. That’s both unhealthy and unmanageable.

   Share the weight, share the success.

   Choose reliable partners, develop a plan, stick to it, and your team will be putting money in the bank. It may not be much income at first, but one brick doesn’t build a house, either. Keep adding.

   Stay with it. Improve it. Grow it.

   If it works, do it again. Branch out. Find other partners and add them in. Soon, you may find yourself published in ten different e-book anthologies. That’s a solid launch pad for whatever you decide to do next.

Advice for Social Improve readers

7. What advice would you give to people who love writing, and have yet to write a paper book or have yet to blog online? Should they start with one instead of the other?

   I believe that writing novels and actively blogging require skills that perform best in tandem with one another. Creative writing can be turned into a blog post, a guest post, a newsletter, a short story (e-book), or a novel (e-book). Blogging will improve your creative writing. The work load for simultaneously producing both a novel and a blog will be heavy at first.

   Be patient. It evens out.

   Your writing is your product no matter where it ends up. Your blog is your marketing arm no matter what it contains. Use your blog to cross-promote other people, from all different places. Keep it interesting and, whenever you have a surge in the number of “hits,” pay attention to what created that success. Your readers are telling you where they want you to take them.

   Listen. Act. Succeed. (tweet this)

Thank you, Ashley, for the amazing insight and tips! We really appreciate it!

What do you think?

Thanks so much, Ashley, for sharing the great tips and thoughts about writing, self-publishing, motivation, and blogging.

Do you have any questions for Ashley?

Do you also share the same experiences as her? Or are your experiences and results different?

What do you think can work for you, or others, as a writer or a blogger?

Please share your questions for Ashley, any comments about the above interview, or any topics covered by commenting below.

You can also thank Ashley for taking the time to share her knowledge and experience with us through this interview. (tweet this)

Thanks for reading our interview with Ashley.

With more and more people jumping onto Pinterest, I start wondering about a very important thing.

Is Pinterest the next big gold, or is it just another hype?

Will everyone keep using Pinterest and make it last for a long time, like Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook are thriving right now?

Or is it just another hype for 2011 and 2012, destined to fade away or become less important by 2013 like the dozens of other social networks popping up every month?

Let’s go through some of the great points of Pinterest, and some of the not so great qualities of Pinterest, that I think affect you, me and everyone else who uses Pinterest in any manner.

I need to see what all this pinterest hype is about

— Mack-Sound-Savvy.com (@soundsavvy) April 11, 2012

Yes, let’s!

You can decide in the end whether or not Pinterest will be your next online love for the next several years.

Good Things about Pinterest

Pinterest is where the big action is at the moment. That’s a very, very good thing.

Is the Pinterest hype paying off now then? “Amazon, eBay Add Pinterest Buttons sewat.ch/Iwxxtp via @sewatch“

— James Perrott (@James_Perrott) April 12, 2012

Here are some great things about Pinterest at the moment:

1. It’s bringing and driving massive traffic for sites.

   It’s a fact that Pinterest is growing a lot and very fast compared to any other new social network. More and more studies show that Pinterest is probably the fasted growing site ever, and driving traffic to the sites of those who are active on it.

2. It’s a nice visual twist on showcasing images.

   Flickr (in a good way) and Tumblr (in a not so good way) were the last big things to happen to images via new network entries, I think.

   Facebook Photos and even Twitter Photos are awesome, though Pinterest takes the entire approach to a different, side-stepped level by making every image act like a non-image entity. While Pinterest still feels like an upgraded Tumblr, there seems to be more life to each pin than the life we see on our photos on Facebook and Twitter in terms of tools, likes, attention and so much focus from the site itself.

3. It’s the first real social marketing tool which can help visual promoters by allowing everyone to have fun.

   Pinterest is fun. Once you get past the initial stage of understanding how to upload images in the proper size, and how to start sharing things faster, it’s a lot of fun.

   That fun is what has made Pinterest so big and famous so fast.

4. Pinterest revolves around the simple focus of pinning images.

   Pinterest is very simple to use. Everything revolves around Pins.

   You upload a pin, pin an image online, Like a pin, comment on a pin, or follow someone’s pins. That’s it.

5. Anyone, including non-visual people, can start pinning.

   Pinterest allows anyone to pin any kind of image online. While that may be a very bad thing (discussed below as a bad point about Pinterest), it’s great in terms of getting people to start pinning.

Bad Things about Pinterest

Even with all the traffic, Pinterest is still a newcomer and seems to be focusing on some specific things.

It’s doing some things the same as any other network, and it’s doing some things differently than many other networks in its war to justify being different and to survive.

#rant bit.ly/IhNVJL Pinterest: Do you break web standards because you are a recent hype?

— Michael Haschke (@haschek) April 13, 2012

Pinterest did not start out as a platform to cater more to females (as so many today will tell you) or to focus solely on pins. It has turned in that direction because of the massive amount of interest and reaction. That’s good.

Will such interest last, though? Here are some points which make people wonder if Pinterest is here for a long term, or if it’s just another trend.

1. Almost no one on Pinterest wants to take any action other than Pin or Like.

   While Pinterest is driving a lot of traffic, people are more interested in pinning images or talking about it, on Pinterest, than leaving the Pinterest site.

2. Pinterest focuses on images being pinned, and nothing else.

   While Pinterest is drawing massive amounts of traffic to the Pinterest site itself, there is still a lot of doubt as to how that translates to marketing traffic for people who are on Pinterest with interests which lie outside of Pinterest.

3. Pinterest seems to be an upgrade of Tumblr.

   Just like Tumblr, Pinterest is full of images that Pinterest users have copied, without permission, from elsewhere simply to tell everyone else “I like this pic!”

4. Pinterest is NOT about Your NOW.

   All the popular social networks have some sort of mobile flexibility in them. They all want you to, and allow you to, share and represent what you’re doing right now or on the go.

   Pinterest is just about pinning images, liking images, and leaving comments about images.

5. Even Likes on Pinterest favor some very specific people.

   Any person or business can promote anything, socialize and connect on Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn. That’s not the same on Pinterest.

   Only image-centric entities can thrive on getting Likes on Pinterest. Pinterest is not for everyone or as many industries as the other networks.

   Sure, you can pin tons of random images and get people to follow you. But that’s it: how will such followers translate to anything else outside those random, not-related-to-you images?

What Do You Think of Pinterest?

Do you think Pinterest is here to stay? Or do you think Pinterest is just another hype?

Pinterest is the third largest social networking site according to @Experian_US. Shocked, still don’t see what the hype is about. Too old?!

— Adeline Joie (@adelinejoie) April 10, 2012

Do you have a lot of your own images to pin on Pinterest? Or do you usually pin other people’s images? Do you upload someone else’s images on your Pinterest?

Please share your thoughts about this in the comments below. You can use your Pinterest profile link as your website when leaving the comment.

Thanks for reading!

Whether you’re sharing an image on or asking for a Pinterest invite, uploading a photo to Instagram, or checking in on Foursquare, you’re communicating something to the online world.

With the increasing number of people and blogs, it is becoming more important than ever to realize what you prefer, and how to use that preference, in your online communication.

For many people, communicating by writing is the way to go. They prefer the text, and prefer the details and privacy they can accomplish through it.

For many other people, communicating by having voice chats is what they thrive on. They prefer talking and listening, and they prefer the direct offline element it brings to online communication.

Is one format better than the other, though? Do people who voice chat better than people who do not voice chat?

Let’s go through the different benefits of voice chats and text chats to see what you think.

To clarify, by voice chats, I’m referring to any kind of video chat, audio chat, webinar, podcast, or audio file through which someone can hear you talking.

By text chats, I’m referring to any kind of text messages, e-mails, chat messages, or any text writing in which someone reads what you wrote.

5 Benefits of Voice Conversations over Text Messages/Chats

1. Clarity of tone.

   The tone of almost any message can usually be better understood, by many people, through voice than through text.

