PressIt - Social media news release tool. Nice free way to distribute press releases that get picked up on social sites.
The Email Game - Somewhat goofy little email management tool that helps put the emphasis on better email productivity and getting to an empty inbox in the shortest amount of time.
"If a man empties his purse into his head, no one can take it from him. An investment in knowledge always pays the highest return."
Ben Franklin
Your action for today is to check your credit card statements or your check register to see if you have recently invested in your education.
Tools, links and services we found this week
10 Best TEDTalks of 2011 - Read Write Web breaks down the year's best from TED - watching these is one of the best ways I know to become a better speaker.
Mockingbird - Very cool online tool that makes it very each to mock stuff up and share it with people. Great tool for web designers just trying to share wireframes.
Tools, links and services we found this week
Tout - This app helps you template, analyze and schedule business email. Integrates with lots of 3rd party mail and CRM tools.
Sent - This is the tool I use to replace Google's not so ready for prime time iPhone app. Much better handling and viewing of email.
Whether you plan to whip up a lavish feast for your in-laws or stick with the kids table, there are always ways to prepare for Thanksgiving. The tips below can help absorb some of the holiday stress, even if all you plan to do is stuff your face and watch football.
Read on to discover 16 online resources that can help plan a successful and fulfilling Thanksgiving holiday.
1. Invites: Before you even start planning the menu, make sure to send out a memorable invite or reminder card. Try exploring Someecards if you’re up for something witty and bold. If not, an interactive card is sure to keep guests on their toes for the big reunion.
2. Food Prep: Practice your cooking skills in advance by viewing the Food Network’s Thanksgiving Live! show on Nov. 20. Experts will offer tips, solutions and recipes for cooking the best meals. Act quickly to add your own questions or to tune in live via Skype.
3. Travel: Whether you’re traveling 10 or 3,000 miles for turkey day, it’s important that you make travel cheap and efficient. Use the GasBuddy mobile app to discover the cheapest gasoline prices in your vicinity.
4. Décor: As the leaves begin to fall and the weather chills outside, you’re concerned with making sure it’s warm and cozy inside. If you don’t have a fireplace, there’s an app for that. Then spice it up with a variety of DIY centerpieces that feature mother nature’s finest elements. Finally, make sure each person is accounted for by personalizing your table’s place settings.
5. Cooking: It’s turkey time! Are you sure you know what you’re doing? If not, Butterball has the best tips, like how to pick and cook a turkey, complete with videos and step-by-step guides — as well as a telephone helpline for last-minute kitchen emergencies. Still lost? This interactive quiz from Bon Appetit helps plan your meal depending on timeframe and number of guests.
6. Vegetarian: There are plenty of healthy and meatless alternatives for those PETA or calorie-conscious guests. Or try a non-traditional protein option, like pork or roast beef.
7. Entertainment: Instead of zoning out in front of a football game or answering the same old questions from Aunt Kathy, try a playing a game that involves everyone. Go on a scavenger hunt, or play a game like Fictionary – which bring out the competition in my family.
8. Leftovers: Rather than waste that half-eaten turkey, prepare it for a variety of meals over the following week.
The Internet is here to stay, no doubt about it. Still, many small businesses haven’t moved online. Some may not feel the need yet. Others may be scared because the territory is unfamiliar. Whatever the case may be, below are some simple steps you can take to move your brick-and-mortar business online—something you must do if you want to be able to compete in the long run. Your customers are online. Your competitors are online or moving there soon. Don’t get left behind.
1. Get found.
Many businesses invest money in building a website in order to have an online presence and then stop there. In the offline world if you put up a business in a well-trafficked area of town, you’ll get visitors. They see the building and stop by. On the Internet, it’s a different story. Once your site is built, you still need to put significant effort into getting found.
Get listed on Google Places. Get listed in local directories. Get listed in industry directories. Learn the basics of search engine optimization or hire someone to do that work for you.
2. Get leads, not just traffic.
Another area where many people goof up online is in lead generation. After you build your website and start driving traffic, your job is to turn that traffic into leads. Ideally most pages of your website should have a lead capture mechanism. You need to offer something of value to your visitors in exchange for their email address or other contact information. If you don’t, you’ll lose a lot of your traffic. You need to develop a list-building mentality. Build a list of leads with every activity you engage in. Then, follow up with that list. Email marketing systems can help you do this in systematic ways.
3. Use email marketing to tell people about your business.
Recently, proponents of new marketing techniques have bashed email marketing, claiming that the medium is dying. This is far from the truth. Research firm ForeSee Results published a study early this year that was conducted during the 2010 holiday shopping season. They asked people who made purchases online about what influenced their visit to ecommerce sites.
As you can see in the study, the overwhelming majority (64 percent) stated that they prefer to hear about sales and promotions through emails. When engaging in email marketing, make sure you follow best practices and provide value to your leads instead of bugging them with sales messages all the time. Use email to build real relationships with your leads, not bother them.
4. Know that text messaging is not just for teenagers.
Many brick-and-mortar businesses are successfully using SMS marketing (text message marketing) to capture leads and follow up. You can have your store visitors opt into text message promotions by texting a keyword to an SMS short code. You can follow up with these people in the same way you do with email. You can even use text messaging to capture email addresses.
The world is going mobile—don’t miss out on these emerging opportunities.
