There it is in every photograph, in every video, like a shining beacon of intelligence and humor. I wonder if he has ever had hair, or perhaps he has a full, luxuriant growth that he has to secretly mow everyday.

Seth Godin made a brand out of baldness.
For this image to work as an icon he has to be totally, unabashedly, and completely bald. Not a glimmer or hint of living follicles can grace the top of his cranium, not one hair can survive the razor’s edge of his intellect and drive to be remarkable. He has to be proud of being bald, no hiding it or combing it over.

His head resembles a light-bulb.
When a man is truly bald, he cannot help being noticed. As an idea-man, I am sure that he knew that the best way to show that he is a genius was to have his head look like that icon of idea-generation: a light-bulb. Why not use baldness as a way to take over the (marketing) world?

Baldness as a brand is not new, in fact, it may be the Idea-Virus that Seth caught as he tussled with how to make himself a Purple Cow in the eyes of the public and peers. Seth had a historical precedent: movie star Yul Brenner struggled to become famous, and couldn’t make any headway until he allowed his razor full access to the top of his cranium. A shiny skull made Yul an icon in the movie world, making him somehow irresistible to female fans, but it didn’t convey the idea that he was the Mensa of Marketing.

How did Seth ever hit on the brilliant idea of turning what most men might think of as a liability into a memorable brand? I like to imagine a thought bubble emanating from his celebrated cerebellum:

“Now, what can I do to make my image remarkable?” “How can I convey the idea that I am a marketing genius just by using my head?”

The solution is now history.

Copyright Aliyah Marr

If you are a new blogger/website owner, you may want to learn how to install and use Press This. Press This provides a lightning-fast way to publish a link to a page or post from any website to your blog without ever visiting WordPress.com. It’s as easy as clicking the Press This bookmarklet while you’re viewing the page or post you want to share.

This morning, I went to use Press This and I got a “this tool is depreciated” message. Huh?

Sick WordPress blog or website? The WordPress Doc is ready to help!

I searched to see what happened and couldn’t find any documentation except via WordPress.org (not .com). A longer search returned this page. Apparently, Automattic changed the tool without telling us. It isn’t even here in this documentation.

If your Press This applet is no longer working for your WordPress blog, I recommend that you follow these instructions.

1. remove the old Press This bookmarklet
2. select Settings from the blue interface
3. select Writing from the menu at the top
4. drag the Press This link to the bookmarks or favorites area of your web browser

A little trick: I tried this first in my blog’s “black interface” (accessible from “Admin”) but it didn’t work until I tried to access it in the “blue interface”* Not exactly the same as before, but I can at least breathe a sigh of relief…

Need help with your WordPress blog or website?

via Press This — Support — WordPress.com

Of course, as a graphic designer and marketer, I like to reflect on why Apple placed their logo upside down for me, a loyal customer, and dedicated user.

Apple has always been an example of great branding and marketing. Of course, the Apple logo has to read right-side up for the potential buyers of the brand, not for the already-convinced users. The rule of repetition in marketing is operative here; the more often a potential customer sees the logo, the more the idea of owning an Apple is implanted in his subconscious mind. So, the logo needs to be upright for him, not me. So, my owning a computer with an apple on the cover makes me into a quiet evangelist for the brand. I don’t mind evangelizing a brand that I like so well.

For more ideas on how to “market without marketing” please read my book, Squawk! Social Media for the Solitary Bird.

And I am not alone. Convinced Apple users are more than just computer users who bought a certain kind of computer; many are evangelists for the brand. Why? Because Apple is the computer that fulfills the original promise of the personal computer: it makes your life easier. But more than that, it is a computer with style. The higher price point reinforces that point, rather than detracting from it: only those who appreciate the beauty, style, and design of a utilitarian object will ultimately buy Apple. Apple fans WANT Apple products to be more expensive so that they can join an elite market that shares the same refined design values. The higher price point keeps the riffraff of the dull utilitarian user who doesn’t appreciate art and culture out of the store.

