No, I’m not talking about Google being talked up in the news, blogosphere, or twittersphere.  Although I do think Google’s new Buzz concept is newsworthy.  I haven’t really caught any “little b“ buzz about it except within ”big B“ Buzz itself (although there are some news articles to be found about it).  Buzz is Google’s answer to Twitter and Facebook’s news feed.  I’m a longtime GMail user, so I saw it when it rolled out to most users yesterday.  I guess I did see one tweet and one GChat status about it when it apparently soft launched on Tuesday, which had me investigating in advance.

It was interesting yesterday to see people experimenting and wondering what it was all about, through the Buzz interface itself.  It’s apparently not totally intuitive for everyone.  I generally like it and get it though, and I’m not the only one.  There was a lot of people posing questions or concerns through Buzz status updates, and other folk responding back about how they thought things worked and made sense.

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Andrew Crowe Categories: Social Media, Technology, Web

People have been serving customers in “real time” ever since there have been customers. So this is not a new concept. In fact, we’re using technology to correct a problem that technology introduced–distance between company and customer.

If someone walks into your store with a problem, you fix it immediately. If a customer calls you on the phone, you talk to them (hopefully) immediately. But what if someone posts something negative about you on Twitter or to an Internet Forum? What then?

Real time search allows you to monitor those types of interactions, complaints, and complements. It’s still your responsibility to respond, but the time needed to find such messages has been greatly reduced.

The lines between marketing and customer service are blurring. Quickly responding to someone on their own turf in a respectful manner has potential not only to set them straight, but also increase the likelihood they will tell other people about your remarkable effort to make it right. And your public response will serve as a permanent record for anyone else who sees the comment.

Twitter is currently the primary source of real time content, but expect others to get on board quickly. Twitter’s success has driven the major search engines to add real time search features to their products. But Twitter still manages the majority of real time traffic, so you can use Twitter’s built-in search engine as a place to hear what people are saying about you. Otherwise, expect popular online listening tools to start accommodating real time search in the near future.

This certainly won’t pre-empt any traditional forms of customer service, but people are out there talking about you online one way or another. You’ll be better off if you’re aware of it, since it’s not just going to go away on it’s own. At the end of the day, you should view this as an opportunity to serve people better.

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Andy Swindler Categories: Entrepreneurship, Marketing, Social Media, Technology, Web, ePiphany Featured Story

Real time search is getting to be a quite the buzzphrase in recent months. But what is it really?  The simplest and most familiar example is Twitter’s search feature, which provides almost instantaneous access to anyone’s tweets.  But given the recent implementations by the major search players, Google and Microsoft’s Bing, there appears to be some disagreement on the finer points. This article by Danny Sullivan from Search Engine Land analyzes the concept in a really nice way that I tend to agree with. It also delves into a lot of other specialized tools for real time search, but I’ll stick to the big names here (Twitter, Google, and Bing). Sullivan maintains that real time search is only truly “real time” when its sources come from microblogging services that provide a real time feed of the activity on their networks. For the most part right now, that means Twitter. There is just no single place for search engines to constantly look for updates from news sites or long-format blogs. So they have to depend on being alerted to updates by such sites, or actively crawling around the entire internet looking for new content. Neither of which is reliably real time in the up-to-the-second way that Twitter is.

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Andrew Crowe Categories: Social Media, Technology, Web, ePiphany Featured Story

The right CMS allows you to focus on your website content rather than the tools that run it. Numerous options meet the demands of countless websites. Astek designed Webany for you.

By now you should know why you need a CMS and how you can use a Content Management System to keep your website up to date. I wanted to share some tips about choosing the right CMS to make your Web life easier and more productive.

