1. iPhone 4G/HD

Rumored to be released at the Apple World Wide Developers Conference in San Francisco this week. Some of the features include Front and rear camera, new operating system, faster better, all the things that we have been wanting in the iPhone.

2. HP Slate

This device is set to be a great competitor to the iPad.

This upcoming slate computer will feature full Windows 7, flash, SD Card reader, Camera, everything you have on your laptop. Which is more than you can say for the iPad.

3. Fuji Finepix Real 3D W1 Digital Camera

Take 3D pictures from your digital camera, sounds great, but you need a 3D display to view them. Has potential, it is something we will watch in the future and let you know. This one could go the way of the laser disc before it begins.

4. Acer Liquid

Not the best source of information but if it proves true it could be a great entry for Acer into the smartphone arena. Loaded with Android it will be more featured than the iPhone and HTC.

Anyway, that’s just a quick round up of some of the upcoming tech for the second half of 2010. Stay tuned for more.

Firstly, I imagine that you are a standard computer user, that is, you don’t do high powered gaming or graphics and don’t need the meanest machine around. So you want, email, internet and facebook. Standard stuff. Lets take a look at the contenders.

Apple MacBook Pro 13″

• 2.4GHz or 2.66GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor with 3MB on-chip shared L2 cache
• 1066MHz frontside bus
• 4GB (two 2GB SO-DIMMs) of 1066MHz DDR3 memory; two SO-DIMM slots support up to 8GB
• 13.3-inch (diagonal) LED-backlit glossy widescreen display with support for millions of colours
• 250GB or 320GB 5400-rpm Serial ATA hard drive; optional 320GB or 500GB 5400-rpm hard drive, or 128GB, 256GB, or 512GB solid-state drive
• NVIDIA GeForce 320M graphics processor with 256MB of DDR3 SDRAM shared with main memory

MSI CX620 15.6″

• Intel® Core™ i5 Processor
• Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium
• Classic Cross-Hatch Design
• 15.6” 16:9 wide screen display
• LED power-saving backlight technology
• 802.11b/g/n Wireless LAN with Bluetooth
• HDMI (High-Definition Multimedia Interface) Output
• 250GB/320GB/500GB SATA

Ok so obviously I am not comparing apples with apples (no pun intended). But I did want to make a point. I have had an MSI laptop and they are FANTASTICALLY good machines. A brand you will not think of, but up there with the Toshiba’s for quality. No, I wanted to bring your attention to the Apple MacBook Pro range. I know that I am comparing similar computers here, the main differences being the Apple has a smaller screen and older processor, but it does have 4 times the ram and and better graphics card, these are the twp things that are going to matter to you for what you are going to be using the machine for. Secondly to performance, is weight, 13″ Apple ~2kg, MSI ~2.5kg. Not much but you can hold 2kg in one hand easily, and for a while, 2.5kg is just more.

The other main point that you may not be aware of is the life of the machine itself. I have a 7 year old Apple PowerBook G4. I can tell you that even today, it not only still looks modern, but it can handle all of the latest software easily. And you can expect the same from the MacBook Pro, not from the MSI.

Now to cost. Apple retail the 13″ at $1499.00, the MSI at $1225.00 from ITSDirect. While the Apple is $300 more, you will be grateful that you paid extra in 6 years when it is good as new and the MSI is long in the bin.

There are many more benefits of owning a Mac over a PC, jump over here to find out more.

In conclusion, just a thought, if you think that Apples are two expensive, consider the long term costs of owning one. They break down less, no viruses and will last the test of time. AND, if in 6 years you want to sell it you will likely get over 1/3 of your money back, unlike any PC where it is immediately worthless. They can do everything you can do on your PC and they are easier to use, why not consider one?

So what do we look for in a strong well planned logo? I offer a few keywords.

1. Beauty
2. Simplicity
3. Relevancy
4. Symmetry
5. Simplicity
6. Simplicity
7. and Simplicity

Let’s take a closer look.

Beauty

“Well,” you may think, “I designed my own logo in paint in my spare time, and I am really proud of it!” You are WRONG! It’s awful! Sorry to say that, but if you are an auto electrician and you fancy your self a marketing and branding expert, sorry, your not. You need a real professional to help you, someone who lives and breaths branding and design. You need someone to analyze your business and come up with a beautiful logo that represents your businesses identity.