I call this phenomenon “Elite Marketing,” a term that defines a type of market share of users who see themselves as belonging to a smaller group of individuals who share common values, in this case, they value beautifully-designed utilitarian objects. The same difference separates the buyers of Chrysler Sebring’s and Jaguars: both cars share the same purpose and will get you where you want to go, but one of them does it in style.

One of the major reasons that people buy Apple products is that Apple leads in computer style and design. But, if they didn’t know it when they bought the product, they soon find out that they bought better-designed hardware and software; a computer that won’t get many—if any—viruses, and one that almost never breaks down. Good design again.

Now, like any style leader, Apple has had its imitators. But, without exception, these copycats see only the exterior of the brand. They try to compete with the outward style, but they lose the main point: Apple products are designed well inside and out. Every detail is thought out from every design standpoint. Apple employs design leaders in every field: marketing, hardware, product design, UI/UX design, web design, graphic design, GUI, etc.

I won’t deny that sometimes they miss the mark, like the weird-just-incrementally-smaller-than-normal keyboard that shipped with the G4 towers. I had to buy a new keyboard because it made me miss all the keys when I typed. My personal favorite faux-pas was the Cube, one of the most beautiful, classic computer designs that I had ever seen in my life. I actually lusted after this computer — I think a lot of my fellow designers did too — until I realized that the design was severely limited: it was impossible to add any hardware to the CPU. So it became, instead of a cherished classic, a paperweight or doorstop.

A well-designed, recognizable logo is the best kind of advertising. Every time I go to a cafe or to the local library, it is hard not to notice a field of illuminated Apples at the tables; it’s a testament to the growing market-share of my favorite platform. As a branding technique, the simplicity of the softly-glowing iconic logo cannot be denied.

I have owned Macs for my entire career as a graphic designer, and, I have to admit that one of the draws to buying this computer is that Apple — as opposed to every other brand of computer hardware manufacturer — pays attention to those kinds of design and branding details that make the computer and the brand appeal to people like me.

From the time I opened the lid of my first Mac, I have been impressed by the genius of this brand. Even the packaging is not overlooked; ease of use is emphasized, the brand carries the idea that Apple makes your life both easy and beautiful. A Mac computer, like any well-designed object, is a thing of beauty and a future classic collectible.

I have been a Mac enthusiast since the days when I taught software packages through online videos; I had to show how to use the same software on both Macs and PCs and used to grit my teeth whenever I had to get on the PCs to do my work. Everything about the PC was clunky, insulting, primitive, childish, or just plain wrong. I found this essential difference impossible to describe to an avowed PC advocate. Since they belong to another group of evangelists who don’t share my design values they simply couldn’t see what I was talking about.

Years later, I had the chance to work for Apple in the educational division. I would have been employed in teaching users how to use the interface without having to crack a manual. Since the early days of interactive design, expert usability designers have known that the best design is the one that “teaches” the user how to use it without the user realizing that he is being taught. The user doesn’t even notice the design or realize that he has had a question, it is answered so fast by the presence of the “transparent” platform. Again, another, case of good design. Apple is the king of transparent design.

To a large degree, I buy Apple because the design of the computer puts me in a smaller elite class of computer users, those who appreciate the good design, both outside and inside, that the brand “Apple” has come to represent. There are many other reasons, of course, and they mostly have to do with the fact that the design itself makes the computer easy for me to use.

Design today is so much more than visual design: it now stands for several kinds of design at once:

• visual communication
• branding
• usability
• transparency

The question I have to ask myself is: if tomorrow another company started making computers as good as or better than Apple, would I switch?

And my answer? Only if Apple dropped the ball and I could no longer believe in their collective genius. For now, I have nostalgia to add to my evangelism; after all, I have seen my career develop on their platform, in fact, I would go so far to say that I would not have become a graphic designer if I had had to do it on a common PC.

Copyright Aliyah Marr

Aliyah Marr is the author of The Avatars of Eden and Parallel Mind, The Art of Creativity: The (missing) manual for your right brain

#CreativeDirector #Branding #CareerDevelopment #HuffingtonPost #FastCompany

SaveSave

The “em” dash is generated on the Mac in all programs by hitting three keys at once—

shift + option + dash (I do this so automatically that I had to look at the keyboard when I did it just now.)

