Welcome to Our Resolution-Free Zone

What did you expect for the first working day of the year? A quiet bit of time, perhaps, to hide the last of the 2011 bodies and steal that nice chair from the conference room? Had you counted on having to rid your Inbox of 2012 Predictions, 2011 I-Told-You-Sos and Helpful New Year Resolutions for marketers everywhere? I don’t know about you, but dumping that rubbish took most of the morning on Tuesday, leaving me far too exhausted to offer you more this week than a bunch of links to helpful, amusing places:

All This and Katherine Hepburn Too
If you’ve been struggling to explain your SEO spend to the Hand-Wringers, check out this brilliant metaphor by Steve French at Profit Awareness.

Comes Pre-loaded with Coffee Stains, What’s Not to Like?
Eloqua continues to crank out wonderful content, most recently the Grande Guide to B2B Content Marketing. This is the 8^th in their series of topical overviews that are theoretically consumable in the time it takes to suck back a medium-sized coffee. This guide is not really for hard core B2B marketers, but it’s a great leave-behind for bosses, mothers and sales directors who really don’t understand what you do all day.

A Reason to Stop Screaming at Your Dry Erase Markers
With all that holiday cheer evaporating around you like HR people in a contract dispute, you’ll want a place to go for a bit of perspective. Timothy McSweeny’s Internet Tendency is the gathering point for people who actually write down the depraved stuff you only think about. Check out Oyl Miller’s classic bit on PowerPoint 2010  or the Open Letters section featuring correspondence to office parties, dashboard lights  and Windows Speech Recognition.

Keywords are Your Friends. Say it With Me…
Keywords used to be easy to come up with but that was ages ago. Like maybe before iPhone 3.  Now it’s a complicated, messy business that seems to attract people with cauldrons and rather more cats that you might think necessary. But help is at hand, my friends. The kind folks at OpenView Labs offer us this brief but comprehensive guide through the whole thing. Cleverly, they ask only for your permission to get their newsletter in return. The guide comes with plenty of links to templates and more material so make sure you read the e-version.

Bring out Your Undead…
The Content Marketing Institute has plenty of helpful stuff for B2B marketers, including this delicious post on what we can learn from zombies (the real ones; not the guys in Customer Service).

Wipe That Sneer off Your Boss’s Face
At least briefly and only if the sneer is to do with social media. PWB has five statistics that just might get the Thought Police to let you Tweet on their dime.

You Want ROI? Well Measure This, Chumps
Or maybe don’t. This is a wonderful post  about measurement, tradeshows and the fact that the people who demand marketing ROI head for the hills when it turns out to be harder to do than they think.

Eigen Value Faster Than You Can
But not as fast as Stephen Denny. If you haven’t read his articles or too infrequent blog posts, you really should. He makes a great deal of sense. He also has a wonderful free e-book about Eigen Values and how you go about living up to your own brand.

That Gurgling Noise Really is Something Choking You
Wondering how it’s possible that your simple website is taking longer to build than a Gothic cathedral? Time Management Ninja has a theory and, very possibly, a solution.

Now get back to work.

BizMarketer is written by Elizabeth Williams
I help organizations build their brands through great conversations with employees and customers

Drop me a line at ewilliams(at)candlerchase.com
Follow me @bizmkter