How to Turn Social Feedback into Valuable Business Data

Joshua March is co-founder and CEO of Conversocial, a provider of integrated social CRM and marketing software for Facebook and Twitter. He resides in London.

You’ve set up your company’s Facebook Page and Twitter account, pulled together a social media team to start generating engagement, and now you’ve got a decent… read more

Online Marketing for Photographers: The Lessons I Paid For

A Guest Post By Kristen Simental

Image by Stian Eikeland

When I decided to get serious about marketing, I did some research and felt that online marketing was the way to go. All right, I saw that everyone else was doing it. In the course of a year, I thought I was… read more

8 Strategies for Launching a Brand Presence on Pinterest

Charles Nicholls is an expert in ecommerce, web analytics, social media marketing and online buyer behavior. He is also founder and chief strategy officer at shopping cart recovery company SeeWhy. You can follow Charles on Twitter @webconversion and read his blog.

Many marketers have heard of Pinterest, but despite this, most… read more

Learn to Leverage Twitter

Freelancers and small business owners can learn a lot from how bigger businesses use their social media. You’re not going to be able to capitalize on everything these larger companies can, because your business model is different. However, there are some things big companies do to leverage their Twitter… read more

Has Apple Lost Its Outsider Status?

Despite operating within the profit-driven world of consumer technology, Apple has often maintained a distinctly rebellious public persona. Launched by two former telephone hackers Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak (in addition to Ronald Wayne), Apple forged their own path by ignoring the status quo and offering such innovations as the… read more

Sound Design: Move To The Beat

Coca-Cola launched its marketing campaign for the London 2012 Olympics

The campaign introducing British music producer Mark Ronson as the creative linchpin of a global effort called “Move to the Beat” that will bring together music, youth and sport.

Mr. Ronson has been travelling around the world, working closely with… read more

34 New Digital Media Resources You May Have Missed

This year’s Mobile World Congress is fast approaching — are you caught up on all of Mashable‘s digital media resources? If not, don’t fret. Here’s our convenient and comprehensive weekly features roundup.

This week we have a list of free Android apps you’ll use every day, tips for reaching voters successfully… read more

Can Social Media Turbocharge NASCAR on TV?

When most people think of tech-savvy social media users, they probably don’t picture fans of NASCAR. At this weekend’s Daytona 500, though, social media will play a central role in television coverage of the event.

Speed TV, which carries much of the Daytona 500 coverage and will broadcast Saturday’s final… read more

Best Western International Hotels Adds Facebook Booking [VIDEO]

Best Western International reservations are going where the customers are: Facebook.

The hotel chain is the latest to let travelers book their stay on the top social media website. Hotel brands including Hilton and Trump have flocked to Facebook to cater to customer wants. Best Western’s Facebook booking… read more

Pinsanity: How Sports Teams Are Winning on Pinterest

Quickly shooting up the social media pyramid, image sharing network Pinterest has gained a reputation for largely being a repository for photos of wedding dresses and floral arrangements, due to its huge female user base.

But a budding trend shows that sports teams are hopping aboard the Pinterest bandwagon. Mashable… read more

10 Things to Plan for When Developing a Mobile App

David Tucker is a principal architect at Universal Mind. As the resident Apple and Adobe expert, he works closely with Universal Mind’s clients to develop rich user experiences that leverage many of today’s exciting new development platforms. Follow David on Twitter @mindmillmedia.

Many companies have mobile apps at the top of… read more

Discovery Channel Adds Pop-Up Tweets to ‘Gold Rush’ Show [EXCLUSIVE]

Leading up to the season finale of popular mining reality TV show Gold Rush airing Friday night on the Discovery Channel, the network will be showing previous episodes with pop-up tweets from fans.

Gold Rush — which follows the ups and downs of miners in Alaska — has become popular among… read more

A Fun Approach To Creating More Successful Websites

As Web designers and developers, each project we work with has a unique set of goals and requirements. But one goal we have for all of our projects is that we want them to make an impression on people — we want the websites that we create to be memorable.

