Today it seems that no matter what industry you’re in, your competition is stronger than ever.  How do you stand out and get that sale when people aren’t as loyal to brands as they used to be?   How do you get their attention in an ever growing sea of noise when they’re so often swayed by price rather than quality?   One answer is to become recognized as an expert in your industry, someone other people seek out for information.

The most important part to becoming known as an expert, of course, is that you know a lot about whatever it is you do.   That could be construction, public relations, HR, dogs — whatever it is, in order to gain the requisite knowledge to be regarded as a thought-leader in your field likely requires years of schooling or real-world practice, or both.   In addition, when your goal is to be recognized as an expert you need to always keep learning, and to constantly share that expertise. But first let’s talk about why you might want to be an expert.

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Benefits of Being an Expert

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Being an expert in your field makes you the go-to person for your industry. There are many people that I trust inherently on different subjects simply because they know their stuff, and they’re not trying to sell me anything.    They just want to be helpful in their own space.  These are people that I learn from, but also whom I would buy from because I trust their knowledge and expertise.

Being an expert helps you:

- Establish yourself as an industry leader
- Help others
- Become a trusted resource
- Get interviews and media coverage
- Gain access (via conference/speaking invites, etc.)
- Convert followers to sales

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Keep Up-to-Date

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Blogs & News – Blogs in your industry are a great place to find out the latest tools and news.   If you’re not already reading blogs, do a web search for to locate some blogs that cover your business niche.   Find ones that you like and subscribe to them by RSS so you won’t forget to read them.

It’s not a bad idea to set up a Google Alert to search for news about your industry.   Paying attention to news headlines is a great way to stay abreast of changes in your field.

Online Education – There’s no reason you have to enroll in college (again) to keep learning. There are a variety of online resources at which you can take free or cheap webinars or e-courses to keep the wheels churning.

Social Networks – Increasingly, social networks like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Digg, and Delicious are where people are sharing news and information that matters to them.   By following the already established experts in your niche, you’ll gain access to the information they possess, which will in turn increase your knowledge.

Conferences & Events – Every industry has conferences, trade shows, and other events, at which other experts in the industry gather to share their knowledge.   Attending these meetings can help you in your quest to continually learn new information.  You can find out about conferences by reading industry blogs, searching events sites like Upcoming.org, or finding local user groups on Meetup.

Imparting Your Wisdom

By sharing your knowledge with others, you’ll quickly become known for your expertise.   This can translate into sales, job offers, gigs, or other opportunities, as you build your personal brand as an expert.  Here are some ways you can share what you know.

Blogs – The easiest way to start sharing is by creating a blog.  Blogs are fantastic if you’ve got a ton of information in your head and need a place to dump it.  The bonus is: you can help others through that information.  Blog about what you know.  Share news, offer advice, give your opinion, and make yourself the go-to resource for what you do.  The key to successful blogging is to consistently put out good, original, and useful content that encourages readers to engage with you and with each other.

Social Media – Social media sites are designed for experts! I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had a question about something, tweeted it, and gotten free advice back, later, the people who provided me with expert advice are the people I buy from when I need their services.  By providing free advice on Twitter or Facebook, you will build a base of fans that both trust you and look to you for expert advice.  These fans will seek you out and recommend you to others seeking advice and information — in other words, by sharing your knowledge and gaining trust, your network will grow on its own.

Video – Don’t underestimate the power of video. For those who do well in front of a camera, sharing free how-to videos on sites like YouTube or Vimeo can lead to increased awareness. It also demonstrates to television producers how well you do on camera, which means online expert videos can lead to television appearances.

Speaking Up – You should already be attending industry conferences, trade shows, and user group meetings, and you should make sure to assert yourself as a knowledgeable voice in the community while at those events. Whether that means lining up formal speaking engagements — which will be easier to do the more you grow your personal brand as an expert — or just networking and sharing your expertise with other attendees, speaking up is helpful in building your expert brand.

Consulting – Offering consulting services can do two things: first, it can make you a little money, and second, it can help you establish yourself among industry insiders as someone who knows their stuff.  One consulting gig can lead to many based on referrals and having a list of business owners willing to give you a recommendation can be invaluable.  If you plan to offer consulting services, put information about your services on your blog and in your social profiles, and consider offering phone consultations.

