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WordCamp 2011 Portsmouth part 1

Posted in Uncategorized on July 18th, 2011 by Sue – Be the first to comment

My first WordCamp. And I didn’t really know what to expect. I was on my own – didn’t know anyone. But I found the WordCamp folks to be a lovely bunch of people.

Here’s my notes, mainly for myself so I can keep track of all the things I learned and people I thought were truly inspirational.

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Changing your WordPress admin username and password

Posted in Uncategorized on June 28th, 2011 by Sue – Be the first to comment

A topic many Cybermummy 2011 delegates wanted more details on…

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My favourite visualisations

Posted in Uncategorized on April 5th, 2011 by Sue – Be the first to comment

My private obsession: data visualisations.

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Social media: it’s not about the tools

Posted in Uncategorized on March 29th, 2011 by Sue – Be the first to comment

It’s not the tools themselves, but using them right that matters in social media land. Here’s some ideas from the Future of marketing micro-conference in November 2010. read more »

William Gibson and Cory Doctorow at The Cadogan Hall

Posted in Uncategorized on October 12th, 2010 by Sue – Be the first to comment

I was lucky to catch William Gibson speak in London in October 2010.

He talked about his new book ‘Zero History’ and about writing science fiction and writing in general. William is my favourite source of quotes when teaching. “The future is here, its just not evenly distributed” being one of my favourites when I teach social media. And of course he invented the term ‘cyberspace‘. read more »

Google Instant Search

Posted in Uncategorized on September 10th, 2010 by Sue – Be the first to comment

Google instant search was rolled out to all users of the Google search engine on 9 September 2010.

As soon as you start typing your query, search results are shown to you right away (even before you press the ‘Enter’ or ‘Search’ button). As you type, the search results change based on whatever you have typed so far. Google tries to be smart and presents you search results based on your search string, location, previous searches and many other parameters.

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Interview: Tips for setting up a grantmaking trust website

Posted in Uncategorized on June 22nd, 2010 by Sue – Be the first to comment

ACF interview

ACF interview

In June 2010 I was featured in several interviews with grant-making trusts in the Association of Charitable Foundations Journal.

Here’s a great article on Tips for setting up a website (PDF) aimed at grantmaking trusts.

LinkedIn for web writers

Posted in Uncategorized on June 17th, 2010 by Sue – Be the first to comment

LinkedIn is perfect for web writers.

Groups are essential for keeping abreast of topics.

Here’s some worthwhile LinkedIn Groups for web writers to join:

Freelance Web Writers

Web Content

The Content Wrangler Community

Freelance Editing Network

Seasoned writing and editing pros

The National Union of Journalists

STET: Professional Copy Editors

LinkEds & writers

SEO: choosing your target keywords

Posted in Uncategorized on April 1st, 2010 by Sue – 1 Comment

So, you’ve done your research: asked potential readers how they would search for the things you are writing about, consulted a thesaurus for synonyms, looked at competitors’ websites, checked out your hunches with Google’s Keyword Tool. You’ve now got a long list of words and phrases to use on your web pages.

But which keywords are best? read more »

Freelancing in a downturn

Posted in Uncategorized on March 5th, 2010 by Sue – 4 Comments

Whenever I teach I’m often asked how I set up on my own, how I am surviving in these harsh economic times, how to set up as a self-employed web writer and designer.

These last few months have seen me work on numerous site launches, email newsletters and courses for my clients.  I have never been busier. But there’s no denying that starting up is tricky when budgets are particularly tight for clients.

This is a round-up of some recent articles and forthcoming courses that look helpful, whether you’ve chosen to go freelance or are forced to be self-employed (in other words, have been made redundant).

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