5. Use QR codes in fun and creative ways.
You have offline customers. Eventually, you want to be able to communicate with them online as well. QR codes are barcodes that can be scanned with a cell phone to send people to a particular website. QR codes on direct mail pieces, your store window, your checkout desk and other strategic areas can give you an opportunity to move offline traffic online.
Keep in mind that QR codes are used by cell phone users. So drive them to mobile-friendly pages where you offer something in order to capture their contact information.
6. Use online partners–they can be huge assets.
You may have been slow to get your business online, but that doesn’t mean you have to suffer forever. Most likely you know other local business owners who made the transition earlier. They may already be getting significant amounts of traffic. Hunt down the people who are doing well online and set up a way for them to drive traffic to you and you to them.
Complementary businesses can set up referral or affiliate programs to drive traffic to each other at appropriate points in the sales cycle. Using partners can jumpstart your online business significantly.
7. Give your customers an online account portal.
We’re all getting used to managing our accounts online. We can do this with our banks, our cell phone accounts, our utilities, etc. But do you offer a way for your customers to manage their accounts with you online? For those of you who provide recurring services (pool cleaning, landscaping, legal retainer, etc.), providing a portal where customers can manage their accounts online makes working with you more convenient for them.
That’s really what the Internet is all about – convenience. The more of it you give, the more your customers will love you.
8. Get social, maybe.
Social media is a booming arena for online marketing. If used correctly, it can provide a great stream of online traffic for your business. It also is a great way to listen and engage with customers. But I say “maybe” here because I see many small businesses wasting way too much time trying to figure out how to make social media work. The truth is, it’s not for everybody.
If your target audience is social, then you do need to figure it out. If you want to get into social media, I suggest you read my Small Business Trends post on The Social Media Money Formula. It will show you how to actually tie social media efforts to increased sales, instead of wasting time getting “friends” and “followers.”
One last point to consider is that there is a lot of hype on the Internet. Like most things, Internet hype is usually based on some amount of truth. The key is to decipher the hype about the latest trends. Adopt only the trends that make sense for your business, and make sure the tactics you use make a difference to the bottom line. If not, you’re wasting your time.
Of course there are many other things to consider when getting started online, but these steps will help you get started in a meaningful way.
Summary: Online con artists are targeting PC users worldwide in a brazen scam. It starts with a phone call from a “tech support specialist” who warns that your computer is infected with a virus. To fix things, all you have to do is give the caller remote access to your PC. Here’s what happens next.
An old social-engineering scam appears to have taken on new life lately, targeting PC users worldwide.
Ironically, the scam doesn’t use a computer at all—at least, not initially. Instead, it starts with a phone call from someone who claims to be affiliated with Microsoft or another legitimate company or government agency.
The caller then asks for the primary computer user in the house, who is told: “Your computer has downloaded a virus.” And, of course, the caller is ready and willing to fix the problem. All you have to do is navigate to a web site, click a link to install some remote-control software, and allow the “technician” to get to work.
The perps are using legitimate remote-assistance software, like the Ammyy Admin program from Ammyy Software Development, which posted a warning that included some reports the company has received from scam victims:
“I got call from an India based consultant who said to me that he is calling from a govt. organisation in Melbourne, Australia. He made me to log into my computer to track some files and without advising me he wanted me to download a software application from ammyy.com and get remotely connected to a technician to delete some files…”
“I was recently called by what I thought was my internet service provider technician who used Ammyy to gain remote access to my computer - after I stupidly granted him that permission. It turns out that he was nothing to do with my internet service provider. When I became suspicious and began questioning him he said he would show me who he was and opened a website of a company - the web site triggered my virus software and I then demanded that the remote access be terminated…”
The scam has been around for a few years. Charles Arthur at the Guardian UK wrote about a similar scam last year, noting that it had been “going on quietly since 2008 but has abruptly grown in scale this year.” He wrote about it again in March 2011.
In June of this year, Microsoft published a warning about the scams, including results from a survey it conducted in the U.K., Ireland, U.S. and Canada. The survey showed that across all four countries, 15 percent of those surveyed reported having received one of these phony support calls.
Of those who received a call, 22 percent, or 3 percent of the total survey sample, were deceived into following the scammers’ instructions, which ranged from permitting remote access to their computer and downloading software code provided by the criminals to providing credit card information and making a purchase.
The vast majority (79 percent) of people deceived in this way suffered some sort of financial loss. Seventeen percent said they had money taken from their accounts, 19 percent reported compromised passwords and 17 percent were victims of identity fraud. More than half (53 percent) said they suffered subsequent computer problems.
The latest outbreak appears to be another wave, judging from the sudden increase in complaints I’ve seen recently.
I’ve heard from Windows users and legitimate support specialists who’ve seen this scam in action in Australia, Canada, and the UK. Recent reports from Microsoft indicate that the scammers have widened their net and are now working in languages other than English, targeting Windows users in Poland and the Czech Republic.
I also got one reliable report from an extremely trustworthy source: my mother.
A caller with a thick accent tried to run this scam on my mom, who peppered the caller with questions. What’s your name? What’s your company’s name again? What’s your phone number? (She raised six kids. She’s used to social engineering attempts.)
My mom’s Caller ID said the call originated from 999-910-0132; the caller claimed to be from a company that sounded something like Alert Center, and she gave a callback number of 609-531-0750.
If you plug those numbers into a search engine, you’ll find that they lead to a group of companies using identical website templates under different names, including TechResolve, Itek Assist, and—bingo—AlertSoft. A company with the unimaginative name Custom Design Firm, at the same address in Kolkata, India, also offers custom web-design and search-optimization services at exorbitant prices.
