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Category: amazon

Do You Have A Business GOOGLE Plus Page?


Wednesday February 22, 2012

Reading Time: 5 minutes

Do you have a business Google Plus page? A number of our clients have inquired about setting up a Google+ page for their businesses.  We have been trying to stay abreast of this new social media arena and for a couple of months I have been gathering article links to share with our clients. (You can see these and more below.) But in the meantime…

First: Watch A Short Video from GOOGLE

 Second: Check Out Useful Print Screens of How to Start Creating Your Business Google Plus Page

google business
On your GOOGLE+ home page look for the “Create a Google+ Page in the right margin and CLICK

 







create google business page
Pick a Category and get started

Third: Consider Buying Chris Brogan’s Latest Book
Now you are probably thinking this might be strange advice. But consider this: Chris’ latest book is “Google+ for Business: How Google’s Social Network Changes Everything” and according to the McClatchy-Tribune News Service Chris Brogan’s book is one of the top 25 books that Corporate America is reading.  Go ahead and visit Amazon, (not an affiliate link) you can read reviews and/or buy the paperback book, the Kindle Edition or an audible Audio Edition. Here’s why I think you will find Chris’ book helpful:

  • If you read Chris’s blog, then you already know he is a good writer. His writing is interesting, but at the same time easy to follow.
  • We have introduced you to Chris many times here at Webconsuls.  Chris should not be a stranger to you.

Fourth: Enjoy A Video of Chris Discussing GOOGLE+ For Business 

Ok, this is our full report.  We hope you find all of this information helpful.  Remember, as a business owner you really need to understand and manage this social media platform for yourself.  Only you can tell your story…

Would love to read your comments…

Reading Time: 5 minutes
books
Judy’s new books to read! Trust Agents and Social Media 101

If you read this blog regularly then you already know that I have written on many occasions about my Twitter sentiments. To help you enjoy my evolution I will link to the related blogs at the end of this post. But today I thought I would take a few minutes and share with you what I gained from tweeting over the past 10 days or so, as I am sure you want to know what’s happening on Twitter. Am I right?

  • I follow Rick Klau. Rick is the manager of BLOGGER. Get it? By following Rick I knew real time when the Blogger migration tool had been released. “rklau FTP Migration tool launching tonight. Details on http://blogger-ftp.blogspot.com/ and in your dashboard later this evening.” I re-tweeted this message so that my Webconsuls’ team members would get the news real time, March 3, 2010, 4:52PM. Why is this important? Many of our customers have blogs and are impacted by this migration tool. We are now working behind the scenes to update their blogs.
  • I told you a while ago I follow Chris Brogan. Both Chris and Rick, and a few others that I follow, are at the SXSW Conference this week. Looks interesting. I would not really know anything about this if I hadn’t been following Chris and Rick. Let me know what you think.
  • The other day Chris Brogan tweeted @chrisbrogan Don’t forget to try the Video Marketing Quiz. Tweet your score, win a prize! #VMQ10. So I took the quiz. Guess what? I won a $20 Amazon Gift Certificate and now eyeview_inc is following me!
  • I think you know that Chris Brogan has written two books. I have been wanting to buy them, but have not gotten around to it. So I decided to take my $20 Amazon gift certificate and buy both books, get free shipping…I only had to chip in $11.30. I tweeted about it and Chris Brogan re-tweeted my tweet and so did EyeView_Inc. Books arrived Saturday, so I am ready to read. Trust Agents and Social Media 101.
  • Here is some other interesting news I picked up by following Rick Klau. On March 11th Blogger announced a new Blogger Template designer. The reviews so far have been very exciting. I am thinking of trying it to create a new personal blog. What do you think of that idea?

So you see, my tweeting has helped our clients, Webconsuls’ team, and me. The more I learn the more I can share.

JUST LIVING is not ENOUGH said THE BUTTERFLY, ONE MUST HAVE SUNSHINE, FREEDOM and a LITTLE FLOWER.”…Hans Christian Andersen.

You can enjoy our March 13th trip to the Tucson Botanical Garden where we met real butterflies and enjoyed some freedom!

Reading Time: 3 minutes

Most of us have used the opinions of strangers to guide us. Maybe we crossed a movie off a list because we saw a bad review on television or went to a new restaurant based on a review we read in the newspaper. The Internet lets us all be reviewers and almost anything can be reviewed. You can rate books on amazon.com, local businesses on yelp.com and DUI attorneys at gotdui.com. And you can use those sites, and countless others to help you chose a book, a restaurant, or a lawyer.

