You already know my experiences at SOBCon08 – at least those I could get down in a reasonable amount of time.

But aren’t you curious what others have been saying about it?

Well, I’ve done my best to compile all the posts I could find about the event. While extensive, this is likely not a complete listing. So if you have a post you’d like to add, please do so in the comment box and I’ll add it to the post below.

Did I read them all…no. But I did read most of them and commented on those I had something to add too. What always intrigues me most is that people often report more about their time getting to know someone then then they do the event content. Is there a little business secret tied up there? What do you think?

• Lorelle VanFossen on Blog Herald – Blogging is Not About You
• Lorelle VanFossen on Blog Herald – SOBCon08: A Conference Experienced in the Moments
• Joanna Young‘s Confident Writing – What I Learned From The Gifts I Received At SobCon08
• Joanna Young‘s Confident Writing -Â Chicago Pulse: Why The Windy City Was The Perfect Setting For SOBCon08
• Joanna Young‘s Confident Writing -Â Blog Writing Tips from 100 Successful Bloggers
• Joanna Young‘s Confident Writing – 10 Outstanding Definitions of Powerful Writing
• David Bullock – Business and Blogging: Trust, Community Building and Profits
• Terry Starbucker from Ramblings From a Glass Half Full – We’ve Got The Dreamers Disease, Reflections on SOBCon08
• Liz Strauss (THE Liz Strauss) – Meet Sia, the Heart of a Web Hosting Company
• Liz Strauss (THE Liz Strauss) – How do you Build an Incredible Experience
• Liz Strauss (THE Liz Strauss) – SuperTramp, Terry Starbucker and Chicago
• Liz Strauss (THE Liz Strauss) – SOBCon Influence According to BuzzLogic
• Liz Strauss (THE Liz Strauss) – Terry Starbucker Brings Sexy Back at SOBCon08
• Easton Ellsworth‘s Visionary Blogging – 139 Business and Blogging Improvement Tips from SOBCon08,
  
• Easton Ellsworth‘s Visionary Blogging – The SOBCon08 Step Forward Challenge
• Denise Wakeman of Biz Tips Blog and The Blog Squad – SOBCon08 Provided Great Insights to Social Networking
• Chris Garrett from chrisg.com – People of SOBCon08 (flickr)
• Chris Garrett from chrisg.com – SOBCon Report: Landed Home
• Chris Cree of SuccessCREEations – Down To Business At SOBCon08
• Brian Gardner, creator of Revolution WordPress Theme – Social Networking in Action
• Shashi Bellamkonda from Network Solutions – SOBCon08 – New Friends
• Jesse Peterson on Perfectly Peterson – Jesse’s SOBCon08 Takeaway
• Phil Gerbyshak of Make It Great – (Re)Connecting with Old Friends: Attitude Vitamin
• Zane Safrit – One great thing about social media
• Amy L from Earnest Parenting – What’s The Point of This Blog?
• Stephen Hopson from Adversity University – End of the Week Gratitude
• David Dalka – Remembering SOBCon08 – My House Guest Andrew Dubber
• John Gatrell from Spacially Relevant – SOBCon08: A Narrowcast Effort for Sponsors’ Brands
• Tammy Lenski of Conflict Zen – A Little Gift for the Weekend: Origami Crane
• J. Erik Potter – SOBCon08, Have We Met?
• Andrew Dubber – Postcard from Chicago – Blogger’s Beard
• Anita Bruzzese from 45 Things – Feeling Dumb May Be The Smartest Thing You’ve Ever Done
• Brad Shorr from WordSell, Inc. -A Question for SOBCon08 Attendees
• Matt Murphey from Matt’s Cuppa – Farewell SOBCon08
• Todd Jordan – Vong’s Thai Kitchen, SOBCon08 Dining Experience
• Chris Brogan – SOBCon08 Was Great
• Jared Goralnick from Technotheory – Why AwayFind? To Escape From Email (quick clip from SOBCon 2008)
• Sara from Suburban Oblivion – Suburban in the City
• Stephen Smith from Productivity in Context – Post Conference Productivity
• Stephen Smith from Productivity in Context – Oblique Strategy
• Derek Semmler from The Man Page – Step Out Of Your Comfort Zone
• Jen Knoedl – Liz Strauss’ Irresistable Offer
• Karen Hanrahan, Mother Earth herself – Thank You SOBCon08
• Michael Martine, the remarkablogger -76, 4, 58, 16, 12, 47: What Do These Numbers Mean?,
• Kristen King from Inkthinker – Can You State What You Do In Under 10 Words (or why I think my identity crisis may be ending)
• BuzzLogic’s Valerie Combs – The Top 25 Influential SOB’s
• Sonia Simone from Remarkable Communications – Monkeys and Bloggers and Tribes (oh my!)
• Derrick Sorles from Business Blogging Consultants – What is Social Media and Do I Need To Use It For My Business?
• Joe Hauckes from Working at Home on the Internet – My Take on SOBCon08: It Takes Passion to be Successful
• Karen Putz from A Deaf Mom Shares Her World – SOBCon08 – An Amazing Weekend
• Karen Putz from A Deaf Mom Shares Her World -Â SOBCon08 – What’s the Deal with those Klondike Bars?
• Sheila Scarborough from The Perceptive Travel Blog – Lou Malnati’s: going local for Chicago-style deep dish pizza
• Debra Moorhead – TCB
• Naomi Dunford from IttyBiz – What REALLY Went Down at SOBCon08

