ZKQ Blog

Tweaking TypePad

TypePad is my tool of choice when it comes to creating blog sites. I currently have four active sites and numerous sub-pages in development. In the course of creating content, adding widgets, exploring ideas for grouping content, etc, I have found that I run across site elements that I may not want to use right away or need to test before publishing.

  This is especially true for SmartCollegeVisit. Development of this site is an organic process. I did not create a final vision of this web site and launch a finished piece of work. Instead, I created a work in progress. "Dynamic" is perhaps the better word choice.

The best way I've found to manage a dynamic site is to create a duplicate framework of the live site. I call this my "resource site." It looks just like my live site, minus the actual blog posts.

It's here where I play around with layout, add new elements, and test new features. I also store items that only need to be used at certain times of year. This way, I know that when I add new features to the live site, I can do so with confidence.

**For step-by-step instructions on how to create a resource site of your own, click here.**

Startup Lesson: People Will Surprise You

It's not exactly a news flash that people are full of surprises, but when my HARO query for the Smart See, Smart Do column on SmartCollegeVisit targeting colleges and universities asking for input about what not to miss during a campus visit resulted in responses from people other than admissions and public relations officers, I admit the "other responders" surprised me. In addition to responses from my target response group, I also received responses from tourism departments, alumni and community citizens. 

Tourism Departments and Visitor Bureaus

As I read through the emails from these other responders, I realized how fortunate are the schools who work closely with their city or state tourism office. By working together, the school gains a powerful ambassador of good will, often with access to resources outside the realm of traditional college PR. 

Alumni

There's nothing more heart-warming than to read a response from a school's alum sharing his or her opinion on what prospective students should see or do when they visit campus. This opens up a whole new aspect to college visit promotions. The information comes from someone who has "been there, done that," loved it, and hopes you will, too.

Community Citizens

It really speaks volumes about a place when someone not associated with a school is moved to voice an opinion about what should not be missed on a visit to campus. Knowing that people outside the college environment also love the campus and live in the college town or city adds value to the overall package represented by the school. 

What all of this shows me as a content creator, web site developer, marketer, and founder of a startup to promote college visits, is that if I'm to provide a valuable service to college-bound students and their families, that even I need look beyond the traditional college PR channels so I don't overlook the extended community that helps make the college visit experience the best it can be.

SmartCollegeVisit launched November 9, 2009.

Can Cats Make Snowballs?

Remembering Dad

     A Jeweler's Hands

Dad's hands are thick and wide
Wide enough to palm a basketball
or so I think as I pass the ball to him

With both hands he catches it
pushes it toward the pavement
On the rebound he reaches out
his hand stiff like a paddle

He misses

He has no rhythm for dribbling
nor is he built for basketball
Tall, but not thin
Dad's build is thick and wide
like his hands

Yet I've seem him lift the
smallest springs and wheels
and cogs from a broken watch
and lay them out on felt

And with the tiniest of tweezers
replace them in proper order

He can mount the most precious
of stones in a four-prong setting
for a man and a woman in love

And with the skill of surgeon
cut the words “Love is forever”
on the inside rim
of a gold wedding band

            Z. K. Queijo, 1990

Blogging with Purpose

 The post Top Content by Top Content Creators for Handshake 2.0 lists the titles and authors of articles published in 2009 that attracted the most visitors to the site. It's exciting to see that several of the posts I wrote made the Top 10 list for the year.

Knowing this fuels my confidence as a writer and as a content creator. It makes me think that if I can create good content for Handshake 2.0, then I can do so for my own business, SmartCollegeVisit.

My writing experiences over the past year have taught me that writing just to be writing (which was the reason I launched my very first blog years ago) is just blogging. Later I figured out that creating content means blogging with a purpose. To me this means delivering useful, or perhaps insightful, information in a way that tells a compelling story.

In the month that SmartCollegeVisit has been live, I've worked to deliver content in a variety of formats ranging from the retelling of parents' stories about visiting colleges with their children to showcasing a single interesting place unique to a particular school. The post with the highest traffic thus far is Student Panel Highlight of Radford Open House. We'll have to wait 11 months to see if it holds on to its First Place title.

First Email of the Day

The first email messages I receive every morning are from:

Tom Markiewicz
(@tmarkiewicz) with StatsMix reports for my blog and SmartCollegeVisit.

Peter Shankman
(@skydiver, @helpareporter) with the first HARO of the day.

Anne Giles Clelland
(@handshake20) with a "Good morning" and a glimpse of that day's slice of the social media pie.

Coffee and pie. A great way to start the day.

If you're wondering who bakes a pie in fry pan, it's quirky people like me who believe that you can take something traditional and mix it up a new way, using nontraditional tools, and come out with a delicious alternative.

Handshakes All Around

Last night, I attended my very first 3-minute video premiere. I stayed an hour. Anne Giles Clelland, founder of Handshake2.0, hosted a Tweetup at a local brewhaus to celebrate the release of her corporate video and theme song. The video was shown on one of the restaurant's big screen televisions. The name of the video: "Handshake." "Handshake," the song is available on iTunes. 

For most businesses, a web site and business cards are all that's required to represent a company, but for Anne, whose company is founded on harnessing the power of social communications by using today's technologies to connect regional businesses to the broader, global marketplace, web sites and business cards are not enough. It's a multi-channel world and having a multi-dimensional presence opens doors to more business opportunities. Handshake 2.0 facilitates making that happen.

What did I do at the Handshake premiere? I shook hands with people I met there for the first time. I shook hands with friends and business associates, and I introduced those I knew to people they did not know. It was a good night for handshakes 1.0 and 2.0.

Credits, per Handshake 2.0:

"Handshake" was directed by Jarred Foresman of Blacksburg Media and produced by Handshake Media, Incorporated.  It premiered on Handshake 2.0 on December 1, 2009.

The original music, Handshake, was written by Joseph Masciello and is available on iTunes.

The cast included Rob Martinez, Sean Moore, Kevin Allen and those from all over the world who shake hands when their paths happen to cross in Blacksburg, Virginia.