Travel Photography Tips: What Should I Pack?

From the new book,

Travel Photography Tips: What Should I Pack?

Backlink: http://intelligenttravel.nationalgeographic.com/2011/09/21/travel-photography-tips-what-should-i-pack/

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Five Online Strategy Tips To Manage Data Across Multiple Channels

Fundraising and building a robust and active email list is critical to nonprofits who want to thrive in a multi-channel world. To do this effectively though, nonprofit campaigners need to truly understand data by segmenting their current list and tracking and segmenting new supporters.

So keeping data in mind, here are five tips I hope can help you with your online strategy: 

1)      Profiling is key to targeting and hence the *channel*:  creating supporter profiles will help you target different audiences in different channels more effectively.  For example, your fundraising email list versus your Facebook page versus your direct mail—three different channels translates to three different communication tactics. 

2)      Social Networks require their own list growth strategy: email open rates are on the decline, according to Pew, 61% of adult users are social network users, an increase of 9X since 2005.  This means organizations have to think about not only growing their presence in relevant social networks, but they also have to think about growing their “lists” in these environments—much like you think about growing your email list.  Roz Lemieux argued that where we are with social networks today is where we were with email in 1999. 

3)      Email appeals are not dead: although according to M&R Strategies, email open rates declined by over 48% between 2005 and 2009, it does not mean the email channel should be ignored.  What it does mean is that you have to get more creative with your emails and that begins with understanding your audience.  What no longer works is the same email blast with the same ask to your entire list.  Email thoughtfully (check out BuzzMaven’s e-mail marketing check-list on how to write effective emails).  Start with segmenting your database, and then create conditional copy to match your supporters profiles, and always test your different segments with different content (such as subject lines or even the content and ask within the email itself) and measure the response.

Five Online Strategy Tips to Manage Data Across Multiple Channels

Backlink: http://www.frogloop.com/care2blog/2011/9/10/five-online-strategy-tips-to-manage-data-across-multiple-cha.html

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Tips To Boost Your Online Fundraising

Over the last few weeks, we’ve shared some resources to help you get started on specific aspects of your year-end online fundraising. But really, there’s a lot you can be doing all year to increase your base of supporters, engage them in your mission, and convert them to active donors. Using the Internet to Raise Funds and Build Donor Relationships: Tools, Tips and Techniques for Boosting Donations, a new handbook from Convio, will help your organization see the big picture and create effective strategies for long-term success.

This guide integrates many of the tips and best practices you’ve read about here, into a detailed overview, with frequent reminders of the benefits of online vs. traditional donor relationships, suggestions for the types of tools you’ll need, some metrics that will help you to set goals for your program, and real-world examples.

To make the most of the advantages of online fundraising over offline methods – cost-effectiveness, timeliness, and the ability to find out more about your supporters over time and more easily communicate with them based on what they respond to – you’ll need to take an approach that includes:

• Build and manage your email list: drive traffic to your site, and make sure it’s optimized to convert visitors to subscribers. Make your join button easy to find across the site, keep “required” information limited, and have incentives (such as an insightful newsletter or invites to special events) for joining your organization or signing up to your email list. Send messages to your existing supporters, asking them to “tell a friend” about you and follow you on social network like Facebook and Twitter. Consider engaging a reputable “list append” service that finds email addresses to match postal addresses in your existing database.

• Develop relationships with your supporters: over time, you can survey or poll your members to find out more about themselves and their interests (helpful for list segmentation), and create special messages and landing pages based on what they tell you.

Tips to Boost Your Online Fundraising

Backlink: http://www.frogloop.com/care2blog/2011/8/26/tips-to-boost-your-online-fundraising.html

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Key Tips For Super Effective Writing

Writing should be enjoyable! (source : Ed Yourdon) Writing is supposed to be an enjoyable experience. Especially, for people who depend on their writing as a source of income, this is the most complicated necessity. While you have to maintain the quality of your written piece, the creativity is also that much important. For the [...]

Key Tips for Super Effective Writing

Backlink: http://brajeshwar.com/2011/key-tips-for-super-effective-writing/

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Tips to Make Your Google Image Search Even Better

Today, we are share few tips to help make your image search experience better. The tips are simple enough, but if you haven't seen this kind of trick before, it's well worth knowing.

Tips to Make Your Google Image Search Even Better

Backlink: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/DTWB/~3/ZLmnAoP-j-Y/

Windows Azure Tips for Microsoft Platform Ready

If you are developing an application, you might be interested in the following resources to help you get compatible and to make the most of the Windows Azure platform. For more information please visit Microsoft Platform Ready and MSDEV. If you have any questions please contact the team at: 1-888-346-3129 via email email. or Online Chat.

Windows Azure Tips for Microsoft Platform Ready

Backlink: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/DTWB/~3/bSK16Dat2DA/

Ten Tips to Kick-Start Your Startup With Twitter

It seems like only a few months ago when I wasn’t sure if Twitter was relevant to my business, or if it would be a waste of time. Now I have over 280,000 followers on Twitter as StartupPro, and the business is fun as well as profitable. I’m now convinced that any entrepreneur can use it to kick-start their business, and build their brand as well.

