Happy Indie-Preneur Day! 7 Tools To Help You Celebrate Your Independence.

Indie.
It’s everybody’s favorite power-to-the-people word, especially when you check out the dictionary definition and discover its intrinsically American qualities: free from external control and constraint; “an independent mind”; “a series of independent judgments”; “fiercely independent individualism.

All of which translates so smoothly into a star-spangled new word: Indie-Preneur. Being an entrepreneur is so last century.

On this pivotal Independence Day 2009, it’s time we re-defined ourselves with a word that better represents the burgeoning world of plucky, passionate, indie-innovators who are busily working to rebuild our country.  Our chances of rebounding may be vastly increased by honoring — not resisting — today’s fluctuating and increasingly independent workscape. Indeed, Indie ‘tude celebrates all that made the U.S.A. revolutionary 233 years ago.

An Indie-preneur may be working solo, as part of a team, small business, non-profit or even work fearlessly within a giant organization. Indie-preneurism is a state of mind; a style of being; a scrappy, bootstrapping never-say-die way of life. Indie-ism is finding new solutions to pressing old problems by honoring our inner quirks and creativity; that eccentricity that provokes us to see things in a different way. Indie can scale big or stay small. There is no hard and fast definition of Indie. (Except this: note the word: ‘fiercely’ above.)

And no, Indie is not a synonym for maverick.

Here’s the First Annual Indie-Preneur of the Week Award, which goes to:Socialbees. Here’s why:

Argg! I hate when that happens:   When Facebook abruptly changed the Vanity URL requirements to a 100 fan minimum to claim Fan Page names, small business owners who had expected to nab their URL with just 25 fans were flummoxed. Then Facebook-savvy Socialbees came up with a brilliantly viral solution:  A Fan Page Chat.  Encouraged by Socialbees’ networking pro, Hazel Grace Dircksen, these chatters went beyond chatting and ‘fanned’ each other. I don’t have stats on how many of these Fan Pages jumped to the required 100 as a result of Socialbees’ small business smarts or how many valuable business connections were made that night –but it’s good example of how Indie-Preneurs can rock the rules and win.

Not surprisingly, Indie-Preneurs are fervent do-it-yourselfers. Here are 7 easy online tools to help you celebrate your independence:

Do It Yourself Logo Design: Logoyes.com  LogoYes is the leading provider of do-it-yourself logos and other premium design products to small businesses around the world. Guru’s Note: Logoyes is simple, fun, and even if not the perfect customized logo for which you’d pay thousands, it’ll do in a pinch. Consider it market research and explore colors, fonts and symbols.

Did you drool over that shimmering new box of crayolas every fall? Then prepare. Once you enter this site, you’ll be lost in color lust for hours. Colourlovers.com calls itself a resource that monitors and influences color trends. Check out color palettes, read color related articles and interviews. Guru’s Note: This site is a powerful brainstorming tool. During my Lab360s, each participant creates colors and names for whatever product we’re focusing on that day. Sparks the imagination! Also a valuable tool for banishing writer’s block.

Got new website? Get new feedback. Just launched itself, Launchlyshowcases new websites to an audience to help site owners get the attention and feedback necessary to succeed. Launchly’s big plus: instead of just showcasing a startup and letting it fall by the wayside, Launchly allows apps to resubmit new iterations and build on their ideas. Guru’s Note: Yes, Ms. Website Owner, you do need Feedback– and from more than just the peeps you drink with and their cousins-in-law. Website/app development very quickly becomes a myopic process — a site like Launchly is very reasonably priced ‘insurance’ in a world of fickle marketplaces and even fickler (?) users.

My social-media-genius pal Janet Fouts tested the hot new app Evernote: Always on the lookout for a new app, I couldn’t help but take a look. This, my friends, is a very cool app. In a nutshell, Evernote lets you add information to a database that is accessible through the web, a desktop app, and your iPhone, Blackberry or smart phone. Items are tag-able and fully search-able so you can add pretty much anything, run a search, and quickly find it again wherever you are. Now when I say you can upload things, try to visualize this. You’re at a networking event and you suck at remembering names. With Evernote you can take a picture of a person with your phone, tag them with their name and they’re saved for future reference in your database. Even more interesting, include their name badge in the snapshot, even a handwritten name tag, and evernote will recognize the handwriting and enter it as searchable text!

