Tuesday, May 18, 2010

Protect Your Facebook Privacy and Mine



I have just learned that starting today Facebook will begin to share your public contact and profile information with other sites your friends visit. In fact, even if you do not share your information your friends will be able to but there is something you can do. Here’s what Facebook says...

What your friends can share about you through applications and websites
When your friend visits a Facebook Platform application or website, they may want to share certain information to make the experience more social. For example, a greeting card application may use your birthday information to prompt your friend to send a card.

If your friend uses an application or website that you do not use, you can control certain types of information the application can access. Please note that applications will be able to access your Name, Profile Picture, Gender, as well as any information that is visible to Everyone. They will also be able to access your Connections, but you can limit what they see. In those cases, although the information is considered a Connection, you can control whether an application can access it.

You'll find a personal and social experience the moment you arrive on our select partner sites -- currently Microsoft Docs.com, Pandora, and Yelp. We're working closely with these partners in a pilot program so you can quickly connect with your friends and see relevant content on their sites. These sites personalize your experience using your public Facebook information.

When you arrive on these sites, you'll see a notification from Facebook at the top of the page.

You can easily opt-out of experiencing this on these sites by clicking "No Thanks" on the blue Facebook notification on the top of partner sites.

OK so there are two things you need to do to resolve this issue.

1. Go to Account > Privacy Settings> Applications and Websites > Instant Personalization > Edit Settings, and uncheck "Allow". While there check all your personal contact information and pay attention to what you share with everyone. Choose, friends of friends, only friends or only me. Only friends should share with friends.

2. Send this post to all the friends you have either by posting a comment here or cutting and pasting parts of this post so they get the message.

Do it today before you forget.

Be well.

Saturday, May 15, 2010

Design It Yourself Or Hire A Pro?



Whether you should design that website yourself or hire a professional web designer depends on several very important factors.

One of the most important things to consider is the level of expertise that you or your employees have in the necessary web technology needed to create an attractive, professional looking website that functions the way you want it to be.

The decision whether or not to do it yourself comes down to your skill levels, the features you want or need, the image you want to project for your web site and the amount of time you have to devote to building the website.

Some of the necessary skills to design and build a website are: Click Here

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

22 Compelling, Profit Pulling Reasons To Build A Business Website

business modelCombine Them To Create A Unique Online Business Model

A website without a business model is like a picture on a wall. Everyone can view it and even see some details but it's valuable only to the owner. Choosing the right business model will determine the success or failure of any business website.

So what is a business model?   

According to Wikipedia, the free online encyclopedia

A business model describes the rationale of how an organization creates, delivers, and captures value - economic, social, or other forms of value. The term business model is thus used for a broad range of informal and formal descriptions to represent core aspects of a business, including purpose, offerings, strategies, infrastructure, organizational structures, trading practices, and operational processes and policies.”

As you can see a business model consist of a number of processes. Let’s crystallize that long definition into 5 practical questions that if answered would give you the basis for your online strategy:

  • Why are you on the web?

  • Who are you targeting?

  • What are you willing to give?

  • What do you expect to get?

  • How are you going to do it?


Here are 22 reasons why every business should build a website Click Here

Sunday, May 9, 2010

20 Critical Questions You Must Ask Your Web Designer - Before Building A Site



It's Always Better To Ask A Question Before Than Pay Later


A website can be an electronic money pit. Or, it can become an important element of your overall marketing strategy.

Website design and development is a relatively new industry and as such there is not much information on how to build a successful revenue generating website.

Depending on the purpose and complexity of a site, investments in the Trinidad and Tobago web market can range in the low $2000 $3000 TTD for a basic site, to $20,000 to $30,000 TTD for a complicated site. The lower end representing sites developed by individual designers and the later web developers. You can find an explanation of the difference between a designer and developer; here.

You should consider the construction of your site is a team effort with the designer being the creative part of your team. Your responsibility is to supply the content you will like to include on the site.

Hopefully you have already done your homework with respect to developing a purpose and business model for your site. At this point your primary question is…


How do you find the right web designer?


Keep in mind that once a site is built, delivered and accepted your contract has been stratified. Unfortunately, the idea of a website is a “work in progress” which is a nice way to say; expect changes. At that time you may realize the real price of questions you neglected to ask before the site was built.

Most business owners at this point, throw up their hands and decide, even against their better judgment, to leave the site exactly like it is. Their rationale is that it is better to have a web presence than none at all. That is exactly why you need to ask these questions...

The Web Designer Interview

It’s time to build; you have developed your content and know the business model you will use. If you don’t know yet, you will discover that there are literally hundreds of designers in Trinidad and Tobago who can build a site. From self taught web designers to full fledged development companies, all providing seemingly same results.

Let’s just assume that after reviewing the designer’s/developer’s portfolio you decide that a particular designer does exactly what you are looking for. Consider that you will be hiring this designer/developer to work for you. The following questions should be part of your initial interview with them.

You need the answer to the following questions:

Thursday, May 6, 2010

4 Useful Web Tools That Can Hurt Your Site

website download speedAlfred Hitchcock, the famous drama/suspense movie director and producer said it best when he was quoted as saying that if a scene in a movie did not contribute in some way to telling the story; cut it out.

Today web designers can use literally thousands of feature rich websites with widgets, tables, videos, high resolution graphics and java scripts to awe visitors but they can also slow the download of your site. The internet is now super fast and if the designer knows how to install them; why not?

The truth is they can literally kill your visitor count.

As you may well appreciate, there are still thousands of dial up connections all over the world and especially in Trinidad and Tobago.

Many will not get an opportunity to view your site although they will still be counted by your analytic as bounced visitors. (a bounced visitor is one who visited but did not stay). It is important to know how fast your website loads.

There are a number variables that affect the load speed of your site. Out of your control are variables like your visitors ISP server connections or web traffic density but there are four specific category of web tools that you have complete control over.

This post explores these four categories of web tools and what you can do to ensure that that your web site download speed is maximized. Maybe your designer did not mention them. Read more here...

Sunday, May 2, 2010

Web Semantic - What does it mean to you?



Peel Away The Onion Skin And Look Inside

Imagine a spider web with nano computers on every intersection emanating from the center and spiraling larger and larger. Now imagine millions of these webs connected to each other blanketing the earth. Collectively, it's called The Web, Cyberspace or the Net, a mass interconnection of computers connected by data lines.

That is the web. But there is a little more... The video below explains the semantics and syntax of the web to that you can better understand it.

It the video does not appear below Click Here



Next we will look at Twitter and clear up some of its mystery.

Are You Unknowingly Plugged Into Web 3.0?

What is Web 3.0 and what does it have to do with everyday appliances?

Are you just beginning to understand Web 2.0? Stop for a moment and contemplate the next level; Web 3.0.

The internet is evolving right before our eyes. It's like a child we see daily and only notice how much they have grown when an occasional visitor points it out. Think of the internet like a growing child and you would realize that maybe you too have not noticed how it has grown.

This week's post is going to paint the big picture of the evolution of the Internet.

If the video does not appear, click here to visit the blog.




In our next post we will explore the syntax and semantics of the web.

Is T&T Carnival Still The Greatest Show On Earth?

In Defense of We Carnival Recently, a situation has arisen where differing perspectives prompt contemplation.   I am referring to two inst...