Casual Articles - Internet and Businesses Online

6 Crucial Steps For Building A Solid, Bullet Proof Business Online
It is not uncommon in the internet world to hear of someone who just started out online one day and makes a mountain of money the next. It's not unusual for the people who have been online for awhile who spend their time learning and testing which methods work, they create a brand new site, do everything correctly and make a tonne of money online in just a matter of weeks. Crazy but true.So, what’s the magic success formula for building your own solid, bullet proof business?1) The first port of call is your own web site, I cannot stress this enough, it is absolutely vital that you have your own web site where you have full control over all content, the last thing you want is a “free” site riddled with distracting ads and pop ups promoting other businesses and companies. There must be a built in feature that allows you to view your web traffic statistics to know what is working when and how. If you do not know how to program, most people starting out don’t, there are plenty of good site builder type programs out there that allow you to point and click when creating your first web site. Shop around for these types of sites, most webhosting providers should offer this feature when you join up with them, do your research and enquire.2) You must have a way of collecting leads on your

or DXF.

Create the Resource Site Using Excel

Here's how to create an online resource site which will allow access to your important documents and forms through a browser, using Microsoft Excel. For this example, I used Microsoft Office Excel 2003.

Open a new workbook in Excel. Place your company logo at the top by clicking "Insert/Picture/From File" and selecting your logo. If the picture needs modification such as resizing, right click on it and select "Format Picture". Then you have a world of options.

If you think your resource site will have many links, use the tabs in Excel to correspond to your major categories. These tabs will carry over to the web page version. If not, just work with one page. You can add tabbed pages later.

Set the Width

Decide how many columns of links you will want to display. If it will be one column only, widen column A so that it stretches about 800 or 900 pixels wide. If everyone is using wide screens, you can go up to about 1100 pixels wide. For all purpose use, I believe 900 pixels is better. Do your work on monitors similar to ones your co-workers will use to get the best visual feedback.

If you want more columns, drag the columns so they are equal and add up to 900 pixels. These columns will be where you will place y

Starting A New Business Is Easy And Other Myths
You’ve got your business ideas, you know what you want to sell and to whom. You’ve even got enough money to survive for six months. The next bit is easy then. Sorry no it’s not – now the hard grind starts. Here are some business myths that you should be careful not to believe.Starting a new business is easy: Well you have done a lot of the hard work if you’ve done your planning but now you are working for yourself and need to be your own boss. You will need to set clear objectives, work towards them and keep yourself motivated.I won’t have to work so hard: Sorry but entrepreneurs generally work harder and longer hours, particularly at the start of their business life. The difference is that they generally enjoy it and get rewarded for their effort.I’ll be the boss: To a certain extent you will be BUT please remember that your “customer is king”. Look after them and, apart from your bank manager – you are in total charge of your business!If I need more money – I just put up my prices: Should be true, but unfortunately the economic laws say that as prices go up usually the amount of items you sell goes down. There is a limit to what people will pay for an item before they start looking at alternative products or alternative suppli

As small business grows, it accumulates forms, lists, procedures and other resources which become the backbone of the company's functioning. Over time, these important documents become scattered and soon people begin asking, "Is this the most recent form we should use?" "Is this the latest list?" "Where is the certification we just updated?"

Coherent use of resources is essential to your work, yet bringing about coherence can be a daunting task, especially if the resources have been allowed to grow uncontrolled. But it's not impossible. It just takes a well-chosen method and a quiet afternoon.

Start by Organizing the Paper

The most primitive, but effective method of achieving document coherence is to create a big, fat 3-ring binder with tabs dividing the resources into categories. Obsolete pages can be culled, and gaps in the collection can be easily noticed.

This hard-copy can be an easy reference, as long as the path/filename of the corresponding digital version is displayed on the document. This can be an important first step, especially if many of the resources are hard copy, as opposed to digital.

Binders are also great if there is a certain type of static (not often changed) information which needs to be easily accessed without the user being chained to a computer. An example would be out on a factory floor where the worker needs to quickly check the drill bit size required to accomodate a particular screw. Don't bother that guy with a computer. But even that information should be digitized so the clean-hands bunch can find it.

Decide: In-House or Web-Based Distribution

For our computerized world, after reviewing the hard copies and organizing them, you will now need to make an important decision: Will your resource site always stay local (operating on your computer or local network only) or, will there be a chance that you might want to post it on the internet, for use of employees when they are remote?

