Testing out our new text editor
Posted Wednesday, January 7, 2009 by mikey mioduski

Our team of engineers deserve a lot of credit for their hard work making this new text editor interface more awesome than ever. They are always busy making our business blogging platform more powerful and easier to use.

I am using this post as a test to see if they actually did anything or if they're just saying they did, because nobody really knows what goes on back in that room. They sometimes grow beards and some of them don't wear shoes, so I don't know if I fully trust what they say. But here I go.

I will now attempt to upload a picture.

Hey, that was pretty easy. I really enjoyed doing that.

As I type my thoughts onto this editor, I am noticing how fast it is. I mean, it's a lot faster than I remember.

What about linkage? I will now place a link to a client blog, Christy Sports, because I just noticed they're a client, and I have rented skis and boots and boards from them since I was a tyke.

Wow, that was also really easy.

The work of our Dev team reminds me of a song by postitive rock legend Stan Bush. In his words, "Never surrender, never say die. You got the will to survive."

I will now attempt to embed a Youtube video into our newly enhanced text editor, and if it works, I shall dedicate the video to our Dev Team.

Gosh dang that was easy!

Well after some serious testing, I would like to give props, whatever those are, to the dev team on this one. The new features look really slick, plus they make adding content to our corporate blog much much easier. It's also noticably faster. The awesomeness is beyond words.

I think I just fell back in love with blogging. Thank you dev team for helping me rekindle this flame.

 

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Fancy Schmancy User Interface
Posted Wednesday, January 7, 2009 by Jenni Edwards

I have always love learning and reading about web usability - it's amazing how certain ecommerce sites have increased their sales dramatically by adding a button or changing the number of screens to check out; so I am naturally stoked to be using a brand spanking new UI for Compendium today...and not to mention, it motivated me to post! :)

Why does the User Interface matter you ask?  Well, first back to the ecommerce example, the easier we can make things on our business blogging clients - the more they will blog.  So what changes did we make?  Mainly, basics - aligned icons more with Microsoft Word standards and some HTML clean up, to even further search engine optimize the blogs.  It's one of the beautiful parts of a Saas solution, like Compendium -- always improving our product!  

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Business Blogging makes SEO a LOT easier than doing your taxes
Posted Wednesday, January 7, 2009 by Chris Baggott

For those marketers  involved in search marketing, we know that search is the one bright spot in the marketing landscape.  As you can see from the eMarketer forecast, search will continue to accelerate against other online advertising…and of course we all know that traditional non-online advertising is in a long and protracted decline.

Corporate blgging strategy for search trends



Why is search winning?  Because it is the only mass marketing tool in history where you are responding to a prospects intent.   No longer do we have to analyze data and hope that certain segments might be interested in our offer. 

With Search, our prospects simply tell us when they have a need or problem they could use our help with.  Condo, Austin?   Variable Printing Services?  Chrome 4 slice toaster?  New Tires, Buffalo?  All of these and millions more indicate the needs and desires of the searcher.   Do you sell tires in Buffalo?

80% of all web interactions begin with searches.

So why, in a recent Microsoft adCenter survey, did 73% of the small business owners say they would rather DO THEIR TAXES than start a paid search marketing campaign.   

It’s not a lack of desire or a lack of intelligence, what most web folks fail to recognize about small business marketing is that they are constrained by both time and money.   This is what  makes and internet business blog such a compelling option.   

With a business blogging solution designed for business, they get two things.  The first is a managed solution.  One of the beauties of SaaS is help.  Unlike “free” blogging tools where you are completely on your own,  hosted business blogging tools have actual people that work to make their clients successful.  

At the end of the day, all the business needs to do is tell stories…as Sienfield’s Kramer says…talk about your day.  The more they talk, the more search traffic they drive.   Easy to use blogging software makes search marketing a LOT easier than doing taxes…. Blog for SEO...and win.

 

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Product Releases!
Posted Wednesday, January 7, 2009 by Abby Rivera

We are proud to announce a successful lauch of a couple of new pieces to Compendium Software and Compendium Product Support today! 

