- John W. DeSpirito – CEO, iSafeTECH

Social networking sites are not only for individuals, teens and kids to chat about their horrible days in school or how fun the weekend was with friends getting drunk…yeah with no responsibility to life and no cares in the world.  Well, also these sites can talk about what clothes Mary wears to the mall or how Jim’s SUV is sucking up all our O2.  Social sites are turning into online gossip billboards of situations that, I think everyone will resent someday.

Recently, I have been jumping into social networking sites to promote my business and found they are powerful business tools to market products and push ideas to potential clients.  Information is easily accessible and simple searches seem to be more precise to bits of vital information than found on Google.  I began by launching a Twitter account backed by Google Analytic’s to log traffic. I then ran a  test to find followers and we landed more than 40 followers within a few days and they are growing hourly.  I then monitored Google Analytic’s and found are traffic sources were from Twitter and growing.

To begin how I started, I first learned what is out there on Twitter by searching for related products and services that I provide.  I then searched for all competition in my geographical region then globally.  It was astounding to see the tactics other business use in their marketing efforts to drive traffic.  By the same token, it was great to see how other businesses are using Twitter to communicate with their clients in a new way of expression.

I am now ” Tweeting”, yes I said it, tweeting all our products and services and posting our blog links to inform our followers of our interests.  I have found that your interests are the most compelling elements of how others view you online.  This is important because your words are your company’s image and how you communicate is how, well you know where I’m going with this.

Interesting to see with this test is that we are reinventing marketing practices by using no face-to-face or imagery to drive business but our words.  “Going back to basics” it seems, our creative minds and words will be selling our products.

Social networking “IS” for business

• It’s FREE to setup an account on most social networking sites.
• Time is money, but it’s more cost effective to try before you buy.
• Educate yourself with technology resources available.

Businesses can greatly improve their online presence by, “getting out there”, let the Internet know what’s the going’s on in their business.  I may sound sarcastic, but to be serious business from all sizes are chatting, tweeting, texting, blogging, online and channeling their information to the world in a new form of marketing.

Social networking is not new, but it is becoming an avenue to traffic your information to many others, quickly with one click of a mouse.

The only drawback to online social networking is that you MUST work at it religiously.  You need to drive not only your business, but drive yourself to update and keeping adding content, be creative to market your products and understand what is marketable in your business product line.  I have learned that time is an issue, but without keeping technology on your side your business may not be able to compete in a society drivin by technology.

Go Social

To summarize, “Go Social!!!” with your business and do it from the comfort of home.

Bring your business to the next level from an informational website or spamming by email or spending thousands on mailers and utilize new technology elements to market your products and services.

- John W. DeSpirito – CEO, iSafeTECH

Our Computer Technology Age has offered us “computer users” another alternative to living a normal lifestyle.  Computers have transformed our lives from how we communicate, how we transact financially and how we obtain information.  The flip-side has become about losing our identity, personal information stolen, investing in new security software and bombarded with ads from people you don’t know.

The terms spam, malware, spyware, viruses, trojans, etc and etc are scary words used in our daily lives like we need to be prepared for a battle mission.  In recent news we have been warned about the Conficker Trojan Virus.  But most computer users are unaware that the virus has been known for months and the release of doom date was April 1st, 2009.  Business and home computer users around the globe spent countless dollars on security software in the days leading upto April Fool’s Day.  The US National media also advised us to turn off our computers before midnight, just to be safe.  The truth is the virus is alive and well and as the security experts create patches a new variant of the virus will be created.  Hear is a good article to continue reading at PC World.

Why Do I get Spam?

iSafeTECH has been offering email services for more than 4 years and we have seen our Spam traffic increase dramatically in the past year.  We have reported that 99% of our email traffic is Spam related and combatting this issue has become a full-time job.  We constantly battle Spam and Viruses on our systems by monitoring and upgrading our software filters daily.

Spam is unsolicited email or email messages that you did not intend to receive in your inbox.  When you register for a service or sign up for a newsletter, your address is stored and eventually sold to be used for sending advert messages.  You, as a conscious computer user, will state you have not signed up for anything.  Yes, you may be right but how did you get your email address to begin with?  Most people will forward their mail from many email accounts to one email client like Outlook or Thunderbird.  The mail will be combined with other email addresses that you may use for free services or online purchases or whatever your pleasure.

But I continue to click Remove Me from your email list?  The leading and most respected Spam fighter experts from the “Spamhaus Project” have concluded that by removing yourself from an email list will only advise the spammer that your email address is real and you are reading it regularly.  Please visit them to learn more.

“By sending back a ‘remove me’ opt-out request you are confirming to the spammer that your address is live, you are confirming that your ISP doesn’t use spam filters, you are confirming that you actually open and read spams, and that you follow the spammer’s instructions such as “click this to be removed”. You are the perfect candidate for more spam.”  the Spamhaus Project

It is also been noted that users clicking Spam will be directed to download software programs to their computers without their knowledge.  We now term this malware.  Malware is a little program that will run on your computer as a virus or a spyware program to monitor your online usage.  They will come in many forms from destroying data to using your computer as a gateway to send more information to other computers connected to the Internet.