A… read more

3 Things Retailers Can Learn from Mom and Pop Facebook Stores

Christian Taylor is founder and CEO of Payvment and developer of the number-one Facebook ecommerce platform for brands, agencies and merchants, and the world’s only Facebook Shopping Mall.

Recently, Gap and J.C. Penney closed their Facebook storefronts because the retailers weren’t seeing immediate traction. The move has sparked an interesting debate:… read more

Why Stunts Drive Clicks for Gen-Y Auto Marketers

The Digital Marketing Series is supported by HubSpot, an inbound marketing software company based in Cambridge, Mass., that makes a full platform of marketing software, including marketing analytics tools.

This year, Chevrolet‘s Super Bowl ad for its Sonic hatchback had its share of white-knuckle stunts. For those who missed it, the… read more

The Benefits of Using a Digital Flipbook

For the past four years, I have created a digital flipbook for every publication I have worked on—from the once-a-year publications for nonprofit organizations to the monthly publications.

Digital flipbooks are exactly what they sound like—a digital magazine that you can flip through on your computer screen.

As a freelancer, creating… read more

Interview with Kristina Halvorson

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How to Fix Microsoft With Marketing

Alex Goldfayn’s new book is called Evangelist Marketing: What Apple Amazon and Netflix Understand About Their Customers (That Your Company Probably Doesn’t). He is CEO of the Evangelist Marketing Institute, a marketing consultancy with clients that include T-Mobile, TiVo and Logitech.

Microsoft’s stock price today is approximately half of what it… read more

Get Ready to Grab a Free Song From This Oscar Ad, via Shazam

Viewers of this weekend’s Academy Awards telecast may want to have their smatphones handy when a Tide ad comes on. If you have the Shazam app, you can download a free song from that ad.

The tune, “Pop Goes the World,” is a remake of a Men Without Hats song by… read more

Film Startup Prescreen Adds Facebook Integration

Streaming movie-on-demand platform Prescreen announced on Thursday that it has integrated with Facebook’s Open Graph Platform to make it easy for people to discover and share movies with friends.

Prescreen — which offers a selection of long-form movies largely from independent filmmakers and packages it in a Gilt Group-style daily-deal format… read more

Marketers: What Mobile Users Will and Won’t Put Up With [INFOGRAPHIC]

Young people between the ages of 18 and 24 are even more connected to their mobile devices than you might think.

Nine in 10 young adults spend between one and five hours on their mobile devices daily. Nearly one in 10, meanwhile, are on their gadgets between five and ten… read more

NBA Fans to Decide Dunk Contest via Twitter in Most Connected All-Star Weekend Yet

Tweets, apps and status updates will join the usual barrage of dunks, three-pointers and no-look passes more than ever this weekend at the NBA’s annual All-Star event.

For the first time, fans will be the sole dunk contest judges via Twitter, SMS and website-based voting. The league is also partnering… read more

Quick Look: Mailjet

Quick Look posts are paid submissions offering only a brief overview of an app. Vote in the polls below if you think this app is worth an in-depth AppStorm review!

In this Quick Look, we’re highlighting Mailjet. The developer describes Mailjet as a service for cheaper, better and faster emailing

Mailjet is… read more

Get it Now: “Getting to Know SEO”

Rockable Press has just released a new book: Getting to Know SEO. In this book, content analyst and SEO expert Andre Kibbe gives you a solid grasp of what SEO is all about, and how it can help you generate steady and sustainable traffic to your site or product.

What’s… read more

Profile: Freelance Writer and Entrepreneur Thursday Bram

Around here, Thursday Bram is best known as the one who answers questions sent to Ask FreelanceSwitch.

But did you know that she’s been writing since high school? That she came from a family of entrepreneurs and has always expected to run her own business? And that the deal-breaker between… read more

Good Old Static HTML Sites Aren’t Dead Yet. Should They Be?