   For example: an e-mail criticizing someone can sound much more hostile compared to you telling the person, via a voice chat, what you didn’t like about their recent action.

2. Clarity of message.

   When you’re speaking to someone via voice, you can explain your thoughts more per each sentence you say. With text, each sentence sent is a complete thought which can result in less clarification if you’re not clear in your writing.

3. Direct Interaction

   In my view at least, it seems voice interactions can allow for more direction interactions between the people involved than through text messages.

   Anyone can speak up (hint hint: “interrupt” as many people say, or even jump in) and share their thoughts, helping manage or affect the flow of the conversation.

4. It requires, and usually results in, more attention.

   In direct voice conversations, you usually don’t have the luxury of walking away or responding later. You have to think on the spot, you have to pay attention to everything being said, and you have to actually think before you speak too.

   For many people, this is actually a bad thing, which we’ll discuss below when we go through the 5 good things about text chats.

5. Fewer chances of misinterpretation because of being more direct and personal.

   With text chats, even good things can be misread. With a voice chat, you can be direct and more personal because of our association with sounds in the offline world.

5 Benefits of Text Messages/Chats over Voice Conversations

1. It’s a time saver.

   Admit it. We want more time in the day. Text chats are quick. You can reply to a chat message later on, instead of immediately within 3 seconds of someone else.

2. You can multitask with text chats

   While a growing number of people are starting to realize that Multitasking may not always be good (raises hand!), we all do multitask in almost everything we do (eating while answering an e-mail, listening to music while writing a blog post, looking at notes while talking to someone, etc).

   Text chats allow you to do more than one thing at once. You can reply to an email or a chat question while listening to music or having YouTube running in the other window.

3. Text chats can be started, responded to, and ended at any time of the day from either party.

   Unlike voice chats, text chats can be started at any time, replied to at any time and a solution/resolution/end/etc found at any time too. Two or more people do not have to be on at the same time to communication via a text chat.

4. Text chats make it easier to meet new people

   Text chats are good ice breakers and great ways to meet new people. For many people, it’s easier to send an e-mail or text chat online compared to starting a voice chat. You can send an e-mail at 2am, and get a text message next day at 4pm.

5. Text chats keep things organized.

   Text chats can make things very organized. You can share lists, bullet points, links, images, video, voice recordings, and more, all via text chats, emails and other textual avenues.

Which do You Prefer – Voice or Text?

In the end, it usually boils down to what you prefer and what the audience (one person, entire generation, etc) prefers. Some people like text chats, while others prefer voice chats or video chats (which includes voice by default almost all the time).

Do you prefer writing emails? Or do you prefer talking to someone? Do you prefer reading what someone writes, or do you prefer hearing people online?

Which form of communication do you prefer the most?

Please share your thoughts and any questions about this topic by commenting below. You can use text to describe yourself, or attach a YouTube video reply (or any video/voice reply) link in your comment.

Thanks for reading!

Foursquare is here to stay for a while, even if major companies shunned it in 2010 and in 2011.

Except Yelp, Foursquare doesn’t have any other noteworthy competitors which have the exact mobile fan base that it does. And Yelp is actually a reviews site, which focuses mainly on reviews and only recently started offering the check-in feature also.

In fact, there’s probably nothing else out there, in 2012 at time of this writing, which has the same user base and focus as Foursquare where the only purpose of the app is to share with others which exact business or location you are at.

Even though it’s 2012, sharing your exact location with others most of the time is still considered a very touchy subject. While the subject tone may never change, users will eventually decide whether or not they will keep using Foursquare.

So the question today is: do YOU think Foursquare is worth using? Here are 4 reasons why I think Foursquare may rock, and 4 reasons why I think Foursquare may not. I do keep using Foursquare at the moment, by the way.

4 Reasons Foursquare May Rock!

I use Foursquare almost regularly, and think it has a lot of potential. Here are 4 big reasons why I think Foursquare may keep rocking and thrive in the long run.

1. It adds a physical presence tone to your online presence.

   With almost everyone doing something online, Foursquare allows you to connect your actual offline presence to your online activities. You can check into the supermarket on Foursquare while tweeting about the crazy cashier up ahead.

2. It allows businesses to get direct feedback as to which online people are coming into the offline stores.

   Foursquare allows businesses to see which users come into their stores, what times people check in, what people are saying, and what they can do to make more people be happy with their check-ins.

3. It adds to your online personality.

   Anyone who wants to showcase their personality and themselves online benefits greatly by checking into places they want everyone to know about. Sure, people may check into an ULTA store more than CVS, though it still allows someone to share more about themselves.

4. It allows you to connect with offline places in an online manner.

   Connecting with an offline store you’re visiting through an online venue, while you’re still in or around the store, is a revolutionary concept in the online world which is still being heavily researched into by Foursquare, Facebook and Google. The possibilities can be endless (giving more perks, giving instant discounts, giving new offers based on whether one is happy or not, making such check-ins act like membership discounts, allowing people to use that as a receipt, etc), and the only limitation seems to be the kind-of-slow adaption of this check-in phenomenon when compared to the billions of users online.

4 Reasons Foursquare May Not Rock!

Back in 2010 Microsoft said Foursquare is a failure and will never succeed. While it is unknown how much money Foursquare is currently making, the fact is that Foursquare is still growing, and is not showing any sign of simply shutting down due to any potential unpopularity in use.

Here are 4 big reasons why Foursquare may not thrive as much among majority of users:

1. Privacy issues

   By sharing your actual location with the world, issues like being robbed because of Foursquare may cause physical harm or property loss in some cases. Many people are still wary of sharing their exact location with the world, which is probably the top reason why geo-check-ins have a slower adaption rate compared to many other online trends (like pinning an image to a site like Pinterest).

2. The prize for checking in turns Foursquare into a game instead of a utility.

   Majority of the places you check into get you a Mayor status. Once you become a mayor of some places, your entire focus turns into competing with other Mayors instead of gaining anything useful online or offline (unless you consider being a Mayor a useful online thing – then this point is actually the 5th good point for Foursquare).

3. Not enough Foursquare users compared to Facebook friends or Twitter users.

   The adaption of Foursquare, while phenomenal compared to all its direct competitors, still lags crazily behind the growth experienced by Google+, Facebook and Twitter. Eventually, you check on to Foursquare to compete with total strangers, even if they’re in the neighborhood, while majority or all your friends keep posting on Twitter or Facebook. Not all your friends or family members may have Foursquare, so they can’t see what you’re up to.

4. Majority of businesses give you no reward for checking-in.

   The number of discounts or rewards you get for checking into any store on Foursquare is almost non-existent compared to all the businesses you visit almost every day. Why should people keep checking into a store via Foursquare when they can simply tweet or Facebook their thoughts, along with simple check-ins directly on those services and through those services?

Tons of ideas for Foursquare

Here is Jess3, from back in 2010, offering lots of advice and tips to Foursquare on things that can be improved. Which ones do you like, and which ones do you think have yet to see light of the day?

What do you think of Foursquare?

I think the concept of check-ins has yet to hit the massive potential that exists. The same way you don’t want a stranger on the bus to know where you live, millions of people out there do not want to post regularly about the restaurants they eat at, the shops they visit at 2am, the shopping store they buy clothes from, and more. It’s creepy for many people, it’s a privacy issue for many other people, and it’s simply not useful for many other (other) people.

Getting more people to check-in and giving them a reason to do so may be the biggest hurdle faced by Foursquare, Facebook Location, Google Latitude, and other places. Unlike Foursquare, however, Facebook, Google and even Twitter have tons of other things to offer besides check-ins, and thus can survive, and already do thrive, in other ways. Foursquare relies solely on check-ins.

It’s a dangerous game where if the check-in trend does not become a global craze, Foursquare may have to change business models, or simply check-out.

