Earlier today, I messed up on some lyrics while singing in the shower. I was humming my way through Everywhere You Go by Third Day, and then I started to sing the chorus. The correct words are:
Everywhere You go I want to go, won't You take me with you...
However, it came out like this:
Everywhere I go I... oops.
It immediately occured to me that I make this mistake in practice all of the time. I ask God to be "with me everywhere I go today."
Of course, I expect God to bless my efforts.
It's not like I'm asking him to go into a bank and rob it with me.
I am a Christian. I think I have some idea of how I am supposed to act. I'm trying to do good things. "Christian" things. Things we see Bible women doing.
Those are certainly efforts that God should bless, right?
The problem is, I'm still leading.
And that is our problem as women of the church today. We tell women how their lives should look as a Christian wives, moms, etc, and promise them that God will bless their efforts
So women make rash decisions like quitting jobs or changing jobs or picking fights with their husbands about what needs to change in their household.
Are you considering a rash decision? Who's leading way?
Chatham made the most of their page real estate by using slideshows.
By using the main slideshow at the top of the page, they can offer 4 different images without making the site look cluttered.
There is also a smaller slideshow under the "spotlight" topic that allows for 5 more image links; again, keeping the site simple.
Multiple forms of navigation make it easy for readers to find information quickly.
There is a quick navigation link set in the upper right corner for the most direct utility functions: apply, inquire, give, student page. A student does not have to get frustrated reading other contect to go to their course pages. An applicant or donor can get right to business. Someone wanting specific information does not have to read through content.
There is a main navigation bar with the categories that people just browsing would expect to find for a college.
Tabs that narrow the information to the nature of the visitor(future student, family, alumni) offer more specific browsing.
Finally, popular secondary links are included at the bottom of the page.
If you still can't find what you need, there is a prominent search box.
Are you planning or updating a website?
I did this wireframe with PowerPoint. However, there are other tools available for wireframing here.
The Long Tail is a concept I've heard of often but never studied.
Two years ago, as I cluelessly entered this online world, there was a phrase that I read often: The Long Tail. Apparantly this concept was the reason bloggers could find niches of traffic. It was the reason another catch phrase, multiple streams of income would work. The Long Tail was also used to evaluate streams of keywords.
If you asked me for a summary of the Long Tail, I would have simply said it has something to do with earning a little bit of money from a lot of things, as opposed to earning a lot of money from a few things. That was the extent of my knowledge.
I really didn't grasp the research behind it, or why it was even called The Long Tail.
However, one of my class assignments in Writing for Digital Media was to choose a book (we had a choice of 3) to review on my blog. When I saw this book on the list, I knew immediately it was the one I wanted to read. I now have a much better grasp of what the Long Tail is.
Let's start with where the name came from...
Do you see that long tail?
The chart above shows entry pages to the Tabitha's Team Website (This is the static website only; it does not include blog traffic). It is a graph of the top 50 entry pages in the month of June, showing how many visits entered through each page. There were actually 324 entry pages in June, so the actual "tail" on this graph is much longer than I can reasonably fit in a picture.
Chris Anderson's book is precisely about this distribution of consumer behavior, and how the marketplace is changing because of the access we have to the tail.
If I only "offered" you the pages that brought in at least 50 visitors to my site, I would only have 9 pages. These 9 pages accounted for 42% of my traffic in June. However, I would be missing all of the visitors who came from the other 315 pages - 58% of the traffic.
It really doesn't cost much in time and effort to write one more page, but the benefit of increased traffic shows.
The Long Tail shows how this concept works in industries such as music, print media, television, and movies, as "shelf space" and "broadcast time" become irrelevant.
If you are as old as I am, you remember when the TV had a dial on it and there were 4 stations plus the cartoons you got when you turned the top to "U" and the bottom to 53 (an idea that my teenager cannot wrap his head around).
When I rode the school bus in the morning, we all could talk about The Dukes of Hazard, because we all had watched it the night before.
When there are only 5 stations to pick from, everyone watches the same thing. We only had access to the top 4 shows of probably hundreds that were pitched for that time slot. We only saw the hits - the head of the graph.
Today, I have hundreds of channels available through satellite. I can download shows on the internet, watch them on DVD, or even Tivo 2 shows that are playing at once.
