The first advantage of widgets is that they are easy to install and use. You don’t have to be a software designer in order to install a text widget on your site or blog. The second advantage is that most widgets can be customized in size, color and style to fit your blog in an elegant way. In this post I”ll recommend a few content-related widgets, that add relevant content to your readers in addition to your own original content:

Twitter Search Widget – There is no doubt about the impact tweets have on the web. over 50M users tweet daily billions of tweets, why not share the relevant ones for you with your readers? Instead of adding a twitter widget of your own tweets, add the search widget and cutomise it to your blog topic.This example is a search widget on ‘Ipad’

The widget can be adjusted with theme, color, size and number of tweets shown. I would recommend using this widget with a search related to the topic of your blog, or a topic concerning current events related to your blog, and maybe even changing the topic of search on the widget from time to time, giving your readers a glimpse at the most relevant tweets.

TimesWidget – The New-York Times also has a great widget for your blog. NYTimes, the leading print and online newspaper lets you enjoy its RSS feed through a great widget(still beta).

This widget enables you to add the NYTimes feed customized to your topic. Pick the subject relevant(can pick more than one), sports, business, technology or others from the list and add it to your site, letting your readers have online access to fresh and relevant content right out of the NYTimes.

Google AJAX Search API for youtube- Not exactly a widget, but I found this cool API that could be suited for a few blogs. I can’t say every blog should have this, but blogs more on the fun side, or writing about media, can use this youtube API as a widget on their blog.

It can be placed in a horizontal or vertical layouts to suite your site. In this example I placed the AJAX with Monty Python’s Youtube Channel. As mentioned about the twitter search widget, here also recommended to change the channels every now and then.

There are many more widgets, these are just a few examples I found useful, and even eye catchers for readers. Don’t add too much to your site, but try to find a few widgets that could give value to your readers.

About a decade ago, a friend bragged about a new phone he just bought, that can hold up to 300 contacts in his address book. This sounds funny when thinking about it in 2009. He then showed me that except for name and phone number you can type in additional details such as city, birthday and mail. To demonstrate the abilities of the new gadget (I remind the readers this is 1999 we are talking about) he showed me a memo the phone just made about one of his customers. The customer’s daughter just turned 16, and my friend called to congratulate his customer for the sweet sixteen birthday party they are holding. We can learn 2 things from this ‘ancient’ story:

1. Know your customers – they will return a favor by doing business with you again.
2. In 2009 there is no need to input your phone manually, we have technology for that!

Before reviewing the possibilities with advanced mobile devices such as Iphone and Blackberry, lets take a closer look at Facebook and LinkedIn and their immediate business added value. Befriending online with business associates and customers, but not too soon, can let you take part in their lives. Choose to use it wisely, and you will enjoy a constant and fruitful relationship with your clients. Instead of relating to your business alone, you can connect to your clients about their personal interests, hobbies and important events such as birthdays, anniversaries and other social gatherings.

In the past, you would keep logs or lists of customers, birthday details and addresses that would consume a lot of time to manage. Today, Facebook has an application for almost every smartphone: Blackberry,Iphone, HTC, etc. that will notify you with important dates related to your connections. The new Facebook app for Blackberry, can connect automatically to your calendar and address book.  Twitter has also hundreds of applications for almost every existing phone. LinkedIn can also be used from most phones.

We are not always near a desktop, or a notebook, but if we can see what our business connections are up to, or what they are celebrating, we can choose to use it. We can make a call to congratulate an associate on receiving an award, text a client on his birthday and send an email with an article that would interest a customer that just tweeted on the subject. All these options are easy to use today, and were not available 3-4 years ago. All the examples I’ve mentioned can be available using notifications on Facebook mobile applications, and any Twitter app such as the popular Tweetdeck (on Iphone also). The Tweetdeck, by the way, has a new version that includes feeds not only from twitter as before, but also facebook, myspace and linkedin, which means you can enjoy your feeds and text from all those applications in one place. An advantage for all those having a hard time following Facebook, Twitter and linkedin togather.

Even if social media doesn’t interest you that much, you should still consider it as a working tool for you. LinkedIn can be your professional database, Facebook can be your clients’ event notifier and Twitter even just for short and immediate direct messaging to clients.

For a kick start:

facebook latest app for Blackberry

Tweetdeck for Iphone

Linkedin on mobile

1. Setting up a website can cost as low as $150: there isn’t a bigger mistake for a business than this one, especially for small and medium businesses. In many cases, a business website is the ‘Front Cover’ of the business and your reputation. This is where most of the new clients and costumers first encounter your product. That ‘Front Cover’ of your business should reflect the quality of your product. You don’t have to spend a fortune on it, but have a professional do the job, plan wisely what your site should consist of, make sure the design is friendly, and that all the features work properly(links, payment, video’s, ads etc.). This still isn’t a big cost, and it is of great importance. Isn’t it worth paying a little more on your website?
2. Social media is a waste of time. I will start by how NOT to use social media (Sent by Shooky Galili) It’s rarely heard that social media is a waste of time. I can relate to businessmen who say the haven’t any spare time to be active on social platforms. I don’t think a business owner should be active on more than 3-4 social websites. It can be difficult to keep track. The key here is to start with a small modest blog, where you can update on new products and news. All that with writing no more than one 200-word post a week. Some businessmen such as lawyers already have a substantial amount of content written, and can start by posting it. After the blog is up and running, you can link it to your facebook, twitter and so on. Step by step is a good method to step into social media. An interesting discussion about this issue is happening right now at the Social Media Today group on LinkedIn.
3. Offline Advertisement is dead. Although social media and online advertisement are taking their share in advertising budgets, offline media such as newspapers, radio and TV is still part of our lives, and businesses should consider them as part of their marketing campaigns. When focused on local costumers, radio and local papers still have influence on the market. With local radio stations and papers you could complete your campaign and reach more clients in a relatively low cost. It turns out there is even much to learn from radio. Read more about it on digitaltonto by Greg Satell
4. Online Networking and Offline Networking are two completely different stories. The truth couldn’t be further away from that. On social media, email, conventions and even birthday parties, people behave like…people. Most of us enjoy meeting new people, knowing them and having some kind of a relationship (business, romantic, community..) .  If you meet someone face to face, you first want to know who you’re meeting and what common grounds you have. Then, if it seems reasonable enough for both side, a connection can be made. Online and social media aren’t that different. Our previous post about befriending too soon on Facebook guides you what to ‘do’ and what  ‘not do’ on social media.

