Okay, it happened. I broke up last week, just like people do these days and I made the jump. You know what I’m talking about, we’ve all been there one way or another... that line you naively crossed one unsuspecting fateful day where life, the universe, and everything changed in a second.
I’m sorry, I just got swept away by the passion of the moment.
"Time for you to move on little missy miss BB."
I knew there was no going back and I knew life would never ever be the same again yet I chose to go.
I had that day last week.
I showed up at the office on Monday morning and there was this unsuspecting small brown cardboard box from FedEx sitting on my desk.
What is it?
O M G! It’s my new iPhone 4s!
My little BB, my Blackberry Curve 8330, we’ve been together since early 2008. You've been very very good to me. Small, good looking, slim and petite. We've enjoyed each other’s company immensely. But times change and there's no denying this last year you've been choking, freezing, burping, and crashing. Heck, the last few months I’ve almost had to reboot you once a day. What's with that?
I guess all those social media apps, videos, messages, and emails were just too much.
I couldn’t help it, within the day I became so absorbed with i, I lost track of my little BB. It was kind of weird. I was overcome with guilt.
“I’m sorry little BB."
I’m not ungrateful and it seems like we’ve been together forever. We were closer than close, you and I
You were my life line, my constant companion. We were always together.
"Looking back at you too, your i-ness!"
Yet now, already, I can’t remember where I last set you down.
I’m calling you (from i's place) so I can find you. Heck, I wasn't expecting that.
"Oh the retch that I am, plotting scheming and planning. How fast can I move everything over and shut you down?"
What kind of a heartless thankless ungrateful beast have I become?
Yes, me... who dares call himself a gentleman!
We broke up, what can I say?
I’ll get over it.
Hey, by the way... What's your top 10 favorite iPhone apps?... just curious.
Answer: To offer up the most relevant and freshest content it has based on the terms we use to search.
Why? Search engines like Google, (Bing and Yahoo) want to provide everyone with the latest and most useful on target content they can so we keep coming back. The more ‘eye time’ on their pages the more opportunity is created to click those paid-for-ads.
That’s it in a (proverbial cyberspace) nutshell!
Granted this explanation is a gross over simplification, yet...
The more you understand what the search engine wants to accomplish the more opportunities you’ll find to get your brand out there and seen.
Let me put it this way...
We wouldn’t do over a billion searches a day on Google if they didn’t offer up the answers and content we were looking for.
This is why geographic or hyper-local blogging is so powerful. People out of town checking out your area, yet more so, locals looking for the best deal on a new coffee pot, the best chicken teriyaki joint, the lowest price on a set of tires for the car, when is the museum open, what's playing at the cinema, what grocery store has the best deals this weekend, the phone number for the local cleaners, and yes, real estate.
You know(or should) if all we talk about is ourselves and how we’re the #1 choice in real estate people are not going to find us very interesting, nor are they likely to follow or engage us, and neither will Google, Bing, or Yahoo.
I hope you see the obvious, search engines need content. A lot of it. Not necessarily content about you (like advertising), but the content people look for every single day. I want Google, Bing and Yahoo to consider me a good source of relevant content. If they do they will choose my content as a 'best solution' to fulfill the searchers request.
Blogging about your community creates an opportunity to become a purveyor of content that the search engines will want to offer up. If they find you a reliable source of good local information your visibility will grow.
What is marketing? I heard this so many years ago I can’t remember who said it or how exactly they put it, but I morphed it into this...
Marketing is two things...
1. Attract people who are not doing business with you and convince them they should.
2. Convince your present clients they should keep doing business with you.
There’s no denying in today's world that pull is more powerful than push. Getting and staying in front of people means what you have to say better have some value, be useful, hopefully interesting, and/or entertaining.
Write about the world your clients live in. Address their interests, needs, wants, and desires... And the more your topics align with what the search engine needs to fulfill its objectives, the more you’re going to be smack dab in front of your audience creating opportunity.
When people do have a need for a real estate professional, who do they know? Who will they remember? Who will they call?
What is a search engine’s job? It’s a job very much like yours.
I think that depends on the audience you’re trying to reach. We all have lifestyles and many of our clients work 8 to 5 jobs where internet surfing isn’t allowed (hence the surge in mobile smart phone usage I’m thinking), and many have schedules that change every week.