 

Our first item is and most exciting piece is the launching of an updated and enhanced text editor.  Thank you to our engineering team for all of their hard work and dedication to the product.  As a part of the Product Support Team at Compendium we strive to hear and communicate with Product Planning what our clients are wanting, what sort of dfficulties they are having and move to enhance those pieces of the software. This new text editor, is exactly that.  Our clients asked and we listened!   

 

Our second item we are excited to announce, is the self service portion of the help page.  In the past, clients have had the abiltiy to submit support requests via email - help@compendiumblogware.com, phone - (317)777-6255, or by completing the webform.  Product Support quickly responded to all requests. 

 

But as we grow and expand this Support functionality to our business blogging software, we want to make getting support for our clients as easy as possible. Our solution, we introduced a self service portal to the help page.  Clients can now

  • search answers for Frequently Asked Questions
  • find out how to accomplish different items with in the software
  • Ask question and look for support easily on their own

 

We still love feedback, so if there is anything we can do, let us know!

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Measuring the Impact of Blogging
Posted Wednesday, January 7, 2009 by Ali Sales

I blogged on this topic a few weeks ago and couldn't resist expanding on measurement...

"How do you know whether or not your corporate blogging program is working?"

We get this question all the time. The answer is simple:

Business blogging can be measured the same way that all other marketing is measured.

The top line measurements are: Total traffic, quality of traffic, and clicks on your call-to-action.

Yes, that means that your blog template MUST incorporate something for your visitors to do. They need something to click on. That's no different than how you treat your website and email marketing campaigns (and if you're not treating them this way, now is the time to start).

The bottom line metrics are: Leads and dollars. That could be dollars generated or dollars saved.

My next few posts are going to feature Compendium's own blogging program and I'll also feature metrics/stats from some customers.

I'll also cover the key aspects of success in order to get the top line and bottom line metrics headed in the direction you want.

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Seth Godin on Business and Social Media
Posted Wednesday, January 7, 2009 by Douglas Karr
On measuring your business strategy's success with social media...



It's so refreshing that there's one marketing guru out there with the guts to go against the social media stream and challenge businesses to measure their success and do what matters!  Every corporate social media strategy should start with a business blog.
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Gone Fishing?
Posted Wednesday, January 7, 2009 by Douglas Karr
A couple of years ago I wrote a post about advertising versus marketing - and how it related to fishing.  Advertising is an event, but Marketing is a strategy and process.

Business Blogging is fishing.

The fish are users of search engines who are looking for the products and services that you have to offer.  If you put up a website, it's a lot like leaving your pole stuck in the sand and hoping to get a bite.

Using search engine optimization is a lot like chartering a boat and a captain who can bring you to where the fish are.  In our case, Compendium is your captain.  We figure out the fish you're looking for, we find them, and we put you on a ship heading directly for them.

But you still do the fishing!

If you've ever been fishing, sometimes it takes time.  You get to know the water, the time of day, the temperature, what bait the fish are biting on, how to cast your hook and how to wrestle the fish in.  That's what blog posts are!

Blog posts are your lines in the water, each of them with a different characteristic.  Perhaps it's an introduction to your company, a testimonial from your clients, a new product introduction, a story about the client who strikes terror in the office, the latest news, the latest offering... you name it.

The great thing about fishing with a Blog, though, is that you can drop as many lines in the water as you'd like.  In fact, you can pretty much build a net the size of the trophy lake you've decided to fish in.  You simply have to blog.

Every blog post is another line in the water.  Go fishing.  Now.

They're biting!
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CP+B shred school melts faces. Prove content is king.
Posted Tuesday, January 6, 2009 by mikey mioduski
face melting riffs, creative hombres, cpb shred school
CP+B's shred school is rad. Ney. CPB Shred School is way rad. These pushers of interactivity have done it again with the launch of this b.a. new website.

What it is.

A gathering of easy to play songs on guitar, from soft and sweet serenades to mind numbing punch dancing ballods.

