TechTidBit - Tips and advice for small business computing - Tech Experts™ - Monroe Michigan

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Consider A Spare Or Second Battery

One option you may not have considered when you bought your laptop was getting a spare  battery. This item is a must for someone who is seriously on the road or in a remote location, where a long time is spent away from the power socket. Before you use a spare battery, ensure that it’s fully charged.

If your laptop has some type of quick-swapping ability, when the power gets low, you can just eject your laptop’s original, spent battery and quickly insert the spare battery.  But be sure that your laptop can survive such a transplant before you attempt it! Perform a test swap in a noncritical situation, just to be sure.

If your laptop doesn’t have the ability to hot-swap batteries, just turn off (or hibernate) the laptop when the original battery is nearly spent. Remove the old battery, insert the fresh one, and then turn the laptop on again. Keep the following points in mind:

• Label the batteries so that you don’t get the two (or more) batteries confused and accidentally insert a dead battery.

• You can buy a spare battery from Tech Experts, or from online stores that sell extra batteries, such as iGo or Batteries.com.

Be wary of generic batteries! Always try to get a manufacturer’s (or manufacturer-approved) battery for your laptop. Get anything less, and you run the risk of setting your laptop ablaze!

Selecting A Quality Domain Name For Your Business

As easy as it might sound, depending on your business, choosing the right domain name for your business can be a very difficult task.

There are many factors that you need to consider when choosing a proper domain name for your business.

Related to your business
First off you should have a domain name that reflects what your business is, does, or is about.

What I mean is, if you own a business related to toys have the word toys in the domain name or let’s say computers maybe incorporate the word pc or computer in to the domain name like… www.qualitypcrepair.com.

Keep it simple
This is one of the most important factors of choosing a domain name. For example www.pcrepair.com. This way when people either see it on the side of the road or just coming across it on the Internet they will lock it in their heads very quickly.

It also makes things easier when people try to refer you to another person. They can just say something along the lines like “Hey I found this website called www.virusremovalexperts.com that can remove some of the toughest and nastiest infections that you can catch around.”

Stick with letters and “.com”
Try not to set your business domain up with any numbers, if possible. Many people like to add numbers in their domain name. This can be a very bad idea since when people are being told the web address to go to, they tend to spell everything out.

For example www.july4th.com many people would think www.julyfourth.com. Avoid using dashes or underscores, too.

Yes it is very easy to say “check out my website pc dash repair.com” but it is also even simpler to tell them to go to pcrepair.com.

You’ll also find there are a number of top-level domains. The top-level domain is the part after the period in the domain name, such as “.com.”

There are hundreds of top-level domains, such as “.net,” “.org,” “.biz” and so on. None of those have the staying power or the ability to be memorized that “.com” does. Having a “.com” domain name also adds credibility to your business.

Keywords
Keywords are very important and every search engine uses words that the owner specifies from their website and allows the search engine to have the public use that to find your business.

Some search engines will use the words in the domain name as a keyword so that if you are a business that does computer repair you might want to use www.apluscomputerrepair.com which has a keyword computer and repair right in the domain.

Trademark
Another thing people do not look in to when choosing a good domain name is that if you’re infringing on a trademark of someone else’s business. This could lead to you losing your business.

Be sure to take a look at http://www.uspto.gov/main/trademarks.htm to make sure you are not infringing.

The best things you can do when looking for a great domain name for your business is to make a list of about ten to twenty domain names and organize them from the best to the worst that you can think of. Start from the best and check them for availability. You will be surprised that fifty percent of them will be taken. This helps so that you actually sit down and think about what is best for your business.

Using Twitter To Strategically Market Your Business

Thomas Fox is president of Tech Experts, southeast Michigan’s leading small business computer support company.

Seth Godin is one of the most widely read bloggers in the world. The success of his blog, which covers marketing and business development, fuels his book sales and keeps his day planner filled with high-paying speaking engagements.

