emerging trends
THE
POWER OF LINKS
You boost your PageRank by boosting the number of links pointing to your website. But through recent changes, Google prefers sites that link to you to be relevant, not random. The helps eliminate black hat linking farms.
WAYS TO
BUILD LINKS: 1.
2. 3.
Create quality, educational or entertaining content. If people like your content, they will want to link to it. Submit your website to online directories. Make sure your website information is up to date on Chamber sites, associations, social media, etc.
* Amanda Betts, marketing director, Stellar Blue Web Design LLC, Amanda@ stellarbluewebdesign.com
Why These days there’s not just an app for everything, there are 10 apps for everything. This can make finding the app to meet your needs a bit challenging. Luckily, there’s usually an app or two that stand above the rest in a particular category. For mobile travel applications one of those apps is KAYAK. The free app, available for Android, Windows Phone 7, Kindle and other popular devices, includes flight and car search, hotel search and booking, flight tracking and tools to view and manage your trip itinerary. The app, which gets high marks from users, is a handy tool for business travel or personal vacations. * Julie Boyce, associate product manager, Cellcom, Julie.boyce@cellcom.com
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collective impact | APRIL 13
THE CLOUD BAILS YOU OUT
The importance of remote data backup is greater than most businesses realize. Backing up your data off-site can save your company exponentially if a disaster were to decimate your business.
The Internet is one big popularity contest. Powerhouse Google has been upping its game on sites that it deems as popular. Therefore, it’s our job to represent to Google that we are winner-worthy. One way to build your popularity is through quality links. Google gives a grade to every website; it’s called PageRank. PageRank is on a scale from 0-10. ‘10’ symbolizes that your website is fully optimized and is the most popular. ‘0’ means there is definitely room for improvement.
REMOTE DATA BACKUP –
THE WAY IT WORKS IS SIMPLE:
A software agent is installed at the business; then you select what data you want backed up and how often. That data is sent to an off-site data center (“the cloud”) where it is stored and duplicated to another data center to protect against disasters. Most data centers have raised floors (flooding), fire suppression systems and multiple generators (loss of power) to prevent downtime. When a business needs to restore files, it’s as simple as opening the software agent and selecting the backups needed. The data is then transferred to your business. * Peter Helander, CEO, Heartland Business Systems, phelander@hbs.net
“Be proactive; back up your data off-site today.”
I-GADGET POWER The downside to a bag full of i-gadgets is their appetite for power. While it's easy to keep all those charging cables in your bag for when the need arises, what do you do when you can’t get an outlet or are on the move but your smartphone or tablet is on its last legs? There are plenty of emergency USB power devices that will almost charge a smartphone, but in my travels, I pack the Mophie Juice Pack Powerstation Duo. It packs a whopping 6000 mAh of power, and with its two USB ports, it can charge up multiple devices on the go. I don’t leave home without it. www.mophie.com * David Troup, Midwest Internet pioneer and entrepreneur, DMI Studios, sales@dmistudios.com