Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

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• Venezuela Decrees "All Properties Leased for 20 Years Will Be Sold to Tenants in 60 Days at Government Set Prices"
• Michael Pettis Responds; Fantasyland Thesis vs. Reality; Counter-Challenge!
• China Sees Sharpest Contraction of Output Since November 2011; Japan Returns to Growth but Business Sentiment Collapses

Venezuela Decrees "All Properties Leased for 20 Years Will Be Sold to Tenants in 60 Days at Government Set Prices" Posted: 03 Apr 2014 09:59 PM PDT Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro proves once again the capacity for stupidity is virtually unlimited. Today Maduro mandated that any properties leased for 20 years or longer will be sold to current tenants at government mandated prices, essentially confiscating all long-term rental properties. Via translation from Libre Mercado, please consider Venezuela Expropriates Properties Leased More Than 20 Years. Nicolas Maduro, president of the Republic of Venezuela decreed on Monday that properties leased for 20 years, will be sold to their tenants in a maximum period of 60 days. The National Superintendent of Housing says the lease countdown began on March 28. In the event that the property owners refuse to sell their property, the Superintendent of Housing will impose a fine of 29,000 euros, which must be paid within five days. If the penalty is not paid in 5 days, the fine will more than double to 60,000 euros. Property owners are totally defenseless, as buyers may propose bargain prices. Nonetheless, owners shall comply with the "fair value of the dwelling" determined by the government via a form which shall provide, among other things, photographs of both the housing and the façade. Once completed, the owner must wait for the government determined "right price" estimated by the superintendent for housing. Wow. What's next? Mike "Mish" Shedlock http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com  Mike "Mish" Shedlock is a registered investment advisor representative for SitkaPacific Capital Management. Sitka Pacific is an asset management firm whose goal is strong performance and low volatility, regardless of market direction. Visit http://www.sitkapacific.com/account_management.html to learn more about wealth management and capital preservation strategies of Sitka Pacific.

Michael Pettis Responds; Fantasyland Thesis vs. Reality; Counter-Challenge! Posted: 03 Apr 2014 08:10 AM PDT In response to my article Pettis Proposes Savings Glut and Income Inequality are Source of Global Imbalances; Mish vs. Pettis: I Respectfully Disagree, I received an interesting reply from Michael Pettis. Before posting his response and my reply to his response, I reiterate my gratitude to Pettis. He has taught me much of what I know about trade. I recommended his book "Great Rebalancing", and still do. I also deeply appreciate even having this discussion and for Pettis to personally respond. That said, Pettis failed to convince me. Here is his reply. Does he persuade you, or do my arguments make sense? Michael Pettis Responds Thanks for the discussion, Mish, but I don't really think you've addressed the essay, which provides a logical argument, not a moral or political one. My argument has been praised as brilliant by one group of people and as evil by another, but too many people on either side have failed to understand and instead have resorted to political prejudices. The problem is that you cannot agree with just the part you like. Either the entire argument is true or it is false. In fact all of these conditions can be true but are likely to be more or less important under different conditions. One of the great follies of contemporary debate, it seems to me, is that certain policies are considered to be intrinsically and always wealth-enhancing, or intrinsically and always wealth-destroying, depending on your political beliefs, whereas I would argue that these policies, and in fact many others (free trade, unionization, free banking, etc.) can be wealth-enhancing under certain conditions and wealth-destroying under others. Rather than close the door to debate we should try to figure out the conditions under which they are one or the other, and guide policy according to the relevant conditions. But let me explain why I do not think you, or most others, have addressed the argument. To summarize, I start with three propositions, from which everything else follows: 1. The rich in any economy save a greater share of their income than do the poor. This is an assumption that can be proven or disproven empirically. The fact that some countries are rich and others poor may complicate things, but this only means that income inequality inside a country matters, whereas income inequality between countries might or might not matter. 2. In every closed economy savings is equal to investment. This is true by definition because the demand side of an economy consists of consumption and investment, while the supply side (how we allocate total production of goods and services) consists of consumption and savings. Because demand and supply always balance, savings is always equal to investment. I know you understand this. 3. No one has infinite debt capacity. I don't know if this is an assumption or true by definition, but at any rate I know you agree. Here is the argument which, if you accept the three propositions above, can only be logically true or logically false: 1. From Proposition 1, if income inequality rises, the savings rate must rise. 2. From Proposition 2, if savings in one part of the economy rises, we must see one or both of the following: a) investment must rise, or b) savings in another part of the economy must decline. 