There are four basic types of CMS:

1. Open source applications that require configuration from a Web professional
2. Boxed desktop software that allow you to edit your website from one computer
3. “Boxed” hosted software that requires configuration from a Web professional
4. Hosted software as a service (SAAS) applications that relieve you from the burden of worrying about the backend

Here is some more info on each type of CMS to help you make the right decision:

1. Open source means that the code used to create the software is publicly available and takes advantage of a huge pool of resources (programmers) to develop. There are advantages and disadvantages to open source software. Since development is not regulated by a single entity, it also means that version-control isn’t 100% predictable or reliable. Typically this weighs on the side of advantage since there are a number of passionate, dedicated developers to fix problems that arise.

Open source developers create add-on modules or plug-ins to provide extended capabilities including forums, blog, wiki, web-stores, photo-galleries, contact-management, e-commerce, etc. It can be time-consuming to find the right plug-in, verify it works with your website and does what you need it to do, but chances are there is a solution out there for you. You will typically need to work with a developer to install, configure, and develop an open source CMS for you to use.

We like to use Wordpress for blogs, which is an open source CMS for publishing. For blogs it’s nearly perfect, but we find that for creating more complex websites it has some limitations that inspired us to create Webany.

2. You can purchase boxed CMS desktop software like you would a word processor and run it from your computer. Adobe Contribute is a fairly capable desktop-based CMS. Typically these are designed for one person to manage one or more websites from one computer. While they can sometimes handle multiple users, this gets expensive quickly since you have to purchase additional licenses of the software for each person.

Some boxed CMS products are far more expensive and do offer a greater array of features. These also require set-up from a knowledgeable professional and rarely work perfectly “out-of-the-box” as their packaging might suggest. Again, these products are usually not designed to handle highly complex websites like our solution.

3. There are a few “boxed” hosted solutions out there that are not open source, but may still offer a suitable range of options for your Web needs. These are “boxed” solutions in that they are purchased as a single license, but are not designed as do-it-yourself products. You will need the help of a Web developer to install and configure these products on your Web server, as well as train you to use them. Telerik’s Sitefinity is a good example.

4. That leaves us with SAAS or hosted Web CMS. These have a big advantage in saving you time and money with set-up since they are maintained by the company who provides the service, which means you don’t have to worry about it! Some hosted CMS’ have pre-made templates for you to use, and only a few allow you to use a custom design.

You may still need the skills of a Web professional, especially if you are custom-designing a website to match your brand and specific needs. Astek specializes in this type of development, but we were consistently disappointed with CMS solutions that sacrificed features for ease-of-use, or packed in so many features that that they became cumbersome to use. Rather than settle for another solution, we decided to make one that meets our ideal for a CMS.

Webany is just right. She offers more flexibility than you’re likely to need while maintaining an intuitive design that makes managing your website a snap. You can update anything from words to photos to movies to custom forms without any knowledge of HTML. Use a custom design from Astek or anyone else.

Most importantly, Webany makes sure that your updates won’t counteract the effort and money you put into creating a custom-tailored look and feel. Auto-archiving and user workflow ensure a painless approach to website maintenance.

If you’re interested in learning more, please contact us for a Webany demo.

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Andy Swindler Categories: Entrepreneurship, Marketing, Technology, Web, ePiphany Featured Story

If you’ve never used a Content Management System before, you may not be familiar with just how neat they are. We’ve put together a quick tour with lots of screenshots and explanations to get you “behind the screens“ to see how a CMS-run website really works.

We’ll admit, we’re happy to get a chance to show off both Astek’s beautiful new website and our killer CMS – Webany. But more than a chance to strut our stuff, we hope you find this a valuable tutorial in how user-friendly a robust and flexible custom CMS system can be.

EASY UPDATES WITH RICH TEXT BOXES
For the most part, the ”content“ handled in a content management system consists of text, images and files (like downloadable PDFs). Most CMSs, including Webany, allow you to make changes to content using rich text boxes – (sometimes referred to as a WYSIWYGs – what you see is what you get).

Here is an example of a Webany rich text box:

The reason they are called ”rich“ text boxes is because they allow you to have text with ”rich“ formating like bold, underline, hyperlinks, etc., using buttons much like you would find in Microsoft Word.

