Entries from July 2008 ↓

MinnPost has an article on changes in the publishing industry towards conserving paper resources and other green practices.

Read it at the MinnPost site.

• Twitter has acquired Summize, a tool used to search recent tweets for keywords. The URL http://www.summize.com will now redirect to http://search.twitter.com.
• I’m checking out TweetBeep. Supposedly, it’s like Google Alerts for Twitter. I stress the importance of Google Alerts to anyone who doesn’t know, so this will probably be an important resource as well.
• Larry Chase has compiled a list of 18 of the Top Twitter Tools & Resources. He’s got some on his list that haven’t made it to my Online Publicity Resources page yet. But I’ve got some listed that he doesn’t have, too. (By the way, that Resources page will be evolving pretty heavily pretty soon. I’m breaking the list of resources up into different pages for authors, artists, and musicians to make it easier for people to find tools relevant to their fields.)
• Andy Beal wrote an article about 5 Twitter Tactics for Building a Stellar Brand. The first line in his list is what I consider the Golden Rule of Twitter: “Don’t be the guy that jumps on Twitter, “follows” 10,000 people, then tweets “@” them every two minutes.” Thanks to Ivana Taylor at Strategy Stew for tweeting about this article.

Jennifer Perkins of Naughty Secretary Club is a celebrity in the indie/DIY craft scene. A member of the Austin Craft Mafia which launched dozens of chapters worldwide, Jennifer’s jewelry has been featured in numerous magazines including Bust and Seventeen. She also has her own TV show, Craft Lab, on HGTV.On top of all of that, Jennifer is a soon-to-be published author! Her book, The Naughty Secretary Club: The Working Girl’s Guide to Handmade Jewelry, hits bookstores on August 11.

In her blog this week, Jennifer evaluates some of the social networking opportunities for authors.

Jennifer’s also a good example of how the use of online video can help boost publicity for a book. She filmed a video of herself making one of the projects for her book and it’s now syndicated in various places on the web.

What is the best way to blog? Be yourself.

Marrus, an artist and acquaintance of mine, maintains a blog at LiveJournal. A friend of hers, Jeff Simmons, recently wrote about her in his own blog, Can Someone Please Explain?. In his post, Jeff credits Marrus’ achievements in integrated marketing.

One of the reasons that Marrus’ blog is such a delight to read is because it seamlessly blends the lines between her artistic profession and her life outside of work. Some days you’ll read about her pet chicken and other days you’ll hear about her fight to sell prints of her artwork in New Orleans’ French Quarter.

The strongest reason, however, that Marrus has so many cyberfans reading her blog is that it is sincere. She keeps an online journal because she wants to — not, I believe, with any marketing slant in mind.

So if you want to check out a good example of an artist’s blog, whether for inspiration or pure enjoyment, jump over to Marrus’ journal.