Some of my best results here on Activerain are posting early morning and even better if that’s on Saturday and Sunday. For other locations it’s Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, mid morning and later at night around 9 or 10.
No matter when and where I post, following up with a strategy based on a slight revision of content and re-posting (2 to 5 days later) to one of my other blogs works well, especially when I include in the footer: originally posted on the Activerain network. Then throughout the week I use excerpts (with links back to the blog) on Facebook or Linkedin, a few Tweets, and now Google+.
I don’t have an exact formula, I have a strategy, and I’m always tinkering with it looking for sweet spots. I do know my hyper-local posts love this scenario. There are local searches I rank first page and often with multiple sources and photos linking back to my blog and content. Often Activerain proves to be the catalyst in this type of process.
I found Chris Perillo one day online. At first I wasn't too sure (he was off on a random tangent) but I gave him a shot and he won me over. He’s quirky, funny, lives in Seattle, and was born to be in front of a video camera. As a young guy he's totally at home online and shares a lot of great ideas and content. In this short video Chris brings up a few considerations about when to post and squeezing more mileage out of your content with a strategy. Enjoy...
It’s not like we’re suffering in quiet indignation or anything. But it’s been a while since I’ve witnessed the people of the Pacific Northwest rally in spirit and all come together in agreement about any one thing.
The catalyst was Wednesday afternoon’s blog headline from the Los Angeles Times...
“Color Seattle clueless. The city has always marched unarmed into its infrequent battles with snow, and Wednesday's snowstorm was no exception.”
Wow, them’s fightin’ words! “Now don’t hold back L.A., tell us what you really think.”
Oh, and they didn’t hold back continuing with...
“The snowstorm had been forecast to be the worst to hit the Puget Sound region in 30 years, an ominous warning that scared easily scareable Seattleites. As a result -- as is usually the case here when cold weather hits -- the city collectively declared a snow day and gave up most thoughts of going to work.”
Snap!...
Thursday, January 19th... late afternoon, the hedge out in front of my deck looks kinda like ice worms.
KING 5’s Art Thiel made us proud yesterday when he defended our honor and returned fire with a quintessential Northwest canonical blast over the bow of their blog with:
“The incredibly shrinking newspaper has nothing to say to me about Seattle's weather. Especially when a Southland sprinkle sends literally millions of Angelenos into freeway aqua-spasms. TV reporters there hold microphones next to curbs so viewers can hear water running.”
January 19th... Nobody's getting out of here this morning. It's like an ice cream sandwich.
Followed by another fine shot from Scott Sistek, meteorologist for KOMO News.
“Then, as if to prove my point, just hours later the National Weather Services in Los Angeles and San Diego each put out Special Weather Statements for an incoming weather system over the weekend that might bring a quarter to a third of an inch of rain to the coast.“
And you’re calling us wimps?
January 16th... pretty on Monday afternoon, but with snow and ice, that's one hill you don't want to go down.
I have to admit laughing over “snow wimps” has been a most welcome relief from this weeks politics, the usual bad news, SOPA & PIPA, being snowed in, and worrying about loved one’s and friends out there on snowy icy streets.
Thanks L.A. Times.
As of 9:00 am yesterday the Washington State Patrol reported over 2,300 accidents. Later that afternoon over 300,000 people were without power and Gov. Chris Gregoire issued a State of Emergency so the National Guard could be mobilized in neccesary.
There's something terribly wrong when our elected officials even contemplate the systematic dismantling of our citizens ability to freely share its own creativity with each other.
Scene 3 - (In the not so distant future): "I was so excited to share this really cool idea I had with y'all but I just got a DM from Congress." The Committee on the Suppression of Creative Thought and Freely Sharing has determined I would be in direct violation of paragraphs 193, 206, 319, and 573 of the Amateur Citizens Open Thinking Reform Act of 2016.
Wherein it is clearly stated... No persons, citizens, nor foreigners within or outside our borders will posses any right to intellectual, artistic, or creative thought (no matter the origin) via the written word, image, audio, or video transmitted, conveyed, received, or otherwise consumed through any other means than those dictated by your benevolent government and its officially assigned expert dispensers of said content.