I wasn’t sure how the en dash is used so I looked it up and learned something new:

Q. What is the difference in usage between an em dash and an en dash?

A. I will try to condense the various bits of information scattered throughout CMOS. First of all, there are three lengths of dashes: hyphen (-), en dash (–), and em dash (—). I frame it this way because the work they do is roughly related to their length (though I don’t think CMOS puts it this way outright).

The hyphen connects two things that are intimately related, usually words that function together as a single concept or work together as a joint modifier (e.g., tie-in, toll-free call, two-thirds).

The en dash connects things that are related to each other by distance, as in the May–September issue of a magazine; it’s not a May-September issue, because June, July, and August are also ostensibly included in this range. And in fact en dashes specify any kind of range, which is why they properly appear in indexes when a range of pages is cited (e.g., 147–48). En dashes are also used to connect a prefix to a proper open compound: for example, pre–World War II. In that example, “pre” is connected to the open compound “World War II” and therefore has to do a little extra work (to bridge the space between the two words it modifies—space that cannot be besmirched by hyphens because “World War II” is a proper noun). Now, that is a rather fussy use of the en dash that many people ignore, preferring the hyphen.

The em dash has several uses. It allows, in a manner similar to parentheses, an additional thought to be added within a sentence by sort of breaking away from that sentence—as I’ve done here. Its use or misuse for this purpose is a matter of taste, and subject to the effect on the writer’s or reader’s “ear.” Em dashes also substitute for something missing. For example, in a bibliographic list, rather than repeating the same author over and over again, three consecutive em dashes (also known as a 3-em dash) stand in for the author’s name. In interrupted speech, one or two em dashes may be used: “I wasn’t trying to imply——” “Then just what were you trying to do?” Also, the em dash may serve as a sort of bullet point, as in this to-do list:

—wash the car

—walk the dog

—attempt to explain em and en dashes

This explanation is not intended to be exhaustive (for much more, see chapter 6 in CMOS 16), but I do hope that it helps to frame the different potential of each length of dash.

via Hyphens, En Dashes, Em Dashes : What is the difference in usage between an em dash and an en dash?.

I am a professional designer and published author. Here is my publishing process in a nutshell:

1. Research a good title.
2. Design a cover.*
3. Write the document in Word.**
4. Check it for formatting, spelling, and grammatical errors.
5. Convert the document to an epub file.
6. Write a description for the book in a TextEdit document (Notepad on the PC)
7. Log in to Kindle; create the title and fill in the info they require.
8. Upload the book interior (the epub) and cover.
9. Check that the book looks OK in the Preview on KDP. Submit for review.
10. Approve it or go back to correct errors (step 4), redo steps 5-9.

* I design my cover for the print edition, save it for the later CreateSpace print edition, and then reduce it for the ebook/Kindle edition.

** I format the Word doc before I start writing to streamline it for eventual ebook/Kindle production.

A lot of skills are involved in publishing a book; it can be overwhelming for the first-time publisher.

I have written a book that makes publishing on Kindle a snap, taking you through the process step-by-step; it can help you streamline the process and remove a lot of confusion.

HOW TO GET A GREAT KINDLE BOOK COVER

I recommend hiring a professional designer, who has a proven track record in book cover design. Hire one who designs for your genre; for instance, I specialize in designing book covers for certain genres. Ask the designer to design your cover for a print book (includes enough image for a back cover and spine), and then output a version for your ebooks and Kindle editions.

PRICING  YOUR BOOK

Kindle offers a great service that allows you to determine how to price your book. It is still in BETA at the time of this writing. Currently, a book at 70% royalty option maxes out at $9.99, and can be set at a minimum of $2.99. You can set it higher or lower if you take a 30% royalty instead.

HOW DO YOU PUBLISH A BOOK ON KINDLE?

Establish an account on Kindle here: https://kdp.amazon.com You will have to give them your tax information, address, and other account information. They will then let you establish an account, and you can upload your book contents and cover when you are ready to publish. (Don’t forget to save your password and user name!)

