How to Overcome Writer’s Block
Stephanie Liu

How to Overcome Writer’s Block

For many bloggers, the worst part of writing is the beginning, when you’re sitting at your desk starting at a blank screen and a blinking cursor.

Writer’s block sucks. I know because I’ve been there before. It’s a frustrating feeling that can consume you and stop your creative efforts dead in their tracks.

Overcoming writer’s block is tough. So when I discovered Michael Koenigs 10×10 formula at Ignite Your Fire last Saturday, I had a breakthrough! I was so inspired that I wanted to find a quiet corner in the conference and start working on my 10×10 formula right away!

The beauty behind Koenigs’ formula is that it takes less than a day to start implementing it. It might sound too good to be true but when you see how simple the process is, you’ll be scribbling one idea after the other and waving bye to writer’s block.

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Stephanie Liu

This Week’s Highlights

My Google reader was flooded with great articles and blog posts this week and there were a few that I knew had to be highlighted and shared with the rest of you. Want more great blogs to read? You can view all of my shared items on Google Reader here.

Also note that I want to try something new and promote upcoming Web 2.0 and marketing events. Feel free to contact me about any upcoming events or social media tools that you’re aware of or find useful.

Posts

Social Media Tools

Stephanie Liu

World of Wordle

Wordle lets you create “word clouds” from an RSS feed, a del.ici.ous username, or you can paste in a bunch of text to generate you word cloud.

Once you have the text all set, you can tweak your word cloud with different layouts, fonts, and color schemes. And because images created by the Wordle application are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license, you can use your Wordle on anything from book covers to T-shirts. I added my Wordle to my new Contact page.

Just remember to let people know how you created your Wordle. If you took an image from the Wordle gallery, don’t forget to mention where you got it from.

Thanks to Andrew, author of The Working Title, for highlighting Wordle in his blog. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have found out about this awesome site. And kudos to Jonathan Feinberg for creating Wordle, I absolutely love it.

Stephanie Liu

Why I Love Post-It Notes

Editor’s Note: I wanted to share with you the guest post I did for Maxie at IHateSoMuch for the 20SB Big Blog Swap. Maxie’s a blogoholic from Chicago and a featured blogger in Alltop’s Twenty Something. If you haven’t checked her out yet, please do – you won’t regret it.

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Ever since college, Post-It notes have been a must have in my arsenal of tools to stay organized. I could easily write myself a reminder and stick it to my monitor, mark important chapters for easy reference, and my favorite – write a quick love note to my husband and stick it to the door before he leaves for work.

Recently, I discovered Sheer Color Post-It notes which has literally taken my reading experience to the next level. My friend and I share marketing books with each other all the time but when I come across an important quote, I’m tempted to highlight it but can’t because it’s not my book. Now with sheer color post-it notes, I can highlight, circle, and make notes without getting reprimanded.

My dependence on

these sticky square pads isn’t rare. In fact, if you run a Google search on “how to use Post-It notes,” you’ll receive thousands of results including Leon Ho’s list of Twenty Uses for a Post-It Note. How do you use your Post-It notes?

What I love most about Post-It notes is that they can be used for other activities besides reminders, planning, and brainstorming. To prove my point, you can check out the entries in the “Post-it® Notes: One Million Uses & Counting…” contest on YouTube.

Here’s my favorite entry:

(Video Credit: Emaz88)


Stephanie Liu

Grab a Gravatar

  • By Stephanie Liu
  • May 23, 2008
  • Blogging

Gravatars are showing up on blogs everywhere and for good reason.

A gravatar, or globally recognized avatar, is quite simply an avatar image that follows you from weblog to weblog appearing beside your name when you comment on gravatar enabled sites. Avatars help identify your posts on web forums, so why not on weblogs?

3 Reasons To Get a Gravatar

  1. Get noticed. Avatars help others easily identify your posts in forums. With Gravatar, you can apply the same exact principle when you comment on Gravatar enabled sites. I’ve already clicked on several Gravatars which led me to discover new blogs to add to my Google reader.
  2. Consistency. Use the same avatar on blogs, forums, Flickr, or any other social medium you use and people are bound to recognize you.
  3. Multiple personalities welcomed. Got multiple emails? Don’t want to be stuck with the same avatar? You’re in luck. Gravatar lets you manage multiple email accounts and avatars.
  4. It’s Easy. You can have your Gravatar in just seconds. All you need is an email address and it’s FREE. Easily upload your image and crop to fit the avatar size. That’s it! You’re done.
  5. Other Platforms Support it. Disqus and SezWho also support Gravatars.

So what are you waiting for? Get yours now!