As you can see, my use of the Internet in 2001 revolved around experimenting with Amazon’s affiliate program and job seeking.

Ten years later, I’m done job seeking, but am not done experimenting. If you are feeling generous, click through this link to Amazon’s site and buy stuff. Thanks!

Well, I have the answer. SWHS stands for Sedro Woolley High School. I can be certain because the drawing of the cheerleader has Cubs written on her shirt, which is the high school’s mascot. Mystery solved!

For those who do care, here’s a map of the t-shirt’s origin:

When contributing, I noticed that I had the option on the thank you page on Kiva.org to add my loan info to my Facebook news feed. Here’s what the option looked like:

Now, here’s what my loan looks like in my Facebook news feed:

It’s features like this and I’m sure many others that are helping the loan applicants get funded so quickly. Kiva.org’s success in attracting money loaners is evident in this post on their site:

“Our new service is experiencing record traffic. In fact, on average, loans fundraising on the Kiva website receive full funding within a day. We want everyone to have a chance to lend, so we’re temporarily limiting loan contributions to $25 per business. We hope to remove the limit soon, as we work with our Field Partners to post more loans on the site.”

Pretty cool!

The entrepreneur receiving my loan is named Ashurov Ravshan and lives in Tajikistan. He still needs another $425.00 to complete their loan request of $1,050.00 (you can loan as little as $25.00!). The money I contributed toward Ashurov’s loan will go toward purchasing a horn pedigree bull and pedigree milk cow. Help me get this business off the ground by to make a loan to Ashurov Ravshan too.

It’s finally easy to actually do something about poverty - using Kiva I know exactly who my money is loaned to and what they’re using it for. And most of all, I know that I’m helping them build a sustainable business that will provide income to feed, clothe, house and educate their family long after my loan is paid back.

UPDATE: Ashurov’s loan request has been met. Best wishes on the new pedigree animals Ashurov!

Note: The cat in this photo is the brother of my cat here in New York. He was a bit too unstable to move across the country, but lives the farm life with my parents now.

For those of you that also have blog feeds that you’d like to put on Facebook, check out Lee’s great post on the topic.

Get the application launcher called Quicksilver.The download is at http://www.blacktree.com/. Wikipedia has a good entry about it with some additional background information. Once installed, I suggest updating the application launcher shortcut to the Apple Key + Spacebar combo. To do this, you’ll need to first make sure that the Spotlight shortcut doesn’t conflict. Go into System Preferences > Spotlight and update “Spotlight menu keyboard shortcut” to use ctrl + Spacebar (it looks like ^ Space). Also inside System Preferences > Spotlight, make sure that “Spotlight window keyboard shortcut” is not using the Apple Key + Spacebar combo. I am using alt/option + Spacebar for this one. Save the new settings and exit System Preferences. Now, you are ready to set the Quicksilver hotkey. Open the Quicksilver app. In the top right corner of the app, there is a down arrow. Click that to expand a menu. In the menu, navigate to Quicksilver > Preferences. Once in the preferences menu of Quicksilver, click on the Command item in the left column of options. Within the Command section, you’ll see a HotKey Activation area. Click inside of that and hit the Apple Key followed by the Spacebar. Click the red close button. You are done configuring the shortcut.

Now, to reap the rewards of all this setup work, press the Apple Key followed by the Spacebar. Start typing the name of a program you like to use, say iTunes. As you type, Quicksilver suggests which program you are looking for and allows you to open it by pressing the return key.

Now, the challenge is to learn something new that you can do with Quicksilver, and post about it here in the comments. I’ve head it can be used for much more than an application launcher, but haven’t spent too much time with it. Let me know how you use it.

I’m lucky enough to be in an organization with many salesforce.com experts, including a woman who was recently hired to work with our system on the sales operations side of things. In her first week on the job we had an informal meeting where I showed her how our marketing department uses the system. When I told her my ultimate goal of tracking closed/won opportunities to my campaigns she laughed and said something along the lines of, “ah, yes, but that never happens.”

So, if CRM isn’t the answer, then what is?

A collection of ideas from a blogger and podcaster I like, Brian Carroll have helped me get my head around a non-CRM approach to tracking the success of lead generation activities. Here’s my summary:

1. Work with the sales team to define a universal lead definition.

2. Launch campaigns designed to secure leads that fit into the definition.

3. Implement a closed-loop feedback program. This can be as easy as a weekly phone call with the sales people that are touching the leads.

4. Provide a mechanism for sales to return leads that aren’t sales ready to the marketing department for further cultivation.

Once in place, I expect the marketer would have, at a minimum, data on total leads generated, percent of leads that are sales-ready, and percent of leads in need of cultivation. That would be a pretty chart and gets things closer to the ideal.

Or, if you want to try things the South Park way, do this:

1) Implement closed-loop feedback

2) ?

3) Profit

Let me know which system works best for you.

Technorati Tags: leadgen, b2b, salesforce.com, marketing, crm

Here’s what a tagometer looks like when a site has been bookmarked multiple times:

Here’s what a tagometer looks like when a site has not been bookmarked:

Got a tagometer on your site? If so, let me know about it and I’ll bookmark you in del.icio.us for the fun of it.

Technorati Tags: tagometer, bookmarks, widgets, bookmarking, tag

Technorati Tags: craft, art, family, mom, blogger, craftart