Disqus - Latest Comments for Betsy

Re: Frozen in Time

Betsy — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 15:04:28 -0000

I like the fact that's you're livin' large in Central America as a freelance webpreneur. Or whatever. :) I know that's indirectly associated with your three items. But I think the personal story is what will interest your readers, make you real enough to do business with, and so on. Two cents.

Re: Stop Being Bearish

Betsy — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 08:58:05 -0000

Howard, I'm not an investor. I do understand some of the jargon because I was married to a trader and the dinner table was full of it. Jargon and b.s. enough for me to realize Ahat's comment was hilarious. I don't read your site because of what you have to say about the market or the economy. I read it because you're not a whiner. Back to lurking.

Re: Teaching Your Son to be a Man | The Art of Manliness

Betsy — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 21:12:37 -0000

Sean, this is your all time best because it has all you are and strive to be. Bravo. Hall of Fame. Hats off to you!

Re: Remodelling is never done is it?

Betsy — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 10:59:05 -0000

Wow - awesome! I am dying to replace our kitchen floor. The idiot who lived here before did such a wonderful job of installing it: it runs halfway up the toekick on the prehistoric cabinets. Unfortunately, I have yet to locate a live hand grenade - which everyone agrees is the first step of any kitchen remodel. :)

Re: Out of the mouths of babes!

Betsy — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 14:08:27 -0000

Oh, how sweet! Just heartwarming! Thanks.

Re: How to Fail: 25 Secrets Learned through Failure

Betsy — Sat, 08 Nov 2008 09:23:16 -0000

Dithering! The main reason for failure! It drives me nuts when someone has to plan for any ontingeny, no matter how remote. My God! Get up and get moving!

Expect a swarm from Daily Blog Tips. What a swell post. I'm off to look around here further, and have subscribed.

Re: Apture Introduces Next Generation Of Contextual Websites | Social Media Explorer

Betsy — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 08:52:47 -0000

Finally, a plug-in that works the way I think. I agree with your assessment that it's a little more involved than Zemanta, but holy smokes - it hits one out of the park with respect to being able to stack the links and not leave the page. Awesome recommendation. I've installed it and looked at the videos. This is a fabulous product! Thank you!

Re: Why Your Corporate Message Isn’t Being Heard

Betsy — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 09:37:39 -0000

Jason - A copy of this should be on every government employee's desk. Particularly the speechwriting department. Great post.

Re: Adventures in Car Shopping - how not to sell!

Betsy — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 07:43:06 -0000

Hi Shawn - You hit it: good selling isn't selling. We blogged about it a couple of days ago. I can pretty much tell when someone had sales training - how many years ago - if at all, by their methodology. I've often fantasized about asking to see the manager for a few minutes and calmly stating along the lines of what you've written. Unfortunately, with most I'd anticipate a deer in the headlights response. Not long for the world. Thanks.

Re: Welcome to Finance Your Freedom

Betsy — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 07:20:07 -0000

Per above (1) Not even so much. :)
(2) Check.
(3) Check, with modifier: can't guarantee arrival in an office.

Inviting negative people to hang out elsewhere is a good move any time. Good on you!

Re: Crazy Like a Fox?

Betsy — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 09:55:30 -0000

Outsider (capitalized) in Alaska-speak means someone in the lower 48.

Re: The Triiibes Blog Project

Betsy — Mon, 29 Dec 2008 11:57:36 -0000

Hi Megan - Greetings and thanks for the mention from sunny and frosty Northern Minnesota! It's 9 degrees and we're ice fishing, x-country skiing and eating! Best wishes for a fab New Year!

Re: Guillebeau’s Brief Guide to World Domination

Betsy — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 21:45:27 -0000

Isn't it a great piece of work? I loved it! We affiliated with his Unconventional Guide series, too. Very smart and a fellow Triiiber.

Re: Megans Against Overviews

Betsy — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 06:20:50 -0000

Oh yeah, I do. Because I'm the one who invariably paints the entire landscape instead of zooming in on the leaf, or the rock, that is so perfect and deserving in its own right. Here's a writing goal I've set: zoom in. And you've helped by explaining the feeling of why it needs to happen more than anyone has. Up til now. I can't wait to hear/read your takes. :D

Re: Power Line - The price is right (Ellison hajj edition)

Betsy — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 09:54:16 -0000

Deluxe resort vacation or standing in a sea of humanity in 1000 degree heat is not the point, Paul, although we can agree that he is deeply flawed, ideologically and ethically. The point IS the benefactor, and also that the Star Tribune, per usual in its dereliction, is late to the table. The Strib dances around in this vague piece, still not quite bringing itself to connect the dots for the casual reader who remains oblivious to who the MAS is and what they do.

