I was asked for my take on Google Plus on the day of launch. So here it is:

1. Competition can only help the social networking space. If Google+ gains any traction then Facebook may look to match and better. Hopefully the user wins.

2. The social networking space is littered with shipwrecks over the last decade +.  Just on the odds alone (not the product) the chances of anyone succeeding are low.

3. The social networking space has also been one of rising and falling stars. MySpace.

4. Google needs this bad. Social search is a big hole in their search offering. (Not good for a search company) Social recommendations can be an important factor in the decision to buy.

5. Because its important Google will probably keep evolving this. Think Chrome, Gmail & Docs. What we see now could look quite different a few years down the track.

6. Google has attacked the biggest weakness in Facebook – controlling the level of intimacy – with its drag and drop Circles. Interesting to see how well it works. Just as interesting will be the workarounds to allow Facebook connections to be  move into the Google  ecosystem.

7. Facebook does not need to fail for Google to be successful with this. The +1 data are are potentially more valuable to Google than its non-search competitors. And Google can monetize anyone in its ecosystem by serving paid search results.

8. Google has existing properties – like YouTube – where the +1 could be rolled out straight away.

9. Fits nicely with Google’s new inititatives in local business, payment and deals. e.g. have “show me deals” enabled on your mobile, get the alert, grab a meal across the road, pay with Google payment and give a +1 rating. Google makes money on the front end – deal and payment – and gets the +1 data for its backend. Nice business model.

10. Hangouts group video chat looks interesting. Could we see another MS (Skype) vs. Google (Hangouts) battle for this space?

And if you’re not sure what this is about A simple explanation of Google Plus is here

Listen to the Gary Vaynerchuk Podcast

All 3 of these guys have made a big contribution to the Bricks & Mortar IM space.

In real estate where a “buyer” is usually seen as someone likely to buy within the next few weeks Dean has shown the value of niche relationship marketing over 18 months and more. Most of us in B&M can learn from this. Particularly on the “big ticket” stuff and where there is high lifetime value to the relationship.

How many B&M businesses will tell you that all that matters to their customers is price? Joe took an industry that had largely been a commodity industry with low barriers to entry, endless price cutting and some shonky business practices and take it into a space with more value creation, quality, pricing power and a lifetime relationship with the customer. Again there are some big lessons for most of us in B&M here.

And Gary took an industry where most family businesses were content to sit in the corner sucking their thumb complaining that there was no way they could compete with the bulk buying – big discounting liquor chains. He found and exploited the weakness of the big corporates by building authority, a tribe and communicating naturally and personally. Its hard for the corporates to compete with the personal, edgy Wine Library TV. In the process he’s shown B&M how they can blow away their geographical boundaries and directly reach customers through their own video channel.

Listen to the Gary Vaynerchuk Podcast

“No matter what happens, however, my course of action will remain the same: I will continue to build and develop Thesis and trudge through the evolution of this software.”

Posting on the DIY Themes forum Chris Pearson pledged to continue to build and develop Thesis win or lose a possible GPL licence breach case:

Re: #thesisWP The Reckoning
scott,

Ultimately, it’s impossible to predict what all the market effects of switching to GPL might be. Pricing would be unaffected, as would our ability to charge for Thesis. As far as the functionality within Thesis is concerned, there would be no effects whatsoever. Externally (outside of DIYthemes), who knows—people would be able to rip us off legally, so I reckon anything is possible there.

angryandcliff,

If this issue goes to court (I don’t think it will) and DIYthemes loses, then Thesis would necessarily become a GPL product. No matter what happens, however, my course of action will remain the same: I will continue to build and develop Thesis and trudge through the evolution of this software.

Please keep in mind that if a court decision is ever to happen, it will likely occur at least two years after the time the lawsuit is filed. Given that this bridge is far off in the distance, we’ll cross it when (and if) we get to it.
Last edited by pearsonified; 5 Hours Ago at 12:56 PM.

And here are the Mixergy interviews:

Would WordPress Sue The Maker Of Thesis, A Leading WordPress Theme?

Thesis Theme: How A Well-Designed WordPress Theme Became Big Business

Ever since Lisa popped out in 2007 we just assumed that she would always get all the cuddles she wanted and that she would sleep with us. This is traditional in Japan – with futons on tatami there was no bed to fall out of – and it just seems natural.

When Lisa was a baby Aunty Reiko would cuddle her all day and at the end of the day she was sooo happy.. excited, laughing and smiling. and it began a strong bond with Reiko that she will probably always have.

Our western thinking seems to think in terms of learning independence as early as possible. But what of is the point of becoming independent if we don’t feel loved, safe and secure? Surely once we feel loved, safe and secure our development moves ahead in leaps and bounds, like we’ve found with Lisa. And in the future this will mean not just independence but being able to lead, inspire and mentor others.