Simplicity

There is no sense in having a beautiful logo if no one can understand it. Too much motion can really detract from a good design, it should be instantly recognizable and easily identifiable. Note: second use of the word Identity.

Relevancy

Well, obviously, if you are an auto electrician named Jims Electrical, a dancing clown is not a relevant logo, not an appropriate mascot. A good example is for you to look at 10 telecommunications logos. I guarantee that a good selection will show a common theme of connection and unity.

Symmetry

This one is very important, people can see balance, and if a logo is off balance it is not appealing. To get a good balance, imagine you can balance the logo on the tip of your finger, if it looks too heavy on one side it will not be balanced and fall off. Symmetry is crucial in good design.

And lastly, SIMPLICITY! No need to cover old ground, but for the love of god, KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid).

Well that is a small taste of what you need to have a good logo. I really recommend spending the extra bucks and having a professional design your logo. And like a quality wine, you get what you pay for. If it’s too cheap, you are at the wrong place. Look for a designer that can give you a full BRANDING package, not just a logo designer, as you will just get something pretty, but not something that speaks well of YOUR business.

Firstly, I will not be describing what Search Engine Optimization, or SEO, is. If you are interested jump over to our “Get Great Google Results in One Year“  page to read up.

SEO has been around for a few years now, longer than most sites have even lived on the internet, and all of them have some level of SEO applied to them. Most sites have their code tuned up at least once or twice a year. So what is going to happen when all of the sites on the internet are SEO-ed?

Imagine it, you are trying to optimize your site, a site that has been optimized many many times, and you can’t squeeze any more optimization-ness into it. So what do you do? You would have to invent some kind of SUPER-SEO to get a leg up on the regular SEO-ed sites on the internet, and only one site can be at the top of Google. So what that means is NONE of the sites on the internet are effectively SEO-ed and you start again from before SEO existed!

So you find yourself inventing a new industry, Super-SEO and you make a billion-trillion dollars. And eventually SUPER-SEO catches on that all sites eventually become SUPER-SEO-ed and then, AGAIN, none of the sites have any SEO. So you need to invent SUPER-SUPER-SEO… and it can go on again, and again, and again until the ends of time.

I have always believed that SEO is great for now, but it is an idea that just can’t last forever. It’s a flash in the pan, internet FAD and it can’t last. And the next internet billionaires who already know this are busy at work inventing the next big internet optimization or marketing fad, I call it SUPER-SEO!

So if you want to make a billion-zillion dollars get out your protractors and start thinking… SUPER-SEO!

Have a nice day!

While the phrases “New and Improved” and “There has never been a better time…” spring to mind when you are trying to be “creative” note how many times these have been used in advertising in the past.

The public today are looking for the B.B.D (Bigger, Better Deal), so how can you hope to compete in a market where your competitors are providing the B.B.D? The answer is simple. Be creative. These creative approaches may seem risky, however you have to be risky in business, why not in your advertising also. I am  not saying be insulting or offensive, but you need to WOW your audience, if not WOW, then at least give them something to think about or remember.

When you think of great advertising campaigns in the past which ones spring to mind? Is it Nike “Just Do It” campaign, THAT  ran in 1988 and we still remember it! How about “An apple a day keeps the Doctor away”? That was a campaign that ran in the 1900’s and it was advertising… you guessed it… Apples!

Looking back at great campaigns from history you soon see a pattern, they were all short catchy slogans, but beneath those slogans was a great product. And there is no point in advertising a sub standard product. But if you have a well polished and marketable product you need to be creative. Agencies are paid millions of dollars to think up simple ways to remember your product, the Nike “Just Do It” campaign was first created by Wieden & Kennedy in 1988, it was co founder Dan Wieden who first coined the phrase and now it is a part of history. Three simple words.

Which goes to show you how you don’t have to be fancy, just be creative!

Let me give you an example, we have a product called ActivCart, which is an e-commerce website program. We started out with a simple system and have gradually expanded it into a program that is used by some of the top online stores in Australia. Originally our “catch phrase” for ActivCart was “E-commerce systems”, however this was boring, unimaginative and uncreative. We needed to make a change. We conceptualized and trialed many variations but came up with the same results. So it was back to the drawing board. We needed to capture the essence of the program. We came up with a list of keywords, here was the top 3.

1. Smart
2. Simple
3. Easy

We looked at each of the words carefully, Smart was very accurate, not only was our software smart, but smart businesses were successfully running it.

