Archive for May, 2010
Google TV is Coming Soon!
Posted by: | CommentsThe Wall Street Journal’s Jessica E. Vascellaro and Don Clark said “Google is currently planning on sharing some details about the technology with more than 3,000 developers expected to attend its Google I/O conference in San Francisco May 19 and 20.”
And this software has got quite a bit of other big companies very excited. Sony and Intel have already been working with Google on this new software, but now Samsung and Logitech are keen to jump on board too.
Google is apparently keen to iron out all the creases of the final product and launch at the I/O conference, so that the 3000+ developers that are expected at the conference, can help them build applications for the platform.
Google TV is designed to bring Internet-style content, including web search, applications and video entertainment to your living room. The next step would be for the Google TV software to be embedded in the new generation of internet-ready TVs, game consoles, set-top boxes, and Blu-ray players.
Writer’s Bio: Derek Morris is Senior Editor of Vectorwire.com, source for the latest graphic design, web design, web hosting, and technology news and articles.
How to Prevent Customers from Abandoning Hosting…Stop Churn Now!
Posted by: | CommentsAs all of us in the industry know, customer churn is the “ENEMY”! It is the killer of profitability and the reason we all keep a bottle of extra strength Tylenol on our desk.
We spend $100s of dollars on customer acquisition, yet what are we really doing to stop churn. Yes we all provide great hosting services, give great support and make sure they stay up BUT is this enough.
Absolutely not! Why? Because we really are not addressing why customers quit hosting. I am not talking about the constant switching hosting companies; I am talking about the No. 1 reason why hosting customers quit hosting.
Failure to successfully market online is the No. 1 reason, hosting customers quit hosting! Absolutely!!
Most hosting customers are hosting their web site online to sell their services and products both online and offline. Their web presence is either directly or indirectly related to their profitability YET we are not doing enough to help them market and succeed. I mean really succeed. In fact, many hosting companies stop right there..just providing hosting services & they wonder why they have high churn???
The first step to succeeding online is not having a pretty website, nor is it even about being ranked No.1 on Google (of course this is a big part of it). No it is just being visible; being found online. If customers cannot find the businesses, they cannot buy their products and services.
So the first step is being highly visible; being listed everywhere they need to be listed, across all major search engines, online yellow pages, 411 directory assistance, social networks, mobile phones, and GPS navigation devices. If their customers are finding them first, then at least they are in the game. If not, then they do not even have a chance to succeed.
Fortunately there is a simple, straight forward solution. UniversalBusinessListing.org (UBL) has come up with some simple, easy to implement and did I mention, very affordable services which make this incredibly easy for their customers.
UBL helps businesses save enormous time, money & effort having to register separately at all these locations. This includes unlimited updates, changes and best of all, distribution to all major search engines as a verified source; all for just very low price. We also have an Audit tool for large organizations to check all their locations and a new claiming service for Google, Bing, Yahoo, DMOZ and FaceBook.
Most of you know that I spent many, many years in the hosting industry, during which I analyzed this problem in great depth; which is why several years ago I became such a strong advocate of hosting companies adding marketing services to their offerings & why I sit on the HostingCon Advisory Board – to help hosting companies understand what they need to do to overcome this issue.
During my 15+ years in the Industry, this is probably the best and easiest service I have come across for any hosting company to implement to help their customers succeed online and help stop churn. To learn more about how you can implement what is the very first step towards helping your customers succeed online, please contact me.
The Death of Microsoft Tablets?
Posted by: | Comments“At any given time, across any of our business groups, there are new ideas being investigated, tested, and incubated. It’s in Microsoft’s DNA to continually develop and incubate new technologies to foster productivity and creativity,” said Frank Shaw, corporate vice president of communications at Microsoft. “The ‘Courier’ project is an example of this type of effort and its technologies will be evaluated for use in future Microsoft offerings.”
Expected late this year, Courier was built in the shape of a book with two 7-inch screens, a built-in camera and Wi-Fi. The device also was said to support a variety of user inputs such as touching, handwriting and drawing.
Although this set back may end up benefiting Microsoft and Windows OS tablets in the long run, for now it seems that Microsoft is dead before ever entering the tablet wars.
Writer’s Bio: Derek Morris is Senior Editor of Vectorwire.com, source for the latest graphic design, web design, web hosting, and technology news and articles.
Dedicated Hosting Not Just for the Big Guys
Posted by: Dave | Comments (0)One of the great myths of web hosting is that only large scale companies or huge web sites can benefit from dedicated hosting. Often times smaller businesses or popular but small websites use a form of virtual hosting instead.
For SMBs consider a website your place of business. For customers who cannot visit a physical location, your website is the physical location affixed in their mind. Therefore if a website is profitable or if a website services many customers should that not justify the price of dedicated? How many brick and mortar store owners would jump at the chance of getting prime real estate for only $300 a month?
There is also a matter of security and uptime issues that can be easily solved by dedicated hosting. Since the physical space of the website is not shared with others the influence of other sites on the server that can reduce system resources, add backdoors and security problems to the server, or create hindrances to adding custom packages is eliminated.
Sudden spikes in popularity such as Cyber Monday in November can greatly cripple virtual hosting plans for retail SMBs. Not so with dedicated server hosting. Going dedicated also makes it easier to add hardware appliances such as firewalls or (if the company begins to see increased growth) more servers with load balancing.
In comparison to the physical realm, web hosting is inexpensive, regardless of the form of hosting. Don’t get locked into the mindset that dedicated server hosting is only for large companies. You can find an affordable dedicated server host such as Superb Internet.