Of course, any review is subjective. For example, The Lost Symbol, Dan Brown’s latest book, has over 1400 reviews, almost 500 of which are positive and about 650 are negative. Also, the quality of service at any business can vary. So before trusting a review, read carefully.

If you own a business, you need to understand that your next customer might review his or her experience on the Internet. Just as bad reviews in the New York press can doom a Broadway show, then a bad report can seriously hurt a business.

How do you combat the bad reviews? The first thing to do is to try to not get them. Be on top of game as much as possible. If you see that a customer is dissatisfied, try to find out why and do something to satisfy them. Be honest in your advertising so that customers don’t expect one thing and get another.

The second thing is to try to get good reviews. Encourage your satisfied customers. Publicize your good reviews and their sources.

Here are ten other things you should consider.

Reading Time: 8 minutes
woodstock poster

So here we are with another one of those 40th anniversary Saturdays. Were you at Woodstock 1969? I am going to save you a lot of reading time. I was not at Woodstock 1969, but you all know I am old enough to have been there. It so happens that Woodstock took place in Bethel, New York, and at that time I lived in San Diego, California. I couldn’t travel to New York; I had to go to work every day for Wells Fargo Bank. But all this aside I would like to take just a few minutes today to honor the memory of Woodstock and, yes, I do have a friend who was at Woodstock and indeed performed at Woodstock!

We all either knew about the music festival or soon learned about it when 500,000 people showed up and the media decided to pay attention, most of us could not really appreciate the magnitude of this festival until the Academy Award Winning documentary “Woodstock”* was released March 26, 1970 (this film has been remastered and re-released in June 2009 to celebrate the 40th anniversary). Keep in mind the average 20 year old could not easily travel to New York State for a three day festival. There was no way to purchase tickets on-line or even by phone, in fact according to Wikipedia, the “ticket sales were limited to record stores in the greater New York City area, or by mail via a Post Office Box at the Radio City Station Post Office located in Midtown Manhattan.”

woodstock movieOver the years I have often thought back to that weekend. I remember sitting in the clubhouse of my apartment complex in the Hollywood Hills. It was then 1977 and in walked Richie Havens and he sat down next to me and introduced himself. Wow! Who will forget Richie Havens singing “Freedom”? But much later, actually around 2002, I had the pleasure of meeting Dallas Taylor. You might remember Dallas. He was the drummer for Crosby, Stills and Nash (CSN) and yes, he played at Woodstock. Dallas authored a book Prisoner of Woodstock. As mentioned on Amazon, Taylor provided the backbeat for some of the brightest stars of the Sixties and Seventies, most notably Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young, with whom he performed at Woodstock. For more than 25 years Dallas has  spent his time helping others find recovery. Last summer, Dennis and I enjoyed seeing Crosby, Stills and Nash on their Summer 2008 tour. It was quite the evening sitting in an open air arena with our oldest son, Aaron, enjoying great music and memories.

Prisoner tells two tales: one of Taylor’s successes and failures in the rock music business, and the other of his struggle with drug addiction.” Dallas has been our friend and client for many years and now with almost 25 years of sobriety Dallas continues to work with the music industry with Music Cares.

I have one more anecdote about Woodstock. I opened this blog by telling you I was not there, but I actually knew someone who was there; however, I also know someone who lived in New York City at the time, was 20 years old, had tickets to Woodstock, started the drive to Bethel and when he got stuck in traffic he decided to turn around and go home! (Of course, this may be an urban legend, but this person is Dennis’ first cousin.)

Sit back, take a break, rent the movie or in the meantime I invite you to watch a YouTube video of CSN Woodstock 1969

If you are having trouble viewing the video, you can see it here.

*Roger Ebert once said: “Woodstock is a beautiful, moving, ultimately great film. It seemed to signal the beginning of something. Maybe it signaled the end. Somebody told me the other day that the 1960s has “failed.” Failed at what? They certainly didn’t fail at being the 1960s. Now that the period is described as a far-ago time like “the 1920s” or “the 1930s,” how touching it is in this film to see the full flower of its moment, of its youth and hope. The decade began with the election of John F. Kennedy and ended as the last bedraggled citizens of Woodstock Nation slogged off the muddy field and thumbed a ride into a future that would seem, to many of them, mostly downhill.”

