Nathan Snell's Blog

The world is getting to know about you organically. Facebook is just giving it a push.

Nathan Snell — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 14:10:11 +0000

Last month I wrote a post on why Facebook should open up, and mentioned some of the subsequent benefits of doing so. Well, last week Facebook made everything published from your “What’s on your mind?” box available to view by everyone (including robots*), unless otherwise specified in your privacy settings.

How many people do we really know on our list?

When I first started out using Facebook, the only friend I had on there were those that I had personally met (which is really how Facebook started out). Now I probably get a friend request at least once a day from someone I’ve never met, or hardly know, most frequently involving business with the occasional friend of the fiance doing a bit of Facebook stalking to find out what the soon to be husband is all about.

I am sure we are all seeing that friend lists are beginning to become more and more bloated and they’ll only continue to as Facebook continues to see mainstream success with some 200 million users. This worsens as business leaders continue to adopt Facebook and as it grows as a networking tool (which is too bad, because I think LinkedIn is so much better designed for that). List saturation is inevitable.

Speaking of businesses, a recent survey shows that 60% of employers search the web when considering potential employees. At first that may not matter to you, but when they send you a friend request on Facebook, suddenly it becomes a lot more real. Do you friend someone who is potentially your new boss, or do you reject their request? I bet a quick way to lose a potential job is to reject their friend request.

The world is already getting to know about us organically.

The more these 6 degrees of separation type friends and acquaintances begin to saturate our friend lists, the less it begins to matter that Facebook is making our information available to everyone – because it’s already happening organically. The organic growth of our online presence should be of no surprise since the web is constantly moving toward a more open platform (both naturally and due to giants like Google giving it a swift kick in the pants). Our choices then becomes embrace it, or start learning to use Facebook’s advanced privacy settings.

robots*: What is being referred to as “robots” above, and in the readwriteweb article as a “robot”, is actual programmable code that will be able to view and store all of that status information on Facebook. This allows companies to then use our data for products or applications. Note twitter’s application success for why this is good.

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One wordrpress edit that will improve traffic to your blog.

Nathan Snell — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 08:10:20 +0000

I think search engine optimization has been blown way out of proportion. It’s been made this almost mystic art of gaming the search engines and learning to speak google. I don’t disagree that being great at SEO requires a good set of technical understanding and knowledge (both of Google and HTML/CSS/XHTML). There are some tweaks, however, that fit into the category of SEO, are greatly important, but hardly require a technical depth. The one I am about to explain is a great example.

How to add a meta description just to your blogs index page.

First off, a meta description is a tag that holds the description of what your blog (or website) is about. Taking it one step further, search engines often use the meta description you provide as the description for your blog in the search engines results page (the page you see that lists all of the results for your search). Simple, right?

Why should you care about having a meta description?

A great blog post title can be the difference between a post that brings in a ton of traffic, links, and new readers, and a dud. Even if the content is awesome on it, if the title sucks, no one will want to read your post. That’s why most good bloggers spend a fair amount of time thinking about the title of their blog posts.

Your meta description works in the same way . While not the title of your blog, it’s the additional descriptive [sales] copy that accompanies your title. And good sales copy can help to convince potential readers to come to your blog.

How to add your own meta description to your blog’s index page.

Goto the admin area of your blog, click on Appearance, goto editor, and click the link that says “header.php” or similar. That will load your header file and its respective code.

Now, in-between the tags there’s going to be a bunch of stuff. Insert the following code somewhere near the “meta http-equiv”:

{
?> }
?>

And save the file. Viola, you’re done. Just for clarification, this will only add the meta description you specify to your blogs main page (otherwise known as its index page). The reason we’re only adding it there is because the meta description is effectively auto-generated for every one of your posts. The “effectiveness” gets a bit dicey when it comes to your index page, though.

Understand SEO and Your Blog

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When 1 day looks like 1000 years.

Nathan Snell — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 03:55:31 +0000

I’ve been pressing more into God lately, and it’s been awesome, even considering I’m currently going through a “desert” (as is often referred to). My spiritual father shared something this past Monday that stuck with me, and that I wanted to share here.

“With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.”
2 Peter 3:8

Consider that at its core, Christianity is about a relationship with the one true God. I think we sometimes overlook how much our Father in heaven wants to spend time with us, and the degree of His love. The above verse is a perfect example.

Often times, it’s no big deal to us if we miss one day of prayer, or a day of really taking time with the Lord. To us, it’s just a day. But to our Father, that day is like 1000 years of missing us.

