Computer and Web Articles

1. http://tinyurl.com/yllhppa - Fifty simple yet brilliant guerilla advertisements/marketing campaigns. Definitely a fun slideshow to click through.
2. http://tinyurl.com/dcr945 - As dear Steven Abootman, President of the World Canadian Bureau, so elegantly summed it up, “The internet makes lots of money. Give us some of that money!” It is this mindset that encourages so many entrepreneurs to try their hand at making money online. Perhaps you’ve been thinking about starting your own online business? If so, find tips on making your eCommerce site work, strategies on positioning your site, and explanations of various website business models all right here.
3. http://tinyurl.com/62ajlm - Do you have your own personal or business blog? Of course you do. That’s why I’m suggesting you take a look at this helpful post entitled “A blogger’s to-do checklist before hitting the Publish button.”
4. www.ecofabulous.com – A lovely blog focused on beautiful, and sustainable …. stuff. Topics covered include beauty, fashion, home, kids, and lifestyle.
5. www.zapproved.com – Zapproved, an online tool with the tagline “Better decisions made easy” has a little diagram on its homepage with lots of people and arrows and a big question mark accompanied by the text “Using email for approvals takes time and results in poor, unclear decisions.” The next image to the right shows a happy person and organized arrows accompanied by the text “Zapproved makes decisions faster, easier, and more accountable.” Visit their site to learn more.

I’ve always wished there was a way to sort my search results by date–a key factor that has always helped me determine relevancy within search results. So it’s now time to celebrate, as Google recently implemented functionality that allows people to filter search results by … time!

Give it a try.

Next time you conduct a Google search and find yourself reviewing the results page, click the Show options link (the one with the little plus sign in front of it) below the search box.

More filtering options will instantly appear on the left-hand side of your screen – and you’ll note there is now an entire category allowing you to filter your results by time. Cool!

ScreenSnapr was created for all of you who have, at one time or another, thought, “Geez, I wish there was an easy and FREE way of taking pictures of what’s on my screen … and saving those pictures … and sharing them with my friends.”

Press two keys on your keyboard and you’re instantly provided with an image that you can save to your computer and a website address that you can share with anyone you’d like.

Hop over to www.screensnapr.com and watch the little 30 second introductory video at the top of the homepage to learn more.

Pssst.

I have a little heads up to share with all you folks out there who calls yourselves Summit County Colorado locals but have never heard of Summit Freecycle.

Summit Freecycle is a free group you can join that allows you to send and receive email notifications with other Summit County folks pertaining to free stuff.

Have an old sink sitting in your garage that you’d love to get rid of? Post it on Summit Freecycle.

Receive a Freecycle notification from somebody looking to give away their queen-sized bed frame? Let them know you’d love to swing by and pick it up tomorrow.

Looking for a high chair for your toddler? Post a notification on Summit Freecycle and see if anyone has one sitting around that you could take off their hands.

Give away stuff you no longer want. Pick up treasures that others call trash. And do your part to keep usable, valuable items out of our landfill.

To learn more, visit http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SummitFreecycle, and when you’re ready to join, send an email to SummitFreecycle-subscribe@yahoogroups.com and let the moderator know that you really do live in Summit County, CO and you’d like to join!

Your company’s website exists for a reason. Perhaps your website exists so that you can sell your products through an online store. Maybe you had your website developed for the sole purpose of encouraging potential customers to make reservations online instead of over the phone. Or perhaps you built your company website because you wanted a marketing tool to persuade people to swing by your showroom.

Think about the purpose(s) of your company website; then consider the types of people who visit it.

With these two things in mind, set aside a few minutes of time to read through your website’s text. (I’m guessing you haven’t given much thought to the text since your site was originally built. If this is the case – you’re not alone.)

After reading through the text of each page, answer the following questions as honestly as you can:

• Did I use industry-specific terms or acronyms that my site visitors won’t understand?
• Did I include too many details or specifics about our services and products . . . to the point where the large amounts of content actually become distracting?
• Did I include personal information or personal opinions that provide little to no value to our visitors? (Seriously. Do your potential clients really need to know that your niece plays the flute?)
• Did you list features of your products or services that—while they’re true and seem important to you—have little to no meaning to your site’s visitors? (Yes, it’s great that your crew uses the latest 320 KPM machines on the job, but that doesn’t translate into meaningful value or benefits to potential customers visiting your site.)

Do your best to objectively analyze your pages’ content. Make sure you’re not including content that’s simply taking up space and keeping your visitors from finding the information they’re looking for.

I’ll be the first to admit that it can be quite difficult to remain objective when looking at your own text – so if you find yourself struggling to see your site’s content through the eyes of a visitor . . . simply ask for an outside, non-biased opinion or two.

You’ll likely be surprised by what you learn.

The sun’s disappearance and the gloomy weather that keeps hiding it away as of late has been bringing me down a bit. As I’ve heard others say the same, I decided to start off today’s article with some inspiring, fun, and just-plain-neat websites and products.

If any of these links make you smile even just a tiny bit, I’ll consider my efforts worthwhile.

Link #1 – The (Almost) Invisible Man: http://tinyurl.com/yelvnu8
An amazing artist and—as one recent commenter of this blog post mentioned—even more of an inspiration when you read about his troubles with the Chinese government (Google for his interview).