Small Business meets Big Government: Business.gov is a web portal operated jointly by 22 different federal agencies — a kind of one-stop-resource for small businesses. With links to federal programs, links for various rules, regulations and laws, state-specific and industry-specific links, it’s just what we Indies need to stay within the lines, at least occasionally.

And then there’s the Patron Saint of the Indie-Preneur: TED. “Riveting talks by remarkable people, free to the world” from the landmark conferences have now been translated into 51 languages and counting. After the fireworks this weekend, set off a few more by tuning in to TED.

Thanks to Mashable for the heads-up on Launchly.

The Great Facebook Name Grab Is Hours Away.

If you’ve logged on to your Facebook Profile anytime in the past week, you can’t miss the drumroll-please message. In a matter of hours, starting at 12:01 a.m. EDT on Saturday, June 13, Facebook is (finally) letting users pick their own Facebook profile usernames on a first-come, first-serve basis. Sure, this technology has long been standard at MySpace, Twitter and Linkedin but with Facebook’s exploding growth, personalizing your Facebook URL smartly ups your personal brand presence. Plus, these enhancements mean an end to that Facebook.com/26537215 numerical gobbledygook and the beginning of a faster, easier way for your peeps to be able to find you online. Here’s what the Facebook blog says about the new vanity URLS:

“Your new Facebook URL is like your personal destination, or home, on the Web. People can enter a Facebook username as a search term on Facebook or a popular search engine like Google, for example, which will make it much easier for people to find friends with common names.”

See you tonight on Facebook where I’ll be mightily scrapping with legions of other Sarah Brownes. I got name-jacked on Twitter and if you saw what the current @SarahBrowne was tweeting, you too would be chomping at the bit in this FB Great Name Grab. (Follow me @guruofnew)

Are You A Small Business with a Facebook Page? If So, Good News!
There’s been a lot of confusion about eligibility for usernames for Facebook Pages. Originally, Facebook would only allow Pages created before May 31, 2009 with a minimum of 1,000 fans to be eligible for the vanity URLS. After Admins of Small Business Pages rightfully complained, (me!) even forming a Facebook protest group, the powers-that-be in Palo Alto relented.

So remember this date: Sunday, June 28. On this date, “All Pages created after May 31, 2009 or that had less than 1,000 fans on that day will be eligible to claim usernames on Sunday, June 28.

If you have more than 1,000 fans and the Page was live on Facebook prior to the cut-off date of May 31, 2009, then go for it on June 13 along with your personal Profile.

Guru’s Note: Please check the Facebook blog for Page eligibility updates. Rules and dates keep changing as often as Heidi and Spencer exit the jungle.

Forget the Office Space — Just Rent A Desk.

With half the world busily participating in the new Gigocracy, working from home or even from the corner Starbucks can get old fast. This is why we should all immediately up and move to London, where they’ve come up with a smart solution called Desk Space Genie.

Desk Space Genie is a new website that advertises vacant desk space. The service helps businesses make a bit of money from their unused office space and enables bootstrapping small businesses or freelancers feel more established. It also sounds like it would be a great networking tool; ever so much more social than taking tea with your pup.

Desk Space Genie lets space-seeking ‘deskers’ search for a space by postal code or town, contacting the advertisers directly. The site lists vacancies in most major cities around the UK, covering ‘all inclusive’ desk packages with wifi and other utilities, or more basic ‘pay for what you use’ services. The site is free to use until 1 May 2009.

While co-working is an awesome concept, Desk Space Genie sounds even simpler. Wouldn’t it be great if someone got this idea going over here? (Or will I be *forced* to move to London?)

Many thanks, as always, to the trendspotters at Springwise.com

Six Signs Your Business Needs A Spring Cleaning.

Open the windows and let all that stale air go whoosh. There’s a lot of creepy, cruddy build-up crowding our attitudes, beliefs, behaviors — and probably our bottom lines as well, courtesy of sitting inside and stewing all winter. We’re living with a year’s worth of sludge that rates a serious scraping.

When it comes to your business, it may be time to start fresh. And for some, it may be time to scrub it completely.