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iPhone development Revenues, Costs, and other import market information

Nathan Snell — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 19:59:56 +0000

A few weeks back I was doing some research for an idea I had that involves an iphone app. As I came across the information, I went ahead and tweeted it. Since I’ve spoken with a few people since then about iPhone app stuff, I figure I’d share the links I found regarding it.

Development

Must read and sobering post on apple app store development and revenue models.
iPhone app dev costs can be anywhere from $20,000 – 150,000 according to Forrester research
NimbleKit: #iPhone native app development using Html and JavaScript (as opposed to ObjectiveC).

Market Place

The average shelf life of an iphone app is 30 days.
Reports show that apple’s app store apps may actually be getting cheaper.
iPhone possibly the best platform for mobile ads?
A closer look at the iphone app store revenue numbers, and potential app developer revenues
How much can you really make from free iphone apps?

If you have any addition links or info that would be of benefit, feel free to tweet me, leave a comment, or e-mail me!

Let’s be nice!

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When everything I thought I knew about relationships changed… and I got engaged.

Nathan Snell — Sat, 30 May 2009 13:47:21 +0000

After I decided when I planned to propose to Stacy, time slowed down until that day came – and then time stopped. Probably the longest, most anxious day of my life was March 24th, 2009 when I proposed to Stacy.

I had a great plan. I normally go way over the top when I do things for her, but I knew if I did that she would suspect something. The proposal had to be a total surprise, so I was going to fly it low, under the radar. I thought for weeks.

A surprise flight to New York to see Phantom of the Opera? No. The second we hit the airport she’d know.

A hot air balloon ride at sunset over a beautiful area? A bit strange.

Purchasing a house and then when looking at the house, “deciding” to buy, proposing and announcing the house? Good, but wrong focus. It’s about her being the most amazing woman in the world, not about a house.

Then I had it. Our first date landed us at night on the beach. We talked for hours, until early morning, and about all the things you’re not supposed to talk about on a first date. Religion, politics, family – the works. It was awesome.

That’s where I was going to ask her, at the same spot I realized she was the one I wanted to be with forever so many months ago. Oh, and it had to be at sunset because sunsets are pretty (It’s like adding “in bed” to the end of your fortune cookie fortune. Except it’s “at sunset” and for date plans).

Now that I had the location decided, the rest of it flowed. Stacy loves seashells. She’s like a kid in a candy shop, she picks up all the pretty looking ones and wants to turn them all into necklaces or bracelets. It’s great! I bought a giant seashell. One she couldn’t miss.

I love to tell Stacy how much I love her. I do it in various forms: words, love notes, surprises, etc. Not because I have to or I am trying to be sappy, I just think it’s a nice thing to do. I want to make sure her “love tank” is full. All the time. A love poem that I could stuff into the shell that I knew she would pick up at the place we had our first date was perfect.

A week later, I execute my plan. We’re walking on the beach, and I’m telling her sweet things that make her smile. I pause to direct her attention to a shell she can’t refuse to pickup and as soon as she does she sees the paper and gives me a look. I love that look.

As she unfolds my love note/poem, she pulls it close to her face to read (I have horrible hand writing which worked out so perfectly), blocking her vision of me.

“Stacy, will you marry me?” I ask on one knee, ring box open and extended in her direction.

Shocked, she starts laughing and crying at the same time, backing up a little.

“Uhh-huh!” she couldn’t quite get a ‘yes’ out but the semi-verbal was even better.

Already sized, I slipped the ring onto her finger. The clocked ticked 7:04pm on March 24th and I became the happiest man ever. Praise God (He totally set us up)!

(For those curious about the after part, I followed up the proposal with dinner at the restaurant we ate at the night we first told each other “I love you”.)

Advertising And Social Networks – A Model

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Make thought become action

Nathan Snell — Thu, 14 May 2009 15:27:08 +0000

Every time I hear Richard Johnson, the former CEO of Hot Jobs speak, I always think to myself that I need to be putting myself out there more, improving my edge, my experience, and just the presence of my character. It’s because he’s just got that kind of aura of knowledge/edge to him, much of which I am sure just flat out comes from experience.

That reminder was placed in me again today as Richard spoke briefly at the Coastal Entrepreneurial Awards here in Wilmington, NC.

Richard and I have chatted a number of times from when I first got to know him a little while at UNCW, but while he was speaking, he had a great remark I hadn’t heard before about what he learned when he was in the recruiting industry.

“Make thought become action. Every time you think of something, you pick up the phone and you do something about it.”