I do keep using Foursquare at the moment, even though I check into Google+, Facebook and Twitter for each location that I check into. I think Foursquare does bring in people to see your profile, your sites, your check-ins, and more. I’m interested in having more people find me, so I’m guessing Foursquare is not doing any harm for me at the moment (other than being another account which I have to manage in a life full of online accounts).

How about you? What do you think of checking into places in general?

What is your opinion of Foursquare? Do you use it? Do you recommend it? Why or why not?

Please share your opinions and views below, along with your Foursquare profile link in the “Website” field, if you wish. Thanks for reading!

Forget Facebook for the time being: everyone knows about that. Everyone is not talking about Facebook, though. Almost everyone IS talking about Pinterest.

Pinterest is the new social media sharing service which allows you to share images and videos in the form of pins which interest you or which can be of interest to others. Pinterest allows you to pin your life, or other people’s lives and work, for others to see. Pinterest is basically an awesome upgrade and the next version of Tumblr, without any of the porn or other annoying side effects.

That’s a good summary of the service. What makes the service stand out is that it’s very beautiful interface, and visually attractive profiles.

Pinterest is currently in an invite only mode, and everyone is on the lookout for an invite. Social Improve recently got an invite thanks to Janet and Clarence, so I decided to spread the love and offer invites to anyone who wants one. Tweet this

@JanAndClare could I get one please? I can dm you the email.

— Bes Zain (@besz) March 22, 2012

Get Your Pinterest Invite Now

Simply leave a comment below requesting (or DEMANDING!) a Pinterest invite. If you leave a comment using your Facebook or Twitter account, be sure to message me on Facebook OR dm me on Twitter to let me know your email address.

You should receive your Pinterest invite within a few hours of your comment.

Remember: Social Improve will be sending out as many Pinterest invites as currently possible. That means once we run out of the invites, we will stop sending out invites (scary, right?).

Optional: If you wish, as a way of saying thank you to me and Social Improve, you can do any of the following:

1. Tweet this post and let others know
2. Follow me @BesZ on Twitter
3. Subscribe to this site via e-mail or RSS
4. Pin Social Improve to your new Pinterest using Pin It button (on the left of this page)
5. Follow me (Bes Zain) on Pinterest
6. +1 Social Improve on Google+
7. Use any social sharing button to share this article with others
8. Like Social Improve on Facebook

What will you do with your Pinterest invite?

Tweet this and let others know

Go ahead, request your Pinterest invite below. Once you have your Pinterest invite, be sure to leave a comment below letting everyone know that you have your invite, and what you plan to do with it.

Thanks for reading, and enjoy your Pinterest!

Writer’s block, including the blogging version of it called blogger’s block, happens to people every minute of the day. It has probably happened to you many times too.

Running out of blog topics is not a new concept. Every time someone runs into a writer’s block, the usual reaction is to consider it a defeat and to try to run away from the block while feeling disappointed.

The feeling of thinking that one does not know what to think is more harmful than the concept of writer’s block itself.

You’ll run into people having writer’s or blogger’s block daily, because of not knowing what to write about, on sites like Twitter and Facebook.

No guys seriously help I’m having extreme writer’s block.

— Gabby(@GF_Futurism) March 27, 2012

Worse writer’s block ever. Perhaps some intense tweeting might help

— Sofia Varino (@sofiavarino) March 27, 2012

While it may seem that there is no good topic you can think about at such times, think of this: you had the energy to write words to share your feelings about not being able to write.

How could that happen when you were having a writer’s block?

Why not always, when you have a blogger’s or writer’s block, turn your full energy and attention to the topic of the writer’s block itself?

Treat Writer’s Block like a Topic

Usually, people focus so much on avoiding taking any action when in the state of a writer’s block that they think it’s an excuse to not even try. Unless you’re writing a dedicated book where a specific topic which you have to cover is not creating enough new ideas and thoughts inside of you for that very specific line of dictated and pre-planned thinking, you can start thinking and writing about the writer’s block and your reaction to it.

The best cure for any kind of writer’s block, including blogger’s block, is to write about the block itself and its influence on your current life.

You’re reading this very post. I don’t have writer’s block, yet I made an entire post out of the topic that many people simple consider a scary hole that one can never come out of.

You or someone you know have probably talked, and complained, more times about the writer’s block than the number of paragraphs in this article. Why is that?

If you can tweet a 140 character message to the world talking about your writer’s block, you can probably use that tweet as the first line of an actual writing entry on your blog. Or even a book.

Total blog post writer’s block. What do you want me to write about for tomorrow?

— Serena Bell (@serenabellbooks) March 27, 2012

What’s stopping you? Did you even try? Don’t worry about the past. Start writing and trying from right now.

Talk about Your Blogger’s Block

I’ve been asked many times in life about solutions to writer’s blocks. I’ve also seen many people talk online about writer’s block.

I usually tell such people to start doing something else, or to start writing about the writer’s block itself. That is probably the best solution for situations where your mind is just stuck inside the idea that you’re stuck in a writer’s block.

At that very moment, while feeling stuck, you can write a lot about the writer’s block. You have the golden opportunity to explore and share the topic more.

Yet, almost every person gives up that opportunity intentionally. Everyone thinks it’s boring to write about being stuck in the writer’s block.

It’s useless to not do anything than to give up an opportunity to try more, newer, or the same things more efficiently or nicely in life.

Sure, there can be other better solutions, though no one pursues them or acts on any solution to the writer’s block. Almost everyone wants to talk about writer’s block negatively without actually doing something to address the situation.

So many great book and blog post opportunities are lost every minute of the day not due to writer’s block, but due to people loving the idea of not having to do anything while experiencing the writer’s block.

I look at the writer’s block as an awesomely great thing.

When it happens, you should start writing about what’s stopping you from writing or coming up with new topics. What are your thoughts? How do you feel? Is your environment affecting you? Is your body affecting you? Are people around you affecting you?

Remember those questions the next time you run out of topics to write about.

Solution: Write a blog post about you having writer’s block, instead of only tweeting about having writer’s block.

I need to get in the studio!…I think that’ll help me get over this writer’s block

— Vince Bracy (@VINCEBRACY) March 27, 2012

Challenge: Write a Response Blog Post

How often do you run into a writer’s or a blogger’s block? How do you deal with such blocks?

In addition to sharing a comment below about the above questions and this topic, I want to please invite you to accept a challenge:

Write a post anywhere on your blog or any other site, sharing your thoughts and responses to this very article.

You can share your thoughts in your post, share your tips, discuss the things which prevent you from writing regularly, and anything else you can think of related to this topic.

Feel free to link back to this post in your article. Also feel free to share a link to your new response blog post in your comments below.

Remember: if you are against the ideas of challenges, you now have another topic to write about in your response post.

Thanks for reading!

Such events of other people copying and using your online work, without your permission, can make you upset or even affect your daily life. This is specially true if you do a lot of online things, like blogging, posting to Flickr, and so on.

There is an easy way to take care of such things, so that you can continue being more optimal. Simply file a DMCA notice with the company that hosts your work without your permission. This will allow you to try and protect your copyright.

You send a DMCA Notice, often called a Copyright Notice or Copyright Violations Notice, to the hosts of the websites where your work is being used or shown without your permission.

This will also allow you to simply keep doing what you want to do, without having to pause your focus or passion of writing online.

Let’s go through DMCA a little bit to help you get your DMCA skills up to date. Some real DMCA letters are also included below, that you are allowed to use for your own DMCA pursuits.

Jump to: What is DMCA? | Godaddy DMCA | HostMonster DMCA | Limestone Networks DMCA | Host Ignoring Your DMCA Notice? | Person Copying Your Work Replies Back with Non-Compliance? | Protect Copyright without Stress | Are You Protecting Your Copyright?

What is a DMCA Notice?

