After a long break I’ll be giving a course on social media marketing for businesses on Sept. 23 and 30. The course had filled up already, but we’ve moved the venue to a bigger room so we have 5 spaces left for anyone interested. The course will take place in the Sandisk offices in the Kfar Saba Hi-Tech park. Each session will be four hours, and we will get hands-on at every stage with tools and techniques for optimizing your social media activity.

For more information about costs, venue, topics, etc., please contact us at (02) 5660297 or via email at info@illuminea.com.

Agenda

Sept. 23: What exactly is social media, and how do I use it effectively?

Part 1: What is social media marketing? (1 hour)

• What makes something social? What is Web 2.0? We’ll look at the most important elements of social media today: RSS, Video, Widgets, Tagging, and more to get everyone on the same page.
• The importance of social media in your marketing activity
• Case studies: companies and organizations that have successfully and unsuccessfully used social media

Part 2: Planning effective strategies for social media activity (3 hours)

• Elements of an effective social media strategy
• Setting goals
• Important considerations before starting
• Research your space
• Implementation
• Monitoring & engaging – how, what
• DO NOT neglect the other “boring” stuff: SEO, email, advertising, etc.

Sept. 30: Practical techniques for implementing your social media strategy

Part 1: Overview of important social networks – what they are, how to best use them for marketing (3 hours)

• How to use twitter for marketing: setting up profiles that work for business, building up community, promoting your profile, what and how to write, monitoring, measuring, the best tools, etc.
• Using facebook for business: profiles, Pages, applications, events, etc.: critical differences between each of them, how to choose the right ones for your purposes, setting up a facebook presence that works for marketing and promotion.
• YouTube and other video sites: why video is the next generation of web marketing, what to keep in mind when working with video, ideal length and content, how to promote your video to achieve your marketing goals
• Blogs – “old fashioned” but crucial: blogs are the hubs of an effective social media presence. What to keep in mind, how to set it up, how to integrate it with your other social media activity, ideal frequency for updates, what to write, how to write, how to promote.

Part 2: Personal branding (1 hour)

• What is personal branding?
• Why everyone should work on their online personal brand today
• How to create a successful personal brand with social media

Summing up: Where to go from here (0.5 hours)

• Key points to keep in mind when branching out into social media
• Putting it all together
• Working with (skeptical) upper management

About the speaker – me, Miriam Schwab

Miriam is the Friendly CEO of illuminea, and has been speaking and teaching about social media and blogging for business for over two years.

illuminea is a marketing firm dedicated to helping businesses and organizations use the social web effectively as an integrated part of their marketing mix. illuminea has extensive expertise in designing, developing and strategizing business blogs, and using these blogs as the hub for launching successful social media marketing activities. Part of illuminea’s day-to-day activities involve keeping up with the latest developments in the social web so that we are always able to offer our clients the best solutions for their needs.

Among illuminea’s clients are some of Israel’s leading companies and personalities, including Comverse, Commtouch, Natan Sharansky, and more. Click here to view testimonials from illuminea’s clients.

Here is a list of the conferences and events that Miriam has spoken at:

Wordcamp 2007 – moderator http://english.wordcamp-israel.info/ and the schedule

WordCamp 2008

Elephant

Techshoret 2007

Affilicon 2008

Affilicon 2009

Marchshoret, Nov. 2, 2008. Presentation is here

Partnership 2000, Nov. 12, 2008

Pradler Institute

SSVN, hosted by IBM on July 8, 2009. Read reviews. Presentation.

ISOC Israel:How to create a personal brand by using online tools- MP3 of lecture; presentation; article on The Com (Hebrew).

MEET Alumni Conference, August 4-5, 2009 Istanbul Turkey: “Blogging Secrets: Tips for marketing your business online.”

For more information about costs, venue, topics, etc., please contact us at (02) 5660297 or via email at info@illuminea.com. Hope to see you there!

PR: wait… I: wait… L: wait… LD: wait… I: wait… wait… Rank: wait… Traffic: wait… Price: wait… C: wait…

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We often get emails from people who want to increase exposure of a new online service or software and hope that we’ll blog about it.

I have no problem with this as I see this practice as acceptable…as long as the writer has a clue who I am and why there’s a possible connection between their product and my interests.

But a few days ago I got the funniest pitch letter ever, and I mean “I’m laughing at them, not with them” funny. This letter was a form letter with all the options left in. I’m reprinting the first paragraph here for your entertainment, and I will omit the name of the of the writer, but not of the product because it actually seems useful. The “funny” parts are highlighted in red:

Hello,

We have just launched the “Real Time Board” at surchur.com and wanted to give you a first shot at helping us spread the news. Based on your passion for/interest in/blog that covers social media (or some other topic) at somedomain.com and your voice as an incluencer [sic] in the social media/search/real time search/media (pick one of these or something else related) community I’d honestly be grateful if you’d take a look at surchur.com, give us feedback but especially help spread the word on your blog or twitter account….

The writer left me hanging! Am I passionate or just interested in social media (or could it be race car driving)? Am I an incluencer? What is that? And if I am one, then is it in the social media, search, media or perhaps race car driving communities?

Don’t do online PR this way. The one thing bloggers HATE more than anything are mindless efforts to get their attention without taking the time to address them as a human being, rather than as another person on the mailing list. Take a few minutes to address me properly, and I’ll take a few minutes to see what it is what you want. Otherwise, into the Trash your email goes.

As for the product above, Surchur – well, I checked it out anyways and it seems worth looking at for tracking current trends. You can also search for any term and get a quick overview of activity around the web related to that term, from Google Blogsearch, IceRocket, Technorati, digg, delicious, twitter, flickr, Yahoo News, YouTube and more. And the results really are up-to-date, as opposed to what we’ve seen on other services that offer similar results.

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So you’re wondering how you can use PayPal in Israel? Does PayPal accept Shekels? Can you withdraw your PayPal funds to your Israeli bank account? Etc. As you often do when in doubt, you head over to Google and type in “PayPal Israel” to see what the web has to say about your questions. If you are located in Israel, here are approximately what the results will look like:

See results number 3 and 4? That’s us. Where’s PayPal or PayPal Israel? Nowhere to be seen.

Ranking high for this term was an accident for us. We happen to have published two blog posts on the subject of using PayPal in Israel over the past year, and as you can see the web is not exactly saturated with good content on this topic, so it was an easy score.

The funny thing is that as a result, people have begun to perceive illuminea as PayPal Israel experts. We get at least one phone call and/or email from people with questions about using PayPal in Israel about once a week.

PayPal Israel is missing an opportunity

Although PayPal officially serves the Israeli community, the amount of information available online about using PayPal in Israel is meager at best and confusing at worst, and the amount of people with questions is huge as is evidenced by the number of them contacting us with their PayPal questions.

I must give credit to Nissim Ohayon, Sr. Business Development Manager at PayPal Israel, who wrote a post on our blog about using PayPal in Israel, and even took the time to answer the many questions posed by readers in the comments.

However – maybe this is a sign that PayPal and/or PayPal Israel needs its own blog? PayPal should be engaging in the conversation, providing solid and timely information. I suspect that PayPal could win quite a lot of Israeli clients if it provided a minimum standard of online customer support.

