Why You Should Always Go With Your Gut
The single best piece of business advice that has shaped me as an entrepreneur is to trust your instincts.
[Startup People] Blake Miller – Helping You Build, Launch, & Grow Your Startup
There’s a reason why we are called Think Big Partners. We want to work with people who have a partnership mentality. Being a good partner can mean a lot of things, but one of my biggest takeaways is that you don’t have to win all the time. Give a little before you get. My favorite quote and something…
[Startup People] Phil Laboon – Developing Online Presence & Credibility
Phil Laboon has consulted for everything from startups to Fortune 500’s, developing clients’ online presences and online credibility. Eyeflow Internet Marketing specializes in providing organic SEO, online marketing solutions, social media and PPC by utilizing strategic, ethical and natural techniques…
Focus Online Attention On Your Expertise – Create A One Page Website At Enthuse
I thought it was a challenge to show people the value of poetry. Imagine the plight of the Tuvan throat singer… Everyone has special skills and a unique story to share with the world online, but giving others a clear window into individual genius grows harder each day. Enthuse has a solution for…
ResumUP.com – Create Visual Resumes
ResumUP is a new platform for the online creation of resumes. It tries to beat well-established competitors like Kinzaa, Emurse and Get Noticed First by letting users create resumes without having to type half as much. On ResumUP.com, everything is a lot more visual. You can get a resume ready by choosing your skills from a large list of mosaics. And just to ensure you won’t have to do that much typing, you can then have your background information imported straight from Facebook.
Of course, once your resume is ready you can have it shared with all of your contacts there. Just a couple of well-placed shares might as well put you face to face with the HR manager of the company you’ve always dreamed of working at. And resumes can always be easily printed, and downloaded as PDFs for easier sharing.
I think ResumUP would work a lot better if you could have your resume shared on Google+ and LinkedIn. But I’m also sure that’s coming in time. ResumUP already offers a unique and distinctive interface for getting a resume together. More sharing options and support for other services are the obvious improvements to be made now.
SparkHire.com – Online Video Resumes
Paper resumes are out. Online resumes are in. It’s been like that for some time already, and now the gap is getting wider. Spark Hire is a site that lets you not only list all of your qualifications online, but also tell the world about them by uploading your own videos. This can be done for free, and once your profile has been created then you just have to share the link with these employers you’re trying to get to hire you.
For its part, HR managers can use this service to conduct online interviews with candidates. If your work involves hiring people, then you know already how useful something like this can be. You know which candidates are a good fit for any open position the minute you see them. That’s the way it’s always been. And candidates can but find a service like this appealing, since they won’t have to drive their cars or take a bus to get interviewed. They’ll do everything from their front rooms if that’s what they want.
And when it comes to people like consultants, then these can use Spark Hire to showcase their portfolios, and connect face to face with their clients. They’ll not only provide them with a much speedier service, but also beat their competitors by taking their prices down. Which is what happens when a service can be provided without having to travel to the other side of town, of course.
NetworkClean.com – Keep Your Social Profile Clean
NetworkClean is the perfect service for those who want to ensure no inappropriate content will ever surface on their Facebook profiles. This company provides all-around-the-clock monitoring services to its clients, and it can take care of removing flagged content automatically for them. And when it comes to comments that could have a potentially negative effect on your brand or business, then NetworkClean can notify you about these as soon as they have been posted so that you can act on them. Even the most negative of comments can be turned on its head by dealing with it as soon as it has been made. It’s the best way to show punters that you really care about the services you provide, and that you’re listening to what the people who’re paying your wages have to say.
As a user of NetworkClean, you can actually customize the frequency and the lengths of scans, and set down your exact email preferences. And something that I really like about NetworkClean is that it can handle profiles in languages other than English. Few social monitoring services can do that, and it’s a definitive point in this company’s favor.
Read more on NetworkClean.com – Keep Your Social Profile Clean…
CareerScribe.com – Manage Your Career Online
CareerScribe is here to revolutionize the way in which resumes have always been shared and handled. This web platform lets you create the closest to a “live” resume that’s ever been devised. It allows you to set down all your personal and professional accomplishments along with your aspirations and aims in an interactive profile that employers can check out anytime they want. This profile is giving them a true window into your past, present and future. It’ll give them the kind of understanding that a drab paper resume could never convey. If you’ve been born to do a job but don’t have all the necessary qualifications, then CareerScribe is going to be just perfect. It’ll let you overcome that lack of qualifications, and show employers you’re a perfect match for any position you’re interested in.
CareerScribe is available by paying a monthly subscription. This gives you access to a unique URL where all your data will go. Your virtual portfolio, your introductory video… everything is going to be hosted online, and you’ll be able to edit your privacy settings. If you don’t want just anybody to view your profile, then you can restrict access to it. You can actually make parts of it accessible by invitation only, so if you’re the kind who keeps on worrying about your privacy and being overexposed then CareerScribe is sure to go down well with you.