My mom eventually hung up on the scammers, but others haven’t been so lucky. If a victim falls for the scam, the next step involves a credit card, naturally, as this victim reported:
Posed as troubleshooter, got into my system, used a “safe code” to get into my computer. Claimed my machine has been hacked into and infected with a virus. Tom and John, heavy Asian accents. Wanted to install “lifelong protection” for $130. I balked. They have my name and number and have been calling incessantly. I’m concerned that they might have planted something in my computer that allows them access.
Indeed, that’s a legitimate concern. Once a victim has granted an intruder remote access, it’s impossible to tell exactly what sort of damage they’ve done. If you know someone who has fallen for this scam, you should assume their computer has been compromised and respond appropriately.
Most readers of this blog are sophisticated computer users who would laugh out loud at an attempt like this. But you probably have friends, family members, or clients who could use a heads-up on this one. If you get a call from someone claiming to have detected a virus on your PC, just hang up.
By Ed Bott
Curebit - Nice little platform that helps you create campaigns that get your customers to refer your business in social networks.
Like oil and water or like peanut butter and jelly? Google+, the search giant’s new social network, has everyone in the tech industry speculating about whether it’s "the Facebook Killer."
The death of MySpace seems to prove that people have room in their lives for only one social network, one profile page. After all, how many different places do you need to announce your favorite TV shows? How many different places do you need to share your witty thoughts?
On the other hand, Twitter proved that "social" can come in different forms--and 140 characters is more appropriate for some witty thoughts than for others. Twitter also allows users to link certain posts to their Facebook page if they wish, meaning that if the social networks could restrain themselves from treating social networking as a zero-sum game, everyone might win.
Of course, Google and Facebook haven't played nice lately, and they probably won't now. Google has tried to index public Facebook pages for its searches, inciting the ire of Facebook, which earlier this year hired a PR company to pitch Google-negative stories to the press. And Facebook's recent partnering with Skype to compete with Google+’s Hangouts suggests that each Internet giant has the other in its crosshairs.
Though all-out war between the two companies seems imminent (if it hasn't already begun), Google’s executive chairman (and former CEO as of this April) Eric Schmidt thinks that there’s more than enough room for the two companies to exist independently. According to a July 7 Reuter’s article, Schmidt said that Google+ will succeed just as Facebook and Twitter have because demand for entry into Google+ is high, and because Hangouts--Google’s multiperson video chat feature--is very popular with younger users.
The response is a familiar one from Schmidt, who told 60 Minutes back in 2005 that Google believed it could coexist with Microsoft’s relatively new Bing search client. Because of Google’s size and search accuracy, the company never seems to break a sweat in public, insisting that identical services can exist in tandem. But that talk might just be a PR ploy: Google and Microsoft do compete head-to-head for search advertising dollars, just as Facebook and Google+ will in the social network arena. In June, the Federal Trade Commission launched an antitrust probe into Google’s dealings, concerned that the company may exercise too much control over what we see on the Web.
Despite their face-off, both Google and Facebook have massive user bases (and a massive potential user base in the case of Google+) so it’s entirely likely that the two can and will coexist. Smaller companies such as LiveChat, which builds software for companies to offer customer service through video chat, are expecting both social networks to succeed and thrive, and are strategizing accordingly. Mariusz Cieply, the CEO of LiveChat, says that his company hopes to offer its services through both Facebook and Google+ in the near future, so that companies can, for example, provide post-sales tech support through video over Facebook or Google Hangouts. “It will be great to have both Facebook and Google Plus,“ Cieply says. “We will start with Facebook first, but we see a huge opportunity with Google Hangouts.”
The idea that Google+ and Facebook can offer people different types of social media and therefore coexist without endless hostilities isn’t crazy. People have created channels on YouTube, profiles on Twitter, AIM screen names, Flikr albums, and Tumblr pages. Surely there’s room for one more?
If Tom from MySpace, and Mark Zuckerberg from Facebook, are on Google+ then maybe everyone can get along after all.
Many industry experts believe that the ability of Google+ and Facebook to coexist will depend on how well the two companies connect with one another. Jason Shellen, head of AIM products at AOL, sees the Google+ vs. Facebook battle as a familiar story--after all, AIM coexisted with MSN messenger, and now is trying to reinvent itself to compete with Facebook chat and Gchat (the Google Mail chat client) by allowing users to set up video chats without any login or account beyond an AOL-generated URL, and AIM hopes that that URL will be shared and embedded on Facebook and Google+ walls.
“We’ve made it so you can go to Gchat and add an AIM buddy,” Shellen says of AIM’s coexistence strategy. “We federate and talk together; sometimes this false walled-garden thing doesn’t need to be that difficult.” Certainly that worked for Twitter, whose hashtags and 140-character tweets can be linked to just about every other social media hub, from Facebook to YouTube channels.
In this respect, however, Google+ is at a disadvantage. In the same recent Reuters article mentioned earlier, Google’s Schmidt admitted that talks with Facebook to allow importation of friends from Facebook to Google ended in an impasse, and talks with Twitter to integrate that service also broke down. That leaves Google+ a little less convenient for people who like to link their profiles together.