Here are the Six Signs Your Business Needs A Spring Cleaning:

Your business is in a ‘soiled’ category.
Many businesses were built on the assumption that our world economy would be forever in 20th century growth mode. Starbucks is a vivid example of this mis-guess. Dubai, in fact, is looking like another one. Then there are the products smudged by environmental, cultural or humanistic factors, from Hummers to plastic bags to fur coats. Is yours a service business based on ‘guilt-inducing’ services people can no longer afford or have cut back on? Does your product dwell in a consumer-unfriendly category? Could you, should you, make it greener?

Clean-up: The chain Massage Envy is cleaning up in this stress-packed environment versus pricey (empty) spas by offering low-price massages ($49-59), memberships, convenient hours and locations. Former poster-children for luxury fashion, the style mavens at UrbanDarling created a Purge, Merge and Splurge program that promises not only to help you spend your clothes dollars more wisely but also simplify your life. Smartly, this new ‘invest in you’ positioning taps into the two key trends of simplicity and frugality. Plus, this show of empathy assures reluctant clients ‘we get it.’

You’re stuck. (Under thick layers of cloudy thinking).
You know who you are, that guy with the cobwebs covering his ears. You’re convinced that if you just ‘wait it out’ maybe ‘things will go back to normal.’ But even the most optimistic of experts, from economists to psychologists (we’re leaving the politicos out of this equation) believe that many of the consumer changes in progress may well be permanent. Yes, there is a certain amount of pent-up demand but increasingly today is the ‘new normal.’

Clean-up: Now is the time to power-listen to your customers. Survey, interview, chat, do whatever it takes to connect with your regulars and then listen hard. If yours is a face-to-face business, take your best customers out for lunch, invite them to a town-square type meeting and ask for opinions. Follow the conversation about your industry or product category already in full swing online via Twitter, Linkedin, Facebook and relevant niche sites. You need to get a realistic sense of what’s happening. Resistance is futile, dude.

Call in the Merry Maids.
Yup, we’re lone wolves, mavericks, solopreneurs and renegades. But perhaps some of the crud is coming from the sweat and swagger of always going it alone. It may be time to switch from me to we. You may know best when business is booming but times like this call for additional brainpower.

Clean-up: The solution? How about a Board of Advisors? If you don’t have one already, tap into the wellspring of genius around you and for god’s sakes, pick their brains. Make sure you have assembled a balanced group with a combination of backgrounds, specialties and personalities. The secret to an effective Board is to choose experts rather than networkers. You don’t need schmoozers. You need supporters who will speak their truth.

Buzz is fogging up your brain.
In a world where breakthrough tools like HARO, pitchengine and Twitter make buzz-generation easier and more fun than ever, it’s possible to spend hours everyday pursuing reporters and social media mavens. Often these efforts are successful — at least in terms of seeing your name and words in black-and-white. And occasionally, you’ll land the right mention in the right media and voila! your business is booming overnight. (This is also known as The Oprah Effect.)

But here’s the caution: Make sure your buzz-generation efforts actually result in real business. Like customers. Sales. Products. All those non-buzzy words. I don’t mean trying to calculate ROI, which has eluded most traditional and neo-PR pros these days. But with all the do-it-yourself PR tools today, it’s all too easy to spend too much time chasing buzz and thinking it’s always relevant to your bottom line.

Clean-Up:Allocate a certain percentage of your day to buzz. Peter Shankman sends HARO twice a day, so plan on at least skimming it for potential. Update your social networking sites, follow up on blog comments. Be very strict with your time.

Your brand identity looks dingy.
If you haven’t re-evaluated the look and feel of your brand’s identity for years — business cards to collateral materials to website to your business profile photo — it might be time to reassess. What may have been perfect when first created may either feel dated or be inadequate for your communication needs today.

Clean-up: Optimizing Social Media sites with professional photographs makes a big difference in impact. And I don’t mean those stiff, fold-your-arms-across-your-chest business pictures that Colbert so brilliantly lampoons. Find a photographer like the Bay Area’s talented Monica Michelle, who specializes in bringing out what’s naturally fascinating about you. And don’t neglect the power of pimping your Twitter Profile: an interesting and polished Twitter background (@hughbriss) will immediately increase your Follows the right way.