Static HTML sites look so last century that sometimes you might be wondering if they don’t belong to the past. There is no doubt that dynamic, database-driven sites, offer more and they make static HTML sites look like a poor relative but are static sites to be extinct?

Historically,… read more

Why are Brands Shutting Their Facebook Stores?

Eager to monetize the large followings they had built on Facebook, many large brands set up shop on the social network for the first time last year.

Now many of those Facebook stores are closing.

A Bloomberg report this weekend pointed out that Gap, J.C. Penney, Nordstrom and GameStop have all… read more

Bug-Eyed Student’s Basketball Face is Internet Famous

What’s a University of Alabama freshman to do after instant Internet fame invades his life because of a viral cardboard cutout of his face? If you’re 19-year-old Jack Blankenship, you flag down Beyonce and Jay-Z at a New York Knicks game Monday night.

“Beyonce laughed and did ‘The Face!’ Jay-Z did… read more

Facebook Ads Have Some Competition From ThingLink [VIDEO]

Iggy Pop may not need much help engaging listeners, but he’s trying a cool new tactic anyway: an interactive image on his read more

Microsoft Channels ’80s Hit ‘Moonlighting’ in Latest Jab Against Google [VIDEO]

Remember the TV show Moonlighting? Microsoft is hoping you do. Otherwise, you won’t get the main joke behind it’s latest smear against Google.

“Googlighting,” from Microsoft’s Office 365 unit, presents Google as an ill-prepared, smug salesman trying to convince a Cybill Shepherd type to use the company’s cloud collaboration… read more

5 Key Components of a Successful Interest Graph

Moataz Rashad is an entrepreneur and advisor to a few startups. He is founder and CEO of Vufind Inc. and the publisher of VuHunt, a mobile geoSocial real-life game.

The interest graph has been gaining increased attention over the past few months. With Google transforming itself into a social company, and… read more

How Google’s +1 Button Affects SEO

Since the days of Google Buzz, the +1 button has been a mystery to users and content producers alike. It’s different from Facebook’s “Like” button, in that it doesn’t directly share content to a user’s social stream. But the cultivation of a social graph has long been the goal of… read more

5 Tips for Reaching Voters in the Social Stream

John Manoogian III is the founder and CTO of 140 Proof, the leading social ad platform for Twitter and Facebook. John created the 140 Proof brand and co-led development of its API and ad-targeting architecture.

Every election year breaks records for ad spending. The total spend leading up to the 2008… read more

A Quick WPPI 2012 Day 1 Recap

I’m at WPPI 2012 in Las Vegas at the MGM Grand and I thought I’d give everyone a quick recap in case you can’t make it out to the conference.

The Venue
Personally, I love the MGM. I know some people don’t, but I’ve always liked it. I guess you… read more

Learn to Say No

It used to be hard for me to say ‘no’ to people. I think the sheer confusion people have over what freelancers actually do all day makes us an easy target. But just because many of us work from home, doesn’t mean we aren’t working. On the contrary, I’d… read more

Handy Elephant: Transform Contacts Into Dynamic Relationships

In business, knowing a lot of people is a great asset. If you are a marketing professional, it’s imperative you get to connect with as many people as possible. Smart sales persons not only concentrate on the networking part of the equation, but also in putting the contacts to good… read more

10 Evergreen Strategies To Boost Your Freelance Writing Career

Are you a freelance writer? Then you’re very important in today’s web marketing.

Every business that’s done online revolves around content marketing. In fact, the web is powered mostly by written words. Your ability to combine common words into concise sentences could lead to income opportunities for you.

But writing in… read more

40+ High Quality And Free Web Templates In PSD

Finding out high quality and premium PSD files is extremely difficult but keeping them in the toolbox is tremendously important for the web designers because such PSD files always come in handy and save loads of time. There are so many resources available on the net you can get freebie… read more

How NOT to Write a Headline for Your Press Release

Do you have to write a press release? It’s not as easy as you think. Writing headlines for anything—be it a press release or a story—is one of the hardest things to do.