But the other loser in Google’s failed “Facebook integration” talks is Facebook, because Google has a huge user base (including people who use Gmail, Google Checkouts, or Picasa, for example), and Facebook has been butting up against a lot of negative press lately that could increase Facebook users' willingness to switch to Google+ if they have to choose one or the other..
The "One Social Network to Rule Them All" mentality might be right as consumers get smarter about how to deal with social media. Judy Shapiro, a blogger for AdAge and the CEO of EngageSimply, a technology marketing firm, says that both Facebook and Google+ are in a war, and consumers will choose the victor based on privacy or on how well they can turn the social network off. “Google+ is just Google's attempt to be Facebook, and Facebook is doing its share to become Google,” Shapiro says.
In the beginning, Google had search and a way to make money through ads, and Facebook had social data. Google seems to feel that the best way to improve the accuracy of its search results is to integrate social data, something it tried to do back in 2010 when it acquired Aardvark, a company that gave feedback to questions based on the preferences of the asker's identifiable friends and followers. For its part, Facebook has gradually built an onsite platform that allows advertisers to send targeted ads based on users’ personal and preference data. It has also established a partnership with Bing to help generate revenue from all of that social data.
But Shapiro argues that the convergence in what Google and Facebook can do might not merely create a mass exodus of users from one social network to the other; it might ensure their mutual destruction. “The more precisely a network can target us [in terms of ad-sales] the more resistant we become to it,” she says. “If you marry the strength of the search that Google has with behavioral base of social media that Facebook has, that's a one-two punch. But our privacy becomes the collateral damage.” Eventually we might get smart enough to seek alternatives that let us share information with friends and family, and yet avoid sharing it with companies that have an abiding interest in monetizing our data.
By Megan Geuss
SizeUp - Interesting startup that aims to provide research and data on large list of industries by city. Could be a nice way for small organizations to get some big data.
PrintFriendly - Turns any web page into a PDF. Great way to save from printing pages that you want to keep. You can also put a button on your own site to make easy for people to use it.
Reel - With this app you can upload a slide presentation and get real-time feedback on the content - recipients don't need PPT and don't have to download the file to view and vote.
Formulists - Organize, manage and expand your Twitter community through smart Twitter lists
Ask about our free PC Check! Business Remedy is the leading Houston IT Support & Houston Managed Services provider here to help via the web (http://BusinessRemedy.net), email (info@BusinessRemedy.net), or phone -- Toll-Free (1-855-765-4444). We are standing by to help you with all of you Technology requirements.
Facebook Cover Creator - With those big changes to the Facebook profile page and timeline coming you may want to check out one very simple way to get creative with the new look.
That’s not a secret that testimonials and customers success stories are powerful when it comes to advertising tools. They are important for creating a sense of credibility and “social proof” which is the cornerstone of today’s marketing.
According to the Forrester Research and Perception Study, 70% of consumers weigh their buying decisions on other clients’ feedbacks. You may wonder how it works? The issue is that there’s a tendency for people to believe what other people believe and say. If someone praises a product we’ll eagerly listen, especially if we know and trust this person. Moreover, if the feedback author is popular and authoritative it increases demand for the product for sure.
Words from real people are effective just because of this real effect. The trustworthy testimonials should make your clients open their wallets. And since we all like reasonable expenses, it’s not as easy as putting two and two together. In this article we are pondering on the effective ways of presenting testimonials and success stories on your webs stores.
How can we use testimonials most efficiently? First and foremost you should make a Success stories section or page on your website. It’s nice to provide a simplified document, comments field or a short form to make leaving a feedback a quick and easy process.
Celebrity testimonials and customer testimonials are different. Celebrity testimonials will most likely require some payment, but they are worth of a thing. Such feedbacks seem pretty much believable for your customers. People trust them not just because they are celebrities, but rather because they are beautiful and successful and seem to be contented with their lives. And all of us are craving for the same. And you won’t necessarily have to pay thousands of bucks for a good review. Some celebrities don’t even need the extra endorsement money if they believe in the product quality.
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Nevertheless, the most reliable way of getting a testimonial is inviting your own customers to share their ideas about your website. It’s a lot cheaper than inviting a celebrity and work just fine as well. Ask them about their experiences in the following ways:
To use the customer feedbacks effectively you should find other ways of their presentation, simply putting up a testimonials page is not enough. This is good, but it’s boring, so we’d recommend you to diversify testimonials usage:
Face the truth – you should be prepared to getting not only the positive feedbacks from your clients. Sometime people aren’t happy about working with you, but this doesn’t mean you have a bad business. So what are we supposed to do with the negative comments?
The adequate answer to this question was given by Robyn from Blueacorn.com. She states that she can never modify a negative review that’s been posted on an independent blog. However she does have a decent answer to such feedback, which would be the following: “Thank you for the honest feedback. You bring up some good/intriguing/interesting points, and my team and I are taking them into consideration.” Robyn suggests to change the tone of the comment based on the level of negativity, but avoid engaging in a conflict.
As for us, TemplateMonster sometimes does receive negative feedback in testimonials or on Facebook page, and our best way to handle the situation is to actually handle it – we find our what went wrong, we assist the person and help him or her solve the problem and then just comment on the initial negative post. So being good is always the best bet, even if things don’t look good at first.
Still some reviews can be written in a nasty way, and you should remain calm and professional commenting on them. Anyways, it’s nice to remember that negative reviews are extremely helpful for revealing the weak points of your website in the most natural and free way.
But surely no one would recommend posting negative feedbacks on your website. It would be ridiculous because they look okay on independent blogs only.
