The 30–Day–Challenge–Chronicle

On we move to opening ourselves up to a whole bunch of websites we might not otherwise have come across, but for our ’stumbling across’ the ever popular social networking site,  StumbleUpon.

We are shown how to download and instal the StumbleUpon toolbar, are given a tour around the toolbar and shown how to comment and tag before submitting the site of our choice. The analogy of having  a bank account comprising deposits and withdrawals is used, where ‘’stumbling’ other quality sites is likened to deposits and over-emphasis on our own websites, withdrawals. The need for finding the right balance in using this social networking site is explained.

Ed warns us that what he is about to share in these videos will ‘blow us away’ and that we will be able to completely dominate our niche with this .. giving us so many leverage options that we will be wanting to use in the Thirty Day Challenge. It will enable us to be completely informed about what is happening in our niche .. right across the internet.

We start off being shown how to create a Google account (if we don’t have one already), how to configure the Google Reader and then how to fill it with RSS feeds. The explanatory video Google provides is recommended viewing.

Thirty Day Challengers are introduced also to the Summize search engine and are shown how to instal it.  The feeds for Google Alerts, so vitally important in providing up to date information on our niche can also be added to Google Reader.

Ed also delights in sharing the ‘hidden secret’  which nearly no-one knows about and which will save us one hour a day . .  One can also see just how powerful the ’share with note’ facility is. I am sure that this will be put to great use once we are underway.

Finally – there is a bit of tweaking done to settings.  Ed recommends using the filtering function rather than having a number of different Google Reader accounts and we are also shown how to import our feed in from Bloglines .. useful for those of us who did the Thirty Day Challenge last year.

Three further videos warm Thirty Day Challengers to the all powerful features of Twitter and Twirl.

Rather than go back on it to the Twitter website to start using Twitter we can do things in such a way that we now no longer have to interrupt what we are doing to head off elsewhere, but can access Twitter via the sidebar and the Twitterbar. Tweeting in a millisecond!

We are shown how to set up the add-on Twitterbar; – and are shown how to use it without being taken out of our work flow. Note, Flock IS compatible with Twitterbar.

Participants in the Thirty Day Challenge are also introduced to the Twitter client, Twirl and shown how to download and instal this ‘cross-platform’ application. This can be configured for both Twitter and FriendFeed which we are to be introduced to shortly. The Twirl protocols and natty features are explained.

Next, Thirty Day Challengers are shown how to sign on to the new, all powerful communications tool, Twitter, how to follow folk and the effects of that. We are also advised to watch the video on offer here.

To avoid being bombarded with a heap of ‘visual noise’ Thirty Day Challengers are recommended to start off on Twitter very slowly, just following a few select people. Who better than Ed and Dan Raine for starters?

Ed points out that Being on Twitter is a really great way to get the very first updates of what is happening regarding the Thirty Day Challenge and tells us that every page on Twitter is an RSS feed, so we can choose who we wish to keep track of .

Let me say at this point that I am not intending to provide a commentary on the TV shows themselves which Ed will be putting out each week or so. Rather, I want to focus on the training material and in due course I may integrate with this content the Thirty Day Challenge blog posts by way of RSS feed, but I want to have a wee think about that first.

The next of the three training videos takes us through a series of steps needed to get the Flock browser set up as we shall need it.

Ed kicks off with a great little video where he lets us in on a tip provided by Mountain Guy on the Thirty Day Challenge forum, for speeding up the Flock browser. When I close down which will be very shortly – we will see just what impact this has had on my aging machine.

An intro follows to the natty 3D program PicLens (although we have no need for this in the 30 DC .. the exercise is just to show us how to instal an extension.

We are then shown how to download and instal a number of extensions we will be using on the Flock browser, via links detailed in a PDF we’ve been asked to download.

The extensions are to include:

Google Global - which allows us to view search results from anywhere else in the world. So .. we can pretend we are in Chicago for instance and obtain a search result for that particular place within the States – very handy!

Google Notebook .. which enables us to write research notes, without having to go out of the browser.

SEO for Firefox – which shows us how to go get a bunch of interesting data that will show us how to get in the natural search results.

Search Status toolbar – enabling us to view the Page Rank and Alexa ranking for any one particular site.

StumbleUpon Toolbar – a fantastic tool for helping us in our internet marketing efforts and to tell people about great sites we have visited.

Twitterbar – enabling us to Tweet (more about all of that later) without ever having to leave our page. Twitter was emphasized as being of vital importance to us throughout the Thirty Day Challenge, and then finally …

Our very own multi-purpose Thirty Day Challenge toolbar.

Time now for me to see whether that Flock browser has turned into a rocket!