When we looked at the word, simple, we needed to be very careful, we didn’t want people to think that the software was too simple and therefore not have the features people needed. Not only that it could have implied that the client needed to be simple to run it, again this was bad. So simple went out the window.

Easy was similar to Simple. However this was close to how to use the software, easy. But being creative we had to concede that the use of the word Easy was, frankly, overused and had lost its impact with the public.

So we had an adjective, now we needed something to represent how it, or we or they are smart. Again we looked at the options.

1. Think smart
2. It’s Smart
3. Go Smart

Think smart is used by another company, out it goes. It’s smart, well what is it’s, the software? No too confusing out it goes too.

Go smart was good, it was a call to action, Go, be smart or choose the smart product, Go smart was looking good and after discussing it further we settled on it. We now have a creative brand and a recognizable phrase to associate with it. So Go Smart – ActivCart is what we use in our adverting materials now. What we found was that it gave us the ability to stick into peoples minds. If you doubt it, see if you still remember it in an hour or a day.

So when you are working out your advertising costs next time, think of how your actual advertising is affecting your clients. A smart creative idea can mean the difference between remembrance and obscurity.

- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -

Nike Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nike,_Inc.

1. No flash for web browsing – To be confirmed, however in the Apple keynote address Steve Jobs demonstrates the Wall Street Journal website, which shows a space for a Flash ad which contains the familiar (for iPhone users) missing plugin icon.

2. No iSight camera (web cam) accessory sold separately. Users of the iMac or MacBook will know that all apple devices come with a camera of some sort.

3. No multi-tasking, unlike your beloved laptop that can burn a CD, browse the internet, download your photos off your camera, and check your emails, you will find the iPad is like the iPhone, and can only think about one thing at a time. So you will be having to stop what you are doing and change back and forth to get the job done.

Now all that aside, it is a beautiful device. And its size and portability look great. I honestly am contemplating one, but for me, I can’t justify it until I can think of a use for it. And as a web developer the limitations of not having flash in web browsing makes it a very limiting platform for online content. The same goes for playing games in Facebook, sorry, you won’t be able to, they are 99% all built in flash.

It should be very interesting what happens in the coming weeks before the product is available for sale, we should get a good idea as to who will buy and who will not. I would see a device like this being of great benefit to existing iPhone business users, it would expand the capabilities of what they are used to, without the limits of a small iPhone screen. And the integration with iCal, Address Book, Mail, iTunes and iPhoto means that everything you need on the device, be it, personal or business is at the, literal, tips of your fingers.

Just look at the thing, Apple designers have an eye for simplicity and beauty. All of their products, are clean and minimalist. Even with its limits, this device looks to be something quite impressive. I find myself, more and more, everyday, turning to my iMac, instead of my PC. Why do I do this? I look at my XP desktop and feel like I am stuck back at the turn of the millennium again, before the berth of Facebook. Sitting in front of my iMac or Macbook Pro makes me feel cooler, and more special.

For good measure here are the technical specifications of the iPad.

• .7-inch (diagonal) LED-backlit glossy widescreen Multi-Touch display with IPS technology
• 1024-by-768-pixel resolution at 132 pixels per inch (ppi)
• Fingerprint-resistant oleophobic coating
• 6GB, 32GB, or 64GB flash drive
• 1GHz Apple A4 custom-designed, high-performance, low-power system-on-a-chip
• Built-in 25 Whr rechargeable lithium-polymer battery
• Up to 10 hours of surfing the web on Wi-Fi, watching video, or listening to music
• Charging via power adapter or USB to computer system
• Accelerometer
• Ambient light sensor
• Wi-Fi (802.11a/b/g/n)
• Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR technology
• 3G (optional)

Read the full specifications of the iPad here.

We will have to wait and see if the iPad is iGood or an iDud. But until then we can just sit back and start saving for the day they are launched.

More information to come, in the mean time check it out and decide for yourself, the Apple iPad, iGood or iDud?

In another post google as a Black Box Giacomo proposed that we talk too much theory and not enough application of it. So, lets skip the theory and get to what I know works from time proven methods on google. I know the following system works 100% of the time with google to attain rankings across a wide range of keywords. This is what I do with clients to build a successful site and has worked every time. The level of success will depend largely on the subject matter, it’s potential audience, and it’s level of competition on the net.
The following will build a successful site in 1 years time via google alone. It can be done faster if you are a real go getter, or everyones favorite a self starter.

