So, Google Alerts notified me the other day that Frames Direct have named their pink glasses JB140. I love me some Google Alerts 🙂
HD Video Options- What’s the Best?
Over the past few weeks I have really been focusing on increasing my efforts in video and increasing my skills in making video. The other week I shared a post on what HD Video options were the best bang for the buck. One of the comments I received from more than one person was to do a demo of some of the different cameras mentioned.
Today I wanted to share I made of various HD video options that are out there that I currently own. Some of the devices I tested do not promote that they do HD, but I included them for comparison. In the video below you will see comparisons of the Kodak Playtouch, Panasonic Lumix TZ5, HTC MyTouch 4G for TMobile, an original FlipCam, and the InSight Webcam of my Macbook Pro. I shot all the video sitting at my desk in my office from as close to the same position as possible so there would not be any variables in light, audio, or surroundings.
Also, I did not make any edits to the actual videos themselves. They are in as raw a format as possible. Audio has also been left alone. I will note that I did use my Audio Technica ATR 3350 microphone with the Kodak Playtouch. I had recently purchased a mono to stereo adapter and wanted to see if it worked in splitting the audio from a single mono L to a left and right channel. It seemed to work pretty well.
Here’s the video showing the various results:
Granted, there are many other camera options out there, but these were the only ones available to me at this time. If anyone watching this video has an HD video camera they would like me to review, feel free to contact me I’d love testing out your products and sharing with my audience.
So which of the cameras shared in the video, which one seemed best to you and why? Also, you can see many of the products used in my Amazon Video Store.
My daughter is showing her stripes this morning to #savethezebra
She is supporting in her own little way. You too can help by going to http://zebradefensefund.com.
Google Says Goodbye to Content Farms
Over the past two weeks Google has really been making big news and cleaning up their search results. First we heard all about the debacle of J.C. Penney from the NY Times for not playing well online and using too many black hat SEO techniques to even list. Some of the topics that they used to rank #1 on now are not even found in the first ten pages of search content. Clearly, Google will not tolerate people trying to cheat the system and has no problem acting with authority they possess when needed.
Then last week they announced major changes in social search results in Google. No longer will the results just show up at the bottom of the page, but they will now be ranked into regular results along with organic traffic. This means that social media platforms like Twitter are even more valuable to your business. I just did a test to see how this affected my results while logged into my Google account. As many of you know, we built custom WordPress Sites, so when I did a recent search, there was the link to our site sitting at #3 in the results. Granted, my results there might be slightly skewed as I am the owner of the social media accounts, logged in, and in the same geolocation, but when I checked with a friend on the other side of the country, I was #6 there. So, if you aren’t yet using social networks, START NOW!
Following these two big headlines from Google over the past 2 weeks came another HUGE announcement today. Google has declared war on the content farmers. Content farms are websites that simply pull content off of other websites and publish it out as their own. They are also sites that have thousands of pages of random content about absolutely nothing of value at all. People have built these sites because in the past the massive amounts of pages of content would rank well and help them to generate some good income through ads running on the sidebar and people clicking on links within to affiliate programs.
But, Google has recognized that these sites are not worthy of such well placement in the SERP’s and have started to take action accordingly. This means that sites that have a blog attached where users are generating their own unique content to their own site are going to start to see better ranking results. I noticed that already I have seen big jumps by some of my keywords. For example, that same term, Custom WordPress Sites, when I search it in a cache cleared browser not logged into Google, it used to rank on page two of Google. Now I have moved onto the first page of Google and am sitting at number 6.
This once again places a greater importance on blogging and writing new fresh content for your site regularly. If you are not creating new unique content for your site on a regular basis you will probably find yourself dropping down into the abyss of results with the content farmers, black hat SEO users, and plain old spammers. Develop a writing strategy, get a plan in place and start. If you don’t think you can find ideas to write about regularly, there are services to help with blog topics from really great bloggers. Saying you don’t know what to write about is an excuse that can no longer be tolerated.
From my perspective, I am really happy with these recent changes from Google and am excited to see how this will affect online businesses as things move forward. If your business isn’t as successful as you want it to be online, it might be time for a change.
Join Me at Generation Blue March 14th- 17th #GenBlue
When I received an email from Coldwell Banker back a few months ago I was beyond excited to be asked to come speak for the real estate company I worked with for over 7 years as an agent. Then, I heard about the direction that this years conference was taking, I became even happier to be a part of this conference. I hope that if you are a Coldwell Banker agent that you will be in Las Vegas this March 14-17 for Generation Blue.
I will be leading a few sessions at the event this year. The first is called 50+ Tools To Enhance Your Social Media Strategy in which we will be covering over 50 tools that I have found to be extremely helpful with growing my business through social media. We will cover some that you may have heard of before like Twitter and Facebook, but we will dig much further into tools like WordPress Plugins, Mobile applications, cloud computing, and monitoring your online presence.
The second topic I will be focusing on blogging in a session titled Fundamentals of Blogging- 5 Keys to Success. Blogs are the central hub to your online business. In fact, in a study by HubSpot reported that businesses who blog receive 55% more online business than those who don’t. In this session we will cover various places to start a blog, things to write about, and how to write your posts to attract consumers.
Please take a minute and review my personal invitation to join me at Generation Blue:
I look forward to seeing you all there!
Enhancing the Audio of Your Videos for Under $25 with the Audio Technica ATR 3350
As I shared the other week in a post on HD Video, I recently upgraded all of my gear as I hope during 2011 to be more involved with video. So far, I am still working on getting my video settings optimized, but I wanted to share a quick video test I just did regarding audio. Today is a pretty windy day here at the beach with over 25mph wind gusts. I thought this was a perfect time to take my new Audio Technica ATR3350 wired lavalier microphone (affiliate link) outside and see just what type of difference it would make on the audio quality.
I was totally amazed at the difference that this microphone made! As you will hear in the video below, the first half which was shot without a microphone attached I was literally screaming and could still barely be heard over the loud noises of the wind. Once I hooked up the microphone, the howl of the wind disappeared from the audio. This great microphone which you can purchase right now on sale at Amazon for under $20 is a great addition for anyone who may want to take their video production to the next level.
I can see plenty of uses for this microphone including when I am at noisy conferences trying to interview someone. This should reduce the background noise majorly and make it much easier to hear what they are saying. Also, I can see this coming in handy for outdoor videos. There are so many places I see this $20 investment being used.
Here’s the audio test video I just shot. Let me know if you already own the Audio Technica ATR 3350 what applications you are using your microphone for.
Order the Audio Technica ATR 3350 Wired Lavalier Microphone.