"Out of the mouths of babes, oft time come gems." This well-known saying, probably derived from Psalms in the Bible, should remind us to always be on the lookout to learn a life lesson in the most obscure of places. Today, I have 2 posts, as I felt compelled to write this second one, not about how to exponentially multiply your traffic, guarantee 100% click through, or how to have the best website in the world, but rather to share a few "gems".

When you're down, sing louder!

Life is full of ups and downs, good and bad, want and plenty. How we react during these times determines who we are. When Kenya, our Lovebird, was getting low on water or food he'd sing and chat to us even more than normal. Without being a whinger, when life is tough, gather your friends around you and ask for support. A trouble (or problem) shared is a trouble halved.

Make the most of every situation

When he was out of his cage, he'd fly, and fly, and fly. In fact, he was a little naughty, and getting him back into his cage was sometimes quite a mission! But he was taking

If you've been in business more than 6 months, and especially if you've tried some sort of internet marketing, then you'll undoubtedly have a bunch of names and addresses of people who looked, but never bought. Here's a 1 liner email that will really grab their attention and garner a pretty good response rate.

Firstly, I have to admit that this isn't my idea, but I loved it and unashamedly nabbed it to send to all my customers, because I thought it was brilliant. An Aussie firm is using and is, reportedly, doing great things with it. And, let's face it, if they contacted you, then did nothing, what have you got to lose?

What emails get opened?

I get lots of "buy this" emails every day. Most I delete without opening, some I open, scan, and delete. All that effort is just wasted on me. "Make $xxxx in 5 days" is a total yawn - it's all scams trying to make $xxx out of ME in 5 days!

So what DOES get opened? Personal emails - even if they only sound personal. Emails that aren't full of flashy graphics, multiple calls to action, and other obvious "marketing" garbage. They

With the world becoming more and more based around computers, here's a list of ideas to keep healthy even if you're stuck at a desk or computer every day.

1. Take a break at least once an hour. Every hour (set a timer on your computer if you need to), get up & take a quick walk somewhere (workmate’s desk, farthest restroom, photocopier, water cooler). Just get moving.
2. Stretch and move where you sit. Can't go anywhere? Bend and touch your toes, walk or march on the spot a few minutes, rev it up with jumping jacks (who cares what the office thinks!).
3. Mobile meetings. If you have a brainstorm session or meeting scheduled, do it on the move! Walk & win! It's not only good for fitness & health, but can help reduce stress & increases creativity!
4. Elevators, escalators and moving walkways - Public Enemy #1! Maybe you work on the 40th story of a building, then maybe (and I say maybe) not. Otherwise elevators are your body's enemy. Same goes for escalators & walkways. Even if you're on story 40, consider taking the elevator to 35 and walking the rest - you don't need to ride the whole way.

We switch on our computers and expect the internet to flood into our room. And, usually, that happens. But are we getting the speeds we deserve, or even, that we are paying for?

By the end of this year (2014), Americans will have paid about $400 billion (yes, with a "B") by major players, AT&T, Verizon, and CenturyLink to "future-proof" our network with fiber optic cabling. Cabling that NEVER materialized! Though varying between states, once all the fees, taxes and surcharges are taken into account, every household would have been fleeced about $4-5,000 from 1992-2014.

Back in 1992, state laws mandated that broadband speeds should be 45mbps in both directions. My current Cox connection (in Phoenix) gives me about 65Mbps download, and around 11-12Mbps upload - a far cry from 45 each way. It might be comforting, at least, to know that, poor speed aside, we in America at least enjoy some of the best speeds worldwide, right? Wrong! We aren't number 1, or 2, or even 5. A recent test by Ookla (one of the net's standard testing companies) pegs the good ole USA as number 25 in download and number 40 in upload speeds.

By the end of

It's not often that you get something worthwhile for free. In the realm of internet marketing, many people think of AdWords when the topic comes up. But did you know there are many great opportunities to advertise for free on the net, and quite successfully?

The more obvious ones are sites like MerchantCircle, Yelp (though I have issues with some of the less-than-reputable dealings), & your local city business directories. But the one I'm going to mention in more detail is Craigslist. Yes, it has a worse look than a 980's website done by an amateur, but, for many industries, it can yield great results.

It also seems to be better in some cities than others. When we were in Citrus Heights, CA (part of Sacramento) we got 1-2 inquiries off it every week. And many of those became customers. However, Arizonans (specifically in Phoenix) web design at least on CL has been a much worse performer. We're lucky to get 1 a month. However, the time required to keep ads going is minimal, so it still is worth the little time needed.