Ellison has received the most magnificent of passes from this so-called news organization, ensuring that a sheepishly slavish Democrat electorate in his district has guaranteed him an income for life courtesy of the taxpayer. Ellison gallivants around the Middle East with an agenda whose centrifuge is designed to spin Israel off into the stratosphere of oblivion. In this respect, he's our very own Jimmy Carter with a longer lifespan.

Re: Power Line - Health Care Stagecraft

Betsy — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 08:38:24 -0000

This woman can't work, but she volunteers for the Obama campaign doing exactly what? Are we allowed to ask?

Re: Power Line - Notes on Obama's Great Torpor

Betsy — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 08:59:18 -0000

It would be nice if Obama's speechwriting department hired a Freshman Comp professor to oversee what these clowns upload to the teleprompter. But I suppose coherency and premise support are just too much to ask.

Re: Power Line - The Real Sarah Palin

Betsy — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 10:58:48 -0000

Finally, Tom! Thank you! Why is Palin's decision political suicide, yet we have a sitting President whose record of actual achievements is far less? Put the laundry list of Palin's achievements above next to Obama's legislative and policy work prior to January, 2009. Are we going to forever be cowed by the double standard? Wake up! The party is in disarray; Republicans in Congress don't know what keeps hitting them. Palin's about the only one with real cojones among the lot. Sheesh, enough with the friendly fire already!

Re: Power Line - Ascent of the flying imams

Betsy — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 11:24:27 -0000

About the only thing to ascertain at the moment would be whether Judge Montgomery is an unwitting tool of strategic infiltration methodology. Either she is, or she's complicit with the strategy.

Re: ‘It’s spelled F-O-O-T-B-A-L-L not F-Ú-T-B-O-L’

Betsy — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 12:21:32 -0000

So, Jim...¿Con quién vas? Literal translation is "with whom do you go"?

Re: An Open Letter to Protesters

Betsy — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 09:46:16 -0000

Back in the Stone Age, which you whippersnappers don't remember, this was called Radical Chic. Now, it's chic to be against the war, it's darkly chic to be an anarchist, and it's mainstream chic to be a Democrat. Ask someone the why part, though, and you'll get a blank look more than anything. Meanwhile, the doers go on doing under the radar. You get a second AMEN, Matthew, from me this week.
And Jim, what's up with the cool tweaks to the comment options? The twitter thing is cool and the option bar for the comments box is cooler! Thanks!

Re: Twitter FAIL

Betsy — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 11:54:45 -0000

Yes - or just lack of refresh on Tweetdeck and/or the Firefox plug-in. Seems to be working okay now, but yesterday the Firefox plug-in self-adjusted to updates in longer increments because traffic was down at Twitter. I'm still scratching my head...that doesn't follow.

Re: Costa Rica Spanish

Betsy — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 10:47:07 -0000

Hi Jim - When I lived in California years ago, a Castilian woman told me I spoke Spanish "like a wetback." Um, thanks?

<abbr></abbr><abbr>Betsy Wuebkers last blog post..FROM THE ROAD: INTO THE YUKON</abbr>

Re: iPhone 3Gs | Why get a Blackberry?

Betsy — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 22:59:43 -0000

Hi Jim - Blackberry Storms are on sale for $49 bucks with my carrier. This means they must be going to upgrade out of the model? Iphone is supposedly offered by Verizon after the first of the year? All these rumors are keeping me in a state of indecision.

Re: Picnics

Betsy — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 07:16:03 -0000

Hi Chris (and hi to Ed Welch, nice to see you, gosh they'll let anyone in here, won't they! :) )

Thank you so much for addressing this. Yesterday, we posted our first affiliate recommendation - Chris and Ed, you might recognize who we carefully selected. The product dovetails with our content and intent, it delivers a fantastic value, and we fully disclosed the relationship in the post. Still, I struggled, wondering if readers would think we were crassly commercializing.

Finally, I figured we're gonna hear about it one way or the other if anyone should care, so hit publish. As other realists have said above, it's about keeping a balance. You mentioned the Triangle above. Like a tripod or three-legged stool, if one of the elements is out of whack, it'll fall over. This is a very helpful image for us to keep in mind with our future evaluations.

Thanks again!

Re: The Beauty of Pirate Ships

Betsy — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 07:05:50 -0000

"Quitcher bellyachin' and get to work or ye'll walk the plank!"

Ditto to all the positives, Chris. I posted about "Reliance" late last night and repeated it in Triibes this morning, inviting a discussion of ideas and strategies to deal with things the way they ARE, not the way we wish or the way they were. Get up, get revved, and get movin'. Or as my partner's dad used to say, "Press on." Rough seas can provide exhilarating journeys.

