Writeyness :: Info to snack on

Ok, the Web’s a convenient and limitless resource and, used effectively, a great communications and business tool. And we’re all wired up to the eyeballs these days.

But rearrange the letters in “wired” and you get “weird,” which nicely sums up a lot of the rest of the Internet. And there’s no better, or funnier, representation of this than “Real Life Versus the Internet”:

Link.

Projects I’ve worked on over the last few months include…

• A content plan for a US renewable energy company’s website
• A 7-day email course covering Internet marketing strategies
• An 8-day email course promoting a health career advisor’s ebook to be sent to his opt-in list
• A content plan for an Ireland-based careers advisor’s new website
• Several keyword-focused short articles and press releases designed to attract more traffic to a marketing services website
• Two website reviews for small business websites
• An outline for a book on Internet research
• This blog (but not nearly enough due to the above)

Growing up in Scotland, I consumed the “great chieftain o’ the puddin’ race” — otherwise known as haggis — at least once a year on Burns Night and, honestly, it’s great mashed up with potatoes and turnips. Strangely though, not everyone agrees with me, and it can be tough to sell haggis sceptics on the delights of assorted sheeps’ innards boiled in the same animal’s bladder.

Anstruther Fish Bar — Scotland’s best fish and chip shop (and Tom Hanks’s favourite no less) — makes a valient effort, however. Last time I was there, I noticed this sign…

Ignoring any questionable ingredients, they go straight for the suitably vague “new improved” approach.

Got me thinking how else you can sell haggis…

“Just eat it! (And forget about what’s in it.)” (With apologies to Nike)

“Scotland’s caviar. Now with chips.”

“Not exactly healthy… but not bad for you either.”

“The original boil-in-a-bag meal.”

(It’s been a long day.)

By the way, the best haggis comes from Macsween of Edinburgh.

I love Grazr.com’s feed tool. It lets you create a feed reader in three very easy steps, and provides the code for you to place in your web page.

With apologies to Blue Peter, here’s one I made earlier…

(If you can’t see the reader above, click here.)

You can use it to promote your blog’s content on your main website or anyone else’s you can persuade to carry it. And you can configure a reader on your site to display feeds from other non-competing sites your visitors might be interested in.

The promise of a little dynamic content — when relevant — can drive repeat traffic to your site.

There’s a good article on the BBC site — “How to make the web go worldwide” — showing a breakdown of Internet usage worldwide. According to the stats from Internet World Stats, South Korea is the most connected nation with 70% of homes having a high-speed broadband connection. The figure for Africa, on the other hand, is just 0.1%, leaving experts worried that the continent is being left far behind in terms of global Internet expansion.

There are some good links to other articles in the sidebar of this story.