The thing with a headline is that you have to create something that signifies what you are… read more

Demystifying Twitter: Do’s and Don’ts of Twitter

Simply put, the basic concept behind Twitter can be identified as a modem version of short messaging service (SMS) channel with some added features. Your followers on Twitter are the people, who choose to be updated with the tweets (the post or message displayed on your profile page) you share,… read more

Go VIRAL! The key to great exposure

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How to Test your E-Commerce Site Effectively

 
Featured image from EMMEALCUBO on Flickr.

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‘Playing With Your Phone While Sitting on the Toilet’ Gets a Tribute [VIDEO]

“We’ve all had that feeling coming about, staring at the wall and nothing comes out,” raps musician Paul The Trombonist in his latest YouTube music video.

The song’s subject matter is something Mashable‘s digitally minded readers can relate to, and summed up in its decidedly non-metaphorical title: “Playing With Your… read more

Who’s Winning the Twitter and Facebook Presidential Election? [INFOGRAPHIC]

President Barack Obama’s Facebook and Twitter following leaves Republican presidential candidates in the dust.

The president has more than 25 million Facebook Likes and more than 12.5 million Twitter followers.

Since his 2008 campaign for president, Obama has changed the way the public engages with political candidates running for office. … read more

Antennagate: iPhone 4 Customers Win Class Action Lawsuit [UPDATED]

A class-action suit against Apple for iPhone 4 antenna reception problems has reached a settlement in the “antennagate” case, with a preliminary approval granting U.S. residents who bought the phone either $15 in cash or a bumper case from Apple.

According to CNET, the preliminary approval was made on Friday… read more

The Quick and Dirty Guide to Tumblr for Small Business

This post originally appeared on the American Express OPEN Forum, where Mashable regularly contributes articles about leveraging social media and technology in small business.

With the rise of Pinterest and Tumblr’s astounding growth, it seems that 2012 may be the year of the visual platform. Tumblr surpassed 15 billion monthly pageviews… read more

10 Social Media Tips for Bloggers

Liz Borod Wright, a freelance writer based in New York City, runs the popular travel blog, Travelogged. She is also a social media consultant and an adjunct for social media at Columbia Journalism School’s continuing education program.

When it comes to building an audience and driving traffic, bloggers are turning to… read more

What to Do When Your Celebrity Client Flips Out on Social Media

In the wake of another celebrity social media meltdown this week, the question “where is his publicist?” has appeared from commenters in almost every article on the topic.

Let me start by stating this is not a gossip column, nor an attempt to cover content outside of social media. Twitter, as… read more

Yelp Set to Go Public March 2 in $100 Million IPO [REPORT]

Yelp‘s $100 million IPO is set for March 2, according to a report.

Dow Jones is reporting the company plans to sell 7.15 million shares to the public at $12 to $14 each. That means the company’s market cap could hit $838.6 million in the high end, which is lower than… read more

NFL Player Promoters Will Help NFL Dominate Social Media

A select group of college students could get digitally cozier with their favorite NFL players.

United Way is looking for social media interns to promote the philanthropy efforts of the 32 NFL teams and each team’s United Way spokesperson to help the the organizations dominate social media.

The NFL has been… read more

5 Paradoxes Shaping the Future of Mobile Commerce

Igor Faletski is the CEO of Mobify, a web platform that optimizes ecommerce and publishing sites for mobile and powers more than 20,000 sites.

Remember when it took 23 clicks to find movie showtimes on your mobile phone? While that may seem like an eon ago, in reality it’s just been… read more

How Twitter Is Changing the Craft of Comedy

At the “How to be Funny in 140 Characters or Less” panel Wednesday, I watched the full life cycle of a humorous trending topic on Twitter — from its creation, to peak, then death — all within less than an hour.