COPYRIGHT AND ISBN NUMBERS

Your manuscript is automatically protected under US copyright laws, but you might want to record your copyright here: http://copyright.gov/. This gives you more legal leverage should you encounter any problems. The International Standard Book Number (ISBN) is a 13-digit number that uniquely identifies books and book-like products published internationally. In a nutshell, whoever owns the ISBN number is the publisher to your book and owns the rights to publish that edition. ISBN numbers cannot be transferred, so if you are using any POD publisher’s number, they are the publisher, not you. Each version of a book must have its own ISBN number, meaning the digital version and the print version each must have an unique identifier.

Don’t worry! An ISBN number will be assigned to you on KDP and on CreateSpace should you publish a print edition using their service. Or you can buy your ISBN numbers from here: http://www.isbn.org/

HOW DO I CREATE AN AUTHOR’S PAGE ON AMAZON?

Anyone can create an author’s page, go to https://authorcentral.amazon.com. Once you have an account, then you can submit a bio, claim your books, and track your sales.

WHAT IS AN ASIN NUMBER?

“ASIN stands for Amazon Standard Identification Number. Almost every product on our site has its own ASIN, a unique code we use to identify it. For books, the ASIN is the same as the ISBN number, but for all other products a new ASIN is created when the item is uploaded to our catalogue.” ~ Amazon

SUPPORT FOR KINDLE BOOKS

KDP support for Kindle books: https://kdp.amazon.com/self-publishing/contact-us

Author Central support: https://authorcentral.amazon.com/gp/help/contact-us?

SUPPORT FOR CREATESPACE

If you’re using CreateSpace for Print-On-Demand (POD) publishing services, contact support here: https://www.createspace.com/pub/services/contact.request.do

https://www.amazon.com/Yourself-Kindle-Publishing-Publish-Steps-ebook/dp/B017MDHQDG

I back up onto a hard drive with TimeMachine. Since I work outside my home, this backup gets done maybe once a week. This is good if your computer ever crashes and you have to reinstall everything. It has saved my files on more than one occasion, but this backup is not an incremental backup.

For that, I have a cloud-based system. I keep the files I am working on in the folder that is linked to the cloud. Whenever I save a file, it writes over the one on my backup. But what happens if you need to go back to a former version or if that file gets corrupted?

Once, years ago, my project became corrupted, and I lost months of work. I had not saved a duplicate version.

So now I have a very simple technique: it involves two folders, both on the cloud. One folder is called “Older Versions” and the other is named by the project. The Older Versions folder is inside the Project folder.

In the Project folder, I have two files: my main project file and one that is a dupe of that file from the day before.

Whenever I start my workday, I take the dupe and dump it into the Older Versions folder, and let it replace the older copy of the same name in the folder. Then I make a new dupe of my working file (on the Mac, this is as simple as hitting “Command – D” on your keyboard).

Then I start to work on the project file. If for any reason, I lose my original file I have a dupe in the same folder from the start of the day. If that is corrupted too, I can go back to the old version in the other folder. I can never lose more than one day of work.

Try this method and you will be securely protected against the loss of your work.

ISBNs cannot be transferred or resold. So any vanity publisher like LULU or CS is not giving you an ISBN and they actually hold the publishing rights to your work, in that edition that is identified by the ISBN.

I originally started in 2007 with Lightning Source. I bought a package of 10 ISBNs and published a few books under my own ISBN numbers. However, when CreateSpace came along, I realized that my publishing process needed a way to submit changes without incurring additional charges. And then, a couple years ago, I decided to redesign and retitle all my books. Some of them I had to retitle several times, since I would get them out on Amazon after a week or more of work, and I already had a competitor with almost the same title.

ISBNs are linked with the title, subtitle, the physical size of the book, and the number of pages. Every time you make a change to one or more of these elements, you have to publish under a new ISBN. So, these changes would have cost me not only time, but money and my precious ISBNs!

This is why I publish under CreateSpace now.

The advantage in using your own ISBN numbers is that you “own” the publishing rights in that edition. However, if you make a lot of changes to your book after you have approved it for publication, you might want to use free numbers.