So what’s the marketing secret I mentioned above? Any idea?

And for SOBConers and non-SOBConers alike, just one question: what’s one tool you’ve most recently started using that’s changed the way you use your blog or social media? How has it affected your marketing and your business?

(note: image from Tojosan on Flickr)

The only problem I see with RSS right now is that not enough people know what it is and how to use it. What’s worse is so many don’t know why they should be using it.

So I’m always looking for simple explanations and tutorials that can help spread the message of RSS.

Just yesterday I found this short video on YouTube put up by the guys from Sketch Basement. While it’s no where near as entertaining or interesting as the widely spread Common Craft video that went around last year, it’s still a nice tutorial for anyone who wants to begin using RSS. Take a peak (4 mins long):

[youtube MhI06Tb0FSo]

I’d love to know what blog posts, videos, manuals, free ebooks, and audio programs you’ve seen that help explain RSS. Send it forward and I’ll take a look.

And I’d love to know how RSS has changed your business…and your experience of the web.

Ooh, wait a minute. I just found this video. More interesting than the one above. And definitely useful for people who don’t know what RSS is. Thanks to MarketingProfs.

As you can see, I love RSS. So I’m still wanting to hear how RSS has changed the way you’re using the web, how it’s changed your business and what materials you’ve found.

So I’m a huge advocate for people who want to begin blogging. As a matter of fact, while I still design and build websites (and blogs), I’m doing far more coaching and consulting with people who want to use their blog to increase their reach and grow their business.

One thing I’m constantly doing is suggesting blogs that new bloggers can read to learn more about blogging. And it’s been my intention for quite some time to create a list of blogs as a resource for new bloggers. These would be blogs and bloggers who I hold in high regard and who I, myself, continue to learn from.

But it looks like my colleague Drew McClellan beat me to the punch. He’s just released his New Blogger’s Toolbox. The Toolbox is a listing of bloggers who many of us consider great resources for learning the art of blogging. And since his list is pretty much the same as the one I’d put together, I thought I’d simply recreate here for you and all the people I speak with about blogging.

Drew also divided his list into useful categories. So here you go:

Chock Full of Practical Tips

• Converstations
• Creating Comments
• Yotophoto
• Daily Blog Tips
• Logic + Emotion
• Business Blog Angel
• ProBlogger
• Perfect Blogger
• Internet Marketing Monitor
• WebWare

Living Lab on Writing Compelling Blog Posts

• CK’s blog
• Priscilla Palmer
• Noah Brier
• I’ve been mugged!
• Electric Venom
• Styles of Blogging
• CopyBlogger
• Copywriting Maven
• Modern B2B Marketing
• Servant of Chaos

How to Build Community

• Viral Garden
• Sparkplugging
• Dawud Miracle
• Robyn McMaster
• Noah Kagan
• Christine Kane
• Come Gather Round
• Create Business Growth

Teach Marketing Tools

• Lonely Marketer
• Drew’s Marketing Minute
• Todd And
• Duct Tape Marketing
• Diva Marketing
• David Meerman Scott
• Small Business Marketing Mavericks
• Russell Davies
• Greg Verdino
• Jason Lonsdale
• Matt Dickman
• MP Daily Fix
• BizSolutionsPlus
• PodPress Forum
• Seth Godin
• CrapHammer
• Blogopreneur
• Hee Haw Marketing
• Conversation Agent
• Note to CMO

Welcome Wagons for Newbies

• Successful & Outstanding Blogs
• Converstations
• The Good Blogs

Contributors to Drew’s Toolbox:

• Robyn McMaster
• C.B. Whittemore
• Lori Magno
• Janet Green
• Joanna Young
• Paul McEnany
• Mario Vellandi
• Richard Cockrum
• Ryan Karpeles
• Liz Strauss
• Lewis Green
• Patrick Schaber
• Gianandrea
  
• Facchini
• Chris Brown
• Spinning Silk Multimedia

Thanks Drew, for putting this list together and making it available to all of us. You know, if you combine this list with my Ultimate WordPress Resource Guide, you’ve got just about everything you need to be a successful blogger.