3. If investment rises, one or both of the following must be true: a) productive investment rises b) non-productive investment rises 4. If savings in another part of the economy declines, one or both of the following must be true: a) the "non-rich" increase their consumption b) unemployment rises. So far I think you would agree that the argument is true and in fact obvious. You might question whether there are indeed only two ways for savings in another part of the economy to decline, but these are the only two ways I can think of. If you find a third way, it would interesting to see how it would affect the argument. This leaves us with the following. If income inequality rises, we must see one or more of four possible outcomes, which I list as 3a, 3b, 4a, and 4b. Unless you discover any other possible outcome, these are the only ways to balance an increase in income inequality, right? Let us focus on 3a and 3b: 5. If productive investment rises, we all get wealthier, both rich and poor (this is what the supply-siders mean by "trickle down"). The process is clearly sustainable. 6. If non-productive investment rises, wealth declines. Once wealth declines to some limit (it could be zero but it could also be, and is likely to be, much higher than zero) the process can be maintained only by rising debt, but from Proposition 3 there is a limit to rising debt, so this process is not sustainable. Now let us focus on 4a and 4b: 7. If some of the non-rich increase their consumption, they eventually draw their savings down to their minimum level (which might be zero, but doesn't have to be), at which point they have to borrow to consume. But again, from Proposition 3 there is a limit to rising debt, so this process is not sustainable. 8. If unemployment rises, total savings decline, although because it might also cause investment to decline, unemployment might have to rise a great deal, which is what happened in countries like Spain once debt-fueled consumption and debt-fueled non-productive investment came to an end in 2008. This is, unfortunately, sustainable. End of the argument. The conclusion, which follows inevitably from the three initial propositions, is that a rise in income inequality can lead temporarily to an increase in non-productive investment or to an increase in debt-fueled consumption, but in both cases they are unsustainable. A rise in income inequality can also lead to a rise in productive investment or a rise in unemployment, neither of which is unsustainable (unemployment in the long run might be unsustainable, but of course this does not invalidate the argument). This means that rising income inequality must eventually lead to more productive investment or to more unemployment. There is no other conclusion. Can this argument be attacked? Of course it can. If you disagree with any one of the three initial propositions, then even if the argument is completely logical, the conclusion may be wrong. Alternatively, if you disagree with any of the logical steps, then even if the three initial propositions are correct, the conclusion can be wrong. These, of course, are the only ways in which the conclusion can be wrong. From my reading of your piece, you agree that all three propositions are correct. This means that you must believe that the logic is wrong, but I cannot find where you disprove the logic. In fact I do not think the logic is wrong anywhere, and economists ranging from Keynes to Friedman, including both liberal democrats and the supply-siders, all invoke the same argument because it is based either on propositions that are true by definition or on propositions that we all believe empirically to be true. They all agree with the propositions and the logic. Where they disagree is wholly on the issue of whether or not higher savings will lead to higher productive investment. This I would suggest, is where you must concentrate your own arguments, unless perhaps you disagree with Proposition 1. I cannot think of any other way to attack this argument except by calling it politically incorrect, which of course is not a refutation at all. That does not mean that there are no moral, social, or political arguments in favor or against rising income inequality, but these have nothing to do with the economic impact of rising income inequality. Regards, Michael Thanks Michael In one sense I think we are talking past each other. In other respects, I disagree with some of your assumptions. For example, we both can agree that savings = investment. However, from my point of view, you ignore malinvestment and monetary printing, whereas I propose savings = production - consumption. Please consider global debt ... Global Debt Up $30 Trillion in 7 Years Bloomberg notes that Global Debt Exceeds $100 Trillion and it's up 40% since the start of the crisis. If rising debt is a synonym for rising investment (and savings = investment), then in your model, it seems we have "saved" $30 trillion in the past seven years, a rather remarkable (preposterous) achievement. Consider the US credit market in isolation. US Credit Market vs. Base Money What would happen if people attempted to cash in those savings? Is there sufficient savings to allow that to happen or would the system implode? I suggest a whopping $54 trillion in imagined savings would vanish overnight. Let's try a simpler case. What if people went to withdraw just the amounts held in their checking