 

 

Any thoughts?
Reading Time: 3 minutes

This holiday season the ‘recession’ we are all hearing about and probably feeling too made this year’s retail sales fall as expected- except for Amazon who recorded a record year in sales. How could this be? The Washington Times is reporting that holiday sales was the worst this year in 40 years. This is major!

Amazon’s shares went up about 4% due to record traffic and sales. The online retailer rose 17% from a year ago. But how could this be during a recession when just about everyone else is dropping prices and making deals to lure in customers and still are having a tough time.
The online avenue of reaching customers is as efficient as ever not only in online sales, but in reaching who and what you are looking for effectively. The ability to search and buy online is not affected by weather and ‘deals’ are made and changed instantly. Service-based businesses similarly have the same controls and lack of limitations. Searching who provides a service well, closest to my house can be done without making phone calls or burning gas.
In this tough time, businesses need an extra push to get themselves that extra exposure. Webconsuls has customized solutions for every business model. We pride ourselves in adapting our methods to your goals. Contact us and start up a relationship that will build your business online, where clearly Amazon has proved is the place to succeed even in this tough market.
Reading Time: 11 minutes

What is a Kindle?

A Kindle is an portable reading device which connects to the internet. The Kindle can download books, blogs, magazines and newspapers wirelessly.

I enjoy playing with new devices and having worked with DAISY books, a digital format created for accessibility purposes, I was very curious about this product from Amazon. The following is a list of pros and cons from my user experience. It is not an exhaustive list but one from my direct experience with the device.

What the Kindle Excels at:

  • The Kindle is great if you like to burn through lots of paperback books and general reading material. Paperback novels, books with very few illustration and not too much organizational formatting are ideal for this device.
  • The Kindle is the ideal device to use for casual reading while traveling. When I do occasionally travel I never know what book I am going to want to read. A Kindle enables you to have over 200 titles and only one 10.3 ounce device to carry.
  • Kindle books are generally cheaper than their traditional version. Best Sellers and New Releases are $9.99 unless marked otherwise. Currently 105 of the 112 New York Times Best Sellers are available on Kindle.
  • The Kindle is very immediate. You can download a novel from the online store in seconds and be reading. Finish the book you brought, visit the Kindle store right from your device and pick a new read. Amazon was not being foolish when they enabled this device with full time internet access.
  • Want to take a peak at a book. One of my favorite treats with the Kindle is being able to download the first chapter of any Kindle version for free. You have a sample of the book to try before you buy.
  • Kindle books are saved and could be made available if you ever accidentally erased or lost your Kindle.
  • The Kindle is a wireless internet device with no monthly fee. You can access your email, your social networks and browse the internet all from your Kindle.
  • You can subscribe to newpapers, magazines, and blogs and have them delivered to your Kindle.
  • A built in dictionary looks up words with a push of a button. I love this feature and wish I had it when I read the book “All the Pretty Horses” by Cormac McCarthy.
  • The Kindle is also a full encycolpedia. Access to Wikipedia.org, your online encyclopedia, comes with your Kindle.
  • An easy to read screen which excels in the elements, especially bright sun and wind.The Kindle’s screen is “electronic paper” and does not glow like a computer monitor. The screen of a Kindle is more like the etch-a-sketch of the my childhood. The “digital ink” is magnetic. The electronic ink is easy on the eyes and reads well even in direct sunlight. Reading the humongous and unweily New York Times in a slight breeze is much easier on the Kindle.
  • The text size is adjustable.

Drawback that I found

Sharing
The downside is that if you are accustomed to sharing your paperbacks with other readers you can’t really lend or trade your Kindle books as you would a dogeared paperback.

Diagrams
The Kindle is not great for books which contain diagrams. I read a lot of “how to” books. The most recent book I purchased was on photography. I would never even considered buying the Kindle version as the color photographs and illustrations would not be shown full size or in color. Computer instruction and technical books don’t render well for the same reason.

A book in the hand …
When I start a book I read all the front material, the table of contents, all the back material, then I start the book. A Kindle book will display all the same material but it just never feels as easily contained as a book in your hands. Call me old fashioned but I do find comfort in that tangable property of books.

