New Year, New Ideas – Best of the Web!

This last month has been crazy busy (mostly in a good way) for us!

We spent most of November and December preparing for the launch of the Audience Business Masterclass and now we are right smack dab in the middle of the launch!

But we still make sure we spend time reading content on other blogs to expand our knowledge and see what ideas, opinions and research are worth being spread. It’s been a while since our last Best of the Web, and there has been A LOT of great content that we’ve seen since then.

So without any further ado, here are my favorites from the past month, I hope you enjoy them and find them as useful and interesting as I did…

Info in Images

Sometimes, the strongest way to present information is through images. Here we have six amazing examples of the power of visual content:

• 10 Ways to Use Psychology to Convert More Customers [Infographic] (Unbounce)
• The Right & Wrong Way to Do Conversion Rate Optimization [Infographic] (Unbounce)
• Top 5 Infographics of 2012 (Unbounce)
• Password Strength [Comic] (xkcd)
• How Professors Use Social Media [Infographic] (Social Media Today)
• Visual Content Marketing: Capture and Engage Your Audience (Slideshare)

Data in Digits

It’s always great to have multiple pieces of advice on the same topic. Here we have a series of fun and useful list posts to ensure that you find a ton of information in one simple read:

• 7 Business Lessons For Success in 2013 (From the Experts) (Right Mix Marketing)
• 18 Unusual Writing Ideas (Writing Forward)
• 87 Ways to Instantly Transform Thoughts from Negative to Positive (Steve Aitchison)
• 12 Best Personal Development Articles For 2012 (Lifestyle Updated)
• 18 Online Authorities Share Insights On Content Marketing For Business (Reboot Authentic)
• 15 People Drop Their Knowledge Bombs On Becoming Heroic (Dean Phillips)
• 28 Quick Tips for Customizing Your Email Preference Center (Hub Spot)

Wise Words of Warning

Usually, when we make a mistake in our own businesses, someone else has already made that mistake before us and has hopefully worked out the kinks.

We’ve pulled a few great articles from people who *have* worked out the kinks, to give you a heads up on common marketing mistakes:

• Does Your Blog Pass the “Inconvenience Test?” (Think Traffic)
• A Cautionary Tale: Putting your Business in the Hands of Facebook (Business {grow})
• What Killed Michael Porter’s Monitor Group? The One Force That Really Matters (Forbes)
• Are You Making the Most Common Pricing Mistake? (Think Traffic)
• Is it Time for Content Marketers to Abandon Facebook? (Copyblogger)
• How a 10 Minute Mistake Cost Me A TEDx Speech, A Trip to India, and My Sanity (30 Year Old Ninja)
• Are Email Subscription Pop-ups Worth The Risk? (Unbounce)
• The Dangerous Myth About Guest Blogging You Likely Believe (Tommy is my Name)
• Why You Need a Seriously Fast Website (Copyblogger)
• Social Media “Engagement” is not a Strategy (Business {grow})

Examples to Aspire to

This month I came across some really great examples of people who have excelled in their field. Here are some examples of great posts, people, customer service and most importantly of great influence.

• Big Blog Posts that Made a Difference (Business {grow})
• The Greatest Sales Letter of All Time (Roberto Torralbas)
• Positive Influences in the Indie Writing Community (Jane V Blanchard)
• Boy Writes Letter to LEGO After Losing Minifigure, Gets Awesome Response (Yahoo)
• This Video Will Inspire You (Warning: It’s Intense) (30 Year Old Ninja)
• The Surprising Truth About How Much Money You Can Make as a Freelance Blogger! (Be A Freelance Blogger)

How-Tos That Will Help You

You can’t go wrong with a well-designed how-to post. We’ve found some great, easy to follow and implement how-tos that will surely make things a *little* bit easier on you.

• How to Find and Do Work You Love (Think Traffic)
• How To Deal With Difficult Business Or Marketing Problems (i.e. or “Welcome To The NFL”) [Podcast] (The Marketing Show)
• How To Double Your Revenue And Profit. Really (Ittybiz)
• How to Make Your Email Open and Click-Through Rates Skyrocket (Kissmetrics)
• Beyond Traffic: How to Measure What Really Matters (Think Traffic)
• Hacking Kickstarter: How to Raise $100,000 in 10 Days (Includes Successful Templates, E-mails, etc.) (Four Hour Work Week)
• How to persuade people you don’t know to help you (This is the secret to getting links) (Social Triggers)

Bright Ideas, Opinions and Tools

Here we have an array of some refreshing content that didn’t quite fall into our other categories. But it was so great we needed to show it to you anyway.

• Social Media Trends that are Colliding in 2013 (Business {grow})
• The Thing YOU Have That THEY Do Not (Ittybiz)
• More on Profit Doubling (For Those Who Like Detail) (Ittybiz)
• Thesis 2.0 Theme Review (WPKube)
• Dan Pink: To Sell Is Human (For Real?!) (Good Life Project)
• 12 Days of Blogging: Day 7 – 7 Types of Content Likely to be Shared: The S.C.I.E.N.C.E Model (Spectate)
• [Instant Download] My Favorite Squeeze Page of 2013 … So Far (The Marketing Show)
• The Content Arms Race and The Death of the Single Author Blogs (The Sales Lion)

Interviews and Kind Mentions

I’m really honored to have been approached and mentioned by so many talented people this month. Thanks to everyone who has mentioned my new training program Audience Business Masterclass or credited one of my older workshops to their success.

• Technorati and Firepole (Automation Primer)
• Interview with Danny Iny (Live Your Pic Life)
• Connecting: Linearity, Provenance, Serendipity & Social Networks (Nick Kellet)
• My All New Sexy Look! With Meaningful Commentary (Alden Tan)
• Gratitude and the First Day of Life and Ideal Readers and the Art of Stalking (The Connected Writer)
• Why Growing a Big Audience Doesn’t Mean Big Publicity (Publicity Hound)
• The 100 Best Blogs for the Modern Writer (Livehacked)
• 7 kick-ass crusaders kickin’ it in their careers (Your Work Is Your Life)
• Is your business product-focused or audience-based? (Right Mix Marketing)

We’ve listed a lot of great content here, but if you think we’ve missed out on anything important, please let us know in the comments!

Danny Iny (@DannyIny), a.k.a. the “Freddy Krueger of Blogging”, teaches marketing that works at Firepole Marketing. Together with Guy Kawasaki, Brian Clark and Mitch Joel, he wrote the book on building engaged audiences from scratch (available on Amazon, or as a free download).

Tagged as: Best of the Web, Danny Iny