Obviously not in a brash manner, but I thought it was a great statement for an entrepreneur. To-do lists and prioritizing tasks are always important, but I think there comes a time where you have to put down the list and take action. I think there’s a lot of ideas that don’t get executed, whether it’s a new business or just a new product for a business, because people get so caught up in lists, or policy, or fear.

There’s the old adage that says half of business success is showing up. Well, while not entirely the other half of business, it ought to be added that after you’ve shown up, take action.

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That transitional period

Nathan Snell — Sun, 10 May 2009 22:07:21 +0000

I can’t speak for everyone, but I know after a certain point in my spiritual walk there came a transitional period. This for me was a transition away from the struggle of disbelief as to the foundations of Christianity, into a struggle of faithfulness, or trusting in the Lord and what He says. Stacy and I were having a great conversation on this topic last week, and I wanted to share a great analogy she had.

An analogy for confidence and trust.

All of us have our gifts or talents. I would say, with most of us, we also have a great confidence in those talents. I think even if we sometimes hit a rough spot or fail with our talent, we usually persist, still believing in our ability for success. Let me give an example.

Singing and business.

Stacy is a very gifted singer. Before Stacy is about to sing, she already hears the note she is going to sing, so when she prepares to sing, she trusts her voice to produce the beautiful note.

I personally have no idea what it’s like to be able to replicate a note like Stacy. But I know that I can look at a business and immediately analyze its model and areas of opportunity. In fact, it’s hard for me to shut my brain off after analyzing a business because once I know the model, or see their opportunity, the steps to help them succeed preoccupy me from everything else. You can ask Stacy, as my desire to help the company succeed often leads to overcommitment of my own time.

There are times, though, when the steps I put together for a business aren’t exactly right, and sometimes Stacy sings a note and it’s off (though not usually by a lot). But Stacy and I still have total confidence in our ability, even considering that neither her talent nor mine is in any way perfect. I am sure we’re not the only ones with confidence in our talents.

The place our confidence is missing.

This analogy strikes me when thinking about God. We can have such confidence in our own talents, whether we are failing with them or not, yet we don’t have the confidence – the trust – in God and his promises. It’s easier for us to believe we can write that book, grow that business, sing that melody, or find that job than it is for us to believe that God is true to His word, guiding our path if only we ask.

The greatest irony of it all, for me, isn’t that at times I have more confidence in my gifts than in the One who gave them to me, it’s that even after God has distinctively proven to me that when it’s in His hands it’s greater than anything I could ever do, He still has to battle for my trust.

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3 articles you should read if you care about technology

Nathan Snell — Thu, 07 May 2009 15:28:18 +0000

It’s been a super busy week here at work. I’ve been integrating a design our graphic designer here put together (he rocks) for our new content management system (CMS), working to finish up an SEO audit for a site that really needed it, migrating our sites to different web servers, working on our new content strategy, and outlining a new product that we’ve been working on here at Talk. Because of that, I’ve been a little slow to get a few posts I’ve been working on out, but they’re coming up – rest assured.

In the mean time, I wanted to share with you 3 posts that I found particularly interesting that apply to internet technology and what might be significant developments with some online properties like Twitter.

1. The former VP of Google’s Search Quality is now the VP of Operations at Twitter. As such, it’s on surprise that Twitter is starting to get more serious about their search as they begin to index the links that are shared on twitter. Depending on how things go, there could be some newer, interesting times on the interwebs.

2. One thing I’ve always thought was brilliant was how Google has always had these smaller strategies with their various properties like Gmail, Google Docs, Google Maps, Google Reader, iGoogle, and so on. These smaller strategies obviously had bigger purposes behind them, with an even larger strategy behind that. It’s no surprise, now, as what Google is really moving toward is having one account to rule them all – socially integrating their services.

3. URL Shorteners have become very popular. It’s difficult sometimes to see where the value in these are, but from the beginning of its launch, I (and many others) could see Bit.ly was going to take the delicious cake. Well, it has, and the reason is because they’ve got an awesome plan. A small aside to that – I wouldn’t be surprised if we see an API develop that allows a custom URL shortener for sites. There’s a need for it, certainly.

While not qutie as mentally juicy to me, I still thought it was interesting enough to further the thoughts on why firefox could be the real facebook challenger. Nothing against Mozilla, but I don’t quite see it happening in the same light. I do think browsers will be undergoing a significant change, however.

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Why Facebook should open up – It’s better than Twitter.