I might even call cpb Shred School a "compendium" of guitar how-to videos.

Why it is rad.

The site is really simple, which is great from a usability aspect. You can search through tons and tons of guitar lesson videos.You can search through all the videos, and sort a few different ways.

Remember, these are the people that did Subservient Chicken. They know how to get people, a LOT of people, to interact with a website. Right up top there is a simple "upload" button that allows users to upload lessons of their own.

While YouTube has tons and tons of "how to play _______" videos, CP+B has brought them together in an awesome way. The good sites and the good blogs have something to offer the user or the reader. This is what keeps us interacting, because we see value in it. There is a benefit to watching and digging.

Look, a lot of things make this site rad. Mostly, it's really helpful, and it's really easy. Plus, the agency vidoes are really funny. The only thing that I could see improving the site is to get RZA, GZA and Bill Murray back together to teach an exclusive new accoustic version of, say, Triumph. But I guess I'm just a dreamer.

This one below is by far the best. While this Andrew Keller fellow may appear soft on the outside, his ability to blast tasty riffs right through the back of your skull is something that nobody saw coming. I think it's computer generated.

keller shredding computer generated

How does this relate to me, a creative designer for blog software company? Well, CPB school is telling evidence that content that is funny, entertaining, valuable, easy, sharable, and just awesome in general will get people to your site and keep them there. The better it is, and the easier it is to stay involved, the lower your bounce rate, and the more time you have to say something about your company.

Apply directly to your business blog.

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Do You Trust your Blogging Platform?
Posted Monday, January 5, 2009 by Douglas Karr
Two events of late that should serve as a warning to businesses looking to just start a business blog utilizing free services:

1. Journalspace is dead, and so is their content
Journalspace is no more. Countless bloggers have lost all of their content because the folks behind Journalspace were convinced that RAID drives were an appropriate backup methodology.  Ouch.  The only recommendation on the site is to try to get back content via Google Cache.  Double-ouch.

2. Google Feedburner has significant latency issues
Feedburner is having severe caching issues where feeds are not updating for 30 minutes to several hours.  For retailers and businesses with initiatives that are time-dependent, this is unacceptable!

The architecture of Compendium Blogware is built for a business.  We have backups, off-site backups, redundant databases and even an off-site replicated system in the event of disaster recovery.  Our amazing development and architecture teams have even implemented Amazon Web Services and Amazon EC2 Cloudbursting in the event that our client gets an unprecedented bump in traffic.

When they host their blog on a freebie site, businesses assume that these kinds of things are taken care of.  Typically, they are not.
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Get Found in Google Local Searches for FREE
Posted Friday, January 2, 2009 by Douglas Karr
It amazes me how many companies have a local presence, but don't do anything to ensure they're being found locally.  Local search engine optimization is a great reason to start a business blog.  Mentioning streets, cities, zip codes, townships, counties... all of these things help index your company and your content locally!

Local search is on the rise, 76% year over year, according to comScore data:

comScore Local Search on the Rise

Before you even begin blogging, though, there's actually something you can do that's FREE and will provide you with some of the best local search engine placement you can find.  Simply register your business locations with Google Local Business Center.


Registering with Google Business Center will put your business on the map!  Be sure to register and do it today.  It will put your business directly below all of those high-paid links!
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The Truth exists whether you believe it or not
Posted Friday, January 2, 2009 by Brian McKay
The title above carries a lot of weight in marketing circles.  It is the essence of both successful marketing initiatives, and ones that have failed.  The truth rests in the measurable results gained from a campaign.  Those results are the ultimate truth detector for your campaign.

So.... How did you fair last year?  Was it a success based upon your bottom line goals, a middle of the road effort, or an abject failure? 

All of us in marketing and sales are measured everyday.  It makes sense to invest in vehicles for your message that are proven to generate qualified leads, paying customers, and offer a lower cost per customer acquired.  Earning customers through Blogging and Blogging for business is the truth when it comes to those metrics.  It challenges your core points of difference by elevating your business on the search engines to deliver your message.  When someone finds you, and clicks on your Blog site, what do they do next?

