ActiveRain is a vital and growing network. Since inception we have grown by an average of 5% per week and it doesn't look like the growth is slowing down! We believe the more traffic we can drive to ActiveRain the more business our members will generate from the site.
The second graph down represents traffic sent by each of the search engines. February's numbers represent only through today (Feb 26th).
37 comments • Jonathan Washburn • February 27 2007 12:08AM 6 comments • Jonathan Washburn • February 22 2007 06:52PMA collection of posts or links, outside of ActiveRain, from the last week or so that I found interesting:
18 comments • Jonathan Washburn • February 20 2007 08:47PMThis week I will be sending out approximately 25 books to ActiveRainers. I will decide who will get the first batch by looking to the authors of this weeks featured posts. So if in the next couple of days you write a post that is selected as a featured post and you would like to receive any of the books listed below, name which book you want in the comments section of your featured post, and make sure your address is correct in your profile. The list of books to choose from: Smart Mobs, Purple Cow, Wikinomics, Cluetrain Manifesto, Naked Conversations, and The Long Tail. If you are having trouble deciding which book to choose, then win Mark Flander's contest and I will send you all six of them!
33 comments • Jonathan Washburn • February 19 2007 06:23AMLate next week we are working towards a beta launch of an exciting new ActiveRain product. It will be our first attempt at making money and we would like to work with 10-12 Rainers to help us design and test this product. We are looking for a cross section of our users; new members and long time members, young and old, very active and not so much, high and low tech. You get the idea.
If you would like to be a part of this group please leave a comment on this post. The focus group will likely involve one conference call early next week with Matt, Ben, James, and myself.
In case anyone is wondering, the new product will allow ActiveRain members the ability to host their ActiveRain blog on their own private domain name. Their blog will be customizable and the comments will syndicate back and forth between ActiveRain and your own personal blog.
82 comments • Jonathan Washburn • February 12 2007 08:18PMWow! Angela Haralson knocks our socks off with some amazing photos of Oregon's coast line with her series of pictures on Curry County's Gold Beach. Well done Angela!
33 comments • Jonathan Washburn • February 10 2007 04:42PMCongrats Jeff Craig for the featured photo of the day (300 points). Your photo taken in Carroll County Virginia is beautiful!
Runner up was a great nightime picture of Downtown Portland by Tony & Libby Kelly. I would also like to note that Shannon Elizabeth uploaded many more stunning photographs. I am sure she will be a force to be reckoned with!
29 comments • Jonathan Washburn • February 07 2007 08:25PMI was inspired to write this post after viewing the video below.
Steve Jobs is recognized as one of the greatest presenters of our time. A key to his success is the structure of his presentations. I have outlined the structure below.
Stage 1 - Huge (Where we have been):
Here the speaker is seeking to establish credibility. "Last year, using the "low definition video home tour", my team sold over $20M in real estate. That is Huge!"
Stage 2 - Mere Mortals (The "what" - introduction of the solution):
In the Mere Mortals stage the speaker sets the expectations for what they are about to speak about. "I am here to talk about the "virtual high definition video home tour" for the sale of your home! You are probably asking why a Mere Mortal needs a virtual high definition video home tour to sell my home."
Stage 3 - Wouldn't it be great? (The "why" - the promise on how it is going to change your life):
"Well wouldn't it be great if you were able to place a sign in your front yard tomorrow declaring your home for sale tomorrow and be guaranteed that your home would be viewed, virtual and in high definition, by over 100 people during the first weekend without a single non-serious buyer stepping foot into your home?
Stage 4 - Unbelievable! (Demonstrating the "why" in action):
This is the stage were you first demo the product/service and reveal the conceptual ways you could keep the "Wouldn't it be great?" promise. "Up on the screen is a virtual high definition video tour of your home. It has 5 minutes of high definition detail of every room in your home. Notice how you can see the fine detail work in your crown mouldings? Unbelievable!"
Final Stage - Pretty Cool huh? (How the "what" could be implemented)
Actual examples of how the product/service could be executed. "Just last month I sold three homes to out of state buyers that ratified a Purchase & Sales Agreement before seeing the home in person. Pretty cool huh?
Disclaimer: I really don't know if this is how Steve outlines his speeches, but it is how I am going to in the future.
Video link was courtesy of Seth Godin's blog and Gil
4 comments • Jonathan Washburn • February 07 2007 06:41PM
I have fallen behind on reviewing and selecting the Featured Posts, so I am reaching out to the ActiveRain community for help!
If anyone would like to help us select the featured posts for the next 2-3 days, please leave a comment on this post. I will select 1-2 people for this first couple days, and if it goes well and our members enjoy the fresh perspective we will likely make it an ongoing thing.
As we are testing this new idea we will likely be selecting the members with the highest points, as we figure they know what best defines a featured post. Nevertheless, please leave a comment below if you would like to do this and don't have very many points yet. Assuming all goes well with this idea, we will rotate you in as a Featured Post selector soon.
We are going to leave the criteria for selecting Featured Posts pretty much entirely up to the volunteer post selectors. This includes the type of content and how many posts they choose to feature. We don't have any definitive guidelines.
14 comments • Jonathan Washburn • February 06 2007 09:39PMIn honor of the great content that is being uploaded to Localism and all of the effort that is being invested in i
t, I am going to periodically feature what I believe is the top photo of the day. I will be rewarding the member that contributed the photo with at least 300 bonus points!
Today's Featured Photo was uploaded by Shannon Elizabeth.
(She has no photo on her profile but we love her anyways!)
The photo can be found in New Paltz, Ulster County, New York
Congrats Shannon! Our first Featured Photo winner. 44 comments • Jonathan Washburn • February 05 2007 11:21PM