But Godin does not use Twitter. Or Flickr. Or even Facebook. Here he explains why: “My reasoning is simple … I don’t want to use a tool unless I’m going to use it really well. Doing any of these things halfway is worse than not at all. People don’t want a mediocre interaction.”

Secondly, Godin had to face time and money constraints, because “if you want to be in multiple social media and also have a day job, you’re going to need a staff.”

As you consider whether to use Twitter, Facebook or other social media as part of your marketing strategy, think about Godin’s reluctance as well as his high standards. People don’t want a mediocre interaction.

Social Media Requires A Commitment
Should your business commit to social media marketing (you must commit if it’s to work at all), I suggest that you invest time upfront, before your first tweet or status update, to get to know the medium, outline your objectives and define what success looks like.

In 2009, amid the hype surrounding Twitter and Facebook, many businesses took a scattershot approach to social media.

To the extent that there has been a slight backlash against social media in business circles, much of it is attributable to poor planning and execution on the part of businesses themselves.

All of this is to say that social media can be a terrific waste of time and money if there isn’t a solid strategy behind it.

A crucial part of that strategy is understanding your potential audience. One of the first Twitter stars from the business world was Randy Crochet of Naked Pizza, a boutique pizzeria in New Orleans.

Crochet saw Twitter as an opportunity to maintain a presence among fans of his healthy pizza. It helped tremendously that Crochet had a passion that others could buy into – pizza made with fresh ingredients.

Most importantly, Crochet’s personality had that certain x-factor that helped him retain and grow readers. (He’s now partnered with the Kraft Group and has plans to go national with Naked Pizza.)

The majority of Twitter success stories come from businesses that have passionate customers.

Companies that produce less glamorous products have learned the hard way that tweeting their way to fame and fortune is a heavy lift.

That doesn’t mean that social media can’t work for less exciting industries, but a change in approach and expectations is required.

Blue Cross Blue Shield provides a good example. BCBS started using Twitter as a customer service channel, and they defined success less in terms of revenue-per-tweet formula (the model the accountants understand) and more in terms of customer service-per-tweet formula.

And this gets to the heart of social media marketing: it can’t just be about dollars and cents. Sure, every business owner needs to keep an eye on the bottom line, but with social media, the key is to add as much value as you hope to take away. The less you give, the less you’ll get.

With that, here are six best practices to keep in mind when getting into social media marketing:

1. Grow your readership by gaining the trust of your audience;
2. Produce content that plays to your readers’ interests, not your own;
3. Provide transparency into your business;
4. Become a trusted resource to your readers;
5. Maintain the conversation – don’t try to control it;
6. Retain valuable followers.

4 Hidden Dangers Electricity Poses To Your Computer Network

Believe it or not, electricity is one of the biggest threats to your computer network and the data it contains. Here are four computer power problems you must know about and how to prevent them.

Transients
Commonly known as surges and spikes, these are caused by lightning storms, wind, squirrels shorting out power lines, auto accidents, etc.

Several times each week these spikes can travel up the power cord into your computer, damaging everything from power supplies to motherboards. Conventional wisdom says use a power strip with a surge protector and you are safe. As usual, conventional wisdom is dead wrong.

After a few months, these surge protectors become useless since they’ve been zapped by the surges they were designed to stop.

Blackouts
Whether momentary or prolonged, the sudden loss of power can corrupt your PC to the point of not being able to start up again when the lights come back on.

Sags
This is when the power drops below normal. Have you ever seen the fluorescent lights flicker for a moment? Then you’ve seen a sag.

Sags are more common than surges and are caused when equipment like air conditioners, water heaters or laser printers are turned on or come out of sleep mode. A typical small office will experience 30 or more sags each day.

Sags may cause many of the weird and unexplained problems computer users complain about every day.