The momentum, was too strong. Real-time search — and Google’s (Google) inability to beatTwitter at it — became a huge trend in 2009. Everyone wanted a piece of it, and Twitter had the goods. When you want to find out what’s happening right now, this very minute, Twitter’s search trumped Google, and Google had no choice but to react. Luckily for Twitter, the reaction came right on time. Both Bing (Bing) and Google signed a deal with Twitter to incorporate real-time results from Twitter into web searches, just as Twitter’s flat traffic figures became impossible to hide. The effect of this deal is still unknown, but when Google sends you traffic, you can bet it’s going to be noticeable.

Twitter’s future is still uncertain. We still don’t know the overall business plan beyond a few hints at at least some current revenue, and we still don’t know if the service’s huge popularity boom in 2009 was just a passing fad. One thing is certain, though: The Google deal was the adrenaline injection Twitter needed. If Twitter is really destined to become the world’s new SMS, 2010 is the time to do it, and we’re happy to be along for the ride.

Details we’ve all been waiting for… the Google Nexus One phone.  We posted a Nexus One Android 2.1 walkthrough video earlier this month and today Engadget has managed to score a full spec sheet for the phone, as well as some details about its release date.

According to Engadget’s source, the phone will initially be available by “invitation only.”  It looks like Google will be deciding who gets invites (hey, Google, call me), but the specifications also indicate that T-Mobile will be able to sell the phone directly to the customers in the future.

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The Breakdown

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Here are some highlights from the screenshots that Engadget posted:

- 512MB RAM, 512MB ROM, included 4GB microSD card, expandable to 32GB

- 5 megapixel camera with LED flash and mechanical autofocus

- 3.7″ WVGA AMOLED screen — in other words, as big as the Droid and brighter

- Worldwide GSM/EDGE, but 3G only on T-Mobile in the US (supports 2100, 1700 and 900 frequencies, meaning Europe should be covered)

- 1GHz Qualcomm chip — if accurate, that would make the Nexus One one of the fastest — if not the fastest — smartphones on the market.

- Wi-Fi A/B//G/N

- Bluetooth 2.1

- GPS

- Accelerometer

The specs look solid, the phone matches or beats every competing Android phone on the market (aside from having no physical keyboard) and also compares quite favorably to the iPhone (faster processor, nicer screen, wireless-N).

The only caveat for potential U.S. buyers is that, barring some sort of firmware upgrade (assuming the 1900 band is just disabled), this phone will only work in 3G in T-Mobile’s network.  If you live in a large city, that might not be a problem, but T-Mobile does have the smallest 3G footprint of any of the major U.S. wireless carriers.

For international users, this is really enticing, because the phone should be compatible with all UMTS bands in Europe, Asia, South America and Australia/New Zealand.

Now all we need is a solid release date and a price.  My friends are ready to buy this sight-unseen.  What about you?  android, Google, nexus oneWhat do you think of the Nexus One?

LinkedIn came out with the latest version of their iPhone app today. As you might expect from a 3.0 release, the app has been much improved, namely in its user experience.  In fact, it looks a lot more like Facebook’s iPhone app now.

As you can see, there is a new main screen that features 12 main buttons.  Yes, this is just like the new Facebook app main screen that features big buttons.  With LinkedIn’s you’ll get easy access to “All Updates,” “Status,” “Profiles,” “Discussions,” “Connections,” “Favorites,” “Inbox,” “Invitations,” “Recents,” “Reconnect,” “In Person,” and “Themes.”  Of these, the Reconnect, In Person, and Themes areas are entirely new.   Reconnect allows you to find people you likely know on LinkedIn with the click of a button. In Person lets you use the iPhone’s Bluetooth to easily swap contact information with any other LinkedIn iPhone use you happen to be nearby at a conference or event.  And Themes allows you to change the color of the main screen icons — you can choose pink, orange, gold, and a bunch of other crazy colors to ugly-up your app to your heart’s content.

Previously, the app featured a more standard bottom-bar iPhone navigation where you could switch between updates, your inbox, search, and other elements. This new layout gives you access to a lot more information quickly. The updates areas (All and Status) has also been been made more Facebook-like as each now features a user profile picture next to each update. You can also now comment on each of these updates right from within the app — again, yes, just like Facebook.

It’s also now very easy to “star” any profile to mark it as a favorite, to give you easy access to it.  Doing this also creates a filtering mechanism for the update streams.

Find the 3.0 version of the LinkedIn app, available for free in the App Store here.

