2023-07-09 12:13
Reading Time: min
In an effort to help me keep up with everything I post each week, here is my latest “Sunday Summary” of my posts from the week.
Mon, July 3: Your oncologis… Read More
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Mickey is a partner and Technical Director at GreenMellen Media. He’s been using WordPress for about 16 years, and has helped build hundreds of WordPress-powered sites over the years.
2023-07-08 12:14
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When a news story starts taking attention of a large part of the country, like the recent implosion of the Titan sub or as COVID was sweeping the world, many people beco… Read More
2023-07-07 10:02
Reading Time: 2 min
Feedback can be a wonderful thing, as I’ve shared many times on here (like “Feedback is a gift“), but only if it’s the right kind of feedback. If… Read More
2023-07-06 10:15
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It’s hard to come up with any truly new ideas today, as most of the best new ideas are merely the combination of existing ideas — but that’s a good thi… Read More
2023-07-05 10:32
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Most tasks in this world could be sped up with improved processes, but in many cases that’s not what’s best. I recently wrote about un-automating parts of my… Read More
2023-07-04 11:57
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It sounds counter-intuitive, but some of the best companies in the world work hard to sell as little as possible to each of their customers.
I first shared this a few… Read More
2023-07-03 10:47
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In many types of businesses, it’s helpful when the owner has gone through what their customers are facing. I shared a few years ago how that can work well, focused… Read More
2023-07-02 11:55
Reading Time: min
In an effort to help me keep up with everything I post each week, here is my latest “Sunday Summary” of my posts from the week.
Mon, June 26: It’s ab… Read More
2023-07-01 10:21
Reading Time: 3 min
I haven’t talked much about my tech on here lately, because most of it has been fairly unremarkable — I love the tools that I have, but not much has been all… Read More
2023-06-30 10:22
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Generally speaking, there two big ways to get your team to do what needs to be done.
Obedience: You can require obedience, with a very detailed list of what needs to b… Read More
2023-06-29 10:16
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The title of this post may seem a bit obvious, and I think it is, but taken from a wider view it can get a little interesting.
In Patrick Lencioni’s book &ldquo&hell…Read More
2023-06-28 10:30
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While AI is already writing a ton of the content that you come across on the internet, that won’t ever be the case on here. That’s not because AI isn’t… Read More
2023-06-27 10:29
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As you improve some parts of your life it can make other parts of your life seem worse, even if they’re improving as well. As I shared last year, the world is in f… Read More
2023-06-26 10:16
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“Gated content” on websites has historically been a great way to build an email list. I’m sure you’ve done it — there’s a great PDF t… Read More
2023-06-25 11:04
Reading Time: 2 min
In an effort to help me keep up with everything I post each week, here is my latest “Sunday Summary” of my posts from the week.
Mon, June 19: If it costs… Read More
2023-06-24 11:29
Reading Time: 2 min
While Apple (and to a lesser degree, Google) have made huge strides over the last few years in helping you move your headphones from one device to another throughout the… Read More
2023-06-23 10:33
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We’ve all worked at organizations where they had some rules that were clearly overkill, or even didn’t make sense at all. Most of these rules can be traced ba… Read More
2023-06-22 10:33
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For hundreds of years, your ability to create was dictated by the tools that you had access to. If you couldn’t afford the right tool, some types of creation were j… Read More
2023-06-21 10:29
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Advertising tycoon David Ogilvy had many tremendous ideas when it came to advertising, but one of his big ones was to stick with what works. In his mind, companies switch… Read More
2023-06-20 10:36
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I’ve recently started listening to David Senra’s “Founders” podcast, and it’s fantastic! Every week he reads a biography of someone interes… Read More
2023-06-19 10:41
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This is one of those pieces of human nature that I don’t really like, but I need to accept that it’s true. If you pay less for something, you value it less, e… Read More
2023-06-18 12:13
Reading Time: 2 min
In an effort to help me keep up with everything I post each week, here is my latest “Sunday Summary” of my posts from the week.
