Is your Business Harnessing the Power of Twitter ?
Unless you haven’t been following the latest news and hottest things I am sure you have heard of twitter. If you for some reason haven’t heard of twitter yet here is a quick description for you of what twitter is:
Twitter is a social networking and micro blogging service that allows you answer the question, “What are you doing?” by sending short text messages 140 characters in length, called “tweets”, to your friends, or “followers.”
You can also find out more about twitter at www.tweeternet.com
Twitter is proving to be a very powerful tool for many businesses. Twitter allows you to communicate instantly to your followers and provide them with relevant information and in many cases a promotion that they can take advantage of. This typically results in additional advertising for your business and in most cases revenue.
Naked Pizza is doing a great job of using twitter to communicate with their followers and they are seeing a great Return on Investment for this activity. They have used twitter to communicate a special or promotion and in general interact with their customers. In April they decided to track the sales that were a direct result of twitter and found that on April 23 an exclusive-to-twitter promotion brought in 15% of the day’s business.
If you view Naked Pizza’s twitter page at www.twitter.com/nakedpizza you will see the tweets that Naked Pizza sends out to its followers. When you are here please also take a look at the positive comments from their followers. All of these positive comments are also seen by anyone following the person that provided the comment. This is FREE advertising that is seen by thousands of users.
Berry Chill is another company that is harnessing the power of twitter to communicate with their customers and drive additional business. Berry Chill features “sweet tweets” that they send out to customers offering special promotions to twitter followers. This drives a lot of business to the store and even attracts new customers.
If you are not using twitter yet in your business it is time that you start. You can set up an account for FREE at http://www.twitter.com . The key to harnessing the power of twitter is to have a custom background designed for you that showcases your business and your offerings and sets you apart. SourceOne Technologies can assist you in having a custom background designed. To find out more about this service please contact us at 720-306-5001 x 101 or email us by clicking on the link custom twitter background.
You can read more on how Naked Pizza and Berry Chill are using twitter in the article Twitter Proves its Worth as a Killer App for Local Businesses
How to Password-Protect My Documents on My Computer
There are many ways to protect or limit the access to a file on your computer. Applications like MS Word, Open Office and MS Excel have a password protection feature found in their settings. If you are not convinced with the protection offered, you can hide the document in a zip file or any third party program that offers password protection. Just remember to backup the confidential file, in case you forget your password or for other emergency situations.
Built-In Security Feature
Password protection comes as a default feature for programs used for making documents. Accessing it is easy, since you just have to look for it the menus. If you aimlessly click on the items found on the menu bar, you will surely stumble upon the security feature.
MS Word and MS Excel
The menu setup of MS Office programs are similar, so the security feature is practically found in the same location. Once inside security, you can set the password for your document. Make sure you use one that is difficult to crack, possibly random numbers and letters or something that is unrelated to you, so guessing the password is nearly impossible.
Procedure:
1. Open a new document in either MS Word or MS Excel.
2. After finishing your document, click on Tools, which is found on the top portion of your screen.
3. Select Options. A smaller screen will appear containing several tabs.
4. Click on the Security Tab.
5. Place corresponding passwords for opening and modifying the file.
6. Keep clicking OK until you are back to your document.
Aside from placing a password, you can hide parts of the document by changing their font color to white. You can also toggle on the other security settings to totally restrict the access to your file.
PDF Files
The PDF file, being a common platform for creating documents, is blessed with a password-protection feature. In addition, its security measure can be boosted further when coupled by third party programs. No wonder the PDF format is preferred in professions where much confidentiality is involved.
Procedure:
1. Open the PDF file in Adobe Acrobat Reader.
2. Click on the File menu on the top left portion of the screen.
3. Select Document Security. Another screen will then appear.
4. Hit on Security Options then select Acrobat Standard Security.
5. Once done, mark the box beside “Password Required to Open Document.”
6. Place your password on the space provided.
7. In the same screen, you will find an option for placing a password when modifying the first password or permissions. Supply a password if you choose.
8. Click OK. A screen will appear asking you to confirm both passwords.
9. Retype both passwords. Take note, the passwords are case-sensitive so be careful.
If you want to fortify the Acrobat Reader’s password protection, you can download third party programs on the internet for more security. Those programs let you encrypt the file and portions of the doccument easily, aside providing another layer of password protection.
Protection Using Data Compression Programs
Some programs not only provide password protection, they also compress files and folders, so they consume less space inside your computer. Data compression programs are pretty useful, especially when delivering files through email. Given their features, you can send several files and folders safely, without exceeding the attachment limit, in a single email message.