Your MyFax Messy Office Contest Facebook Page has 31,218 Fans.
The first step is admitting you are powerless over the contents of your messy office. If you can’t do it yourself, call in one of those de-cluttering experts or maybe one of those portable pods hauls the whole thing away.

Clean-up: Pine Sol. White vinegar. Lemon oil. Baking soda. These are all your friends. So are the spring-fresh new non-VOC paints. So is getting out of the office altogether and working in your favorite cafe, on the train to Timbuktu or at the beach.

Guru’s Note: The Guru has just launched a rollicking Spring Cleaning by ripping up the office carpet with a handy boxcutter and throwing it out the window. Next step: a ‘greener’ office via natural cork floors, which will make me feel squeaky clean and freshly virtuous.

The Big Three That’s *Not* Asking for Money and Why They Should Go to Washington Instead.

All day long we’ve been hearing about two different sets of The Big Three.

There’s The Big Three from Detroit, now jetless and nibbling on humble pie as they carpool it to Washington armed with their freshly minted ‘strategic’ plans so they can continue to troll for trillions.

Then there’s The Big Three from California, who in heated competition, each released new technology that’s projected to generate some hefty revenue.

An excerpt from today’s Seeking Alpha:

The three horse race between Facebook, Google, and MySpace to achieve dominance in the internet identity space doesn’t appear to be letting up any. It isn’t a mere coincidence that both Facebook and Google have announced their public launches on the same day; both are struggling to establish themselves as the de facto standard for both developers and end users. MySpace managed to beat out both Facebook and Google months ago when it publicly launched its service.

Which is why I wholeheartedly agree with the mavericky (and oddly charged) Mark Cuban who declared mere days after the Election that Obama had made his 1st big mistake.

Unfortunately, the economic advisory team that he has put together looks more like a semester’s worth of great guest speakers for an MBA class than an economic advisory team that can truly help him.

There are a lot of great minds on the list.

“Robert Rubin, Larry Summers, Laura Tyson, who served as Clinton’s top economic adviser; former Fed Vice Chairman Roger Ferguson; Time Warner Inc. Chairman Richard Parsons; former Securities and Exchange Commission chairman William Donaldson and Xerox Corp. Chief Executive Officer Anne Mulcahy.

Google Inc. CEO Eric Schmidt, Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm and Roel Campos, an ex-SEC commissioner, and Warren Buffett are also on the advisory board.”

Notice anything missing ?

Not a single entrepreneur. Yes Warren Buffett started a business, but he will be the first to tell you that he “doesn’t do start ups”. Which means there isn’t a single person advising PE Obama that we know of that knows that its like to start and run a business in this or any economic climate. That’s a huge problem.

So here we are in the midst of a (insert scary word), (insert scarier word) recession, with the media convincing us that we all should be cowed and question ‘the American way’, and yet these Big Three geeks are still scrapping in the schoolyard to beat each other to the punch. Silicon Valley and its neighbors to the South practice a quirky version of spiritual capitalism, worshipping gamesmanship and brainpower, and it’s this bootstrapping version of business that needs to be well represented in Washington as President Elect Obama assembles his economic team.

Certainly, the man who used social media to the max in his winning campaign has to include brainiacs beyond academics, politicians and big business, yes?

Guru’s Note: Thankfully, Eric Schmidt of Google is on board, although has reportedly turned down the first-ever office of CTO.

Tis Almost The Season for Merry Social Networking. Five Ways To Head Off The Business Bah Humbugs.

Despite the Scrooges already shoveling coal for our stockings, we Americans are a resilient sort. Let the corporations cut back on their festivities. Let the bubbly turn to brew, the shrimp turn to sausage, the Black Ties turn to black T’s. Our parties must go on.

