Reviews

Now playing on a blog near you is “Obsessed with Film – Movie News, Reviews and Discussion”. This is a site that movie buffs are going to spill their popcorn over. Here you find a site containing all of your movie news, reviews, and discussion. There isn’t much about movies that you will not find on this site. What I love about this one, is that it carries a lot of unique features that sets it apart from the standard celebrity dish or movie fan site. You are not going to find general news feeds on “playing in theaters now” or “coming out on DVD” or “Oscar dos and don’ts” but you WILL find a wealth of anything movie related literally at your fingertips. The site is newsworthy and informative, and provides big screen lovers a place to get latest and greatest that you actually will be hard-pressed to find anywhere else. Recent posts prove that with headlines such as “Is Watchmen finally shooting in June?”, “Joe Carnahan and Jason Batemen are Remarkable Fellows”, “Macdonald Eyeing the Eagle of the Ninth”, “Posters and Billboards from the Cannes Film Festival”, “Bronte Sisters biopic attaches 2 (and a half) big names…” and those are just a few of the posts from ONE day. One I particularly enjoyed reading was “Andy Fickman Replys to Obsessed With Film”, a post detailing an almost heated banter between the author of the site and the director of the movie Andy Fickman. Seems Mr. Fickman got a little irritated by the use of the word “lazy” in Matt’s review of the Game Plan. Gotta love how directors consider the word review to actually mean a showering of outrageous compliments, but you have to go to the site to see it yourself. It is worth a chuckle.

Navigating the site was very easy. Posts are left marginalized on a very well done backdrop of celebrities and movie scenes. In both the bottom and right sided navigation bars you will find the categories for the blog which include a DVD Blog, Feature Articles, Greatest Scenes, Guest Reviews, Movie News, My Top 100 Movies, OWF Podcast, Movie Reviews, and a Forum for the blogs readers. Each of these categories was extremely well organized and again, relaying new information that would be compelling to the avid film buff. Take minute to read one of their featured articles like “Is Spidey 3 Indicative of a bigger problem with franchises?” or “Movie Devolution – Part 1 – Technology”. Pop into the message board, or check out the Greatest Movie Scenes link. Here you can replay clips from James Dean to Pinocchio and a host of the in-betweens. In reviews you will find everything from 28 weeks later to 16 blocks.

I am giving this one a 4.7 out of 5. What I like about this site is it has a huge amount of movie information, but it is more “right brained” than traditional movie blogs, so it gets some uniqueness points from me. The content is very well written, and the reviews are objective and comprehensive. I also like that you aren’t going to ONLY find the current hits or New Releases, but that the site appreciates the history of the film industry in one comprehensive blog. The navigation and appearance both scored very high as well, if I wasn’t reviewing it would take me a minute to even notice this as a blog. The site also does have a good following, so perhaps it could use some advertising to monetize it a little bit. I also think the forum could use a bit of promotion, as it currently only has 5 of 52 members listed as active, and the youngest post goes back to April. But otherwise, being a huge film buff myself, this one will get a bookmark for me as I am always looking for a good movie site that steps a little bit out of the box. I could tell you more about this site, and I’d love to, but space for me does not allow it. However, there’s a lot left unsaid that you need to check out yourself, and I am just going to leave that trailer rolling…..

– Chrissie

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If you are in business at all, you want to check out Construction Marketing Ideas. The site establishes itself as a place to provide information and ideas for marketing and promoting your construction or construction-related business. The owner of the site runs a business that publishes regional construction newspapers in several Canadian and American cities and is currently building a network of approximately 100 regional and local construction sites. Some of the business’s publications and websites include: Charlotte Construction News, North Carolina Construction News, Ontario Construction Report, Ottawa Construction Report, Triad Construction News, Triangle Construction News, and GTA Construction Report. GTA stands for Greater Toronto Area, and I know that as I am waving from the Niagara Region as I write this. The site is designed to provide information and assistance on marketing or promoting your own construction related site, but if you look into it, you will find some good business sense that can be carried to many standard businesses.

The owner of the site, Mark Buckshon, writes and runs his business out of North Carolina and has a lot to offer business owners. Recent posts include: The SMPS Listserve: One of my most valuable resources; Coke, Pepsi, and Jeffrey Gitomer Do you Agree?; Five Golden Rules for Blogger Relations; Does ‘free work?; and Pricing, value and free services – The balancing act to name a few. One of my personal favorites was a great story about using executive air fares to get into the coveted lounge, but not actually using the ticket. You have to read “Marketing, time, and employees” to get that one.

