If you've ever wondered about your hosting company, or are considering beginning a relationship with one, here is some must-have information before you get into a new relationship (or exit out of a bad one).

Just like you ought to know a little something about someone you're going to be kissing for a long time, turning over the web jewels for your site ought to entail similar background knowledge.

These three questions will help you enter into the right kind of relationship, and in the appropriate spirit - just like the dinner parties your parents used to have.

1. Has the hosting company recently been bought out or taken over by another company?

It turns out the road-to-perdition I just experienced with JustHost on behalf of a client who is a well-known travel writer was immeasurably and torturously lengthened by a chain of ownership that - scuttlebutt has it - goes all the way to a company called 'Endurance International' or EIG.

Here's how one commenter at WebHostingTalk.com put it:

"I've had experiences with EIG not once but twice -- each time buying out a host I was using, and essentially ___ing it all up in the process. It wasn't until some many months after the 2nd incident that I came to learn the foul presence that is Endurance. And honestly, as far as I'm concerned, EIG didn't just buy out Readyhosting and Hypermart -- they raped them. That's their track record -- buy and screw, buy and screw. When they start to move your data to their own servers, it's common to have LOTS of downtime, lost data, and lost emails."

Read that a second time.

If your host gets bought out, hit the road before they run you over.

I pity the tech support chat and phone lines at bottom-of-the-food-chain hosting companies. They are poorly trained, have no real autonomy to actually fix things for the customer, and are the frequent targets of misplaced rage. There but for the grace of God...

2. If you cancel your hosting, do you retain control of your domain name?

JustHost.com is a qualified reseller for ENOM.com, one of the bigger domain name registrars out there. Justhost resells domain names as a part of their hosting packages. They do not offer standalone domain name purchasing. When we set up another hosting account at another company in response the problems we were experiencing, JustHost cancelled the entire account and we were unable to access the domain name management tools, and our nameserver redirects were cancelled without notice. The site then loaded a "This Account Has Been Suspended" page. Inaccurate, damning, and entirely lacking in relationship-building attitude.

Many low-price hosting companies offer shared hosting accounts at rock bottom prices. They make their margins on volume, and once they think you're leaving, the gloves are off. A JustHost technical support person on chat actually put in writing, "You want to leave so why should we provide that [domain access] to you?" I've often wondered if this kind of thinking is unstated company policy. Guess the wondering is over.

We had to pay a fee to get the account restored - just to transfer the domain to a new registrar. To add insult to injury, it took days to work it out. Shift changes, different people managing the file, and my client watching the hours roll along while her clients and publication owners continued to see the suspension message.

A host like Webnames.ca offers double protection - they are a registrar AND an affordable hosting company now offering WordPress hosting. If you ever decide to cancel the hosting side of your account, you revert to domain management tools with the ability to use new nameservers or simply forward your domain to your new host. Critical to have.

3. What are the backup policies for your host?

Make sure you understand how your host manages backups and how you access them and have them restored should something go wrong. (Hey, if the Amazon Cloud can go down, anyone can.)

If you are an active blogger or update your site daily you're going to want nightly backups. If your site is all-Wordpress there are a few good plugins (I like Snapshot Backup a lot). If you use your host's cpanel services for email, shopping cart, or other add-ons, you're going to want an entire cpanel account backup done on a regular basis. We didn't find out until too late that JustHost only does a full backup every seven days, so if you lose your site on day six, that's 6 days of missing content, plugin upgrades, template changes etc that you will literally have to recreate.

Does your host have a methodology for doing backups, or is it just call or email in to technical support? Hostgator.com, though similar in some ways to JustHost (shared hosting, rapidly growing company), has standard request forms that must be filled out by the site owner or the web designer listed on their account via email address. This means it happens the same way every time and everyone involved knows where and how to intersect with the restore or transfer. Level one chat support are empowered to 'expedite' your email suppory ticket if volumes are high.

JustHost has a lot of mostly well-meaning but unempowered and highly siloed tech support people who don't really connect with each other. Adding to the negative impact of the client's site being down for a week was a classic who's-on-second layer of delays that were truly maddening. I'm sure the poor techsupport folks didn't like it much either.