This is for your own protection as well as it is for the protection of all citizens young and old who may become influenced and thereby subject to your thoughts. Therefore, no said or implied creative thinking will be shared in any shape, form, or medium.
If you persist on having these thoughts and the ambition to share them, all evidence will be used against you in a court of law....
One of the best conversations I've listened to this week as to why we need to pay attention to SOPA and PIPA is from Clay Shirky...
Evidently we’re making national news today. Our first snowfall of the season was just a few days ago on Sunday. The weather projections are telling us there’s a lot more on the way and by the looks of it this morning, they're right. It's really coming down.
Here in the Puget Sound convergence zone we rarely get more than a day or two of snow in the winter so a lot of us don’t own studded tires or chains. What’s the point. Most likely, it’ll snow then warm up and turn to rain. Yet, once in a while the Arctic air mass just has to prove to the Pineapple Express who's boss and we get a snow dump that brings everything to a stop.
It's not that we're weather wussy's in the Pacific Northwest. It's more about hills. No matter where you're going, work, home, or the store, you gotta go up 'em and down 'em...
Watching the snow from my deck. Renton, Washington
It usually doesn't last long (thank goodness). Most of us think of it as a floating holiday. Yay, a snow day! Yet joking aside, it can be dangerous. I was downtown Seattle on one of those days. I looked up to see this double long Metro bus tobogganing down First Hill pinging parked cars like an eight year old playing with his Hot Wheels.
I'm praying for that little Honda a couple of blocks down. The one with it's rear tires screaming high C on the ice. I hope he makes it out of the intersection in time. I'll never forget the group at the bus stop, their heads moved in perfect synchronicity as they watched their bus go sliding on by...
Most natives of the Puget Sound area don’t mind driving in the snow. What we're concerned about is 'those' idiots who think they know everything there is to know about driving in this stuff and they're going to prove it. Like the one on my hind end this morning.
They’re so close you can’t see hood nor grill in the rearview mirror, just them gyrating impatiently through flapping wipers on a snowy windshield. He's venting to somebody on his cellphone about the idiot in front of him that’s driving so dang slow. “Hey, that’s me!”
So, today it's about the weather. Be careful out there, my friends.
I love Animated GIF files! Especially when they’re not running in an annoying advertisement banner. Don’t forget how useful and fun this old legacy technology can be. With a little imagination they can used artistically and convey a point like no other effort.
With GIF files, you can create an interesting collage very quickly without all the hassles of video editing. GIF files allow you a simple pic to pic framework thatss all wrapped up in one neat little package.
In this example... I took two treatments of the same image I created in Picnik.com(it's a kind of lights on lights off presentation). I saved the two versions of the image to my hard drive then went online toPicasion.com and uploaded them to the GIF creator. I have a few options like picture size, frame rate, and how many images I want to use. Also I can choose to link to the finished file online (stored on Picasion's server) or download it to my PC.
It’s a free online app. You can create any series of images you choose. Today's fun was playing with an image I took at 12th and Jackson when I was driving through the International District in Seattle.
When you upload a picture to your Activerain blog you can easily change the size and justify it left or right on the page using the editor. Yet, on occasion I’ve fiddled with trying to wrap text around an image and messed up my entire layout. No fault to Activerain, every editor has its own unique temperament.
You could delete the image or the whole post and start over, but uploading the photo again adds bloat to Activerain’s storage space.
With a little HTML code you can place your image anywhere you like and re-size it on the fly if you need.
1st upload your photo to your draft post and save ( by clicking - post blog entry). 2nd click edit and change the view to HTML by clicking the HTML tab...
Here’s the code that Activerain created for my uploaded image...
<p><img title="Car's cost less in Puyallup!" src="/image_store/uploads/2/9/3/2/9/ar132604695592392.jpg" height="250" alt="Big balloon car sale promotion." width="250" /></p>
Note that Activerain uses the <p> paragraph tags to open and </p> to close. This is used to manage the area for the image just like we did in part 1 & 2 to manage the text.
img = image... any text you put between the quotes will show up in a little pop up when the reader runs their mouse over the photo in your published post.
src = source... the characters between this set of quotes tells us where the image is stored on the servers and the name Activerain gave the photo (ar132604695592392.jpg).