But for those looking to these merry months as a never-ending source of business opportunities and shrewd social networking, beware of mixing Mistletoe martinis with clients new and old. Can you spot the red flags amidst the green? Here are five ways to head off the Holiday Bah Humbugs:

1. Give it a rest. (At least sometimes)

That potential client you’ve been dying to meet is standing at the buffet table, eying the sushi. Another prospect is happily greeting a group of friends. And another is headed toward the rest room. You’re thinking: “Now’s my chance!” In these recessionary times, it’s difficult not to leap into full court press when faced with a room full of possibility and prodigious amounts of alcohol. But sometimes it’s best to hang back and observe. Did that client just arrive and he’s starving after skipping lunch? How will he feel if you barge over with your business card? Maybe the other client hasn’t seen her buddies in months. Will she want to be interrupted by someone whose sole mission is pushing her own business? And the rest room. Well, duh.

2. Shameless Promotion and Sacred Do Not Mix.

Never forget that sprinkled among the party-hearty revelers are those who regard Christmas, Hanukah, Kwanzaa or Winter Solstice as sacred. These faithful souls are not likely to take kindly to non-stop business chatter or cards offered along with holiday greetings. This is true for mailings, emailing’s, gifts or festivities. Don’t think you can easily spot those most apt to be offended. Why not be sensitive to one and all?

3. Give The Gift of Friendship (Not Friend Requestship).

We love our virtual friends and the exploding world of social networking. But just as one of the Presidential candidates drove us batty with endless insincere “My friends”, now is the time to be a real friend. People are losing their jobs, contracts, houses, health insurance and self-esteem. Let our gifts this year be kind and loving gestures — not tweets and pings.

4. Honor the Culture Mash.

I continue to be annoyed at the namby-pampy word ‘holiday’ that’s such a cowardly attempt at being politically correct. If it’s a Christmas Party, call it that. If it’s a Kwanzaa celebration, call it that. My favorite comes from those trend-setting folks at the OC: ChrismukKuh. Let’s have (as our new President calls himself) a Mutt-Mas, a party that mashes all our cultures into one wild multi-cultural shebang.

5. Schedule Some Silent Nights.

Rather than schedule frenzied Fa-La-Las, how about planning some quiet times and if clients are involved, declare a No Business Zone. Carving out some time to just ‘be’ keeps us sane — and may actually be a better business plan in the long run. No one wants to listen to or keep up a non-stop tap dance. There is peace in the quiet. Or plan the celebration around music and simply shut the heck up.

I’d love to hear your ideas.

Are You Ready to Build Your Business Blog? Take This Quiz.

According to a recent survey from popular blog network BlogHer, 36.2 million women actively participate in the blogosphere every week. Another survey lists 885,000 small-business blogs worldwide. 

On the other hand, some studies claim 60-80% of all blogs are abandoned within the first month after creation. 

The quiz below will help you decide whether you’re ready to build your business blog.  How many are these statements are true for you?

• I am passionate about my business or industry and believe I have something to say.
• I’m all about authenticity. I want to cut through the marketing hype and be real.
• I’m reasonably tech-savvy, am online at least once a day and in general, am comfortable using the Internet.
• I’m frustrated with spam and email filters; I can’t get info through to my peeps.
• I want to be seen as an authority or expert in my field.
• I am willing to commit to writing a new content-rich blog at least once a week.
• I want to be able to easily and frequently test new ideas for my business.
• Feedback is a good tool to improve my business. Bring it on!
• I know what blogs are and have a few favorite I read regularly, not just perezhilton.com.
• I don’t want to have to ask my graphic or web designer every time I want to change or add something to my site.
• Although I am no Danielle Steele, I like to write and love Spellcheck.
• I want to expand my business’ presence — go national and maybe even global.
• I want to build more traffic to my website. I built it; they didn’t come. Help!
• I want to build a media empire! I want to create ebooks and info products.
• I am patient and understand that a successful blog takes time to build.

Your score?

Blogging Basics: Six Surefire Steps To Starting Your Business Blog.

Now that you’ve finally zapped the nagging voice in your head that shrieks: You’ll Never Be Good at Blogging! it’s time to sit down and find out just how easy it is to get your new business blog up and running.

But before we get going, I want you to promise me something:

Ignore the Jargon. For now.
The alphabet soup of buzzwords about blogging and social media makes many of us feel like our heads are going to explode. Don’t let jargon like SEO, RSS, Ping, CSS, Technorati and ‘Digg it’ stop you from getting started. You can bone up on these buzzwords later.

Thank you. Let’s move on.