Twitter’s great, but it can never take the place of the blog

This accidental positioning of our company as experts in the field of PayPal use in Israel demonstrates the strength and importance of blogging.

Twitter is all the rage these days, and people have even questioned whether twitter will take the place of the blog. The truth is, many people, myself included, are blogging less because they are spending more time on twitter. However, with all the value that twitter provides let nobody tell you that it can replace the power of blogging.

A blog allows you to present an idea and follow through on it. You cannot do that in 140 characters. (Can you imagine this post as a tweet? Let’s try: “illuminea appears #3 & 4 in Google SERPS for term PayPal Israel thanks 2 our blog. PayPal not even on 1st page. Lesson: keep blogging”. Not too bad!) In addition, it offers loads of content for search engines to index and present to users in their results. Yes, tweets do appear in search results but less than blog posts, and also with a strange sort of randomness.

Also, a blog gives you your own place on the web. The content you create on facebook or twitter helps prop up those networks. The content you create on your blog helps prop up your own place on the web.

So don’t bury blogging yet. It’s still the foundation of any online marketing activity you undertake, whether it’s SEO, PPC, email, or social media. It’s on your blog that you have a chance to convert users in whatever way you hope to do so.

In the meantime, we’re happy to answer your PayPal questions as best as we can so don’t let this post stop you from contacting us! And keep blogging!

Our previous posts about using PayPal in Israel:

• Everything you wanted to know about paypal and the Israeli Shekel
• How paypal really works for Israelis and shekels

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This past Wednesday (July 15, 2008) I presented at an ISOC Israel event on the topic of day-to-day use of social media. My presentation was about personal branding, why one would want to create a personal brand online, and how to go about doing so.

Why?

In the past, creating a personal brand was solely the domain of celebrities. However, today everyone can create their own “brand,” thanks to the proliferation of online networks where one can create a branded profile, and blogs which allow owners to present their knowledge in a useful and accessible manner.

Aside from being good for one’s ego, why would people want to create their own personal brand? The reason is that it can give you a serious edge in today’s competitive business world, whether you want to secure the future of your career or promote your business. By creating quality focused content on your own blog, which you then promote via the social networks like facebook and twitter in order to increase your reach, you can position yourself as an expert in your field and even build up a community around your knowledge.

How?

There are a number of factors involved in creating a personal brand online, but they generally boil down to the following:

• Authenticity – Be yourself. Many people think that their personality is not great, and therefore they try to fake it both online and offline. Don’t. Your personality is what makes you unique and plays an important role in your UPS (Unique Selling Point). Embrace it, don’t fight it. Plus, it’s hard to keep up a facade of a personality that isn’t really you over the long-term, and people will pick up that something’s not quite right.
• Consistent look and feel - carefully select the image you will use to represent yourself online; use consistent colors, fonts etc.
• Quality content - create quality content on your blog about the topic you have chosen to focus on. Set up your facebook and twitter profile to automatically publish links to your content on your blog.
• Building up a relevant community – find and friend/follow others who share similar interests and/or could be good leads for your business.
• Continue your brand offline – make sure your offline activity, personality, and even appearance are in sync with your online brand, and vice versa. We all love the web, however nothing can ever replace the importance and impact of face-to-face meetings, so plan to spread your personal brand offline as well.

Rinse and repeat.

The presentation is below. Note that it’s mostly in Hebrew. Let me know what you think in the comments.

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This past Wednesday, July 8 I was privileged to be the “keynote speaker” (I find that term kind of amusing, thus the quotation marks) at IBM for the latest SSVN (The Startups & Societal Ventures Network) event.

The challenge of talking to a large group about social media is trying to make sure that the information is not too overwhelming for the newbies, but at the same time is not too boring for the seasoned users. The feedback from the audience was pretty enthusiastic, so I hope I managed to reach that happy medium.

The talk covers recent landmark events on twitter, such as Dell reaching $3m in sales via twitter, the success of the Iran Election protesters who used twitter to bring their cause to the world, and some other events. We looked at strategies, tips and tools for creating an effective online presence.

Without further ado, here’s the presentation:

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For the second year running I had the opportunity to be on a panel at Affilicon, the Affiliate Marketing Conference & Exhibition that took place last week in Israel. Like last year, this year I was on the social media panel, and I decided to take a devil’s advocate approach to my presentation: to talk about what social media marketing is NOT.

The reason I took this approach is that you can find lots of information out there about how fabulous social media marketing is for promoting your business, organization, or other goals. However, with all this hype I fear that people are a) overestimating what social media can do for them and b) unaware of the challenges involved in using social media for marketing.

Now don’t get me wrong: I’m a big fan of social media marketing. We’ve had good results with it here in our own company, and for clients. My point here is to provide a social media “chill pill” – some facts and realities about becoming active on the social web.

So here’s my presentation. I hope you find it useful, and as always would love to get your feedback and questions:

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Public relations (PR) is as relevant as ever. Getting good coverage for your company or organization can be key in generating new leads and strengthening brand awareness.

But is PR the same thing today as it was five years ago? What I mean is, to achieve the goals of PR, does that still involve traditional activities like press releases?

On the one hand, I can’t believe that companies would continue to invest so much in traditional PR activities if it is irrelevant. They must be seeing results if they continue to pour their marketing dollars into the PR pit.

On the other hand, many of us know that big-monster companies are kind of like the Titanic: they can’t redirect the ship quickly, even if they see an iceberg ahead. They may continue to do certain things just because they’ve been doing it like that for so many years, and because changing it would mean going through 3000 committees and getting board approval.

ON THE OTHER HAND (I feel like Tevye from Fiddler on the Roof), many marketing experts still recommend press releases, especially online press release services, as an integral part of a company’s marketing efforts. I just watched this webinar titled Using Your News to Drive SEO from PR Web with Lee Odden from Toprank Online Marketing. Odden’s point is that press releases can play an important role in a company’s SEO (search engine optimization), helping  your site and/or landing page rank high in search engine results for select keywords. He says that most journalists do not look at press releases as a source for new stories; rather, they decide that they want to write a story and do a search on Google etc. to try to find relevant experts and companies to use for the story. And since that’s the case, you want to make sure your company appears high in the rankings when they search so that they will contact you and hopefully create an ongoing relationship with you as a credible source for future stories.

Are press releases the best investment for search engine optimization?

BUT! (Aside: in elementary school we had a non-native English speaking substitute teacher who would say things like “But! I have a big but!” You can imagine that he didn’t last long with us hoodlums.) If the entire goal is to improve SEO results and help journalists find you, maybe press releases aren’t the best place to investing your SEO efforts. I mean, if the goal is SEO, maybe you should be working to improve your rankings in other ways. Basically, the question is if press releases are the best use of our company resources if the ultimate goal is SEO?

Gary Vaynerchuk says you need to be real like a fat-ass Italian uncle

Gary Vaynerchuk, in his entertainingly persuasive manner, says that press releases are obsolete. He says “press releases are ludicrous in this world…nobody gives a crap.” It’s all about storytelling, not cold- minded press releases. “Make it authentic, care, don’t BS…and you have a business.”