and savings accounts? M2 vs. Monetary Base Supposedly there is $10 trillion of "savings" in banks. But what would happen if everyone were to try to get their savings all at once? Once again people would discover their alleged savings are not there. If it Isn't There, Does it Exist? How can something that isn't there and does not exist be considered saving? Murray Rothbard calls this fraud, and I agree. The fraudulent nature of this system confuses people about what constitutes "savings". Of course, were there to be a run on the banks, the Fed would print as much money as required to make the system whole. Is that "savings"? Income Inequality Thought Game Let's play a thought game. To even out income inequality, while making up for all alleged prior transgressions, let's give $1 trillion to everyone. To do this, we will actually have the Fed issue enough currency so the money is really there. Would that constitute saving? For sure, the new-fledged trillionaires would rush to spend their money. But what would it buy? Anything? Someone responded to me last week that printing money constitutes "production" because it buys something. I laughed. In reality, printing money cheapens ever dollar before it, but in decidedly uneven ways, to the benefit of those with first access to newly printed dollars (banks, government, and the already wealthy). At the same time ... Income Inequality Is Necessary Fundamentally, people are not equal, and their ability to serve consumers and accumulate wealth isn't equal either. Innate inequality is actually necessary to achieve economic progress. To achieve progress, someone needs to come up with new ideas and new ways of thinking, and be rewarded for them. Trying to achieve 'economic equality' by forced socialism never has, and never will work. Problems caused by fiat monetary systems are similar, except those problems are better hidden from the public's sight given that damage accumulates slowly and is spread over a very large number of people. Pettis sees extreme income inequality and excess saving as the problems. I propose extreme income inequality is a result, not of excess savings, but rather a direct result of the fraudulent nature of the system that benefits those with first access to money. Whether or not forcing the .1% to spend their alleged savings would increase employment is actually moot, because that is not the source of the problem. Attacking symptoms of problems can never solve anything. Do the Wealthy Save More? Given the fraudulent nature of the existing system and how it has totally perverted the nature and meaning of "savings", I am not even sure it is safe to say (in aggregate) "The rich in any economy save a greater share of their income than do the poor." Perhaps most do, but then where did $30 trillion dollars of global debt come from in the past seven years? If that wasn't a result of free-market production (and it wasn't), then it wasn't savings, in my book. So where did the savings = investment equation break down? Right here: savings + malinvestment + monetary printing = investment. Savings = investment - malivestment - monetary printing. Malinvestment and monetary printing are capital- and saving-destructive activities. That some people get wealthy from them does not make it saving. Acting Man Chimes In I asked my friend Pater Tenebrarum at the Acting Man blog to chime in on this discussion. He replied ... Additional fiat money only serves to misdirect already existing capital, it does not create new capital. In order to create actual, additional investment (and not just malinvest existing resources), only genuine savings can be used. As you [Mish] have rightly remarked, savings is the excess of production over consumption. Let's also not forget that a large part of genuine savings is needed to merely maintain the economy's capital structure. Only after maintenance can something be added to it. The problem is precisely that 'inverse wealth redistribution' is an effect of fiat money inflation (it matters not whether commercial banks create additional deposits ex nihilo or whether the central bank does it). The effect is a result of the 'Cantillon Effect' - money enters the economy at discrete points and spreads out from there. The first receivers can engage in exchanges of 'nothing' (new fiat money) for 'something' (real resources). Once the money reaches later receivers, prices have been bid up by all the activities of the  earlier receivers. Later receivers thus become 'forced' savers. Forced saving, as Hayek has pointed out, is really only the other side of the malinvestment coin. When genuine savings rise, and no-one interferes by lowering the interest rate below its natural level by throwing additional fiduciary media (circulation credit, or unbacked money from thin air) on the market, then investment allocations will be sensible in the aggregate. The appearance of additional monetary units from thin air makes it seem as though there were enough real savings available to support a production structure of a certain type (of a certain length and width). But in reality, the saved real resources are insufficient to maintain it. Such errors accumulate and it is possible to sustain such a distorted capital structure for quite some time if ever more money is printed. But ultimately it is the functional equivalent of heating one's home by burning the furniture. No additional capital is created in this process - on the contrary, capital is consumed. Then, when the inevitable bust strikes, it is found out that the production structure is actually in disarray - certain projects cannot be completed at all, and many projects that were completed during the boom are in fact not profitable - economic calculation was falsified by the addition of new money, and all the profits turn out to have been accounting fictions. The US and Spanish housing boom are great examples for this - first everybody thought they were getting rich, and then they lost all their gains. But the gains never really existed in the first place - they were an illusion. The Real Problem If the problem was income inequality, then surely giving everyone the same income would fix it. But clearly it wouldn't. Yes, the poor would spend more money if they had it, but if we printed enough money and handed it out, it would be worthless. Q. What is the real problem here? A. The fraudulent nature of fractional reserve lending makes it appear that nonexistent savings can somehow be redistributed and spent without causing still other distortions somewhere. Pettis proposes the problem is excess saving and income inequality (the savings glut thesis). I propose that extreme income inequality is a result, not of excess savings, but as a direct result of the fraudulent nature of the system that benefits those with first access to money. There is no savings glut. Rather,  the fraudulent nature of fractional reserve lending can at times make it appear that way. Reflections on Wealth-Enhancing Policies I also need to comment on Pettis' statement "One of the great follies of contemporary debate, it seems to me, is that certain policies are considered to be intrinsically and always wealth-enhancing, or intrinsically and always wealth-destroying, depending on your political beliefs, whereas I would argue that these policies, and in fact many others (free trade, unionization, free banking, etc.) can be wealth-enhancing under certain conditions and wealth-destroying under others." I disagree. Fractional reserve lending is inherently fraudulent. And the fraudulent nature of fractional reserve lending is the source of the problem, whether or not Keynes, Krugman, or anyone else thinks otherwise. Under fractional reserve lending money (more precisely pseudo-money) is lent that does not really exist. Money is also lent for 30 years when rights to lend stop at 5.  Both practices constitute fraud. Period. Whether or not there are "some conditions" in which things "appear" to operate smoothly under fraudulent schemes is irrelevant. All Ponzi schemes "appear" smooth until they implode. Fraud is fraud, and sooner or later fraud always causes problems. The increasing amplitude of economic bubbles over time and the destruction of the middle class in the process should be proof enough. Getting the wealthy to spend more money, cannot and will not fix the root problem, whether or not it increases employment (something it cannot possibly do without causing other problems, an issue that Pettis fails to discuss). Fantasyland Thesis If everything were so simple as building bridges to nowhere and cities that no one lives in, then redistributing the alleged "savings" from such schemes, we could all live happily forever after in Fantasyland. Reality  Sound banking and sound money are always correct, in every situation. To propose otherwise is to promote fraud. Why Fractional Reserve Lending is Fraud For a short, easy to comprehend discussion as to why fractional reserve lending is fraud, please read. What Has Government Done to Our Money Case Against The Fed I strongly encourage everyone, but especially Pettis to click on and read those links. Who Benefits From Inflation For further discussion of who benefits from central bank sponsored inflation, here is a free refresher course. Reader Asks Me to Prove "Inflation Benefits the Wealthy" (At the Expense of Everyone Else) Monetarism, Abenomics, QE, and Minimum Wage Proposals: One Bad Idea Leads to Another, and Another Can Inflation be Too Low? Income Inequality Fact and Fiction Finally, income inequality benefits far fewer people than you may think! For a discussion, please see No Increase in Wealth Inequality for Top 1% Since 1960 Counter-Challenge!  The problem is not a "savings glut" or income inequality. The "primary" problem is the Fed (central banks in general) and fractional reserve lending. That said, numerous (and important) secondary problems such as public unions, vote buying by political parties, warmongering, prevailing wage laws, etc., must be addressed as well. In every instance, fractional reserve lending greatly compounds the secondary problems. Attacking symptoms of problems is a dead-end tactic. Unfortunately, that is the path most are on, simply because people prefer Fantasyland solutions that involve little pain, vs. real solutions that will require sacrifices. Given that attacking symptoms cannot and will not work, and that it is counter-productive to figure out under what conditions fraud "appears to work", I counter-challenge Pettis to work with me and others to come up with the least disruptive ways to end fractional reserve lending as well as the secondary problems that are the true source of the economic mess the world is in. Mike "Mish" Shedlock http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com Mike "Mish" Shedlock is a registered investment advisor representative for SitkaPacific Capital Management. Sitka Pacific is an asset management firm whose goal is strong performance and low volatility, regardless of market direction. Visit http://www.sitkapacific.com/account_management.html to learn more about wealth management and capital preservation strategies of Sitka Pacific.