If you feel that you are receiving Spam from a source that will not leave you alone, File a Complaint with the FTC.  A complaint form can be found here.

I have stated in the past and feel strongly that regulations need to be imposed on Internet usage.  It may be a form of Freedom of Speech, but the fact is the Internet is running most of our lives.

- John W. DeSpirito – CEO, iSafeTECH

Cough, uhm, I was wondering if I could get a stimulus package.  Like maybe even a few hundred dollars to purchase a printer or copier for the office?  I would even save the government postal charges and drive to Washington and pickup the check.

So, I checked with the IRS at http://www.irs.gov/individuals/article/0,,id=181665,00.html and it looks like I missed the deadline.

To be honest though, our country’s economy needs assistance from our government that we trust will make the most ethical decisions with our money.  He who has money will make money and all the others will work for him.  This was a quote I grew up learning by living and breathing a family business.  Without financial support businesses will not be able grow.  They will not be able to except more work and hire employees and purchase more tools and so on and so on.  Most business will expand with funding and some may not need it, but all it takes is one client not to pay on time.  The deadlines are extended and interests rates applied, but eventually the end will come for another business to lay off or shut the doors.

As we have seen recently, and more and more each day, firms relying on 90 and 120 day old invoices can not seem to bear the burden any longer.  But is it one client or is it their client waiting on 90 and 120 days, also.  I believe we are all in the same boat sailing the same river to the ocean and hoping that hurricane season does not come early!  To make a financial concern worse, banks are refusing credit because of the overdue or in most cases will call this, lost revenue.  Ok, let me say it, to watch AIG executives receiving bonuses is not only a slap in the face to us struggling each day on the front lines, but discerning to a lack of confidence on what will tomorrow bring for business.  No more AIG references pleeaassse…

I am still confused on what to believe in the media from the White House to Fox News telling us on one hand that the economy is stable and keep hope and then on the other the Dow is the lowest in 100’s of years and we are doomed.  Everyday jobs are lost and foreclosures are on the rise and banks are even shutting down.  It sounds sad, scary and even threatening that competition is not one of the only threat anymore, but how any business sector will find more business.

“Where’s My Stimulus Package?”, I ask, well only myself.  I will not see one and neither will my neighbor.  But, local government, local industry may and so will my state.  We will see new grants and programs offered for businesses and new contracts will become available or will extensions will continue.  This is our stimulate.  Our golden opportunity for how struggling business owners trudging through the mud and keeping the doors open will be able to survive another quarter.

I am praying and hoping that this will come fast.  The snowball effect is gradually pulling down one by one each day and we need our government to melt the snow away.

- John W. DeSpirito – CEO, iSafeTECH

Let’s face it, the Web is a pot of soup containing products, services, movies, music, marketing, news and a plethora of sometimes helpful ideas.  Oh yeah,  and it was created for the communication of information.

With billions and billions of websites, read this to get a neat fact, the typical user could get immersed into a sea of nonesense while looking for something as simple as a cure for a wart.  I am not being sarcastic as we all know that the Web has evolved into a marketplace of commerce piggybacked on information that could save someone from insanity.

As the genius’ behind Google have illustrated to the world, online advertising has taken us to the next level of making money without really working for it.  How, why or what is it that companies will pay thousands of dollars for a page impressions when most people will not bother clicking through but the ads post in the hopes someone cares.  An interesting article posted today, in fact just as I was writing this, states that false ads are appearing on sites not relevant or pose false claims to what you may need information about.  Please check out the article at Chicago’s ABC News site.

Internet developers today are pioneers for the future of communication.  I mean mass communication to millions.  We have seen by example recently, in the past few weeks, hundred year old news paper firms are laying off and even shutting down presses.  I have not read a news paper in years and come to think of it why would I.  I come to work each morning and first read Drudge then move on to some local news sites and then, keeping my suspense building, keep Drudge open in a tab hoping for the emergency light image to show up for some breaking news.

How does this relate to my website, you may ask yourself as I keep leading you on.  The Web can be factual, but beware of the author.  Authors could be a ten year child writing a medical journal blog on the cure for the common cold.   Your content you find on a website may or may not be what your looking for but will lead you into a maze of information that will soon lead you guessing.  Both personal and commercial, both medical and spiritual websites are in abundance to us finding information we need.  But, to the savy “Web surfers”, “Googlers” out there we are becoming smart and beginning to create a trained eye on bad content.

I feel in the near future, we will see an advent of relevancy online.  Websites that contain facts, sound services and products and even real medical advice from real doctors.  I am hoping and praying that the information overload does not come first, which may mean we will all being content driven machines with ad banners on our backs.

Let’s all try to be responsible content creators and not teach our future generations that we are, well, dumb.