My opinion: press releases are relevant if adopted to today’s social world

So what’s the answer? Well, since nothing in this world is black or white, here’s my take on press releases in today’s world of conversation and authenticity:

Today, PR is about getting found on the web. Press releases do still have a place in PR and SEO: using one of the leading online press release distribution services can really help boost your site’s rankings in the search engines thanks to their incredible clout and spread. However, companies should maybe try to wrap their big-monster heads around a new type of press release: press releases that are more like blog posts, i.e. they contain informative, useful authentic information that people actually want to read, rather than dry corporate-speak content like “Widgets Inc. has added a new service that they project will change the world.” I mean, put yourself in the journalist’s shoes: would you care about your new world-changing service if you weren’t you? I doubt it.

These “press releases” should also appear on your site, or even better your corporate blog/newsroom, so that you increase the chances that they will be found on your site in searches as well. And of course don’t forget to link to your site’s new content via twitter, facebook, etc.

In short: don’t ignore press releases yet. But use them in a way that suits 2009. Understand that PR now includes a wide variety of online activity, including being active on the social networks. Press releases are just one component of your online marketing efforts to help journalists and bloggers find you and perceive you as a credible expert that they want to use for their next story on your industry.

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There always seems to be confusion regarding how Israelis can use PayPal – can they use it in their currency, i.e. Shekels? Can they withdraw funds? Are there limits they should know about?

Almost a year ago I blogged about an announcement on the PayPal blog regarding new PayPal currencies, one of which was the Israeli Shekel. Despite that post, some questions still persisted, and the accuracy of the information was doubted.

Well, I’m happy to say that I now have the latest info regarding PayPal and Israel straight from PayPal! The following information was provided by Nissim Ohayon, Sr. Business Development Manager at PayPal Israel:

While PayPal services are not fully rolled out for Israeli merchants, thousands of Israeli merchants are using PayPal for cross border sales with great success. Here are some links that will direct you to the products and features available to Israeli merchants today:

————————————————

• Main PayPal web page for Israeli users and merchants: www.paypal.com/il.
• Small to Medium Merchants: 
  • Email Payments – Click here for full details
    • No integration required.
    • Accept credit/debit card as well as PayPal balance and echeck payments immediately.
  • Website Payments Standard (WPS) – Click here for full details including fees and integration tools. 
    • Simple to Integrate. Select from one of three easy integration options.Click here for details.
    • No need to “qualify.” Just open a premium or business account online and follow the instructions.
    • Your site can be integrated and ready to accept credit card payments in a single day.
    • Click here for an online demo (may take a few minutes to load).
    • To see if your shopping cart software already has a kit for Website Payments Standard, please follow this link.

• Merchants with their own merchant account: 
  • Express Checkout (EC) – Click here for full details including fees and integration tools.
    • Some advanced programming may be required.
    • To see if your shopping cart software already has a kit for PayPal Express Checkout, please follow this link.
    • If your shopping cart is not listed on the page at the previous link, please direct your developers to this link to review the API documentation on how they can integrate PayPal Express Checkout to your site.
    • Your account may need to pre-qualify for Express Checkout, so please contact me directly if you wish to integrate this product into your site.

• General Fees Information, click here.

A few important notes for Israel-based users and merchants to consider:

• Withdrawing funds is now available directly in Israel, in New Israeli Shekels via an Israeli-issued Visa card. Since Visa cards in Israel are typically linked to a bank account, those funds do settle directly into your bank account, via your credit card. Please note that this feature is restricted to a $750/day limit. We have plans to improve on the withdrawal methods for Israeli accounts in the coming months, so please stay tuned.
• PayPal users and merchants that have a US bank account may link it to their PayPal account even if their PayPal account is here in Israel. This allows Israeli merchants and users to move funds in and out of PayPal directly to/from their US bank account without the daily limits mentioned above.
• The PayPal web site will not be available in Hebrew in 2009. This means that Hebrew sites will not be able to integrate with the service yet.

To get started, open a PayPal Premier or Business account to start accepting credit cards and PayPal payments today by clicking here.

—————————————

Note what it says about withdrawing funds: it can only be done with a Visa brand credit card, and the money is transferred through the Visa network and arrives in their bank account. This is because the overwhelming majority of Visa cards in Israel are linked to a checking account. So when Visa goes into the account to withdraw funds, funds will be deposited instead (or, at least offset from some of the withdrawals for Visa transactions).

I hope this information is helpful!

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This is an amazing opportunity for Israeli startups. Innovate!Europe will be holding a free workshop and networking event in Israel, and one startup will be selected to participate in  Guidewire STUDIO, an in-residence business accelerator in the heart of Silicon Valley valued at over $30,000.

But the deadline is March 25, so better hurry! Please pass this on to people who you think might benefit from it.

Read on for more…

Innovate!Europe is a competition to indentify Europe and Israel’s most promising startups and accelerate their drive into global markets. During this unique program, startups receive mentoring, promotion and critical introductions while competing for an exclusive spot at Guidewire STUDIO, an in-residence business accelerator in the heart of Silicon Valley valued at over $30,000.

Click here to learn more about the Guidewire Studio.

Innovate!Europe and its partners are hosting a Going Global workshops and networking meetup in Tel Aviv on April 1st. During this workshop, Guidewire Group’s expert analyst team will give you feedback on your company’s competitive value proposition and market opportunity, and help you hone the pitching skills you need to effectively compete for partners and funding.

Best of all, there is no cost to apply or to participate in the Going Global workshops.

Start-ups in the workshops held so far have raved about the experience.

Conor O’Neill of Ireland’s LouderVoice, called it “pure gold” and said it was “the most impressive start-up workshop I have ever encountered.”

Here are the details for the Israel event. You can find out about the European events on their  calendar.

1 APRIL Tel Aviv, Israel (co-hosted by Orrick)

• Going Global workshop from 9:30 to 17:30: apply now
• Networking Meet-up at 18:30 – RSVP required

Note: You don’t need to be a workshop participant to join us at one of the networking meetups. The meetups are also open to investors, journalists and other members of the entrepreneurial community. However, an RSVP is required as space is limited.

If you want to participate in the competition but can¹t attend one of the workshops, apply anyway. If you’re selected, Guidewire Group’s analysts will conduct a telephone interview with you. And if you’re not a startup, but know any that you think should compete, forward this note to them.

If you want to follow the competition, learn about the competitors and connect with other members of the ecosystem, subscribe to the blog or join the Innovate!Europe’sFacebook and LinkedIn groups.

Good luck!

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Here are some upcoming events posted on our Israeli hi-tech and  business events calendar. Check out the calendar to see a full list of all the events and conferences in March 2009.

March 2, 2009. Avenue, Airport City, Israel. GameIS2009 – 5th Yearly Israeli Game Convention. This is a full day event about interactive entertainment and the people who make it all happen. They will cover everything from high end international business trends to how to get in the industry.

March 2-3, 2009. Tel-Aviv, Israel. IPv6 Forum Israel Day Conference at ISOC. The agenda includes speakers from the IPv6 Forum , Juniper Networks, Cisco Systems, the IDF, Bechtel, STKI, ECI Telecom, PurePeak and Tel-Aviv University.

