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I recently logged on to twitter to find a strange @reply message. It simply said, “@bretttilford check this out http://jzyky9.com” I didn’t recognize the name so I clicked on the profile. It was another dreaded spam account. Argh.

Lucky for me twitter recently released a much needed report as spam feature. You simply go to the profile page of the spammer and the click the Report for spam button on the right tool bar. Here’s a picture of my brothers profile for reference (btw he’s not a spammer, this is just an example)

This should come in super handy. I’m going report as spam crazy over the next few days. You can find twitter’s post on the topic here.

Photo Credit: ‘Pong

Our very own Charles Williams recently published an NES ringtone pack on his blog. If the mention of games like Duckhunt, The Legend of Zelda, and Super Mario Bros 3 find you hearkening back to the good old days, then you should appreciate this. Enjoy.

Photo Credit: Sabino .

The number of twitter followers you have no longer counts for much. There was a day when having 500, 1000, or 10,000 followers was impressive. It meant a huge number of people had opted into communicating with you because they liked you, your message, or your product. However, between spam accounts and auto-follow practices it’s easier than ever to get a huge ‘following’ of thousands of people who aren’t listening to you.

I believe a far better way to measure your effectiveness on twitter is around the idea of influence and interaction. How many people retweet or ‘@reply’ you? How many folks are talking about you or with you? Those are the real questions you should be asking. Your goal on twitter should be an authentic community, not a huge fake following.

*Twitalyzer is a great app for analyzing your twitter influence.

Photo Credit: woofer_kyyiv

Whether we admit it or not we all love a good story don’t we? Plot and intrigue simply get us going as a species. It’s almost as though by hearing others tell stories it helps us process our own, and for that reason alone we love them: we can’t stop hearing them and we can’t stop telling them. This is why the companies we love to buy from, the companies with huge followings and passionate fan bases, are doing so much more than selling widget ‘X’ at a fair price. They’re telling us a story that we resonate with, something with plot and sizzle. Remember those L.L. Bean Catalogs you used to thumb through as a kid? Those were telling millions of people a story they wanted to hear. A story about walks in crisp winter snow with the family or fireside chats with our significant other, all made possible by high quality fleece and Egyptian cotton.

I’ve never been to Teavana but apparently they’re doing a wonderful job of telling their story. How do I know? A close friend of mine recently showed up at the office with a brand new tea set in his hands and a fantastic tale on his lips. He’s a hard core coffee drinker but before I knew it he was spinning tales of ancient chinese tea secrets, the benefits of steeping in cast iron pots, and the fact that the freshness of loose leaf tea’s can be examined with the naked eye. He was absolutely raving and couldn’t wait to try out some of his new teas. Three days later I’m at my brothers house when out of nowhere he says, “You’ll never believe what I bought today!” Before I can blink he’s telling me the same story and letting me hold the beautifully designed cast iron pot, cups, and saucers. The enchantment was all around us, I found myself dreaming of sipping tea with the Dali Lama and other people full of wisdom and vitality.

Any company can make up a story as part of some marketing intiative but they’re quickly found out as frauds (especially with the rise of the internet where information travels faster than lightening). The best companies absolutely believe and embody their stories. They feel it down to their toes. For them marketing isn’t something that’s slapped on at the end and design isn’t an after-thought. Everything about the business is done intentionally, each piece a chapter in their grand narrative. Moleskine, The North Face, TOMS Shoes, and 37 Signals all have a story to tell and they’re doing a heck-of-a-job of telling it.

How about you? What story is your company telling?

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Two great books on this topic are Design by Tom Peters and All Marketers Are Liars by Seth Godin.

Photo Credit: vociferous.

Every yes, is a no to someone else. The problem is that for many of us, this never crosses our minds. Our boss asks us to stay late at the office for something pressing and we quickly respond with a yes, not thinking about the fact that we just told our family no. We’re working on an important report that needs to be completed today when we hear our email alert go off. We open our laptop and take a peek at our inbox, the email is marked urgent! We drop the report and say yes to the email. We walk outside to go for a jog when our neighbor spots us across the lawn and hollers our name. It’s been awhile since we’ve chatted so we proceed to do just that for the next 45 minutes, effectively saying no to our new workout routine.

Sometimes we think we can get through life saying yes to everyone. We hate the idea of letting people down so whoever is currently asking us for time or energy gets whatever they want, which gives us the illusion that we never say no. This is bull. The reality is that we’re saying no all the time, and even worse than that we’re lettings ourselves be bullied by the urgent and missing what’s most important. The key is to know your priorities and choose those each and every day.

Photo Credit: Ferran.

Have you ever taken an entire day to “veg out”? I’m not talking about a day where you rested a bit, I’m talking about a day where you acted like a literal vegetable all day? Perhaps you watched the entire Lord of The Rings trilogy, slept the day away, or completed season 1 of Lost. How did you feel at the end of the day? Personally, I usually feel pretty crappy at the end of these 12 hour extravaganzas. It’s almost like I rest so much that I exhaust myself.

I think we begin the day with a certain amount of creative capacity, and our only job each day is to get that out of us. If you’re passionate about writing then you need to sit down and write, if you love sales then you won’t feel settled until you’ve called a potential client, if you’re a developer then the only way you’ll be happy is to hammer out a few divs. The weekends are no exception either because our creative capacity doesn’t take a day off. (I suggest doing something different on the weekends because mental rejuvenation is important, but you still need to create).

We were born to create, to try new things, to stretch ourselves just a bit each day. It can be difficult though because part of us just wants to just sit on our butts and do nothing. A part of us seems to think, “the less I do the more happy I’ll be!” Trust me, that’s a lie. For the sake of your own happiness leave nothing uncreated, empty yourself each day.

Photo Credit: fotologic

Enlightening birds eye view of personal branding in this presentation by Dan Schawbel.  He covers the four parts of everyone’s personal brand: discover, create, communicate, and maintain, then gives some really practical tools for implementing each of these things in your life. Read the rest of this entry »

The personal branding space is really starting to heat up and so I thought it might be helpful to provide a list of influential people and helpful tools to obtain knowledge and tips for developing your personal brand. (Listed in no particular order) Read the rest of this entry »

We just caught Gary Vaynerchuk’s keynote speech from the Web 2.0 Expo and it’s incredible.  For those of you who don’t know him, Gary Vaynerchuk is best described as someone who acts like he’s experienced a near-death encounter…although to my knowledge, this has never occurred. Read the rest of this entry »

Rob Cuesta is an expert on personal branding.  In his video he has some great insights into what exactly personal branding is, how personal branding helps you focus on your strengths, and the relationship between the personal and corporate brands.  You can also check out Rob’s Blog.