More Than WE Know

 I’m excited to tell you about a new list of Top 100 Business Blogs compiled by John Crickett at his interesting site Business Opportunities and Ideas.   It’s a great reference list and source of new ideas and networking opportunities.  I’m especially excited that More Than WE Know is included in the list - despite the fact that we’ve only been here for less than three months!!!

John’s criteria for compiling the list were blogs that “provide business ideas, advice, commentary or feedback on business in general”.  He excluded sites that he felt were “primarily a news based site or that is merely posting content from other sources”  and “sites that are too new or have not been updated for over a month”.

The following is John’s list - there are some familiar faces that I already read on a regular basis (#1, #2, #4, #9,#12,#13, #35, #39, #53, #62, #70, and #77) but John has definitely just enlarged my world!! Can’t wait to get started!

So, why don’t you join me? Pick one new one on the list and get inspired!!!  

 John Crickett’s list of Top 100 Business Blogs:

While there are many great business blogs about, they are not always easy to find amongst the legions of make money online blogs. So I’ve gathered together a list of what I believe are the Top 100 Business Blogs on the Internet. If you feel I’ve missed a blog out then contact me and tell me why.

The blogs are listed in order of their Technorati rankings (T), their Alexa rankings (A) are show as well. The rankings are correct at the time of posting.