The numbers after height and width are describing the size of the picture in pixels.
alt = alternative, it’s a description that will show up if the picture is blocked for some reason and/or won’t show up in the readers browser because they’re on a network or something...
I usually embed my photos from Picasa but uploaded pictures work the same way.
The first thing I do is upload my picture to my draft post and save it by clicking on the “Post Blog Entry” button.
Then click edit and switch to HTML mode and copy the HTML code that Activerain created for my image and paste it into notepad so no matter how much I screw things up, I don’t lose my photo. As long as I have that snippet of code, I have a way back to my uploaded photo on Activerain.
Let’s create a post with a picture on the left that has text on the right. We’ll do it by creating a simple table.
In the editor in HTML mode... we’ll start the table with the HTML tag... <table>
Table means we’re going to create a simple spreadsheet like grid layout with rows and columns. In our case we’re just going to create 1 row with 2 columns.
In the table we need to create a place where the content is placed. Photo on the left, text on the right.
Create the row using the tag... <tr>(= table row) and tell the row where the data goes by using the data tag. HTML is read in your browser from left to right. <td>(= table data). This is telling your browser there’s a table and on this row there’s data.
Tables are like looking at an Excel Spreadsheet... You’re creating a simple grid with rows and columns...
Using a simple table to create two columns so I can display a picture on the left with text on the right just cuz I want it that way. The width of the column on the left for the image is set to 40% of the viewing area and the text area to the right was set to 60%.
So begin your table, start the row, and place your data.
That will look like this...
<table> <tr><td>“paste your photo html here” </td>
Now create the area to the right for the text. Tell the row there’s more stuff to present by using the data tag again...
<td> “your text goes here”
</td>
Now close up shop...
End the row </tr> then close the table using the tag </table>.
What you’ve created is a simple table with 1 row and 2 columns. By default browsers will give each column 50% of the viewing space. All we need to do now is to adjust the area for the photo and the text and tell the columns how wide they should be.
If I eyeball my picture which is 250 x 250 pixels (in a roughly 640 pixel wide viewing space), I can see the width is less than 50% but more than 25% of the viewing area... I’m going to be really scientific and make the extremely educated guess that 40% will work just fine for the image and I’ll give the rest of the space to the right, 60% for the text. I can always adjust later. The combined width of the 2 columns should equal 100%.
I’ll set up the width for the photo area by telling the data tag to be 40% wide... <td width=”40%”>
And, I’ll set the data tag for the text to be 60% wide... <td width=”60%”>
We’re almost there, let’s throw it all together...
1. Upload your photo and if you need to, use the AR editor to size it. 2. Save your post and switch to HTML mode then copy the HTML to notepad for safe keeping. 3. Write your first paragraphs as you would normally do and save. 4. Switch to edit HTML mode and go to the area below your text to create your table.
Type...
<table> <tr><td width=”40%”> “paste the photo HTML here” </td> <td width=”60”> <p><big> “paste your text here” </big></p> </td></tr> </table>
<p></p> (add this if you need a little blank space after your table)
Don't forget to save your file!
A few notes....
Don’t forget every time you switch back and forth between HTML and WYSIWYG mode to save your work (or you’ll lose it)!
Sometimes, when I save my draft from HTML mode then open it to edit in WYSIWYG it won’t open up into full viewing mode. Just save the WYSIWYG again and re-open it and it will be in full size again.
I didn’t mention how tall the row is... In today’s example which ever is taller, the photo or the text, will dictate the height of the row simply based on how much room it takes to present them. So, the row’s height will stretch in height to allow room for the content.
As I mentioned in part 1 & 2, I create my posts primarily in HTML mode to control font sizes using the <big>, “default”, or <small> tag and the layout using the <table> tag.
When I want the text on the left and the photo on the right I reverse my percentages with the data tags within the table and all of these can be changed based on the size I want to use for the photo and how much text I want next to it.
Picture on the right and text on left... Just reverse the data tag width.
<td width=”60%> Add your text here... </td> <td width=”40%”> Add your photo code here... </td>
If you standardize a few presentation styles for your blog using a few layouts that support certain photo sizes etc. you can have all that HTML code saved in a notepad. All you need to do is make a few decisions ahead of time as to what size your photo's need to be and what saved code you have will support the layout so all you have to do is copy/past code the image html and the text next to it and you're off and running.