China Sees Sharpest Contraction of Output Since November 2011; Japan Returns to Growth but Business Sentiment Collapses Posted: 02 Apr 2014 11:51 PM PDT It's a mixed bag in Asia, but all things considered an overall weak one. Let's take a look at the data to see what bulls and bears have to cheer about. China PMI The HSBC China Services PMI Shows Sharpest Contraction of Output Since November 2011. HSBC China Composite PMI signalled that business activity in China fell for the second month running in March. Though slight, the rate of contraction was still the sharpest since November 2011, with the HSBC Composite Output Index posting at 49.3 in March, down from 49.8 in February. Data for March signalled that the reduction in overall business activity was driven by the manufacturing sector, which posted its sharpest contraction of output since November 2011. Meanwhile, services activity growth strengthened to a four-month high, as signalled by the HSBC China Services Business Activity Index posting at 51.9 in March, up from 51.0 in February. However, growth remained subdued in the context of historical data. New business followed a similar trend to output, with new work falling for the second successive month at manufacturers, but rising at service sector firms. The rate of new order growth in the service sector was little-changed from February and moderate, amid reports of new client wins. However, manufacturers' new orders fell at the strongest rate in 28 months. Chinese manufacturers cut their staffing levels again in March, albeit marginally. In contrast, higher volumes of new work led service providers to expand their payroll numbers at the fastest rate since June 2013. Notably , job creation at service providers offset job shedding at manufacturers, and led to the first increase of employment at the composite level for five months. Comment Commenting on the China Services and Composite PMI™ data, Hongbin Qu, Chief Economist, China & Co - Head of Asian Economic Research at HSBC said: "The HSBC China Services PMI suggests a modest improvement of business activities in March, with employment expanding at a faster pace. However, combined with the weaker manufacturing PMI reading, the underlying strength of the economy is softening, which should ultimately weigh on the labour market." Japan Returns to Growth but Business Sentiment Collapses The Markit Japan Services PMI shows Japan Returns to Growth but Business Sentiment Collapses. Summary: Japanese service companies reported a rise in output in March following February's fall. Meanwhile, new business improved for the eighth month running and employment increased again. However, business sentiment was the lowest since June 2012 as companies reported concerns around the effects on demand of the forthcoming sales tax rise. The headline seasonally adjusted Business Activity Index increased to a level of 52.2 from a reading of 49.3 reported in February. Comment: Commenting on the Japanese Services PMI survey data, Amy Brownbill, Economist at Markit and author of the report said: "The latest data on the performance of the service sector was promising, with business activity increasing from the previous month of decline. With output, new orders and employment all on the rise, the expectation is for continued growth over the next 12 months. However, most of the anecdotal evidence suggests that the improvement in March was linked to the upcoming increase in the sales tax, which is due to be implemented this month. The question of whether this continued growth is sustainable will begin to be answered in next month's survey" Bulls and Bears Both Can Cheer There is plenty of room for both bulls and bears to be happy about something. In China it's services vs. manufacturing. In Japan, it's an overall improvement despite a collapse in business sentiment due to huge tax hike. Here's my take: Those front-running the sales tax hike by buying large-ticket items like cars and appliances temporarily skewed the data. The same thing happens universally with expiring tax credits. As for China, growth will undoubtedly slow, and likely faster than most think. But it will not be a straight-line slowdown. Expect unwarranted hope across the board. Mike "Mish" Shedlock http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com Mike "Mish" Shedlock is a registered investment advisor representative for SitkaPacific Capital Management. Sitka Pacific is an asset management firm whose goal is strong performance and low volatility, regardless of market direction. Visit http://www.sitkapacific.com/account_management.html to learn more about wealth management and capital preservation strategies of Sitka Pacific.

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Damn Cool Pics

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#AfterSex Selfies are the Latest Instagram Trend Posted: 03 Apr 2014 11:21 AM PDT A new Instagram craze is sweeping the social media site using the hashtag #AfterSex. Users on the photo-sharing website are posting pics of a post-sex selfie. Most of them are just couples in a loving embrace, while now others are using the hashtag to make light of the new trend.

