Category: Internet

5 Ways to Stay in Touch with Your Extended Network

When it comes to thinking about staying connected with your extended network, especially if you have a large one, it can almost be as daunting as, say, public speaking for a lot of people. But, it can be broken down into manageable steps. The most important thing with networking is that you stay in touch with those you connect with and you make every effort to keep a relationship going – even if you don’t “need” something at the moment.

Here are our five best tips for continued networking success.

1) Pass Along Articles of Interest to Your Contacts

One great way to stay in touch is to pass along anything of interest to your contacts. You want to continually demonstrate that you’re not only passionate about your industry (and follow it regularly), but also that you are genuinely interested in your contact’s best interest. It never hurts to reach out to someone you know and say, “Hi, John, I came across this article and thought of you. Perhaps you’d find the statistic on the growing demographics of 18- to 24-year-olds interesting for your research. I hope you’re well. All my best, Paul.”

2) Keep Your Network Posted of Your Updates

We recommend that you touch base with your contacts at least twice a year. A year can be quite a bit of time, and a lot can happen. If you are hired for a position, pick up a new internship, move to a new city or start a new blog, these are all reasons to update your network on what’s happening in your life. It’s also important that you use these opportunities to thank those that have helped you become who you are or get you to where you are today.

3) Remember Special Occasions

This can be a hard one. In a perfect world, we would all remember everyone’s birthdays and important events, but unfortunately, real life can get in the way of that. If there are certain members of your network who are your friends on Facebook, make it a daily habit to look at the “Birthdays” reminder to see if there’s anyone you should reach out to. And this doesn’t mean you should leave a generic “Happy Birthday” on someone’s wall; rather take the time to type out an e-mail and let the person know you’re thinking of them. It doesn’t take a lot of additional effort, and it’s an easy way to stand out from the “Facebook wall clutter.” In addition, keep an eye on big events announced by your contacts. If you want to get into public relations and you see that your friend launched a new campaign, send them a congratulatory note.

4) Create Google Alerts for Your Contacts and/or Their Businesses

One great way to keep tabs on a contact or his or her company is by creating a Google Alert. It’s free and takes less than a minute, and the service can send you valuable information on a colleague that you might have been too busy to notice. Then, when you see big news about someone or his or her company, take a minute to send an e-mail and follow up. If you’re not sure how to set up a Google Alert, check out our recent post on the CareerSparx blog, “Your Dream Employer? Do More Than Google Them.”

5) Follow Them on Facebook/Twitter/LinkedIn

Again, the idea is to stay connected with your contacts and what’s going on in their lives. If you see that a birthday is coming up or something important just happened, make note of what you see on your social media accounts and follow up via a personalized e-mail. Another tactic is to hit “like” if they post something produced by their company on a Facebook profile, or retweet a Twitter update for a big project of theirs. They will appreciate the support, and you will achieve your goal of staying connected and on their radar.

By following these five easy tips, you will be able to stay better connected to your network. And as you’ll see, it really isn’t as hard or as overwhelming as it seems. Best of luck.

Guest Expert:

Mario Schulzke is the creator of CareerSparx, an online course that helps recent college graduates begin their careers. For more information, download their free 61-page guide on how to start your career or check out the CareerSparx blog.

View the original article here

Great News & Valuable Lessons!

When I got home last night from a dating, judging the local county science fair exhibits with my husband I had a very welcome email in my email box……seems the TV “personality” who was challenging my grandson’s right to the domain has withdrawn his domain dispute!

Apparently he (or his attorneys) now believe that Billy is real and has legitimate rights to own the domain.

This has been a very interesting experience, and I certainly learned a lot – a lot more than I really wanted to know about the person who brought the complaint, but also a lot about the process itself.

If you’re interested – or if you find yourself facing the same thing and want to know how I handled it – you can read about it by clicking on this link.

That’s the Great News. The Good News is that it was withdrawn before I had to make all the copies and pay for shipping to Switzerland, so it’s not costing me as much as I thought it would.

However, I’ve already poured a bunch of time and money into gathering the evidence and having pieces of it overnighted to me, so there are still some expenses.

While I was dismayed in the beginning, thinking I had to find an attorney, not knowing what was needed to successfully respond to the challenge, knowing I would have to go learn a BUNCH (I’d have to read the prior cases and figure out which ones applied to us, as well as respond to every one of their allegations, and all within a 5000 word limitation), in the end it was a lot less of a burden than I had been afraid it would be.

