Ravi's Rants

Rndaom, Yet <Well Formed/>

  • Ravi’s Favorite Movies

Archives for August 2008

Ubiquity: Mozilla’s Mother Of All Mashups

8/27/2008 By Ravi Jayagopal 1 Comment

If you don’t know what a “Mashup” is, fret not.

You’re now going to witness one of the greatest “mashup” tools ever developed…

Full story: Introducing Ubiquity

Filed Under: Firefox, Google, Industry News, Internet, Mashups, Mozilla, Online, Productivity, Purple Cow, Remarkable, Social Media, Technology, Tools, Video, Web2.0

Hey You, Come Stalk Me

8/19/2008 By Ravi Jayagopal 3 Comments

“Twit” is no longer just a mean word 🙂

I signed up for Twitter a while ago. But I never “got it” – until recently – when I figured out the awesomeness of microblogging.

Seth Godin wrote this on his blog:

“My goal in creating this blog is to spread my ideas and keep me from having to write a book about every single thing that pops into my head. I’m an amateur, not a professional.”

“Micro” blogging takes this and turns it on its head – and completely frees me from even the “gotta write a meaningful post” world of “macro” (a.k.a “the usual style of”) blogging.

Microblogging lets me put out stuff that is interesting, stuff that I want to share with my followers, but is too trivial to take up space on my blog.

Though many folks use it in a more social and personal context (“watching Spiderman now”, “woke up late”, “eating lunch” types), it has a much more powerful and serious side to it that is just begging to be taken advantage of.

Now I’ve started leaving behind a trail of my online activities on twitter – for my tribe: Web sites I’m visiting, articles I’m reading, videos I’m watching, books I’m reading…

Whether you twitter or tumble or spoink, do it so that you can make meaning for your followers.

I invite you to come stalk me 🙂

Filed Under: Blog, Business, Cool Sites, Microblogging, Online Services, Remarkable, Seth Godin, Social Media, Technology, Web2.0

Seth Godin’s Scalp Is On Fire

8/18/2008 By Ravi Jayagopal 1 Comment

I’ve always talked to folks about having a sense of urgency in life. Because that’s how I operate.

I look at the young & successful, and I feel like I’m 10 years behind. And I don’t think that’s a bad thing either.

If you don’t have nowhere to go and nothing to achieve, then you just take life as it comes: do your “job”, go home, have a beer, watch TV, hit the sack. Rinse, repeat.

But if you did have greatness to be achieved, that feeling that you are not yet where you ought to be, then you do things differently.

Having this sense of urgency is not the same as “being in a hurry”. Because when you’re in a hurry, you forget the basics, you overlook the fundamentals, you skip over the essentials, and you could end up going nowhere in a hurry.

But when you feel that you don’t have the luxury of time, the luxury that other “mere mortals” have, that’s when you transcend to a different level of your game.

I keep saying “sense of urgency”, but a much more beautiful way to say it is, “like your hair is on fire”.

Obviously, Seth doesn’t have much hair, so I’m pretty sure his scalp is on fire :-).

– Ravi Jayagopal
RavisRants.com

Filed Under: Famous Quotes, How-To, Inspirational, Philosophy, Ravi's Rants, Remarkable, Seth Godin

Are You Keeping A Tab On Your Competitors – and Yourself?

8/4/2008 By Ravi Jayagopal 7 Comments

Quite frequently, I am reminded of how we take certain things for granted, while it could be something completely new/interesting/educating/shocking for someone else.

Using Google Alerts for competitive research is one such “thing”. During a chat with a friend the other day, I casually mentioned how I use Google Alerts to keep an eye on my industry, and it completely blew him away, while I’d actually been doing this for as long as Google Alerts have existed (and before that News.com alerts).

So, for what it’s worth, here goes:

I use Google Alerts to set up specific alerts for specific keywords.

When Google first finds any new or existing content (blog posts, web pages, forum discussions, etc) anywhere on the web that it hasn’t indexed before, that contains these keywords, Google sends me an email with a link to this newly-found content.

And if a publisher has password-protected their content, but still allowed Google to index it (using the “password-protected content” sitemaps feature), then Google emails me a little blurb of that password-protected content!

So, basically I have set up tens of alerts, the first one (vanity “alert” ahead – quite literally! 🙂 being my own name (“Ravi Jayagopal”). That way, I always know the instant (or within a few days at worst), if anyone is blogging/writing about me or my products.

Google Alert

Here are some of the alerts you could create:
1. Your full name
2. For all your product names
3. All your web site urls
4. Each and every one of your competitors’ names
5. All of your partners’ names
6. Name of any industry expert (or their web site url) whose blog/site you follow (like I have one for “Seth Godin” 🙂
7. The name or category of your industry: For eg., right now I’m a month away from launching a very powerful “Access Management” software to manage subscription-based web sites. So, some of my alerts include the keywords “subscription”, “content”, “download”, “security”, etc. Yes, I do get some false positives, but who cares!

The kind of stuff Google finds on a daily basis thanks to these alerts, not only help me keep a tab on myself, my customers, my competitors, and my idols, but it also gives me a lot of new ideas, new features for my products, and great new ways in which I can make my product remarkable!

So go create your alerts today.