The answer rests in how relevant your business was to the keywords you've chosen to target, as well as the strength of the competitive advantages that you promote.

There is our marketing truth serum.  Is your message, your true point of difference, strong enough to fully take advantage of a first page result on Google?  Only a few ways to find out, and Blogging is one of them.
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2009 Corporate Blogging Strategy
Posted Thursday, January 1, 2009 by Chris Baggott
In the early December SES meeting in Park City there was a lot of talk about 2009 being the year of getting back to "Blocking and Tackling" for online marketers.  Dayna Moon, product sales director at Platform A. "As search marketers, we will be asked to improve efficiencies and maximize ROI,"

Dayna hits it right on the head.   Nothing new here....Vince Lombardi said this:

"Some people try to find things in this game that don't exist but football is only two things - blocking and tackling".

During this conference there was still some beating the drum for integrating video into display ads and mobile, but to the Vince-lovers this was more akin to a Terrell Owens strategy.


Blocking and tackling is just what Dayna said, efficiencies and ROI.   In other words, how easy and how effective.

this is why there is so much momentum for investment in a Corporate Blogging Strategy.   Both B2B as well as Retail Marketers are learning that it's content that drives search results and prospect engagement.   Whoever has more content thats both recent and frequently updated wins.  

Blocking and Tackling simply means empowering your employees to talk about what they are doing...the products, the customers, the service....as Cramer said:  "You talk about your day".

Business blogging passes both of Dayna's blocking and tackling tests;  It's highly efficient because the blog content is frequent and free.   The ROI is easily measurable when compared to pay per click or any of your other traffic generating strategies.  
 
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Spice Up Your Blog - Review of Doug's Talk
Posted Wednesday, December 31, 2008 by Jess Wehner
I'm a little late on adding this to my blog (it's been a busy month!) but I did want to highlight some of the great things Doug spoke about in his webinar a couple weeks ago.  We had a client-only webinar where Doug Karr, VP of Blogging Evangilism, spoke about how to "Spice Up Your Blog". 

Here are some of the highlights from the webinar, use these to ensure you are moving forward witha a succesful corporate blogging strategy:

Use a variety of posts (this is great for your readers, providing something for everyone, AND this is great for your bloggers- now they'll never run out of content ideas!  Just write a post on each of the below six topics then lather, rinse, and repeat):

  1. Customer Testimonial
  2. Explanation - describe your products
  3. Tutorial - describe how to do something
  4. Recent News - what's going on in the industry
  5. Lists - top 10, top 5, etc.
  6. Problem/Solutions - state a problem and how you or your company solved it

Use White Space (this allows people to visually break apart your post and pick the parts that are important to them):

  1. Numbered Lists
  2. Subheadings
  3. Ordered Lists
  4. Short Paragraphs
  5. Bolding and Highlighting

Thanks Doug for the helpful tips!
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Managing Your Blogging Time
Posted Wednesday, December 31, 2008 by Jess Wehner
 Having trouble finding time to write you blog posts? 

If you're like most of my clients, I'm sure the biggest challenge for your corporate blogging strategy is finding time to blog!   Here are some tips that will help you and your company bloggers set aside time to blog and be more efficient with your blogging time.  Remember, a blog post only needs to be a couple paragraphs long and should only take 20-30 minutes of your time.

  • Set up an outlook calendar reminder to write a blog post (this also helps with consistency, and will remind you to get a post out every Monday/Wednesday, or whatever your schedule might be).
  • Set up a Google Alert to remind you to blog (they will give you news updates when your company or industry is mentioned in the news (read this post to find out how to do it)
  • Set up a blog lunch 1 time per month and make everyone write at least 2 posts by the end of the lunch (and provide them lunch!)
  • Use Dr. Wicked’s Writing Lab to make sure you are only spending 20-25 minutes on a blog post (read more about this tool here)
 
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Blogging is Recession Proof
Posted Wednesday, December 31, 2008 by Kristen Raves
It may surprise you that blogging is recession proof.  It is the easiest, low cost form of marketing for your business.  A blog can be just what your company needs during this slow economy.  Writing content on your blog everyday is much more effective then putting thousands upon thousands of dollars into Pay Per Click campaigns, or print and radio advertisements for that matter. 