I’m sure there are many more myths we all encounter daily. I would love to hear yours, and post them.

About a week ago I met and old colleague for a beer after work. While having our beer, I heard someone ordering a beer in Spanish two seats away from us on the bar. Being curious about the spanish, I introduced myself, and so did my colleague. The person we met turned out to be ‘Gale Talk‘, A Madrid based techno artist, who came to town for a concert. We had a fun talk about music and a few more rounds of beer.

Gale Talk

From here on, networking went on using MySpace, where you can find information and more importantly a few tracks. So I could listen to his music, which I really liked. Hope you will enjoy it too. I couldn’t make it to the concert, hope to see it next time in town.

Don’t miss opportunities – When does that big opportunity come? You could never know. In order to avoid missing opportunities, there’s only one thing to do. Take part in activities related to your business and personal life as mentioned here before. Any occasion or person you meet, could easily become a great opportunity  for a big client or  a new contract, or finding the perfect candidate for a job your hiring for.

Then again, some meetings just bring up too many bad memories

Don’t force your  business – Your product is great, I’m sure of that. But try to understand the event you’re participating in. Timing is everything (along with a good product,creative  marketing and some luck…). Sometimes you might just have one opportunity to introduce yourself to someone relevant to you -  don’t blow it. If you speak about your business in the wrong place, you might be considered rude and maybe even boring. From my experience, always introduce yourself first as a person, an individual. Don’t talk about your business straight away. People like to connect with people, not companies. Start by a short introduction about yourself. People will remember you but they will seldom remember a company name. If people will remember you it doesn’t matter which business it is, They would be interested in YOU.

Don’t beat yourself when you’re wrong – We all make mistakes, and we learn from them. You tried to introduce your business to a potential investor and failed. Well, these things happen. When you’re unsuccessful, a few things should be done. First of all, go back and trace your moves. What went wrong? Was it the PowerPoint slides? Were you under-prepared? Understand what can be improved for the next time. Now that you are ready to try again, do it as many times as possible. You failed making connections in a convention? Go to a dozen more. You approached potential costumers and it didn’t work, try doing it better, and this time approach a hundred costumers more.

Never, but NEVER, work ‘on the fly’ – It’s nice being spontaneous when it comes to going out, not for your business. Although networking is not a science as accurate as rocket physics, you can plan your moves wisely. Decided on going to a convention to make new connections?  Wonderful! Is this convention in your field of work? Is there a better one soon? How costly is it? You must ask yourself these questions. Otherwise you will be spending more than you can afford of your time and money.

Don’t underestimate the power of online networking – We wrote here about LinkedIn, blogs and other means of social networking. These tools are already important enough for businesses, and will become even more dominant in our lives. Even if your business is completely offline, you need to start changing it. Be sure your competitors are working on it as we speak. Learn where your line of work is exposed on the web. Learn which blogger writes about your industry. Bloggers write almost about everything, from technology to foreign-exchange , Graffiti and even Hummus. Take a few hours a week and find the places interesting for you on the web and be active there, for reputation, costumers, colleagues and in short Networking.

The song you’ve just heard is titled “She loves everybody”. While this song helped them reach out to a larger audience, it wasn’t a huge hit, and wasn’t enough to promote their debut album “Love the Future”.

Traditional musicians rely on their record company to promote their act by using Public Relations offices, posters in record stores, etc.

But D.A. Wallach and Max Drummey took a different path: they’re promoting their music through networking.

The band has set up a website that features various information about the band, news about shows, etc. The added value comes from their activity on the site. They update their blog quite frequently: they release a post approximately every two to three days.

They’re also active on MySpace, Facebook and and other social networks. All these sites give samples of their music, and ask you to further engage with the band. With a unique name as Chester French, it’ll be easy to find them online. In some cases it isn’t that simple to search people on social sites.

They offer the visitors to join their VIP service. These VIP members get free copies of their music so that they will be “ambassadors” of Chester French, and spread their music. They use SalesForce to manage their network of fans. Also here, up to date tools are utilized…

The most fascinating part of their networking is their personal responses to emails from fans. In this article in the Gadgetwise blog (under NY Times), Wallach describes how he personally networks with the fans:

“We respond to every single email we get,” he said. “I do an hour in the morning and an hour at night. A lot of them are just, ‘I wish you’d come to my city,’ and we’ll write back, ‘Us, too.’ We try to keep it personal and intimate. So it’s not just ‘Dear Friend.’ It’ll be, ‘Dear Paul, thank you for coming to see us in Baton Rouge. We’d really like your ideas for how we can spread our music around in Baton Rouge.’”

This way of promoting music via social networks and personal communication with fans is gaining traction, and it’s an excellent example of how networking is used in the entertainment industry. Networking isn’t exclusive to business