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How to Rebrand Your Social Media Accounts

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How to Rebrand Your Social Media Accounts Posted: 02 Apr 2014 04:13 PM PDT Posted by EricaMcGillivray Remember when Moz rebranded way back in May 2013? (Seems like a lifetime ago for this Mozzer, but, alas: startup life.) Well, since then a ton of you have reached out in our Q&A forum and on social media to ask just what we did to get this done. Rebrands happen. While this is a late tale, it's a story better told late than never, and it's not as scary as you think, I promise. Plan early. No, really early. Don't put off thinking about your social media accounts until the last second of your rebrand. In several cases, you have to work with other companies to get things done, and you might have to file trademark claims if your new brand name's been taken. You're also probably going to want to have some new artwork for your Facebook background as well as other social pretties, which means involving your graphic designers. Not to mention, besides your name, you'll need to update company information, and I recommend putting documentation together to copy and paste from on game day. I personally got to work at 4 a.m. on Moz's rebrand day, and I can tell you that preparation saved me from a lot of terrible mistakes by this non-morning person. Not enough earl grey in the world. Twitter You want to grab your new Twitter handle as soon as your company's new name has been selected. You may need to negotiate with someone who might already have your choice. (Note that it's against Twitter's terms of service to pay for a handle.) Or if there's only a squatter, you can reach out to Twitter for either a trademark violation or just their inactive account policy. At Moz, we secured our Twitter handle @Moz almost two years before we rebranded, which meant that we were more than ready come rebrand day. The actual switchover on Twitter was quite easy. We knew that we wanted to keep the old @SEOmoz account for monitoring and branding purposes, and we wanted to seamlessly transition all of our @SEOmoz followers to @Moz. To switch, we first changed the @Moz account's name to something random like @Moz23, and then we changed @SEOmoz to @Moz and @Moz23 to @SEOmoz. I had two different browsers open and logged into both accounts, which let me make all these changes in seconds. All followers of @SEOmoz were then automatically following @Moz. If you're verified, you do lose your account verification when you switch your name, but we were easily able to get it back by emailing our ad account folks at Twitter, who were clued into our rebrand before it happened. (We like to have backup plans for our backup plans.) Facebook Facebook is perhaps a trickier network on which to change your company name, particularly if you have more than 200 followers and your new brand name is three characters or less. We have both at Moz, and this meant that Facebook had to make all these changes for us. If you are changing an account with over 200 followers, you can apply to Facebook for a rebrand. We were lucky; at that time, we had an ads account person that we connected with directly; if there's one time to call in a favor, it's during a rebrand. The good news is that since our rebrand, Facebook has made it easier to request a page name and vanity URL change. It can take up to several days or weeks to process on their end through this request page, so keep that in mind. I've also heard reports from those in the UK that this feature may not be released all over the world. You can also only change your vanity URL once! Warning: Make sure you change your page name before you change your URL as Facebook needs to approve the name change. Facebook required a ton of documentation from us around our rebrand. They wanted to see our legal trademark on Moz (easy enough with public records); our marketing documentation (we sent them an internal slide deck and screenshots of our new site in the staging environment); our rebrand press release; and documentation that we owned Moz.com. We also had to keep our fingers crossed that no one from Facebook would leak our rebrand (not that it was top secret or we're famous). Unfortunately, if you're planning a rebrand and your company culture or rebrand situation is one of non-disclosure agreements and super-secretive plans, you may run into a roadblock here. Even at Moz, we questioned internally about how much information to give away without a non-disclosure agreement. You must upload documentation of your rebrand and legal rights to the new name. Here's what Facebook says: All said and done, we gave Facebook enough documentation and gave them our new name and the date and time to switch over our account. At 7 a.m. on May 30th, we went from SEOmoz to Moz on our Facebook company page, with our fans intact. Your vanity URL is an easy change in Facebook through their interface. However, you can only change a page's name once; so just in case your name change isn't approved and you are forced to start from scratch, you want to keep that vanity URL free. Once you change the vanity URL, you cannot claim your old brand, and the old vanity URL will redirect users back to the Facebook homepage. Google+ If anyone actually figures out how to change a vanity URL on Google+, please call me! But I get ahead of myself. Back in the day when it seemed like only Lady Gaga had a vanity URL, SEOmoz had one. The legends say that one day the gods smiled on us, and we were granted +SEOmoz. I thought in my naiveté that I could change the vanity URL since we already had one, or that after a period of time Google would realize we'd changed our name and do it for us. I was wrong on both accounts. I'd also hoped that maybe once everyone else started getting vanity URLs, there would be an option to edit ours. No such luck. You can change your company page name on the profile section of the interface to anything you want: smelly cat, lover of potato chips, trampler of paper dinosaurs. Or, you know, your new rebranded name. Pro tip: the old garble of random numbers assigned to you will still redirect you to your company even if you have a vanity URL. At Moz, we chose to use the number to link to our company page to from our site. This was so you, gentle reader, didn't ask about site errors and so we hedged our bets in case we wake up one morning to a new vanity URL. You also don't want to forget about reverifying your new domain URL, especially if you're working on authorship and publisher status. Make sure your web developer knows this, and don't forget to have your bloggers change their personal G+ profiles to reflect your new domain URL for authorship. Our G+ company page reads Moz now, but that darn vanity URL still says +SEOmoz. Good thing Google doesn't care about SEO on its own pages. ;) YouTube Make sure your YouTube accountâ€"now forcibly associated with a Google+ page as part of YouTube's anti-spam effortsâ€"is a manager of your G+ business page. Then connect them together so all of your YouTube videos will appear on your G+ page; you can easily share your videos there; and so all your YouTube comments and shares show up in your G+ page notifications. While you don't have to do this pre-rebrand, it will make your life easier as your page name change on G+ will change your YouTube name, too, so you only have to do one. There are some odd rules on YouTube surrounding vanity URLs, though. In some still confusing circumstances where YouTube does not allow you to have a vanity URL that anyone had ever associated with an accountâ€"even if that account was deletedâ€"we weren't able to secure Moz, but instead went with MozHQ for our vanity URL. That said, as long as no one's ever had your brand name, you can easily change your channel name to your brand without any worry. Make sure your brand's YouTube account's cooperating with the new G+ page connections, and that it's associated with a non-employee business email address, not an employee's email, whether personal or professional. At one place I worked, an employee accidentally hooked up their personal email to the YouTube account, and we lost our brand name! Pinterest Pinterest is super easy. All you have to do is edit away and easily change your brand information to your new name. Don't forget, if you have a new domain URL, to re-verify your site. If someone has your new brand name on Pinterest, you can file a trademark claim. When we were SEOmoz, we were successful in getting the SEOmoz username from a squatter. However, when it came to Moz, the very active user wasn't using the name in a way that violated our trademark, so Pinterest did not give us the Moz username. So we're MozHQ there. LinkedIn Let me tell you, LinkedIn is not the community manager's friend. Sadly, rebranding is no more friendly. At Moz, we have both a Company Page and a Group. Company Page I have some bad news: There is no way to change your company page in a rebrand. At Moz, we tried reaching out to LinkedIn so see if we could work something out, but no one returned our messages. :( Instead, we created an entirely new company page from scratch and posted a message on our old one that we'd moved. Which means we lost 7,000 followers there. Special note: If you have a three letter name, LinkedIn will have a hard time displaying your new company name when employees go to update their profiles. After a legion of Mozzers filed support tickets with LinkedIn, we were able to get a workaround. However, before that, it kept trying to make us say we worked for Mozilla. :) Group For those of you running Groups, it's super easy to rebrand. Mostly because your vanity URLs aren't real vanity URLs, and you can easily change your name. Note: We can't change our Moz Group any longer because we passed a 20,000 member barrier, beyond which you must get extra LinkedIn permissions to grow your Group. This happened post-rebrand, so we were able to easily change it in May. Now for your vanity URL, you can literally type any words into it, and it won't matter. The numbers are what directs you to the right group. For example: http://www.linkedin.com/groups/Moz-2976409 http://www.linkedin.com/groups/Kittens-2976409 http://www.linkedin.com/groups/Matt-Cutts-2976409 All those URLs go straight to the Moz Group. :) Instagram While we aren't using Instagram at Mozâ€"yes, I know!