Sweedom.com – Animated Avatars For Facebook
If you feel that your Facebook profile is a bit drab, then something like Sweedom is all you need to begin adding some sparkle to it. Sweedom (short for “Sweet Freedom”) is a free service that will let you take your avatar and have it replaced with a short animated video. This will be culled straight from YouTube, and you’re actually the one who chooses what this video will be all about.
Plus, on Sweedom you can have your profile’s white background page replaced with an image. This is also available for free. All you have to do is to install the Sweedom bookmarklet. Firefox, Chrome, Internet Explorer, Opera, Safari… all major browsers are taken into account. And once you’re done installing the bookmarklet, then you’ll be able to begin changing the way your Facebook profile looks in no time at all. As long as you have a YouTube video that you want to use as your avatar or a Picasa picture that would make for a great background image then you’ll be all set.
Just like Pimp My Profizzle (reviewed here on KillerStartups), Sweedom is a service that both individuals and companies will put to excellent use. And remember, it’s open and free to everybody. No matter who you are or who you work with, you’ll be able to give your profile a whole new lease of life.
QRLme.com – QR Codes For Profiles
QR codes have been used as a means to drive people’s attention to products and services for quite some time already, but they’ve seldom been used in the way this new startup champions. You see, QRLme allows users to create QR codes for their profiles on social sites like Facebook and Twitter, and enable others to find them more quickly there.
QRLme is a free service. Users simply have to submit their Facebook/Twitter profiles for them to be converted on the spot, and the relevant codes to be generated. These can then be printed on leaflets and all the kind of materials where QR codes habitually go, and people who scan them using their smartphones will be taken straight to their profiles. They’ll be able to befriend them, and also to spread the word about them by sending out tweets or posting on their own Facebook walls.
Just in case you’re wondering, QRL stands for “Quick Response Like”. And if you’ve never come across a “standard” QR generator in your life (IE, one that is used for products and services) then you might as well like to check any of these out: BeQRious, QRals and QRbadge.
Pluglocal.com – Classifieds For Artists
Quite a different classifieds service, Pluglocal supports local talent communities. Its users are invariably artists that want to promote their works, and the services they can render. Pluglocal profiles all come with short bios, pictures, audio and video clips highlighting what users can do. These can be created for free, and they can also be browsed at just no cost. And once a profile has been created, the artist can post as many “plugs” (the name classifieds get on this site) as he wishes.
People are actually enabled to filter all their searches by specifying that only “plugs” that come with audio and/or video be displayed. And the most popular artists, gigs and cities are all spotlighted on the homepage.
The cities which are supported right now (the site is currently in beta) include New York, Los Angeles, Miami, San Francisco and Chicago. The company is actually open for suggestions on which cities to expand into next, so if you’re an artist and you live somewhere a service like this would make a great difference then just get in touch.
MyCreek.net – Meet New People Online
Do we need yet more social sites? Well, if you seem to think we do, then a visit to MyCreek.net is in order. The site enables just anybody to create an online profile listing who they are and what they do, and use that as the point of reference from which to connect with the world at large. That can be just anyone – people they have known all their lives, people who they knew a long time ago and that they had lost contact with (such as former classmates), colleagues, coworkers… just any person that they could have a defined bond with is findable and friendable through the MyCreek-net.
At the end of the day, how useful you are finding this website depends on how averse you are to using Facebook to interact with people online. If for some reason or the other you resent it (and I know quite a far share of people who do), then you are going to find something like MyCreek attractive. If not, then there is no real reason for you to even give the site a look, other than satisfying your curiosity and learning what a Facebook competitor looks like.
InfoStripe.com – Create A Profile For Anything
Blogging platforms like WordPress and Blogger make having a page on the Internet about anything you are keen on a piece of cake, but if you need something which is easier to handle (and every bit as effective) then InfoStripe is for you.
This new platform will let you create an online profile for just anything, connecting all the information that goes with it in a way that is as visually-appealing as it is informative. An InfoStripe can include data such as images and videos along with contact information and links to sites such as Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram. And InfoStripes profiles are viewable on just any kind of device – desktop computers, mobile phones, tablets…
If this sounds good to you, then you will be delighted to learn that such pages can be created absolutely for free. The process is quick and painless, and it entails little more than picking a name for the InfoStripe and providing all the data that should be featured there. That will do the trick, and once all the data is in place the page will become operational for all to visit.
Read more on InfoStripe.com – Create A Profile For Anything…
ProfileDefenders.com – Protect Your Online Reputation
Establishing and protecting an online reputation requires the kind of time and effort that would turn the whole endeavor into something akin to a full-time job. The way things work on the Social Web, face can be lost within minutes of an adverse tweet having been sent, or a negative status update having been posted on Facebook.
Fortunately, there are services like this one around – services that turn what would otherwise be an all-around-the-clock task into something which is handled for you. ProfileDefenders.com can take care of monitoring what is being said about your company online, and whenever something negative has been said it can take all the necessary steps for removing it.
