Download Squad

In wake of the federal government's decision that they own your notebook computer plus all your flash keys and your first-born child, coupled with the costs and hassle of commercial flying, travelers are looking at alternatives to data-filled laptop computers. Besides, laptops are heavy, especially when you add in the battery, and then you have to schlep all those geeky-tchotchkes we stuff inside the bag. My eyes are a little too old to use my phone exclusively (it works for on-the-fly email and an occasional text message) but it doesn't get me quickly to web-based apps that I need for business. What to do?

Enter Ultra Mobile computing. From 7" to 11" screens, with Vista or XP operating systems, 2-lb ultra portable computers are entering the business landscape. Costs range from $300 - $2000 and up (US$) and what they offer may be just what you need. The trick is to buy only what you need so it's both portable and affordable. For example, I need Word and Excel when traveling but I hardly need to load Access or Publisher so a smaller hard drive works fine - what I really want is a web browser and speedy wireless Internet with the ability to VPN. We're a Windows shop, so Outlook Web Access (browser-based) takes care of email needs.

Fundamentally just a tiny computer, an ultraportable fits into a larger purse or in your briefcase (yay! no laptop bag to stuff into the overhead compartment!). Once you struggle through choosing to install only those programs you absolutely have to have because the hard disk is going to be significantly smaller than your 160+ Gb workstation, look into the free and low-cost portable applications that take little drive space and require almost no installation so your compact hard drive doesn't get crowded.

But what about hauling all my files with me if I don't have the luxury of a VPN or I haven't figured out yet how to remote into my desktop back in the office (which I remembered to leave ON during my trip)?

The key? For your ultra-portable machine, get applications that fit on a Flash key or iPod with as close to "zero footprint" as possible. Zero footprint? These are applications that remove all temporary files/registry settings once the program has exited. If you create a document, you can move it as well to a portable storage device, like a Flash key. No trace left behind and less for the TSA to explore when they seize your computer at the border.

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No more excuses: let's get your small business Website whipped into shape. People who are moderately online use the Web as their first search source. Phone books are dead trees; if your business is not online with an easy-to-find phone number, I'm clicking elsewhere. People spend money in browser-based shopping sprees and your Web site has to compete.

Let's whip your site into shape. We've already discussed how you can grade your own site; offered tips for upgrading your site; and suggested ways to increase your search-engine ranking. Let's take the next step and whip your small business Website into first-class shape.

What do your site visitors want most of all from your site?

LET ME SEARCH!
I want a search box, plain and visible, preferably at the top of every page but definitely at the top of the homepage. If you don't have a site search, you can get a great free search tool in phpDig but you'll probably have to pay someone to make it work. It's worth your money. Put it at the top of your list.

TALK TO ME!
Company contact information belongs on every page, preferably in the footer. The footer area should also tell me a mailing address, a fax number and not merely supply a link to a contact page. Think: single-clicking! One click to get where you most want to go should be a navigation goal.

HELP ME!
You can add online help to your site through volusion's Live Chat (free edition) or through the Open Source PHP Lively at Sourceforge (the holy grail of Open Source apps to try). Of course, you have to make an employee available to respond, even if only a few visitors click the icon. Surely, someone sits at a desk during the day. Think how important they will feel!

FEED ME!
I want to know what your company is up to and what new products you have that will benefit me. Send out an RSS feed of new information or products. The nitty-gritty of RSS is here and if you're not into coding, try one of several free Open Source apps to generate RSS from your Web site.

Pheeder claims to be easy to implement and has loads of documentation. RSS Genesis works on any type of server and is PHP4/5 compatible and RSS Feed Creator claims simply to generate RSS feed.

While you're at it, how about offering RSS feeds for companion products that might interest me? There are some free RSS services that enable adding feeds to your site relatively easy and, of course, FeedRoll.

While you're RSS'ing, you can create a feed of any Web page that interests you. Feedity is a free service that will create a feed for any page and alert you to changes or updates to any site's page. Keep on eye on the competition or sites of businesses that impact what you sell through easy RSS reading.

WHOLE PACKAGE ME!
Robert Scoble, an online evangelist, lists his best practices for your business cards. Why not incorporate these ideas into your small business Web site?

1. Start the conversation – make your site engage the visitor.
2. Make it a standard size and shape but be different – that's why you need a Web development firm with creative builds in their portfolio.
   
3. Make sure the basics are easy to find.
4. Tell us what you do. Unless your business is globally recognized, we need to see what you're selling in clear language on the home page.
5. Break some rules but stay on the good side of obnoxious.
6. Highlight your corporate tag line. Don't have one yet? Get one.
7. Use language options if appropriate.

Use the rest of 2008 to build a plan for your small business Web site to move toward as many best practices as possible. A site re-design isn't free and is also not a silver bullet that will increase sales dramatically in the first week. You still have to market your Web site. Stay tuned.

Internet Service Providers are coming at high bandwidth users from all directions, but mostly poorly. Dave Winer once again is at the forefront with his Comcast controversy where the ISP threatened to cut off his service for using "too much" bandwidth but wouldn't tell him how much "too much" was. You can hear the DLS podcast here. Comcast is sending out threatening letters labeling customers as abusers, without telling them how much their download or upload caps really are.

The bottom line for Comcast appears to be: you're using too much. We're just not going to tell you how much is too much, because we're the ISP.

