The author lists these 5 tech tools. I don’t completely agree with all of the author’s reasoning, but they are all worth of consideration.

1. Social Media
2. Cloud Computing
3. Tablet Computers
4. Business Intelligence Apps
5. Video Calls

My thoughts on these 5:

Social Media

There is no doubt about it, people are watching much less free-to-air TV than they used to. Some of that time is being spent on Pay TV, some is being spent in front of computer screens. And I’m sure you can guess some popular websites that people are using. (If you can’t, try Facebook, YouTube and Twitter for a start.)

It’s a mistake to treat these websites like an advertising platform. Social Media sites (Facebook, Twitter) are more like a cocktail party or a networking function. Being there is what’s important. You don’t have to “talk shop”. If the opportunity arises, then great, but if you just go in with a full-on sales pitch you’ll quickly find yourself alone in the corner of the room.

YouTube has slightly different rules – it’s a platform for you to create useful, educational content and share it with people. Obviously this is much harder than using Facebook, but the number of hours of video streamed via YouTube every day is astonishing. If you can create (or have access to) video content, you should have a YouTube channel.

Cloud Computing

This is one of those buzz words that has become so overused recently it now means something totally different to what it meant originally!

So I’ll go with the new, broad, buzz-worthy definition: Instead of spending large amounts of money on server infrastructure and buying your industry-specific software, you can now in many instances rent the service from a provider and access it over the web, usually via your Web Browser (think Internet Explorer or Firefox).

No internal servers to maintain, no initial large cash outlay, and it’s totally portable. Access your software/business systems/files in your office, via your smartphone, or anywhere you have internet access.

No system is perfect and there are downsides (if your internet connection dies then you lose access to it until your connection is restored) but we’re using this model for most of our internal systems, including:

• Email, contacts and shared calendars
• Job and project management software
• Time tracking and budgeting software

Tablet Computers

I was initially a skeptic, but am now well and truly a convert. I don’t take my laptop with me any more – be it client meetings or just away – the tablet does everything I need. (In my case an iPad, but there are some very nice Android tablets now made by Samsung, HTC and others.) The battery lasts forever, they start quickly, most have a built-in sim card slot so you can access the internet wherever you have mobile phone reception, and the list goes on. Extremely useful if you’re away from the office in the course of your business.

Business Intelligence Apps

This ties in to the Cloud Computing topic above for me – there are plenty of options out there for keeping records of your customers/clients, what they bought, and a plethora of other datasets that relate to your business.

There’s no doubt it requires some effort and commitment to set up and get some systems in place – but this is one thing that separates smart businesses from the rest of the crowd.

Video Calls

It surprises me how little I use Skype. It’s running down there on my computer, but I just never think about it. A face-to-face meeting is almost always better than a phone call, and Skype (or any video calling application) can facilitate that face-to-face interaction quite easily, but nobody calls me on Skype and I don’t call anyone else on Skype.

We really should use it more often. Is that my new year’s resolution?

Why?

Because it will never be perfect.

We’re not printing 10,000 brochures here

Too often clients get wrapped up in wanting everything to be perfect before their new website goes life. And I can totally understand this. But the web is not print. Things can be changed quickly and relatively easily if something isn’t quite right.

From a recent post on Boagworld.com:

All of these factors make us naturally hesitant to commit ourselves and go live. However it is important to remember 2 things. First, until you put your website in front of real users, it is impossible to know whether it is ready or not. Ultimately you have to launch the site and see what reaction you get.

Second, although it is scary to launch a website you do not believe is 100% ready, you must remember that the web is not like print.

It is amazing how many website owners (especially if they come from a marketing background) forget this. Often they’re used to commissioning print material that once sent to the printer cannot be changed. Fortunately, this is not the case when it comes to the web. Once you’ve launched the website it is still possible to change any aspect of it.

So when is the right time?

Again, from the same article:

Is the new website better than the old one?

If the answer to this question is yes, then there is no reason to hold back from going live. If the new website is better then the benefits of launching early are obvious. Not only will users appreciate the improved site, it will also start generating a return on the investment you make to build it. The earlier it is launched, the sooner you can start reaping the rewards.