A DMCA notice, or a Digital Millennium Copyright Act notice, is basically a way of telling someone that your rights, under the DMCA, are being violated because someone used or shared your copyrighted work without your permission.

You can learn more about the DMCA and its controversial nature via the Wikipedia entry on the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Even though DMCA is considered a very weak and ineffective law that many big companies actually use to stop people from talking about those companies, DMCA is your only real big legal bet against people who share your online work without your permission.

Since DMCA is a law, you can cite it legally to claim protection for your work.

Today we are going to focus on how you can send DMCA notices to let website owners or the hosts hosting those websites know that your content has been shared or used without your permission.

Your intended goal for such notices is to have the website owners remove your content, or to have the hosts force such website owners to remove the content.

While it is very tempting to send something like the following:

Your sites at

http://gogetthemsugarbabes.info/?p=1656

http://sugar-daddy-relationship.info/?p=1636

copied my content, without my permission, from http://eyeography.com/2009/01/15/the-chair-relationship-part-1-the-waiting-room/.

Per the DMCA law, I’m notifying you of this copyright infringement and asking that you remove all such content.

Waiting for your reply. Sincerely,

Bes Zain

You should realize that hosts are very sensitive about DMCA notices, whether it is to ignore them or to act on them. The above letter, while accurately depicting what is happening and what you want, will not be as effective as sending a DMCA letter that actually follows some of the legal rules that the DMCA states should be kept in mind.

The more legal your correspondence is when telling someone to obey the law, the better it is. DMCA is a law, and not a personal preference. Therefore, whenever you’re using it to your own advantage, you should stick with the legal definitions and terms so that that the corresponding host knows that you’re to be taken seriously. When you want to protect your copyright, you have to make sure each step you take is fully legal and effective.

Yes, sending a longer email with more confusing words is against what I always recommend in life about simplicity. However, when you’re dealing with legal stuff, you are allowed to forget simplicity a little bit if going the longer route is more effective. You can make the longer route extremely simple, however, by using any of my real DMCA letters, which I sent to hosts, as your own DMCA template.

Let’s go through 3 different copyright violation situations I had to pursue in the last 3 months with 3 separate hosts. This will show you how you can do the same if you find out any website online using your work without your permission.

Jump to: What is DMCA? | Godaddy DMCA | HostMonster DMCA | Limestone Networks DMCA | Host Ignoring Your DMCA Notice? | Person Copying Your Work Replies Back with Non-Compliance? | Protect Copyright without Stress | Are You Protecting Your Copyright?

Godaddy and DMCA

Sending a DMCA notice to Godaddy is pretty easy. The Godaddy Trademark Terms page which outlines everything.

Skip reading that page, unless you like reading such stuff. Instead, send your DMCA notice to CopyrightClaims@godaddy.com or TrademarkClaims@godaddy.com, or both.

Godaddy response time on DMCA Copyright Notice emails is also very fast. I got an actual human response from them within 24 hours.

Story: I recently had someone scrapping off my photos and content from my Eyeography website.

Godaddy was fast in reacting to my emails and disabling the websites of such webmasters. While it’s scary to wonder whether Godaddy actually looked at my complaint first, checked the links and then disabled the copycat website OR if Godaddy simply disabled the website automatically, it was still good for me in this case because the sites, which were copying my content, were down within 48 hours of my first DMCA notice.

I sent the following email to Godaddy. You will notice all the legal language in the letter. Feel free to use this email or letter template yourself by changing my information below to your info.

To whom it may concern:

As required under Sections 512(c)(3) and 512(d)(3) of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (17 U.S.C. §§ 512(c)(3) and 512(d)(3)), I hereby give notification of possible copyright infringement.

1. The original copyrighted material is listed at the URL(s) below:

http://eyeography.com/2009/01/15/the-chair-relationship-part-1-the-waiting-room/

2. The following URL(s) are infringing upon this copyright:

http://gogetthemsugarbabes.info/?p=1656

http://sugar-daddy-relationship.info/?p=1636

Additional Information:

I [Zain] created, wrote and published the article myself on my site Eyeography on January 15th, 2009. The infringing 3rd party scrapped, copied it and used my copyrighted work and image without permission on their site on November 11th, 2011.

I have a good faith belief that use of the copyrighted materials described above as allegedly infringing is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law. I swear, under penalty of perjury, that the information in the notification is accurate and that I am the copyright owner or am authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed.

Please expeditiously remove or disable all access to the infringing material listed above. Should you require any further information regarding this matter, please contact me at the address, telephone number or email address indicated below:

Digitally Signed,
Bes Zain

Bes Zain
PHYSICAL ADDRESS GOES HERE

PHONE NUMBER GOES HERE
EMAIL ADDRESS GOES HERE

You can see there is a lot of words being used which are not necessary. Long legal labyrinth, though it works.

In the end, you have to use legal forms of such DMCA in order to get results, or to take further action. The above template should help you copy paste anything you want anytime someone copies and uses your work without your permission.

I sent 3 separate DMCA notices to Godaddy in a month regarding over 20 different websites.

In the end, Godaddy shut down each and every one of the websites I had told them about in each email.

Jump to: What is DMCA? | Godaddy DMCA | HostMonster DMCA | Limestone Networks DMCA | Host Ignoring Your DMCA Notice? | Person Copying Your Work Replies Back with Non-Compliance? | Protect Copyright without Stress | Are You Protecting Your Copyright?

HostMonster and DMCA

HostMonster also seems to be fast in taking care of DMCA notices. Again, I’m not sure if HostMonster actually verifies that there has been a DMCA violation or not. They do take action fast, which is good.

The very long HostMonster Terms of Service has the Copyright violations section explained in there. Again, no need to read it unless you want to be extra sure.

Send your DMCA notice to legal@hostmonster.com and you’ll receive a reply within 48 hours.

Here is the actual DMCA notice I sent to HostMonster, minus my contact info. Again, feel free to change my information below to yours.

You’ll notice that it is almost a copy paste of my Godaddy DMCA notice. That’s right: be efficient in your DMCA emails also. Have one template ready, fill in the info, and send that email, all within 2 minutes.

Such templates are what enable you to apply simplification to the DMCA process.

To whom it may concern:

As required under Sections 512(c)(3) and 512(d)(3) of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (17 U.S.C. §§ 512(c)(3) and 512(d)(3)), I hereby give notification of possible copyright infringement.

1. The original copyrighted material is listed at the URL(s) below:

http://thereasoner.com/articles/5-signs-of-narrow-minded-selfish-friends-that-can-hurt-you

2. The following URL(s) are infringing upon this copyright:

http://www.repostpost.com/2012/01/14/warning-signs-of-selfish-people/

Additional Information:

I [Zain] created, wrote and published the article myself on my site The Reasoner on August 14th, 2007. The infringing 3rd party scrapped, copied it and used my copyrighted work without permission on their site on January 14th, 2012.

I have a good faith belief that use of the copyrighted materials described above as allegedly infringing is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law. I swear, under penalty of perjury, that the information in the notification is accurate and that I am the copyright owner or am authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed.

Please expeditiously remove or disable all access to the infringing material listed above. Should you require any further information regarding this matter, please contact me at the address, telephone number or email address indicated below:

Digitally Signed,
Bes Zain

Bes Zain
YOUR PHYSICAL ADDRESS

YOUR PHONE NUMBER
YOUR EMAIL

As simple as that. 5 days later, the plagiarized content was removed.

Jump to: What is DMCA? | Godaddy DMCA | HostMonster DMCA | Limestone Networks DMCA | Host Ignoring Your DMCA Notice? | Person Copying Your Work Replies Back with Non-Compliance? | Protect Copyright without Stress | Are You Protecting Your Copyright?

Limestone Networks and DMCA

Limestone Networks has ignored my DMCA notices completely.

