Now here's a spanking cool way of ranking search results: with the Sproose "user powered search", the users vote which sites are the best. To date I have only seen it used on the Horrorfind search engine but you know how we horror fans proliferate like zombies. Like delicious and other similar social networking sites, webmasters, bloggers, and publishers can install a remote voting button on their sites, upping the ante.

The interface is clean and straightforward like Google's and it loads up like a charm. The tagline: "User Improved Results" is real catchy and the enticement to all self-respecting web publishers is to shameless self-promote their own sites and those of their buddies.

The "why us" sales pitch is quick and dirty, and on the web, that is all that matters. They quickly differentiate themselves from "machine-calculated" search engines, so you can be sure you won't be receiving results which were paid for to the search engine itself, or even more evilly, artificially pumped up by various methods (not for discussion in this article). That is not to say this won't happen here, but remember, the keyword here is popularity.

Truly, it is worth test-running to see how far up you can push your site up to. And you'll definitely have a lot of fun doing it with your newfound web friends. Community is everything on the WWW.

Technorati: Sproose, user improved search results

Let's face it. Managing an email newsletter is no field day these days. With interactive features and a huge database to maintain, you truly need a comprehensive email management program to keep yourself efficient and sane.

You know I'm always an advocate of try-before-you-buy (even if it is a $5 t-shirt - why waste? I don't want a $5 rag), so having a 15-day trial is a nicety for admins to test out a new software. Now if you want to sign up after you've tried it, iContact's email newsletter software prices at a very reasonable $9.95 a month.

Most importantly, they run the whole program off a web interface and offer an intelligent autoresponder tool that ensures your subscribers are never annoyed at being unable to unsubscribe or change their subscription email. Very very important for good client relations.

Technorati: email marketing, iContact

As part of my job as sagelike investor for my home (SIFMH) <- right... anyway, I find ways to save as well as invest our household money. Another part is managing the public relations of our son who has many bloodkin fans all over the world.

Although I own a Canon Selphy photo printer, I get lazy busy and only print and send pictures once in a blue moon. I read in the papers recently that Snapfish has come to town and they're giving some freebies to newbies.

Hence a quick run to my old coupon heaven Couponchief to dig up some coupons and lo and behold, I found some with free shipping!

Technorati: Snapfish, coupons, photo printing