Sloan Creative

I created this video for the Trust for Working Landscapes and made it available on-line.

It was surprisingly easy to do with software that comes free on most computers. I used Microsoft Movie Maker, but there are a number of great options out there.

Download the film

It’s a large (28 Meg) Windows media file.

I could have posted it to YouTube, but that would reduce the quality so I chose to have it streamed by Yahoo.

I’ve just created a new blog focussed on the many benefits of using blogs as the basis for an organization’s web site.

I called it The Sloan Blog About Blogs

It’s based on my years of web development and consulting experience, as well as my more recent experience with blog software. In fact, this entire site is built within a blog.

If I can help in any way, let me know.

“It’s like spending a lot of money on a car, but every time you want to drive it you have to pay more just to get the keys.”

Web 2.0, Blogs and Wikis, Oh my.
With the advent of Web 2.0 (Blogs, wikis, and social networking) and Google’s new search techniques, your website has to be fresh. Either your content will seem hopelessly stale or no one will ever see your site because you will end up on page 13 of Google’s search results which have recently been refocused on the freshness of the content (see page 3 of the linked article above), rather than on how many people link to it.

To convince visitors of anything, you must be relevant and real. Marketing today requires an ongoing dialog with your customers and prospects, we’re all burned out on irrelevant, silly broadcast advertising (junk mail, TV ads, or banner ads).

Blogs to the rescue
Websites based on blogs solve both problems cost effectively.

A blog is simply a database that allows anyone with basic word processing skills to create content for the Web and have it be presented in an orderly, search able, professional format.

You are currently looking at a blog-based site, mine. They are amazingly flexible in that you can have both static pages and chronologically stacked content. I spent several years selling traditional web design services. After many years working with designers and business owners, I realize that there needed to be a better way.

With WordPress I found it.

No expensive, attitudinal designers.

• Complete control of content
• Hundreds of professional- looking, customizable free themes to choose from
• Automatic search engine optimization
• Incredibly easy to add and maintain fresh relevant content
• Allows the distribution of work-anyone in your organization with the ability to type can create useful content for your customers
• Flexible, technologically advanced
• Free

I have now set up several blog-based sites for local community- building organizations and businesses.

Free samples

If you would like to learn how blogging would fit into your Web marketing strategy, I’d love to share what I’ve learned.

Please contact me to set up free half-hour sample session.

My friend Molly Gordon has found success by writing what is true for her and letting coaching clients who resonate with that find her on the web.

I’ve always come from a much more proactive and hands-on selling culture, but I’m dipping my toe into these waters.

Here are a few early attempts at writing on small business marketing topics.