Limestone Networks Terms of Service lists their DMCA policies. You should read this, since it actually lists the process Limestone Network says it goes through when going after their customers who plagiarize content.

Even though the entire terms of service are there to outline the DMCA policies, Limestone Networks has so far, in my experience, not taken any action on any such DMCA notices.

The Limestone Networks Abuse Report Form allows you to submit an online abuse form report. You can also send an email to abuse@limestonenetworks.com with your report.

Limestone Networks hasn’t taken action on my submitted DMCA Abuse Report or my DMCA email.

Following is the email I sent to Limestone Networks:

To whom it may concern:

As required under Sections 512(c)(3) and 512(d)(3) of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (17 U.S.C. §§ 512(c)(3) and 512(d)(3)), I hereby give notification of possible copyright infringement.

1. The original copyrighted material is listed at the URL(s) below:

2. The following URL(s) are infringing upon this copyright:

http://slodive.com/inspiration/pictures-of-hearts/

Additional Information:

I [Zain] took the copyrighted photograph on September 6th, 2004 and published the photograph myself on Flickr with All Rights Reserverd on September 30th, 2006. The infringing 3rd party scrapped, copied it and used my copyrighted work without permission on their site in January of this year, 2012.

I have a good faith belief that use of the copyrighted materials described above as allegedly infringing is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law. I swear, under penalty of perjury, that the information in the notification is accurate and that I am the copyright owner or am authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed.

Please expeditiously remove or disable all access to the infringing material listed above. Should you require any further information regarding this matter, please contact me at the address, telephone number or email address indicated below:

Digitally Signed,
Bes Zain

Bes Zain
YOUR PHYSICAL ADDRESS HERE

YOUR PHONE NUMBER HERE
YOUR EMAIL HERE

I got an automated reply, stating that my DMCA notice was received. I thought Limestone Networks would also take action quickly, just like Godaddy and HostMonster.

I was wrong. Here’s the automated reply:

Hello Bes Zain,

We have successfully received your abuse complaint regarding the IP/Hostname http://slodive.com.

Our Abuse department processes all requests sent using our online form or emailed to abuse@limestonenetworks.com . Please allow up to 48 hours for resolution and please understand that a personal reply to your complaint may only be sent if more information is necessary.

Thank you for your help in keeping the Internet clean,

Abuse Department

However, that was it: Limestone Networks has not contacted me at all after that. They also took no action from their part regarding my DMCA notice to them.

When a host ignores your DMCA notice completely, you can either go cry in a corner, forget the whole thing, stress out and try to take more action, or relax and try to take more action to protect your copyright.

I recommend relaxing and trying a few more things, while keeping in mind that you may not get the result you want at all without actual physical legal action.

Let’s go through some things you can do if a host ignores your DMCA notices, like in the case when Limestone Networks ignored my DMCA notices.

Jump to: What is DMCA? | Godaddy DMCA | HostMonster DMCA | Limestone Networks DMCA | Host Ignoring Your DMCA Notice? | Person Copying Your Work Replies Back with Non-Compliance? | Protect Copyright without Stress | Are You Protecting Your Copyright?

What to Do if a Host Ignores Your DMCA Notice?

There will be many times when a host will simply ignore your DMCA, or not take action. For example, Limestone Networks did not responded to my 2 DMCA notices at all, nor took any action on them.

So what would you do in such cases? Well, you have a few options then.

• Send a legal letter via mail to the company with a tracking number.

  Let the host know you mean business, and that you’re going to treat any response or non-response as something that can be brought up in court by you.

• Contact the offending party yourself. I recommend doing this only if the host does not take DMCA notices seriously.

  This worked for me. A week after Limestone Networks did not do anything about my DMCA noticed, I contacted the admin of the site directly.

  This is the exact email I sent that admin. I also CC’ed Limestone Networks abuse department, so that the person would know I was contacting their host also.

  Hello.

  I was notified that one of my Flickr images http://www.flickr.com/photos/besz/256788051 was used without permission on your site at

  http://slodive.com/inspiration/pictures-of-hearts/

  Could you please remove my copyrighted image from your site completely?

  Waiting for your reply. Thanks!

  It’s a very simple email, though it’s very clear about the “was used without permission on your site” part. Notice how when I’m contacting the person directly, I didn’t follow the DMCA protocols.

  You can go with the above personal template OR the DMCA notice. I went the personal route as I realized sending that simpler email directly to the person who copied my content would result in the person understanding the gravity of the situation faster and would not become too defensive.

  The admin actually replied to me within an hour, saying

  Hi Bes,

  Thank you for your email.

  We can taken down your image if you want, but for the fact we are not making users download directly from our site, neither we are hotlinking the images. We were just trying to get your artwork more exposure. Hope you understand. Looking forward to your reply. Thanks.

  –
  Cheers!
  Bhanu

  http://slodive.com/

  I was pleasantly surprised to get a reply, though bored to see yet another feeling of hesitancy in the person to double confirm that I really wanted the image removed. So I replied back

  Hi Bhanu,

  Thanks for the reply. Please take down my images completely from your site, thanks.

  Remember, there’s no point in being online if you get mad at the small or the big things unless you absolutely cannot avoid it. He replied back within the hour with:

  Hi Ben,

  Cool. Your image has been taken down, sorry for any trouble that might have been caused due to this. If anything, please let us know.

  I was Ben, all of a sudden. Then within a few minutes another email came in:

  Sorry for emailing again but I for to mention that it will take some time for cache to regenerate the new page. Please let me know in 12 hours if the image is still showing up and we will purge that page out of the cache. Thank for understanding. Good day.

  I checked, and my photograph was taken down from his site. He stopped using my photograph on his site.

  Awesome!

  So for me, when the host Limestone Networks ignored my direct DMCA email and my DMCA report filed through their website, I turned directly to the people who copied my work. They took it down once they found out, via my emails, that I knew about it and that I wanted them to stop.

• Contact search engines like Google to have the plagiarizing site removed from the search index and results.

  John in the comments below offered this excellent tip: if the host won’t help you, and the person who copied your content won’t stop, you can contact search engines like Google to have the plagiarizing websites removed from search indexes and results.

  This is, in my view, one of the best routes to take. In fact, you can take this route right in the beginning, even when you file the DMCA.

• Call the host’s phone number and ask for DMCA status info over the phone.

  Many hosts avoid talking about DMCA over the phone since the entire topic of DMCA is of a legal nature. However, it is worth noting to anyone from the host on the phone that you are following up on your DMCA and that you have not yet been replied to. Get things moving and have people looking into the situation.

  Companies are less likely to ignore phone call inquiries than email inquiries, since you’re going to have an actual person on the line who has to react to your questions on the spot.

• Contact the host directly and publicly via social media.

  Almost every modern web hosting company has a Twitter and a Facebook account. Interact with them via these networks publicly. Your comment or complaint, about your DMCA being ignored for example, can get removed or deleted via Facebook, but on something like Twitter, it will live on and gain attention. If a host is intentionally or unintentionally not reacting to your DMCA, posting it publicly for millions to see will get them to react.

  This route can create a lot of attention and defensive reaction from the host, so be careful when going this route. For example, I could have pointed out to my 13,000+ Twitter followers that @LimestoneInc hosting ignores DMCA requests. However, I went the more peaceful and relaxing route.

  Amazing how the person plagiarizing my work was more responsive to my communication than the company hosting that plagiarizer.

• Ask the world for help.

  Yes, this is the best thing to do if everything else doesn’t work. Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and other places have millions of people reading everything that gets posted. Ask the social media world for help. Ask what others would do, ask if anyone knows a special email or contact info for a certain host, and so on. Chances are, you mentioning the very name of the host and the nature of your message will get either someone out there to offer some advice or the host itself to jump in to get things under control.