It's not just Comcast, either, back in 2002, CNet wrote that ISPs are considering new pricing plans that would adversely affect file-swapping. Bell Canada customers suffered through a 10Gb cap but complained that the monitoring software wasn't BC's responsibility.

Internet bandwidth usage is growing, some say wildly, for US businesses. Most companies buy broadband with speeds much higher than their workers have at home and with an inexpensive Flash key, a worker can download movies or songs and transfer them to their pockets with little trace, except for that pesky bandwidth usage.

ISPs are accused of bandwidth throttling, or traffic shaping, to slow down people using P2P software file sharing. Bell Canada calls it "downgrading the internet services of bandwidth hogs," and this month the Canadian Association of Internet Providers has asked the Canadian federal regulators to prohibit BC's throttling of Web traffic on their network.

The implications for small business? Last month, Bell informed smaller Internet Service Providers that it was bringing in traffic-shaping policies on the network space it sells to them, effectively downgrading the services these smaller companies are able to provide to their customers. How about US businesses? What sort of bandwidth regulation might they be looking toward?

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Let's pretend you read this column and agree that it's time to embark on a Web site overhaul for your small business. You understand a little about Web 2.0-ness, want some interactivity, are considering using new online tools and have created a real job for the webmaster to do site updates. What's on your Web Overhaul Due Diligence To-Do List? What steps should you take to ensure that your site gets architected, designed, programmed, launched, and updated correctly?

HOMEWORK – let's start browsing sites and making favorites/bookmarks out of the ones that catch your eye. Note that you like the drop-down menu in one and the fading background in another. Make a "how did they do this?" list of snazzy features to ask your designer about implementing. In fact, build a spreadsheet and make column headings such as: URL, feature, forms, Flash, menus and more so you can keep your design notes and questions in a handy electronic document to share with all the design firms you interview, and we want you to talk to more than one.

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Almost every small business has a Web site and a high percentage of those sites are mired in Web 1.0 parameters. Perform a site self-checkup to determine how Web 2.0 your small business's online presence is. We're talking about all of your online presence and not simply your Web site. Here are 10 ways to grade your business's Web 2.0-ness.

1. Last update – if you haven't updated your Web site yet in 2008, it is definitely old web and not going in the Web 2.0 direction toward interactivity. When content doesn't change, your site is nothing more than a brochure online.
   No updates yet in 2008? Give yourself a C.
   
2. Who, When Where – if you aren't regularly checking your site's visitor trends, possibly using Google Analytics, then you don't know who is visiting your site, when they are paying attention or where they are coming from. You could run a promotion and never know if anyone online saw it. How old-web is that kind of thinking?
   No site stat research when marketing is everything? Give yourself a D.
   
3. Buy me! – does your site scream BUY SOMETHING rather than equally illustrating why your product or service is essential? Show us some case studies, success stories or testimonials in addition to pitching your product.
   No examples of your product's usefulness to buyers? Give yourself a C+.
   
4. No response – when is the last time you paid attention to website-generated email or calls and analyzed how much web-based contact your small business receives? Are you considering how to raise your online contacts through different, not necessarily more, online strategies?
   Not planning how to garner more online contact? Give yourself a C. If you don't yet know that Google Forms can be used to collect survey data, mark that down to a C-.
   
5. Still breaking the law? – if you are sending unsolicited email through your personal email program like Outlook, then you're probably violating the 2004 CAN-SPAM Act and fines are $10,000 per instance. It's time to invest small business dollars in a compliant email application. Start with Constant Contact and research from there.
   Still blasting from a personal email application? Give yourself an F because it's toying with disaster.
   
6. Feeding time – have you resisted adding an RSS feed to any portion of your small business presence because you really don't understand what RSS is? Get one your kids to explain it and then generate a weekly updated online feed for your business.
   Not feeding your customers yet with good information? Give yourself a C-.
   
7. Remote access denied – if your staff still has no intranet and your sales force can't find up-to-the-minute pricing and forms, try the new Google Sites and get everyone on the same online page. Add a calendar and share it with your staff to give your business more bang for its virtual buck.
   No online sharing? Degrade yourself to a D-. Information is king.
   
8. Identity Interrupted – does your logo designer know who your PR and Web firms are or are they each operating in an information vacuum? Worse, are you still trying to figure out if you need any of the above? Get your old logo converted into a high-resolution graphic and share it with your Web designer to pull together your branding and small business identity online and in print.
   Using a Publisher-created logo online? Give yourself a D+.
   
9. Anti-social – very few small business owners know what Twitter is and fewer use it. Are you closing your ears to comments made about your service or your product? Why not Twitter and send a "track [your company name or product]" message or at least use a Twitter search engine to see what's been tweeted. What else should you track? See what Cameron Olthuis, Jeremiah Owyang or Joseph Jaffe suggest.
   No ears on? Give yourself a B- only because Twitter is sort of new but not for much longer.
   
   
10. Remote island – spend time with one or two quality small business blogs a week by subscribing to their feed and figuring out which posts are important to your business. Try Small Business Resource for starters.
    Don't know how to subscribe to a feed? Give yourself a D+ because RSS is simply not new; it's everywhere.
    

The end of the first quarter is upon us and you've probably just paid first-quarter taxes. Now is the time to score your online presence and raise your grade during the rest of this fiscal year. Got more grading areas? List them in comments, please.