Hi All!

Question: Is it ok to Fetch (vote on) my friends' articles?

Answer: Yes. It's natural for friends to vote on each other's articles. Just don't make the mistake of getting a bunch of people together to vote your article to the front page. If the article isn't up to par it's going to get deleted. And then we are going to look closely at who Fetched it.

So, the bottom line is, supporting your friends' work is cool, just be smart about it. :-)

Have a great week!

Linda Riley
News Editor

Don't Just Say You Love Your Customers, Show Them!
I like to think of myself as a loyal customer. If I find a good product or service, I'll evangelize it to death to anybody I know. While I've been happy with DirecTV for many years, over the past few months they are not showing me any love. In fact, I feel like I'm "old news" to them and I can be tossed in favor of someone new.

Submitted By: st0n3y
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Is Profit Sharing Right for Your Business?
If you're looking for a way to give your employees a bigger stake in the company, fund their retirement plans or regulate year-end bonuses, a profit-sharing program might be the solution for you. Giving employees a larger chunk of your company's bottom line might sound risky, but it often gives employees a boost in motivation.

Submitted By: LindaRiley
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Four Pillars of Social Media Algorithms ... Trust x4
Ever wonder why some Digg submissions go hot at 25, while others don't at 270+? Same with Stumbleupon ... why do some posts do exceptionally well while others with similar numbers of thumbs ups get substantially less traffic? One word ... TRUST!

Submitted By: SearchRank
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A Remedy for Blogger Inferiority Complex
There's nothing wrong with aspiring to be something that you're not, learn something that you don't know or achieve something that you've not achieved before - however sometimes when we're focusing upon what we don't have we lose sight of the very thing that could be the key to us going to the next level - what we do have.

Submitted By: LindaRiley
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Why Lease When You Can Buy? - A Case for Content Marketing
A great content strategy does not happen overnight, but it's very similar to buying and building your house. The more investment in skilled builders (journalists, content experts, custom publishers), the better your house will look (customer relationships, loyalty and increased sales). There are always situations where leasing works, but if you can buy the asset of content, and you know that, if done correctly, the asset will grow in value, why would you ever miss out on that opportunity?

Submitted By: juntajoe
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Don't Let Fear Silence the Opportunity to Grow
As a small business, it's important to let your personality show. We work with limited resources, so it's important to leverage what we have. And sometimes what we have are people with personalities that can make a difference. I've learned enough to know that small business owners have a competitive advantage in their ability to react more quickly. I believe blogs enhance a company's ability not only to foresee changes but also to create their own.

Submitted By: Robert
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How Stay-at-Home Moms Are Filling an Executive Niche
Lots of employers would like to be able to hire cheap, temporary teams of seasoned pros with experience managing $2 billion investment portfolios, running ad campaigns or earning Ph.D.s in neuroscience. But few know the secret to finding temps of that caliber: Look on playgrounds and at PTA meetings.

Submitted By: LindaRiley
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Marketing to Third-Party E-mail Lists, Part 1
More of my clients are dabbling in third-party e-mail marketing as a way to grow their in-house lists and broaden their reach, for two very good reasons: (1) The average cost of renting third-party lists is decreasing. (2) The average CTR (define) on e-mail to third-party lists is increasing

Submitted By: LindaRiley
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How to Promote Your Products With Podcasts and Blogs
The average person feels it's too much work to write, blog or speak in a podcast. Or they don't feel comfortable doing it. Get over it! Just do it anyway in spite of your fears. You will NOT feel confident at first. You do it anyway. The people reading your blog or listening to your podcast do NOT care. They care that you write or talk about the common interest and passion you share.

Submitted By: dking
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If You Could Choose Only One Site Metric to Look At...
If you could choose only one site metric to look at, which would it be and why? The video by Avinash Kaushik at the beginning of this article answers that question. Afterwards, I discuss what can be done to improve the performance of this important metric.

Submitted By: ijidak
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Changing Domain Names: One Small Business Example
What happens when you have a very long domain name that does not serve your business well - and you decide to get a new domain?

Submitted By: LindaRiley
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SBA Basics: 504 Loans
Recently Becky asked me to help with some information about US Small Business Administration (SBA) programs. Here are a few basics everyone needs to know; first, SBA does not do direct lending except for disaster assistance. They also do not have grant funding. What do they do?

Submitted By: LindaRiley
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How to Succeed at Everything that Matters
We often hear about overnight success stories, certain companies or individuals thrown into the limelight, having made millions from something or another. What we fail to realize, or rather the people calling them an "overnight success" fail to realize, is that there is usually a pretty substantial history building up to that success. Long hours, lots of money invested, family, goals or desires sacrificed, etc.

Submitted By: Robert
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