Protect your wordpress self-hosted site with tools like BlogVault.net. This service backs up your entire site on a nightly basis for only $9/month and keeps up to 30 backed up copies in Amazon's secure cloud.  It's literally dead easy. The turnaround time on inquiries has been spectacular so far - within an hour.

In summation

Follow these guidelines and you will save yourself from the kind of week my client and I have had. And don't stick with your host just because you've 'always used them'... that's how things ended up the way they did a la JustHost. The client had been with them a long time for her html static site and when she decided to move her blog from WordPress.com due to limitations imposed there and go to self-hosted, JustHost offered it. If we'd only known then what we do now.

I make my living through technology. Everything I do is digital and virtual:  web sites, writing, publishing, photography, art. I often feel severed from the food on my table, the dirt under my feet, the weather outside the big windows of my office.

This 'weltschmerzen' is problematic. I love the Internet. The innovation; the power to transform societies, communities and businesses; the empowerment of the individual; the sense of belonging to a global family; the sudden and deep friendships formed online. All of these benefits make me feel engaged and enthusiastic in my web design and publishing business 13 years after starting it.

The flip side of computing, however, is creating a dark streak of cynicism, like a black hole gargling the Google galaxy with insatiable appetite.  The manipulation, the monopolies, the marauding powers of government to muscle its way into these data repositories for secret surveillance without our knowledge or consent: the opportunity for this technology to be able to negatively affect our lives is in direct relation to our dependency upon it.

Cloud computing brings with it an even sharper blade to hack at the ragged edges of the hole. Cloud computing is where our software and data is stored online and not on our resident computers: subscription-based software, medical tools, backup systems, our contacts file, email, documents, photos... everything.

The benefits are clear. Dumb terminals and snazzy monitors, along with an instant restore of lost data is a vast improvement over being held hostage by the computer manufacturers, in collusion with software companies. How many times have you discovered an upgrade of software means your current computer's operating system and memory is no longer up to the task and must be replaced?

Everyone going it alone creates massive e-waste, huge costs for endlessly updating equipment and software that take egregious advantage of buyers, and creates a barrier to participation for many people who could most benefit from the empowerment of the digital age.

The downside is nebulous and previously the rantings of conspiracy theorists. The constant barrage of data slamming around the Internet leaves us exposed to risks unimaginable even a generation ago - identity theft, mass profiling, pitting of citizen against citizen, citizens against corporations and/or governments (sometimes it seems those are the same animal).

For people accustomed to privacy, to discretion, to look-before-you-leap, moving to the cloud seems fraught with dangerous possibilities. For the first to throw themselves through any open door to see what life is like on the other side, the drawbacks often aren't encountered until it's too late. Think the Amazon Cloud going down a few weeks ago, or all the recent hacks into user databases for credit card data, passwords and other private information.

What's my take? On a personal basis, I take comfort in the masses, and compute that the chances I'll be a victim are lowered inversely by the numbers of people coming online. I am but one tiny minnow swimming in a vast ocean. In 14 years of working online, I have only ever had my information hacked once, way back when RealAudio was king of multimedia. My bank notified me immediately and sent me a new card right away.

I suggest, however, that those of a more conservative bent give it another 6 months to a year and keep your cards to your chest. This is how I treat my customers' data - I stand in as 'canary in the coal mine'. If I live then likely you will too. If I don't, I suspect I'll wish I was really dead!

Let's meet up in six months or so and compare stories from the front.

If you're bewildered by the thousands of plugins for WordPress, you're not alone.  The official WordPress site for the self-hosted variety, WordPress.org, lists over 12,000 in their directory alone. So what's a site owner to do?

Well, here's my top 10 for 2010, based on actual usage. REMEMBER: Always back up your site before adding new plugins, and if adding multiple plugins, view your site in a separate browser window and reload with each plugin addition. That way you can catch any conflicts immediately and know which plugin is responsible (you can deactivate the plugin and visit the plugin website for documentation on bugs, or delete the plugin entirely.)

ALL IN ONE SEO: Yes, WordPress is structured for SEO (search engine optimization) in the most basic ways. But why limit your site to the basics. The All in One SEO Pack allows you to create search engine friendly titles, meta descriptions and keyword tags that will amplify your posts for the engines.

