Cool Business Cards

By darrel hawes | June 11, 2008

Check out this for some unique business card ideas.

Topics: Uncategorized | No Comments »

“Smarter” Permission email marketing and Amazon.com

By darrel hawes | June 10, 2008

Amazon.com is a good case study of smart permission email marketing.

The emails are personalized with my name.

They send recommendations based upon what I have bought in the past.

They send recommendations based upon what people who share my interests have bought.

All of this data is uniquely targeted to me; no other person has the same set of interests and has bought the same combinations of books and music on Amazon that I have. Yet, the email content remains relevant to me. Otherwise, I would have unsubscribed long ago.

They also make it easy to order, and much of the functionality described above is duplicated on the website, if you log in.

They allow me to create my own sense of community on their website (wish list, writing reviews) and use email to keep me connected to that community.

Topics: Uncategorized, email marketing, marketing | No Comments »

Why I Love Google

By darrel hawes | June 9, 2008

Yep, I love Google.

And the reason is, Google seems to have the psychic ability to figure out exactly what I need and want, and give me exactly that, much of the time.

An example from just few minutes ago…

I had trouble remembering the spelling of a particular word, and decided to simply type “spelling” into Google to see what would happen.

Google then displayed a link to the “Spellboy” gadget and asked if I want to add it to my Google start page.

I did, in fact.

Very cool.

Topics: Uncategorized, marketing | No Comments »

Are You a Dork?

By darrel hawes | May 30, 2008

Thought provoking post over at CopyBlogger.com:

http://www.copyblogger.com/dork-copy

Some great tips on injecting enthusiasm into your copy. Worth a read!

Topics: copywriting | No Comments »

Startup Blogs and News

By darrel hawes | May 26, 2008

Here’s a great site which aggregates feeds from business blogs and news sites, especially those oriented toward startups:

http://startups.alltop.com

I learned about this from Tim Berry’s blog on Entepreneur.com, another helpful resource:

http://upandrunning.entrepreneur.com

Topics: marketing | No Comments »

Easily Create Your Own Survey

By darrel hawes | May 23, 2008

If you’re looking for an easy and no-cost way of creating your own survey for your web page, I found the perfect tool for you:

Form Spring

This tool is extremely easy to use and the end product looks great.

There’s a surprising amount of flexibility in the appearance of your form.

The link again is:

Form Spring

Topics: productivity | No Comments »

Backflip

By darrel hawes | May 23, 2008

If you need to visit a list of specific websites every day (news sites, blogs, bank sites, forums, etc), here is an easy way to do it.

1. Sign up for a free backflip account.

2. In the “My Daily Routine” section, add the URLs of the sites you want to visit daily.

3. When you go online everyday, log in to backflip and click on “My Daily Routine”. The first site will appear within the Backflip “frame”. When you are finished with the first site, click “next”. Continue until you’ve worked through all the required sites.

This is the best method I’ve found, and it won’t cost you a dime.

Topics: productivity | No Comments »

Twitter Tools

By darrel hawes | May 20, 2008

For all you existing or aspiring Twitterers out there:

TWITTER TOOLBOX: 60+ Twitter Tools

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Do You Twitter?

By darrel hawes | May 20, 2008

Article over at Business Week (!) on the subject of … Twitter:

http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/may2008/tc20080514_269697_page_2.htm

I admit, I haven’t really “gotten” Twitter. I’ve used it, but after reading the article, I want to get up to speed.

So, here’s my Twitter address:

http://twitter.com/darrelhawes

If you want to keep up with me, feel free to follow my updates.

Topics: Uncategorized | No Comments »

I Surprised Ray Edwards…

By darrel hawes | May 20, 2008

You can read all about it here:

http://rayedwards.com/imagine-my-suprise

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