â€"it's pretty easy to change your Instagram information, as long as your brand name's not taken. Simply edit your profile name and it and the vanity URL change: If your brand name is taken, you can file a trademark claim with them. Tumblr On Tumblr, there are two different places for you to change for your rebrand as you'll want to change both your blog's name and your URL. This will also likely depend on the purpose of your Tumblr. Here we use our Tumblr, Moz Health, to update our customers and community when things go haywire. For the name, this is located in editing featuring associated with the blog's design and title field. (When I first started on Tumblr, I couldn't decide on a name for my blog, and it took me forever to change it from Untitled!) For the vanity URL, your username is associated with it, if you're using tumblr.com as your URL. You can change your username to anything that's not already taken. Redirecting it a URL on your site: Special note: If you have more than one Tumblr blog, you cannot change which is your main Tumblr blog associated with your account when you're commenting via Tumblr. This can be frustrating. I recommend changing your username instead of starting a second Tumblr under the same username for your new brand. You don't want people going to your old brand name! More than just switching names. Of course, a rebrand is more than just switching names on social. You have to make sure your social media messages are aligned with your PR, content, and more. You also have to respond to the people reaching out to you. On Moz rebrand day through the next week, we sent out over 800 message from the main @Moz Twitter account, and that doesn't even count the rest of our social accounts or our on-site blog and in our Q&A forum. We had an entire action plan around the coverage for our community team, and I suggest starting not with the details but with your goals. Then, work down to those details and sharing with all those involved in the rebrand efforts. Our community coverage rebrand goals were: Make sure that all accounts are switched over to Moz names. Make our audience happy with the rebrand. Answer 95% of all questions, in a timely manner, about the brand and the beta product. Have full coverage for launch and then next 24 hours as needed. I'm happy to say that this part of our rebrand went very smoothly, and I wish the best for all of you going on the same adventure! I'd also love to hear about your stories. 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Now Accepting #MozCon 2014 Speaker Submissions. Ready, Set, Pitch! Posted: 02 Apr 2014 03:10 AM PDT Posted by EricaMcGillivray Are you ready for MozCon 2014, July 14-16th, in Seattle? We've been up to our elbows in planning since December and about knee-high since the last MozCon. Before we go any further, you have bought your MozCon 2014 ticket, right? These tickets will sell out... In 2012, we started the community speaker program, where we take speaking submissions from community members (that's you!) and select the four best pitches to go up on the MozCon stage. These sessions are extremely popular with the audience, and in our feedback, you ask us to bring back the program every year. Last year, speaker submissions were open for a week and a half, and over 130 of you sent in pitches! You did such a great job that the MozCon selection committee had a crazy hard time selecting four amazing people to present their ideas in front of the whole audience. I wrote a bit last year about what makes a great MozCon community speaker pitch. One important point: Do keep in mind that these talks are only 15 minutes long. Make your pitch reasonable for that time limit, as you'll only be able to pack so much breadth and depth of information into that time frame. And, I expect even more greatness from you this year. :) 2013 Community Speaker A. Litsa talks about increasing conversions in email marketing. The details about the community speaker submission process: Your pitch must be submitted by Friday, April 11 at 5:00 p.m. PDT. Please submit only one pitch. We're looking for the best of the best. Presentations will be 15 minutes long with an added ~5 minutes for questions. Please frame your topic with that in mind. Topics can range the online marketing spectrum, so submit something you're passionate and knowledgeable about. No matter whether you've never spoken before or have spoken hundreds of times, we want to hear from you. Where these presentations fall on the MozCon schedule is TBD. So please plan to attend all of MozCon, July 14-16. Widescreen-format slide decks are due Tuesday, July 1, before MozCon. If you are selected as a community speaker and you already have a MozCon ticket, we will refund your money or transfer it to someone else; and if you don't have one, we'll comp you one! (You will still have to book your own hotel, flight, and other transportation.) You will be invited to attend our speakers' dinner on Sunday, July 13. And pre-dinner, there will be time to walk on our stage. You must be at MozCon in person. Sorry, no Skype, Google Hangouts, or other video conferencing. Our community speaker selections are final. Everyone who tossed their hat in the ring will be notified via email whether or not they were selected. At this point, we're still finalizing the 2014 agenda, so you won't know exactly what the other speakers are talking about. However, I do encourage you to look at the lineup and see what's missing or already covered. Pretend you're me or another committee member, and find the holes. Thank you to everyone who has already submitted their community speaker ideas for MozCon 2014. We'll be in touch very soon! I can't wait to see all the awesome submissions for potential community speakers. And, a big thank you to our past MozCon community speakers, who've made this such a success:  Darren Shaw, Dana Lookadoo, Fabio Ricotta, Jeff McRitchie, Sha Menz, Mike Arnesen, A. Litsa, and Kelsey Libert. Dive in and submit your pitch today! You can do it. Photo credit: Hallam Internet Limited. If you haven't snagged your MozCon ticket yet, do it now! It's going to be an incredible summer in Seattle. Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

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