Retail businesses and their websites…

Over the years I’ve help a lot of small business owners get their web presence started. One of the biggest mistakes those business owners have been to setup a website with too much of a focus on “timely” content. When writing the content for a website, and more specifically a retail business, it’s important to write generically enough that your site doesn’t look old and outdated in a few months. Using phrases like “We’ve been a leader in water filtration and purification for the past 2 years” means …

Minimal shipping option for Amazon

I love Amazon.com (as many do), but I’ve been bothered for several years at the incredible waste from their shipping packaging. Now, I’m no tree-hugger, but I am a business person and it’s easy to deduce that there’s a significant cost to the boxes and packing paper and air-bags that get put in almost every box. Not to mention the cost of shipping a larger item. Every year Amazon ships tens of millions of packages – some big, some small… this idea is focused on the small items …

Social marketing and the small business…

It’s been a good five years since “social marketing” really took off in a big way. Big, no HUGE corporations use it in one way or another. It likely doesn’t help their bottom line, but Coca-Cola, Microsoft, NASA, General Electric and even Yahoo and Google use Facebook. So WHY don’t small businesses who actually NEED the help? The simple answer is: knowledge. Most (not all) small business owners are intelligent go-getters who want to succeed in their chosen area of commerce. Those in the retail sector should be …

Photo search

I collect FAR too many photos from the web… stuff I find interesting or of my favorites topics like Bodie, Walt Disney’s apartment, the Disneyland Railroad, history or movie and TV filming locations. Sometimes I get an email or see a photo that has no description or information, which used to make it nearly impossible to figure out what the photo is, or where it was taken. Well, Google has done it again. Their "Search by image" feature lets you find that image, or similar ones, without having …

Block domains from Google search results

If you have a Google / Gmail account and stay logged in, Google has provided a fantastic tool for blocking those websites or domains that never return anything good or trustworthy. Just follow these steps: Go to www.Google.com. Click the "Sign in" button at the top-right corner and sign in with your account. Go to http://www.google.com/reviews/t?hl=en In the first box, enter: http://wikipedia.org In the second box, enter your reason for blocking the site. Click the "Block site" button. Within a few hours no Wikipedia results will show up …

Goodbye Internet Explorer

My first job at Microsoft was working on Internet Explorer 4. Prior to that I had done technical support at Spry for their "Internet In A Box" product (before CompuServe bought them). Back then I used a flavor of the Mosaic browser (as did most everyone) and was pretty happy. IE4 was a dramatic change – and I say that as someone who was an expert at the time. It was faster, had more features and was an amazing piece of software. Since 1996 I have tried all …

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