Competing in today's complex business world requires quick thinking, good technology, and hard work. Presentation given to the Small Business Development Meeting in Council Bluffs, IA 02/08/2011.

1. In business for yourself, not by yourself. -Ray Kroc Leveraging technology and not the house. Julian Caldwell

2. Television won't last because people will soon get tired of staring at a plywood box every night." - Darryl Zanuck, movie Producer, 20th Century Fox 1946 "This 'telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us. - 1876 Western Union Internal memo. Getting IT wrong.

3. Technology Tools and News Junky Programming since I was 10 VP Business Development for a $15M/Year company Addicted to the entrepreneurial spirit First venture in college (unsuccessful  ) Second Venture Last Year (successful  ) Third Venture This Year (will be successful  ) About Me

4. How do I improve my productivity? Free tools!

5. Open Office www.openoffice.org Desktop and portable version for Word Excel PowerPoint Draw Etc. Easy to use, similar layout as MS Office BUT (FREE) Productivity Tools

6. Google Applications Spreadsheet Documents Mail Chat Google Desktop Indexing of email, PC, Server, you name it. Easily find ALL documents Free (unless you want business domain like @mycompany.com) usually $50/user/year. All documents can be shared (in real-time) with selected users Voice over IP Google Voice Transcription of voice mails to emails Unique handling of phone calls based upon who they are. Handiest tool I have used in the last 2 months Google (‘nuf said)

7. Freemind http://freemind.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php/Main_Page Mind-Mapping Software Easily create content from meetings, brainstorming, connecting ideas and sharing them graphically. Demonstration Mind-Mapping

8. A person consumes as much information in one week as a person did their entire lifetime in the 18th century. A person is hit with 3,000 advertising messages per day (business owners twice that) How do you separate yourself from your competition? Today’s world

9. How do I improve my communication? Content is king

10. Web Presence Cross-Browser Support Search Optimized for Content Analytics (FREE) www.google.com/analytics Relevant design (new vs. older and dated) Clear and Concise Company Blog News and Information converted to posts (release as RSS) Create content that can be 'mashed' with other sites Who's talking about you http://backtweets.com/ Google Alerts Your website has to be better than your competition

11. Good, but not great. Great. New vs. Old

12. Well designed Meta-Data with online presence

13. Same data, less impact. Poorer designed meta-data

14. www.wordpress.com The most prolific content creation development platform for the web today (my opinion). Easily configurable with thousands of free 'themes' to make your website look professional, easy to update, and tons of online help making content creation relatively easy. 1000's of plug-ins to extend the functionality of your basic website. Email newsletter sign ups. Pools Facebook/Twitter extension Picture galleries Blog Feeds RSS creators Word Press – Online Content

15. Meebo Bar http://www.meebo.com/websites/ Increase "Sharing" of content to your viewers network allows login of multiple instant messaging platforms, Facebook, AOL, MSN Messenger, etc. Skype www.skype.com File Transfer, phone calls, chats, encrypts calls and chats prior to sending them through the internet. QR Codes Quick Response Codes (Phone Friendly Bar Coding) How do you increase sharing?

16. Publish Everything YouTube - How To’s Email Marketing to your contacts with 'how to' Think Content. An email to a consumer about how to, can become a blog post. Shoot videos at events Interview your customers Share lessons learned the hard way Set UP Word Press website < $500 to get your started with hosting development content and some key search engine work Find where your customers are talking Twitter, Facebook, THEN ENGAGE IN conversations with them Don't over do it Good example (http://www.natureshelperinc.com/ ) Leverage who you know…

17. Process with the correct infrastructure can be automated Good use of email marketing

18. Limited Emails (Timely) Links to “do it yourself” videos (even though they are in the business of doing it for you?!)

19. Linked-In, Facebook, Twitter Why? How? Connect with you and your extended network. So, what should I share? How Often? Engage in the Q & A Processes (become an expert in your subject area) Think of keywords in your response, but keep it simple and straight forward Great access to public conversations regarding your business “Like” is the next “word of mouth” Do I need to “Tweet?”

20. www.groupon.com www.foursquare.com Location based offerings I am in the ‘neighborhood’ what is a good deal for me? I checked in at Starbucks, 50% discount on a roll. I am next to Starbucks, CD’s on sale 15% off. I loved the meal I just had at Mom and Pop’s diner. Check it out! Benefits Good visibility (www.groupon.com) New Customers (www.foursquare.com) Drawback Expensive (www.groupon.com) Younger Crowd (www.foursquare.com) 3’s a crowd…that buys stuff.