March 3, 2009. Jerusalem, Israel PresenTenses’s Leaders in Philanthropy Panel will bring together three leading foundation executives who will share their experiences approving funding for the best and the greatest Jewish causes, reveal insider fundraising secrets and discuss the Jewish philanthropy climate during the financial crisis. *A unique, individual Q&A session will follow the panel, providing opportunity for brief one-on-one introductions.* (Hebrew)

March 4, 2009. Ramat Gan, Israel. MySQL User Group Meetup. Agenda: 16:00-16:30 – Gathering & Registration; 16:30-17:15 – Eliran Malki, MORE IT – MySQL success story; 17:15-17:25 – Break; 17:25-18:10 – Shlomi Noach, InterBit – MyISAM & InnoDB Tuning Fundamentals; 18:10-18:20 – Break; 18:20-19:05 – Moshe Kaplan, Rocketier – Sharing Design overview
March 12, 2009, Holon, Israel. GarageGeeks Session: Lost in Conversion? “Future of Web Analytics” Web analytics and conversion optimization is probably the biggest untapped opportunity within online marketing, particularly in a time of economic downturn. Within this GarageGeeks session, you be exposed to best practices and new developments in measurability, user behavior analysis and proven conversion rate tactics.

March 29, 2009. Airport City, Israel. TheMarker.Comvention and Social Media Summit: Israel which will explore the state of Social Media, where things are headed in the future and where the money is today and will be tomorrow.

March 31, 2009. Tel Aviv, Israel. Techonomy The event that delves into the business and economy behind the Web 2.0 technological revolution.

See all upcoming events and conferences in Israel for March 2009

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This past Thursday I was privileged to speak to the Tel Aviv Writer’s Cafe about how they can use blogs and social media to promote themselves and win more (paid) writing gigs.

Here are the seven tips. For more info about the Tel Aviv Writer’s Cafe, please scroll to the end of this post.

1. Brand yourself as if you were a brand name

If you are trying to market yourself as a freelance writer, or freelance anything, it’s important to start to look at yourself as the product that you, the business owner, is trying to sell. Yeah, that’s a lot of hats to wear, and that doesn’t include the fact that you, the freelancer, are also the accountant, administrator, and coffee-fetcher. Anyways, in order to accomplish this, you need to create “Brand You.”

Why should I brand myself?

The brilliant Gary Vaynerchuk has the answer for you (bonus: guess who’s apparently a MOT (Member of the Tribe)…note how he says Alav Hashalom about Paul Newman passing away!):

Another reason you want to do this is because Google has a long memory, and you need to control what prospective employers and others see about you on the web. You have a chance at doing this if you have a personal site built on your own domain. To see what I’m talking about, read this post from Lifehacker: Geek to Live: Have a say in what Google says about you.

So how do I do this?

At the very least, buy your name domain name now (we recommend using www.name.com – and we have no affiliation with them, they just don’t suck like some other registrars we won’t name). If you’re name is Joe Shmoe, buy www.joeshmoe.com. If that domain name is taken, add your middle initial and buy www.joezshmoe.com. If you don’t have a middle name, pretend you do and choose a middle initial to use from this point forwards in all your professional correspondence so that people will Google your name that way and actually find you. If you think it’s weird to add a fake middle initial, ask Michael J. Fox, if he regrets it. (To see why he didn’t just use “A,” the initial of his real middle name, read about his Early Life in Wikipedia. Hint – it may have to do with the fact that he’s Canadian, eh?)

If you’re not up to it, you don’t have to actually do anything with your shiny new domain name right now. So why are you buying your domain name now if you’re not going to use it? Because it can get snatched up between now and when you do want to use it by someone else, which would suck for you.

If you are up to it, I strongly recommend starting a blog that appears under your name-domain name.

But I don’t have thousands to spend on that kind of thing right now!

That’s alright, I say. Here are instructions on starting a personalized blog on a shoestring. The reason this method is good is because if your blog becomes a real success and needs to grow, you can relatively easily move over to your own self-hosted WordPress blog, like all the pros.

Starting a Personalized Blog on a Shoestring:

1. Sign up for a blog on WordPress.com. Try to choose a  name that represents you, but remember that you will be putting your new name-domain on your blog in a few steps.
2. Choose a WordPress theme that best suits your needs. You can find them under Appearance > Themes in the sidebar of your new blog’s admin section. I recommend choosing a pretty plain theme with a header area that allows you to upload your own personalized image. My sister Deena has done a good job with that on her blog, which runs on WordPress.com and you can see here: http://deenascreations.com.
3. You should go through all the other settings and choose what best suits you. To do this, go to Settings, and go through the sub-pages and modify as you see fit.
4. Map your domain name onto your new blog. First, you need to change your DNS settings for your domain name. DNS tells your domain where it should be point to, i.e. where the site that will be using this domain is sitting. First, log into your account on your domain registrar. Try to find where the DNS info is managed. It may be under Manage Domains or Manage DNS, depending on your registrar. When you do find where you manage the DNS, remove any existing nameservers and add the following:
   • NS1.WORDPRESS.COM
   • NS2.WORDPRESS.COM
   • NS3.WORDPRESS.COM
5. Now, go back to your site and click on Upgrades, and then click on the Domains tab.
   
6. Then, enter your domain name in the Add a Domain field:
   
7. At that point it should ask you to buy 10 credits in order to use your own custom domain on WordPress.com. This costs $10 per year.
8. Once it’s set up, create an About and Contact page (crucial), and start blogging your head off.

Here are some examples of people who have really succeeded in creating a brand around themselves:

Chris Brogan

Seth Godin – yes, I know his domain name isn’t www.sethgodin.com, but he’s Seth Godin for goodness sake! He can get away with it. When you reach his stature, you can too.

Suze Orman

Gary Vaynerchuk

Here are some resources on creating a personal brand:

By Dan Schawbel – who has succeeded in branding himself as a personal branding expert

Gain a Competitive Edge by Establishing a Personal Brand

10 Ways Personal Branding Can Save You From Getting Fired

By Brian Solis

Facebook is the Hub for Your Personal Brand

Oh, and more Gary Vaynerchuk just cuz he’s so awesome, inspiring and in your face (and did I mention he’s an MOT? What naches.)

2. Don’t forget about social media

Since blogs run on RSS feeds, it means you can promote your blog content elsewhere. This is good because it increases the likelihood that people will come across your content, which is the most important thing here. You can set up your facebook and twitter profiles to automatically pull in your blog content, and post it for all your network friends to see.

In order to do any of this automatic republishing, you need to know where your feed is. On WordPress.com, it’s at http://myblog.wordpress.com/feed, where myblog is your WordPress.com blog name, or at http://myblog.com/feed, if you’ve mapped your own domain on to your WordPress.com blog.

To learn how to automatically post your blog posts on facebook, read Publish your Blog’s Feed to Facebook.