You have many (easy) blog software options.
Once you start researching choices for your blog publishing platform, these names will bubble up: Blogger, Livejournal, Typepad, WordPress. You can’t go wrong with any of them, although obviously I’m a WordPress fan. The sites make it easy to sign up with big buttons and headers: Express Yourself. Start Now. Sign Up. Take the plunge, even if parts of the Sign-Up process sound like Swahili. You can tweak almost anything later. Here’s what WordPress says:

You can get a blog started in less time than it takes you to read this sentence. All you need is an email address. You’ll get your own WordPress.com address (like you.wordpress.com), a selection of great free and customizable designs for your blog (we call them themes), 3 gigabytes of file storage (that’s about 2,500 pictures!) and all the other great features listed here. You can blog as much as you want for free, your blog can be public to the world or private for just your friends, and our premium features are completely optional.

Business Blogs should be about . . . (duh) your business.
Start with the basics about your business and let your blog evolve from there. Some bloggers begin with a basic ‘Welcome to My Blog’ and simply state the blog’s purpose. You might try some of these basic themes to get you going:

• Best practices for your business or industry
• Business/industry trends
• Executive promotions, employee updates
• Your business activities, successes, changes, events
• Blog about an expert in your field

Experimenting with different approaches will help you find your own voice and style. Try some short ‘announcement‘ or ‘news bulletin’ type posts, which tend to be 200 words or less. Try some analytical, How To, or Ten Tips posts, which typically are 300-600 words. Blogging is all about tapping into your passion and sharing it with current and future customers. There was a reason you started your own business. Go back and find that original bliss and a successful blog will follow.

Post something. Post anything.
Once you’re signed up, pick a template/theme from the many excellent choices and post NOW. Most of the blog software starts you out with a ‘Hello, World’ first post, which can be deleted later. Here’s the good news: even if you’ve chosen to have a public blog from the get-go, it’s highly unlikely anybody will find it unless you’re giving them the link. That means NO ONE IS READING YOUR FIRST RAMBLINGS. If you’re really paranoid that either your best customer or your 7th grade English teacher is going to discover your dreadfully dangling participles, you can choose to keep your blog private. This is easily changed later.

The Look of Your Blog
Most of the blogging services make choosing a basic look a very simple process. You pick a theme, choose your colors, number of columns and the overall look and feel of your blog. On WordPress, you can change the look of your blog with over 60 themes with just a click of a button. Each theme allows you to customize with various options such as uploading photos and logos. At some point, you may want to call on a creative professional to optimize your blog — especially if your blog is part of your existing website and you want to maintain a consistent brand identity.

You’re Not Ready for Prime Time Yet.
If you build it, they won’t come. Which is actually good news. You need a solid 30-60 days minimum to get your blog ready for prime time. This incubation period is even more important for business blogs, which after all, represent your brand’s voice in the blogosphere. Before you start promoting your blog, make sure you do these basics:

• Have written a minimum of 20 posts
• Posted consistently over the past 30-60 days — no yawning gaps in refreshing
• Have posts in each of your Categories
• Have optimized the blog’s look and feel, with the appropriate features and plug-ins including a Contact form
• Have written an ‘About’ page, which tells the reader who you are
• Understand the basics of SEO (Search Engine Optimization)
• Set up RSS feed
• Consider setting up a Blogroll which lists blogs you like
• Depending on your kind of business, post a Comments Policy
• Spellcheck!

Please. No More One-Month Wonders.
According to a number of social media research studies, an astounding percentage of blogs are abandoned soon after that pivotal first (and only) post — and 60-80%  are abandoned within a month.  Obviously, if a personal blog is abandoned, the consequences are limited.  But if a business blog is abandoned, it can send a variety of dire messages — including that your business has gone poof. 

Guru’s Note:  The Guru is a believer in the Web 2.0 mantra — Share, not sell — but a savvy business consultant I met after I spoke on Social Media at a terrific NAWBO (National Association of Women Business Owners) event pointed out that I am woefully lacking in sales techniques.  She was right on.  I’ve been so blessed with so many incredible projects that roll in via referrals and readers I forget about selling my services. So thank you, Carol, and here’s my call to action: Hire me!  Check out the new Hire Me section here on my blog for the scuttlebutt on all the Guru of New & Crew.