Believe me blogging is the most cost effective online business if done with passion!  All it takes is a little bit of time.  In just 10 minutes a day, you and your employees can share what it is that you do on a daily basis, the products and services that you sell, and other areas of your business with millions of readers on the web. 

Compendium Blogware has the best blog software for this day in age.  We focus on leveraging the content you write with the keywords that your organization is trying to win in the search engines.  A recent article by eTechBuzz further explains how to make money on your blog in times like these.  Click here to view their article on "More Ways to Make Money During a Recession." 
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Happy 2010!
Posted Wednesday, December 31, 2008 by Brian McKay
It's cliche to post your typical Happy New Year 2009 article on your Blog, so I've decided to take a look back at 2009 from 2010 when it comes to earning customers, and blogging.

I'm a Ball State grad, so I'll use a David Letterman style Top 10 List to make my point:

10. Small and mid sized businesses take over organic search by reallocating     marketing budgets from weakened mediums and investing in search

9.  Bottom line revenue impact from customers sourced through Google search accounts for 25% of Gross revenue for the year for SMB's.

8.  Auto dealers sticking to traditional advertising experience the worst year of both used and new car sales in history

7.  Business Blogging generates 200% more qualified leads on average than corporate websites optimized for search

6.  Content experts in multiple industries take their knowledge to the web on search optimized Blogs, and hurdle their strongest competitors in 2009 sales

5.  Marketing directors clinging to traditional business development tools lost their jobs in 2009, and where replaced with professionals who rely on firm measurement and accountability for the corporate business development investments.

4.  Pay Per Click advertising spends increase substantially, while overall click through rate on paid ads decreases to less than 5%.

3.  Companies of all sizes that delivered relevant messaging through Blogs realize a cash ROI of over 300% of their investment on average.

2.  Blogging with the sole purpose of winning search on Google and online customer acquisition is the most profitable marketing endeavor of 2009

1.  Business leaders throughout the United States who leveraged Blogging for SEO experienced a record year in new business sales.

We can write our own ending to the story for our company, or we can participate in group think and watch the ship sink.  The fact remains that decisions to drive business development need to be made, and reverting to old school advertising tactics will produce diminishing returns.

Make the decision to Blog in 2009, and do so with advice from strategists who can provide references and a track record of success.

Happy New Year Blogosphere!
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Start A Business Blog In The New Year
Posted Tuesday, December 30, 2008 by Ellie Cummins
I have recently been reading some Marketing Profs and Marketo B2B articles dating back as far as 2006.  It is particularly interesting how well blogging integrates with the "tried and true" marketing strategies they recommend.
  • Provide research tools for buyers early in the sales cycle:  We know that a key component of research is the web 2.0 world is search.  A topically focused blog page dedicated to the search term is an excellent way for businesses to provide focused, relevant information to someone early in the sales cycle and enhance their experience by offering whitepapers, webinars, etc... while gaining permission to bring them into your database
  • Use landing pages:  It makes total sense to bring a searcher to the most relevant page on your site to buy, learn, etc... based on their search term.  Blogging with Compendium enables you to do just that by having relevant calls to action to "buy now", "learn more", etc... while also presenting the real live voices from within that company to help that search be engaged and feel great about working with your firm
  • Use automated systems and processes:  If there is one thing we don't need on our plates its another system to keep track of and monitor.  Our business blogging software enables keyword rich, topically focused landing pages to be automatically udpated each time a blog post is written.  Weekly and monthly reporting delivered to your inbox also takes out the hassle of figuring out how its all working for your business.
As you evaluate tried and true strategies for your e-marketing plans in the new year take a closer look at blogging for your business.  It may just be the best new years resolution your organization has ever made. 
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Some Inspiration for the Aspiring Entrepreneur
Posted Tuesday, December 30, 2008 by PJ Hinton
Yesterday, ecommerce-guide.com ran an inspiring profile about Robert Friedman, a onetime successful businessman whose life took a turn for the worse on multiple fronts  in the mid 90s.  He wound up behind on bills and eventually filed for bankruptcy.  From his experiences, Friedman learned how to navigate the legal system and deal effectively with bill collectors.