Noise
If you’ve ever seen a fuzzy picture or white lines on your TV when you turn on a blender or vacuum cleaner, you’ve seen electrical noise. While a fuzzy TV picture is annoyance, this electrical noise causes many computer problems including loss of data.

So how do you protect yourself from electrical problems? The most simple and inexpensive solution to all four of these hazards is a battery backup, or uninterruptible power supply (UPS).

A UPS can sense when there are problems with the power and automatically switches to the battery, protecting you from computer damage and data loss.

Choosing the correct battery backup for your computer or server can be tricky. Having one with a battery too small is the same as having none at all.

For most desktop computers, a battery backup with a 500VA or larger rating should be sufficient to keep you going through momentary power problems.

Protecting your server requires detailed knowledge of the server functions and power consumption in order to pick the right battery backup. If you want help in determining the right protection for your specific network, give us a call: 734-457-5000.

Should Your Company Be Archiving Your E-Mail?

For companies under the jurisdiction of HIPAA, SEC, SOX, or any of the other alphabet soup regulations, email is considered “work product” and must be retained and protected from misuse or theft.

Even if you’re not under the government’s microscope via one of these regulations, you should still be concerned about e-mail archiving.

E-mail archiving is now mandatory
FRCP – The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure are a set of recently revised rules for managing civil suits in all US District courts and in thirty-five state courts that require you to archive your e-mail (with no exceptions for company size, organizational structure or nonprofit status).

The rules are specific, non-negotiable, and apply to e-mail generated and received by the business, its customers and vendors.

If you sue or get sued in civil court, you may win or lose your case based on compliance with the procedures regarding e-mail archiving.

HIPPA – Safeguarding the privacy and security of patient information is not limited to clinics and healthcare providers anymore.

Any organization that sends, receives or stores paper and electronic personal health information (PHI) must comply with this legislation. A recent survey revealed that compliance failure is around 50%.

SOX – The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 states that all public companies and their accounting firms must sercurely retain all business records, including electronic records and messages, for not less than five years. Failure results in fines and imprisonment.

E-mail archiving keeps you up and running
Just a few years ago, the average size of a user’s mail box was 10MB. Today the average size is 50x larger (500MB)! This causes many servers in small businesses to overload, slowing down speed and performance dramatically. While a third of this bloat are messages that should be deleted, the rest need to be retained, searchable and available on demand. Most mail server software has built-in features that move “old” e-mail off the server, but doesn’t allow for easy access to the information.

You can also buy bigger server hard drives every year to prevent a bog-down, but this can be cost prohibitive. More often than not, email archiving is the most effective and economical choice for retaining messages and staying compliant with regulations.

Triple Efficiency And Save Time With Templates

Imagine, a pre-made template created just for your need! You could potentially triple your efficiency with a time-saving template at your fingertips.

Using templates can speed up any job. Visit www.office.microsoft.com/templates to view, search and download hundreds of free templates ranging from inventory sheets, to schedules, and business cards. You can even find newsletter templates just like the one you are reading right now!

Save time
Using a template can save you from those creative blocks that stall progress. Have you ever tried to create a brochure from scratch?

When you have a template handy, you can save countless hours of trying to arrange the graphics to balance the page.

Structure your workload
Creating presentations, invoices, diagrams, agendas, and other forms can become streamlined processes that anyone can help you complete.

With a template saved for each job, you literally have expert level graphic arts and designs incorporated right into your work, creating a more efficient way for you to complete your duties and improve the quality, too.

Get great design ideas for nothing
Imagine if you had to sit down and structure every document for your company. It would take forever! Templates can cut preparation time and costs as well as provide a reliable and consistent format for your business reports, transactions, and other processes.

What about a website
Are you considering a new website or makeover for your current one? While a template site doesn’t compare with a custom designed site, it can save time and money when you need to get your site updated. Take a look at the premade templates available at http://www.templatemonster.com/.

You can search through hundreds of website templates by style or category. You have the option to buy a copy for as little as $62, or buy a “unique” copy for $2,500+.