Link #2 –What it Was Like to Be a Kid: http://tinyurl.com/r936j3
If you ever played with Legos when you were a kid, the five simple (and absolutely brilliant) advertisements on this page will make you smile. You’ll know exactly what they mean.

Link #3 – Tasty USB Drives: http://tinyurl.com/ybbrmrd
Mmmmmmm. Fortune cookies and dooonuts………..

Link #4 – Emergency Chocolate: http://tinyurl.com/2j7xwx
You know… Chocolate for when there’s an emergency.

Link #5 – Because its always time for cake: http://tinyurl.com/nv6xr4
Yes, yes, I love cakes. But if you’re not familiar with the mind-blowing artistry often found in the world of professional cake designing, you’re in for a very sweet treat here.

I regularly extol the importance and effectiveness of using high quality photography in business websites. When doing so, however, I also have to remind business owners that search engines are blind.

Using gorgeous, professional photographs of your company’s creations and products on your website draws visitors in, helps build trust, and increases online sales.

Yet while these beautiful photos will likely help your visitors instantly understand what you specialize in, they won’t mean much to the search engines. In fact, it doesn’t matter if your photos show puppies, engine blocks, pine trees or copy machines. Search engines are blind; they can’t differentiate between or appreciate your beautiful photos.

This is nothing more than something to be aware of. Pieces of information like these are great to tuck away in the back of your brain for use when it’s time to make informed decisions about improving your website.

It’s always great when readers write in and share tips they’ve found helpful!

The following tip was shared by a wonderful reader of this article and, though I’m not sure exactly how many people are still using AOL email out there, I’m confident that plenty of you will be delighted by this information. [The information was originally provided by Nancy Leo, an AML legal expert.]

Follow these four super-easy steps to get rid of the footer (you know – the one you didn’t write that contains messages sponsored by outside companies and organizations) displayed at the bottom of all the AOL emails you send out:

1. Go to AOL Mail; in the upper right corner, click on “Settings.”
2. That brings you to “General Settings” - do nothing here.
3. In the left-hand toolbar, click on “Compose.”
4. On the Compose Settings page, at the bottom, for “Message Footer,” click on “Turn on/off message footer.”

That’s it!  All done.

Here’s a riddle.

What do the following three things have in common:

1. Eleven year olds who took a website elective class in middle school
2. Grandmas who read a book on website building
3. Computer technicians who have followed a few step-by-step build-your-own-site tutorials online.

Answer: They all have their own websites, are promoting themselves as professional web designers, and will be doing their best to persuade you that they should be the ones building your company website.

Don’t roll your eyes—and for heaven’s sake, don’t think that of course you would be able to easily tell the difference between a web professional and someone just posing at one. I argue that differentiating between the two groups isn’t so simple. Let’s take a look at a few examples to see what I mean, shall we?

Case Study #1: My partner and I are achingly aware of two Colorado web companies selling themselves as Search Engine Optimization and Marketing experts. Problem is, neither one of the companies shows up in the search engine themselves. Ouch. We also happen to know that one of the companies has in fact, never once worked on a search engine marketing project before. Ever. Yet they have a very professional, well-designed site that clearly states—right on the homepage—“Specializing in Search Engine Optimization”. Based on the professional design of the site, one could easily assume that this company is trustworthy and professional; from there it would be easy to take the next step and hire them for a search engine optimization project. It would likely be a very bad move.

Case Study #2: We recently had a potential client ask us why our web design work was more expensive than Competitor Y’s. We asked the potential client to tell us how they felt about the fact the design for Competitor Y’s very own website was, in fact, purchased from a completely different web design company. Yes, you read that correctly. Competitor Y didn’t design their own website. The potential client realized that a company not using what it was selling might have a very good reason for selling its products for cheap.

Case Study #3: Imagine my horror upon finding a New York web design agency’s website in which the entire About, Process, and FAQ pages had been copied and pasted–word-for-word-for-word–directly from my company’s website. Now imagine potential customers arriving at their website, reading that text – and thinking “Wow, these guys seem great! I think they’ll be a good match for our needs.” Unfortunately, these potential customers would be looking to hire plagiarizers unable to craft content for their very own website. The kicker? Their homepage touted that they were an “honest, ethical company you could trust”. Awesome.

So How Does One Sort Through the Riffraff?

It would make things so much less stressful if the process of choosing a web design/development company was as simple as comparing apples to apples. Unfortunately, it’s more akin to comparing apples to vanilla mint cookies dipped in fudge. Or something close to that. You need to be able to prevent yourself from teaming up with a company that talks the talk … but actually walks a little bit funny.
So let’s think about this. You wouldn’t hire a personal trainer who weighed 450 pounds and ate 2 boxes of cream puffs during your first consultation, would you? So then why in the world would you work with a web design company that didn’t create the design for its own site? Or hire a gal promoting her search engine expertise . . . yet can’t seem to rank in the search engines herself?
Please don’t get me wrong. I really do believe that many of these web companies truly feel they are experts and can do everything they purport. What you need to remember, though—unfortunate and labor-intensive as it may sound—is that it really is up to you to determine if these companies can do all they say they can and whether or not they’ll be a good match for your specific needs.

In the end, all you need to remember is this: Do your due diligence and engage in a bit of research before you hire any web company. They all say they can do a myriad of amazing things. Don’t take their word for it, though; power up your good friend Google and find out if they really can.