The SEO or search engine optimization game is to try to get at the top of the search engine’s list of relevance or ranking for each keyword search term. Marketers have tried various ways to fight their way to the top of this heap or words: repeating a keyword in the text, including it in the title of the page, using metatag keywords or metatag descriptions, hiding the repeated words on the page in copy the same color as the page, or in the alt tags descriptions. Some of these are still valid marketing tools, others are now disqualified as “spamindexing” techniques. Search engine developers try to stay one step ahead of the marketers who hope to trick them. Therefore, it is best to prepare copy that truly represents your product or service, while including the more obvious keywords that people may naturally use to find you.

Good copy depends on saavy and honest marketing skills, and should be written for the target audience. Copy that is pertinent to your product or service makes it easy for the user to buy from you. This has always been the best way to advertise, and makes your copy “evergreen” because you are not trying to stay ahead of the constantly evolving search engine algorithms.

Many websites deliver content that is badly written, or they deliver too much copy on each page, resulting in a confused and overwhelmed viewer. This is where good site architecture can be combined with good copy for outstanding bottom-line results. Editing, organizing, shifting, and redistributing your content enhances good communication, which results in happy clients and increased profits.

Copyright Aliyah Marr

Aliyah Marr is the author of Squawk! Social Media for the Solitary Bird
and Parallel Mind, The Art of Creativity: The (missing) manual for your right brain

Then I found CreateSpace. I haven’t looked back: last year, I celebrated my 7th year of book design when I published my 11th book, The Avatars of Eden. All of my books are now printed by CreateSpace and available on Amazon: Aliyah Marr.

Here is the record of a chat I just held with LightningSource.

–begin chat–

Aliyah Marr
I published 3 books through you, but I have republished all those books (some of them several times) through CreateSpace. Now I have 11 books on Amazon, the print versions throughCreateSpace.

First understand that I am a professional graphic designer who is a published author. I design all my books and design my client’s books. In fact, I sent some of my clients to you and they have become book publishers in their own right. Now, however, most of them are on CreateSpace.

May I state why I decided to switch my business to CreateSpace?

Becky
You may.

Aliyah Marr

1. CreateSpace doesn’t charge any setup fees.
This is important when you find that you have a small or large error in your book and you have to correct it.

2. CreateSpace has an astounding user interface.
This allows a professional such as myself a seamless way to upload my files.

3. CreateSpace is Amazon.
Enough said.

4. CreateSpace has distribution world-wide.
They have deals with printers in various countries.

5. CreateSpace connects the reviews of my ebooks (Kindle) with the printed versions on their site.

6. And most important: CreateSpace has better print quality.
I once tried to talk to the tech department at LS about the lack of print consistency from page to page. They were able to tell me that this is due to different toners on the heads, but they were not able to correct the problem.

Another time I tried to talk to a printing professional at LS about how to up the quality in the books from my end. They had no idea what the various printing terms meant. They are not printing professionals, they can only run the book making machines, IMHO.

7. CreateSpace has great turn around too.

8. Lastly, I was never able to really talk to anyone down at LightningSource.
It seemed that my account manager was never in the office, and never returned my calls. Have any of these items changed? I mean, I haven’t really dealt with LS for years.

Becky
We do have support available 7 days a week.

Aliyah Marr
Have any of the other items on my list changed?

Becky
CreateSpace and LSI are very different platforms for differing types of publishers who have different needs.CreateSpace does use Ingram Distribution and printing. They are a customer of ours. Some publishers feel that the services that come along withCreateSpace better suit their needs as self-publishers.

Aliyah Marr
Yes, I know that CreateSpace is a customer of yours. I assume that I cannot control the quality of a book outside the US, but those that I see from CreateSpace are excellent in quality inside and out. Whereas the ones from LS were not consistent at all.

Becky
I’m sorry, but chat serves as a way for publishers to ask quick questions concerning their LSI accounts. If you are interested in discussing CreateSpaces’s services compared to our own, you are welcome to give us a call for a more thorough and satisfying exchange. Do you have any questions concerning your account?

Aliyah Marr
Will you please submit my list of observations to whomever may care to receive feedback?

Becky
Yes. I will.

—end of chat—

I assume that my feedback won’t have any effect. But I hope that this helps others who want to publish their books.

via The New and Improved Ingram’s Lightning Source