Jump to: What is DMCA? | Godaddy DMCA | HostMonster DMCA | Limestone Networks DMCA | Host Ignoring Your DMCA Notice? | Person Copying Your Work Replies Back with Non-Compliance? | Protect Copyright without Stress | Are You Protecting Your Copyright?

What to Do if the Person Copying Your Work Replies Back with a Non-Compliance Rebuttal?

Sometimes, the person who copies your work may reply back to you or their host to “disagree” with your DMCA notice.

When I filed the HostMonster DMCA, the person who copied my entire The Reasoner article actually replied back to me and their host with the following email:

According to this lawsuit http://www.mediabistro.com/fishbowlny/reposting-aggregation-fair-use_b38173
I have not broken any laws. I did not copy the entire articale and I even direct my readers to finish reading the article on the originating site. How is it illegal for me to promote some that I found useful?

At first I wanted to react to it, letting them and the host know how the DMCA is an actual United States copyright law, and that the lawsuit is one small example of a case where the entire specifics of the case are not known. I also wanted to let HostMonster know that they have to tell me legally if they choose to ignore the DMCA request.

However, I decided not to react at all, which was the awesome thing to do. I ignored the email completely.

Within 5 days of my DMCA and 4 days of that email, the content was removed. Of course, this new text now appears in place of my original content on http://www.repostpost.com/2012/01/14/warning-signs-of-selfish-people/ :

Warning Signs of Selfish People
by ADMIN on JANUARY 14, 2012
in PSYCHOLOGY, RELATIONSHIPS
This articale has been removed at the copyright holders request

Laws such as the DMCRA are to broad and far reaching ristricting common “fair use” that has been a common practice. This articale was not published to deprive anyone of their rights but, because I found it useful and relevant to promote.

You won’t always be lucky if you ignore such replies. However, always try to work with the host first, and then reach out to the actual person who copied your work as a second step. After that, go through all the steps in the What to Do if a Host Ignores Your DMCA Notice? section above.

Jump to: What is DMCA? | Godaddy DMCA | HostMonster DMCA | Limestone Networks DMCA | Host Ignoring Your DMCA Notice? | Person Copying Your Work Replies Back with Non-Compliance? | Protect Copyright without Stress | Are You Protecting Your Copyright?

Protect Your Copyright without Stress

The above points and templates should give you a good idea of what DMCA is and how you can use it when someone copies and uses your work without your permission.

Make DMCA and copyright pursuits a pleasant experience for you. Avoid stressing out: it is so easy to right click on any image to save it, copy paste text, and use other people’s content online without permission. When your work gets copied, just relax and carry on with the above DMCA thoughts and procedures.

Have a plan and a single template ready. Customize that template for any DMCA notice you send out.

The entire point of the DMCA in my view should be like everything else in life: while you’re trying to get something done because of someone abusing you or your work, like getting some of your copied content removed, you don’t ruin your life by stressing over it.

Since there is something like the DMCA to help you protect your copyright, use it to your advantage and relax, instead of panicking and stressing out when someone copies your online work.

Jump to: What is DMCA? | Godaddy DMCA | HostMonster DMCA | Limestone Networks DMCA | Host Ignoring Your DMCA Notice? | Person Copying Your Work Replies Back with Non-Compliance? | Protect Copyright without Stress | Are You Protecting Your Copyright?

What do You Think of DMCA? How are You Protecting Your Copyright?

Have you ever had your work copied? Have you ever filed or dealt with the DMCA? Have you ever had an unfair DMCA filed against you? Who is your host, and what is their DMCA policy?

What do you think of Godaddy, HostMonster, and Limestone Networks based on their reaction to my DMCA notices?

Share your thoughts and ideas in the comments below.

If you’re reading this article anywhere other than in your feed reader with the Social Improve feeds or on the Social Improve website, chances are you are reading this content on a site which has copied the Social Improve article without permission. Let me know about it. I’ll take care of it then through a DMCA.

Thanks for reading!

An asset is something of value that a person owns. There are different categories of assets, such as tangible, intangible and digital. Yes, digital was added to the asset list.

Tangibles can be anything from houses to bank accounts, even family photos. Intangibles are things like copyrights, patents, and everything else that is not physical, or that ‘brands’ you or your company.

Digital Assets

Digital assets are electronic items that are either on your computer or on a website. They are things like business documents, blogs, domain names, online businesses, PayPal accounts, online investment accounts, even profiles on social media sites.

These are things that are lingering out in cyberspace that will possibly not be found or bequeathed to your family, should you die, without the proper steps taken.

Realizing that your online accounts are assets is what will determine their future. Think about your domains and the advertising revenue coming from AdSense? What about your PayPal account and your blogs revenue? Will your family know what to do with all of these things to ensure your work will benefit them? What about your photos in Flickr or Facebook? The half-finished novel stored in Google Docs or elsewhere? Will your family know how to access all of them?

Your Digital Will

Generally, when assets are not located or claimed, the government steps in and basically takes them. Have you heard of sites like “unclaimed money” where many bank and financial accounts have money sitting in them – that was never claimed? Most likely because the member died and not a soul knew that money was there.

That is why a ‘Digital Will’ along with digital asset management is so important – so that things that are valuable – do not lie unclaimed or dormant in cyberspace.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Start by checking into an account guardian:

An account guardian allows users to make a list of all of their digital assets, and designate one or two people as executors, to manage it after death, making certain that all of your cash and other assets get transferred to your heirs, as well as closing accounts.

Entrustit.com has this very important product under the name Account Guardian.

Create a Digital Will

The digital will is probably the most important document to aid your family in finding all of your digital assets.

Many people amend their existing will to include their digital assets, or create one online through sites such as LegacyLocker.com, or Entrustit.com

Even sites such as Ziggur.org can manage your online presence, offering your family relief during their loss, and keep all of your digital assets and digital life in one place. Ziggur offers all information stored using only one password, which is convenient because keeping a password list can become outdated as much as we change passwords.

Digital List:

This list is essential to a good Digital Will, because it lists every item that has anything to do with your online life. It should include photos, videos, investment and bank accounts, memberships, income possibilities, PayPal account, domain names and whatever else has to do with your digital life.

This document should be the biggest part of your digital legacy and stored somewhere safe for your family to access.

Power of Attorney:

This legal document allows an executor or family member to act on your behalf should you die, or become incapacitated. They need to be prepared prior to death.

A legal representative, preferably the one who designed your Living Will or Trust will need to prepare one, as they need to be notarized and in legal format.

Make sure you name at least 2 people, in case one predeceases the other.

Executor:

Choose one or two close family members or friends, as executors for your Digital and your Living Will/Trust. They will be responsible for carrying out your wishes, and can ensure the smooth transition for family members receiving your assets in a legal and uncomplicated manner.

Not only will they be the representatives of your wishes, they will act as the distributor of your assets, eliminating the typical scrambling and confusion of family members.

These are the basic steps that will save your assets from becoming state property, as well as offer your peace of mind. Family will need to be guided, and showing that you are responsible enough to have your affairs in order, will leave a lasting impression for them.

Take the time to look into some of these options, and get started. We never know what tomorrow brings.

What do You Think?

What are your thoughts on this topic? Do you have a Digital Will? Will you get a Digital Will? Why or why not?

Share in the comments below.

Everyone from blog owners to business mavericks and lots more in between use Google Plus for outreach, marketing, content sharing and or to mix and mingle with like minded peers.

Whatever your reason for becoming a Google + fan, one thing is clear. Without followers you’re not going to have too much fun.

So the adage as is usual in social media is that the more the merrier. But how does one grow their Circles? How does one go from ten followers to hundred and more?

Below we present a few ideas and tips on how to do just this via a few simple methods and tricks.

1. Do Outreach From Your Blog

Use your blog to garner more followers via a special contest where the method of entry requires one to sign up to your Google + circle, or perhaps write an article that addresses how awesome Google Plus is and why others should join in and become fans too.