Ramification: If you will only operate locally, the resource site can link to any file in any network or shared folder. If you post to the web, all resources and the site itself need to be in one master folder, so that it can be uploaded to a web host with all links intact.

At my company, we decided to prepare for posting remotely. Our people are increasingly traveling and they will need the resources.

Select, Update and Move Resources

This created a useful process for building the site. Each resource could be reviewed one-by-one, then moved to the site folder. In fact, we converted many of them to HTML during the process, so they would render on the screen rather than act as downloads.

Name your master folder something like "resource-site" (avoid spaces in all folder names and filenames). If you have a network, place the folder at the highest visible level of your folder structure and give all appropriate employees access to this folder.

Use Subfolders for Organization

Create a few subfolders under this master folder which organize the forms and documents into categories, such as "Sales," "Accounting," "Products", etc. Then start the process:

1. Open the resource file

2. Check it and update it.

3. If you want it rendered, or viewable in the browser, convert it to HTML if you can. Try File/Save As/ and select "HTML" or "Web Page" as the file type. Save it directly into the folder you just created under the folder named "resource-site".

4. If you want the resource to be offered as a download from the resource website, simply move it to the new folder using Windows Explorer or "File Save As".

5. As you go, if you find multiple versions of the same form, dispose of all obsolete files.

6. Obsolete the moved file from its previous location by either deleting it or adding "-OLD" to the end of the filename.

7. Notify co-workers of the change you made via email and remind them weekly that resources are being moved to a new location. When they add resources, they must do so in the correct location, or better yet, submit it to a person designated as the site webmaster.

The work you have done to this point will bring about a marked improvement in company performance. Now, take it to the next level. Get it online.

Can the Browser Display it?

The word "online", in this instance, means accessible via browser software, such as Internet Explorer of Mozilla Firefox. In some senses, browsers are universal interfaces. Browsers will do something with any file type. For instance, Browsers readily display HTML, TXT, JPG, PNG, GIF file types.

If a "plug-in" or "viewer" software is installed into your browser, then the browser will be able to display these also, but not necessarily modify them. Examples files which can be commonly viewed after installing a plugin: PDF, DOC, XLS.

If the browser can't display the file type, it will offer the file to you as a download. Don't think of this as a limitation, but rather a design parameter. It can come in handy when you want to deliver a fresh form to a user, and force the user to save it in a new location. Examples of files not readily viewed in a browser: Autocad formats such as DWG or DXF.

Create the Resource Site Using Excel

Set the Width

If you want more columns, drag the columns so they are equal and add up to 900 pixels. These columns will be where you will place y

Neon Signs
It is rather difficult to read the ordinary signboards in the dark. For this very reason, many signboards incorporate neon, since it glows in the dark. The Neon signs are a big relief to night travelers specially, as they are easily able to identify and adhere to road signs and instruction. The first neon sign appeared in France in 1910. After its initial appearance, the neon signs went on to be very popular and advertising companies started competing with each other on regards to its creativity and presentation. Neon signs are considered an effective medium of advertisement, as they readily attract attention and have a great impact on the customers.Neon lights are colorful and vibrant in nature. This visual medium meets local marketing needs and consequently helps increase customers and business. In relation to retail and multinational businesses, wholesale neon light purchases prove to be favorable. Customers searching for neon signs may approach local and online stores or find neon sign manufacturing locations through the yellow pages.Retail, franchise and advertising companies make numerous wholesale neon sign purchases, since, they require numerous signs to display different advertisements and products. This includes payday loan signs, bar signs, ATM signs, pizza takeaways, caf? signs

puter. An example would be out on a factory floor where the worker needs to quickly check the drill bit size required to accomodate a particular screw. Don't bother that guy with a computer. But even that information should be digitized so the clean-hands bunch can find it.

Decide: In-House or Web-Based Distribution

At my company, we decided to prepare for posting remotely. Our people are increasingly traveling and they will need the resources.

Select, Update and Move Resources

Use Subfolders for Organization

Create a few subfolders under this master folder which organize the forms and documents into categories, such as "Sales," "Accounting," "Products", etc. Then start the process:

1. Open the resource file

2. Check it and update it.

4. If you want the resource to be offered as a download from the resource website, simply move it to the new folder using Windows Explorer or "File Save As".