Filed Under: Business, Competitors, Customers, Free, Google, How-To, Online Services, Product Development, Ravi's Rants, Remarkable, SEO, Seth Godin, Sitemaps, Technology

About Ravi Jayagopal

Ravi Jayagopal

Ravi Jayagopal is a full-time entrepreneur living in sunny San Diego, CA . He is the Co-Founder & Co-Developer of DigitalAccessPass.com (DAP), the premier Membership Plugin & Content Delivery Platform for WordPress. Check out his Podcast about Membership Sites & Online Courses, at SubscribeMe.fm. Ravi is also the creator of CoolCastPlayer.com, a pretty and powerful podcast player plugin for WordPress. And creator of S3MediaVault.com, S3 Video Player for Amazon S3. Ravi first started selling online in 1997. Check out his book "Subscribe Me: Making, Marketing & Monetizing Online Digital Content with Membership Sites, Online Courses and Subscriptions"


Ravi is also the host of the "Subscribe Me" podcast at SubscribeMe.fm

Contact Ravi

Don't Miss a Post!
Free Updates
By Email

 

Recent Posts

  • I Create For Creators
  • Skyscraper
  • Do you prefer listening to a podcast that is edited? Or nah?
  • Pirates Keep Out
  • Sands of Time
  • Proud Quitter
  • MYSTERY: Guess what I’m trying to highlight in the picture?
  • Radio is (almost) dead
  • If your want your neighbors to start mowing their lawn
  • Disney Slow Pass

Archives

  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • August 2018
  • March 2018
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • August 2016
  • January 2016
  • November 2015
  • September 2015
  • March 2015
  • November 2014
  • May 2014
  • April 2014
  • March 2014
  • November 2013
  • October 2013
  • May 2013
  • January 2013
  • September 2012
  • April 2012
  • October 2011
  • September 2011
  • June 2011
  • May 2011
  • April 2011
  • March 2011
  • January 2011
  • December 2010
  • November 2010
  • September 2010
  • February 2010
  • January 2010
  • December 2009
  • November 2009
  • October 2009
  • September 2009
  • June 2009
  • May 2009
  • April 2009
  • March 2009
  • February 2009
  • January 2009
  • December 2008
  • November 2008
  • October 2008
  • September 2008
  • August 2008
  • July 2008
  • June 2008
  • April 2008
  • March 2008
  • January 2008
  • December 2007
  • November 2007
  • October 2007
  • September 2007
  • August 2007
  • July 2007
  • June 2007
  • May 2007
  • April 2007
  • March 2007
  • February 2007
  • January 2007
  • December 2006
  • October 2006
  • September 2006
  • August 2006
  • July 2006
  • May 2006
  • April 2006
  • March 2006
  • February 2006
  • January 2006
  • November 2005
  • September 2005
  • August 2005
  • July 2005
  • March 2005
  • February 2005
  • January 2005

    follow me on Twitter

     

    Want to give credits to your members just like Audible.com does? Then checkout our Credit Storeplugin.

    No Business Like E-Business

    Available at: NBLEB.com & Amazon.com

    Digital Access Pass

    DigitalAccessPass.com is an incredibly powerful Membership Script for WordPress. It has an inbuilt "ContentResponder", Affiliate Program, Email Autoresponder, Email Broadcasting, and more.

    Links

    • DigitalAccessPass.com
    • NBLEB.com (book)
    • Ravi's Favorite Movies
    • S3MediaVault.com
    • Techiiies.com

    Categories

    • Adsense
    • Advertising
    • AdWords
    • Alerts
    • Amazon
    • App Store
    • Apple
    • Atom
    • Automation
    • Blog
    • Branding
    • Business
    • Business Tools
    • Change
    • Code Snippets
    • Competitors
    • Content Creation
    • Content Marketing
    • Cool Sites
    • Cool Stuff
    • Copywriting
    • Coupons
    • Customer Service
    • Customers
    • DAP
    • Digital Access Pass (DAP)
    • Downloads
    • E-Business
    • Email
    • Entrepreneurs
    • FaceBook
    • Famous Quotes
    • Feeds
    • Firefox
    • Free
    • Free Software
    • Funny
    • God
    • Google
    • Hosting
    • How-To
    • Humor
    • I Don't Get It
    • Industry News
    • Inspirational
    • Instagram
    • Interesting Facts
    • Internet
    • Internet Marketing
    • iPad
    • iPhone
    • iPod
    • Jargon
    • JavaScript
    • Life
    • Live
    • Marketing
    • Mashups
    • Microblogging
    • Microsoft
    • Mobile Apps
    • Mozilla
    • Online
    • Online Reputation
    • Online Services
    • Paid Software
    • Peer-to-Peer
    • Penny-wise
    • Permission
    • Personal Tools
    • Philosophy
    • PHP
    • PHP Code
    • PHP Scripts
    • Ping
    • Podcast
    • Podcasting
    • PPC
    • Pricing
    • Product Development
    • Productivity
    • Publicity
    • Purple Cow
    • Radio
    • Ravi Recommends
    • Ravi's Rants
    • Remarkable
    • RSS
    • Scripts-n-Software
    • SEO
    • Seth Godin
    • Side Hustle
    • Sitemaps
    • Social Media
    • Spam
    • Steve Jobs
    • SubscribeMe.fm
    • SubscribeMeBook.com
    • Technology
    • Technorati
    • This Versus That
    • Timepass
    • Tools
    • Torrents
    • Twitter
    • Un-Remarkable
    • Uplifting
    • ventriloquism
    • Video
    • Video
    • Viral
    • Virtual Reality
    • Web2.0
    • Webmaster
    • WordPress
    • WTF
    • YouTube

    If this were a membership site, it would be Powered by DAP