In fact, by tackling it myself, I found I was up to the challenge. I did the research, I did the writing, I responded to each of their allegations, I gathered my evidence, I talked with attorneys (including his), I corresponded with WIPO (World Intellectual Property Organization), and I continued to talk it over with my 15 year old grandson.

Ultimately, with each and every step forward I knew without a doubt we would win the dispute.

So on Friday I only had to dot a couple i’s and cross a couple t’s before sending it in. I had received my final piece of evidence (a certified birth record for the grandson). I planned to re-examine everything over the weekend in a final review and send it off on Monday or Tuesday to the WIPO Center for the Panel to decide.

Late Friday afternoon I received a call from one of the Complainant’s attorneys. At that point I was certain of prevailing in the dispute.

After a short discussion, during which he brought up (for the fourth time) the possibility of their purchasing the domain name, he told me he was 99.9% convinced that my grandson existed (!) and they would withdraw the complaint on Monday.

By end of day on Monday I had not received notice from the attorneys, so decided I would have to move forward. Tuesday evening, upon returning home from judging the local County Science Fair, the withdrawal email was in my inbox. Wednesday morning I received confirmation from WIPO and Wednesday afternoon my Domain Registrar had unlocked my grandson’s domain.

The process can seem tedious, and definitely if you are dealing with attorneys, it can be intimidating. Fortunately, though, the rules are fairly straightforward. If you have legitimate rights to the domain name, are capable of doing some research, and able to write in a fairly clear and understandable manner, you should be able to handle this yourself.

This is a permanent page that discusses how I handled our dispute, and some things to pay attention to.

Oh, and the lesson? Well, actually there were lots…the main ones being:

  • Don’t be afraid to stand up for yourself, especially when you know you’re right.
  • Persevere, and hold steady.
  • Be nice, even when they’re not. (Okay, these guys weren’t bad once I actually talked to them – it just looked like it by the arguments they submitted in the dispute. Plus, they never bothered to call before filing the complaint.)
  • You don’t have to be the biggest dog on the block to win.

…plus a bunch more that I’m sure will come to me over the next few weeks!

The Blog has moved…and get another free ebook

Content of this post:

  • Cleaning Up
  • Moving On
  • Learning How to Communicate 

This past week I’ve been doing some housecleaning – I guess instead of Spring cleaning I’m doing the Fall cleaning thing.  I always did kind of feel like Fall was a new beginning – perhaps because of school restarting, and then, of course, my birthday is in late September.

So, I’ve been getting rid of lots of old stuff around the house – old files, old half-completed projects, old clothes, just about anything that didn’t feel “right” any longer. And it reminds me of an article I wrote some time ago that I called “Clearing Out Your Mental Attic”. 

Thoughts carry weight, unfinished projects require a certain amount of attention to maintain.  Letting go of what is obsolete (even if it was a good idea at the time) is the only way we can free up enough personal RAM in this information-overload era we seem to be stuck in.  And clearing out your space gives you room to reorganize in ways that suit you now.

So, part of the fun has been moving files and programs to my new computer (that had been sitting since I bought it in July), and reconstituting the projects that were a good idea and that still appeal to me. 

As a result I have pulled out some of my blogging information and decided to move this blog to the Career Life website, and to move my other blogs to the sites where they belong, too.  Once I got a little guidance from a very generous webdiva, I found it wasn’t as complicated as I thought it would be.

In the process of reading through some of the woefully backlogged business emails in my emailbox, I discovered another gem from Ken Evoy for those of you who are interested in improving the success of your website (or in starting one). 

This time it’s called, “Make Your Content PREsell“.  This book is kind of an off-shoot of “Make Your Site Sell”, but it focuses almost exclusively on one thing – communicating effectively with your audience.  Which is the secret to repeat visitors and satisfied customers who want to buy what you’re selling. 

And let’s face it, we’re all selling all the time – whether we’re trying to influence our children, win the job we want, share an important concept with others, or go out on a date with someone we’re attracted to, the only way we get the results we want is by communicating effectively with the other person.

And on the Internet it’s even more important because we lose out on the visual aspect of our interaction.  It’s limited to what’s on the screen, so it’s very 2 dimensional.  Learning how to satisfy our visitor/customer’s needs, and responding to their concerns, becomes a primary focus if we want people to stick around on the site, sign up for our newsletter, or keep coming back.

So here’s another opportunity to pick up a great little reference book – and no, it’s not 1500 pages this time!  Simply click here and you will be taken to the site.

That’s it for now.  Enjoy!

Katie