NEXT GEN GALLERY: If you have a ton of images to manage in your site, whether it's pictures of rooms in your accommodations or photo albums that go in a particular section of your site, Next Gen is a great way to manage them. Drag & drop sorting, description and tag editing, multiple galleries, automatic pagination and easy to place shortcodes for showing them on your pages or posts. Flash addons are available (remember, they won't work on iPhones or iPads).

ULTIMATE GOOGLE ANALYTICS: Sure, you can go with the vanilla stats that wordpress.org provides in the plugin that mimics the environment of their public wordpress.com site. But why limit yourself to that when you can use Google Analytics. It's like strapping on a real rocket instead of lighting a tiny firecracker.

GOOGLE XML SITEMAPS: Now that meta information has dropped in effectiveness (too many people metajacking and abusing the system) sitemaps have become an indispensable tool for engines like Google, Yahoo, Bing and others to find ALL of the information on your site.

ANTI-CAPTCHA: This is a transparent captcha solution that does not require users to enter in any special characters when commenting and protects against automated attacks by spambots - you know, all those bogus comments that need clearing out of the admin area. When a comment is posted without a valid Anti-Captcha token (automatically issued when you visit the site), the comment is instantly marked as spam. It requires javascript and cookies enabled for it to succeed.

SHARETHIS or SEXY BOOKMARKS: Make it easy for site visitors to share your blog or site with a plugin that appends social networking icons to the bottom of every page. Share This is the basic version, Sexy Bookmarks shows the icons popping up from below a line with a handwritten note recommending sharing (see this post). Choose from over 80 sites to share with, or select 'Most Popular' for the handful of the busiest sites. A sidebar widget version is also available.

TYNT: Somewhat similar to Highlighter, the best thing about this plugin is that if someone posts a part/excerpt of your post or page elsewhere on the Web, a small link is added to it (you control what the link says, for example, "Read the full post"). It's a great way to build backlinks to your site and control copyright using the Creative Commons licensing add-on.

WPTOUCH iPHONE THEME: Not an easy one to set up but worth the effort. When a mobile user visits your site a lighter version designed for the mobile market (almost all platforms and devices) is presented. You now have a fully mobile-friendly web site. Note: some plugins do not work with this mobile app: NextGen Gallery noted above, WP Super Cache are the notables.

WP-DBMANAGER: This nifty plugin allows you to manually create a backup of your site's database (not to be confused with exporting posts from the Settings area) or set an auto-backup and determine a regular schedule for mailing the .zip file to the address of your choosing. I set mine to send every two weeks as I only post occasionally on this site, and to optimize my database every 3 days. When it comes through to my email I delete the previous one so I only have the latest backup taking up space on my drive.

Have fun playing, and if you need help, contact Bad Dog Design at web@baddogdesign.com.

If the majority of your online marketing dollars (or sweat equity)  is going to SEO, you're likely fighting a losing battle due to increased competition as the last of the small businesses finally migrate online. It's time to make a change and consider social media for your business.

The field is getting crowded, knowledge of SEO is very broad, and even most web content systems already have built-in functionality to create a new base level. It's getting harder and harder to climb to the top 10 for even longer, more specific keywords.

If you're like most business owners, you're shaking your heads and saying "I don't have time for Social Media!"

I'll ask you one simple question: Can your business survive online if you don't?

WHAT USED TO WORK

My main site is a regional portal for BC's Sunshine Coast - Bigpacific.com - and has been online since 1997. Just by virtue of being an early site, with tons of keyword-rich, REAL content, it has always done well in the search engines. Particularly Google, where it vies for dominance with sunshinecoast.org, the uber-funded destination site for the Sunshine Coast of Australia. In case you don't already know, our BC's Sunshine Coast is a tiny string of communities stretching from Langdale to Lund (about 160km), and the Aussie version is a mammoth 3130 square kilometres. We have about 60,000 people, their Sunshine Coast is Australia's 10th largest area for population, with over 260,000 souls.

The fact that privately owned and managed Bigpacific.com can keep up with a leviathan like the SunshineCoast.org site is a testament to the power of good content created by a person for real people. Sadly, the cold concepts of algorithms, brand density, and the like are making it much more difficult for good sites - and bloggers - to succeed.

Algorithms can change overnight, and what is a minor 'tweak' for Google can mean a reverberation of biblical proportions to a web site owner, sweeping them into the desert like Job, to toil endlessly against incalculable odds to regain what was lost. Big brands can dominate merely by existing; register a url - usually copyrighted and trademarked to the gills - and they are assured of ascendency to the top of Google's rankings.