The event was part of Social Media Week NYC,… read more

Stop Writing Project Proposals

After several grueling days I had finally finished the proposal. I sent it off and waited for a response. Nothing. After a few weeks, I discovered that they were “just looking”. Despite the urgency and aggressive timeline for the RFP (Request For Proposal) plus the fact that we had done… read more

Klout + Gamification = Extra Perks for Influencers?

Badgeville, a gamification platform used by Samsung, eBay and Dell, among others, is integrating data from Klout to help brands identify, reward and promote its most influential brand advocates.

Formed in 2010, Badgeville provides a plug-and-play solution for brands who want to increase engagement and reward loyalty via badges, tokens and… read more

4 Characteristics of a Winning Social Enterprise Strategy

Bill Kalma is VP of technical services at Model Metrics, an enterprise cloud computing services company. He focuses on the effective scoping, management and delivery of CRM projects from a technical perspective.

What is the social enterprise? Traditionally, the term has referred to an organization’s social mission of philanthropy, charity or… read more

How To Recruit A UX Designer

The Web has entered an era of user-centricity. If businesses are to attract new customers and retain existing ones, they must create websites and apps that deliver intuitive and tailored experiences. Whether you run an online retailer or a not-for-profit community website, the user experience is mission critical.

As a consequence,… read more

Plan the Best Content for your Emails

Email marketing is one of the really successful techniques currently used in the marketing world. It has become one of the most popular techniques in recent years and is an indispensable part of online marketing.

Sending mails keeps your site active among your audience and increases visits and clicks on your… read more

A Year In Review: 11 Things I Learned From Freelancer to Agency Owner

I’ve spent the last 10+ years freelancing and bouncing back through different agencies. While there were plenty of perks both working for yourself and in an agency atmosphere, It always felt like something was missing. From the first day I opened up Photoshop and built my first website… read more

Hitting the Mark: A Collection of Creative Advertisements

Over the last 100 years or so advertising has been integrated into every walk of life. Whether you are working on the internet, relaxing at home watching TV or getting the bus or train to the cinema; you cannot avoid being bombarded with advertisements from all angles.

The sheer volume of… read more

Apple MacBook Air Patented; Beware, Ultrabook Makers

Apple was just awarded 19 patents, one of which is for the design of the MacBook Air.

In theory, Apple could leverage its patent on the Air to try and block manufacturers of other light, thin laptops from marketing their products in the U.S.

The patent, No. D654,072, refers to an… read more

How Much Do Sports Fans Love Social Media? [INFOGRAPHIC]

Sports and social media are a marriage made in heaven. News and score updates break constantly. Heated debate is a big part of the fun. And fans love any chance to interact with the athletes they idolize. But just how much do sports fans love and use social media overall?… read more

Why QR Codes Won’t Last

Jon Barocas is the founder and CEO of bieMEDIA, a Denver-based online marketing and media solutions company that specializes in video content production and distribution, mobile visual search, technology platforms, SEO, VSEO and more.

Like most technology fans, I am always ready and willing to try any technology that promises to… read more

Golf, Meet Social Media: PGA Tour Gets First Branded Hashtag

Even golf — that centuries-old Scottish sport stereotyped as rich old white guys puttering around in goofy outfits — has hopped aboard the social media train.

At the Northern Trust Open this week, golfers sponsored by the TaylorMade brand are sporting hats emblazoned with the Twitter hashtag #driverlove. The hashtag… read more

Facebook Timeline for Brands Coming Later This Month [REPORT]

Facebook is planning to make its new Timeline format available for brands later this month, according to a report.

Citing “executives briefed on Facebook’s plans,” Ad Age is reporting that Facebook will use its Feb. 29 conference for marketers in New York to announce the initiative. Facebook will start in beta… read more

The New Rules of Relationship Marketing [VIDEO]

Mari Smith has been deeply immersed in social media since 2007, but even before social media started to really pick up steam, she was evangelizing the idea of relationship marketing through the Internet and email for almost a decade. In 2008, Fast Company dubbed her “the Pied Piper… read more

Does Your Branded Franchise Need Its Own Social Media Strategy?