And, if you have a blog that you think should be included that isn’t, please let me know in the comment box so I can add them and pass them on to Drew.

Also, in the future I’ll be sending lots of people to this page as a resource. So if you have comments on how any of these bloggers have helped you, please include it below…and know you’re helping someone who is learning how to blog.

(note: image Confused from An’veula on Flickr)

I could browse around just fine on my blog itself. However when I tried to do anything else I got this error message:

Error 403

We’re sorry, but we could not fulfill your request for /wp-admin/moderation.php (requested file changes based on task) on this server.

Your Internet Protocol address is listed on a blacklist of addresses involved in malicious or illegal activity. See the listing below for more details on specific blacklists and removal procedures.

Your technical support key is: 4428-b779-1366-73cd

You can use this key to fix this problem yourself.

If you are unable to fix the problem yourself, please contact dawudmiracle at gmail.com and be sure to provide the technical support key shown above.

Didn’t matter what I tried – comments, add post, delete spam, even update my profile – nothing worked. So I tried logging out and back in only to find out that I couldn’t log back in.

After a bit of frustration I found the error related to the Bad Behavior plugin. Here’s what Michael Hampton, BB’s developer said:

…Yesterday I moved all of my sites to a new dedicated server. In the process, I decommissioned an old blacklist I was running which I thought wasn’t being used, not realizing that Bad Behavior was still set to use it. Shortly afterward, I found myself locked out of my own blog, just as you all did. So therefore, this release.

So if you use Bad Behavior, you probably want to upgrade immediately (link begins download).

To upgrade the plugin simply do the following:

1. Download the latest version of Bad Behavior (2.0.11)
2. Unzip the download
3. Create an FTP connect to your WordPress plugins folder (wp-content/plugins/)
4. Upload the entire Bad Behavior folder into your plugins folder, overwriting the one that’s currenly there.
5. Try logging back into your WordPress admin

This should be fixed. It certainly worked for me. Just to be clear, I could browse my blog just fine. I just couldn’t do anything on it.

And…thanks to Joanna Young from BusinessBlogAngel for first bringing this error to my attention when she tried to leave a comment. Joanna, and everyone else, the issue is resolved so please join back in the conversation.

For a moment, imagine the mountain of voicemail, email and blog posts I came back too.

The first few days I was back in my office, I have to say, were overwhelming. It took me almost an entire day to just to listen too, make notes on and begin wading through all the voicemail.

And email…do I even need to go down that road? I hadn’t checked my email at all in three weeks, at one point. That stretch, alone, left me with 1,500 messages to sort through – not including spam. I started sweating as I watched the number of new messages keep climbing in my various inboxes and folders. Needless to say, I didn’t even try to get through them. All told, I had thousands of messages waiting for me when I returned. Not through them all yet.

Then, there’s the 190 or so feeds I regularly follow in my reader.

I’m usually quite judicious at going through my reader; looking for the most interesting and useful post titles. When open my reader daily, it takes me less than an half-hour to scan and partially read all the posts on 190 feeds. But that’s usually a few hundred.

What do you think happened when I didn’t check my reader in a month? Same as email…but worse. Thousands of posts sitting unread in my feed reader. I know some of them have to be great. I know that some of them have to be helpful. What’s more, I know reading some of them would help me as a blogger and a business owner.

But there’s just no way I have the time to wade through all those posts to find the jewels.

My option…just not read any of them. Let them all go. Mark them all as read. What I missed, I missed. Simple as that.

I does pain a bit. But I guess that’s just comes from being afraid I’ll miss out on something amazing. And, well, I haven’t really. Information that’s that good will be back around. And I’ve certainly not missed out on the important things…like family.

Anyhow, when you’ve gotten way behind, what have you done to catch up? Have you slogged the mountain of email and lived to tell about it? How?

Let’s not waste each others’ time! I want to help your blog or website quickly and efficiently AND you’ll get some link love on my blog.

That mention will drive traffic and help with your rankings in Technorati and the Search Engines. In order to do that, I’ve got to sneak up on your blog, and tip it!

How to get your Blog Tipped:

1. Mention my blog in your post, here’s the HTML:
   <a href=”http://www.douglaskarr.com” title=”The Marketing Technology Blog”>Get your Blogging Tips from Douglas Karr at The Marketing Technology Blog</a>
2. Drop me a line in the comments of this post with a link to your post.

My promise: I’ll spend a couple minutes reviewing your layout, usability, SEO, and your latest posts to find something that will help tweak your website or blog. I’ll make an effort to make the tip unique to every blog or website rather than trying to wuss out and collectively ‘tip’ multiple blogs.

Sounds like a pretty cool deal, huh?