Webany can combine several rich text boxes to handle a web page with multiple content areas. Webany automatically formats the content from each rich text box with the color, font and size from your website design. This way, the person making updates to the content does not have to know any website programming.

EVEN EASIER UPDATES WITH LIST DRIVEN CONTENT
Where you see the real power of a CMS, and gain the most efficiency in your updates, is when you start using ”list driven“ content. This means that you upload information into one spot in the CMS and it populates that content to multiple places on the website. This is especially useful for information like staff biographies where you have a ”list“ of people for whom you’d like to display similar information. For example, on Astek’s biography pages we show:

• Photo
• Name
• Title
• Link to Email
• Link to Facebook Profile (if applicable)
• Link to Twitter Page (if applicable)
• Link to LinkedIn Profile (if applicable)
• Funny Quote
• Biography

We also have a ”People“ page on the site that lists all of our staff. That page shows an abbreviated version of this information for each staff member.

One list item generates the content for both of these pages.

You might notice that we use Andrew’s name 3 different times between those 2 pages, and each use has a slightly different font treatment. Webany makes all of these font adjustments behind the scenes ensuring a consistent, professional look with minimum effort on the part of the person making the updates. If Andrew decided to start going by Andy, a quick change in one field in Webany would populate the change throughout the site.

Content management systems can make a complex website easy to manage, but not all CMSs are created equal. We absolutely suggest you ”test drive“ any CMS you are planning to purchase. If your company is considering converting to a CMS we hope you will contact Astek to take Webany for a spin.

This post was featured in ePiphany, Astek’s Monthly Newsletter | Other ePiphany Articles

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Katie Hawkey Categories: How To, Technology, Web

In any kind of business today, your website is a core and essential infrastructure component. People will search for you on Google and expect to find your official site. Getting it high up in search results is another matter entirely (we did an ePiphany solely about search engine optimization a couple of months ago). But you need to have something out there. The efforts related to building and maintaining a business website are not small, like any other technology consideration. And they will be ongoing throughout the life of your business. So it’s something you need to accept as part your bottom line, but with the right planning and strategy you can aim for the sweet spot of minimal cost for maximal site value. A key part of that equation for many businesses involves a content management system (CMS).

The most expensive part of getting a website up is of course an initial from-scratch design and development process. And although a CMS may streamline some of that process, you will likely still need a significant upfront investment for design. And someone with a technical understanding of a particular CMS, as well as some HTML, CSS, and Javascript knowledge would need to do the build-out of a site design within a CMS. However, the key is that once launched, your website is not going to just stay as is. The content of your site will need to be updated as your business ages and changes. A CMS can empower internal personnel without deep technical knowledge to make these updates. In many cases all that is needed is a little training on the particular CMS and anyone who knows MS Word can make site changes.

Where a CMS really contributes its value is with regularly generated new content. This could be events, news, staff bios, etc. With a CMS, you can add such elements to your site with a minimal ongoing maintenance cost. Without one, you would need to factor in the cost of a web programmer’s effort each time you need to add a new event listing. And in many cases, that cost would likely outweigh any tangible benefit. Without that cost as a factor however, you can dream up all sorts of dynamic content for your site. Done properly, it can help bring people back to your site repeatedly, better your search ranking, and give a general impression of web savviness. And even if you don’t currently envision dynamic content for a new website, developing it in a CMS gives you the ability to make static changes on your own, while retaining the option to later add dynamic elements with relative ease.

Astek would love to tell you more about our Webany, our very own CMS. Drop us a line, or read more about her here.

 This post was featured in ePiphany, Astek’s Monthly Newsletter |  Other ePiphany Articles 

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Andrew Crowe Categories: Technology, Web, ePiphany Featured Story

Road trains look like a very encouraging solution to automotive transportation. Essentially cars using wireless signals to automatically follow a lead car. I’ve long felt that if all cars were somehow connected and able to start and stop together that we’d all save a lot of time and headache on the road! Have you ever noticed how much time is wasted just waiting for the cars ahead of you to start moving?