Your blog should be a driving force in all your social media campaigns, so use it wisely and often. Also don’t forget to include the appropriate widgets and buttons on your site to allow others to easily and quickly add you to their respective networks.

2. Ask Your Readers

If you want others to do something, sometimes the only way to know for sure if they will do it is to simply ask. Want more followers? Ask. Place a clear and prominent call to action on your site asking for others to join your new Google + page and if they do so, maybe throw in some special reward like a free ebook, report or other similar goodie.

This idea is highly under-utilized yet highly effective.

3. Guest Post

This idea involves the strategic use of guest articles on popular and well trafficked blogs to garner a certain end result. That might be leads for a new product, joint venture or in this case grow your Google + following.

Most sites that accept guest posts will have a page dedicated to this practice, so try to find blogs by performing a Google search with the query of niche + guest posts, so if you run a travel blog you would type in “travel guest posts” and then contact the blog owner to ask if you can submit a guest article.

If you get the go, then write a fantastic article and at the end of it or in the BIO area include a link to your Google Plus profile page and flat out ask others to follow you.

How do You Grow your Google+ Followers?

There are numerous ways to grow your followers, however the three ideas above should get you going in the right direction. Already have a good following? Let us know your tips on how you’ve done it.

It’s interesting reading such viewpoints, since many theme developers insist that you put all your functions in their theme’s functions.php files.

Your own custom WordPress functions allow you to extend WordPress in your own way, with or without external plugins or scripts.

Your WordPress theme functions.php file gets loaded at the same time as your site, so your functions get loaded instantly. The theme functions.php file is one of the most common venues to insert your own functions into WordPress.

I always put my functions in my WooTheme’s functions.php file, allowing me an easy way to manage all my custom code. That does make me depend on the current theme a bit.

New Solution: Use a Functions Plugin Instead

A new way of thinking is starting to challenge the popular method of putting your functions into the theme’s functions.php file. That’s good for me, as WordPress is part of my online life currently, and I’m trying my best to optimize everything in my offline and online life.

This time, Dave from Do It With WordPress recommends using a plugin to replace most or all the functions you place in your functions.php files.

Use a Functions plugin instead of functions.php?

One thing I like about Dave approach is the simplicity: Dave recommends using a single Functions plugin file where you stick in all your functions and leave them their for eternity. You could change your themes without having to worry about your functions. All you have to do then is either enable or disable your plugin, and everything will work.

All your functions will be in a single plugin file compatible with any theme you switch to.

Dave also says that using a functions plugin gives your functions the exact same priority and power that they would get if they were in the functions.php file. That means your functions plugin will have your functions.php functions working the exact same way, without you having to change anything.

Where do you put your WordPress functions?

What do you think of this idea? Do you put all your functions in the functions.php file? Do you have a plugin with all your custom functions in it?

Would you recommend dividing between the two areas instead, putting some functions in the functions.php file and some in a functions plugin?

I would love to hear your thoughts on this. Comment below to share what you think or what you do on your site.

Thanks for reading!

WordPress Crons, however, do require some visit to any public page of your main site to trigger the cron to run. That could create problems for many people, specially Multisite owners where Crons are set to run on a Multisite level for all sub-sites, and yet where the main Multisite domain may not get any traffic.

Among the thousand other things Tasker can do via your Android phone, Tasker can also easily visit your website.

I’ve been using Tasker for a long time, and since last week started using Tasker to trigger Crons on Multisites which don’t get much or any traffic. And it works beautifully.

Since you can use Tasker to visit any website at any time automatically, once or regularly, you can use Tasker to trigger your WordPress Crons. Here’s how to do it.

What is Tasker for Android?

Tasker for Android gives you wings!

Want to notify yourself of an important task when you’re at the shopping mall? Tasker can detect your location and do that. Want to silence your ringer after 11pm? Tasker does that. Anything your phone is capable of doing, Tasker can allow you to control it and bend it in any manner you wish.

Social Improve will post some tutorials and info on Tasker on a regular basis.

Today, let’s focus on using Tasker for Android to visit any website automatically via your phone and also, if you wish, trigger crons on your Multisites.

Use a Tasker Android Profile to Visit Websites or Trigger WordPress Crons

Since all that’s needed for WordPress to run scheduled crons is a visit to any part of your main WordPress where the cron is scheduled, we’re going to create a Tasker profile to have your Android browser visit your site at any time of the day, stay on it for a few seconds, and then exit the browser.

You have 2 options to accomplish this: download and use the profile I’ve created for you to learn from that, OR create the profile from scratch and see how it’s done in detail.

Both options are outlined below.

Easy Option 1: Download the Profile

Here is my Tasker profile that you can download, save onto your phone or SD card, and then import into your Tasker.

Right click and save Tasker Profile to Trigger WordPress Crons – Trigger_WP_Crons.prf.xml

Remember to change any values you wish, specially the website link, to your own values after you’ve imported this profile into Tasker.

Long Option 2: Walk Through the Full Steps

Taking the long route? Awesome!

Here are all the steps, with associated screenshots, to help you create your own profile from scratch. Follow these simple steps and the associated pictures to setup a Tasker profile called “Trigger WP Crons”, which can be any other name you wish by the way. This is a one-time setup. Tasker will do everything automatically from then onward.

By default, all the “Ok” and “Accept” buttons in Tasker are green check boxes. All red cross marks mean “No”, “Cancel” and “OMG! WTH?”

If you’re unsure about any step, ask away in the comments below!

1. Open Tasker and create a new profile by hitting the big green plus + button.

   The screenshot below shows all the active Profiles I have.

   Your screen will either be empty or will have differently named profiles, unless you and I think the exact same (or one of us is copying the other).

   

2. Give your new profile any name and press the ok (green check mark) button.

   I usually pick names that will tell me instantly what they’re about, like “Trigger WP Crons.”

   

3. In the “First Context” step, you’ll choose the condition that will make Tasker start doing what you want it to do.

   For our case, we want Tasker to visit our website OR websites in question after the scheduled time of our Cron. If your scheduled cron OR plugin is set to run at, let’s say, 11pm, we can tell Tasker to run at 11:05pm or any time after 11pm.

   Because we’re dealing with time, choose the “Time” Context on this step.

   

4. Tasker will now show you some time options that you can use to run Tasker from any start time to any end time, and to run Tasker once or repeatedly at such times forever or as long as you wish.

   If your WordPress schedules are at 11pm, let’s tell Tasker to run this Tasker Profile at 11:05pm. Choose “23:05″ and “23:10″ on this screen.

   Also check the “Repeat” option, since we want Tasker to do this every night at 11:05pm from now on. Enabling the “Repeat” option will let you choose how often you want Tasker to run this task again and again. Choose “12 hours”, since we want Tasker to check if it’s 11:05pm, in order to trigger your WordPress Cron, every 12 hours. Don’t worry: even if Tasker checks at 11:05am (morning), it will not run your profile because of your specified “23:05″ and “23:10″ time frame.

   Press the ok button then.

   

5. Next screen will allow you to choose a Task from a list of Tasks you may have already created OR allow you to create a new one. Tasks are what Tasker will actually do at the time you specified, like visiting your site.

   Choose “New Task” on this screen.

   Your actual screen will again look different since the names you see in my screens are what I’ve named my different Tasker elements for my needs.

   

6. You can (and should) name your tasks also, to make them easier to identify.

   I’ll name this task “Visit Site.” Name everything you can from the beginning in order to remember and identify things easily later on.

   Choose ok.

   

7. Now you’ll see the “Task Edit/Visit Site” screen, or a similarly named screen depending on what name you chose for your tasks.

   This is where you’ll perform the final steps of your Tasker profile. This is where you tell Tasker what to do when it’s 11:05pm.

   Press the blue plus + button to create a new task.