A) Prep work and begin building content. Long before the domain name is settled on, start putting together notes to build at least a 100 page site. That’s just for openers. That’s 100 pages of real content, as opposed to link pages, resource pages, about/copyright/tos…etc eg: fluff pages.

B) Domain name:
Easily brandable. You want “google.com” and not “mykeyword.com”. Keyword domains are out – branding and name recognition are in – big time in. The value of keywords in a domain name have never been less to se’s. Learn the lesson of “goto.com” becomes “Overture.com” and why they did it. It’s one of the most powerful gut check calls I’ve ever seen on the internet. That took serious resolve and nerve to blow away several years of branding. (that is a whole ‘nother article, but learn the lesson as it applies to all of us).

C) site Design:
The simpler the better. Rule of thumb: text content should out weight the html content. The pages should validate and be usable in everything from Lynx to leading edge browsers. eg: keep it close to html 3.2 if you can. Spiders are not to the point they really like eating html 4.0 and the mess that it can bring. Stay away from heavy: flash, dom, java, java script. Go external with scripting languages if you must have them – there is little reason to have them that I can see – they will rarely help a site and stand to hurt it greatly due to many factors most people don’t appreciate (search engines distaste for js is just one of them).
Arrange the site in a logical manner with directory names hitting the top keywords you wish to hit.
You can also go the other route and just throw everything in root (this is rather controversial, but it’s been producing good long term results across many engines).
Don’t clutter and don’t spam your site with frivolous links like “best viewed” or other counter like junk. Keep it clean and professional to the best of your ability.

Learn the lesson of google itself – simple is retro cool – simple is what surfers want.

Speed isn’t everything, it’s almost the only thing. Your site should respond almost instantly to a request. If you get into even 3-4 seconds delay until “something happens” in the browser, you are in long term trouble. That 3-4 seconds response time may vary for site destined to live in other countries than your native one. The site should respond locally within 3-4 seconds (max) to any request. Longer than that, and you’ll lose 10% of your audience for every second. That 10% could be the difference between success and not.

The pages:

D) Page Size:
The smaller the better. Keep it under 15k if you can. The smaller the better. Keep it under 12k if you can. The smaller the better. Keep it under 10k if you can – I trust you are getting the idea here. Over 5k and under 10k. Ya – that bites – it’s tough to do, but it works. It works for search engines, and it works for surfers. Remember, 80% of your surfers will be at 56k or even less.

E) Content:
Build one page of content and put online per day at 200-500 words. If you aren’t sure what you need for content, start with the Overture keyword suggester and find the core set of keywords for your topic area. Those are your subject starters.

F) Density, position, yada…
Simple old fashioned seo from the ground up.
Use the keyword once in title, once in description tag, once in a heading, once in the url, once in bold, once in italic, once high on the page, and hit the density between 5 and 20% (don’t fret about it). Use good sentences and speel check it  Spell checking is becoming important as se’s are moving to auto correction during searches. There is no longer a reason to look like you can’t spell (unless you really are phonetically challenged).

G) Outbound Links:
From every page, link to one or two high ranking sites under that particular keyword. Use your keyword in the link text (this is ultra important for the future).

H) insite Cross links.
(cross links in this context are links within the same site)
Link to on topic quality content across your site. If a page is about food, then make sure it links it to the apples and veggies page. Specifically with google, on topic cross linking is very important for sharing your pr value across your site. You do NOT want an “all star” page that out performs the rest of your site. You want 50 pages that produce 1 referral each a day and do NOT want 1 page that produces 50 referrals a day. If you do find one page that drastically out produces the rest of the site with google, you need to off load some of that pr value to other pages by cross linking heavily. It’s the old share the wealth thing.

I) Put it Online.
Don’t go with virtual hosting – go with a stand alone ip.
Make sure the site is “crawlable” by a spider. All pages should be linked to more than one other page on your site, and not more than 2 levels deep from root. Link the topic vertically as much as possible back to root. A menu that is present on every page should link to your sites main “topic index” pages (the doorways and logical navigation system down into real content).
Don’t put it online before you have a quality site to put online. It’s worse to put a “nothing” site online, than no site at all. You want it flushed out from the start.

Go for a listing in the ODP. If you have the budget, then submit to Looksmart and Yahoo. If you don’t have the budget, then try for a freebie on Yahoo (don’t hold your breath).