22. New Browsers support Lat/Long identification.http://localhost/canyahelp/index.php?/test/geo Lots of META DATA around where the person is located. Can you imagine just limiting your advertising to a neighborhood? It can be done. Cell Phones applications “usually” know where you are. Geo-fencing allows you to know if someone has came “into” your store. (if they allow it) Lots of competition to have the right application that is ‘opt-in’ advertising. I will accept advertising from businesses in the area IN EXCHANGE for discounts, etc. Free Drink at local establishment (85% would take the offer) Location, Location, Location Based Services

23. Audacity http://audacity.sourceforge.net/download/ Create podcasts How to do something. What to look for in a product. What is going on in your community Any business trends you see in your day to day involvement in your business Interviews with key members of your industry Be a DJ….yeah you.

24. Active Collab www.activecollab.com Work with your associates and clients, assign tasks, share files, get notified when something happens, discuss and comment. Everything is saved in the system and available for future reference. Built to engage your staff (from 1 to 10000) to focus on the right things. Same page…

25. MailChimp www.mailchimp.com Easily manage your email marketing campaigns with this affordable software as a service solution. Good analytics, easy to use interface, FREE for small outbound campaigns Automatic integration to Google Analytics (lead generations), Facebook, groups, MailChimp’s RSS-to-email campaigns automatically send newsletters whenever you update your blog or any other RSS feed. BEST in the market You’ve got mail..

26. GotoMeeting www.gotomeeting.com The best (my opinion) online meeting tool on the market. Easily interact with your customers anywhere in the world. Quickly determine if they are a lead or a red – herring Easy for your customers, easy to set up. Record the session for “content” on you website When you need face to face..

27. EventBrite www.eventbrite.com Publish, promote, manage, and sell events that your business is involved in. Training seminars How To Lectures Food Promotion Wine Tasting, etc. Online Event Planning made Simple

28. What is a web service? Web Services

30. WEB 2.0 methodology Interactive sharing between applications (Web services (REST/SOAP), MASHUP's) User-Generated Content Restaurant can easily “post” facebook comments and reviews Restaurant can post events automagically Menu can be ‘posted’ automatically to the web without a developer Make sure you are investing in 2.0+

31. YQL Yahoo Query Language MASHUP of web services around the world http://developer.yahoo.com/yql/console/ The Yahoo! Query Language is an expressive SQL-like language that lets you query, filter, and join data across Web services. With YQL, apps run faster with fewer lines of code and a smaller network footprint. YQL

32. www.twilio.com Cloud-based enterprise class voice services platform Allows small businesses to engage customers with voice and phone (like the big guys) Easy to implement (5 minutes to 1 week for voice/text service) Some Examples Record the caller's audio, and submit the resulting recording back to your web server. Use it as content on your website. Order Status Special Offers via SMS Automate outbound phone calls (for offers, sales, surveys) Voice Services

33. www.surveymonkey.com GREAT relatively free application to ascertain opinions from our customers. Great way to generate customer service surveys, product surveys, general interest surveys. REAL – Time Analytics from the responses. Online (no set up) Free for limited number of survey questions and email addresses. Online Survey

34. Mobify your site http://mobify.me/ FREE for smaller users Great way to take your existing content (web site) and make it mobile. Some limitations to the process, but if you have NO mobile site, it is better than that! Become Mobile

35. www.codeigniter.com Good development framework Great deal of online support Best user community out there (my opinion) Tested on multiple network platforms Configurable for multiple language support Relatively easy to learn Inexpensive resource (off-shore and on-shore) Development Framework

36. http://camstudio.org/ Records screen activity from the Windows desktop into standard AVI movie files. It is an ideal tool for creating software demonstrations and how to’s online. http://www.youtube.com Good example of content http://www.youtube.com/user/growingwisdom Very focused presentations, easy (5 minute) how to’s Become an expert in your arena with a $100 camcorder and a web connection. Creating Online Video Content

37. Email: juliancaldwell@gmail.com Facebook Julian Ivey-Caldwell LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/juliancaldwell Twitter : @demandswarm Questions?

38. www.gimp.org Image Manipulation Program Can be simply a paint application or as a pretty sophisticated graphics tool Free for download Well supported by the computing community Image Manipulation