First, I’ll try to answer the most common question I still get from business people “What is Twitter, really?” For business people, it’s a way to put out “sound bites” or tiny ads on the Internet, much like you see them in the mainstream media on TV, but without the cost, to your prime audience.

Actually they are “txt bytes,” like cell phone text messages in length, and they are broadcast to all your followers, or directed at select recipients. People can respond in the same fashion with personal requests or general comments. The important responses are real “business leads.”

A lot of people are doing some very innovate things with Twitter. I won’t cover those here, but I’ll offer some practical tips to get you started.

This is a guest post by Martin Zwilling, CEO and founder of Startup Professionals, Inc. It has been republished with permission.

Here are 10 ways to do it >>

Join the conversation about this story »

Ten Tips to Kick-Start Your Startup With Twitter

Backlink: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/typepad/alleyinsider/silicon_alley_insider/~3/XAvi2_Mn9WI/ten-tips-to-kick-start-your-startup-with-twitter-2010-12

Google Docs: Tips to Add Images in Spreadsheets Cells

Earlier this month, Google mentioned that you can now insert "images into a cell". With the image() formula you can link to a publicly accessible image and control how it'll look with optional parameters. This is useful for bringing a visual element to your spreadsheets for things such as a product catalog listing.

Google Docs: Tips to Add Images in Spreadsheets Cells

Backlink: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/DTWB/~3/KcI_uyTYZOc/

Comment on Pass It On: Some Infectious Productivity Tips by Per Schmitz

QR Codes are surely very interesting for sharing contact details. We thought a lot about this topic at DooID.com (free virtual business cards) and finally integrated personal QR Codes in three different ways: on the virtual business card, on the mobile card version and as a download for real world sharing. What do tou think about this approach? We would love to hear your opinions.

Comment on Pass It On: Some Infectious Productivity Tips by Per Schmitz

Backlink: http://gigaom.com/collaboration/pass-it-on-some-infectious-productivity-tips/#comment-526945

Comment on How to Manage Telecommuters: Tips from Project Managers by PM Hut

I like the first point, paraphrasing, this is important to make sure that the employee understands the task he or she is assigned to.

Post originale: http://gigaom.com/collaboration/managing-telecommuters-tips-from-project-managers/#comment-517073

The Radar: Check Your Surfboard, Car Rental Tips, Europe's Christmas Markets

• Know before you go. Serious surfers looking to catch some waves in a sunnier locale this winter should research checked luggage policies before they fly to find surfer-friendly airlines. To check a surfboard, some airlines will charge up to $200 each way. However, on three carriers-- Air New Zealand, British Airways, and Virgin Atlantic-- you can check your board for free. [LATimes via @WashingtonFlyer]
  

• The Independent Traveler has broken down the first 10-minutes of a car rental, tracing by the second, essential steps every traveler should take before they hit the road. From tuning the radio to checking for dents and scratches, these steps help prepare for a safer journey.  [The Independent Traveler]

• Get in the holiday spirit with this list of Europe's best Christmas markets from the traditional to ones with a twist.  [The Telegraph]
  

Got Radar? Tag your favorite travel stories from the web #ngtradar and follow us on Twitter @NatGeoTraveler and @IntelligentTrav.

Photo: Paul Procaccio/My Shot


Post originale: http://blogs.nationalgeographic.com/blogs/intelligenttravel/2010/11/tues-the-radar-surfboard-trave.html

Friday Fun, developer tools and resources for Geo Devs – tips from Google, GeoIQ and Nokia

Some Friday Developer tips… Here’s a tip received from Google Maps Tech evangelist, Mano Marks (via facebook) as his slides from a recent presentation at Google Developer Day 2010 in Moscow titled “New Features in Google Geo” are now available for viewing… enjoy!  Speaking of Google, check out this video from New Orleans showing off [...]

Post originale: http://blog.gisuser.com/?p=8056

Tips for Online Brand Protection

With he the explosion of social media, sharing, and the likes, the thought of brand protection is often a hot topic and concern. Here’s a tip about an interesting guide that could help give you a few ideas to tackle the issue of protecting your brand. Learn the four steps that comprise the ideal online [...]

Post originale: http://blog.gisuser.com/?p=8025

Relocating? Top Tips on finding work in a new location

Being new in town isn't always easy, but it can be an adventure. Moving into a new flat or house can be a new beginning, a time of new discoveries, opportunities and challenges. Ideally you would have already found a new job before moving to your new

Tags: career advice

Post originale: http://www.blogcatalog.com/search/frame?term=location&id;=ca7d87b2d9aaf4f91e2d69eb2cd26916

The Radar: Writing Tips from Susan Orlean, Skip the Line at Customs, Spectacular Places of Worship

• Tonight at Nat Geo HQ, Contributing Editor Don George sits down with Greg Mortenson, the best-selling author of Three Cups of Tea, at our sold-out NGLive! event. Don last took to the stage to interview Susan Orlean where she dished these travel-writing tips: find a connection, be in the moment, and value surprise. Read more about Don's interview with Susan here and stay tuned to IT for a re-cap of tonight's chat.