Re: Cafe-Shaped Conversations

Betsy — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 16:08:26 -0000

Admittedly, I just scanned all the comments, so if someone has already said this, sorry, but the reason the cafe concept works is because it's small. I blogged about it a month ago here: http://passingthru.com/2008/10/small/

Small is important because people need to feel they matter. The commenter who talked about tweeting with Best Buy's marketing guy gets it. BB's Marketing Boy doesn't. As long as marketers don't get that people crave feeling like they're worth something to somebody, they may sell product, but the impersonal transaction is all they're going to get. Big companies do well to rely upon individual salespeople who have the wherewithal and the empowerment to interact in a stand-up way with their sub-tribe of customers. Imagine if Best Buy's marketing guy started treating the Blue Shirts as adults, empowering them within their bailiwick to run a micro-business that is housed under BB's roof?

Sub-tribes always form within larger tribes once critical mass is reached. I'm betting we're going to see a host of new companies form who are more than content to stay small and connected. Howard Lindzon talks about being "too small to fail."

Re: My Site Dressed in Thesis

Betsy — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 07:15:02 -0000

Love it! We've been dressing in Thesis, too, since early September. I customized our header, dropped the stock rotating images, and made our blog title "live" using the help of the forums and the tutorials, all in a day. Without. One. Bit. Of. Experience. Ever!

Looking at your rss and other icons up top makes me want to do more! I love the font you've selected and the background color in the sidebars adds just the right touch with your background - very handsome!

Re: Advertising and Trust

Betsy — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 06:50:06 -0000

How can I say this bluntly? It seems like the ladies on the corner who are giving it away for free are accusing you of working at their profession for money? And so... ???

I think if there was a huge concern about journalistic ethics - an oxymoron now if ever there was one - from within the Fourth Estate, we might have had a different outcome in the recent elections. Or at least a little parity in favorable coverage. Talking about how the coverage you produced favored one candidate AFTER the election doesn't count. We know it's an attempt to regain credibility. The notion that journalism remains unsullied by the stain of lucre belies all the ongoing fawning throughout the media. Glass houses, pots, kettles, and all that. Just sayin'.

Don't look back, Chris. "Journalism" (said with breathy reverence, looking heavenward) exists to stir up the crap. There will always be those who look to bring a leader down. Ironically, they wouldn't have known about this if you hadn't told them in the first place. :D

Re: Think in Curves

Betsy — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 08:43:23 -0000

Hi Chris - Recently Pete and I were working on something and it dawned! He's a linear thinker, a list-maker, a sequential. I think like a web or a net. All those little intersections of thoughts and ideas. Curves, webs, remain open to the unexpected and the connectivity.

Re: What Storytellers Can Do In Real Time

Betsy — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 05:59:18 -0000

In response to the commenters (journalism purists?) who question the relevancy of the scoop to a presser rather than breaking, harder news: This is a scoop of a different nature. The feedback immediacy is totally relevant and accelerates the reactive process to the launch, which in turn - down the road - will accelerate any modifications Panasonic might make in response to customer demand.

By now, companies should understand that business is relationship-based. Those that don't won't have a prayer of selling a product. It's great news that a large company like Panasonic is demonstrating not only an understanding, but is working within the paradigm.

Re: What An Executive Blog Editor Needs to Know

Betsy — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 08:03:55 -0000

Thanks, Chris - very timely and masterfully focused.

Our gift basket franchise's private online community's blog is one week old. These tips will help me maintain the best standards in delivering quality content to our franchisees. Including these guidelines in our editorial calendar will help "sell" topics and series to Head Office - who has come around nicely to the concept after being totally against it when I first recommended last fall.

I also agree with Joanna that private blogs will benefit greatly from this advice.

Re: You Still Need a Frame

Betsy — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 07:31:59 -0000

Uncanny the way the universe provides the direction. We're launching another project, and there's absolutely no reason not to use this blueprint. We'll keep you in the loop, Chris. Thanks a heap!

Re: How You Can Help End the Problem of Blogs With Great Content and No Readers

Betsy — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 13:30:17 -0000

I'm in with a trackback! Great way to pay it forward, thanks!

Re: Exciting News and Help Wanted

Betsy — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 08:52:54 -0000

Hey Chuck - the reason this took off so well is that you were unconcerned with self-promotion. You started by paying it forward, and look what you get! :) It's so deserved, and look how it's gone viral. Just by sheer awesome-ness you should be able to attract an A-list panel to help with your selections, whatever you decide the parameters will be.

Re: More Variety, Different Types of Blogs

Betsy — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 13:37:50 -0000

Chuck, you are doing an awesome job. Your process has been thoughtful and timely. Your selections have been excellent, and in line with your original intent. Frequent updates to let us know what happens next are great. You're building a community around this project and broadening everyone's horizons! Thanks for all you're doing.