To automatically post to twitter, first create a user account on twitter. Then, go to EasyTweets, sign up, and add your twitter account to your profile. Then, click on the RSS icon at the right-hand side of your dashboard:

Enter the feed URL (see above for info on how to find it), entry frequency that EasyTweets will check for new posts (every hour is fine), any text to add before each tweet (I don’t recommend adding any text because then it looks automated), and whether you want to post the current new item in your feed, or only start updating from new items. Press Add RSS Feed, and you’re done.

One thing that came up during our session, and often comes up, is people’s confusion as to what usefulness twitter provides. Here are some links that may help you better understand why all these people get to excited about twitter:

7 Habits of Highly Effective Twitterers: Kris Colvin

How to Attract and Influence People on Twitter — The Ultimate Twitter Resource – this is like a how-to book for twitter

Twitter Enlightenment for Business Owners

50 Ideas on Using Twitter for Business

The Big Juicy Twitter Guide

3. Get people to stay in touch with you via RSS feeds and email subscriptions

If someone comes to your site, you want to get them to subscribe in some way to stay in touch before they leave. If you do, you can start to create a long-term connection where they consistently receive content you create, and trust grows between you. If you don’t, chances are they’ll leave, forget that you exist, and never come back.

So, make sure to prominently display the options for subscribing. Here’s a screenshot from Natan Sharansky’s new site for an example on how to do this – note how the subscription info appears very close to the top of every page:

4. Focus – so that people know what they’re getting

People subscribe to certain content because they are interested in the general topic being covered. Imagine if you were an avid car fan, and you bought Cars magazine only to find a spread about the latest hairstyles (or whatever they write about in fashion magazines). And imagine if you were an avid fashion fan and you opened the latest edition of Elle only to find a spread about axel grease (or whatever they write about in car magazines). You’d be pretty disappointed because you are paying to read those magazines because of their focus.

Same with your blog: people subscribe to it because you are writing about something they are interested in, whether it be politics, celebrities, iPhones, or cats. So stick to that 99% of the time, and your readers will stick with you.

5. Optimize for search engines

Yes, even you can optimize your blog for search engines. SEO may be perceived as a magical talent only bestowed upon special fairy beings, but there are some basic things you can do to help your blog rank better in the search engines. Here is a quick rundown:

1. Make a quick list of keywords you think people are using to find people like you. You can use all sorts of fancy keyword tools if you want, but you can also just use your brain since you know your industry. Take this list, and write it down on a piece of paper. Make a note of which terms are the most targeted, and which are less focused. You have more of a chance of ranking high for “Jerusalem car fans” than for “car fans.” You see what I mean? So while you’d probably like to rank high for car fans, it’s best to aim for Jerusalem car fans. But even so, don’t lose sight of the big vision of ranking for “car fans” because you may get there.
2. Once you’ve got your keywords, make sure to use them whenever possible in your blog titles, and in your first paragraph. However, when in doubt, make sure you are ultimately writing for humans. What I mean is, don’t stuff your title and paragraph with keywords that don’t make sense, because while you may make Google happy, you won’t make people happy, and that’s not good.
3. Tag your posts with tags related to your keywords, but also to other stuff you mention so that you may rank for those words as well.
4. Pay attention to meta keywords and particularly to your meta description, because that’s what appears under the title of your post in the Google search results.
5. Link internally. When you mention an event, term or phrase that you’ve mentioned before, link to that other post, or category if it exists on your blog.

6. Promote offsite

Aside from trying to get traffic via the web, make sure to promote your blog in other places as well, like in your email signature and on your business cards. And tell people about it whenever relevant, without being annoying.

7. Track your success

Like anything in life, if you are trying to achieve something in life, you need to track if you are getting there. As the saying goes “if you can measure it, you can manage it.” So track your site stats and feed stats. Don’t worry about seeing huge leaps in growth, but you do want to make sure there is a steady incline at the very least. You don’t want to plateau or start to shrink – that’s bad news, and if you see that you need to work to reverse it, generally by creating more content, and commenting on more blogs.

8. Bonus – accessing the awesomeness that is called humanity

“But you said 7 tips,” you say.

That’s right, I say, but I added a bonus. The bonus is about all the people you get to connect with via your blog and online activity, particularly when those people are…extraordinary (in every sense of the word).

Recently I got the following comment on this blog, and it makes it all worth it. Note the author’s name:

Author : moshe rabeynu
Comment:
I am a former male exotic dancer and am interested in establishing a “Chippendales” type establishment in Israel. What type of assistance and tax benefits does the Israeli government provide to new businesses of olim chadashim? Are there many such entertainment facilities in Israel?  I would like some idea as to how stiff the competition would be.  Do Israeli women, as a rule, like to look at males dancing in skimpy G-strings?  Are they generous tippers?  Would they put a shekel to the shmeckel?  If I hire other olim chadashim as dancers, would they have to pay any taxes on their tips?   Can I employ dancers who have not had a briss ?  I might want to hire one or two to add variety to the show lineup. Is a liquor license hard to obtain in Israel.  Do I have to bribe any officials to receive one?  To whom is it customary to pay proteksia money to start a business and keep it going and approximately how much to they ask for?  Thank you for your help.

If there were commenting Olympics, this one would bag a super-gold.

That’s all!

That’s it – 7 tips + 1 on how to market yourself using blogs and social media. Thanks to those who came to my session – it was great meeting you!

And now, a bit about the Tel Aviv Writer’s Cafe:

It was started 3 years ago by Stephanie Freid, a freelance writer and journalist, as a way of grouping Tel Aviv area writers together for networking and topical discussions on everything from how and where to look for jobs to tips on approaching editors to discussing what makes good journalism to deciding on filing taxes in Israel and abroad. Attendees come from a variety of writing backgrounds including technical, journalism, marketing, book writing & blogging.
Writer Forum guests have included NBC New bureau chief/author Martin Fletcher who spoke about his experiences covering world conflict and his acclaimed first book “Breaking News”, successful book author Matt Beynon Rees on taking a journalism career to the realm of fiction novel writing, NY Times writer Dina Kraft on covering conflict in Israel and why it seems to hit a nerve among so many, Pajamas Media editor Alison Kaplan Sommer on how to slot into the new era of blog writing, Israel Project Executive Director Marcus Sheff on keeping the foreign media informed and celeb blogger Lisa Goldman on how her blog propelled her into the limelight.

For more info, please contact Stephanie at [stefanella.stef at gmail.com].

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We are really excited to announce that after months of work, Natan Sharansky has a shiny new website, blog and social media presence. The goal of these efforts is to help spread Sharansky’s ideas regarding human rights, dissidents, democracy and Zionism, as well as to make access to his own fascinating history more accessible.

The site also offers a photo gallery, video gallery, audio gallery, timeline, and information about his books. You can also subscribe to a monthly newsletter with updates regarding Sharansky’s writings, activities, and news appearances.

Here are the details:

Website: http://NatanSharansky.org
Blog: http://NatanSharansky.org/blog
Twitter: http://twitter.com/NatanSharansky
Flickr: http://flickr.com/photos/natansharansky/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Natan-Sharansky/38110548299
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/natansharanskydotorg
Delicious: http://delicious.com/natansharansky/

I hope you check it out and take advantage of this new resource!

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Here are some upcoming events posted on our Israeli hi-tech and  business events calendar. Check out the calendar to see a full list of all the events and conferences in February 2009.