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You should also consider weak points of testimonials and success stories – people believe that testimonials are more often solicited and can be easily faked. So you should provide proven and reliable content, looking legitimate, adequate and not too emotional.
Try your best to use customer’s actual information including the company name, job title and the real name to reveal authority and not make it a bold assertion. Don’t edit testimonials unless there are some serious grammatical mistakes or typos in them. The more original a feedback looks, the more credible it is.
Follow these simple rules and you will be getting more and more enthusiastic clients!
Sloan Churman was born deaf. For 29 years, she has relied on reading lips and, to a very limited extent, hearing aids.
Two months ago, she received Envoy Medical’s Esteem Implant, which utilizes ear drum vibrations to bring hearing back to its users. The reaction, captured by her husband on video, is nothing short of extraordinary. Her pure joy is contagious.
Here’s what she said on her YouTube page:
“I had an implant put in 8 weeks ago called The Esteem Implant by Envoy Medical. I was born deaf and have worn hearing aids from the age of 2, but hearing aids only help so much. I have gotten by this long in life by reading lips. This was taken as they were activating the implant.”
Check out the video, and feel free to share your reactions in the comments.
This post originally appeared on American Express OPENForum.
There is a never-ending list of things businesses must purchase in order to grow. It’s just a fact, and that fact is exploited by plenty of folks that want to sell you things that may or may not actually propel you towards growth.
In the building of your brand, both online and off, there will come a time when a company approaches you with an offer for a service that seems to address a need, but in fact, is so detrimental it may actually do more harm than good.
These offers often address our inherent desire to shortcut the real work required to produce sustainable business and marketing results—but, of course, that’s the appeal.
Below are five things you must do the right way—and that usually means you should never pay for them.
Advertising you can’t account for
I’m not against paying for advertising, in fact, quite the opposite; I think advertising is an essential part of small business lead generation. What I am opposed to is buying any advertising that you can’t or don’t track.
Advertising only works if it’s the right message, presented at the exact right time, to the exact right audience. There are so many variables at play here that the only way to get your bang for the buck is to measure real results, in almost real time. Advertising without accountability is like playing roulette with your money.
Referrals
Lots of companies offer incentives for referrals, and in some instances a little cash for the act of a referral can motivate, but is it the right motivation?
Referral generation is an important aspect of marketing, but when you pay for referrals you change the relationship from social to financial and that changes the dynamic in ways that won’t last long-term.
The proper motivation for a referral is the lending of trust in an effort to help either the company receiving the referral or the individual being referred. That’s not to say that you shouldn’t use creative incentives to keep referrals top of mind, it’s just that if you provide something of value, you shouldn’t have to bribe people to share.
Reviews of your business
Online reviews carry increasing weight in the information gathering routine of prospects, as well as in the ranking factors that contribute to high search engine results. Because of that, smart marketers are paying more attention to reviews and even getting more proactive about stimulating written reviews from happy customers.
So, it should come as no surprise that enterprising snake oil types are offering reviews for fee services that can get your business favorably reviewed by professional Yelp and Google Places review accounts located right there in your town.
On top of being dishonest, my guess is that paying for these reviews may actually get some businesses banned from review participation. Put the work in and make reviews an authentic arm of your message.
Links to your site
This one has faded from the mainstream for the most part, mainly because the search engines police it so heavily, but there are still lots of SEO types willing to sell you links from high quality sites leading back to your site.
Back links to your site are extremely important, but its become extremely easy for search engines to recognize abnormal linking behavior, and even easier to penalize sites that participate in it.
Write good content, point to good content and participate in social networks—that’s how you create organic links to your site.
Opt-in e-mail lists
Every list company, including the largest, most respected names, will sell you a list of targeted opt-in e-mails. The thing is, no matter how many hoops they jump through to make sure these e-mails are CAN-SPAM compliant, they aren’t opt-in, because they did not opt-in to get your e-mails.
Some companies get around this by not actually selling you the list, but instead renting you the ability to send an e-mail from their servers to a list. No matter how tempting this may sound, it’s still spam and not something you should even consider.
It can be difficult to navigate the various offers of help that show up at your door, but some things just simply can’t be bought.
posted by John Jantsch
Cool Tools
Sulia - billed as an "interest network" this tools delivers news and information from very reputable resources on the topics you choose - I've found it a great way to filter content.
Business Remedy is the leading Houston IT Support & Houston Managed Services provider here to help via the web (http://BusinessRemedy.net), email (info@BusinessRemedy.net), or phone -- Toll-Free (1-855-765-4444). We are standing by to help you with all of you Technology requirements.
There is a common opinion that email marketing is mostly used by big companies that can afford it. This results in a wrongful opinion that if you are running a small blog it will be quite difficult for you to use this marketing technique. But in reality technology these days allows you to integrate virtually anything you want into your WordPress blog, and WordPress developers demonstrate the amazing flexibility of this CMS platform. Here are most popular newsletter plugins that will help you to easily manage email marketing campaigns without any problems. Actually it wasn’t that easy to find really powerful and reliable pieces of software, but these 5 plugins that we’ve chosen really do work and really are worth being used for email marketing on your WordPress blog. Having installed any of these WordPress newsletter plugins you’ll receive a great tool with a bunch of useful features allowing you to manage every step of your email marketing campaign starting from the process of the subscription to the moments of creating different mailing lists etc. We strongly recommend you to try at least two or three of these email marketing plugins for WordPress because each of these has its own interesting features that might be useful for you.