Taylor Hulyk is the social media director at re:group, a marketing agency in downtown Ann Arbor, Mich. You can follow her on Twitter @taylorhulyk.

While social media can perplex a single business unit, imagine the challenges and multidimensional complications that can arise when a franchisor decides to incorporate social media into… read more

6 Tips for Designing a Promotion Worthy Business Card

You might not always know when an opportunity for networking or the chance to expand your client base will present itself. Incorporating personalized business cards into your professional and personal marketing efforts is a positive way to ensure opportunities will not be missed.

But before you can promote, you need… read more

Pinterest: Everything You Wanted to Know About 2012′s Hottest Startup [INFOGRAPHIC]

Pinterest has emerged as the runaway social media hit of early 2012. You probably knew that already. But did you know the company just has 12 people? Or that 97% of Pinterest’s Facebook fans are women?

Lemon.ly, a visual marketing firm, took a deep dive into the data to catalog… read more

Brochure Design: 50+ Brilliant Layouts

Brochure design is an important and useful marketing tool for businesses who want to put their products and services in the spotlight. Like a business card, a well designed brochure can make the difference when attracting new clients and conveying the image and personality of your business. In this post… read more

Hashtag Marketing: 9 Ways to Avert Disaster

David Berkowitz is vice president of emerging media for digital marketing agency 360i, where he develops social media and mobile programs for marketers spanning the media & entertainment, retail, travel, and CPG industries.

Marketers creating campaigns centered on hashtags need to be cautious. Hashtags can easily turn into flashing targets that… read more

10 Reasons Twitter Is Sexier Than Facebook [INFOGRAPHIC]

It’s no secret people behave differently, depending on the social network. Sometimes it’s the audience you’re speaking to. Sometimes it’s the people you know are following your every move (hi, mom).

The differences are especially apparent in regard to sex. In anticipation of Valentine’s Day, marketing agency Euro RSCG surveyed 1,000… read more

How to Get the Most From Your Design Education

Finding the best way to get a good design education is hard. The costs of going to a university are getting out of control and the wages designers are making are not going up. There is enough information online to teach yourself how to be a designer but finding the… read more

How To Determine What Your Clients Really Want

Advertise here with BSA

The world of freelancing is host to many complicated skillsets. Artists and graphic designers are constantly trying to match their talents with the numerous demands pouring out from clients. Project work can be exhilarating, yet also very stressful if you aren’t prepared.

In this article we’ll go… read more

How Jimmy Kimmel Earns Nearly $2 Million Annually via YouTube

Nighttime talkshow host Jimmy Kimmel is the latest mainstream performer who’s found it possible to make a mint without solely relying on traditional broadcasting and promotional channels.

His solution? YouTube.

Kimmel’s channel, called JimmyKimmelLive, features clips and recaps — typically running under five minutes each — from every episode of… read more

How to Launch Your App in an International Market

Edith Yeung is the head of marketing of Dolphin Browser, the world’s first Gesture, Webzine and Add-on-enabled mobile browser. She is also the founding partner of RightVentures, which focuses on cloud and mobile investments. You can find out more about Dolphin on Twitter, Facebook or via the Dolphin blog.

Many… read more

We Didn’t Warn Apple Off iTV Name, Says UK Broadcaster [VIDEO]

The rumored name for the television set that Apple is supposedly working on is iTV. Trouble is, that’s also the name of one Britain’s biggest broadcasters — ITV, or Independent Television, the main ad-driven alternative to the BBC.