The site is very simply constructed, this making it as simple to navigate. Posts are left marginalized, and the blog is active – already over 40 posts in May as of the 23rd. Down the right navigation bars you will find blog standards – a list of other construction blogs, recent posts, and the about me section. Here you will also find Construction Marketing Resources Links which if you are in the business, will be very useful to you. At the top of the page you can sign up for the blog newsletter.

I am going with a 3.5 here, and mostly would recommend some appearance changes to the blog. The site is so simple it does not appear interesting just from appearances alone. However the rich content makes up for that as all posts are well-written and the voice is clearly professional and knowledgeable. However some construction pictures, such as the ones on their publishing sites, would give this site a little bit of pop I think. Activity scores are high, as this blog is worked on regularly. And the content of the posts offers it some uniqueness points as well. I think also this site could use some categories, just to tag the posts a little more effectively and hopefully run up the readership. Otherwise, this is an excellently written blog and even offered me some tips for my own business (freelance writing that is) so I think it deserves a peek from anyone that is working for themselves.

– Chrissie

Note: For further blogs similar to this one or to submit your own please browse our World Famous and Incredibly Strong Blog Directory! If you’d like to interact with other bloggers to share tips and traffic secrets please join our Blogger Forum. If you would like feedback from your blog please make one of our Free Blog Poll’s!

For today’s blog review we have another Internet Marketing blog, “Self Made Minds – Earning by Learning“. If you own a blog or run a website, this one is worth checking out. It IS another Internet Marketing blog, but it is not JUST another money making site. I promise you that you will get something valuable from this website even if you can’t drop in for more than a few minutes. Self Made Minds is the baby of two Internet entrepreneurs Al and Scott. Their goal of this “earning by learning” blog is to share with you, the Internet Marketer, what has and has not worked for them along the way. Both of them are true entrepreneurs with neither of them paying credence to the 9-5 rat race, and this blog as well as their other websites is what puts their “bread and beer on the table”. Even if you aren’t trying to make money on the Internet, take some time to go through some of their recent posts: “Well it works on my machine”, “How to value a site”, “Stumble on, and on, and on”, “Organic links and how to get them”, “Finding Traffic Domains”, and so many more. If you do so, you will understand why one of their sites is valued at 2.308 million dollars, a self-described “bloody massive slight over estimate” in their opinion. But if you view some of their work, you will see why they are so highly regarded. The goal of this site is to show by example, and they do just that, proving how self made their minds really are.

Navigation on this site is straightforward. If you are looking for something specific, you will either find it very quickly, or it won’t be listed on the site. If that happens to be the case, be sure to drop them a note about it. They value their readers input and take it seriously, as you will see from their opening page and how they have been responding to readers comments. However if you are into Marketing online, you should not have a problem finding an answer to any of your questions in the Adsense, Blogging, Building Traffic, Business News, Domains, History of a $100 K Site (theirs, by the way), Miscellaneous, Money Making Tips, Online Business Ideas, and Site News Categories. Their understanding of the importance of content is palpable simply from their own writing, and the credence they give to their current guest author Jason Rickard. The posts here are well-written, such that you get the immediate impression that these opinions are professionally derived, but they are not pure business speak. The content is extremely user friendly, enjoyable to read, and appropriately humorous when called for. Further, it is clear that they have a solid and loyal readership judging from the amount of comments each of their posts contains. That alone gives a substantial credibility to this website.

I am going to go with a 4.8 here. The content is very unique, this site definitely sets itself apart from other Internet Marketing blogs. Navigation and appearance marks also score very well. Activity is so excellent, that no improvements are needed there. For two very busy guys, they are extremely dedicated to ensuring the success of this website. The only suggestion I would make is to shorten the blog posts just a smidge. I understand the reason their posts are the length that they are, as it is difficult to provide quality, unique content in just a paragraph or two, however I found them very long and was not able to get through the entirety of a few posts. Not that I didn’t find them interesting, just my attention was not maintained and found myself wandering to other areas of the site. However, if you are an Internet Marketer you may feel different. I urge you to go check it out, and can pretty much guarantee you will not walk away without at least one new idea for your Marketing campaigns.

– Chrissie

Note: For further blogs similar to this one or to submit your own please browse our World Famous and Incredibly Strong Blog Directory! If you’d like to interact with other bloggers to share tips and traffic secrets please join our Blogger Forum. If you would like feedback from your blog please make one of our Free Blog Poll’s!