I only stumbled on this philosophy of Attachment Parenting by accident when I found internet guru Dave Taylor’s Attachment Parenting Blog

I found that to move forward we needed a lot more pages – probably over 1,000 in the long term – a blog and much better code on our flagship website. With a custom site it was $100 a page and weeks of drama just to do fairly simple stuff. And we needed foreign language and product niche websites.

With WordPress and Thesis I can put up a new page in under a minute with just a few clicks. And even putting up a new site only takes 10 minutes. The time is in the customisation and content.

There is more on the Thesis theme here. And some sample Thesis sites here.

The corporates are now starting to use it too, like P&O and Krispy Kreme.

I will never have a 100% custom site again – just too many hassles – and platforms like WordPress, Drupal and Joomla are now just so good.

Why WordPress?
Needed a blog on the site anyway, so why not use WordPress for the whole site?
Good internationalisation for building foreign language sites with same structure.
Huge user base and third party plugins and apps.
Regular updates

Why Thesis?
SEO optimised out of the box.
Separates out the code for easier customisations and updates.
Big user-base.
Great forum support.
People who were using it were smart people. If they were using it it must have something going for it. Matt Cutts, Brian Clark, James Schramko, Andy Jenkins, Jeff Walker etc. etc. etc. and theres more moving over all the time.

Is Thesis perfect?
No. It can still be frustrating sometimes.. I wish there were more simple click the radio button customisations available right out of the box.. but I think they’re coming. I don’t envy Chris Pearson’s job in having to base Thesis on the ever-changing third-party WordPress. But Thesis could be brilliant in a few years and probably more futureproof than most other options.

Needed some coolers for our “always on” (or nearly always on) notebooks. Got some of these. Brilliant! They now work much cooler, much faster, and freezes or crashes are (almost) a thing of the past.

I wouldn’t want to be a Microsoft shareholder at the moment. With the Windows OS losing market share – particularly in the exploding mobile market – and with their flagship Office suite now matched and bettered by the free Open Office and Google Docs.

But there’s a couple of their products that are great:

Microsoft Keyboards – Strong, well built and zoom lever is great for small pictures and text. I’m hard on keyboards – goes back to learning to type on a manual typewriter – and often wear out keyboards. But I’ve never worn out one of these… (yet)

Microsoft Wireless Mouse – Moulded to hand size with both big and small available – zoom lever is great for small pictures and text. Hard to go back to wired mouse once you’ve used them. Use rechargeable batteries. The Laser mouse is better than the previous generation optical mouse…. more accurate and can be used without mousepad.

A bit weird that the only product I like from a software company are there peripherals… but it is what it is…

And the Ricoh Dentrex

More on Water Picks here.

Love this new toy Sonicare.

When thinking about rolling out some niche websites I went to look at how the best marketers are doing it. Particularly the ones who really get it – by understanding the conversation thats going on in the prospects head – and are constantly testing how they connect with that conversation.

I’ve found that one of the best Internet Marketing learning strategies is not just to learn from what successful marketers teach, but to directly observe what they do on their own web properties.

Information marketer and internet marketing guru Eben Pagan asks the question “Does Your Website Give Or Take?” I’ve never heard it asked before about a website. But if you look at a lot of commercial sites they’re often about the company or product – and how great they are – rather than about solving the needs of the prospect.

As Eben says, “Where is the spotlight?” of the website. Is it focussed on the needs of the visitor or the company or person who owns the website?

Its interesting to see how Eben has applied the formula to his flagship “Double Your Dating” site. The old Double Your Dating had been up for years and Eben had been constantly testing and tweaking. It had become one of the most ripped off sites because of it.

Instead of the entry point to the marketing funnel being a one page “squeeze page” Eben’s revamped flagship “Double Your Dating” site uses this “giving” approach. Let’s take a look at it:

Sidebar is on the right hand side with Widget 1 Video Dating Tips on a YouTube video, Widget 2 the optin box, and Widget 3 the links to articles on the site. Interestingly he’s put the Video Dating Tips video in top position, in the top right hand side “Golden Area” where typically the optin box would go. The optin box is below the video in Widget 2, but still above the fold.

He’s now duplicated the formula with an update to the Catch Him & Keep Him. He kept the old format for this site up for some time while he was testing and tweaking Double Your Dating. It obviously worked for him to roll it out on the other site.

I’ll keep watching these sites to see how they evolve. It’s a great education in website design.

Eben’s previous sites sparked a wave of clones. I wonder if these will too?

P.S.  You can get a similar layout to this in the WordPress  Thesis Theme with the Thesis Play skin.  Needs some customization to get the Teasers in blocks with thumbnail, etc.