February 12, 2009, Jerusalem, Israel. Jerusalem Twestival, over 180 cities worldwide will be hosting Twestival 2009 to raise money for Charity:Water which provides clean drinking water to villages in Africa. More details.

February 15-20, 2009. Jerusalem, Israel. Jerusalem International Book Fair is a unique biennial event which draws over 1200 publishers from more that 40 countries who display more than 100,000 books in different languages. More details.

February 16, 2009. Ranaana, Israel. Lecture by Prof. Judith Donath on social media and networks “ Visible interactions: The Design of Sociable Media “Designers of online environments shape the social potential of these spaces far more profoundly than do the architects of our familiar physical spaces: they determine whether participants are anonymous or named, whether history persists, whether reputations are prominently displayed or privately discussed.

February 17-19, 2009. Eilat, Israel. International Renewable Energy Conference & Exhibition. Technologies, Investments, Implementations and Regional Development. The focus will be on formulating strategies to fight the global energy crisis. Examples of successful industrial or governmental strategies will be presented. Networking will be conducive to transforming specific threats into business opportunities. More details.

See all upcoming events and conferences in Israel for February 2009

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Talk to people. But I mean really talk to them.

Building a web presence is a lot like building your offline reputation; it’s a long term effort. Reaching your online publicity and traffic goals involves understanding the user perspective – give them things they want, and they will remember you for it. Give them what you want, and you will quickly be relegated to the trash heap of me-me-me companies out there.

Recognizing that what your organization wants to say may not be the same thing as what your users and customers want to hear is sometimes a difficult, but nonetheless critical, step on the path to a truly successful website and web presence. What this means practically is that you need to move your focus to creating and sharing content that is helpful and valuable, and not necessarily directly related to your products, mission, services, or any of the other things you want to promote through your website. Offer people good content that is related to your industry or skill set, and start to enjoy the fact that they come back for more. While seemingly counter-intuitive, this is actually a great way to promote your organization since it helps you build lasting, stable relationships with prospects and clients.

This point is especially important for non-profits, who rely strongly on values of goodwill and public service. Since the people behind non-profits often feel like their organization is their baby, they cannot help but talk about themselves. While people do want to know that your non-profit is a success, it gets tiresome hearing repeated stories about gala fundraisers and the hundreds of children you have helped. Instead, get up-close and personal and transform your stories from statistics to actual people. Interview your staff and the people you help. Also, talk about your field or industry. For example, if your non-profit is related to education, discuss developments in the world of education. Show people that you are an expert, and give those passionate about your field a reason to stay in their relationship with you.

Great content builds your organization, even (especially) if it’s not all about you.

This post is co-written by Miriam Schwab and David Danielson, our intern

Picture credit: The Conversation by polandeze on flickr

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December 1-2,2008. Ramat Gan, Israel. The World Summit of Cloud Computing IGT Annual Event & Exhibition. This year the IGT Annual event IGT2008 will focus on Cloud Computing, and its impact on the enterprise IT, the next generation data center, SaaS and Utility Computing. Speakers from cloudera, Amazon, eBay, Yahoo, Forrester, DataLine, Microsoft, Reservoir, NYSE Euronext, HP, Salesforce, Animoto, Sun Microsystems, Merill Lynch, and many more. More details.

December 3, 2008. Tel Aviv, Israel. John Bryce is hosting a seminar series on Web2.0 – 4 meetings of 4 hours each to discuss web2.0 – blogging, social networking, wikipedia, Ajax, enterprise2.0, and more. More details.

December 3, 2008. Tel Aviv, Israel. Amazon Web Services, Tel-Aviv Meetup. At the Afeka Tel Aviv College of Engineering, The Ficus Building, Room 30. From 6:30 to 11:00 PM. Come meet the Amazon Web Services EMEA team and learn about how Cloud Computing is enabling Israeli companies to flourish in these troubled times.

December 3, 3008. 9 Hamenofim St. Herzeliya, Israel. “Head to Head” with Rich Zippel, VP CTO Sun Microsystems. At Ackerstein Tower A, 8th floor. From 13:00 – 15:00 you can be part of an open forum with Rich and ask him whatever you like. For instance: the future of cloud computing; how does Sun Labs manage its project flow; what is new with Sun; etc. Don’t miss this rare opportunity to interact with one of Sun’s driving forces.

December 3, 2008, Jerusalem, Israel. The Jerusalem Investing Meetup. Meet others interested in investing in stocks, bonds, options, and whatever financial strategy you care to learn more about. Join us at the Jerusalem Investment Group’s December meeting to learn and discuss how to persevere through this bear market and begin rebuilding your portfolio and wealth with an eye towards the future. Starts at 6:30 PM; join the meetup group for a precise location.

December 4, 2008, Petach Tikva, Israel. Job Search 2.0 – A workshop to help you build your profile on LinkedIn, tips for networking, good practices for dealing with human resources, and more. More details and to sign up.

December 4, 2008, Israel. Welcome, Herzeliyya Entrepreneurs and Investors! Meet a new network of local entrepreneurs and venture capitalists to share tips and problem solving techniques, get advice on profitability and career and discuss mentoring and business models. Swap business cards and watch your personal business directory grow! Join the meetup group to receive a location.

December 8, 2008, Present Tense Office, 64 Emek Refa’im, Jerusalem, Israel. SEO Expert Panel Discussion. Panelists will discuss their approaches to Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and give specific practical tips on how to optimize Web sites for better search engine ranking. Admission is NIS 20 and registration is required via facebook RSVP. The office is directly above a bridal shop.

December 8, 2008. The Jerusalem College for Technlogy, Jerusalem, Israel. The Jerusalem Business Networking Forum. The JBNF promotes business networking among English speaking professionals in business, high tech and investment fields in Jerusalem. Each meeting will feature a speaker on a different topic relating to business in Jerusalem. 18:00 sharp! Cost is $5 per person. RSVP.

December 9, 2008. Tel Aviv, Israel. OpenSource08. More details.

December 9, 2008. Tel Aviv, Israel. Health08 conference. More details.

December 10, 2008. Tel Aviv, Israel. The Marketing and Communication Network of the Gvahim project is honored to invite you to attend its networking event:
Targeting Israeli customers: how to make successful your communication campaign in times of crisis? What are the key factors of success for an Israeli or an international brand to make an efficient marketing and communication campaign in Israel? At Beit Zion America (ZOA House), 1, Daniel Frish St. 7 PM. Register here.

December 14-15, 2008. Tel Aviv, Israel. Globes – The Israel Business Conference, considered the country’s most prestigious event. With the participation of the Prime Minister, ministers, businesspeople, and Israel’s most influential experts, the annual Israel Business Conference is the place where new business ventures, deals and decisions are announced, new trends are launched, and new strategies, plans and ideas are formulated. More details.

December 16, 2008. Tel Aviv, Israel. Breakfast with Jeff Pulver and friends.  Network with real-life social tagging. If you’ve never been to one of Jeff’s breakfasts, watch this video: Introducing the Personal Social Networking Toolkit

December 17, 2008. Jerusalem, Israel. Breakfast with Jeff Pulver and friends. 9 AM to 11 AM. 41 King George St. Network with real-life social tagging. If you’ve never been to one of Jeff’s breakfasts, watch this video: Introducing the Personal Social Networking Toolkit More details.