Imagine how much better life would be if we could have transit time to do whatever we wanted. Work, sleep, read, you name it. I’m sure it will be awhile before they are ready for prime time, but I personally can’t wait.

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Andy Swindler Categories: Fun, Gadget, Green, Technology

The theme of the week is showing off our clients’ successes. Recently, L.A.-based VeriFacts Automotive received some nice press for their ongoing efforts to increase the quality of collision repair work through coaching and therefore increase the safety of cars on the road.

Read more about VeriFacts and President Farzam Afshar, interviewed in Parts & People magazine.

Afshar says his company’s goal “is to go into shops and evaluate their work quality and coach their technicians on what they’re doing right and wrong rather than waiting for a repair issue to get them into court and conflict.”

Astek supports this goal by providing Web consulting, back-end development, and maintenance for the organization’s custom Web applications.

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Andy Swindler Categories: Entrepreneurship, Technology

For businesses, an email signature is like a website on a micro scale.  You should definitely have one, but it needs to be done well to make the right statement about your business.  There are also various stylistic and technical issues to consider.  I like to think our email signature is pretty good.  Clean, simple, with a hint of color to make it stand out and represent our brand:

However, one of our clients stands out for having an all-around great email signature that I think should stand as example to others.  As part of our ePiphany issue focusing on inspiring work by our clients, we would like to show you the email signature from Demi and Cooper. They are a Chicago advertising agency we have worked with to provide webcam service for building development projects.  Their signature has a nice mix of clean and simple design, appropriate use of images, and inclusion of social media links.  Have a look at the signature of Walter Ottenhoff, who did the actual design for it:

	Walter Ottenhoff | Web Art Director/Manager | Demi & Cooper Advertising P 847.931.5800 | F 847.931.5801 | demicooper.com

If you’re going to use graphics in your signature, do so sparingly.  And be sure to host any images at your company’s website, referring to them there rather than including them as email attachments.  If social media links are appropriate, by all means include them and use the appropriate thumbnails.

A professional email signature should ideally be crafted by an experienced web designer.  The signature is basically just a little bit of HTML, but there are concerns specific to viewing in an email client.  Test in as many email clients as possible to be sure that people won’t see an unintended mess at the bottom of your emails. We recommend Litmus for an automated service to perform such testing.

If you can’t get a custom HTML signature, one free alternative is a Firefox browser plugin called WiseStamp.  Their signature edit tool would feel familiar to anyone who has used MS Word or blog authoring tools.  You can input your social media profile addresses and it will add links to them automatically, with some nice options for customizing their display.  WiseStamp will add your signature to all the common web mail clients.  You can even get the HTML from it (although without the social media links) to use in a desktop email client like Outlook.  One tip: be sure to uncheck the promote Wisestamp Project option in the settings.

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Andrew Crowe Categories: General, How To, Marketing, Technology, Web, ePiphany Featured Story

Astek is proud to announce the first session of classes for our new Green Star Academy! Wednesday, October 21, 2009, get out of the office and make some real progress on Web Marketing for your company as you learn tips, tricks and shortcuts used by the experts!

In the morning Tom Lynch teaches a crash course in Search Engine Optimization:

SEO: Smaller Ponds, Bigger Fish
Targeting Behavior to Lure Customers

Turn your online presence into online performance. Find your customers by behavior and reel them in as they search. Master the SEO strategies, tools and shortcuts used by the experts to find “smaller ponds” filled with new customers.
REGISTER

In the afternoon, Katie Hawkey gets you set up to reach new customers through Social Media sites like Facebook and Twitter:

Zero to 60 Social Media
Rev Up Your B2C Marketing with Facebook & Twitter

Now is the time to implement your social media strategy. Get the concepts and tools you need to drive social media marketing while you set up optimized Facebook and Twitter accounts for your company.
REGISTER

We hope you’ll join us! If you know anyone who might benefit from this class please pass it on! And if there is a class you would be interested in seeing us offer, by all means, let us know!

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Katie Hawkey Categories: Search Engine Optimization, Social Media, Technology, Web