I use a variety of tools for doing research and saving things.  Online notebooks are useful to capture data and save it.  For example, you can capture a page and even if the page changes later, you captured what you wanted.  Useful for book research, etc.

Then I stumbled upon a Diigo.  This is some nice stuff.  Now I can put notes and bookmarks on webpages and see my notes when I return.  I prefer this much over something like del.icio.us, which seems to not be doing too much to keep growing.

I did not install the toolbar.  I have too many things installed already and did not want to risk slower performance.  However, with a little playing around I added the button to the favorites and it is working nicely.

I especially like the feature that gets more information on a page.  Now I can see how popular a blog is before I contact them.

If you want a better way to do web research and organization, give Diigo a try.

Tell me how fun this is! 

Please write my NY Times Bestseller for me while I enjoy life.

I don’t know if it will work, but if it does it is very cool.  It is also a chance for you to finesse some great buzz.  If you can work your product or service into his book, that is great buzz.  But don’t spoil it.  Only try it if it is a good fit.

While you are at it, if you have a Buzz Marketing best seller that you would like me to take and publish, let me know. 

Jim Kukral at Marketing Ideas Online points out some interesting opportunities with video and the writer’s strike.  His post is built from a longer post on Mashable.

Essentially, the writer’s strike means less new stuff will be out there for people to see, so now is the time to crank up your video effort.  Wondering what I am doing?  I have been working with video for a little while now, but am still not 100% happy with what I have done.  I will definitely be in our upcoming online training.

A good friend of mine, Ralph Berge, has teamed up with some of his collegues and are doing a two day Business Rich Boot Camp.  I have attended a one day boot camp and came away with a great 90 day plan that helped me improve the business.  If you are in the NE Ohio area, check it out.

Do you ever catch yourself saying, “I don’t know what I don’t know”? And you do know that it’s impacting your business…

Action Coach of Akron-Canton is working with business people to answer that question and more at its Business Rich Boot Camp on November 15th and 16th at Firestone CC in Akron.

At this intensive two day workshop, you will learn the fundamentals of building a successful business model. This #1 business coaching firm will teach you the business foundation of knowledge required to outperform your competition. It’s not just theory, its hands on, hard hitting, business education that can be implemented in your business.

Here’s a link for more information:

http://www.actioncoach.com/ralphberge/events.php

 Handshake HQ

We have not fully launched Handshake HQ yet.  It is fully functional but we continue to look at ways to improve the interface and marketing.  That said, give it a try if you would like.  You can sign up at http://www.handshakehq.com/ and there is a free account as well as a paid version.

What is it?

OK, long story short.  I wanted a better tool to follow up with people after I met them, so I tossed together the first version of Handshake HQ to help me by templating my emails so I could craft better messages with better goals.  Then I could power through a stack of cards in seconds and send each person a highly personal email. – No SPAM, these had to be sent one at a time.  It just helped me write better emails and not have to retype the whole thing.

I started using it with a great deal of success, and as soon as I told the first person about it, they wanted it for their organization. Handshake HQ is the commercial version of this simple solution.  Better Messages Faster with Better Results is what it boils down to.

Give it a try and let me know what you think.  It is an attempt on our part to share tools we find useful and profitable with other people that may benefit from the same strategy.

I just read the new book, The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich, by Tim Ferriss and loved it.  Now my daughter and wife are fighting to read it.

One interesting thing that I had happen already.  Being in this best selling book created a lot of buzz for a a company called Get Friday.  It sounds too good to be true, so I contacted them last week.  Then again on Tuesday.  Then again on Wednesday….  still no reply.  Too much buzz can send your business into the crapper pretty fast.

I still hope they call me. I would love to try this service.  However, I am wondering if it is this much work to hire them, how much work will it be to have them do projects for me?

Tracy Sheridan of Waxxi invited me to an interactive podcast with Seth Godin.  I am looking forward to this because I am curious about the technology and want to interact with Seth.  Below is the email she sent (reprinted with permission) and you are all invited.

After having read your post about The Dip, and Seth, I thought I would personally invite you to our next Waxxi ‘cast, which features Seth. What we do is allow people, globally, to talk to our guests via phone and/or IM. We allow them to be a part of the podcast experience (hence, the interactive podcast’) vs. just listening.We’d love it if you could join. The date is June 6th (1:30pm ET) and more info is here: http://waxxi.us/sethgodin.html

I’m a big fan of Buzzoodle Buzz Marketing Blog, and a big believer in WOM marketing.

I frequently talk about the value of giving.  If you give people value, they often reward you by creating some buzz.

So I started out reading Make It Great, which led me to dmiracle – Healthy Web Design, where I read this post about removing the no follow tag from comment links.  I then followed the link to Andy Beard, and finally to the site where I downloaded and installed the plug in.

My whole education took 10 minutes.  And now you will be happy to know that if you comment on this blog, Google will treat the link like a real link and boost your website ranking.  Remember, to get past the sensor, your comment has to be reasonably free of nonsense and meaningless dribble.  I reserve those topics for me.

Recently we assessed how we manage our contacts.  Traditionally you have your Outlook contacts and you may have a CRM for sales.  The problem for us is we do not need to sell much, because people come to us.  So the CRM has languished, rarely used.

We have various ways to track advocates, but not a good, centralized way.  Until last night at 11:30 PM when I was on Seth Godin’s Blog and came across Highrise.

Many people are going to look at this and say, “I don’t need another contact manager.”  You are probably right.  However, I feel fairly confident you are not tracking all your advocates and fans in their own database, and that is where I see the big value.

This software has a fully functional free version.  There is absolutely no excuse to not build an advocate database for yourself.  And if you use the email function (drop box) you can quickly forward emails and populate the system with the right contacts. Then you can use the tasks to make sure you are following up regularly.

The funny thing for me is we have a plan on the table for a custom database system geared only towards advocacy…. Did I say on the table?  I mean in the trash.

Generally speaking, adversity is bad.  It is the world trying to get in your way and stop you from succeeding.  However, think of how adversity has helped you…

• If you have never really had to struggle, you have probably never really learned anything.
• If you have never been knocked down, you have never had to recover and get back up.
• The more adversity you have faced, the more you have tried to do great things.
• When things are not rosy, you find out who you friends are.

… and why am I writing about this in a Buzz Marketing Blog?

#5 The more you overcome, the more great stories you have to tell, and that other people will tell about you.  We all love those stories where people maxed out their credit cards and were down to the last dime and then hit it big.  We crave these stories.  They are what give hope to people trying new things.

Do you have a great story about overcoming adversity?  Feel free to share it in the comments field.