Here’s the evolution of SEO – Search Engine Optimization – a nice visual of the SEO historical timeline.

I remember lots of these early search websites and web directories. I even remember SEO developments like metatags, keywords and link-back strategies. What do you remember? Any SEO tips you care to share?

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ICANN approved new top level domain (TLD) names today. Does this mean major brands now have a shot at having their name as the TLD name? interesting move! So, will we see Dell.dell or IBM.ibm? The web will sure look different!!

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SXSW Chaos Management Central

SXSW is a one crazy puppy of a conference. This is my irrational attempt to bring order to the insidious onslaught of chaos coming my way. Well any way… here’s my calendar of possible events I’ll be attempting run around and attend.

I will be doing a blog post soon with some tips on how I am planning to keep my sanity, avoid crazed zombies, find and attend the most awesome and *relevant* events/panels/parties; also, do some good ol’ fashioned networking to solidify connections with all kinds of “smarties”. Throughout this marathon conference, I will do my best to blog with photos/video content in real-time so I can share all this SXSW goodness with you guys. See my full calendar on my SXSW page.

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Research by Scores.org

Great infographic!

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Dell, Inc., in an effort to pro-actively listen and solicit valued feedback, hosted their inaugural DellCAP event at company headquarters this past week.

What is DellCAP?
What is DellCAP you ask? “DellCAP” stands for Dell’s “Consumer Advisory Panel.”  Dell, over the course of two days, sat down with two separate groups to engage in rich dialog about how the company is doing and soliciting consumer input on remedies to hot button issues.

The two groups  were comprised of consumers from opposite ends of the experience spectrum, i.e. folks that have had a bad experience with Dell (sometimes referred to in the industry as a “brand detractors”) and also folks that have been happy consumers, bloggers, social media enthusiasts, i.e. “brand evangelists” with good experiences working with Dell.  So, as you can see these groups are indeed polar opposites!  Dell conducted multiple sessions with the two groups this week.  The two distinct groups met separately; bad news first, then then the good.

Dell welcomed us to their world-wide headquarters located in Round Rock, TX, with gracious southern hospitality, to provide an open forum of discussion to understand our perspectives and to solicit our feedback and suggestions.  Dell is clearly looking to listen, engage and learn from this event and take what they’ve learned and develop actionable plans with recommended “corrective actions” to remedy the surfaced issues.

Mack Collier, the DellCAP Moderator, wrote a blog post two weeks prior to the DellCAP event and provided great details and insights about it  (read his blog post here).  @MackCollier did a fabulous job moderating our session.

As could be expected, Dell executives and employees received an ear full of richly detailed feedback delivered with a passionate fervor.  The feedback received was both positive and negative.  Conversations and creative ideas flowed from the passionate and lively discussions.   I can certainly say that Dell really came prepared to listen and engage both groups in order to understand and learn from the Panelists’ varied perspectives. Dell demonstrated their commitment to consumers and really convinced me that they are truly serious about change.

Distinct stove-pipe issues certainly popped up on both days… yet there were some key similarities, repeated patterns and issues that surfaced on both days. (Note: While I was only present for Day 2 I did review feedback obtained from Day 1 and observed similarities in feedback messaging).

Throughout the day, Panelists shared their stories (good and bad), along with their perspectives on needed solutions to remedy such issues; thus, if successful executed, could really place Dell at the top of the tech industry in terms on not only superior products, which they  are already well known for, but also return them to their former glory as the world-wide leader in client support.

Panelists enjoyed various sessions consisting of facility tours, panel discussions, executive briefings, upcoming product demonstrations (under NDA), and briefings on key initiatives such as their global IT Asset Recovery program (think Recycling and Re-Use) , which are arguably the best in the world for the tech industry – very impressive to say the least.  I wish I could share all the details on the great product demos, but we all signed NDAs… just know that there is some really great stuff coming soon from Dell. When those products are released, I will let you all know and share my insights on those innovative products.

Hopefully, Dell will do this again next year!  Companies large and small really do benefit from outside viewpoints and creativity beyond their own four walls.