• Global Entry, a two-year pilot program run by the U.S. Customs and Border Control, helps you breeze through arrival security check points, eliminating the dreaded customs line that typically weaves itself around international arrivals terminals. For $100 and after a government background check and round of finger printing, U.S. citizens and permanent residents can skip the line and go through customs at Global Entry kiosks that take an average of 40 seconds to clear. Hoping to make the program a permanent feature by the end of the year, U.S. Customs says Global Entry helps separate out low-risk travelers allowing them to focus more resources on those travelers who might be considered a risk. [WSJ.com]

• Matador has put together a photo essay of "The World's 12 Most Spectacular Houses of Worship," including the Sagrada Família in Barcelona, Mecca in Saudia Arabia, and Il Duomo in Florence. [Matador]

Got Radar? Tag your favorite travel stories from the web #ngtradar and follow us on Twitter @NatGeoTraveler and @IntelligentTrav.

Photo: National Geographic by Mark Thiessen



Post originale: http://blogs.nationalgeographic.com/blogs/intelligenttravel/2010/11/the-radar-writing-tips-from-su.html

The Radar: Street-Food Eating Tips, Traveling While Fat, Ten Great D.C. Restaurants

• While traveling, I strive to stick to the wise (and diarrhea-free) traveler's adage: "If you can't cook it or peel it, forget it!" and order my drinks without ice. Maybe there's a little more leeway than that; check out Laurel Miller's five tips to successfully eating street food here.

• Getting ready to travel this holiday season? Dreading having to sit next to an "oversized" passenger on a long-haul flight to Grandma's? Rob Goldstone--5'7" and 285 pounds--shows us the other side of the coin in "The Tricks and Trials of Traveling While Fat." He explains how he's adapted his traveling techniques (buying two seats, beseeching flight attendants for a seat-belt extender at the start of flights) and details some of the surprises he's encountered while traveling the world while fat: being told not to ride Vietnam's rickshaws, struggling to pass through a bus's turnstile en route to a Rio beach, and being playfully poked in the belly by curious kids in China who thought he resembled the Buddha.

• For those coming to D.C. for this Saturday's Jon Stewart Rally on the National Mall, you'll be sure to get hungry from all of your sanity restoring. Check out this list of ten great D.C. restaurants and put our D.C. City Guide to good use.

Photo of National Mall by Photo Phiend on Creative Commons.


Post originale: http://blogs.nationalgeographic.com/blogs/intelligenttravel/2010/10/the-radar-streetfood-eating-ti.html

Video Tips from Krist: Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta

Bob Krist, one of our fabulous photographers for Traveler, occasionally stops by to share his wisdom with us. Today, he shares his foray into video at the Albuquerque International Balloon Festival.

The annual Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta is one of the world's most photographed events. I had the opportunity to shoot it last week (for the second time----the first being way back in the film era), but this time, I decided to try it in video.

Thanks to the array of features of many of today's still cameras, I didn't need any special gear. Instead, I used the HD video capabilities of my Nikon D300s SLR and P7000 compact -- both have the ability to shoot in 720p HD video.

The balloon launching area is huge, so you need to be mobile. I carried three lenses for the D300s: a 10.5mm Fisheye, a 12-24mm wide angle zoom, and an 18-200mm zoom. And although I've been shooting stills professionally for over 30 years, I'm a video newbie, and every foray into the world of moving pictures brings a new lesson.  

At the Balloon Fiesta, that lesson was "learn to love your tripod." Yes, nothing says "I don't know what I'm doing" more than shaky video. So I had my tripod with me fulltime, and used it just about full time as well. In fact, my cameras probably spent more time on a tripod in those two days they have in the last year's worth of still shooting.

Admittedly, there are plenty of times when an experienced cameraman can use a moving the camera to create dynamic video shots, but for tyros like me, slow and steady wins the balloon race!

See more Photo and Video Tips From Krist from our blog, and visit Bob's blog for more info about his most recent shoots.  


Post originale: http://blogs.nationalgeographic.com/blogs/intelligenttravel/2010/10/video-tips-from-krist-albuquer.html

Geocaching Tips from Garmin, tips on Chirp, paperless cache, and myGarmin

Loads of interesting resources from Garmin for geocaching enthusiasts including a push towards paperless geocaching. Additionally, Garmin has introduced Chirp, a unique wireless beacon designed specifically for the outdoor adventures of geocaching. From Garmin… Affordable, durable and waterproof, chirp can communicate with, and be programmed by, any compatible wireless-enabled Garmin handheld for a more interactive [...]

Post originale: http://blog.gisuser.com/?p=7943

Some Tips For A Reduced Cell Phone Plan

Yes, we’re all busy and we get inundated with email and snail mail, pretty much to a point where keeping tabs on the important stuff is a challenge and a time waster. One source of frustration for me has always been managing the cell phone bill. I’ve had it with paper billing and my email [...]

Post originale: http://blog.gisuser.com/?p=7945