My Pitch Log Mashup, Vol. 8

Time to clean out the inbox again with a Pitch Log Mashup. As a reminder, this series is a collection of the sites, services, platforms and programs I get pitched by PR folks, start-up entrepreneurs and various others that I either don’t have the time or the interest in really writing full blog posts about, but are probably somehow still interesting or useful for you.

And if you’re interested in pitching me something, increase your chances and read the “How To Pitch SME” page. If you’re wondering why your pitch didn’t make it on my list, see the, “How To Pitch SME” page. If you’re still not sure, re-read the, “How To Pitch SME” page.

My Pitch Log Mashup, Vol. 8

Free White Paper Seminar For SME Readers!

My friend Michael Stelzner, whose blog on writing white papers I’ve been reading for years, is once again giving away his expertise, but only to a select few, including SME readers. You can sign up for a free online class called, “Marketing Strategies With White Papers,” which is normally priced at $59 by clicking here. The class is online, so you don’t have to go anywhere. It’s going to take place on Thursday, July 2. If there’s one source in the world for White Papers, it’s Michael. Go check this out.

BtoB Magazine Hosting Free Virtual Event

BtoB magazine is teaming up with virtual events provider ON24 to produce a free virtual tradeshow demonstrating how to make the Web 2.0 world more effective for business. I may log in just to check out the virtual event, which is becoming a more compelling option for those who are watching their travel dollars. The thing is June 23rd. Their PR folks tell me attendees will learn about how social media can drive sales from experts at LinkedIn and Cisco. There will be breakout sessions, a vendor exhibit hall and real-time networking with other professionals using ON24 Virtual Show business networking tools, as well as Twitter. If I can carve out the time, I’m going to check it out. Perhaps you could, too.

Weber Shandwick Offers Online Video Production & Distribution

I’ve met a lot of great Weber Shandwick folks over the last couple of years. The big agency is now offering a digital video production and distribution service called Social Studio. You can learn more about it here. It took me 10 minutes, though, to figure out exactly what it was they were offering and I probably still haven’t nailed it. Worth checking out, especially if you’ve got a budget and want to do some video content online.

Twitter For Events Gets Sophisticated With ParaTweet

ParaTweet.com has launched to capitalize on the Twitter-as-event-backchannel trend. It’s a real-time, full screen display of tweets pulled from any hashtag or search term, but with powerful moderation capabilities that allow for any tweet to be approved or disapproved prior to showing on the screen. So if you’re conference organizers are nervous about updates having curse words, etc., you can use ParaTweet.com to filter them out. Or you can just filter out the Trolls who try to hijack your hashtags during conferences. The only drawback is that it’s a paid service and, frankly, is a bit on the costly side in my opinion. But it’s out there and useful.

Twitter Lexicon Becoming Useful Elsewhere

Outright.com has figured out a way to use the Twitter lexicon of @ replies to make Freshbooks a little easier to use. Instead of me trying to explain it poorly, go read their blog post about it here. Essentially, you use something like, “Paid @MackCollier $500 for social media consulting,” in your ledger and Outright translates that into the fields in your accounting system. I don’t do math, so I don’t quite get how cool (or not) that is, but you might. Go read and report back.

Add A Little Zing To The Web

Miracle Whip is attempting to spread some cyber salad dressing on the web with a new Firefox plugin called Zingr. You download the plugin and can then add a post-it note type comment to any web page. If other people have the plugin, they can see your Zing on that particular page. Interesting concept. Not sure why anyone would really do this, but it does offer a way to comment on a web page in a public fashion that can’t be edited by the web page owner. Not sure if I like that or not, but I tried it out and it’s at least interesting. Download the plugin here if you want to try it out.

A Connected Book Hits The Shelves

Iggy Pintado, one of my LinkedIn connections, has written a book called Connection Generation about how our connections determine our place in both society and business. Sounds pretty interesting. You can check out a YouTube video introducing the book, download a free chapter at the official book site or order it on Amazon.

Nice New Internet Marketing Book Available

My friends Brandon Eley and Shayne Tilley have written a book called Online Marketing Inside Out that is very useful. I gave it a quick spin and can honestly say I was surprised at how well done and wide-angle lens the effort was. (Not that I didn’t think they had it in them, just that I’ve read a LOT of online marketing books.) There’s everything from social media to affiliate marketing to paid search knowledge there. Please do check it out. If you’re hoping to use the Internet to promote your business, this book will come in handy.

Catching Wildfire For Your Online Promotion

Wildfire Interactive is in Beta with their Wildfire Promotion Builder. The concept is when you have an online promotion that is supported by video, etc., they help you distribute it across a bunch of social networks. Worth checking out.

Social Media Newsroom Made Simple

Presskit’n is live and offers an alternative to some of the larger and sometimes costly social media newsroom or social media press release solutions out there. You can do a couple of releases a month with a few images for free. There’s a mid-level and a soon-to-come pro upgrade for more space and releases. Looks like a neat solution for small businesses looking for a simple online press kit creation place.

Get And Give Advice Online At FunAdvice

Why spend time searching for advice on virtually anything when you can just ask and get an answer? FunAdvice.com seems to have that type of setup. Go there, ask for advice from fellow members and users on everything from the right MP3 player to buy to the best place to seek help for substance abuse. Interesting concept that Jeremy Goodrich and his crew have going there. They also came a smidge shy of five million visitors in May, so it’s a growing community and, thus, resource.

Online Community For Entrepreneurial Youngsters and Start-Up Types Live

There’s an online community for everything. An interesting one that came to my attention recently is Fledgewing.com. It is a ‘one-stop-shop’ for entrepreneurial students looking to springboard their careers and ideas. Josh Myers, one of the founders tells me, “The site helps get their businesses off the ground by networking them with students with complementary skill sets, matching them with mentors possessing extensive industry experience and providing a unique collaboration tool. In addition, FledgeWing launches their entrepreneurial careers by enabling them to directly showcase their abilities through its case study area and finding internships at hot new start-ups.” Worth a look see.

Allstate Offers Good Hands Community

Allstate continues to push for social media innovation. Their latest effort is an interesting one. They launched the Good Hands Community on May 4. Their objective, according to Allstate’s Ben Foster, who reached out to me, is, “to provide useful content and a discussion platform to help consumers live responsibly by helping them protect what they have and prepare for their future.” He also said it is a, “non-marketing based environment.” Which is an interesting declaration. Looks like Allstate is getting into the social media swing of things by giving great content and gathering great advice and customer insight and not just trying to sell more stuff. Nice work, folks.

Please jump in the comments and tell us what you think about any and all of the sites, platforms, services or products above. Our hope is always that we can collaborate to determine which, if any, of these items are useful for the rest of us.