1. Copy Blogger T: 36 A: 7,825
2. Seth Godin T: 47 A: 10,314
3. MicroPersuasion T: 169 A: 33,643
4. How To Change The World T: 180 A: 14,709
5. Freelance Switch T: 312 A: 10,638
6. A VC T: 1,226 A: 27,737
7. Rough Type T: 1,253 A: 69,429
8. Successful Blog T: 1,432 A: 44,935
9. Small Business Canada T: 1,517 A: N/A
10. David Allen, Getting Things Done T: 1,549 A: 53,592
11. Springwise T: 1,913 A: 23,858
12. Small Biz Trends T: 2,155 A: 63,364
13. Fast Company T: 2,310 A: 12,141
14. Instigator Blog T: 2,477 A: 58,816
15. Occam’s Razor T: 2,548 A: 45,541
16. Smart Wealthy Rich T: 2,879 A: 79,415
17. eMoms At Home T: 3,443 A: 27,125
18. Escape from Cubicle Nation T: 3,467 A: 202,751
19. The Marketing Technology Blog T: 3,496 A: 47,038
20. Business Pundit T: 3,724 A: 114,669
21. The Engaging Brand T: 4,404 A: 433,644
22. Influential Marketing Blog T: 4,779 A: 98,886
23. Drew McLellan - The Marketing Minute T: 4,820 A: 129,669
24. The Digerati Life T: 4,873 A: 53,353
25. Success From The Nest T: 4,908 A: 95,008
26. Business Blog Consulting T: 5,186 A:237,901
27. Church Of The Customer T: 5,576 A: 250,201
28. Todd And T: 5,643 A: 161, 019
29. Net Business Blog T: 5,936 A: 36,107
30. Don Dodge on The Next Big Thing T: 6,583 A: 92,784
31. Bootstrapper T: 7,497 A: 50,304
32. About.com Entrepreneurs T: 7,797 A: N/A
33. Blogtrepreneur T: 7,897 A: 53,011
34. Branding & Marketing T: 8,200 A: 710,326
35. Duct Tape Marketing T: 8,985 A: 31,714
36. Simplenomics T: 10,252 A:288,753
37. Freelance Folder T: 10,543 A: 63,590
38. Business Opportunities Weblog T: 11,018 A: 16,213
39. HELLO, My Name Is Blog T: 11,395 A: 422,218
40. Self Made Minds T: 11,704 A: 39,719
41. Sox First T: 12,894 A: 994,161
42. Young Go Getter T: 14,239 A: 45,373
43. Trust Matters T: 15,462 A: 58,403
44. Small Biz Survival T: A: 18,074 A: 875,069
45. The Personal MBA T: 19,207 A: 142,649
46. The Entrepreneurial Mind T: 21,958, A: 155,166
47. Blog Business World T: 23,025 A: 252,405
48. Working At Home On The Internet T: 23,247 A: 423,900
49. Biz Informer T: 24,631 A: 904,745
50. EmpowerWomenNow T: 25,837 A: 117,085
51. Biz Plan Hacks T: 27,048 A: 1,335,732
52. CreateBusinessGrowth T: 32,949 A:197,290
53. Business Opportunities and Ideas T: 33,205 A: 282,805
54. The KISS Business T: 35,496 A: 621,082
55. Startup Spark T: 35,747 A: 386,949
56. Buzzoodle Buzz Marketing Blog T: 41,092 A: 467,418
57. MindPetals T: 41,714 A: 128,487
58. Marketing Deviant T: 43,764 A: 281,072
59. Go Big Network T: 44,842 A: 25,303
60. Cool Business Ideas T: 49,679 A: 187,126
61. Neville’s Financial Blog T: 52,048 A: 140,296
62. Atlantic Canada’s Small Business Blog :T 52,589 A: 795,253
63. College Startup T: 53,143 A: 184,398
64. Reflections Of A Biz Driven Life T: 79,365 A: 361,398
65. Branding Blog T: 93,462 A: 1,110,518
66. Carnival Of The Capitalists T: 93,462 A: 1,897,375
67. Young Entrepreneur T: 104,933 A: 26,491
68. Marketing Genius T: 132,066 A: 2,222,119
69. Better For Business T: 137,774 A: 590,797
70. The Small Business Blog T: 140,824 A: 577,490
71. Focused Mind T: 162,356 A: 520,971
72. Small Business Tips T: 166,367 A: 74,005
73. Lifes Perspective T: 194,358 A: 179,801
74. Business Opportunities Blog T: 199,700 A: 832,678
75. The Savvy Entrepreneur T: 224,227 A: 391,147
76. Egg Marketing Blog T: 231,062 A: 740,867
77. The Franchise King Blog T: 273,240 A: 520,732
78. Small Business Entrepreneur T: 317,977 A: 883,094
79. The Great Startup Game T: 331,293 A: 421,492
80. Work At Home Start Up Guide T: 345,597 A: 1,190,178
81. Dorm Room Biz T: 360,865 A: 957,072
82. Startup Blog T: 377,609 A: 2,552,189
83. Open Inovators T: 395,824 A: 1,230,257
84. Get Entrepreneurial T: 437,475 A: 446,085
85. Bplans Blog T: 437,475 A: 1,373,525
86. Stuff4Restaurants T: 461,534 A: 298,982
87. Canadian Entrepreneur T: 484,461 A: 237,901
88. Strategize T: 487,964 A: 2,856,731
89. The Marketing Spot T: 587,893 A: 2,550,840
90. The Ravings Of A Mad Entrepreneurial Scientist T: 587,893 A: 566,836
91. More Than We Know T: 871,446 A: 2,964,420
92. Solo Entrepreneur T: 1,212,405 A: 471,491
93. Stuff4Business T: 1,391,575 A: 298,982
94. Consultant Journal T: 4,262,598 A: 667,342
95. Startup Addict Musings T: 4,446,976 A: 1,03390,690
96. Edith Yeung T: 8,911,336 A: 125,290
97. Boostrap Me T: 8,911,336 A: 550,348
98. The Selling Sherpa T: Not Listed A: 772,292
99. BizzBangBuzz T: Not Listed A: 1,484,797
100. The Freestyle Entrepreneur T: Not Listed A: 1,519,518

Which ones of these have you read? Which new ones did you find?  Which can you recommend for others?  Share your thoughts and opinions below!

(photo by Thiago Felipe Festa)

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I’ve recently discovered the fun of carnivals as an easy way to get to know a variety of new bloggers who write on topics that I am interested in.   

Similar to a networking event, carnivals give you a chance to have a few short encounters with new people, get exposed to new ideas and new opportunities.

The following are some I’ve been enjoying lately - I thought you might enjoy them as well.

Allow me to introduce you:  

The Success Principles carnival is hosted every week at the E3 Success Blog . It collects articles on how to be successful. Bloggers share principles they’ve used and secrets they’ve learned.  

This week, among many inspiring articles, Sue Massey presents How to Write a Business Proposal posted at Business Management Life. She provides a checklist with the four questions that a good proposal should answer - and tips on writing a proposal so clear that even your mother could understand it.