Happy coding... If you experiment and have issues, let me know. I’m happy to help.
Using a simple table to create two columns so I can put text on the left and position a photo next to it on the right. All I did was switch the content and reverse the percentages between the data tags. The column on the left is now 60% and the column on the right is 40%.
I’m fortunate to have so many great memories of my family. I remember very well the stories we heard growing up about the old country, their travels to settle in the Pacific Northwest, dad’s WWII adventures, living and working the coal mines, and what it was like around here in the early 20th Century.
Between Christmas and New Years I had a wonderful stay-cation. I have an old suitcase full of pictures and documents that belonged to Grandma & Grandpa Fabre. My brother Steve dropped it off a couple of years ago, but until now it’s been sitting in a closet.
I spent a couple of days spellbound in discovery and scanned all kinds of treasures. Old pictures, my grandfather’s passport dated 1907 from Decazeville, France, letters from his cousins and a nephew in French, such wonderful memorabilia.
These two photos are among my favorites. They were taken in 1936 or 37 in front of the home Grandpa George built on Tobin Avenue behind Renton High School. They left Newcastle (and working the coal mines) and moved to Renton. Grandpa became a contractor and built many homes in the area throughout the 1930’s and 40’s.
?, Al Fabre, Pauline Fabre, George Fabre Jr., Celine Delaurenti, George Fabre Sr., John Delaurenti.
I need to do more research. I don’t remember the woman on the left but next to her is my dad, Al Fabre, with his accordion. He cracks me up, that’s his Renton High Letter for Track stuck on the front of his accordion. Next is Grandma Pauline, Uncle George, Great Grandma Celine, Grandpa George, and Great Grandpa John Delaurenti.
In this second picture it must be Grandpa’s turn at the camera because now we have Great Uncle Pete Delaurenti front and center looking rather proud with that big grin and his sister Pauline giving him a big affectionate smile. It must have been a good day.
?, Al Fabre, Pete Delaurenti, Pauline Fabre, George Fabre Jr., Celine Delaurenti, John Delaurenti.
As I look through these treasures from yesteryear, my mind is full of questions I'd love to ask.
In part one we took a look at upsizing your font size in HTML... The easiest way to do it is to use the paragraph tag <p> and size the font using the <big> tag. HTML on Activerain is easy because you only need the most basic tags, AR handles the rest. Part One
It’s important when you’re working with HTML to remember that everything you turn on needs to be turned off... So if you want to make a font “big” throughout the document it may seem logical to start with <big> at the beginning and then turn it off at the end of the document using </big>.
Not so...
It’s best practice to turn “big” on and off in each paragraph, or single line you want separated from the rest.
So every paragraph starts with <p><big> and ends with </big></p>. I save a lot of typing time by keeping the HTML tags in a notepad.txt on my desktop. When I’m working on my post I simple copy the tags I need and paste them.
Usually, I try to stay on the HTML side of the editor as much as possible then switch to the WYSIWYG tab.
A couple of common tags you’ll use a lot are “bold” and “italic”... When you want to bold a word or a sentence put <strong> to start bolding and </strong> to turn it off.
example for bold... <p><big><strong>Your blog is awesome</strong> and I love your photographs!</big></p>
Will look like... Your blog is awesome and I love your photographs!
When you want a word or phrase in italic put the tag <em> to start and end it with </em>.
example for italic... <p><big>Blogging on Activerain really enhances your <em>(Google Juice)</em> web presence.</big></p>
Will look like... Blogging on Activerain really enhances your (Google Juice) web presence.
And if you want both bold and italic... <p><big>Blogging on Activerain really enhances your <strong><em>(Google Juice)</em></strong> web presence.</big></p>
Will look like... Blogging on Activerain really enhances your (Google Juice) web presence.
Stay tuned for part three... We’ll look at sizing and positioning photo’s.
Disclaimer: ActiveRain Corp. does not necessarily endorse the real estate agents, loan officers and brokers listed on this site. These real estate profiles, blogs and blog entries are provided here as a courtesy to our visitors to help them make an informed decision when buying or selling a house. ActiveRain Corp. takes no responsibility for the content in these profiles, that are written by the members of this community.
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