   

8. You’ll now see a “Select Action Category” menu, which lists all the things you can do with your phone.

   It has a ton of options and several sub-options each, so don’t worry if it looks overwhelming. It’s usually a lot for me too, though I focus only on the names to get to where I want.

   In our case, choose “Net” on this screen.

   

9. You’ll now see several “Net” actions that Tasker can do for you.

   What we want is to browser your website, so choose “Browse URL” option.

   

10. This will load the “Browse URL” screen, where in the URL field you can type in your WordPress website URL where your WordPress crons are scheduled.

    This can be anything on your site, from the front page itself to any specific page.

    Tasker or your Android keyboard might capitalize the “H” in “http” portion of what you enter. No worries: ignore that and carry on, or simply edit the “H” into an “h” manually.

    I put in “http://socialimprove” here. You put your website link, that you want Tasker to visit, in this URL field. Hit ok.

    

11. Next we want Tasker to close the browser after, let’s say, 15 seconds of being on the site.

    At this step you should be back on the “Task Edit / Visit Site” screen, where you’ll see your Browse URL task from the previous step.

    Hit the blue plus + sign again to create another task.

    

12. On the “Select Action Category”, this time choose the “Task” action.

    Among other things, the “Task” action contains the commands to tell Tasker to wait as long as you wish before carrying on the next action.

    We want Tasker to wait 15 seconds before returning to the home screen. Hit the “Task” option.

    

13. Now you’ll choose “Wait” action under the “Task” action.

    Wait tells Tasker how long to wait before going to the next action.

    

14. The “Wait” options menu has several ways to specify a time frame during which Tasker will pause the current profile from performing the next step.

    It may look complicated with so many time options, though it’s fairly easy to work with. We only want the “Seconds” option, so slide the “Seconds” tab using the plus button in front of it until it says “15″ seconds.

    Hit the ok green check mark button then.

    

15. You’ll now be returned to the “Task Edit / Visit Site” menu again, where you’ll see your “Browse URL” and “Wait” tasks.

    If everything looks good so far, hit the blue plus + button one last time so that we can tell Tasker to add the final task of visiting the Home screen to close the browser.

    Tip: in Android, you don’t have to exit applications. If you are on the home screen or turn off your screen display, Android automatically manages your memory and applications, turning off unneeded resources as needed.

    That is why we’re simply going to visit the Home screen to have the browser automatically close off when Android automatically realizes it’s not being used anymore.

    You don’t have to do anything in Android other than to visit the home screen to exit applications.

    

16. On the “Select Action Category” screen, choose “App.”

    

17. You’ll see several “App” actions. Choose “Go Home” action.

    

18. You’ll now see the “Go Home” options.

    Ignore everything on this page, to keep your sanity like I do in the face of all the power Tasker offers.

    Hit the green ok check mark button.

    

19. You’ll now be taken to your Task Edit / Visit Site screen, where you’ll see all your newly tasks.

    On this screen, if you wish, you can hit the bottom right “Play” button to test your settings. This will Start your browser, wait 15 seconds, and then go to the home page. You can open Tasker again after this to be returned to this exact screen.

    Hit the ok button again to finalize everything.

    

20. You’re done now!

    On the resulting screen, where you’ll see all your profiles, scroll down to your newly created “Trigger WP Crons” profile, or whatever name you chose. Your actual screen will look different, since I’ve many other profiles there also.

    You’ll see a green check box in front of your newly created profile. This tells you that your new Tasker profile is active and will thus run as defined by you.

    If everything looks good, hit the bottom left green check box button. This button will be used by you always, as it tells Tasker to be active and to run in the background running all your active profiles.

    If you hit the red cross marks button here, Tasker will be paused, or disabled, until the next time you manually run Tasker and hit the green check mark button.

    

Awesome!

Your Android phone will now, every night at 11:05pm, load your website in your Android browser, stay on your website for 15 seconds, and then simply go back to the home screen.

This will make WordPress trigger any 11:00pm scheduled crons you have on that site.

Everything is automatic. You can keep sleeping through your scheduled cron triggers. Or you can keep playing Killing Floor and Battlefield: Bad Company 2 at this time, like I do.

What about non-Android users?

Tasker and the similar Locale apps are for Android only, so you’ll have find out similar apps for your phone. iPhone users shouldn’t have to worry though, since iPhone has been around longer and has a very strong developer base.

Google should help you find out an app similar to Tasker for your phone. Do similar Google searches for your other non-iPhone phones to find out something similar.

Post in the comments below if you can’t find something similar for your specific phone, OR if you find something other than Tasker that helps you do the same thing.

What do you think of using Tasker to trigger Scheduled WordPress Crons?

What do you think of this Tasker Profile? Can you use this to visit websites automatically at specified times? How do you deal with WordPress Crons for websites that do not get enough or any traffic?

Please share in the comments below. Thanks!

You can upgrade via any of the following 3 methods:

1. Single Sites: Visit Dashboard –> Updates as a Site Admin.
2. Multisites: Visit Network Admin –> Dashboard –> Updates as a Network Admin.
3. Manually by downloading WordPress 3.3.1 and then using any FTP program to upload it over your existing files.

Be sure to follow any extra steps, as shown by your specific WordPress admin, to finish the upgrade process.

This can be specially true for Multisites, where you have to take an extra clicking step to upgrade all the sites in your Multisite, by clicking the “Update Network” link under Network Admin –> Dashboard –> Updates area.

If you’re upgrading via FTP, be sure to log into your WordPress admin panel after you finish uploading the updated files manually.

One of the New Year resolutions you should make for your online life, if you haven’t already, is to keep your online sites updated at all times. Slacking off on your website, even in the back-end, is so 2011′ish!

Will you upgrade right away?

Do you usually upgrade to the latest WordPress versions right away? Or do you usually wait a few days or even weeks to see how others are rating such updates?

Happy upgrading!

Facebook has gone from having the cleanest and most consistent social networking layout to probably having one of the most complicated layout of all the majority of the sites I use daily. Twitter, Google+, and even the sophisticated LinkedIn is easier to use and manage than Facebook at the moment. And in some areas, Facebook is now as difficult to use as MySpace once was and currently is.

That is not a good sign, is it?

Every hour someone out there is either supporting or bashing all the new things Facebook is trying, adding and releasing. And there is a good reason for such reactions.

Where is Facebook headed?

Do you think Facebook is the New MySpace?

MySpace was dethroned because Facebook came up with something simpler and better. Right now, it seems Facebook is not the simpler and better network anymore. In fact, data shows that users are starting to spend less time on Facebook now compared to before, specially when Facebook keeps introducing new features to try and compete with everything else online.

But, is Facebook really the new MySpace? Or are users (including myself) simply used to the simplicity of the original-Facebook era and are associating any complexity in layout and controls with the complexity that doomed MySpace functionality?

Do these qualities make Facebook the New MySpace?

1. Simplicity has been killed
2. Unwanted Information Spam. It’s actually official that Facebook will show you information from groups you’re not part of.
3. Unwanted Photo Tags
4. Unwanted Group Additions. It’s also official that Facebook does not allow you to moderate your group memberships – you can be added to any Facebook group by your contacts without your permission.
5. Spam Messages
6. App Status Post Spam
7. App Invitation Spam
8. Facebook Layout is going from being extra simple to being extra complex.

   This was the biggest selling point of Facebook back when it was taking on MySpace. This is also one of the 2 big reasons people back then switched to Facebook. However, the Facebook layout is now getting more and more complicated as more new features are added to everyone’s profiles.

Do you think Facebook is becoming the new MySpace?

Click here to view the embedded video.

What are your thoughts on this? Do you think Facebook is headed in the direction of MySpace? Do you think all these new features are going to end up turning users away when something new and simpler, like Google+, comes along or gets more attention? Or do you think Facebook, even with all its features, is still never going to face the MySpace fate and will easily avoid being taken over by Google+ or something else?

Share your opinions or questions by commenting below. Thanks for reading!