Logo Design Blog

While doing some semi-random surfing using Stumbleupon, I came across a website, 10 Ways, that is a collaboration of five designers, each with two projects. Two that caught my eye are Light and Information, both found under project Sumona. They are variations on a similar idea, using images (from Getty Images) in a fascinating way.

Light has a collection of images mapped onto a a rotating sphere that you can interact with.

Information starts with an initial image, and as you zoom in on area, you see a grid of smaller images that constitute the image – like pseudo-pixels. The idea is not new, but it’s presentation on a website is not one I’ve seen before.

I recorded a 3 minute screencast of a “journey” through Information, which you can see below. Please note: all of the images used in the Information project and thus the video below are property of Getty Images.

If you think customer loyalty can be achieved by using cutting edge customer relationship management (CRM) software and different loyalty programs, think again. Just like in friendship, loyalty must be earned through excellent service and high quality products, over a period of time. Borrowing the words of Zoomstart, loyalty is all about making unconditional connections.

Customer loyalty does not happen overnight. You should be sensitive to their needs and follow it up with action. Here is a simple 3-step method to start building loyalty:

Sit Down and Listen

If you want to learn more about your customers, then you should talk with them as often as possible. Know their habits, buying patterns and their feedback about your current performance. You might also want to use them as part of your crowdsourcing initiative.

Test Drive

If you are implementing some changes in your products or services, you may want to test first if it will satisfy your customers or if it will add value over your current offer. In some cases, they will agree with the idea but totally disagree with the execution. Product testing will bridge that disconnect.

Say Sorry (If Necessary)

If you make some mistake, admit it right away and assure your customers that it will not happen again. Do not let this matter escalate to a point of breaking up your professional relationship. You should also offer something in return like discounts or gifts for giving you another chance.

Business experts are one in saying that your employees are your greatest assets. They are the movers of your ideas and contributors of great insights. That’s why selecting and hiring new employees are very important tasks for many entrepreneurs.

Equally important is measuring how well they are faring compared to their assignments as well as their relationship with other employees. Also, employee performance reviews offer a glimpse of their satisfaction level with your company. To make each review more productive, here are some things you should do:

• Be ready. Gather all information you have and read it carefully before talking with an employee. This will give you enough time organize your thoughts and handle the discussion.
• Criticize the performance not person. Avoid any personal attacks and do not provoke your employees. Be objective and highlight both their high points and low points.
• Probe on the job satisfaction level. Most of the time, poor performance is strongly related to poor job satisfaction level. Make the evaluation a two-way communication and find out what you need to improve or change to improve satisfaction.

It is advisable that you have a formal system to evaluate your employees. You can read a comprehensive guide from Seeds of Growth on how to implement a performance management system.

After carefully assessing your startup ideas, the next step is effective implementation. However, some entrepreneurs are stuck in the market research and idea-generation stage. This is what we call analysis paralysis or over analyzing a situation without taking any action. If you want to start earning then it’s time to start working. Here are some starter tips:

Write Your Action Plans.

Nothing is too complex once you break it down into small pieces. While micromanaging is strongly discouraged, this is a situation where attention to details is very much needed. Getting a 20 percent market share, for instance, seems like a very easy task. If you work backwards and start outlining the things you need to do, you’ll soon realize how much effort is needed to achieve this goal.

If you are a solo business owner, you might want to identify the tasks you can outsource so you can focus on the essential matters.

Establish Accountabilities

In some cases, you cannot do all the things you’ve included in your action plans. You should start dividing the tasks according to the competence and experience of your staff. Commonly, we are the designated project leader but if you have a more qualified staff, do not hesitate to turn over this task.

Implement and Monitor

Stop procrastinating and start working once all tasks and accountabilities are in place. Identify and celebrate all milestones to easily monitor your progress.

As a guide, you might want to use the Action Method tools recommended by MarketingProfs Daily Fix to make your ideas happen.

If you haven’t explored Technorati, the blog search engine, you might be surprised at what a great tool for bloggers that it is. This short list shows you there is more to Technorati than you might realize, and many of the features are useful to bloggers.

1. Find hot terms: top searches.
   Want to know what people are searching for on Technorati? Check the Top Searches list. If you search for the same terms a fair bit, use the Watchlist feature, which acts like an automated search aggregator.
2. Find hot terms: top tags.
   Technorati indexes blogs and assigns one or more tags for each blog post. The Top Tags tag cloud displays what tags are most common at the moment. This data can change at any time Technorati indexes new blog posts anywhere in the blogosphere. Note that Technorati tags might overlap blog platform categories but are not the same.
3. Find popular rich media.
   Want to know what videos, music, movies, games and other items are popular right now? Technorati scans blog posts – that it has indexed – for links to known “media” sites such as YouTube, IMDB and Amazon and builds a Popular list.
4. Blogosphere search.
   Search for blog posts mentioning a specific keyword/ phrase. The results are displayed starting from the freshest.
5. Find niche blogs.
   Search for blogs falling into a specifc niche category. This is a great tool for building up Top X Blogs lists for a certain category.
6. Track backlinks.
   Use their Cosmos feature to determine who is linking to you. Amongst other uses, this also helps you track blog carnivals you might have been accepted into.
7. Get traffic.
   Once Technorati indexes your blog, that could bring you traffic, especially if you are writing in a popular niche. It’s not guaranteed, but it could help.
8. Spread trends
   That’s “Where’s the Fire?”, not the other meaning. WTF is Technorati’s social voting feature. Submit a brief description of a topic to create some buzz about it. You can include relevant links, so a WTF might bring you traffic. Just don’t spam WTF.
9. Claim your blog(s).
   Let other Technorati users know that a blog is yours by claiming it. You can even put an avatar up if you like, and your bio.
10. Favorite some blogs.
    The Favorite feature simply aggregates the latest posts from any blogs you add to it. They can be your own or someone elses. Essentially, you can use it in lieu of an RSS reader.
11. Customize Technorati tools.
    Use the Technorati API to build custom applications, or use one of the many widgets or plugin tools.
12. Find popular blogs.
    See what sites have the greatest buzz going. Blogs listed in the Technorati Top 100 already get a lot of traffic, but being on the list is sort of self-perpetuating. Or at least it had been, and many bloggers complained that they didn’t stand a chance at cracking the list.

    Then Technorati started applying a sort of momentum measure for Authority. That is, Authority indicates the number of sites linking to your blog, but those links are no longer permanently recorded in Technorati. They’re only good for 180 days. So newer popular blogs now stand a chance of knocking off veteran bloggers.

Bonus Use: Web 2.0 logo mashup random slideshow.
Here’s how to have some real web 2.0 mashup fun. This is completely frivolous, but a bit of entertainment.

1. Sign up for a free Technorati API key.
2. Pick a term, any term.
3. Build a Yahoo! Pipe and use the URL Builder and Fetch Feed modules to retrieve search results for that term.
4. Sort results chronologically (most recent first).
5. Use the Term Extractor module to extract any keywords.
6. Use the Loop and Flickr modules to pull 1 or more images that have tags related to each extracted term.
7. Feed the output URL to a slideshow player such as SplashCast.

It’s quite possible I’ve forgotten something, since there’s a lot more to Technorati than just a blog search engine.