So what is your take?  Do you have ideas that can improve Dell in your eyes?  What do you think is working? or not working right? What are the most important changes Dell should make?  What should Dell keep doing that you like?  I want your feedback too!  I’ll take your comments and capture them in a follow-up post and share with Dell.  So, don’t be shy… (and keep it classy ok!)

See what others are saying online, check out the twitter search feed for #DellCAP.

Related Posts (Day 2 content):

• Dell Community @JVMatDell: CAPturing the Moment
• Mack Collier @MackCollier: The next evolution for social media business is …
• Liz Strauss @LizStrauss: #DellCAP DAYS: How DELL Builds Trust Long Before a Meeting
• Fast Company @Gardener_Dave:  Dell Customer Advisory Executive Summary
• Shawn Collins @AffiliateTip: I’M ON TEAM DELL
• Susan Payton @EggMarketing:  Amazing day at Dell
• VIDEO – by @GuyNamedNathan: Day 2 – Watch @SusanBeebe on Dell Streak VS. iPad.
• VIDEO – by @GuyNamedNathan: Day 2 – Watch @cbenson on educating customers.
• VIDEO – by @Moon: Day 2 – Watch Dell’s Ed Boyd (VP User Experience) from Experience Design Group talk about how design has changed the company.
• VIDEO – by @Moon: Day 2 – Watch Dell’s Matt Parretta (Mobile) - Dell Streak First Sight
• Sarah Kimmel @Tech4Moms: Dell shows other companies how to listen DellCAP
• Liz Strauss @LizStrauss: #DellCAP: From Behind the Curtain to Next Steps
• Mack Collier @MackCollier: Teaching a Brontosaurus to run; My review of #DellCAP
• Sarah Kimmel @Tech4Moms: How Tech Brands Create Raving Fans

• – Did you write a blog post regarding #DellCAP?  If so, leave me a note in the comments and I’ll be sure to link to it, thanks!

Here are my photographs taking during the #DellCAP events … go take a peek!

#DellCAP

Disclosure: Dell paid for event costs, food, transportation, etc.  Since, I live here in Austin, TX area no hotel costs were incurred for my attendance.  Each panelist on Day 2 received a high-quality embossed, leather-bound journal and executive pen, both bearing Dell’s logo (very classy, love it!!).  I was not compensated in any other way.

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The first ever RIT48 competition kicked off this weekend at RIT University where students from various majors came together and were challenged to do the following:  form a team, plan, design, develop and launch a new web startup in less than 48 hours!  There were 10 teams competing for cash prizes, awards and recognition for their efforts.

I was honored to be selected as a Judge and Mentor throughout the weekend of March 19-20, 2010 for the first ever RIT48 event.  The teams all did a fantastic job of preparing Business Plans and Demoing their websites.  This was quite a treat for  me as I love to mentor and provide assistance to young startups.

“RIT48 aims to bring together RIT students from various disciplines to pitch, plan, develop and launch a startup in one weekend — or, as the name suggests, 48 hours.”   – RIT48

I will be uploading more event pictures later, but in the meanwhile I thought I’d provide a link to the Ustream live feed Video that was taped during our final judging of the RIT48 competition.

See next page for video…

At the Judges’ table (seated left to right):  Aaron Newman, Liz Lawley, Susan Beebe, Lee Drake and Jon Schull.

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As I am sure you’ve all seen the fairly new “retweet” (RT) feature released by Twitter, it has not been fully understood to date.  Influence on twitter was previously quite easy to track, but now with the new RT feature, it’s becoming less clear who’s influencing who.  For example, prior to the new RT feature a user would “RT” a tweet by simply copy/pasting the content like so: “RT @username: original content” (sometimes a comment was added too).  Then, the RT would be published out to the RTer’s followers.  Some of those followers would then RT the RT, thus establishing a clear line of influence, stemming from the originating tweet and RTs (to a point, of course).

What the old RT model showed was a path of influence on twitter (and how information travels – interesting stuff for sure!).  Now comes the new RT feature and this “influence” model is completely disrupted.  No longer can we track who’s RT’ing what.  It’s been completely flattened out. So, folks who RT can no longer see who is RTing a post after them.  So we lose the whole influencer in the middle (middle man influencers).  Now it’s all flat – just the original post and a lateral line to the RTs.  Whereas, previously we had the original post and a plethora of tangential RTs, with some fairly obvious track-backs, so to speak.

