As we enter the month of December, I can’t help but look back at the year that was. The thousands of new businesses started, the people we’ve profiled, and the technology applications that have made our lives complete. In no particular order of preference, I give you my top 5 technology applications of 2008.

1. Basecamp – the backbone of the business. This project management software helps us keep on top of things. By logging in, the team can see the status of each client and contribute to future projects. It saves on sending group emails and files and keeps your thoughts and intelligence in one place. To clients, it makes you look super-organised.
   Cost: $49 per month (£32)
2. Skype – our virtual water cooler, video conference system and podcast production kit. Yes, we do lots with Skype! It’s a versatile product that, at its most basic level offers an instant messaging service. Taking it to the next level allows you to connect with customers by webcam or group calls.
   Cost: Free to download. £20 for basic hand phone or headset. 
3. Twitter – a perfect way to show off your expertise .. and, yes, see what your friends had for lunch. Twitter has had a bad rap for being ‘lightweight’ and ‘a form of virtual stalking’ but anyone who uses it will know it’s no such thing. Twitter is a tool that is low maintenance, yet powerful. It provides an outlet for your expertise as you tweet in less than 140 words on your thoughts and motions of the day. To be sure, there is a social angle to this neat application but that’s what home business is all about; business mixed with life.
   Cost: Free
4. Surveymonkey – take polls and run Awards with this cheeky piece of software. Our 2008 Home Business Awards were managed by surveymonkey.com - it was a delight to use and is also cost-effective.
   Cost: Basic package is free.

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Microsoft PowerPoint is the software of choice for many when it comes to making a presentation before students, employees, project team members and the like. As with other similar presentation packages, it offers many useful features and functions. The downside is that in all too many presentations, the technology takes center stage, shunting the presenter to the role of supporting act. We have all witnessed presentations that seemed designed to help us catch up on our sleep and others that were a whirlwind, “full of sound and fury, signifying nothing”.

Over the years of witnessing hundreds of presentations, I have seen my fair share of yawn promoters and storms in teacups. As a professional trainer, I thought: Why not condense the most common errors that I have seen and draw some useful lessons from which we can all benefit? Here are my top seven PowerPoint annoyances and what we can learn from each of these to improve our own performance.

1. Not telling the participants the purpose of the session

You know the kind of presentation I am talking about. From one slide to the next, you have little to no idea of where the presentation is going. You wonder whether you should even have turned up. Eliminate the guessing game by letting your audience know up front the purpose of your session and how you plan to achieve it.

2. Overdosing participants with information

Novice presenters often suffer the illusion that some content is good, so more is better. With this mindset, these presenters cram as much as possible onto each slide, filling it with font sizes as small as 10 point. Help your participants avoid eye strain and to stay interested by using plenty of white space and font sizes large enough to read from the back row. Add to your slides tables, charts and other graphics that will aid understanding your message.

3.

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Communication comes in many forms including television and radio. You will remember that in the past decade there has been a surge not only in the types of music and television programs but in the number of television and radio networks. Some of these networks have grown and become quite profitable while others were disasters that flopped and are no longer on the air. You can find a TV network for sale or even a radio network for sale through various methods.

Finding a Television Network for Sale
One way to find television businesses for sale is through an Internet search and asking around in your community. You can even contact the various TV networks to determine if one of the television businesses is for sale in your area. In fact, your strongest option is to locate one through direct contact with the station manager who will then be able to connect you with the station owner for buying the TV network for sale.

Finding a Radio Network for Sale
Radio stations and radio networks for sale are found using the same method as finding television network for sale. It will be important to be resourceful to find a potential seller in this niche of the communication industry. Do not despair because it is very probable to find a great radio network for sale.

Legal Assistance
You will need to have a strong business lawyer to help you finalize the paperwork for the sale and to make certain that everything is accurate on the legal forms.

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As the volume of data generated continues to soar, businesses are finding that accessibility to their information is decreasing. Reorganizing the way information is stored and retrieved is the key to improving communications and increasing productivity … which ultimately, enhances an organization’s bottom line.

Because the benefits of handling the exchange of information electronically are so compelling, all classes of corporate communications are quickly becoming digital placing dramatic strain on today’s telecommunications infrastructure. Faxes made our mail digital, voice mail made our phones digital, and more of our computer-generated documents will stay digital because they are easier to access, deliver and manage.

While communications backbone service requirements is doubling every four months, the bottleneck has been the lack of corporate “structure” we see in today’s virtual corporations. It places immense responsibilities on tele and data communications and network managers who must help workgroups (internal and external), suppliers and business partners interact. Clearly, an affordable, interoperable document management solution is an excellent opportunity to help communications firms link customer resources - regardless of their geographical or platform boundaries.

The Ultimate Filing System
The growth and acceptance of the Internet and its graphical version, the Web, have given firms of all sizes a flexible, cost-effective and easy-to-implement vehicle for electronic collaboration, information distribution and business-to-business interactions, both inside (Intranet) and outside (Internet) the organization. Because the Internet is truly a global network, it provides a ready-made platform for extending a business customer’s universe of business trading partners to literally all businesses on the Net.