The Carnival of Small Business Issues is hosted this week by Atlantic Canada Small Business Blog.  This carnival focuses on small business issues - marketing, HR, finance, operations, customer service, trade or even trivia that relates to small business. 

Of particular interest to Women Entrepreneurs is the article  by Joel Libava, guest columnist at Small Biz Trends. His article Help For the Time Starved: Service Franchises  explores the booming franchise opportunities available in service businesses that cater to time starved people like us.  

The new Business Success Carnival is doing well, with twice as many articles as in the premier issue. The Carnival was originated by Dominate Your Life. It focuses exclusively on articles related to Business Success.

Women Entrepreneurs who work at home will want to be sure and check out  Ideas to Help Make Your Home Office Functional and Fun posted at ask the CareerCounselor.

The Mom and Women Entrepreneurs Carnival is also in its second issue originated and hosted by Chronicles of a Mompreneur.

An interesting interview with a Woman Entrepreneur is presented by Doris Chua in H.O.W. Feature - Michelle Sweeney posted at A Meeting Place for All Home Office Women. 

Enjoy the carnivals. And be a good guest - if you like what you find, leave a comment, stumble or digg the carnival.

Have Fun!

It’s not even October yet but I feel like I’ve already gotten my first Halloween Scare!!

As you all know, I recently moved this blog to a permanent domain host HostICan.  It had been recommended as a good site to work with Wordpress the software I use and had a good reputation as having good availability and service.

Last week the Support team at HostICan notified me that the site would be down for a maintenance window from Friday 11 pm EST through Saturday 6 am EST. They suggested putting a notice about the outage on the site. I asked them whether readers would be able to view the site during that time and they said it was best to put it up early but didn’t elaborate on what the readers would see. They suggested putting a notice about the outage on the site.

I opted not to put up the notice, assuming that HostICan would have some type of generic message about maintenance during that time which would suffice. I didn’t want to call more attention to the site being down than was necessary.   

I also assumed that the maintenance window they provided was the maximum range they expeted the site to be down, and that in all likelihood their scheduled maintenance would take less than 7 hours which is a very large window.

But to my horror when I logged on yesterday morning, 3 hours after the window was supposed to close - my website was nowhere to be found!! When I attempted to go there, I was told that no site existed!!  When I attempted to go to HostICan - that site didn’t exist either!

First, I panicked - you see I hadn’t backed up my site before their scheduled maintenance. The last backup I had was the one that I did before moving the site a week ago!! 

Second, I realized that I had copies of recent posts in a feed, so I could recreate them if needed. But I was still dismayed because I wouldn’t be able to recreate any comments that had come in!

Third, I tried to contact customer service. But I had never written the number down!  It’s listed on the HostICan website, but of course that was missing! I did have the Support center’s email address from their previous emails to me so I knew I could email them. But I really wanted to call someone and yell about the fact that my site was missing!

In the end, I opted not to contact customer support while the entire host was down.

1) This was not a small problem they needed to be made aware of - I was sure they were already aware of the problem.  

2) They didn’t need to take resources away from solving the root cause of the problem to focus on my site, which after all was only a symptom of the larger issue

3) I knew I wouldn’t believe any assurance the support system gave me about my site being restored properly, until I actually saw it anyway - so nothing was to be gained by asking for reassurances

I’ve spent a career working in technologies and I had a good sense for what was going on behind the scene at HostICan right about then - tired, overworked, stressed out technicians working feverishly to resolve whatever issues was preventing their process from working, trying to be creative under the pressure of knowing they were potentially damaging their company’s brand as well as the brands of the businesses they support, and deciding whether they were just on the brink of success or needing to admit defeat and implement their fallback plan.  

I have a lot of respect for software technicians and just had to assume that HostICan had hired good ones.

So, do I regret my decision to move here? Am I going to jump ship to another provider?

At the moment, I am standing by my decision. HostICan has a good reputation and a good track record. You can click on this picture  to see a chart from RealMetrics.com. This site tracks the actual availability of all providers and presents unbiased results. Over 110,000 tests per day are performed on real accounts to determine the results. You can find  even more detailed charts and trend analysis on RealMetrics. Suffice to say HostICan is still a good value in tterms of availability, price and ease of use.  

So, what can I do in the future? 