Google’s Feedburner allows you to set up free email updates based on your RSS feed.  Here’s an easy tutorial on how to set it up.

Burn Your Feeds

You first need to head over to Feedburner to claim your blog’s RSS feed.  Log in with your Google account and enter the URL of your feed into the “Burn a feed right this instant” box:

Click next and you’ll be asked to choose a title and address – the defaults are usually fine.   Follow the rest of the instructions through and you should arrive at the Feed Management page.

Enable Email Subscriptions

Hit the “Publicize” tab and select “Email Subscriptions” from the left hand side.

Click “Activate” to enable the feature.

Customisation

In the left hand navigation you should now see four more options below “Email Subscriptions”.

“Communications Preferences” allows you to change the from address and subject/body of the confirmation email your readers will receive on subscription.

“Email Branding” lets you edit your email’s subject, fonts, colors, and allows you to add a logo.

At this stage it may be wise to edit the subscription email and subjects so that the tone is consistent with your blog.  The applies to fonts and colours too – leaving the email as it came out of the box looks dull and lazy.

Finally the “Delivery Options” page lets you customise the time zone and delivery window.  Ensure that the time zone matches that of the geographic location of the majority of your readers (check this in Google Analytics) and think about the best time of day for your email to go out.  The nature of your content may dictate this, but generally just before lunch is a good shout.

Add to your Blog

Go to the “Subscription Management” page to get the code to add a means of subscription to your blog.  The Subscription Form Code adds a form like this:

The Subscription Link Code adds a straight link.  There are also widgets available for TypePad and Blogger.

Simple!

Improving collaboration between people and between organizations is no longer optional if you want to survive in today’s hyper connected businesses world.

Social media marketing (SMM) announces your presence to the world.  It’s a reliable marketing trend to build your network online for success, for the world of tomorrow.

SMM is about finding the right way to promote and introduce exciting ways of communicating to consumers of internet and brick and mortar businesses.

If you think about it, social media is the new yellow pages.  Social media is an innovative tool that will help local businesses pump out all types of information, from the latest in local news, to their promotions and coupons.

Social media allows you to be in control of your marketing, you’re able to reach out to your consumer through non-traditional channels and still have them listen to your message.  SMM allows you to be in control of your business advertising, drive traffic to your site, where you want to place your promotions and coupons, with little or no cost.

About 54% of Americans have substituted internet search engines and local phone books for social media.  More content is created, distributed, and advertised online, and more advertising dollars are moving towards social media.  If your campaign is executed correctly, social media will get you more referrals, generate more leads and help you share information used to educate prospects.  The all new SMM requires different skill sets and strategies when compared to traditional marketing.  You can hire firms who specialize in this type of marketing or simply try it out for yourself.  It is important to note, that is as in any form of marketing, consistency is the key to success.  So, don’t expect to get a ton of new business from just starting a Twitter and Facebook account.

The public has turned to social media sites such as, Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, and Linkedin to reach their audience.  Social media activity also helps your businesses improve search engine rankings through link building. There are now more and more companies that are seeking out alternative and effective marketing strategies, because the phone book is no longer providing what they need.  Many would argue that SMM is the new yellow pages.

The API (Application Programming Interface) has been an essential component for creating applications that hook into or utilize web apps such as Twitter and Facebook.  With it, developers have been able to create some amazing mashups and tools.   Some of the most helpful and oft-used applications on the web wouldn’t be possible without APIs.

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1. Google Maps

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Google Maps is one of the hottest APIs on the web.  The ProgrammableWeb API Directory tracks over 1800 mashups for Google Maps, which is more than three and a half times as many as the next most popular API. Google Maps perhaps did more to popularize the concept of web application mashups in the middle part of this decade than any other API.

1. Google’s Official Documentation for the Maps API is probably the best place to start. The site offers a developer’s guide, code samples and demos, case studies, and even a sandbox where you can test stuff out while you learn.

2. Earlier this year, Google abandoned its official Google Maps API blog in favor of a new Google Geo Developers Blog. The new blog encompasses all of Google’s mapping APIs, including both Maps and their Earth program. The blog is filled with useful posts about using the API, frequent news updates about changes and developments with the API itself, and links to creative uses by other developers.