Well, he’s been part of the team that has been redesigning Google Analytics. You can read about the whole new experience with Google Analytics to get an idea of what’s changing. Or read a great overview from Avinash Kaushik. Avainash has a ton of screen shots of the new interface, highlighting a number of new features. Last thing, take a tour of Google Analytics new features and design – definitely worth watching.

Of course reading this in Jeffrey’s blog this morning, I jumped right over to my Analytics account to see the updates. I was a bit saddened to see the same interface. I soon learned that the updates will happen to everyone’s current Google Analytics accounts over the next few weeks.

All I can tell you is the changes look incredible. As do some of the new features. Can’t wait until my account is updated.

Are you using Google Analytics? Do you find it to be useful?

Thanks to Jeffrey Veen for use of the new Google Analytics screen shot.

UPDATE: I’ve found a bunch of others who have done reviews of the new Google Analytics.

• First Look: Google Analytics Launches New Interface and Reporting
• Google Analytics Gets A Pretty Reporting Interface
• Google Analytics Relaunches with a Simplified Interface
• Google Analytics Gets An Upgrade
• Google Analytics Gets A Beautiful New Interface
• New Version of Google Analytics
• Google Analytics Redesigns
• Google Analytics Relaunches
• Hurray, A New Version of Google Analytics
• A New Version of Google Analytics Released
• Google Analytics Relaunched
• Google Upgrades and Re-launches Analytics

1. Lorelle on WordPress – If I need anything related to WP, I go to Lorelle’s site first. It is such a comprehensive resource. (Bookmark it NOW)
2. WordPress Codex – The second place I go when I need a question answered.
3. Problogger’s WordPress Resources
4. Alex King – I’m loving the Most Popular plugin (I have it running at CasualKeystrokes and it will be here soon)
5. cre8d design
6. Lisa Sabin-Wilson – her upcoming book WordPress for Dummies is sure to be a must have resource
7. WASABI WP Plugins
8. Themes.wordpress.net – the huge sortable database of free WP themes
9. WP Designer – themes and support forums
10. Brian Gardner – more beautiful themes
11. Kaushel Sheth – and more great themes
12. ThemesBase – more themes and support forum
13. WordPress Station – a WP blog about WP

I used 1-3 regularly. And Alex King is a great resource for anything WordPress.

There are a few other resources I either use regularly or have found to be helpful for my clients:

1. WordPress.org – Home to everything WordPress.
2. WordPress Plugins – Finally a plugin directory on WordPress.org. Good initial place to search for plugins – growing quickly.
3. Weblog Tools Collection – Daily updates of new themes and plugins. I read feed daily.
4. BloggingPro – Up-to-Date news about many things WordPress.
5. The WordPress Podcast – WordPress Community Podcast. Nice listens. Most recent podcast covers WordPress 2.2 delay and how tagging figures into future updates.
6. 7 Essential WordPress Hacks – Tubetorial’s 7-part video how-to series. Well-done, easy to follow.
7. WordPress on YouTube – Over 11,000 More than 500 video clips related to using WordPress. Need to know how to do something, likely find it there. (updated)
8. UPDATE: www.wordpressthemes.com

So there’s a few more helpful WordPress Resources. You can find a ton of WordPress sites so if you have anything to add, please let me know.

What is popuri.us? It’s a single site where you can check a number of your blog’s rankings and popularity stats, including:

• Google Pagerank – Google Pagerank and the Prediction Tool
• Alexa Rank
• Compete Rank
• Quantcast Rank
• Google Backlinks
• Yahoo! Backlinks
• Live Search Backlinks
• Technorati inbound links
• del.icio.us bookmarks
• Bloglines subscribers

I used it and it ranked everything accurately as I know it. If nothing else, I got a bunch of information about the popularity of my blog with a simple click. Not bad. Useful to some degree.

What might be more useful is the popuri.us widget that can display live stats on your blog. I’m probably not going to use it just because I don’t want to add any clutter to my blog. But it could useful for others.

But I’ve always wondered if Google is always the best option.

Well Phil Bradley has compiled a list of what he calls Finding What You Need With The Best Search Engines. I’ve looked over the list and found the usuals like Google, Yahoo! Search and MSN Live Search for keyword searches.

But there’s some other gems in the list. Like using Encarta and Answers.com for facts searching or GooFresh for new additions to Google. KartOO, of course, gives some beautiful, visual search results (try it if you haven’t) and can be fun to use. I’d never seen Quintura before, but I can see its usefulness. It displays search results with a tag could of similar search keywords.

There’s lots of good stuff on his list. Much you’ve probably seen but some I’m sure you haven’t. So take a look, and let me know what gems you find.

By the way, he plans to continue updating this list on a regular basis. Maybe this is a resource to bookmark.