So I am taking Paul’s advice here and launching this new website a little early.

I know it’s not quite there yet, but:

1. If I wait for it to be perfect I’ll be waiting forever
2. If I wait for it to be “finished” I’ll be waiting forever
3. It’s better than the old one (I hope!)

Websites are never actually finished, as it turns out

One last thing to keep in mind, if you think your website is finished then you have missed an important aspect of the web. Your website should be current and up-to-date, so unless nothing you do ever changes then your website is never actually finished.

It’s a bit like the washing when you think about it!

How can your business take advantage of this? Do you have a strategy in place? The time to start thinking about this is now.

Learn More about Mobile Tagging at Microsoft Tag.

1. Google has quite effective spam filtering in place and it’s really cut down on the junk mail we receive each day.
2. The free version of Google Apps allows about 7 gigabytes of online storage per mailbox. That means you can leave a copy of all your email on Google’s servers. In the event of your computer crashing or getting stolen, you can then re-download your Outlook inbox.
3. Rather than relying on a single server to be online (as is probably the case for you now) your email is stored in server farms. One single machine can crash but others take up the slack, reducing the likelihood of email downtime.

However – if you choose to upgrade to the Business Edition, you also get:

1. The ability to synchronise all your email, contacts and calendar between Outlook and your smartphone, instantly in the background over the internet. Very handy if you own an iPhone or similar.
2. Ugraded mailbox sizes (25 gigabytes per mailbox)
3. 99.9% uptime guarantee

Read more about the differences here: http://www.google.com/apps/intl/en/group/index.html

What are the disadvantages?

Your email is being pushed through Google’s mail servers. If you have the free version then there’s nobody you can call if you can’t access your email – although Google tend to know when their servers go down. It doesn’t happen often, but no system is perfect. (If you choose the pay for the business edition you are provided with a Google phone number for emegency support.)

We believe the 3 advantages listed above that come with the free version alone make the transition worthwhile.

If you use a smartphone, or use webmail often, then the syncronisation tool makes the Business Edition a very valuable upgrade.

We can set this up today and tomorrow you’ll be receiving your email via Google Apps – but from your perspective you can still use Outlook as you always have. Contact us if you’d like to know more!

So this week we have had that many calls from our clients who work outdoors asking for the little things that they can do to update their business image and promotion while it is wet.  Problem is that not everything can be done at short notice.  So, perhaps now is the time to think and plan ahead for the next wet spell –

• Do you need to refresh some of your branding on vehicles and mobile equipment?
• Do you have enough stickers and signs to go on vehicles, so that when they are all in the yard next time, you can get them all done?
• Do you need to create or update an asset register and number all your assets?
• Do you need to label any specific items in the workshop?
• Do you need to upgrade any safety signs and stickers?

Well, if you need to do any of those, take this rainy period to plan, and the next rainy period to implement.

Well, it depends!

What’s a Bounce?

Basically, if someone visits one page of your website, and only one page, it’s classed as a bounce.

Typically, it will mean that someone has found your site via a search engine, looked at the first page they landed on, and then hit the back button.

You may find this thought horrifying – but there are valid reasons why Bounces may occur:

1. They are not in your physical area. If you’re an accountant, and someone from France manages to find your site, there is a pretty good chance they’ll never become a client anyway. Let them bounce.
2. You don’t actually solve their problem. Some keywords are not really good ones to chase – many are too generic. If you run mine safety training courses, you may think that “training” would be a good keyword. Except for all the people that search for dog training, sales training, weight training… Even though the keyword may be relevant in a generic sense – you may not be what your visitor is looking for.
3. Random keywords and search terms. To illustrate: back in 2004 I posted a short piece after Anna Meares won her Gold Medal in Athens (link). Shortly after, I noticed a lot if incoming traffic from people who had “googled” for her name. Were those people looking for our services at the time? Nope. They bounced. But that’s okay, we were getting traffic from a keyword totally unrelated to what we do.

So, you’ll see that you will always have some bounces. The number without context doesn’t mean much. Not all bounces are bad though – in these examples your website is helping to qualify your leads. If you can’t help them, you don’t want to be spending time answering emails and phone calls.