J) Submit
Submit the root to: google, Fast, Altavista, WiseNut, (write Teoma), DirectHit, and Hotbot. Now comes the hard part – forget about submissions for the next six months. That’s right – submit and forget.

K) Logging and Tracking:
Get a quality logger/tracker that can do justice to inbound referrals based on log files (don’t use a lame graphic counter – you need the real deal). If your host doesn’t support referrers, then back up and get a new host. You can’t run a modern site without full referrals available 24×7×365 in real time.

L) Spiderlings:
Watch for spiders from se’s. Make sure those that are crawling the full site, can do so easily. If not, double check your linking system (use standard hrefs) to make sure the spider found it’s way throughout the site. Don’t fret if it takes two spiderings to get your whole site done by google or Fast. Other se’s are pot luck and doubtful that you will be added at all if not within 6 months.

M) Topic directories.
Almost every keyword sector has an authority hub on it’s topic. Go submit within the guidelines.

N) Links
Look around your keyword sector in googles version of the ODP. (this is best done AFTER getting an odp listing – or two). Find sites that have links pages or freely exchange links. Simply request a swap. Put a page of on topic, in context links up your self as a collection spot.
Don’t freak if you can’t get people to swap links – move on. Try to swap links with one fresh site a day. A simple personal email is enough. Stay low key about it and don’t worry if site Z won’t link with you – they will – eventually they will.

O) Content.
One page of quality content per day. Timely, topical articles are always the best. Try to stay away from to much “bloggin” type personal stuff and look more for “article” topics that a general audience will like. Hone your writing skills and read up on the right style of “web speak” that tends to work with the fast and furious web crowd.

Lots of text breaks – short sentences – lots of dashes – something that reads quickly.

Most web users don’t actually read, they scan. This is why it is so important to keep low key pages today. People see a huge overblown page by random, and a portion of them will hit the back button before trying to decipher it. They’ve got better things to do that waste 15 seconds (a stretch) at understanding your whiz bang flash menu system. Because some big support site can run flashed out motorhead pages, that is no indication that you can. You don’t have the pull factor they do.

Use headers, and bold standout text liberally on your pages as logical separators. I call them scanner stoppers where the eye will logically come to rest on the page.

P) Gimmicks.
Stay far away from any “fades of the day” or anything that appears spammy, unethical, or tricky. Plant yourself firmly on the high ground in the middle of the road.

Q) Link backs
When YOU receive requests for links, check the site out before linking back with them. Check them through google and their pr value. Look for directory listings. Don’t link back to junk just because they asked. Make sure it is a site similar to yours and on topic.

R) Rounding out the offerings:
Use options such as Email-a-friend, forums, and mailing lists to round out your sites offerings. Hit the top forums in your market and read, read, read until your eyes hurt you read so much.
Stay away from “affiliate fades” that insert content on to your site.

S) Beware of Flyer and Brochure Syndrome
If you have an ecom site or online version of bricks and mortar, be careful not to turn your site into a brochure. These don’t work at all. Think about what people want. They aren’t coming to your site to view “your content”, they are coming to your site looking for “their content”. Talk as little about your products and yourself as possible in articles (raise eyebrows…yes, I know).

T) Build one page of content per day.
Head back to the Overture suggestion tool to get ideas for fresh pages.

U) Study those logs.
After 30-60 days you will start to see a few referrals from places you’ve gotten listed. Look for the keywords people are using. See any bizarre combinations? Why are people using those to find your site? If there is something you have over looked, then build a page around that topic. Retro engineer your site to feed the search engine what it wants.
If your site is about “oranges”, but your referrals are all about “orange citrus fruit”, then you can get busy building articles around “citrus” and “fruit” instead of the generic “oranges”.
The search engines will tell you exactly what they want to be fed – listen closely, there is gold in referral logs, it’s just a matter of panning for it.

V) Timely Topics
Nothing breeds success like success. Stay abreast of developments in your keyword sector. If big site “Z” is coming out with product “A” at the end of the year, then build a page and have it ready in October so that search engines get it by December. eg: go look at all the Xbox and XP sites in google right now – those are sites that were on the ball last summer.

W) Friends and Family
Networking is critical to the success of a site. This is where all that time you spend in forums will pay off. pssst: Here’s the catch-22 about forums: lurking is almost useless. The value of a forum is in the interaction with your fellow colleagues and cohorts. You learn long term by the interaction – not by just reading.
Networking will pay off in link backs, tips, email exchanges, and it will put you “in the loop” of your keyword sector.