Plus, you will need a little help from a web designer to post the site on the Internet and make it work, but it is considerably less than an entirely custom website.

What’s the difference? A unique copy removes the template from the company library so no one else can purchase or use that template.

The downside is that if other people have already downloaded the template, they will still get to legally use their copy.

Don’t wait another minute! I am sure in reading this article, you thought of at least three projects or processes in which you could use a template. Get started today!

FBI: Rogue Antivirus Scammers Have Made $150M

They’re the scourge of the Internet right now and the U.S. Federal Bureau of investigation says they’ve also raked in more than $150 million for scammers. Security experts call them rogue antivirus programs.

The FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center (ICC) issued a warning over fake antivirus software, saying that Web surfers should be wary of sudden pop-up windows that report security problems on their computers.

This software can appear almost anywhere on the Web. Typically, the scam starts with an aggressive pop-up ad that looks like some sort of virus scan. Of course, the scan turns up problems, and the pop-up says the only way to get rid of them is to pay with a credit card.

This is always a bad idea. At best, the software is subpar. At worst, it could result in viruses, Trojans and/or keyloggers being installed on the computer. Identity thieves often use keyloggers to gain access to credit
card numbers, bank account information, and computer users’ social security numbers.

The tactics of the scareware have caused significant losses to users. The FBI is aware of an estimated loss to victims in excess of $150 million.

The IC3 says that users who see these unexpected antivirus pop-up warnings should shut down their browsers or their computers immediately and then run an antivirus scan to see what’s going on.

Windows 7 – Microsoft Wins With New Operating System

Microsoft has had everybody from family and friends, to clients and colleagues talking about the newly released operating system Windows 7. So what is the big deal, and what is all this hype about?

If you’re one of the many that didn’t make the upgrade from Windows XP to the Windows Vista, then Windows 7 is for you!

I’ve been running Windows 7 Enterprise for a couple months now, and hands down, this has been the best operating system I’ve used, making my entire computer experience more enjoyable. With that said, here are some of the key points and new features that have really got me on the Windows 7 bandwagon.

Overall System Performance
I saw a tremendous increase in overall processing time, running the same hardware as what I was before. Less processes running in taskmanager, more available memory due to programs not requiring as much memory as in XP or Vista, and an increase in my laptops battery life due to less power consumption.

The Shake Down
This is a fun feature. If you have a few different windows open like email, web pages, some pictures, and maybe some music playing, by simply clicking and holding the click anywhere on the title bar, all other windows will minimize, leaving only the window you “shook” up.

Windows XP Mode
If you have a program that is picky, possibly old, or simply works only in Windows XP. You can run that type of program from a virtual machine right inside Windows 7. The only requirement: A free additional download from Microsoft.

Problem Recorder
This application simply records your screen as you perform various steps you take to complete a task. For example, if you need to know how to set up your Outlook for a Yahoo, Gmail, or other free email account you can simply have the tech do it on his machine, with problem recording running, and then send you the file as an MHTML document. This type of document can be opened with any web browser, and will show you a break down with pictures, graphics, text, and even custom messages you can insert to demonstrate a common configuration or setup. This is great for training.

New Taskbar
This caught my eye right away, as I always have numerous applications running. The Aero theme really sets off the task bar, and you can now drag your minimized apps around, and pin your favorite programs to
start up automatically. You can now minimize/maximize all yourapplications with the click of a button located right next to the clock.

Windows Media Center
Again the Aero theme sets off the entire look and feel, but now you can finally play DVD and even Blu-Ray discs without any additional software or applications.You can even read/write with the appropriate hardware.

Personalization
The personalization center now offers over 20 different colors, several new dual screen compatible screen savers, rotating desktop backgrounds, and over a dozen new sound themes. You can even create your own personalized theme, making the system look and feel exactly like you want!