Newsletter plugin offers the widest range of options so far and is considered to be the most popular software in the field of email marketing tools for WordPress. Newsletter offers full set of tools including subscription widget, comfortable plugin interface with huge list of custom settings for the newsletter and subscribers. Also you can track down your marketing results via statistics tool available with this plugin.
Price: Free
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The following WordPress newsletter plugin offers a flexible system of creating and storing database of email subscribers on your website. You can easily create custom types of emails by using 15 custom fields, textboxes/radioboxes fields and many other useful options. This plugins is compatible with external newsletter software. It means that subscribers list can be automatically synchronized with any third party service.
Price: Free
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Email newsletter is very simple plugin created for simple and basic mass email sending. You can send HTML email to the subscribed user and he/she can reply to the sender. Also this software contains contact form plugin used for feedback as the subscription tool. If you want simple and reliable email marketing tool – this is what you need.
Price: Free
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Actually ALO EasyMail is considered to be the “rising star” because it is just as good as the Newsletter plugin that was the first in this list, but it offers even more awesome functions for WordPress email marketing purposes. Frankly speaking you can manage every step of your mailing campaigns with the help of this software. It is a very reliable software with tons of awesome features. There is an Ajax widget for subscription, excellent theme manager to enliven email appearance, debug tool and many more.
Price: Free
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WP Autoresponder has subscription widget at the sidebar, generates custom subscription forms to collect more information about subscribers, and schedules e-mail broadcasts to your email newsletters in text/html. The great thing about this plugin that it is completely free and easily replaces any third-party service.
Price: Free
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Business Remedy is the leading Houston IT Support & Houston Managed Services provider here to help via the web (http://BusinessRemedy.net), email (info@BusinessRemedy.net), or phone -- Toll-Free (1-855-765-4444). We are standing by to help you with all of you Technology requirements.
When we say “defensive” we generally mean something protective. Defensive design is also known as contingency design and deals with potential errors and difficulties that users may encounter while working with websites or software interfaces. The main goal is minimizing the chances of the audience drain because of stupid minor mistakes we see on websites every day. This is all about improving help sections, search and contact forms, error messages and other crisis points. Everything that makes your website joyful but not stressful!
After analyzing the users behavior on your website you may often notice that people are using some website options not the way you thought they were supposed to. Besides, they can mistype their personal info which will put them in a middle of dead end – and they will eventually abandon your website. And it’s not necessarily their fault. Defensive design is the younger brother of user-friendliness. It is aimed at eliminating dead ends in case of errors and making users enjoy staying on your web page. Sounds pretty simple, huh?
Humans make errors, systems have glitches, servers can be down, connections can be slow – you should consider all this when developing a project. If done correctly, it all can be minimized and accommodated. In healthcare it’s important to locate the disease before it causes you problems. Allowing to check on errors, defensive design is virtually the same story. It improves your traffic quality and boosts your site attendance.
Many users would rather load sites from their mobile devices and smart phones than from desktops. A great amount of people use wireless connections that are normally faster but are not always reliable. So you should think about the possible slow connections and the ways to work with them.
You may easily resolve this issue by optimizing the images, navigation and content and other graphical elements on the websites that normally have high quality graphics. Try to eliminate Flash or other specific content that requires plug-ins. The best option would be creating the cut down version of the site. It is not so money- and time-consuming as you might think. Still it helps to lure more people with mobile devices to your internet pages. Using multi-purpose code, less images and texts will be perfect for low-speed connection.
The problem lays often is designers themselves who want to implement all features imaginable into the layouts they create: special options, players, flash animations and other slow-loading elements. Be careful and think about the consequences of using extra widgets.
You may easily find mobile website templates on the net which even speed up the task even more.
One of the ways to make user experience intuitive is including pop up boxes with useful information where it is needed. This is far more convenient than creating ‘help desk’ or ‘terms and conditions’ pages. Any user will be happy to have no need to search for info on his own.
It is called inline and contextual help.
Inline help is usually provided in some content tabs that appear when hovering over objects or it could be presented by pop ups. You will see a couple of nice examples of inline help below.
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Spruz offers information on all levels of their plan as long as users browse and go from one step to another. This kind of help seems to be distracting a bit but it’s extremely helpful for controlling the whole process and flow of text.
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Contextual help is a special guidance that shows up relevantly to the page you are viewing or the action you are taking. Contextual help differs from inline help by relating to the entire page. So it appears inside the content itself, without any need to hover on or click.
One of the most comprehensive materials regarding the issue is Defensive Design for the Web, written by Matthew Linderman and Jason Fried. It provides with exhaustive guidelines on Defensive Design, with awesome illustrations and comments. After reading the book you’ll find out how to write successful error messages, design help sections and contact forms.
We’d like to outline the most helpful tips presented in the book, aimed at the developing the defensive design on the whole:
But all these guidelines mean nothing until you analyze the users activity and track where they face difficulties or even give up. The minor things such as fixing spelling and stylistic errors, unclear buttons might also help to fix the picture of the visitors activity. And the last but not least – don’t ever make clients feel like they’re criminals if they make an error. Be polite and diplomatic. Use defensive web design to minimize damage and guide your website audience.
KeepVid - this free tool allows you to download videos from sites such as YouTube to embed in presentations.