Why would twitter do this?  Two good reasons are potentially driving this decision.  First, data management and data storage optimization.  Second, establishment of twitter as an authentic news source (more on this in a bit).

Data management is a tricky proposition when a web startup takes off and begins to manage millions of records in their database(s).  The new RT feature is a smarter implementation at the database level.  Now with the new RT feature, the database could store just 1 original tweet plus a bunch of variable flags turned on/off (1 or 0) for the RT usernames versus the old RT model of originating tweet plus copies (e.g. 72 copies of that same tweet +/- variations thereof).  Thus, this is a very smart approach to shrinking the data footprint of RT content.

The whole “News industry” is currently undergoing a rapid change much akin to the industrial revolution.  Companies and jobs are folding every day as the old model of journalism is eclipsed by the new real-time web and emergent citizen-journalism model.  Twitter is a major component of this new version of “news.”  Thus, it is in twitter’s best interest to develop a trusted system for delivery of real-time news that is timely, reliable, authentic and trackable.  Since, the new RT feature preserves the originating author’s name and content, this perfectly fits with the news model.  Now we can see who tweeted what without alteration.  That is a huge move towards authenticity on the web – a must for reliable and trusted news content.  Twitter is positioning itself to be the most trusted news source on the web and this new RT feature goes a long way to provide just that.

Originators of news on the web will feel this impact in a number of ways.  Specifically, if they are RT’ed, then their tweets will show “Retweeted by x and x others ” (shows amount of RTs by users – think “reach” on the web).  For what I call the “middle man” influencers – the RTers out there – they will feel a negative impact as they no longer are associated with the originating content (and downstream RTs) as in times past.  Now, when a user sees a RT it just shows a pile of #s, so the middle man no longer benefits, i.e. their name is not associated with the originating post as it used to be (middle man influencers will see a drop in engagement levels based on RTs).

Overall, I think this is a fabulous move by twitter and applaude them for making the switch.  It’s smart and disruptive.  I like it.  It shows twitter has smart folks at the helm who understand the web and the future of it very well.

For me, I will definitely  use the new RT feature anytime I want to preserve the original tweet author/content.  If I need to add something (and there’s char space!) then I will add my 2 cents and RT that.  What’s your take? Do you like or dislike the new RT feature?  Think of other reasons why twitter would implement this new RT feature and let me know what you see.  I’d love to hear all your feedback and ideas on this!

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Click to enlarge / view dynamic source

Source: http://www.axiis.org/examples/BrowserMarketShare.html

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Earlier today, I was inspired by Tris Hussey to provide a comprehensive list of Google Chrome “power extensions.”  So, here is my exhaustive list of forty “must have” Extensions for the Google Chrome browser.  But first, to get started you’ll need to download the Dev version of Chrome (it works great on my new Windows 7 PC laptop).  Mac users can get the mac Dev version here.   Google Chrome is by far the best performing browser ever released to the web.  It will liberate you from the frustration so common with other browsers.

There are hundreds of Google’s extensions, so if you’re looking for something not on my list, then go here and search for it!  Please do let me know if have any feedback to share.  Feel free to recommend different extensions, or perhaps you know of a better version, than I have listed here:

AdBlock
Aviary Screen Capture
Better Gmail

Facebook for Google Chrome

Feedly

FriendFeed
OpenID AutoFill

Docs PDF/PowerPoint Viewer (by Google)
FlashBlock
Fittr Flickr
Google Apps Shortcuts

Google Tasks

Google Voice Notifier (by Google)

Ok, phew you installed all these great extensions!  Ok, now go tweak the “Options” for each extension here –> chrome://extensions/ You can also disable or uninstall extensions.  (I had to disable the “Cool Iris” one as it was crashing too much).

Subscribe to this blog (RSS or email) and follow me on twitter.

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Source: OnlineCollegesandUnviersities.com

via Is College Really Worth It? #Infographic hat tip to @FastCompany (Source: http://www.onlinecollegesanduniversities.com/) – Susan Beebe’s posterous.

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