I can watch the show that is specifically about gardening in the backyard during prime time if I want to. Could you imagine CBS broadcasting a show about backyard gardening during prime time in 1983?
I would recommend the Long Tail if you want to learn:
What forces changed the variety we have available to shop from today.
Why this doesn't just resemble a jumble of "crap" for sale that we have to sort through like we are yard-sale shopping.
What factors are necessary to make the Long Tail work for companies like Amazon, iTunes, and E-bay.
Why this is good news for you if you have a niche blog or website.
I liked the fact that Anderson did not just focus on the technology of today as if this idea just popped out of nowhere.
He shows a well-grounded history of how this new long tail market evolved over time in bits and pieces, through a combination of inventions and social trends.
There were times when this book seemed to be getting unnecessarily repetitious; however, just when I would start to give this criticism, Anderson would pull it all together to illustrate another point.
The Long Tail has received some challenges.
Chris Anderson responds to a challenge to the statistics in a blog post.
I found that his analysis made sense, and seemed to reflect what we actually see happening in the market today.
If you purchase the revised addition of the book, you will also have an added chapter that responds to questions, doubts, and misconceptions about the Long Tail.
I do review these before publishing, but I am not extremely censuring.
I have received several submissions to the Christian Women Blog Directory over the last few weeks that I could not publish for one simple reason: you didn't talk enough!
I realize that if you have been quickly moving through directories and pasting in your standard, short summary, you may have missed these important directions I have given above the form:
Please!:
•Include your URL! I've had to delete submissions because there is no URL and no email address to ask for one.
•Be Wordy - you have an entire page to tell us about yourself and your blog. So use it!
Missing URL's and lack of content are the two main reasons blogs don't get published.
On the Tabitha's Team directory,you do not just get a small space for a brief description; you get a whole page!
You can write several paragraphs.
You can add multiple pictures.
You can add headings and use basic HTML.
I can accept a short description, especially if there is also a picture; but I need more than 2 sentences to justify a whole website page.
So don't be afraid to tell us more about yourself and your blog!
There are over 100 listings there, so be sure to tell us why we should visit with you.
It often seems that when I think I am shaping my children, I am shaped and molded even more in the process.
The vision that we have been given for our children, compared with the hard work it takes to get there, can seem impossible. I just thought it would be easier than this.
Why, when I know what needs to be done, when I know the "right things to do" and the correct priorities, are there still so many roadblocks to actually carrying them out?
God gives us the vision, then He takes us down to the valley to batter us into the shape of the vision, and it is in the valley that so many of us faint and give way.
How do I this without giving up?
It is so easy to look at those around me who have decided to go with the flow of life and not be very intentional about parenting and say, "eh, why not?"
Their kids aren't in jail or anything. Why should I put so much effort into this? If I can't get rid of the things that make discipleship of my children so hard, then why bother fighting? Quite frankly, this molding process hurts.
But then there is that darned vision.
If you have ever had the vision of God, you may try as you like to be satisfied on a lower level, but God will never let you.
So I've caught the vision...and it seems that it can't be cured. Thank goodness, for I'm sure I will look back and be glad.
I am looking at the last post on this blog and laughing.
When I wrote about being "ready for what He asks", I didn't really know what was going to be asked of me. However, a couple of weeks later I ended up in graduate school.
My world has been a little crazy, and I have been sure that God has me confused with 5 different women. As usual, however, things have started to connect and make some sense.
The best part: Writing on this blog is now HOMEWORK.
I enrolled in the Master of Professional Writing program with a concentration in web content development at Chatham University. Who knows? Maybe you will start to see some improvements around here.
Mom Mornings With Oswald will resume soon. I can't promise every day, but as often as I can - how does that sound? I will also be working on changes to the main website.
In my absence, you have been active here - thank you.
You have contributed to the servants blog. You have listed your blog in the directory - there are now over 100 blogs listed by Christian Women. You have shared your prayer requests and encouraged others.
For some reason you have continued to subscribe to the RSS feed and newsletter and join the facebook page.
Although it has been very hard to not be active on this site, I have really enjoyed watching everyone else keep it running.
Readiness for God means the we are able to do the tiniest little thing or the great big thong, it makes no difference. We have no choice in what we want to do, whatever God's program may be we are there, ready.
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