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This year, number of Web sites will grow at an unbelievable rate of 1,000 percent.

The strength of a Web presence is that any organization can look as good or as bad as any other firm on the Web.

Getting on the Web with a home page is a no-brainer.

Getting the most from the Web’s global reach takes a lot of gray matter.

Most Web home pages are developed, controlled and managed by marketing, because “they have the budget”. But the team needs to involve IS, marketing, engineering, advertising, public relations, engineering and customer service.

IS needs to be involved because they are ultimately responsible for protecting the organization’s most critical resource, computerized data.

Before you commit to a home page design, surf the Net and Web. Visit large and small, complex and simple Web sites. Study their strengths and weaknesses.

Determine how to make yours an effective and profitable Web site.

Advertising and marketing materials are usually the first items put on the home page because the Web is often viewed as a new promotional media.

Unfortunately, most organizations stop here; but they’ve really only scratched the surface.

The Web site is an excellent place for marketing and product research. An integral part of your home page should be an evaluation/feedback section. Get input on how you can expand/improve the information presented to help the “reader.”

The Web site can be an open forum for new product ideas and product enhancements as well as a repository for input on products/services customers would like to see.

Your Web site can be an excellent tool for providing timely and cost-effective customer service and customer support.

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Good News: This year more than 95% of the businesses in the U.S. – large and small – will have Internet access. Globally more than 65% of businesses in industrial countries will have Internet access. This year an estimated 60% of homes in the U.S. will have Internet access.

Bad News: This year more than 95% of the businesses in the U.S. – large and small – will have Internet access. Globally more than 65% of businesses in industrial countries will have Internet access. This year an estimated 60% of homes in the U.S. will have Internet access.

Whether your firm’s target customers are businesses, homes or a combination - nationally or internationally – the forecasts for your future are a mixture of good news, bad news. As your business grows so will your support requirements. It’s unavoidable. After all, you are in business – business-to-business, business-to-consumer or simply business-to-customer.

If you’re like most firms in the industry, 70 percent of your customer service budget is staffing. Every day, your support knowledge goes out the front door and home (even if you outsource it or move it offshore). On a monthly basis you probably have to replace some portion of that knowledge that was lost as a support person leaves for a better paying job.

The biggest problem a company (regardless of the channel) faces today isn’t competition from the infrastructure players who threaten to undercut your pricing, the breakneck speed of keeping up with technology or the struggle to balance income with outgo. It’s creating and maintaining relationships. While people are pivotal in the relationship picture it is even more important to use our technology to cement and enhance that relationship.

While some industry “experts” will tell you that automating these processes and activities will be expensive and painful, we disagree.

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Often neglected by some business owners, computer information should be considered the most critical asset to protect and secure. Even a one-person small business that is run from a single personal computer should routinely consider these regular routines/procedures:

1) Backup your data daily.

By backing up your data, you ensure that a hardware failure or catastrophe will only impact your business minimally. Hard disks are mechanical, and prone to failure over time. When possible, backup to an external medium such as tape backups, CD/DVD backups, USB Flash Disks or the most practical external hard drives.

2) Secure your data including backups, with encryption (passwords)

Even worse than losing data to hardware failure is your information falling into a theives’s hands. Ensure your data is safe, by locking up backups offsite (where possible) in fire-resistant safes or files. At the same time, investing in encryption software is ideal, so that in case of theft, your computer system’s data cannot be deciphered by anyone.

3) Invest in RAID configured Systems

In a more critical business where you need to work without a system failure stopping you, consider investing in RAID (Redundant Array of Independent Disks) hardware. This can allow for one hard drive to fail, but others can take over ‘on the fly’ so that your business is not halted. More expensive systems/servers allow for failed disks to be hot swapped and replaced - meaning they can be replaced without powering off the system. Basic and mid-level systems require that the power be shut down before any hardware replacement can be made.

4) Ensure your Scheduled backups are really working and can actually be read elsewhere.

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The first thing I would recommend is to do some research. Sign up for some SEO newsletters, join some news groups and browse web sites like these.SEO can be very in depth and continues for the length of owning your web site. Since this is a new web site here are some things to consider before beginning the creation:

• Choose a domain that matches your products/services
• Host your web site on a reliable, host. One that does not use reseller accounts (possible SPAM issues) and doesn’t hide behind the wall of a ISP (could block search engines).
• Make your site easy to use and the navigation clean.
• When writing the code keep as many of the technical functions outside of the main page. By this I mean include the Java script in a separate file, the same for the CSS etc.
• Keep flash to a minimum and always provide a text menu where the main menu is flash or graphics
• Keep a detailed and up-to-date site map
• Register your site with Google Site Maps
• Install some tracking software so that you can see how your on going changes effect your traffic
• Be sure to manually submit your web sites to the major engines and directories
• Search out some like minded web sites to exchange links with
• Don’t do it all at once. Leave some content back so that you can continually update the site. Search Engines like to see you adding to your content on a consistent basis and so do people.

These steps won’t guarantee you success but they will help.

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