Re: Introducing Ryan and Oktober5

Betsy — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 14:52:44 -0000

YAY! Triple YAY! Ryan is giving, consistently talented, and just all-around wonderful! Great pick, Chuck! Congratulations, Ryan, now maybe we'll get more out of you!

Re: 120 Persuasive Words That Build Rapport (VAK)

Betsy — Wed, 27 May 2009 11:57:15 -0000

Congratulations on being selected at BWAB! This post was a fabulous introduction - comprehensive and thought-provoking. It's going to help me in several endeavors I have going! I had read about the three types of learners when the kids were little in an attempt to help them and their teachers. It was a "Doh!" moment to realize the knowledge is so critical to business practice, too!

Re: Embracing our cultural identities at work and in life can only be good for us

Betsy — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 09:19:21 -0000

Hi Maya, Hearty congratulations on being named New Blog of the Week at Barbara's site, and with good reason!

I wish we would be more mindful that diverse elements combine into a happy kaleidoscope if we celebrate them, and not worry about being slighted. The result of too much political correctness in the past few years is blandness and fear.

<abbr></abbr><abbr>Betsy Wuebkers last blog post..VOTE</abbr>

Re: iPhone 3Gs | Why get a Blackberry?

Betsy — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 11:51:49 -0000

Well, see that's the thing. I don't know. I think it would be like the microwave for me: "Who needs it! Oh...now that I have it, I'm using it constantly."

I do admit to liking that app with the level bubble. :) Yeah, a $300 level so I can hang pictures with my phone!

Re: With Gratitude to NAFOW and Its Participants: The Holy City

Betsy — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 12:15:20 -0000

Beautiful, Megan. Thank you.

Re: Recession Marketing: Communicating Value is Even More Crucial Now

Betsy — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 17:55:09 -0000

Hi Christine - Congratulations! This topic resonates with me, as I am speaking at our local wholesale gift mart the week after next on this very topic to anxious gift store owners.

It's funny, we have almost 50 franchise locations in our corporate gift company. It's fair to say that in the four countries we operate, the recession is definitely in full swing. Yet, some franchisees are doing well, and others not so much. The difference is outreach. As in, not waiting for the customers to come in the door once it's unlocked and the lights are on in the morning. It's avidly courting community within their customer base: not relying on advertising, but actively marketing and creating a reason for customers to come in, whether it's an event or a preferred customer program, etc. In other words, you are so right: it's reaching out, and creating/nurturing a meaningful relationship.

<abbr>Betsy Wuebker’s last blog post..ON THE WINGS OF EAGLES</abbr>

Re: Why Integrating Blogging with Social Media is a Great Combination

Betsy — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 07:08:35 -0000

Hi Christine - I just found out about the Networked Blogs app on Facebook over the weekend. Doh! I'm really new to Facebook anyway - and was excited when one out of our five kids accepted me as a friend. :D

J.D. is so right - we forget that not everyone even knows what RSS is. It's up to us to make sure we're available to be found in the ways that people might be looking for us. I'm looking forward to seeing your post on FriendFeed - another place I'd like to utilize more. I'm there, but don't quite "get it." Thanks.

<abbr>Betsy Wuebker’s last blog post..ON THE WINGS OF EAGLES</abbr>

Re: A Week in Paris, and the Joy of Technology and Doing Business Online

Betsy — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 13:05:00 -0000

Hi Christine - Isn't Paris wonderful?! It's such a cliche to gush over it, but there's a reason it got to be that way, right? I was lucky enough to go with my daughter when she was 12, a perfect trip of a lifetime that we will always treasure. Now to convince my husband . . . because I must return. Thanks.

<abbr>Betsy Wuebker’s last blog post..ALL THE WORLD’S A STAGE . . .</abbr>

Re: 5 Crucial Facebook Privacy Settings

Betsy — Tue, 12 May 2009 07:53:23 -0000

Hi Christine - Very helpful and comprehensive! Thank you - now I just need to decide!

<abbr>Betsy Wuebker’s last blog post..MORNING IN PHILADELPHIA</abbr>

Re: How Can I Best Help YOU? Talk to Me…

Betsy — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 20:08:01 -0000

Hi Christine - I'm performing a similar function in acquainting and encouraging our franchisees with social media. Some of the "issues" I see as an observer of new users are a lot of broadcasting and lack of relationship-building in social media and in real-life networking. They are so focused on having to sell something that it's all they can communicate. Cringe. Instead of making relationships work and a natural sale or referral resulting, the perception will take more work to un-do. So, etiquette would be the broad topic, I would think.
.-= Betsy Wuebker´s last blog ..SURRENDER, CONSECRATION AND FREEDOM =-.