Switch to linux video....

So, we were in class watching a bunch of videos....I commented on this little beauty of a video. Enjoy!!

Internet Marketing Toolkit????

First, I'm not endorsing this website. But, I just Googled "Internet Marketing Toolkit" and came across a great example of how to not market oneself on the Internet.

The website, YourIMToolkit. Trust me on this one, I only added the link if you need a good laugh. The website has a constant popup disallowing you to read the material on the website. Additionally, the website reads like a boring 20-page novel from top to bottom without sub-pages. Would you want information on how to market on the internet from someone that cannot successfully represent a good online presence and really poor design? <>

Unfortunately, this was just the top link. All of the sites I found were similar....

I did find a great informative page, Internet Marketing Best Practices found with a google search of: Internet Marketing "Best Practices"

Based on what I read, I may add another blog about its contents...

Another Week Bites the Dust

So, another week...and what have I accomplished? I guess not much. My buddy Stephan came into town from Albaquerque, NM to celebrate not only his birthday but also have a baby shower for a soon to be baby boy Nicoli (he's channeling his Ukranian roots). I've never been to a baby shower, as this is typically a women's only event. I must say....kind of boring. But, I am the godfather, so I had to put on a happy face.

Additionally, I went to GameWorks where I had a great time racing horses on a game called Derby Owners Club. It is game where you mate a male and female horse, train the horse, and race the horse. Very fun. My friends give me a hard time about liking that game more than the shooting games like House of the Dead IV, but oh well.

I guess I need to write a little about Marketing, or even Internet Marketing. So, a bit of interesting news on our Google Online Challenge. We were added to the unofficial website GOMCHA. However, I just checked, and we were no longer on the site....BOOO! Regardless of that, we used up all 100% of our budget on AdWords campaign in the three-week limit. Very cool.

Also another cool factoid, I'm ranked in the top 130 (in the world) for a game called Towers of Hanoi (at least for those using the game on the iPhone). If you are interested in the origins of this game, click here. It is interesting to think that I can complete the 8 disk puzzle in under 3 minutes, and the origins has a 64 disk puzzle and an estimated time to completion of 600 BILLION YEARS.

Ok, long blog. I will write again later when my thoughts are in order...

Another New Business Idea

So, I was going to write this blog post about my personal mission of a business. Called InvestorRankings. I didn't end up creating the website. It is still "in the works" and may eventually come to fruition. But, I want to talk about something I noticed awhile back.

So. If you didn't know, I have an MBA from Wright State University with a focus in Finance. Yay. To get into B-School I needed to take the GMAT sponsored by the Graduate Management Admission Council. But why? I didn't want to go to Harvard. I wanted a non-traditional MBA program that was close to my place of employment that would allow me to work and do my assistant coaching gig. That was neither here nor there. However, noticed something on the way out. Where was the assessment of knowledge gained? There is an opportunity for a business there.

The JD (Juris Doctor) degree that law students get has a test at the end. The Bar Exam. Heck, they get paid to study for it by whatever firm picks them up.

The MD (Medical Doctor) degree that medical students get also has a test called the USMLE, United States Medical Licensing Exam before they are admitted to being a resident.

Is there an equivalent in the land of Business School? Could it be applicable? I'm certain that some form of assessment could help to acually quantify the ability of the students of any given MBA program. I don't know, just a thought. It would take a whole lot of PhDs sitting in a room coming up with an appropriate set of questions to ask MBA students...but it could have a very high profit potential. Who wouldn't want to demonstrate they learned just as much as the guy or gal that went to Harvard?

Anyway, my 2 cents.

Blogging. Why?

Well, I've talked about why or what I'd be blogging about. Things that are relevant to me. So, why is that important? Why is relevance important? Well, from my humble opinion relevance is the crux of the importance of blogs. Sure, we're typing away and potentially no one will read what we write.

BUT--if it is relevant to someone else, they might. There's an inherent power in the concept of relevance. It creates a congregation and aggregation and summarization of relevant articles. For example, the political race in the US for the Democractic Nominee. We've all seen the articles, watched the news day in and day out. Every week the message is different. Why? Does the relevance or importance of yesterday's message disappear? No. So, over time if we can aggregate all that information we can then make a more informed decision.

Meh...I've been rambling. I think I've been on overload with papers and projects in and out of school that I forgot what I was going to write about. Which I just remembered...time for a new blog post.

A Generation of Opportunists

So, the title was catchy. But, not really relevant to the text in here. I've been in communiblogo recently. I apologize for that. If anything I should have been blogging more about all the fun and interesting things that have happened.

As a recap:
My hurdler, Gary Sims, has been running phenomenally. In the 110 High Hurdles, he's down to 14.48. This is really a very fast time for a first year college high hurdler. As some of you know, the hurdles get higher in college....I just wish he could get his grades up to monopolize on his athletic talents. I'm finding myself mentoring him more on work ethic than how to be technically perfect in the hurdles.

The track team that I coach went to Delhi, New York to compete in the NJCAA Division III National Championships. The end result was a national title. This is a Back to Back victory for Renee Zellner, the head coach of Harper Track team. This has been a great honor to be a part of the team for this year (which could have only been possible given my current standing of Full-Time Graduate Student)

What else.....ah...I've been forced to expand my internet experience to Second Life. When I say force, I really mean pushed. It has been interesting and I've travelled to see Versailles, The Acropolis, The Statue of Liberty, Accenture, to name only a few places.

How is this relevant? Well. As a start, the fact I'm writing this and it is stored is internet marketing in one sense or another...but I digress. It really isn't relevant, the main blog will be posted shortly.

Online Challenge Day 1

So, things were a bit tricky today. Dumb me, I didn't activate my campaign ads until around 10am. Seeing as that my particular campaign in this group is for Commercial Staging. Be that as Real Estate Sales or perhaps corporate housing furnishing projects. Maybe residential people that want to "stage" their home like on HGTV or other channels and sell the house.

Anyway, the corporate folks are only at work from 7am-6pm--so I missed out on some times.

Anyway, our campaigns did fairly well. We only spent $3.10 today. But, we had roughly 14,000 impressions, but only 18 clicks. The good news...we're learning. Next, we will need to help the webmaster optimize the website. Hopefully the skills taught to us by our expert professor, James Moore, will be used on a very short-term basis and we can get the website optimized, the website optimized, and higher on the results list.