December 30, 2008. Tel-Aviv, Israel. TechAviv Israel December Meetup. For, by, and about Israeli tech startups. Presenters will be anonced shortly. Starts at 7 PM, for a precise time join the meetup group. For more general information, check out the TechAviv website.

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People are always asking for background information on why and how they should blog. While there is great information out there on the web, I thought I’d put together a resource here that I can refer people to when they ask. This post will be updated regularly so keep checking back.

Why blog

Why Start a Blog and 25 Tips to Make it Work, Conversation Agent, Nov. 6, 2008

iMedia Connection: Five Reasons to Blog

Social Media still on rise: Comparative global study

Blogging tips

Blogging Tips for Beginners from Problogger

Blogging Tips from Lorelle VanFossen

Twenty Usability Tips for Your Blog — Condensed from Dozens of Bloggers’ Experiences

The Ultimate Blogger Writing Guide, Dean Rieck, CopyBlogger

You Need a Blog Strategy, Darren Rowse, Problogger, Dec. 10, 2008

Social Media Tips

Let’s talk: Social Media for Small Business – e-book from Microsoft (who would’ve thought)

If I Started Today, Chris Brogan, Nov. 22, 2008 – Chris Brogan gives advice on how he would start a social media strategy from scratch

The Ultimate Social Media Etiquette Handbook, Tamar Weinberg, Techipedia, Dec. 10, 2008

Combining blogging with social media

Your Social Media Strategy Starts with Monitoring, Marketing Profs – before you dive into social media, you must monitor it first.

How to Develop a Social Media Plan for Your Business in 5 Steps, Mashable – Great 5 step guide to getting your business into social media

How to Leverage Web 2.0 & Social Media Sites to Market Your Brand & Control Your Message, SEOmoz – a business-minded look at thirty sites whose content fits the Web 2.0 description

The Essential Guide to Social Media (PDF)

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Have you ever wanted to follow what’s being said about a certain topic around the internet? Well, it’s not as hard as you think. Monitoring tools are the primary way to track buzz about a given topic online. For someone conducting an online social media marketing campaign this is especially true. To properly promote something, you have to continuously follow what people are saying about it. Monitoring tools can be broken into two primary categories:

• Background Tracking
• Conversation Tracking

One of the best social media monitoring tools  is Google Alerts. With Google Alerts, you can receive weekly, daily, or even “as it happens” alerts whenever your search term is mentioned on the web.

Don’t be afraid to enter multiple phrases that mention your brand; this can only yield more and diverse results. In addition to delivering relevant links to articles, blogs, video, etc., Google Alerts is also a great spring board for learning more about where your brand is being spoken about.

Probably the best feature of this service is that you don’t have to keep checking for the most recent mentions on search engines. Having the alerts delivered directly into your inbox allows you to keep tabs on where you might want to comment on a blog post or follow the development of a news story.

The major drawback about Google Alerts is that it doesn’t cover social media sites, such as facebook. To become a part of the “conversation,” you must use monitoring tools that focus on discussions, media (such as video, audio, photos, etc.), and just about anything else. If you are conducting a social media campaign, you absolutely must know if people are already talking about your brand. Sites like Twitter, Digg, and YouTube are the some of the many featured sites on Addict-o-matic, which is the site to find “the latest buzz on any topic.”

Addictomatic screenshot via flickr from Maestro Alberto's photostream

Other sites such as Daylife and Silobreaker are also great for processing recent quotes, graphs, trends, and lists of recent articles or blogs that mentions your topic.

Long gone are the days of missing what someone said about you behind your back. Utilizing effective monitoring tools will help you to truly be part of the conversation in every corner of the web.

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Yesterday I was privileged to give a presentation at the first Marcshoret conference in Jerusalem for marketing professionals. I wasn’t able to attend the whole event, but from what I could see Paula Stern and her crew at Writepoint did an excellent job putting a high-level, professional event together. You can see the program here if you’re interested.

In my presentation, we discussed how to market and manage your business in tough economic times by using the many excellent, free tools that are available on the web. Many entrepreneurs who have survived previous market crashes are talking about how those that get through these difficult times are those that tighten their belts. We’re lucky to live in a time when we have access to applications that in the past were the domain of Fortune 500 companies, like shared email, calendars, CRM systems, etc, but are now accessible and affordable.

We discussed what cloud computing is, since most of the tools I discussed are hosted on the web, meaning you don’t have to download them onto your computer. I also pointed out that now is a time when you should actually invest in marketing, so that you are in a stronger position when the good times arrive again. But when I say invest, I’m talking about time, not money, and most of the tools we spoke about demand time investments, which is something we may find we have a lot of if business slows down. I also mentioned how some of the biggest blogs today, like TechCrunch, started during the last bubble burst.

Some of the advantages of working in the cloud are:

1. Collaboration - you can easily share documents, spreadsheets, presentations, and more when using online services.
2. Accessibility - working from home? Your computer crashed? You can still access your information since it’s not dependent on one machine – it’s sitting on the web.
3. Cost - these services are much lower in cost than software that you have to license and install on your own hard drive or server. These services also take care of upgrades and glitches, removing the need for you to hire IT people.

Disadvantages of cloud computing:

1. Dependence on Internet connections - you can only access your online information if you are near an Internet connection. However, this problem is mostly disappearing thanks to the proliferation of Wifi hotspots. In addition, Google has tried to solve this problem with Google Gears, which allows you to download and sync your online info. WordPress and Zoho have integrated Google Gears, for example.
2. Dependence on their servers – when your information sits online, you are dependent on the integrity of the service provider’s servers. If their servers go down, you are stuck. This recently happened when Amazon’s S3 servers crashed, taking down with them all the services hosted there by other companies.
3. Security (or lack thereof) – when your information is sitting on servers that can be accessed from any computer, it becomes much more vulnerable to hackers or glitches that inadvertently expose your data to others.

Despite the drawbacks, my own business is heavily dependent on the cloud, and I believe it’s made us more efficient and productive. Here are our favorite services:

• Google apps – that’s gmail where you can use your own domain name. It includes all the Google goodies, including chat, which we use a lot internally for short messages.
• Google calendar – so we’re all on the same page in terms of meetings, events, vacation, etc.
• Zoho CRM – the lowest cost, best CRM service out there. Someone who knows about these things took a look at it and said “It’s just like Salesforce, but cheaper!” Manage leads, contacts, opportunities, quotes, sales orders, and invoices, all in here. Fantastic!
• Zoho Writer – the only online word processor that offers styles. To me, that is essential.
• Zoho Projects – great project management app
• Zoho Wiki – the best free wiki I could find that offers password protection. This is where we share all internal documentation.

I briefly mentioned twitter, but I didn’t give any tips on how to use it. Since twitter is such a great tool for marketing and networking, I recommend that  you read a recent post that I wrote on the amuta 2.0 blog about getting started with twitter. In that article, I discuss using twitter for non-profits, but the principles are pretty much the same for businesses.