Mon, June 12: If you finis… Read More
2023-06-17 12:03
Reading Time: 2 min
When it comes to sports, the best athletes are the ones that appear to do things without thinking — and it’s true. As explained in the book “Trying Not… Read More
2023-06-16 10:35
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There are a lot of tools out there to help automate your note-taking. For example, a recent episode of Tech Talk Y’all shared the Omnivore app, which can automatica… Read More
2023-06-15 10:37
Reading Time: 2 min
Readwise has a lot of great tools to help manage the content you’re reading. I’ve mentioned their RSS reader before, and they do a nice job of pulling over h… Read More
2023-06-14 10:32
Reading Time: 2 min
When sharing ideas and strategies with others, I try to be very clear. This takes two forms:
First, it’s not magic. It irritates me when people tell me they hav… Read More
2023-06-13 10:36
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Trust is one of the more important qualities you can build in life, whether for yourself or for your business. While there are some shortcuts you can take, they’re… Read More
2023-06-12 10:53
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As a guy that prides himself on productivity, I’ll admit that the title of this post is really weird. As I dug in, though, the concept has slowly made more sense t… Read More
The Sunday Summary: Start Now, Lots Of Anki, Lots Of Content, And There’s No Way You Can Be Copied
2023-06-11 11:35
Reading Time: 2 min
In an effort to help me keep up with everything I post each week, here is my latest “Sunday Summary” of my posts from the week.
Mon, June 5: The right tim… Read More
2023-06-10 11:56
Reading Time: min
We all have shortcomings in our lives, and it’s important to be aware of what they are. However, self-awareness doesn’t excuse them and you should be working… Read More
2023-06-09 10:29
Reading Time: 2 min
Between our business mail service and returning Amazon orders, I visit our local UPS Store quite a lot. They’re great!
A few doors down from them I often see a… Read More
2023-06-08 10:28
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It’s difficult to create high-quality content. Whether we’re talking about words, art, video or any other medium, there is a lot of scrap that needs to be cre… Read More
2023-06-07 10:33
Reading Time: 2 min
Over the years, an interesting thing we’ve done at GreenMellen is to literally give all of our “secrets” away. Across dozens of podcast episodes, hundr… Read More
2023-06-06 10:38
Reading Time: 3 min
A little over two years ago I hit a streak of 1,000 days in a row of reviewing some flashcards in Anki. Most days I studied a few hundred cards, but all you need to revi… Read More
2023-06-05 10:33
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You likely have plans to start doing something soon.
Perhaps it’s eating better, exercising, blogging more often, starting a new side hustle — it could be… Read More
2023-06-04 11:35
Reading Time: min
In an effort to help me keep up with everything I post each week, here is my latest “Sunday Summary” of my posts from the week.
Mon, May 29: People are mys… Read More
2023-06-03 10:31
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It would seem to reason that if you show someone gratitude for work they did, more gratitude and thankfulness would be a good thing. It might be, but not always.
An ex… Read More
2023-06-02 10:32
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As humans, we tend to be more aware of challenges in our lives and less aware of places where we’ve had unearned help along the way.
A common example of this is… Read More
2023-06-01 10:38
Reading Time: 2 min
Kevin Kelly’s “Excellent Advice for Living” had a lot of great snippets in it, and these two seemed to go hand-in-hand. First, he shared:
Actual gr… Read More
2023-05-31 10:29
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We all know people that view the world through different lenses. Some see the positive side in everything, others see the negative. While some of that is due to circumsta… Read More
2023-05-30 10:33
Reading Time: 2 min
If you read much from the stoics (which I’ve done a bit, but not a lot so far), they tend to focus on a few key concepts. One is to let your decisions be led by lo… Read More
2023-05-29 10:34
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I never considered the difference between a “mystery” and a “puzzle”, but Mónica Guzmán laid it out nicely in her book “I Neve… Read More
2023-05-28 11:48
Reading Time: 2 min
In an effort to help me keep up with everything I post each week, I’m going to start writing a “Sunday Summary” of my posts from the week. My hope is t… Read More
2023-05-27 11:43
Reading Time: 2 min
It feels hard for me to believe, but today is the 20th anniversary of the first release of WordPress (you can see the initial announcement here). The story of WordPress… Read More
2023-05-26 10:24
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Kevin Kelly’s book “Excellent Advice for Living” gives a lot of small pieces of advice, and I really liked this one:
Assume no one remembers names… Read More
2023-05-25 09:23
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Some of us are born into more privilege than others. This could be related to race or gender, but it also can be greatly affected simply by who your parents are. You can… Read More
2023-05-24 09:11
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Defining yourself based on your opinions can make for a tough life, because then changing your opinions (which you should probably do from time to time) becomes much mor… Read More
2023-05-23 10:32
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If you do something often enough you’re likely to get pretty good at it, but simply doing something over and over isn’t the same as practicing it.
In his b… Read More
2023-05-22 10:38
Reading Time: 2 min
It’s getting harder and harder to determine if something is a scam, particularly on the internet or over the phone, and your best bet is to just assume it is.