3. The Official Google Maps API Group is probably the first place you should check out if you need help with your Maps-based project. The extremely active group hosts hundreds of thousands of discussions and is frequented by both seasoned and rookie developers, as well as Google Maps API core contributors. It is often the first place that upcoming API changes are made, so if your project hinges on the Google Maps API, then you should definitely keep an eye on the official group.

4. Mapki is an unofficial Google Maps API wiki at which Maps developers come together to discuss and document the API. The site has a huge list of developer’s tools and tutorials, as well as code snippets and FAQs.

5. Mike Williams’ Google Maps API Tutorial is an excellent and up-to-date overview of the API. It’s a great getting started point for anyone trying to get into mashup development with Google Maps or integrating maps into an existing project.

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2. Facebook / Facebook Connect

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Over a million developers have created over 350,000 active applications on the Facebook Platform and Facebook Connect has been adopted by more than 15,000 web sites, according to official stats. That easily makes Facebook’s platform and Connect API among the hottest development platforms on the web today.

1. The Facebook Developers site is one of the most complete and well-made and maintained developer sites on the web. It has a great getting started guide, as well as super active forums, an official blog for developers, and more.

2. If you’re developing anything for the Facebook Platform, then Facebook Developer Tools page is a must-bookmark resource. The tools, including test consoles for the API and FBML, as well as a playground environment for Facebook Connect, are super helpful for anyone working with the app platform or Facebook’s other developer APIs. They also recently released the Facebook Connect Wizard that makes integrating Facebook Connect with your site a snap.

3. Facebook’s Wiki offers a plethora of useful information for developers from guidelines to how-to guides to code examples and more. The site hosts over a thousand articles ensuring that if you need to do it with Facebook’s APIs, there’s a good bet you’ll find the information you need to know to learn how to do it somewhere in the wiki.

4. Though it hasn’t been updated in just over a year, the unofficial Facebook Developer online magazine is still an amazing resource for Facebook developers. It has an incredible archive of useful articles, tutorials, guides, and case studies that are still available for viewing.

5. It may just be a clever marketing tactic to get people to sign up for its hosting services, but Joyent’s popular Facebook Applications Developer Program, which offers free hosting for app developers for one year, is nonetheless a great resource. Especially for developers just getting into Facebook, Joyent’s program offers a no-risk way to test the waters.

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3. Twitter

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Anyone who reads this blog is well-aware of just how fast Twitter is growing. According to Compete, Twitter has grown over 650% this year, and it’s popular with developers too; Twitter application directory oneforty tracks over 1,800 Twitter-based or connected tools and applications.

1. The place to start, of course, is the Official API Wiki, which Twitter has packed with documentation, guides, tutorials, known issues, and FAQs for dealing with the Twitter API and OAuth.

2. Being Twitter, the Twitter API team naturally also has a Twitter account (@twitterapi). The account is updated by 5 core API developers at Twitter with news about the Twitter API and offers support to developers using it to build applications.

3. Twitter also has a blog, on which the company posts updates about their developer tools, as well as links to content that is helpful for developers, and spotlights of exceptional API uses. Also be sure to keep an eye on the service’s status blog to keep track of downtime issues and scheduled maintenance.

4. The Twitter Development Talk group/mailing list, which is hosted by Google Groups, is one of the best places to go to for help when you’re stuck with a Twitter API development problem. The site has had over 20,000 messages posted to it and is frequented by the API team. Twitter also operates a group for API announcements, which is a must-follow for developers craving the latest Twitter API news.

5. A search for Twitter on GitHub will return a ton of useful resources for developers, including over 13,000 code snippets and over 1,300 repositories, including many of the most popular Twitter libraries and wrappers. You can also find some of the open source technologies that actually power Twitter on GitHub.

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4. Flickr

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Flickr just recently passed 4 billion photos, so it’s no wonder that developers are excited to use it. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of mashups that rely on the Flickr API to add a little bit of visual appeal.

1. code.flickr is the home of Flickr’s official developer blog, and their official forum community. There are thousands of discussions in the Flickr API pool, as well as developers sharing screen shots of their creations, and the site also hosts the official SVN and Trac pages for the Flickr API, as well.

2. Yahoo!’s impressive Developer Network hosts a helpful Flickr section with a basic overview of the API, and links to the API key application form and information about rate limits and commercial usage. However, if you want meatier documentation, you’ll need to check out Flickr’s Official Flickr API documentation page, which offers a ton of information about using the API and links to third-party API kits for languages including ActionScript, Java, .NET, Objective-C, PHP, Python, and Ruby, among others.