ITV has been around since 1955; it hosts the nation’s most… read more

Hey Hollywood, Online Piracy Doesn’t Hurt Your U.S. Box Office Returns [STUDY]

Remember SOPA? Remember the urgency with which the bill’s backers were trying to convince us that its intended target, online piracy, was a clear and present danger? Remember how those dastardly BitTorrenters were going to deprive us of a functioning, creative movie industry?

Well, an academic study now doing the… read more

8 Tech Jobs Companies Want to Fill Right Now

Scott Gerber is the founder of the Young Entrepreneur Council, a nonprofit organization that promotes youth entrepreneurship as a solution to unemployment and underemployment. The YEC provides young entrepreneurs with access to tools, mentorship, and resources that support each stage of a business’s development and growth.

As the possibilities of the… read more

10 Places to Find Potential Clients that You can Engage with Online

Do you have a collection of potential and past clients on your social media networks that you gain work from? One of the main things freelancers and small businesses can get out of social networks like Google+ is the ability to develop relationships with prospects on them and maintain… read more

Can Pinterest Help Your Job Search?

Sean Weinberg is the COO and co-founder of RezScore, a free web application that reads, analyzes and grades resumes instantly. You can connect with Sean and the RezScore team on Facebook and Twitter.

Just when you thought you had mastered the job search on all social media platforms, along came Pinterest.

You’ve… read more

Linkswitch #95, Agile Method, Guest Post Tactics, Charge More

Every other week we roundup some of the highest quality articles and resources that benefit freelancers from across the web. We present these articles here on various helpful topics. This week we have articles on powerful guest post tactics, agile methods, and how to charge more.

Tackling Freelance Projects… read more

Who Will Win a Grammy? Twitter Predicts the Future [INFOGRAPHIC]

Who’s going to win a Grammy on Sunday? Webtrends gives us a sneak preview, using Twitter as its crystal ball. Check out the prognostications in this exclusive infographic created fresh this morning using hot trending data from millions of tweets all over the world.

Webtrends, a digital marketing and analytics agency,… read more

Quick Look: BuildChatter

Quick Look posts are paid submissions offering only a brief overview of an app. Vote in the polls below if you think this app is worth an in-depth AppStorm review!

In this Quick Look, we’re highlighting BuildChatter. The developer describes Buildchatter as a tool that provides easy to use, function rich,… read more

How Social Media Can Help You Snag Top Talent For Your Company

Curt Finch is the founder and CEO of Journyx, a company that offers time-tracking and resource management software. Connect with him and Journyx on Facebook and Twitter.

Social media has emerged like an errant piece of debris from a tornado, and has smacked the world of business in its metaphorical face…. read more

7 Marketing Lessons From RIM’s Failures

Alex Goldfayn is CEO of the Evangelist Marketing Institute. His new book is called Evangelist Marketing: What Apple, Amazon and Netflix Understand About Their Customers (That Your Company Probably Doesn’t).

You remember, don’t you? The emails magically appeared while you weren’t looking. That blinking light turned us into addicts. And that… read more

Where to Find Mashable at Social Media Week 2012

Social Media Week 2012 begins on Monday, Feb. 13 and extends to 12 cities worldwide. Mashable staff members will once again be taking part in various panels across New York City.

Now in its fourth year, Social Media Week continues to grow, with 60,000 people attending events annually. Just like last year, we here… read more

5 Ways to Market Your Brand on LinkedIn

Linda Coles is the author of the book Learn Marketing with Social Media in 7 Days (Wiley) and is a social media speaker and consultant at Blue Banana.

LinkedIn provides plenty of marketing opportunities, but lets take a look at some of the lesser-known tools. Although not all are free, try… read more

How to Crowdfund Your Next Big Idea

Scott Steinberg is a small business expert, professional keynote speaker, noted strategic consultant, and creator of The Business Expert’s Guidebook series and video show Business Expert: Small Business Tips, Trends and Advice. Entrepreneurs and startups can download and share free guides, tip sheets and inside advice from his website.