Attacks, falsehoods, distortions and slanders can all be neutralized by this company. And ProfileDefenders can also take care of replacing them with positive information.
These services obviously come at a cost, but you can request a free quote on the site, and see how everything works out in practice for yourself.
Read more on ProfileDefenders.com – Protect Your Online Reputation…
StarsClips.com – Genuine Star Profiles
There is no definitive way to stop fake star profiles from blighting the Internet. It is very easy for someone who hates Lady Gaga or Justin Bieber to create a false profile and fool a couple of unsuspecting fans before Twitter or Facebook steps in and closes the offending account for good.
However, sites like StarsClips.com are here to prevent people who keep on assuming false identities from having such a ball. On StarsClips, just anybody can get to realize which the authentic and genuine profiles of stars and celebrities are.
Musicians, actors, athletes, authors, models, politicians… these are all easily findable through the site, either by launching a keyword search, or by browsing through all the categories which are featured on the main page.
And as a user of the site you will not only be able to find where stars and celebs are on the Social Web – you will actually be capable of favoriting the ones you are keener on, and following their updates that much easier.
ProfilePictureMaker.com – Profile Pictures For Facebook
I can live with having a normal-looking profile picture on Facebook, but I can understand that certain people need something a little bit more special. Teenagers certainly do – they have an incurable longing for captioned pictures, pictures with starry effects, photo montages… It is all understandable. And such are the things they will be able to do if they put this website to the test.
ProfilePictureMaker.com will let them process and edit any picture they have taken for free, and have it immediately uploaded to Facebook for friends to see and comment. And if they fail to find a suitable picture, then they can simply take one with their webcams and have that one edited and modified on the spot.
All the basic effects that one could imagine are instantly applicable here – pictures can be zoomed and rotated, their colors can be altered, they can be blended… The chances of the user not finding the effects he wants to apply on ProfilePictureMaker.com are pretty scant if you ask me.
Read more on ProfilePictureMaker.com – Profile Pictures For Facebook…
SocialCorral.com – Bring Your Social Profiles Together
First you add a badge for Facebook to your blog/site. Then you add a new badge, this time for Twitter. After that, you add yet another one for LinkedIn. And so it goes, until your blog has sunk underneath a myriad of badges and widgets that end up defeating their own purpose. Is there a way to present all that information in a way that is not overwhelming?
Yes, there is. Meet SocialCorral, a service that can create a widget bringing together all your different social profiles in the same place. Over 40 different social services are currently supported, and once it has been generated this widget can be added to any site just by copying and pasting a string of code.
And those of you who have no blog or site to add such a social profile to can always get a free SocialCorral page, and have all your different social identities displayed there for all to know how to get in touch with you.
Read more on SocialCorral.com – Bring Your Social Profiles Together…
FireViews.com – View And Get More Views
This is a new content promotion platform that is built upon a very easy-to-understand premise. Essentially, here you get views when you actually view what others have done.
On FireViews.com, you can upload photos, videos and full posts, and others will be able to comment on these as long as you comment on what they have posted. You create a profile for doing so, and the moment your profile is ready you can start viewing and being viewed, and get both likes and comments. The site is free to join, and it is actually possible for the same person to have more than one profile at once.
I believe most of you understand what the site is all about by now, but if you still fail to grasp it think of FireViews as a variation of the one for all and all for one concept, only that here everything revolves around content. There, I am sure seeing it like that will let everybody assimilate its essence more than adequately.
Reppler.com – Protect Your Facebook Profile
The more popular Facebook becomes, then the more hackers exert themselves to wreak havoc there. I am very, very cautious when I am checking my news feed. And even I have clicked where I should never have clicked recently. The consequences were not really that drastic – a couple of videos posted where they should not be. It was a mere matter of deleting them manually. But it was something to be dealt with alright. And I can imagine how damaging it would be for a company if that happened to it – the chances of any of its thousand of followers seeing something inappropriate before it is removed are just too high.
Reppler is a new security tool that can protect any account from unwanted content. It can detect most phishing and hijacking threats, and have them neutralized on the spot. And it can also go through any profile and warn its owner if information that is public should actually be set to private.
In this way, companies and professionals alike can ensure that their image will never be at stake on the Social Web (IE, the one context where everything can snowball within a couple of minutes and reputations that took weeks to be gained are lost in seconds).
Glitter.im – Glitter Text For Your Profile
Nowadays, there are more ways than one to have a spiffier social profile. There is a certain trend to let you do more with pictures – splitting them up, coloring them, using borders and backgrounds… the amount of applications for doing that on Facebook alone are endless. But no matter how far things are taken, there is something that is never going away: applying glitter effects to the actual texts within your profile.
And that is exactly what this new web tool lets you do. On this site, you will be allowed to choose a font and different glitter effects for an embed code to be generated. Upon pasting it on your profile, you will be unleashing the desired effect.
Revolutionary? Novel? Unique? Not really. But it is as useful as ever when it comes to telling the world that Edward Cullen is the cutest character in celluloid history. And it is completely free.