Availability
Not everything has a Kindle version at the moment. There are more than 190,000 titles. You should be able to find something.

Can Kindles replace books?

Kindles and electronic devices can create digital copies of the text in books. Where the representation of the straight text is all you need the Kindle serves its function well. Will it replace books? Not in my lifetime and not for me.

There are the books that you carry around from childhood. I lost my original copy of my beloved book “Happy Horsemanship”. A copy of my favorite book on the Kindle would be a poor substitute. There are the books you have given to you by your parents. My copy of “Collected Poems of Emily Dickinson”, the inside cover contains my Mother’s handwriting “to Lisa, Love Mom and Dad, Christmas 1984” or “My Dog Skip” given to me by a friend and past student are not only stories but mementos. Another favorite and useful book never far from my desk “Reader’s Digest Family Word Finder”, a thesaurus of sorts, but one that is actually intuitive and immediate to use. I have turned to this resource for help since junior high school. Paging through this reference that I have had for so many years, even the breaks in the binding serve as bookmarks to pages I have referenced repeatedly. Kindles can’t do that.

On the other hand … I can’t access my email with my copy of Emily Dickinson.

There are books you will keep forever. There are books you want to touch and pour over. There are books you want to just consume with one read. The Kindle is for the later.

In my opinion and experience the ideal Kindle candidate is one of two people, a traveling bookworm who frequents the best seller section and devours newspapers and/or the gadget infatuated individual who will thrive on squeezing every functionality they can out of an internet device that happens to also read books.

Will you buy a kindle for a gift … well not right now because they are currently sold out. There are Kindles available for resale on ebay, but some of those are asking for as much as twice the retail prices. OUCH!

Reading Time: 2 minutes

HAPPY CYBER MONDAY! 

Hope you all had a safe trip to Grams house and a Healthy Happy Thanksgiving. Did you find all the best deals on Black Friday? Because Today, Monday December 1st, is the first day back to work after Black Friday. All across America wallets are opened and credit cards are being removed. Current estimates say that 56% of workers with internet access, 70+ million people, will spend more time today shopping online than working.

CyberMonday was born.

Do you need something for your Kindle?  Today sites like Amazon will offer deep discounts and see Cyber Monday traffic increases up to 26%.

So if you missed your new LCD or PLASMA deal on Friday you get a second chance today!

Looking for more Cyber Monday Deals? Don’t forget to check out CyberMonday.com

Now to find that perfect gift for Lisa McClure…

Reading Time: 8 minutes

Earlier this month, you might remember, I visited Amherst, MA, for homecoming weekend at Amherst College. During that weekend Dennis and I took a side trip to Hampshire College to visit the National Yiddish Book Center. How and why we came to make this side trip is a story for another day, but suffice it to say we were awe struck as we parked our car and strolled into this incredible center. We were welcomed into the center and invited to watch a short video on the history of the National Yiddish Book Center. The words of the narrator were both comforting and chilling: “Throughout their long history, Jews have turned to books as a ‘portable homeland’, the repository of collective memory and culture.” What struck me about this statement is while it is true for Jews, I think it is also true for most people. That is, our books ground us as we move from place to place, from home to home. Looking back on my adult life, I have always treasured my books and I have never felt quite settled in a new home (whether it be a college dorm, a new apartment or a spacious house) until the books are gently set in a place of honor. It is not that I keep re-reading these books, but the fact that they are present in my home makes me feel settled.

My books are a conglomeration of novels, history, memoirs, poetry…many were gifts from friends and family or simply passed to me from my parents over the years. I have packed these books so many times over my adult life, at least 16 times, that each time it has become a ritual to hold the books, dust them and then quietly set them on a shelf…”just in case”. They represent a part of my life’s history. What I particularly love to do is read the personal inscriptions that many of them hold, written by people that have touched my life.

A few months ago I was riding in a car with Darin and Lisa McClure and Lisa reached into her purse and retrieved a new “gadget.” I asked her about it and she cheerfully extolled the virtues of her Kindle, Amazon’s wireless reading device. According to Amazon this is “a convenient, portable reading device with the ability to wirelessly download books, blogs, magazines, and newspapers.” I could see that the device was all of those things, but what about the book? In other words, what about the essence of the book itself: Buying the book, reading the book, holding the book, referring back to the book, sharing the book, and giving it a place of honor on your book shelf? What about the “dust cover(s)”? Here is how this new “reading” works. First you buy the Kindle for about $360. Then there is the download purchase vs the traditional purchase. For example, in 2005 Doris Kearns Goodwin wrote Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln. If you purchase the hardcover version of this book it will run about $35, the softcover version is about $21 and the Amazon Kindle version is $9.99. You can learn more about the Kindle by watching this YouTube video.