Ask about our free PC Check! Business Remedy is the leading Houston IT Support & Houston Managed Services provider here to help via the web (http://BusinessRemedy.net), email (info@BusinessRemedy.net), or phone -- Toll-Free (1-855-765-4444). We are standing by to help you with all of you Technology requirements.
Just over five months ago, we welcomed ITA Software to the Google family. Since then, our engineering teams have been working closely together to build new travel tools that provide faster, more flexible, and more useful results to online travel searches. We wanted to give you an early look at some of what we’ve been able to accomplish so far.
Starting today, when you search for flight information on Google, for example “flights from Chicago to Denver,” you will see a “Flights” link in the left-hand panel. This link leads to our new Flight Search feature, and is offered in addition to the flight schedules which have been available since May. You can also access the Flight Search feature directly at google.com/flights.
With this first step in flight search that combines ITA’s expertise with Google’s technology, you will be able to:
Flights are chosen primarily based on cost and total travel time, while covering a variety of departure times and airlines. We automatically set the filters to focus on options which are reasonable in both price and duration, and you can always adjust the filters to show even more flights.
The selection of flight results is not influenced by any paid relationships. Airlines control how their flights are marketed, so as with other flight search providers, our booking links point to airline websites only. We're working to create additional opportunities for our other partners in the travel industry to participate as well. This is just an early look: the takeoff, not the final destination! You may notice that at the moment we include a limited number of U.S. cities and show results for round-trip economy-class flights only. We’re working hard to improve this feature and look forward to sharing more updates. Don’t worry if you don’t see the Flight Search feature -- we’re rolling it out over the course of the day. To learn more, check out this video:via Google Apps blog
Summary: The fake-antivirus business was a big money-maker in the first half of this year. Then, at the end of June, fake-AV products practically disappeared from the web. Was it technology, or does traditional law enforcement deserve the credit?
The fake-antivirus business went from boom to bust in record time.
Early this year, the bad guys were making money hand over fist with scareware and rogue security products. Then, suddenly, the business dried up.
The event that caused the sudden plunge? A high-profile bust by Russian authorities. On June 23, a network of web sites that were distributing fake antivirus software for Windows PCs and Macs suddenly went offline when the head of the company that processed payments for the group was busted.
The effect on the fake-AV industry was dramatic, according to Enigma Software Group:
Aside from the FBI cracking down on international “scareware” rings in 12 countries, Russian police arrested Pavel Vrublevsky, co-founder of ChronoPay, Russia’s biggest processor of online payments and a lead player in several fake AV scams. The combination of these two events [led] to a dramatic decline in fake anti-spyware and anti-virus software. On our end, we’ve seen a drastic drop in scan logs from new users, support logs, detections, and support tickets from new customers. Basically, we’ve witnessed a 60% decline in new fake AVs, scareware, and rogue anti-virus incidents.
Independent security researcher Brian Krebs also noted a “huge decline” in the fake-AV racket. According to Krebs, McAfee reported “a dramatic drop in the number of customers reporting scareware detections in recent weeks… McAfee has tracked more than a 60 percent decrease in the number of customers dealing with fake AV since late May.”
The Enigma Software report included a fascinating set of graphics that used data from Google Trends to monitor consumer searches for known fake-AV products. In theory, those searches represent interest by victims in how to remove the threats they’ve encountered. A spike in searches means more infections in the wild; a drop means the malware distributors are seeing less success.
I decided to use the same methodology to track the progress of this underground market from a slightly different angle. Starting with a similar set of Google Trends data, I came up with this chart, which tracks fake AV products for Windows XP and Windows 7 and adds Mac Defender to the mix:
That picture shows the ebbs and flows of an entire underground market. The green and purple lines on the left represent a pair of fake Windows AV products (XP Antispyware 2011 and Win 7 Antispyware 2011) that emerged in February and peaked at the beginning of April. They were replaced with 2012 versions (light blue and yellow) at the beginning of June, giving the market a new jolt of activity.
I’ve annotated that chart with a few key dates:
The moral of the story is clear: technological solutions have some effect, but nothing gets rid of a gang of criminals like a series of well-coordinated worldwide police raids.
Sadly, this break in the action is probably nothing more than a brief interruption. Sooner or later—probably sooner—a new gang will be along to start up where the previous one left off. But for now, at least, the quiet is welcome.
By Ed Bott
Glassdoor recently took a survey of employees of some of the most popular companies, asking workers what they thought of the way their bosses were running the company. Glassdoor then broke down the data and ranked the head honchos based on the answers, in hopes of helping potential employees get a better picture of companies and their bosses. What resulted is an interesting look at why these business leaders have such great standing with their employees.
1. Ken Powell, CEO of General Mills
Ken Powell has worked for General Mills since 1979, but has been the CEO of the food company since 2007. Running a food company during a recession can be a tall order, and General Mills revenues continued to climb nonetheless. Their legendary products (Wheaties, Hamburger Helper, Cheerios) might seem a hard sell considering there are plenty of off-brands that could be purchased instead, but General Mills continued to expand its marketing budget and started innovating with online ads before their competitors. The result: major growth and revenues in 2009, at a time when companies were struggling to keep their doors open. In 2009, Powell received a 100 percent approval rating from his workers, a testament that his leadership style is one of the best of the Fortune 500 companies.
