Productivity
News: Online Marketer Sydney 2011 – Day 2 Photos: eMetrics
First look at some photo highlights from Day 2 of the Sydney Online Marketer conference, Wednesday April 13th – the first day of the eMetrics stream.
Advice: Critical thinking 101: identifying the real problem
Identifying ‘problem areas’ in your own business is probably quite easy: just ask where your staff are having problems, or find out where your customers are either making complaints, or dropping off the face of the earth.
The bad news is that while identifying ‘work areas’ is pretty easy, coming up with sensible solutions is usually the hard part: both because we very rarely identify the true source of the problem, nor do we absolutely set out to fix it – more often, a quick patch and a smooth over does the trick. Not good.
With a series of critical thinking questions, first mooted by no less than Socrates himself, somewhere prior to 400BC – I can at least help you define your problems with a little more clarity, and begin to rule in and rule out some simple solutions.
Let me explain. No, there is too much. Let me sum up:
Advice News: Epoch: the end of one era – the start of the next
This month marks a major shift in my business life: I’m changing from a solo consultant to joining the full-time workforce. Yes, I’ve been seduced by the Dark Side. They have cookies.
Rebusiness, Andrew Ballard, and this blog will still remain, however from here on in, I’ll be a little more selective in the clients and projects I take on out of ‘work’.
I thought that after 11 years of business in this mode, I’d go back through my archives and tease out some revealing insights from my records, to give you a brief glimpse into the life of a solo consultant.
So sit back, relax, and help me unravel some of the deepest and darkest secrets (??) of the solo entrepreneur. I’ll bring the cookies.
Advice: Viva le revolution – the future is here (just thought you might like to know)
Not sure if you’re aware of a minor revolution in the world of technology in recent years, but if you’ve ever experienced one of those devices that begins with an ‘i’, then you already know what I’m talking about.
With the advent of the iPhone some 2 years ago, and now with the introduction of the iPhone’s big brother, the iPad, earlier this year, there’s been a significant shift in the way we mere mortals use the internet.
Not only do you see the uptake/market saturation of these button-less devices (iPhones proudly displayed on coffee shop tables), or the ease of use/intuitive controls (young children taking to them like a duck to water!), but there’s now solid proof of the ramifications of their increased usage: new reports show that 1 in 10 searches on Google is now on a mobile device. iPods, iPhones and iPads are both the market leader and the thought leader.
Let’s look into this new revolution a little bit further…
Advice: Why don’t we push the envelope?
A tricky question this time around – why, with the best of intentions, do we stick with what we know, rather than trying to expand the horizons of our business? There’s nothing wrong with a quick recharge of the batteries, or doing a little bit of navel gazing before ploughing onwards and upwards… But if you’re not exactly firing on all cylinders, how to you get back into gear again?
Advice: Bowing to a higher authority
I’d suggest that as an individual, we don’t need to be able to amass 100% of the skills we need all by ourselves – in fact, we simply can’t – and that apart from the odd moments of epiphany, we gain our skills and experience by absorbing information from other rich sources – our own stable of mentors. So – who are my own ‘rich sources’ of pure gold? Who are my mentors? Let me introduce you to a couple…
Advice: Twitter 101: A primer…
So… what is Twitter? Ah, the multi-million dollar question… Perhaps it’s easier to answer what Twitter is *not*, first:
• Twitter is not exactly like a chat program (MSN, iChat, Skype, etc), but it does let you communicate back and forth with friends
• Twitter is not exactly like sending an SMS from your phone, but it does let you broadcast news and other messages to many people
• Twitter is not exactly like a blog, although it does let you get to know people over time
• Twitter is not exactly like Facebook, although it does let you find people and see what they’re up to
• Twitter is not just a fad – it fills the otherwise empty niche of ‘real-time written communication’ – although it seems to be the mainstream media’s darling this year!
What Twitter *is*, is a free system of writing messages of no more than 140 characters, so that anyone in the world who is also on Twitter can *follow* you, and thereby follow the stream of messages you’re writing.
Advice: Stuck sending emails with big attachments? Get Dropbox and let the magic happen…
It’s happened to the best of us – we try to send an email to a client, colleague, or family member, and we cram in one too many attachments. We press ‘send’, and wait for the progress bar of life to tell us that our email is on it’s merry way when – uh oh – it bounces back to us with a gibberish technical message saying, in effect: ‘too big, try again’.
Let me show you an awesome bit of *free* technology that lets you send and recieve files of any size across this Internet – and it all happens as if by magic.
Advice: Skype 101: A primer…
Have you heard of Skype but were afraid to ask about it…? Don’t panic – it’s been a mainstay of voice communications for computer-folks for a long while, but there’s still lots of you (us!) out there who need to be introduced to the concept… one step at a time…
Advice: Two screens are better than one
What used to be the height of luxury for computer professionals has now become an affordable and very real productivity boost for small businesses: adding a second monitor to your computer.