And finally…the presentation is embedded below, and every screenshot and title in it is a link that will take you straight to the app or service displayed.

Enjoy!

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November 3, 2008. Tel Aviv, Israel. Beta Goes Public @ The Barbie. Beta, Israel’s hi-tech rock band, launches its Public Beta tour with a performance at the Barbie club. The performance includes original songs, “upgraded” cover versions of rock hits from the 70s and 80s, and some comedy sketches all based on the Israeli hi-tech culture. More details

November 4, 2008. Netanya, Israel. The Entrepreneurs club is hosting Asaf Peled, Benny Shneider, and Yoram Shamir at Cisco HQ. More details

November 4, 2008. Tel Aviv, Israel. Building a Social Network of Enviornmental Activists in Israel hosted by Jeff Pulver and Eilon Schwartz. More details.

November 5, 2008. Tel Aviv, Israel. Breakfast with Jeff Pulver and friends. If you’ve never been to one of Jeff’s breakfasts, watch this video: Introducing the Personal Social Networking Toolkit More details.

November 5, 2008. Holon, Israel. GarageGeeks are hosting Yahoo! BOSS(Build your Own Search Service) with Yossi Vardi. They’ll be discussing BOSS technology, with Q&A for Yahoo’s leading product folks headed by Bill Michels, GM of Yahoo! Search BOSS; Eran Palmon, Head of BOSS Egnineering; Ronny Lempel, Head of the Yahoo! Haifa Research Lab.More details.

See complete list of November 08 Events »

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I know that I may be a bit late to the party, but it took the purchase of my new iPod Touch to make me understand that as a person involved in developing for the web, I could no longer ignore the significance of the mobile web.

Because mobile really is the new web.

1000 mobiles via flickr from Gaetan Lee's photostream

The Internet is about full-time connectivity

One of the main trends in the development of the Internet has been a drive to increase quality and quantity of connectivity. With mobile taking center stage, we are heading into an era where billions of people can theoretically be connected to the web at all times.

Let’s take a look at the progression of connectivity on the web:

1. Phone line Internet: In the beginning (sounds like the bible), we would log on to the web via our phone lines. This limited our time on the web since: a) people could not call us while we were on line, or if they did, the internet connection would be broken, and b) the ISPs charged us by the minute, so we would get on, download our email, view a few sites, and get off.
2. Broadband: When broadband was introduced, it meant that our computers could be connected to the web 24/7; charges became flat monthly rates, and our phone lines were freed up. This changed the way we approached all computer-related activities, and none of us today could imagine working in an environment without Internet. However, while our computers could be connected 24/7, if we were not by our computers our own connection to the web was broken.
3. Cell phones: As cell phones became more widespread, we discovered a new way to connect to people who were not geographically near us, at all times. We could now be reached anywhere and everywhere, and we could communicate via regular phone calls or SMS messages. Some phones offered (and still offer) a crude form of Internet connectivity that allowed people a feature-limited connection to websites. The era of real 24/7 connectivity had begun.
4. Blackberry (and friends): Email is one of the most social and widely used Internet applications, and it has become one of our primary methods of communication. So much communication takes place via email, that people needed a way to be able to access their email even when not by their computers. Enter BlackBerry. Although the BlackBerry offers additional PDA types of applications, like contacts, calendars and to-do lists, its main use is to send and receive email. People became so connected to their BlackBerry’s that terms like “CrackBerry” and “BlackBerry Widows” (women whose husbands spend all of their time engrossed in their BlackBerry) were created. By April 2008, BlackBerry subscribers had passed 14 million.
   But BlackBerry has two main limitations: a) Its goal is email access. With people using web-based email and other “cloud” applications, it is important that access to the web is easy and user-friendly, which is apparently not the case with BlackBerry; b) Use has been limited to the BlackBerry wireless networks and system: in order to use their email system, users must set up expensive systems for syncing their email. In addition, with the growing proliferation of wireless hotspots, people should not have to pay one provider for Internet access for their mobile device.
5. The one and only iPhone (and iPod Touch): The introduction of the iPhone has changed everything, in my opinion, and other companies are scrambling to emulate Apple’s approach to the mobile web. With the iPhone, Apple has accomplished the following: a) A powerful computing device in the palm of your hand: the iPhone is more powerful than the computers we had about 10 years ago. More importantly, it is flexible and easy to use. Apple doesn’t try to dictate to you which email system you must use; you can use your online email, imap, pop, etc. With Wi-fi included and the Safari browser, you can easily view almost any web page. The screen is too small? Tap twice on the main column of text and it takes up your whole screen, or turn your device sideways for a wider view. The availability of iPhone apps means that the functionality of the iPhone is almost unlimited. (To see what I mean, browse around the app store to see what apps are out there. Beware: it’s really fun, and don’t let the word “store” fool you – there are many great free apps.)
   Often using an iPhone means paying extra fees to your cellphone provider. If you’re like me, and you feel like the cellular providers are ripping you off, get an iPod Touch. It’s basically the iPhone without the phone, so you get the fun (I mean productivity) without the extra fees.

We are now at the stage where Internet connectivity can realistically become 24/7 (or 24/6 for Shabbat observers). According to the Official Google Blog, there are 3.2 billion mobile subscribers in the world, and that number is expected to grow by at least a billion in the next few years. Today, mobile phones are more prevalent than cars. As mobile phone technology develops, more and more of those billions of phone users will gain high quality, user-friendly access to the web. Suddenly, 14 million BlackBerry subscribers doesn’t sound too hot, does it?

What this means for us

With billions of people around the world potentially accessing the web via their mobile, web developers will need to start taking mobiles into serious consideration:

1. Mobile-compatible web sites: it is no longer enough to test your sites on Firefox, IE and Safari. Now, you must test your site for mobile devices to see how they look there.
2. Mobile web versions: In addition to testing your site for mobile-compatibility, you may need to start considering developing special sites for mobile devices. Some sites that already have these types of mobile offerings are twitter, Gmail, Google Calendar, popurls, Netvibes, and facebook. Some are better than others, but the idea is the same: viewing a site on a mobile device is a different experience than on your 19″ LCD screen, and web developers need to take these needs into consideration.
3. Mobile apps: Mobile compatible sites are good, but many sites (and third parties) are developing apps that you install on your mobile device to provide even better access to a site’s features from your mobile. For example, you can download mobile apps for the iPhone and iPod Touch for facebook and twitter. These apps offer different features than the mobile sites.
4. Mobile email: If you send out HTML email campaigns, you should now be testing them for mobile compatibility. You may even want to start offering a mobile version of your emails, and allow people to indicate what type of email they prefer to receive. Winston Bowden, in a recent article on Marketing Profs, even suggested creating mobile version landing pages, and offering a link at the top of your emails saying something like “BlackBerry users, click here.”

The mobile web is here, and I think that we’re in for an exciting ride. So embrace it, and let’s see where it takes us!

This is the first in a series of posts on the mobile web. Future topics to be covered include:

1. Reviews of mobile sites and apps.
2. Reviews of companies developing mobile technologies.
3. A look at the Israeli mobile industry.
4. And more…so stay tuned!

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