WinZip
Protecting documents and folders with a password is easy using WinZip, one of the world’s premier data compression programs. You can simply toggle on the password feature when you are about to compress a batch of files. Once the files are compressed, they can’t be opened until the password you set is supplied.
Procedure:
1. Let’s say the files and folders you want to password protect are in My Documents. Double click My Documents on the desktop.
2. Right click on a file, which brings out a list of options.
3. Select “Compress to .zip.” This automatically creates a new zip folder.
4. Right click on another file then select Copy.
5. Go to the zip folder via WinZip then right click on the empty white space (the section where the compress filed is stored). Select Paste.
6. Repeat steps 4 and 5 for all the files and folders you want to compress and password protect.
7. When all the files are in, select File on the top left portion of the WinZip screen.
8. Click on Add a Password.
9. Supply the password for the Zip folder then confirm it.
Zip files are versatile. You can compress any folder or file that you choose, even the My Documents folder. It is a good move when your computer’s memory is nearly filled up, given the zip file’s space-saving features.
WinRar
WinRar, much like WinZip, compresses files and supports a wide array of file extensions. It can also restore damaged archives and is more resistant to file corruption than most data compression programs, which makes it a pretty popular. Best of all, you can get it for free on the internet.
WinRar works just like WinZip. The procedure for password protecting files is exactly the same, only you have the choice of turning the compressed folder into a RAR file. WinRAR appears to be the best choice for data compression protection, as its security features give it a distinct edge.
To Serve and Password-Protect
The password may be a basic form of protection, but through the years, it has proven to be an effective means of file security. Besides, correctly guessing a password is, by all means, no easy feat, which is why it is the means used to protect your email account or your credit card information. Give your files the same amount of security by password-protecting them.
Wisdom is the sharing of wise experiences and knowledge, but a lot of it is common sense. The difference is how we apply this common sense – we all have the ability to keep going even when we face challenges in our lives – basically it comes down to your attitude. Learn more helpful how-to do stuff by visiting Monster Guide.
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Dennis_Paguio
Getting Started with E-mail Marketing
May 3, 2009 by admin
Filed under E-Mail Marketing
If you are a business owner and haven’t started using email marketing to communicate with your customers and prospects yet – now is the time. Jupiter Research predicts that US spending on email advertising will grow to $2.1 billion by 2012, so if you haven’t started using email marketing now is the time if you want to survive.
What exactly is email marketing?
E-mail marketing is is the use of email to send a targeted messages, information or offers to a designated set of customers or prospects. This is done by asking your customers or prospects to sign up or opt in to receive email from you.
If you haven’t gotten started yet with email marketing there are a few things that you can do to get started on the right foot.
Getting started with email marketing
The first thing you should do is identify the email management tool that you will use to store your customers or prospects names and email addresses and send out email from. There are a few tools that we recommend for this that range from $18 – $40 a month depending on your needs. This tool must provide an option for the visitor to opt-in to your list and if they wish to opt-out. It is important that you don’t skip this step. Trying to cut corners on this step could end up costing you.
The next thing that you will need to do is establish a method for collecting the names and email addresses of your customers or prospects. There are several ways that you can do this. One of the top ways to capture names and email addresses is to set up a lead capture form on your web site and offer a coupon or special in exchange for providing their name and email address. If you have a storefront location you could have your customers complete a registration card to be added to your mailing list, or you could place a computer near the checkout as well and have them register when checking out.
How to build your list?
One key to successfully building your list is to offer your customers and prospects an incentive to sign up for your list. In most cases if you operate a retail store or restaurant a good incentive to sign up for your list is to offer a a coupon of value (i.e.: 20% off, Free Dessert, Free Appetizer). A good incentive for a doctor, dentist, or other health care provider could be a free report on a health related topic.
Once you have your email management tool in place and have a method to collect the names and email addresses of your customers and prospects it is time to begin marketing to your list. The key to effective email marketing is to provide useful, relevant information to your customers and prospects without directly selling to them with every email. Your goal is to build a relationship with your customers and prospects and position yourself in their mind as the first choice when they need the product or service you offer. If you are a restaurant or retail store owner it is a good idea however to include a coupon or a special in your email messages, this is typically very well received.
If you follow the tips above for setting up an email management tool, building your list and how to mail to your list you will experience great success in your email marketing and you will l not be left behind with email marketing.
About the author: Stefanie Blackburn is the Internet Consultant for SourceOne Technologies. SourceOne Technologies focuses on helping our clients excel when it comes to creating an online presence and succeeding with email marketing.