X) Notes, Notes, Notes
If you build one page per day, you will find that brain storm like inspiration will hit you in the head at some magic point. Whether it is in the shower (dry off first), driving down the road (please pull over), or just parked at your desk, write it down! 10 minutes of work later, you will have forgotten all about that great idea you just had. Write it down, and get detailed about what you are thinking. When the inspirational juices are no longer flowing, come back to those content ideas. It sounds simple, but it’s a life saver when the ideas stop coming.

Y) Submission check at six months
Walk back through your submissions and see if you got listed in all the search engines you submitted to after six months. If not, then resubmit and forget again. Try those freebie directories again too.

Z) Build one page of quality content per day.
Starting to see a theme here? google loves content, lots of quality content. Broad based over a wide range of keywords. At the end of a years time, you should have around 400 pages of content. That will get you good placement under a wide range of keywords, generate recip links, and overall position your site to stand on it’s own two feet.

Do those 26 things, and I guarantee you that in ones years time you will call your site a success. It will be drawing between 500 and 2000 referrals a day from search engines. If you build a good site with an average of 4 to 5 pages per user, you should be in the 10-15k page views per day range in one years time. What you do with that traffic is up to you, but that is more than enough to “do something” with.

Well, firstly… the internet marketplace has never been stronger, it seems one of the only places that the GFC has not yet touched. In spite of the dire predictions of lower consumer spending, there seems to be a steady trend of “spend, spend, spend” on the internet, and eCommerce is a strong internet platform to sell. Naturally you are interested on how you can capitalize on this seemingly limitless technology. Well it is not as hard as you think. It is not something I like to do, however I would like to talk for a second about our eCommerce application ActivCart.

We are planning a huge product launch very soon, the new version 4 system is like nothing we have released previously. We are talking a complete ground up rebuild, with new and easier ways to integrate it into any website. Plus a HUGE suite of new features, including Order Management, Reporting, Sales Reports, GST Reports, Email Marketing, Live Chat, Event Viewer and much more to name a few. This new system is something that can get you up and running very quickly, whether you have a website or not.

Now that the gratuitous sales pitch is out of the way we can focus on how you can get a leg up on the world of ebusiness.

Advertising
Ok, you have heard all this before. But internet advertising is one of the strongest and most proven methods to get results there is. You can get up and running within minutes and start drawing traffic immediately.

Search Engine Optimization
SEO is something that goes hand in hand with internet advertising. Unlike internet advertising, this is a means to an end. SEO can give you much free traffic to your site, which allows you to reduce your marketing spend and increase your bottom line.

Blogs
These are very interesting, it is something that practically started overnight, however blog writing is something you can get into, it is an enjoyable past time and if you are good at it, you can earn a little money on the site writing for other blogs on the internet (as a side note: I am available to write for anyone interested!!! ) These are also great for SEO, drawing quality traffic to your site, which in turn leads to higher sales.

And there are many more methods to get started. Without giving away too many trade secrets, we have a very proven method for getting started in a competitive market.

And secondly… the internet is an evolving being, constantly changing, what is popular today may not be tomorrow, for example, who uses MySpace anymore? It’s all Twitter and Facebook, but who knows what it will be in 2010. It could be you. If you are interested in getting started in an online business we have a very proven method to get up and running. You can contact us here.

There has never been a better time to get started with your own online ebusiness. It is cheap and there is a client base out there on the internet, no matter what you are offering, someone is looking for it. What are you waiting for?

Why is building client communities important for business? Simply, it puts you and your client on a level playing field. It gives them the feeling of being a part of a community of like minded people. For example if you are a fan of our work, you can look on our new FaceBook Fan Page here. We are currently building our own client network, based on our research the clients who are involved in your business are the ones with a passion for it. And those people are the ones that are loyal if you treat them right. And social networking can help.

So where do you start?
Firstly you want to find out where your potential clients are “hanging out” online? Facebook is a good place to start. And it can’t hurt to ask some of your clients if they are on Facebook or MySpace. This will give you an idea of your client bases online activities, and help you decide where you need to target your social networking. But you have to give them something, if you are giving away free samples, try offering them to people who are fans on your Facebook page, if you are good at writing quality content  blogs that your clients would be wiling to read, then get a few of these pre-written so you can start your social networking with a few well written pieces.