Nathan Snell — Sun, 03 May 2009 15:50:10 +0000

Twitter is a great service. I mean, who doesn’t love to be constricted to 140 characters when they want to say something? Less is more, after all. And the less room you have to say in one tweet, the more you have to say in several, which means the more time you have to spend using Twitter.

What makes Twitter popular?

The activity level is part of what makes Twitter so attractive to businesses. Another important factor is that everything anyone says on Twitter is free to be read by anyone. This makes it extremely easy for businesses to do market research, see what you love and what you hate, or otherwise build tools (like social crm) with little hassle to monitor what’s being said, or interact with those of us on twitter. The constant activity on Twitter combined with Twitter’s openness is part of what’s helped Twitter’s widespread adoption.

Is 140 characters enough?

Twitter is a content ecosystem built from too much free time during lunch and a lot of link sharing in an effort to build more traffic to your own endeavors. While this may benefit Twitter because the purpose of you being there is less about friend activity (like Facebook), I think Twitter’s content may actually be sub-par.

Yes, there are some instances where more in depth conversations take place on Twitter, but they are fragmented to say the least (they can’t not be). Then there are smaller utilities that Twitter is used for, but I would bet these activities are a small percentage of activity on Twitter.

Facebook needs to open specific content to be viewable by everyone.

Enter Facebook, Twitter’s fat older brother. Yes Facebook has more features, a bunch of spammy applications (which are more relevant to me than auto-follow floods from Twitter), and a team that never seems to be satisfied with their interface design. But Facebook also has legitimate conversations and tons of content being created by its users in the form of shared videos, links, photos, wall posts, notes, quizes, profile updates, statuses (tweet tweet!), and comments.

This leads to the quality of content on Facebook being of much higher value, and if Facebook gives open access to all that content in the same way Twitter allows, that will revitalize (and maybe even monetize) the social network. This isn’t something that can be done overnight, obviously, due to Facebook’s terms of use, and simply how the social network has worked thus far. But it is probably the most valuable thing they can press on towards, and they are. It’s just a matter of time until Facebook opens up big, garnering more adoption from businesses, and business-oriented services.

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The struggle of boldness

Nathan Snell — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 13:13:54 +0000

I used to ask God for patience. I tend to be an impatient person, so I never quite understood why God wouldn’t give me patience when I asked. That is, I never quite understood why until a wise friend of mine and I, Anthony Horvath, were having a conversation on this topic one night. I was telling Anthony about my amazing girlfriend and he was telling me about his book and then we somehow got to my frustrations with not receiving patience. He gave a great response.

“You asked for patience but don’t really want it, because what you’re asking for is the trial that requires you to issue patience. You just want it without any work.”

He was right. People don’t want to have to go through what’s required to learn patience, they just want it. Poof. But it’s not magic, it’s character. I’ve since changed my thinking on patience, welcoming the trials that teach me it.

Then God challenged me in various ways with boldness. Why wasn’t I blogging about my faith? I’ve never wanted to be the kind of person who forces it on people, but why wasn’t I at least sharing it? That applies to here and in person.

It’s because usually talking about faith makes Christians and non-Christians feel uncomfortable (there are obviously exceptions). But maybe people need to feel uncomfortable. Not all the time, of course. But enough to spur them from complacency because everything in life is progressing forward, so if you’re not pressing forward, you’re moving backwards. I don’t think people should be left behind, in business, in life, or in faith.

I think boldness is a different beast than patience, though. Being bold means seemingly putting yourself at risk. That’s why it’s usually harder to become bold than to become patient, even though you learn it the same way.

In business we call boldness “innovation”, and the same principles apply. You don’t become innovative by wanting to be innovative, or telling people you’re innovative. You become innovative by working at it and by going through the trials that require you to learn it.

Apple is innovative because they work at being innovative. They released the iPhone, which is a huge success with 21 billion units sold and having just hit the billion mark on number of apps sold. They also released the Apple TV, which no one is talking about anymore.

It can be difficult at times, being bold and putting yourself out there at risk. I think it’s worth it, though, as I remind myself that boldness starts with me having a humble confidence in myself, and my beliefs. And I know it effects those around me, businesses and individuals, because I’ve already seen (as I am sure we all have) the positive effects of others with a humble boldness.

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Nathan Snell's Blog

The world is getting to know about you organically. Facebook is just giving it a push.

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One wordrpress edit that will improve traffic to your blog.

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When 1 day looks like 1000 years.

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When everything I thought I knew about relationships changed… and I got engaged.

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That transitional period

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