I invite you to visit on-line The National Yiddish Book Center. You can enjoy their video “A Bridge of Books: The Story of the National Yiddish Book Center.” As you view this video, you might wonder about the meaning of the word “save”.

According to Merriam-Webster’s On-Line Dictionary, the intransitive verb “save” has the following meanings: “1 a: to deliver from sin b: to rescue or deliver from danger or harm c: to preserve or guard from injury, destruction, or loss d: to store (data) in a computer or on a storage device (as a floppy disk or CD).” Now ponder a Kindle vs the National Yiddish Book Center. A Kindle depicts definition “d”, while projects like National Yiddish Book Center honors definitions “b” and “c”.

Going back to the “portable homeland” and “just in case”…a few months ago my youngest son asked me if I had ever read The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran. Imagine my delight when I was able to walk to our bookshelves and retrieve my copy of this book. It had been a gift (1968 price for this hardbound book was $3.95) to me 40 years ago and still I could find it, touch it and present my copy of Gibran’s masterpiece to my son to touch, read and enjoy. Simply amazing, dust cover included!

Reading Time: 7 minutes

Recently I received an Amazon.com gift certificate as a gift. I am an avid reader and an avid kindle reader so I am sure that is what my in-laws had in mind.

I have come to rely on Amazon.com for far more than just books. This particular transaction was representative of how social media is molding the customers’ experience for the better and I feel compelled to share the story.

Once people were quite wary of ordering online. Giving their credit card information over the internet to people unseen seemed scary and just not wise. Years later I make most of my purchases online. What is not to love? You can order exactly what you want. There is no trip to the mall. No walking up and down the shopping center corridor looking for that store directory while hoping for one more chance to find the exact brand and model so you can go home.

First it starts with how I select my purchases. I am a review reader and a very specific shopper. I generally know exactly what I want and why I want it. I don’t necessarily come up with these answers myself, but I have trusted experts, think of them as “authority sites”.

I wanted to get a few items for the kitchen. For cooking and kitchen equipment my two top sources are Alton Brown and America’s Test Kitchen. Alton Brown, of Good Eats and Iron Chef America fame, has won me over again and again with his creative and campy show “Good Eats”. His advice and elementary scientific explanation of why things work fascinates me and turns the once mundane chore of cooking dinner into a fun and creative thing to do at the end of the day. His show “Good Eats” is a family favorite in our house. I frequent his website for quick recipes and tips. Alton is welcome at our house any day. Here he is with some Thanksgiving tips.

America’s Test Kitchen is my other authority. They judiciously test equipment and recipes. They recommend good solid equipment and explain why they favor one model over another. I have their family cookbook and it is where I get all my “Mom answers”.

So with “my authorities” suggesting what makes and models are the best purchases I take a cursory look at Amazons’ online reviews and as long as I don’t see any glaring descrepancies in the reviews I make my purchase.

Amazon follows up and makes sure your purchases arrive on time and there is a link so you can track the delivery right to your door. Not everything is actually purchased directly from Amazon as they are the dealer for other merchants and resellers.

This time my entire order arrived within days, except for the pie dish. I had specifically chosen this pie dish for its deep well, perfect for a really deep apple crisp. It turned out that I was not the only one eying this lovely deep pie dish from the reseller unbeatablesale.com as it was sold out. My account was never charged. A few days later I was asked to review my experience. I couldn’t give the transaction 5 stars as I didn’t receive my purchase. I did comment that the item was sold out and while I was disappointed it would certainly not prevent me from shopping there again.

A store representative emailed me as a result of my less than 5 star rating and offered a gift certificate to use in their online store worth twice the amount of my initial attempted purchase.

They listened to my review. They care about the ratings. They care about the rating because the ratings from social media are going to affect their future sales. I am going to shop their because it is convenient and I am heard. If I am not satisfied they are going to remedy the situation.

No hassles. No buyers remorse. I like it.

Social Media improving the customer experience.