A decade later, Friedman used his know-how to help out a friend who was going through a rough financial patch.  Later on, someone suggested that he make a business out of helping others in similar situations.  It was a prime example (albeit a long-term one) of making lemonade from life's lemons.

The profile goes on to talk about Friedman's experiences in building up a client base from scratch.  Friedman is a firm believer in the power of blogging for business. 
Then came the daunting task of marketing the service online. Bronson (a friend of Friedman's) helped him structure the Web site, and more importantly, taught him how to blog. In their opinions, building a blog is the key to a business being interactive with today's Internet buyer. Rather than a blog being a justification for a Web site, Friedman believes that a service-oriented Web venture should become a blog:

"Your regular Web site should be a blog Web site, and the 'normal' Web site pages are where you showcase your products and services as a display after they have read the messages about it from your blog.

The article goes on to talk about the benefits of blogging for search and the lack of success he had with pay-per-click advertising.

If you are a small business looking to get found by customers, Friedman's story should serve as a great case study in the benefits of blogging.  Because Compendium Blogware is designed with SEO in mind, we can help you meet your goals, regardless of whether you have friends as tech savvy as Friedman's.
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I judge posts by their date.
Posted Monday, December 29, 2008 by mikey mioduski

I stumbled upon this article Can Technorati Beat Google at Blog Search? from MediaShift. I read it because it was written a week ago.

One thing that caught my eye had to do with what we tend to ask (perhaps internally) for when we're searching blogs. And that is, when was this post written?

The article quotes Technorati CEO Richard Jalichandra:

"99% of all blog searches aim for something less than six months old. About 92% are looking for something less than a month old and over 70% are looking for something a week old."

So true for me. A lot of times, the first thing I look at is the headline. Next I see when it was written. In such a fast paced age of evolution online, I tend to judge the book by its publication date. A bad habit? Maybe. There's obviously tons of still relevant stuff that was written 2+ years ago. But I still do it.

I tend to dismiss things that were written in 2006 or before. I hesitate to read things written in 2007. I read the stuff that was written within the past month.

Snooty right? Apparently I might not be alone.

What does this have to do with your business blog? Well, fresh content not only appeals to the search engines, it appeals to the human eye. Something to consider in evaluating your own corporate blogging practices.
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What do airports and blogging have in common?
Posted Monday, December 29, 2008 by Ali Sales
So I'm in the Atlanta airport right now, with a 3 hour lay over...

I'm getting caught up on some work but can hardly think because of the BLARING overhead speaker notifying passenger Davis that he should report to the front desk. Oh, and passenger Walker, too. And now guess what? The flight to La Guardia is delayed. And passenger Walker, could you PLEASE report to the front desk?

The volume on the speaker is entirely too loud, the voice is nasal, and every single message that has been announced since I arrived has been completely irrelevant to me. I'm flying to Kansas, my name isn't Walker or Davis, and I'm being interrupted while trying to work.

In the world of marketing, interruptions are no less obnoxious and frustrating, and that includes online marketing.

The more that we are interrupted in marketing and life, the more we try to tune out the message. I now have my headphones on because I don't want to be bothered.

You should think about this as you are gearing up for your 2009 marketing initiatives. Starting business blogs should be part of your plan because a corporate blogging program will enable you to intercept prospects and customers online and with a relevant message.

The beauty of a corporate blogging strategy is that you will know exactly what is relevant to your audience because of the keywords that they plug into Google and other search engines.

Interruption marketing is becoming a thing of the past...now if I could just get the Atlanta airport to change their ways, too!
 
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