Looking for help with your Web 2.0 development and marketing efforts? Check out these valuable resources. First, the helpful folks at the FontShop have assembled an extensive compilation of Web 2.0 typeface, logo, design and website examples. As they point out with regard to Web 2.0 design, "There is no official standard for what makes something 'Web 2.0', but there certainly are a few tell-tale signs...characteristic among these brands is their appearance. Web 2.0 sites nearly always feel open and friendly and often use small chunks of large type. The colors are bright and cheery — lots of blue, orange, and what we jokingly call the Official Color of Web 2.0: lime green." Many of the sites are also, not surprisingly, Web 2.0-related; blogging, tagging, photo sharing etc. They also link to Ludwig Gatzke 's even larger Web 2.0 logo collection here . Second is InfoPirate's Search Engine for Social Bookmark Services . This listing of 53 social bookmark sites ( ...

Webcasting and rich media producer ON24 is beta testing a new portal / directory site for B2B webcasts , podcasts , corporate videos, and online demos called Insight24 . With content in over 30 business and technology categories, Insight24 has been called " YouTube for B2B podcasts, webcasts etc." but the better analogy might be that it's KnowledgeStorm for online audio and video. Insight24 allows companies to freely upload podcasts, corporate video and other rich media assets into a categorized, searchable directory. It enables businesses to leverage and increase the ROI of their rich media investments, and virtually any type of rich media, from any source (not just ON24 clients) can be uploaded. The site also provides an RSS feed to keep registered users up to date on newly added content. Although Insight24 is likely to attract some viewers as a destination site, the real value to businesses that take advantage of this will be through exposure on syndication partner ...

Many companies struggle to implement a comprehensive web marketing strategy. They may be running some Google and Yahoo search ads, but even for these programs, keywords, bids, ad content and landing pages are frequently not optimized. Part of the reason is a shortage of practical models. That's now been partially remedied with the addition of a page on How to Develop a Web Marketing Plan on WebMarketCentral. This outline is loosely based on the Six Pillars of Internet Marketing blog. Although the Six Pillars model is one of the best available, it does have some shortcomings. For example, it fails to start with the most basic element of all: building an effective website . Also, affiliate marketing is overplayed (this is important in online retailing, but a small component of B2B web marketing strategy). Helpfully, however, the Six Pillars model includes interactive PR as a key element; this is an important but challenging area for many PR agencies, let alone small to midsized com...

A couple of quick items: First, Mike Schultz , co-founder of the Wellesley Hills Group and publisher of Rai nToday , is now writing his own blog. The Services Insider Blog is focused on marketing and selling professional services. Topics of recent posts include successful cold-calling, prospect targeting, lead generation, and the proper use of CRM systems. Services Insider is a cleanly structured, thoughtfully written, carefully researched must-read blog for anyone involved in professional services sales or marketing. Second, GoogleFight is a tool mentioned here previously in my post on e-words vs. ewords . GoogleFight is a great tool for determining which of two terms is most commonly used in web writing. For example, I used it recently to check "dropshipping" vs. "drop-shipping" vs. "drop shipping" (the last variant is the most commonly used -- by a wide margin). But my nine-year old became curious about the little stick men fighting on the screen as ...

Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive And Others Die by Chip and Dan Heath explores why some ideas "stick" in our consciousness while others are never understood in the first place and are quickly forgotten. The authors cite two examples early in the book, from opposite ends of the political spectrum, to illustrate stickiness: Ronald Reagan's "It's morning again in America" and James Carville's "It's the economy, stupid" (proving that sometimes stickiness is more a matter of luck than brains). Still, the authors attempt to both define the common characteristics of sticky ideas, and prescribe methods to make ideas sticky. The result is not only philosophically interesting, but a practical guide for marketers in trying to make their messages stick in an increasingly over-promoted marketplace. As the Blogcritics review of the book points out, however, the book is not solely aimed at marketers, but also at teachers, politicians, parents, and ...