New Facebook Fan Page Preview

Not sure if I really am into the new Home Page but what choice do we have.  I would love to hear what you think of it.

Chesapeake City Council KickOff Campaign For Brian White

Wed Jan 27, 2010 6-8pm

Aloft Chesapeake

1454 Crossways Blvd

Chesapeake, VA 23320

Brian White is having his campaign kick off this week and all are invited to Meet and Greet the new canidate! Voting is May 4, 2010 and looking forward to getting the word out! 

This is a great opportunity to see how Brian is looking to make a difference right here in our local community!

Let’s Tweetup Wednesday!  @votebrianwhite

RSVP for the event!

How To Add Fans To Your Facebook Business Fan Page

Here is a quick video on how to add fans to your facebook business fan page.  You can always send the link, tell people about your page or suggest to your friends. 

Checkered Flag Auto Group is running a promotion for every fan they receive in the month of Janurary 2010 they will donate money to the United Way of Hampton Roads.

Making Time for Social Media

It seems like there is never enough time in the day. Fact is that we live in a fast paced world and if you’re not busy, and you’re not where you want to be or on your way there, there might be something wrong with your business model.

That being said, the way busy professionals communicate is changing rapidly and social media is becoming a primary vehicle for that communication. Though many people see this rising trend, I often hear people say “my schedule is busy enough as it is!” or they ask “how do you find the time?”

Well here are some potential answers to those problems and questions.

Trim the fat: Though we are always busy, we can always scan our days and find time that could be better spent. It could be taking that phone call that we know always takes longer than it should or even sleeping in that extra 15 minutes. Try pinpoint similar patterns and cut back on them.

Rethink, Reevaluate, Replace: If your like me, your constantly doing something to try to grow your business. If you see the importance of social media and want to make it part of your routine, think about the methods you are using and evaluate their effectiveness. If adding social media to your arsenal is a priority, consider reducing or eliminating your time with less effective growth strategies.

First thing, last thing: Some people start strong, some finish strong. If you start strong, make social media part of your morning routine. Go to any Starbucks and you’ll see many people on laptops and Blackberries doing just that. If you finish strong, use the thoughts you’ve gathered through the day and share them with the world.

Set it in Stone: If you’re busy, you probably have a planner. Put it in your schedule and stick to it as though it were a meeting with your dream client because who knows, you may end up meeting that person through social media!

Google Raises the Bar….. Again

I just can’t stop raving about Google and for good reason. Once again, they have rolled out a new set of tools that we can use on both our computers and our phones.

Of the additions, my favorite allows those searching Google to get the freshest results. As a blogger, this makes me particularly happy but it makes me even more ecstatic as a compulsive googler! I can’t begin to express how frustrating it was during the elections last year to search for news and blogs on the issues only to get data about the previous presidential race.

Another great new application will be Google Squared! Now initially, this tool seems a little scary to me. It basically keeps tabs on the types of sites you like to look for and every time you log on to your computer, this tool gives you a list of sites that appear to be your online preference. If this was a government sponsored tool, I’d be a little worried, but I can see what Google is trying to do here by making the ways we navigate the world wide web that much easier by giving customers what they want more readily and opening the door for yet another way to get more sponsors to buy in so they can provide even more free services! Go Google!

So Google Went Down Today. Quit Whining.

I’ve been using Google as long as its been around and I hate to sound like I have a crush, but I love everything about Google! From the Keyword Tool to the Local Business Center, Google is loaded with services that they give away absolutely free. Google literally feeds millions of people by feeding them free information that empowers them to navigate the world at no cost, and in all the years I’ve been using the site I’ve never encountered a problem. Try asking any business on earth to provide a good or service with that kind of reliability absolutely free. You’ll either get a laugh or a polite request to leave the premises.

So there was a buzz in the news and across the web with the headline Google Down today because for a few hours the site was in fact down due to some technical difficulties. As a result, some internet blogs and forums were flooded with angry complaints about the problem because people couldn’t access Gmail and other Google account services. Maybe I’m just lucky, or maybe I rely on more than just Google to get me through the day, but either way 11 years of problem free service is good enough for me.

Hey Google, everyone’s entitled to a bad hair day right? Enjoy it and get back to work!

How to make CSS and HTML Work Together Part 2

In part 1 we learned what CSS is, now we can see what it does. We now know how to move our furniture around, lets bring it in the room. HTML is one of the languages of the internet. It is how the internet interprets images, words, music etc.

Thanks to the sharing and teaching power of the internet there are may great places to generate HTML codes. Because of that, actually creating the proper HTML code is easy, its the placement that has become a little more difficult to understand.

If you’re using a templated website (and most of us are), when you place an HTML object onto the web page, you preview it and tweek the CSS code to make sure the object is place where you want it. Usually you see this problem with objects like headers, footers, and images to name a few.

Initially, my CSS header template was 760px which caused it to look like this: as a result, the header is centered like this in the template:

When I edited the header, i changed the pixel field to 960px: which made the field wider. As a result, the expanded header looked like this: .

As you can see, CSS has the ability to stretch and shape the HTML objects you place into your template.

Facebook Instant Messaging Gets a Facelift

I’m always bragging about the versatility and customizability of Facebook. Just when you think it’s gotten as custom as it can get, they take it to another level.

The newest change for the Facebook community is in the Instant Messaging application. You can now use the categorization tool that’s used to help you organize and filter your friends in conjunction with the Instant Messenger app.

Here are some of the benefits of these new changes:

1. A new level of privacy: We have different relationships with everyone and the fact is that we aren’t on an instant messaging basis with everyone. This app. allows you to go offline with the friends you specify.

2. Category Selection: If you have your friends categorized, this update allows you to completely deselect an entire folder of friends.

 

 

3. Hierarchy: Some friends have a higher priority than others. With that in mind, you can now set your folders according to importance, relevance, and even tolerance.

 

Some of the changes I don’t like are the fact that if you have a friend in a designated category and they are idle, their picture still appears. This makes it more difficult to identify available friends. Another issue is that some friends could belong to multiple folders. As a result, those friends show up multiple times on the chat list. This leaves to much potential for clutter so hopefully they figure out a way to allow this without the clutter being an issue. In the mean time, I just have to specify which category each friend fits in most and keep them there.

Overall, I love this new change with Facebook!  What are your thoughts?

What is Social Media and Why Does It Work for Business?

Through my searches for good social media content, I came across this awesome video. Its a good story that breaks social media down in a pretty simple way.

Social media allows business owners to establish individuality in the marketplace, brand themselves relatively easily and pinpoint their niche clients. Direct marketing, and ‘Blast’ marketing allow you to target a group of people, but social media gives you the opportunity to target specific customers that you know have some degree of interest in your product or service.

So what are you waiting for? Get your ticket to Scoopsville today!

Social Media Meeting of the Minds in Hampton Roads

The most recent meeting of the Hampton Roads Internet and Technology Meetup was a roundtable discussion at New American Mortgage in Virginia Beach. Because there has been so much interest in Social Media and internet technology, some Hampton Roads Social Media and IT experts gathered to discuss the direction of the HRITM and expanding the knowledge of social media in our area.

The group was founded with the principle of professionals helping professionals make sense of the emerging popularity of social media in a professional environment and it is now read to take social media in Hampton Roads to another level.

The group’s founder Naoma Doriguzzi, expressed her desire to continue to bring relevant and useful information to the MeetUp. Some of the topics discussed were: Blogging for Business, Branding, Website Development, Forums, and Link Building among many other things. That being said, there is something brewing on the horizon. Social Media fans, be on the lookout for great new things! Hope to see you at the next MeetUp

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