I… Read More
2023-05-21 11:29
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I’m constantly on the lookout for what I might be missing. I shared some of these fears a few years ago and how it related to game shows, but I think it’s lar… Read More
2023-05-20 11:27
Reading Time: 2 min
In reading Jonah Berger’s book “Magic Words“, he shared some thoughts on “The Curse of Knowledge” and how it can impact the ways that you c… Read More
2023-05-19 10:11
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I’m one of those people that rarely removes any connections on social media. Sure, if someone is acting wildly inappropriate I’ll cut them loose, but I have h… Read More
2023-05-18 10:31
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There’s a saying out there that says “bad drivers never miss their exit”, meaning a good driver will take the safe route if they are about to miss their… Read More
2023-05-17 09:57
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Strong beliefs are great things to have, but when they contradict with the truth it can be troublesome. You might change your mind and be glad you’re now less wrong… Read More
2023-05-16 10:16
Reading Time: 2 min
I recently finished reading the book “Magic Words” by Jonah Berger, and he had some great insights in there. I have other posts to share later, but one big t… Read More
2023-05-15 10:25
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As I’ve gotten older, I’ve become quite good about not trusting myself to remember things. In the past I’ve said many times “I’ll remember t… Read More
2023-05-14 11:54
Reading Time: 2 min
Over the years, I’ve tried to make the slides for talks that I give have fewer and fewer words on them. Generally speaking, that’s a good thing to do. For ex… Read More
2023-05-13 12:08
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I certainly have many convictions when it comes to political issues, but I try hard to see the “other” side as human — because they are! It’s diff… Read More
2023-05-12 10:05
Reading Time: 2 min
I’m a big of of asynchronous communication, where two people can talk to each other at different times, like via email where one party can respond to the other two… Read More
2023-05-11 10:22
Reading Time: 3 min
One of the areas of AI that I’ve very interested in is using it to comb through my own information. I’ve used it a bit with my Obsidian notes, and more tools… Read More
2023-05-10 10:27
Reading Time: 2 min
Nearly a decade ago, I wrote a post explaining how Google doesn’t really change the rules when it comes to search engine optimization (SEO). While they change the… Read More
2023-05-09 10:34
Reading Time: 2 min
Web browsers have had the padlock icon next to the website addresses for years to show that the site has an SSL certificate and that your data is protected between you a… Read More
2023-05-08 10:31
Reading Time: 2 min
As a partner in a digital marketing firm, I can appreciate the value of various digital marketing tactics. Search engine optimization, email marketing, digital ads, soci… Read More
2023-05-07 12:20
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It’s always felt to me that being transparent was a big part of being honest. It can be, but they aren’t the same thing.
In his book “Lost and Founde… Read More
2023-05-06 11:20
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Our company will turn 14 later this year, and it’s a far different company than I might have predicted 14 years ago. I didn’t have a specific plan in mind whe… Read More
2023-05-05 10:34
Reading Time: 2 min
I talk about this a lot, largely because I struggle with it myself — if someone has beliefs that are completely counter to mine, pushing them away is likely a bad… Read More
2023-05-04 10:21
Reading Time: 1 min
I talk about memory quite a lot on here, as it’s a concept that is fascinating to me. I frequently talk about using Anki to improve what I remember, but that&rsquo&hell…Read More
2023-05-03 10:23
Reading Time: 2 min
“Keeping score” can make a big difference. Growing up, if my friends and were shooting hoops it’d generally be casual and fun, just tossing the ball ar… Read More
2023-05-02 10:31
Reading Time: 2 min
I write a lot about honesty on here, but being honest doesn’t mean always keeping your beliefs the same. As I wrote more than 10 years ago, it’s a good thing… Read More
2023-05-01 10:36
Reading Time: 2 min
I’ve talked about my use of Anki for years now, and it’s a tool I’ve used on-and-off for nearly a decade and one I’ve used every single day for a… Read More
2023-04-30 12:16
Reading Time: 2 min
We were recently hiring for a new position at GreenMellen and we interviewed a handful of folks. We’re very thrilled with how it ended up (Amanda is great!), but I… Read More
2023-04-29 11:28
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Starting a healthy habit can be difficult. It could be a regular workout schedule, eating better, reading frequently, or blogging daily. As with many things, the first on… Read More
2023-04-28 10:29
Reading Time: 2 min
In reading the book “The 4 Disciplines of Execution“, they talked a lot about “the whirlwind” — all of that junk you have to do every day j… Read More
2023-04-27 09:52
Reading Time: 2 min
As a small business owner, I’m often looking for ways to better incentivize our staff to work hard and for our clients to stick with us. For our clients it’s… Read More
2023-04-26 10:09
Reading Time: 3 min