• First, I should have backed up my site; I should do it every week but also before any scheduled maintenance. That was definitely an oversight on my part.
• Second, I’ll consider notifying readers about upcoming maintenance - especially if I get feedback from readers that they would have liked it; I’m still not sure whether it will drive more people away in anticipation of a problem than would occur naturally.
• Third, I will add HostICan support to my contact information instead of assuming that their site will be available.
• Fourth, I will provide feedback to HostICan that they should have had a plan for communicating with their customers when things went awry. I’m assuming that even their email servers were down - which I have to say makes me question the viability of their implementation plan….
• Fifth, I will continue to monitor my support from HostICan and compare it to other service providers to ensure that I am getting high quality service.

What have been your experiences with web hosting? Have you had availability issues? How did you decide which hosting service to go with?

(photo. Michal Napartowicz )

I accomplished one of my goals for the week -  getting us settled in our new site.  I fixed the comment section in the about page (take a look!) and tested the backup and disaster recovery process.  After that, I decided we were ready to roll!!

So, take a look around our new digs.  Check out the previous posts - in case you missed one before. 

And keep coming back - there will be more changes, additions and of course,  posts, coming soon!!!

WE’re glad you’re here!!

Liz

As I mentioned yesterday, one of my goals for this week is to move this blog to its permanent home.  I’m pleased to say I am making good progress on this goal.

You may be wondering why I am bothering to move my blog. Afterall, Wordpress is free and the new site  isn’t.  So, for all you bloggers and aspiring bloggers out there, I will give you the pros and cons of using a free site versus a paid hosting site.

First of all, let me say that Wordpress.com is fantastic. It is very easy to use and there is a lot of support in the forums.

It is perfect for the blogger who is inexperienced,  budget-constrained, time-constrained, technically challenged or just wanting to use a simple blog as  a hobby.  With Wordpress.com you can literally get a blog up and running in less than five minutes.  I know, because I did.  And once you do, you never have to worry about back ups or disaster recovery because Wordpress handles all of that for you.

So, why change?  Wordpress does have a few limitations, especially when you get into commercial blogging.  In the new site, I’d like to create some options to allow you to:

• subscribe to a newsletter
• sign up for free e-courses and tele-seminars
• download free articles and e-books
• purchase e-books, mp3 files and other informational products

Having a commercial blog also enables me to potentially earn a little money on affiliations or advertising to help pay for the cost of hosting and maintaining the blog.

There are lots of hosting companies available. I went with ICAN because they work very well with wordpress blogs and they were recommended both by wordpress.com and other blog experts. 

The biggest concerns I had with finding a host were availability and cost.  Wordpress.com blogs are pretty much always available becauseWordpress has a good server network. I wanted to find a host that guarantees similar availability and provides 24×7 real-time customer service.  I also wanted a reasonable price:  ICAN costs about $7 per month.

The biggest challenges I have faced in creating the new site were:

• tweaking the “theme” that controls how the site looks; in Wordpress.com you can select from several themes but can’t make any changes; in the new site I could choose from over 2000 themes , but I found that the theme I wanted to use didn’t allow comments on the “About page”.  So I had to learn some html code and make some coding changes (this was fun!)
• wordpress.com has some automatic features like keeping track of blog statistics and filtering spam comments; the new site only has the features that I add so I needed to find plug-ins (pre-written code) that did both of those things; there are lots of other plug-ins that I will probably explore over time but for now I wanted the minimum features that I was already getting for free
• wordpress.com automatically backs up my posts in the case of a disaster; the new site doesn’t do that; I need to back up my site and keep track of the file; if there is a disaster, I will need to restore it myself from the backup; I haven’t tried this yet - but I will this week before moving us over there

At the end of the day, putting your blog on a paid host server provides more freedom but demands more responsibility.  Blogging on wordpress.com is truly worry-free.  Blogging in my new site will be a little more challenging.  But I’m excited about the opportunities to offer more and interact more.

Please check out the new site and let me know what you think!  Do you like the theme I chose? Do you like the way the information is arranged? What do you think of the new header? And how about those comments on the “About page” - not too shabby, eh?

Stay tuned - if all goes well with the backup/recovery tests  - we should be over there by the end of the week!! 

 update 09/21 - WE MADE IT! WELCOME!! - Liz