For the past year, we’ve been working on a software application for online communities. The system currently makes it possible for you to create a niche website, blog, and business card. You can create and join groups and talk to others via a messaging system. Your profile is listed in a directory based on your location and other criteria that’s specific to the community.

The first version was launched at the beginning of 2009 and is geared towards working professionals that wish to expand their reach and marketing efforts. If you’re a self-employed, freelance, or small business professional, you will benefit greatly from this website because it gives you a place to blog about your talents, products, and services. You are allowed to link back to your own website which gives you a boost in search engine rankings and brings people directly to your site. So far, we have accountants, lawyers, business owners, marketers, real estate agents, and photographers using the site.

We’d like to extend an invitation to you to take a look at http://www.prospotlight.com

ProSPOTLIGHT is a great place to gain additional exposure to your talents especially if you are trying to start or build a business. We know as much as anybody that it’s expensive to market yourself either online or offline, and therefore a place like ProSPOTLIGHT.com will greatly aide in your efforts because it’s currently 100% free to use.

ProSPOTLIGHT is also being used by job-seekers as a homepage to send potential employers to for more information about their talents. A well written spotlight could be the tipping point that convinces an employer that you’re the right person for the job. You also have the ability to link out to many of the other sites that you use such as your Facebook account, your Monster resume, your LinkedIn profile, etc.

To give you an example of what can be done, I’ve created a spotlight for my nature photography at http://www.prospotlight.com/pro/naturephotography - I intend to use this to show off my best nature and wildlife images.

We hope you like the new site, and we welcome any feedback that you might have. Feel free to comment here or send me a message using ProSPOTLIGHT’s messaging system.

Thanks,
Brian

PS The directory system is ordered by ‘points’, which you earn by being active on the site. For example, if you write a blog post, you will earn points. Those with the most points show up first for their country, state/region, city, and occupation. Those at or near the top will receive more traffic, leads, and sales than those at the bottom simply because people choose the first options more often.

Once you sign up, be sure to direct people to your spotlight. Any person that visits one of your pages first and then registers an account will be flagged as your referral. You will earn bonus points for any points your referral earns, which will help you move higher up on the directory pages.

Over the last year, I’ve been creating a professional network named ProSPOTLIGHT.  The site offers a blog, website, and directory listing for professionals of any occupation or location.  This makes it possible for a professional to market themselves in their local area.  So far, we have real estate agents, lawyers, photographers, marketers, and others using the site to help generate traffic and leads to their products and services.

I’m pleased to announce that the 3rd revision of The Lens Flare is now live. The Lens Flare is a large friendly community of artists and photographers who use the site to upload images, share ideas, and learn from each other. It’s located at http://www.thelensflare.com

To quickly recap the new features, they include:

• More Images: Up to 500 images on the basic free account, 1000 images for silver, and unlimited for the gold account.
• Less expensive to upgrade your account.
• Multiple Image Sizes: 150px thumbnail, 500px standard image, 900px large image, and 2 250px detail images.
• Dashboard - to quickly get to important links.
• Albums - to organize your pictures however you want.
• Videos - updated art and photography videos from YouTube.
• Camera Reviews - to help you decide on which camera to purchase.
• Search - the search page has been improved.
• Image Categories - categories are formed automatically based on the pictures on the site.
• Member Profile - customize your homepage with the profile fields.
• Stat Counter - view traffic to your pages, where in the world they come from, etc by integrating your statcounter.com account with your pages on The Lens Flare. To do this, add your stat counter codes on your profile page.
• Image Management - easier management of your images, with stats showing traffic trends over the last 7 and 30 days to your pictures.
• Less Spam - spam registrations and crude comments will be far fewer with the addition of several features to hinder automated programs from submitting information to the site.
• New Look and Feel - the site’s look and feel has been completely redone to promote a more professional appearance.

Thank you and I look forward to seeing you on the website.

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http://www.thelensflare.com - Art and Photography Community Gallery

I wrote an article this morning titled, How to buy a printer, on The Lens Flare this morning detailing different types of printers, some things to look out for when buying a printer, what features are important from a photographer’s point of view, and some things I’ve learned the hard way about them.   Hopefully, this article will help you when you’re ready to purchase your next photo inkjet, dye-sub, large format, or mini-lab printer.