The single best thing you can do with your marketing is to always keep the end user in mind. When we build websites for our customers, we frequently remind them that the… Read More
2023-04-25 10:29
Reading Time: 3 min
I’ve shared a few times on here some concerns I have with AI. There are good things coming, but probably some bad things too. You’d be wise to spend time wit… Read More
2023-04-24 10:16
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You likely saw last week when SpaceX launched their new “Starship” rocket, which exploded minutes after launch. If you’ve not seen it, here is a video o… Read More
2023-04-23 12:02
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Through the course of your life you’ll encounter many people that disagree with you. They might not like your political party, your car, your mobile phone, your rel… Read More
2023-04-22 11:24
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If you’ve followed my writing much over the past few years, you’ll know that a big push of mine has been to see situations from all sides and remove as much b… Read More
2023-04-21 10:12
Reading Time: 2 min
I’ve mentioned a few times in the past how we use the EOS / Traction model at GreenMellen. If you’re not familiar with it, it’s a way to organize and m… Read More
2023-04-20 10:19
Reading Time: 2 min
In reading Matthew Dicks’ book “Storyworthy“, he introduced a practice that he started years ago, and I’m giving a shot as well. Matthew calls it… Read More
2023-04-19 10:38
Reading Time: 3 min
Back in the mid-90’s, I worked for a few years at Electronics Boutique, a software and video game store. It was great! It was a fascinating time in the world of vi… Read More
2023-04-18 10:22
Reading Time: 2 min
We’ve all heard the idea of “it’s not what you know, it’s who you know” and that’s very likely true. I’ve never liked that stat… Read More
2023-04-17 10:55
Reading Time: 2 min
I recently shared a glimpse into the “bad side of AI“, where I’m starting to get some automated comments on social media and it’s likely to get m… Read More
2023-04-16 11:39
Reading Time: 2 min
Earlier this year I was at a business event, and the main speaker was a local congressman. As this man generally does, he made plenty of cracks about people “the o… Read More
2023-04-15 11:36
Reading Time: 2 min
You’ve heard it as solid advice on every multiple choice test that you’ve taken in your life — if you’re unsure of the answer, stick with your fi… Read More
2023-04-14 10:16
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Nearly 14 years in, our process for building websites and digital marketing strategies is pretty fantastic. The outcomes, both visually and financially, are a winner for… Read More
2023-04-13 10:14
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A common refrain I’ve heard over the past few years is that “people need to stay more informed” with the news, and that’s likely true. However, st… Read More
2023-04-12 10:22
Reading Time: 2 min
A common phrase from adventurous people is to live with “no regrets”, but that’s not really possible.
Say you’re considering breaking up with… Read More
2023-04-11 10:13
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AI is all the rage these days, particularly “generative AI”, or AI that can create new content. This could be new text output, new images, or even new videos… Read More
2023-04-10 10:12
Reading Time: 2 min
In reading Mónica Guzmán’s fantastic book “I Never Thought of It That Way“, she shared the idea of sobremesa. She tells it like this:… Read More
2023-04-09 11:30
Reading Time: 2 min
I recently listened to an episode of the EconTalk podcast, where host Russ Roberts spoke with Monica Guzman about her book “I Never Thought of It That Way“… Read More
2023-04-08 12:24
Reading Time: 2 min
We all knew it was coming, and the first taste of it is here — people using AI in social media to try to reach more people more quickly.
I recently shared a pos… Read More
2023-04-07 10:18
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One of the common complaints about social media has been the huge influx of personal information that “nobody cares about”, but that’s not necessarily t… Read More
2023-04-06 10:23
Reading Time: 2 min
I remember watching a video last year where some software was able to listen to a recording of a voice for a few minutes and then mimic it with amazing accuracy. Since t… Read More
2023-04-05 10:19
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As I’ve shared before, my primary motivation for this blog is selfish — it’s a place for me to think through new ideas and concepts. The act of listenin… Read More
2023-04-04 10:30
Reading Time: 2 min
You hear it a lot, particularly in political discussions: “they don’t share my values”. It’s often intended largely as “they’re a les… Read More
2023-04-03 10:25
Reading Time: 2 min
I always find it interesting when the data shows the opposite of what I expect. It could be something like Simpson’s Paradox, which is just so weird, or the idea t… Read More
2023-04-02 11:47
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There are a lot of situations where it feels you should quickly steer conversations toward business, but that’s almost never the right way to go. Even if you’… Read More
2023-04-01 12:51
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It may not seem like it at times, but those people you know who support “the other party” probably aren’t as evil as you think. As we deepen our relatio… Read More
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