These are just a few of the user friendly additions that I have been found to be my favorite, but there is a laundry list of other features that just continue to amaze me. The manageability additions for IT professionals are quite impressive and extensive as well.

Overall, I would highly recommend Windows 7 to any user who is still running XP looking to finally make that leap, and even to the Vista users’ who might be skeptical. It has totally changed and made my entire computer experience a better, faster, more efficient, and less stressful activity.

At the end of the day, we just want our computers to run smooth, and do what we want, and Microsoft really hit the nail on the head with this one.

Could There Be A Tablet PC In Your Future?

Thomas Fox is president of Tech Experts, southeast Michigan’s leading small business computer support company.

So far, 2010 has been the year of the tablet.The recent Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas featured tablet PCs from HP and Lenovo. The word among Apple-watchers is that the latest must-have product from Steve Jobs will be a National Geographic-sized computer called the ‘iSlate.’

Tablets aren’t new – Bill Gates introduced Microsoft’s first attempt way back in 2000. But could 2010 be the year that this technology finally takes off?

I’m not so sure. With e-readers, smart phones and netbooks already popular, will the tablet find a way onto people’s wish lists? What will it offer that isn’t already available?

After all, many devices on the market today – from the Amazon Kindle to the iPhone – offer portability and easy Internet access.

By replacing the keyboard and trackpad of standard laptops, the tablet is able to shed some bulk and weight – a nice feature for travelers and denizens of coffee shops.

But when it comes to actual typing – the basis of productive computer usage – most touch screens fall short. (Of course, I wouldn’t bet against Apple’s ability to once again revolutionize the touch screen and make entering text a breeze.)

I suspect that the tablet PC will find a niche in the consumer market while not quite breaking into the business world.

The tablet’s allure seems mostly limited to passive engagement – watching videos, scanning Facebook feeds reading e-books, etc. In other words, not exactly productive activities from a business standpoint.

Tips For Setting Up Your New Computer

We know that when a new computer arrives everyone acts like a kid in a candy store. Usually the typical person is in such a hurry to open it and set it up they forgot about the importance of taking care of some important tasks that will help save you tons of time later on.

Plan to set aside about three or four hours to properly set the new computer up.

First you need to figure out where the computer will go. Does the room have enough space to allow you to work comfortly and not have to move things around?

Most people will decide to just use the smallest room in the house and convert it in to a computer room and then others choose to just place the computer in to an existing room like a kitchen or den. The next thing to do is save all paperwork when unboxing your computer. This includes any receipts.

This helps later on when you are in trouble and need to find out if you have a warranty or not. When you have all the paperwork together I would recommend, if you have a scanner, scanning these in to the computer so you have copies.

Also I would recommend to keep the box through the duration of the return policy, since most retailers require the original packaging to return or exchange the computer.

Next, all the disks you get with the computer need to be kept in a CD case or stored away in a file cabinet.

These disks are vital for your computer. Most disks will need to used at least once in the computers lifetime.

Technicians needs these disks if you ever have a problem with your operating system, and have to do a system restore.

Now you need to actually set up the computer and connect all of the cables. Take your time and make sure you hide all cables and make everything is neat.

This will save your time in the long run when you try to add hardware. No need to turn the computer on yet just get everything plugged in to a surge protector or a backup power supply(UPS).

Now is the big moment where you get to turn on the computer.

This part is very vital to setting up the computer. Make sure you complete the setup wizard for the computer so that no issues arise later on.

Normal setups will ask for registration information. Make sure you fill this out to protect your warranty. These are usually just a few questions about you, where the computer was purchased, and how you use the computer.

Next you will be asked to create a username and password. The username will be required, but the password is going to be optional. If you use a password I would suggest using a password hint to help you, in case you forget the password in the future.

After this, the computer is properly setup based on a typical computer setup. From here, you’ll just need to set up the Internet, and run any Windows updates that are needed. Be sure you install an anti-virus program before connecting to the Internet.