For the purposes of this article, we will assume that Facebook is your chosen method. With Facebook, you can create pages, and your clients can become fans of the page. A page is basically a regular Facebook profile page, however it can be for practically any purpose. Have a look at our Facebook Page here.

How will this increase your bottom line? Well, basically if your clients are involved in these pages, they will be more likely to remember your brand and message.

It may sound like a lot of work, but it only takes 30 minutes every couple of days, and you do want to keep it updated, people keep coming back to see the latest content or offerings, so keeping things up to date is the most important thing.

In almost all cases doing this costs only time so give it a go, find a social media outlet and get interacting with your people. It just might be the best thing you can do for your business.

Well lately Apple has been doing things quite right, while Vista was being such a headache for mainstream PC users, Apple was busy making sure that you don’t have the same problems on a Mac, and you don’t, seriously. Are you concerned about viruses? No need on a Mac.

If you have been one of the unlucky many to be caught by a virus on your PC over the years fear not, Apple computers don’t get them, and that means less stress, less worry and less expense in Anti-Virus software. I have both Mac’s and PC’s and one of the best things about them is the fact that you can browse and download emails in confidence that you are not going to open a nasty one that will delete all your data, eat all the food out of your fridge, leave drinks on your coffee table without a coaster, make long distance phone calls on your phone and leave the toilet seat up!

So let’s say that you buy one, okay so what if something goes wrong? Well, I have had experience with that too. One of the keyboards stopped working on some of the keys, while this is a major problem for workflow, I was straight on the phone with support, who easily helped my try to diagnose the problem, when one could not be found the support tech dispatched a new keyboard. All I had to do was put the old one back in the box the new one came in and send it back, free of charge. And it was a fast turn around AND I could track it all online. Pretty neat huh?

One of the things I need in business is Microsoft Office, you need Word and you need Outlook, so you want Office and guess what, you can, Office:mac is Word, Powerpoint, Excel and Outlook (although they do not call it Outlook in the mac version it is called Entourage). So taking your word documents to a mac is definately do-a-ble!

The operating system is stable, compatible and bug free, are you hearing me Vista users! It is very intuitive to use and you can’t really make a mistake with the system, one of the nice things is that it can think for you, now that may sound scary, but it’s not. All the scary configuration that you need to go through on a PC aren’t available to break on a mac, while they are there for advanced users to find, people who are playing in the control panel can’t do any lasting damage to the system, and a fix is as simple as turning the off switch that you were messing with back to the on position.

So I would expect at this point you are at least considering buying one? Am I wrong? Well if you are and I am not wrong, you will probably be interested in some of the cool new features that the new iMacs are sporting. Firstly, the screen, Apple claim that the point of the design of an iMac is to show off the display, and this is true, they are so minimalistic, it is just a screen, with an Apple logo! But it is a nice screen and the new ones are now 21.5″ and 27″ wide screens. With very high resolution. The other new features are the fact that they now come with a wireless keyboard and mouse, now interestingly they come with a very weird wireless keyboard, it has no numberpad on the right, which is a little annoying when you use it. That was a bizzare choice for Apple  if you ask me.

But they have made it up by giving us a new toy, a magic mouse. Spooky!!!! No not really, however it claims to be the most intuitive mouse you can have, instead of click buttons the entire top surface of the mouse is touch sensitive, which means you can click, scroll and do plenty more, by just rubbing your fingers across the surface.

Another good feature that isn’t really a feature is the fact that it is the entire computer, I have moved mine dozens of times, the reason I do this is because I can, there is literally two cords that go into the back. Which means its a simple matter of unplugging the power cable and your off. Brilliant!

It also plugs straight into your iPhone or iPod with no dramas at all. So no hunting for drivers or downloading software, it just works. And that is the best feature of all, it just works. It is pretty to look at, is a talking point with friends and it just works. What more could you want, and they are more affordable than you may think.

There you go, they are quite good, oh and you can run word on them, or Windows, if you are so inclined. Just have a play with one for a while, if you are not entirely confident using a computer, I bet that after an hour of playing with one, you will get the hang of it, they are simple intuitive, pretty and safe, all the things you want and need. Now that Windows7 is out it will be interesting to see if the frustrated masses will stay loyal to Microsoft or defect to the dark side?

Who knows? Only time will tell…