2. John Hennessy, Stanford President
People don't often think of university presidents as "bosses," but Stanford's President John Hennessy is one of the best. Dr. Hennessy became president of Standford in 2000, but has been a faculty member since 1977. He was one of the pioneers in computer architecture, and in 1981 he contributed to the RISC (Reduced Instruction Set Computer) architecture, a technology that greatly improved computer performance. It's safe to say that Hennessy is an entrepreneur. John Hennessy's entrepreneurial streak has been what has helped Stanford become one of the most innovative universities. Stanford is one of the top three wealthiest schools in the U.S., and last year announced that it would start forging more ties with local tech companies, many of which sprang from the halls of Stanford. Dr. Hennessy received a 98 percent approval rating from his employees at Stanford, saying that Stanford was an "overall great place to work."
3. Steve Jobs, Apple CEO
Steve Jobs has become one of the most iconic bosses of all time. His keynote speeches at the annual MacWorld Expos keep the tech industry on the edge of their seat, and Apple's revenues continue to grow at blistering speeds. In January, the company posted it's highest fiscal first quarter ever, with their net income up 50 percent. It's no surprise then that the man leading Apple's charge has become one of the most popular and well-liked bosses. As Jobs' popularity and Apple's profits continue to soar, Apple employees will continue to rate the CEO highly. Employees at Apple gave Jobs an approval rating of 97 percent, with 517 votes.
4. Lloyd Blankfein, Goldman Sachs CEO
Love him or hate him, Lloyd Blankfein is popular with his employees. Even though he made our list of dumbest business mistakes of 2009, his employees who voted at Glassdoor gave him a 97 percent approval rating. Blankfein has been under intense scrutiny, with Goldman Sachs receiving federal aid in 2008 and then giving out $16 billion in bonuses. While this may have enraged the general public, it certainly made Goldman Sachs employees happy. Employees described Blankfein's leadership as "intense," but overall they were very happy with the performance of the company under his lead.
5. Eric Schmidt, Google CEO
Google is another tech company that has posted massive growth year after year. Many attribute this to the excellent leadership of CEO Eric Schmidt. Schmidt joined the Google board of directors in March of 2001, and quickly became the company's CEO five months later. Schmidt has helped raise revenues quarter after quarter, with sales last quarter jumping 23 percent from the previous year. Google has grown to handle over two-thirds of all search queries in the U.S., and continues to add innovative products and services to the company year after year. Schmidt was even named PC World's #1 on the 50 Most Important People on the Web in 2007. With all the growth and accolades, it's no surprise that Google is one of the most sought-after tech companies to work for. As Google continues to show strong growth and great leadership, Google employees will continue to be happy with their CEO.
6. James Truchard, National Instruments CEO
James Truchard is the co-founder of National Instruments. While National Instruments may not be the sexiest company around, it's definitely one of the best companies for employees. The company has been on Fortune's 100 Best Companies to Work For for eleven consecutive years and counting. CEO James Truchard is directly responsible the accolades. James' employees refer to him as "Dr. T," and is one of the most accessible CEOs of a fortune 500 company. He drives an old pickup truck to work, wears jeans, and sits in a cubicle on the 8th floor, where employees are encouraged to discuss any issues they might have with the company. "Dr. T's" accessible leadership style has won the hearts of his employees, giving him an approval rating of 96 percent.
7. Edward Zore, Northwestern Mutual CEO
Edward Zore has been Northwestern Mutual's CEO since 2001, but he's been working for the company since 1969. In 2008 Zore made the list of 100 Most Influential People in Business Ethics due to his strong stance on ethics in banking. When most financial institutions were caught with their pants down in the subprime markets, Zore insured that Northwestern Mutual had less than 0.5 percent of their assets exposed to subprime loans. Under Zore's leadership, the company has brought in award after award on social responsibility and quality. His employees gave the company a 96 percent approval rating because of the strong human element that Zore and the rest of the company have embraced.
8. Richard Edelman, CEO Edelman
Richard Edelman has helped the company his father started become the largest public relations firm in existence. Richard Edelman is a thought leader on PR, and has produced regular reports on the state of trust with corporations. Edelman has worked with high-profile clients like Walmart, Starbucks and many others. Richard Edelman is known for his outspoken critiques on the PR industry and industries that have PR problems. Yet his company ranks as one of the best by employees. They gave Edelman a 95 percent approval rating, giving Richard Edelman high marks for being a visionary and a great educator.
9. Gary Kelly, Southwest Airlines CEO
Southwest is known for its innovative approach to customer service, and also for the care of their employees. The man in charge for the excellent corporate culture is Gary Kelly. Gary Kelly joined the airline company in 1986, and was eventually named the CEO by 2008. Since then Kelly has been named one of the best CEOs in America twice (2008, 2009) by Investor magazine. The company has a slew of recognition and awards like "100 Best Corporate Citizens" for eight years in a row, and the leader in American Customer Satisfaction Index in both 2005 and 2008. Kelly scored a 94 percent approval rating for the care of his employees.
10. Matt Ferguson, Career Builder CEO
CareerBuilder.com has grown into the largest online job site, and has held that title since 2001. CareerBuilder CEO Matt Ferguson has used many innovative strategies to grow the company, and the dividends are paying off. Under Ferguson, CareerBuild.com has built impressive customer service and expansive marketing campaigns to bring in high amounts of traffic and revenue. In 2004 Ferguson was named one of the Crain's Chicago Business 40 Under 40. Ferguson received a 94 percent approval rating thanks to his innovative vision for the company and his employees.
By Glen Stansberry