Killer Bounces

What hurts is a bounce from someone who lives in an area that you service (or can service) – and who has searched for a keyword that accurately matches your business.

How do you find this out? What can you do about it?

We’ll look at these issues next month!

(Haha – I feel like Eddie McGuire leaving people hanging during the ad break on Who Wants To Be a Millionaire!)

And if you can’t wait until next month for the answer – contact me to arrange an analysis of your website’s performance.

Why?

1. That particular page is likely to be themed towards that location, so someone searching for your business in a specific location will be more likely to find it via search engines
2. Finding your contact details is one of the main things visitors to your website will be trying to do. If you have this information neatly organised (and not hidden behind gimmicky forms), you give them a better experience, regardless of how they managed to get to your website in the first place
3. Even better – embed a location map on each page as well, so they can print it off and use it as a reference!

Really simple advice – but often overlooked.

• To tell people who you are
• To tell people how to contact you
• To reaffirm your brand
• To make it easy to ‘file’ you for future reference

What should your business card do?

• Inspire confidence
• Provide relevant, correct information
• Have a clear message – call me, contact me, email me!
• Save you money by getting happy clients to work for you…

How does your business card work?

The most important part to getting your card to work is to share it! Give your happy clients 2 or 3 cards and ask them to share those with people they know might require your service. If you clean carpets… if you design houses… if you fix cars… if you sell cars… encourage your happy clients to provide you with more happy clients!

Viral marketing, without the internet!

We know that we need the fundamental details like name, phone, email, address, web and possibly a short list (perhaps 4 points) of services/offerings.  That shouldn’t take up too much space, and if you have a double sided card, you could relocate some of the information to the reverse.

Make it easy for your clients or prospective clients to find the relevant information first – your name and contact. For the rest they can flip the card over.

What about the design? Although all of this is a personal choice, and depends on your sort of business, if we take a corporate or professional approach, here is one way to approach it:

1. How many fonts do you use?
2. How many colours?
3. How many elements?
4. How much contrast between colours?
5. How much rest or ‘white’ space do you need?
6. Do you need photos?

Let’s use Telstra as an example (seeing as everyone knows their brand) – this is how they use those 6 points:

1. One for all text and perhaps a second that is defined in the logo itself
2. Two
3. Logo and one item of branding
4. As much as possible
5. As much as possible
6. No!

If in doubt, use the ‘less is more’ tactic – and you will never have a design that is too busy.

So how do you make it successful? This very topic was discussed on a recent edition of BoagWorld, and I have summarised the main points here:

1. Your posts don’t have to be long. Only have a couple of paragraphs to write? That’s fine. (In fact, shorter posts may even be read by more people than longer posts.)
2. Keep a list of ideas. Often when it comes time to sit down and write, you struggle to come up with something. However, you’ll think of great ideas in the shower, or somewhere equally inconvenient. When you have that moment of inspiration, make a quick note of it somewhere. That way, when it’s time to write, you can just pull out that list and get started!
3. Vary the type of post you do. There’s a huge list of different ways you can attack your blog, including:
   1. Asking questions and inviting comments
   2. Doing an interview
   3. Case studies (don’t make it too self-congratulatory though – does it interest the reader?)
   4. Event reviews or previews
   5. Multimedia posts that include audio, video, or both
   6. Commentaries – posts that comment on something you have read elsewhere
   7. News – industry or sector news that would interest your reader
   8. Reviews – books, software, services, and so on
   9. Hints and tips – brief ones
   10. Tutorials – more in-depth
   11. Lists – everyone loves a top-10 list! (Don’t they?)
   12. Resources
   13. Predictions
   14. Debates – put forward opposing viewpoints and invite comments
4. Don’t be too critical of your writing. Obviously check it for spelling and grammar, but don’t be too much of a perfectionist or you’ll never publish anything!
5. Believe you have something of value to say! Even if you think everyone already knows what you’re writing, there is often value in getting a refresher. How often do you hear, “I already know it, but it was good to hear it again anyway.”

I may have to take some of this advice myself!