The 5 Bogus Reasons You Haven’t Built Your Blog.

You know you need to get your business up and blogging. You know the buzzy b-word is one of the most important tools in your brand building toolkit, the one that can quickly turbocharge your online presence. You probably even know that 175,000 new blogs are being built everyday. So somebody’s getting around to it. Why not you?

Here are just a smattering of the excuses I’m used to hearing from clients:

But I’m not a writer.

Not only is it not necessary to be a star writer, I sometimes think it’s actually a disadvantage. Too often we professionals wordsmith a phrase or header to death, substitute pretty prose for pithy bulletins and slave over posts so long they’re no longer timely. That doesn’t mean you should publish sloppy posts, skip spell-check or let your syntax be eligible for the next edition of the Grammar Nazi. But increasingly, we live in a world of pings, posts and texts; paragraph after paragraph of literary genius does not a blog make. Short but sweet rules. Lists rock.

But I’m not a geek.

Today, thanks to the wonders of Web 2.0 technology, everybody qualifies to celebrate National Pi Day and to build and maintain a thriving blog. Blogging sites like wordpress, typepad, livejournal and blogger offer simple templates that let you create a basic site in mere minutes. You can easily upload your business’ brand identity materials like logos, etc. Most of the blogging sites feature easy plug-ins that let you add everything from Contact Me forms to Tag Clouds with a mere drag-and-drop.

But I don’t have time.

You don’t have time if you consider your blog to be a series of articles or essays. But instead, if you understand that the origin of blogging came from the phrase web-log — and that these early blogs were simply a series of links with personal comments — then you can visualize your blogs as newsy updates or quick posts with a point-of-view. Even better, most blog sites let you update your blog from your mobile phone. Check out author and marketing genius Seth Godin’s blog, which perpetually ranks at the top of most lists. His posts are often just a couple of brief paragraphs, with lots of easy-on-the-eye white space.

But I don’t know a thing about all that Search Engine stuff.

In addition to dramatically boosting sales of Excedrin Migraine tablets, the term “search engine optimization” or SEO, describes the process of increasing both the quality and quantity of traffic to your website or blog. SEO is actually a variety of techniques that make your content easier to find for search engines like Google and distant runners-up Yahoo, MSN Search and Ask.com. And while, yes, SEO is a science of sorts, the truth is that all the fancy keyword bots and optimization programs typically aren’t any more effective than these three simple things:

• Post often, post regularly
• Post quality content about your business, using descriptive titles on your post and SEO keywords early on in your post
• Do the basics, like listing your site in Yahoo!, Google, DMOZ, and claiming it in Technorati.com.

Guru’s Note: I always tell clients that it takes a good 60 days to get your blog ready for the search engines. You’re going to want to make sure that everything from your domain name to your blog’s graphic look and feel to ‘populating’ each category with keyword-rich posts is up and running smoothly. Then and only then, do you tackle additional SEO, beyond what you’ve already built into your blog. (Check back for: The Top 8 Mistakes Newbie Bloggers Make’)

But will it really help my business?

There’s a good reason some people think BLOG really stands for: Better Listings On Google. There’s nothing like fresh, frequently updated, high quality content to improve your business blog’s ranking with the search engines, especially with Google, which now has almost 70% of the U.S. search market share. Blogs are inherently more search-engine friendly than even the most robust websites. Websites seldom get updated, but remain as fixed ‘corporate brochures’ while most bloggers post new content frequently. (Especially if they hire The Guru to do the Blog Refresh!)

But there’s another benefit to blogging, beyond the inevitable desire to generate traffic. Your blog is a primo opportunity to express — and extend — your brand’s personality. Your blog is the place to be authentic, to be human, to hone the many facets of your brand. This where you can magnetize a new audience, maybe that secondary psychographic you’ve wanted to reach. This is where you can experiment. Want to leverage the equity in that popular product of yours? Play market researcher and ask your readers what they think. Blogs — and their close relatives on Facebook, Ning, Linkedin and MySpace, are powerful tools for testing ideas, content, and new marketing campaigns. And cost-effective, too.

Okay, folks. Any excuses left? Get blogging!