5. As you go, if you find multiple versions of the same form, dispose of all obsolete files.

6. Obsolete the moved file from its previous location by either deleting it or adding "-OLD" to the end of the filename.

The work you have done to this point will bring about a marked improvement in company performance. Now, take it to the next level. Get it online.

Can the Browser Display it?

Create the Resource Site Using Excel

Set the Width

If you want more columns, drag the columns so they are equal and add up to 900 pixels. These columns will be where you will place y

Site Promotion – Why Article Marketing Should Be the Backbone of Your Site Promotion Efforts
When I first got started in internet marketing, I got involved in all kinds of traffic. Exit traffic, expired domain traffic, traffic exchange traffic, safelist traffic – all of it came with big promises and guarantees – but none delivered. I spent a lot of money there, just thinking that if I had enough traffic, I could win the game.Well, I kind of stumbled on article marketing for traffic. You see, I had heard that article marketing was good for getting a high search engine ranking in the big search engines, so I started writing a few articles and posted them to like 100 different article directories. And in a few weeks, I had a number one ranking in several of the search engines for a few keywords.The problem with those keywords, though, was that they were low volume keywords. My guess is that if they had been high volume keywords the strategy would be almost impossible. So the bottom line is, I wasn’t getting traffic from those keywords. A little, but not enough to go fulltime online!But the craziest thing happened – I started testing groups of article directories, and finding that certain groups of directories pulled much higher responses – like 100 times the response of other groups. So I continued breaking them down into smaller and smaller groups until I came up with l

e process, so they would render on the screen rather than act as downloads.

Use Subfolders for Organization

Create a few subfolders under this master folder which organize the forms and documents into categories, such as "Sales," "Accounting," "Products", etc. Then start the process:

1. Open the resource file

2. Check it and update it.

4. If you want the resource to be offered as a download from the resource website, simply move it to the new folder using Windows Explorer or "File Save As".

5. As you go, if you find multiple versions of the same form, dispose of all obsolete files.

6. Obsolete the moved file from its previous location by either deleting it or adding "-OLD" to the end of the filename.

The work you have done to this point will bring about a marked improvement in company performance. Now, take it to the next level. Get it online.

Can the Browser Display it?

Create the Resource Site Using Excel

Set the Width

If you want more columns, drag the columns so they are equal and add up to 900 pixels. These columns will be where you will place y

The Voice of Viral Marketing
Generating buzz through word of mouth will help drive greater sales and from your most important customers.Viral marketing strategies can effectively generate traffic to your website by creating buzz-building campaigns that excite and energize your customer base. However, in order to most effectively execute a successful viral marketing project, it is important to build a significant understanding of your target audience to tap into their social and psychological network.By creating articles or newsletters, for example, that resonate with your audience, you will encourage loyal customers to share the useful information or unique advice with their family and friends. Indeed, viral marketing is one of the most powerful forms of product support as it consists of unbiased recommendations from trusted sources.Initiating a viral marketing campaign begins with the development of unique and attractive content for your most loyal customers. While articles that pertain to the product or service you are selling will help draw visitors to your site, creating resources that speak to your audience in a strategic fashion.Once your marketing theme or ideas have been thoroughly cultivated, you can begin to build a viral marketing campaign around your most critical ideas. For example, post your

via email and remind them weekly that resources are being moved to a new location. When they add resources, they must do so in the correct location, or better yet, submit it to a person designated as the site webmaster.

The work you have done to this point will bring about a marked improvement in company performance. Now, take it to the next level. Get it online.

Can the Browser Display it?

Create the Resource Site Using Excel

Set the Width

If you want more columns, drag the columns so they are equal and add up to 900 pixels. These columns will be where you will place y

Google AdWords - Will Changes Hurt Small Business?
If you are running one page sales letter websites, squeeze pages that gather email addresses before giving out information or reports that are given at no cost, a site whose sole purpose is to display adSense ads or any affiliate site, you may be in for a big surprise when Google ups your minimum fee from .05 to .50 or more.So why would Google want to knock out paying customers and drive them to Yahoo or MSN? They say it is because they want the customer to have a good experience with good content so that they will be encouraged to click on other ads in the future. This means that when the customer has a good experience from clicking on one ad, they will likely click on another one in the future. And if Google continues this way, they will stand to make a lot more money for each click.The biggest thing I question is that the content on the site doing the advertising has to be unique and not the same as any other site. I believe this is pointing directly at affiliate sites that are similar or almost identical to the parent site. It may also involve the usage of syndicated content or using article marketing sites that have RSS feeds. Does this mean that a newspaper that carries a story from the newswire can only be carried by one paper throughout the world? I guess if you are buying AdWords,

or DXF.