Cult favorite… read more

8 Powerful Tips for Marketing Your Business With Ebooks

Scott Gerber is the founder of the Young Entrepreneur Council, a nonprofit organization that promotes youth entrepreneurship as a solution to unemployment and underemployment. The YEC provides young entrepreneurs with access to tools, mentorship, and resources that support each stage of a business’s development and growth.

Your company’s Twitter handle has… read more

Coca-Cola to Host Google+ Hangout Next Week

In another vote of confidence from Corporate America for Google+, Coca-Cola is planning to launch a Hangout on the network next week.

Coke’s Hangout, scheduled for 2 p.m. EST on Feb. 16, will feature company archivists Ted Ryan and Jamal Booker taking questions from the Coca-Cola Archives. The Archives have… read more

Upcoming Web Design And Development Conferences For 2012

We’re well into 2012, and many designers and developers around the world are planning their travels for the year, which may include attending one of the many Web design and development conferences that will be held in the upcoming months. To help you out with your plans, we’ve once again… read more

Tailor Your Sales Style to Fit Your Clients’ Needs

Like many other freelancers, I have a hard time selling myself. It’s something I know I have to work on this year. But as a freelancer, we don’t have someone else out there selling our services for us. It’s up to us to land our own jobs.

I recently read… read more

Do You Have a Thriving Business? Prioritize to Improve Productivity

We talk a lot about marketing and securing clients here on FreelanceSwitch, but there’s another aspect to freelance life that comes as your business starts to flourish–being overwhelmed!

It’s hard to deal with, actually, because you spend so much time learning how to launch your business and probably less on… read more

Meet the Developers: A Fascinating Discussion with Mike Lee, Mayor of Appsterdam

You don’t have to go far to see work from Mike Lee, in fact there’s a decent chance you’ve got some of his work already on your devices. Mike (or as he likes to call himself, ‘the world’s toughest programmer’) has been involved with the development of Delicious Library, the… read more

Valentine’s Twitter Campaign: Your Tweets Read by ‘Golden Voice of Love’

Ted Williams, the former homeless man with the golden voice who hit YouTube fame in early 2011, is back for a Twitter-based Valentine’s Day campaign for Kraft Macaroni & Cheese.

From Feb. 12 to 14, Williams will shoot up to 100 videos for the brand’s “Golden Voice of Love” campaign. The… read more

17 Most-Popular Photos From Flickr Commons

Female Aircraft Worker

“Woman aircraft worker, Vega Aircraft Corporation, Burbank, Calif. Shown checking electrical assemblies.”

Image courtesy of The Library… read more

When Should You Go All-In on Your Startup? [VIDEO]

From bootstrapping his company, to raising a seed round last year, to his company’s recent $8 million A round, Neil Capel exemplifies the grit and hustle typical in successful entrepreneurs. Capel founded Sailthru, an enterprise software-as-a-service company that uses clickstream data to individually tailor marketing emails to each user,… read more

LinkedIn Hits 150 Million Members

LinkedIn on Thursday announced it has 150 million members in its network, a 20 million increase over November.

The figure was disclosed in a press release the company issued Thursday announcing its fourth quarter and full-year 2011 results.

The company posted revenues of $167.7 million, beating the analysts’ consensus of $160… read more

5 Essential Spreadsheets for Social Media Analytics

Ann Smarty is a search marketer and full-time web entrepreneur. Ann blogs on search and social media tools. Her newest project, My Blog Guest, is a free platform for guest bloggers and blog owners. Follow Ann on Twitter @seosmarty.

Social media analytics and tracking can be very time-consuming and expensive. You’ll… read more

H&M Has the Most-Followed Brand Page on Google+

Fashion retailer H&M has beat out heavyweights Pepsi, Starbucks and Coca-Cola to become the most-followed brand on Google+.

In a testament to the network’s viability as a marketing vehicle, Google, the former number one on Google+, is now number 13. Following H&M is Samsung USA, Pepsi, Starbucks and Burberry. The rest… read more