3. If you’re still stumped, a good place to turn for an answer would be the YWS-Flickr Group on Yahoo! Groups. The active discussion list has over 3,000 Flickr developers that regularly share tips and tricks and help each other out.

4. The Ultimate Guide to Decoding the Flickr API is a very impressive tutorial from Nettuts+. Though just a single tutorial, it is a very good overview that is definitely a good place to start for developers interested in utilizing the Flickr API.

5. GitHub has a collection of over 200 Flickr code repositories including libraries and other helpful tools for developers. Ruby, JavaScript, Python, and PHP are the most popular languages among Flickr developers on the code sharing site.

A study conducted by Harvard Business Review reveals that most Twitter users don’t actually use the service much, or even at all.  In fact, 10% of active users are responsible for over 90% of all Tweets.

According to the research, conducted on a random sample of about 300,000 Twitter (Twitter) users in May 2009, 25% of Twitter users don’t tweet at all, while 50% of users tweet less than once every 74 hours.  Active users, on the other hand, tweet a lot, which makes Twitter a lot more like Wikipedia (Wikipedia) than an average social network (see graph below, courtesy of HBR).

Although this may sound strange at first, Twitter really is more like Wikipedia than, say, Facebook (Facebook). Twitter is not so much about connecting with your friends, it’s about broadcasting information.  Although it doesn’t necessarily take much creativity to create a tweet, only the most creative users actually persist in tweeting every day over a longer time period.

However, Twitter is also similar to a instant messaging tool, which should have a very different curve, with a larger proportion of users contributing to the number of overall tweets. It seems that Twitter’s micropublishing component is winning over its chatting component.

The Harvard Business Review study reveals another interesting tidbit: men seem to follow men more than women on Twitter. There are more women than men on twitter – approximately 55% of all users are female – but an average man will follow a man in 65% of all cases, while a woman will follow a man in 56% of cases. It’s hard to pull any meaningful conclusions from this anomaly, except one: Twitter is different than other social networks. But you already knew that.

Want to know how to unlock Facebook??  Get clients and like minded individual’s friending you in the masses on Facebook.

Social Media Marketing (SMM) to make Facebook a contact cash machine on the web to your niche.  The best way to attract clients and like-minded individuals on Facebook is to create a self explanatory profile using keywords, which explains what you do and what you have to offer.   Facebook profile picture and texted box are the first impression with these step by step methods clients and likeminded individuals never leave guessing.

• Identify yourself on your profile picture on Facebook like a business card.  The profile picture is the picture that you show to the world on Facebook and represent you as an expert.  “Do” use a professional picture of a suit or a coat (business attire).  “Don’t” use a picture of your kid or a cartoon because this will not identify the Facebook profile.  Hot tip if you’re a man, show a picture with a female like your wife, girlfriend or just a female friend this will show you’re not on Facebook to pick up on girls, double the friend ad with a couple picture.

• Use the texted box (this is under your picture on your profile page) to explain what you do and what you are looking for.  This will be seen when people add you,  so if you’re a web site builder you could say. (Example) I build custom websites starting at $999 check my site out for free advice http://www.digitaleyemedia.com.   So before they even request to add you as a friend they will know you’re a website designer - “PERFECT”.  This will make you have a group of friends in your industry or your clients.  Hot tip you can use 236 letters-symbols in the texted box and spaces don’t count.  Use spacing so people can read at a glance (less is more).  Also you can use your web address and the link will work just make sure you use http:// like this http://www.digitaleyemedia.com.

Could the Google phone be the death of the newly released Android?? The HTC-built device called the Nexus One was handed out to Google employees last week in the “mobile lab”. The rumor is that these phones would be sold unlocked directly to consumers.

The million dollar question is: How would Google bring an unlocked phone to market? There are really only three ways to sell phones.

1. License spectrum from a carrier and become a mobile virtual network operator or MVNO — a business model that time has proven to be a failure.

2. Of course, is to partner with carriers and offer phones at discounted prices through carrier subsidies, which is more or less the case with every successful device on the US market today.

3. Sell unlocked devices at full retail price that can be used by consumers on the network of the their choice. This is allegedly the model Google will be using to sell the Nexus One.

Stay tuned… we’ll see when and if the phone comes out to the market anytime soon.