Create the Resource Site Using Excel

Set the Width

If you want more columns, drag the columns so they are equal and add up to 900 pixels. These columns will be where you will place your links.

At the top of each column, but beneath the logo, enter main categories of resources you will be presenting. In cells below these headings, type names of each resource you want to link to. These will be the names of the links you are building. You don't need to enter filenames to describe your resource, just a simple understandable resource name.

Take some time with this step, it will be an exercise in organizing your thinking and your company's organization.

Sort the Resource List

You can use Excel's Data/Sort capability to alphabetize the resources.

Build Your Links

Right click on a link name, then click "Hyperlink". In the dialog window, at the upper left corner, click "Link to Existing File or Web Page", then navigate to the file in your computer or network.

Select the target file. Where it says "Text to Display" you should see the name you already selected for the resource. You can change it there if you like.

Click "OK". The link name on your page will now display in the familiar blue underlined text.

Easy, isn't it? Do a bunch more. Don't worry about making mistakes. Everything you do can (and probably will be) edited and corrected.

Then click File/Save As. In the dialog box, navigate to your resource-site folder. Name the file "resource-site". Where it says "Save as type", select "Web Page".

Do not save it as an Excel Workbook.

Before you save it, you will have a choice of whether to save the entire workbook or only the selected page ("Selection:Sheet"). If your Resource Site is only one page, select accordingly. If you only have one page with content, Excel will only produce a one-page site, even with "Entire Workbook" selected.

If you are using multiple tabbed sheets in Excel for your Resource Site, select "Entire Workbook" and the tabbing function will be preserved in the site. Having the tabbing available on your resource site is a very nice feature.

Give Your Site a Title

You can also click "Change Title" to use a different title for display in the title bar of the browser. Select a title which will tell your story in the title bar. It adds credibility when the browser title shows "Acme Resource Site" as opposed to "Resource Site.html". Your title bar will show your web page file name if you don't specify a title.

You can now click "Save".

You are a Webmaster!

Open your browser. Click "File/Open" or "File/Open File" (depending on the browser), and browse to your Resource Site file. Click "Open". If you see your Resource Site rendered on the screen, you just published a website!

Technically, since it is not hosted on the World Wide Web but rather in a closed system, some might argue that it is not a "web" site, but I won't tell if you don't. If you upload the same folder to a web server and pointed a URL at resource-site.htm, it would be undisputably a website.

Fine Tuning

One at a time, click on the sample links you posted. Observe how the file opens. This can vary from user to user depending upon the browser and add-ins, also known as plug-ins, the browser has installed. Based upon these variables, results may not be consistent across your entire user base, but it should be close.

When I create sites using Excel, I review the results of my work in two browsers simultaneously, Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox. They display differently, especially in the location of graphics. For consistency, you may need to left-justify your logos and images.

To edit, have same resource-site.htm file open in Excel and both browsers at the same time. Make your edit in Excel, click "Save", then refresh both browsers. You will see your results immediately. Make your corrections accordingly. After a few rounds of this, you will have a great Resource Site.

Teach your people to set their browser home page to the resource site, and you now have a company-wide Resource Website.

HTTP = HTML link (for blogs, profiles,phorums):
<a href="http://www.casualarticles.com/article/87098/casualarticles-Create-a-Resource-Website-for-Your-Company.html">Create a Resource Website for Your Company</a>

BB link (for phorums):
[url=http://www.casualarticles.com/article/87098/casualarticles-Create-a-Resource-Website-for-Your-Company.html]Create a Resource Website for Your Company[/url]

Is your Six Sigma implementation suffering due to a plethora of mistakes? This article shows you how to use Poka Yoke in every area of your company to get your implementation back on track!

How do search engines find your website, and how does your website find its way into search engines? Think of it this way, every page in your website is an opportunity to tell the search engines what your web site is about. Even the savviest web developers sometimes overlook this simple rule when constructing a new website.

If your website promotion tactics have not been generating the number of hits you need to build a successful online business, maybe you have not realized the full potential of article writing for web promotion. These 5 ways to develop an article-writing strategy will help you immensely.

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