How to work Craigslist for free advertising

I will say that when we first started on Craiglist,

There are 3 main learning styles, auditory, visual and kinesthetic. It's hard to do kinesthetic on your website - they're the touchy feely group - offer them a free sample by filling in a SIMPLE form. Visual is what you're already doing (I will assume you have a visually appealing website - if you don't talk to us about a redesign). But where is your site on auditory? If you're at zero, join the club - most are.

As many as 60%+ of the population learn by visual primarily. For those people, lack of video seriously underpowers your site!

 With the price of video production falling dramatically, it's now easier than ever to add video to your site. And, if a pictures says 1000 words, then a video says 1000 pictures. You now have the ability to showcase your business and your products and/or services like never before.

Here's a video (yep, I'm into it too!) of a local Phoenix voice over artist I know, doing just what I'm talking about - showcasing her business. I've teamed up with her and a local media production company (that Weecks Productions who made Amber's video) to bring together a special package for

A coule of weeks back, I blogged about using add-ons/extensions for Joomla that came from warez sites, and the potential security problems associated with that (see "How to get a free lunch on the internet"). A joomla website is just a bunch of images, text, HMTL files, PHP files and CSS files. Whilst it's possivle to attach "nasties" to an image, or embed in text, when it comes to websites, usually the most common is adding code to one of the last 3. And of those 3, PHP is the "best" (from a hackers point of view) as it's the most powerful for wreaking havoc.

Templates for Joomla, or any modern CMS, are a collection of HTM, CSS and PHP files, so are just a good a target for hackers as the core website files. When we're doing sites we code our own templates - we don't buy templates, so your site will be unique. Templates are not usually particularly expensive - in the $20 - 50 range - though there are some more expensive than that. However, humans are loathe to pay for something they can get for free, right?

The same sort of sites

In the ever-changing world of search engine rankings, Google recently released a major upgrade to their algorithm - the first major release in quite a while. Nicknamed "Pigeon" it promises to be good for local based businesses, which make up a huge percentage of the nation's businesses and covers almost every "Mom and Pop" one.

Local business directories - you've all used them before, they're Yelp, TripAdvisor, etc - have received a boost and the long-running fracas between Yelp and Google seems to have been fixed, with Yelp results now showing up properly in searches.

So what's in it for me?

If you're a local business, that is, you don't try and grab your customers right throughout the nation, you could see a significant improvement in search rankings - depending on the search phrase of course. If someone searches for "Pizza, Phoenix", or "sporting goods, surprise az", then, assuming your site and peripherals are properly optimized, you will now stand a better chance against the nationwide brands - Dominos or Sports Authority.

But there is a catch (isn't there always?). You may need to do some off-site work first to take advantage of this change.

What should I do?

First

According to the latest statistics from the British Department for Business Innovation and Skills (BIS), 60% of small businesses had a cyber security breach in 2013, slightly down from 64% in 2012. I'm doubting that the stats are any better anywhere else.

Current statistics show you have a better than even chance of having your website hacked!

Often, hacking is just an annoyance, requiring deletion of the existing upload, and reinstalling of a (known) clean backup. Oh, you DO do regular backups right? DON'T rely on your host to do it - mostly they don't care as long as you don't infect their servers. Assuming you have a backup, you can restore. But does your website, or the server it's on, have security holes?

An article I was reading this week talked about one such small business from the UK who got hacked. The owner had had a great holiday away and went to log onto her site to update clients.....and it wasn't there. Gone! Thrashed! It's back up now so it seems she had a backup. Unfortunately, a quick check showed she was using versions of software that were very out of date. This is your first line of

"There's no such thing as a free lunch". It's a well known saying, but do you know just how it applies to the internet? What IS a "free lunch" on the internet?

"Free" download

Yes, there are many great genuinely free programs and content you can download. I run a number of free alternatives to paid programs. Though I actually own a legit copy of Photoshop CS3, I have never invested the time needed to learn it, so I use a reasonable alternative called Inkscape - free download. However, a quick Google search will also give you dozens, if not hundreds, or links to sites offering full copies of Photoshop for free. So why not? Well, because it's illegal (plenty of reason on its own), but also because the download has a high probability of containing one or more viruses.

What you don't know about website add-ons/extensions

So you don't download pirated software or even visit those sites - great! But what's your website designer's integrity like? Are you getting an amazing website with loads of functionality, but it's really cheap? The first question you should ask is why it's cheap - does he really know what he's doing, and