In the early days of search here was a rush to add an 'A' in front of business names to take advantage of alphabetical ordering of lists. Overnight I had a rash of accommodation providers looking to gain the advantage over each other in the old A-Z paradigm. Rotational scripts brought an end to the silliness, but it nearly prompted brawls and many a business owner retaliated with meta-jacking, misdirection and other deeds of evil-doing.

A decade of acronyms followed, trumped by the mighty 'SEO'. Web site owners spent hundreds of dollars a month to fight for the 'Top 20' in sites like Google and Yahoo. In my regional area, the bare-knuckle wars to get the premium spots in both organic and paid search ended friendships and forged new and unlikely alliances.

Now if you're not in the top 10 in Google, you're invisible. You and the other million + working on that keyword. Brand names, however, with their trademarked names as urls, soar to the top seemingly overnight, even bypassing sites that have been online for years, with more and better content.

Social Media Tips:

• Break the dependency on Google. If a changing search algorithm is likely to break you, diversify into other channels.
• Try Twitter for one month, tweeting once per day about a new product or service, a customer testimonial, an interesting link to content your customers would find useful or entertaining
• Set up a Facebook page. I resisted this one a long time, but face it - Facebook is everywhere, easy to update, and a great place to build a visible fan base that leverages peer relationships to your company's benefit. Never post negative information, ask questions, ask for input on products and services, link to great content, and if you're going to post something personal, it MUST BE OF BENEFIT TO OTHERS.
• Video is increasingly effective and widely shared and reposted so invest in an inexpensive camera (flip mini, kodak Z series) and have a conversation with the viewer.
• Blogging is effective when you actually have something novel to say. Dry bulletins about open houses don't cut it. Instead, tape a walk through of the property, peppered with real ideas and comments and list the three most powerful points you can make and add a link. Don't be afraid to have an opinion - you may alienate some but you'll attract enough to replace them. It's blandness that kills most blogs.
• Link building is no longer as effective due to the proliferation of link farms and sites built purely for adsense, but high-quality reciprocal links with sites that make sense in your niche can help.

What I like most:

• the dongle-as-mouse
• the full surface window
• the dual pico projectors for overhead display and absolutely sexy virtual keyboard

What I don't like:

It's only a concept!!

Apparently a (fabulous, award-winning) product designer who is also a part of the (large) open source mozilla community, Billy May, came up with a concept of what mobile computing could be using open source and newly developing technologies. So this is basically one user's dream of mobile phone utopia.

Firefox/Mozilla has a disclaimer on the Seabird concept page stating they so far have no intent to come out with a mobile phone.

To which we must roundly respond: WHY NOT?

Someone better snap up Billy's idea.

Check out Billy's site - the Nike Hindsight glasses are scrumptious looking, and Torn Light is sadly not in production yet either but looks to upend lighting concepts for the home and office. Me want!

You can join in the designing the future space by heading over to Mozilla's Concept Series Home and checking out the discussions. I'm off to cradle my militaristic i4 and pine for the days of curves again.

Just like you or I can make biscuits that fail to rise, or attempt to use quinoa flour instead of regular to universal disgust, so too can we catastrophically screw up the design and functionality of a specialized web site.

I'm talking today specifically about designing web sites for the Real Estate market, which mostly means for realtors, who follow a broad stereotype of being driven, detail-oriented, competitive, and exacting in their expectations. A good realtor is always looking to stay ahead of the pack, to utilize technology first (even if it means leaping off a cliff to demonstrate that the cliff is there), and to be effective and efficient in everything they do. Duplicative efforts, redundancy, or misuse of technology or people resources is a thorn in the side to any realtor worth their salt.

This is where the template vs. designed proponents start duking it out. Designers - of which I am one - argue that they can make something for the realtor that is customized, tweaked for search engine optimization, and otherwise tooled up to give the most powerful and branded solution to a realtor. Typically these sites cost from $1000 - $10000 depending on what the market will bear - which in itself should cause some consternation to those in bigger centres paying whacking big design fees when their semi-rural counterpart is getting the same deal for a fraction of the cost (though rural designers are often grossly underpaid for their work, which explains the lack of longevity in rural web design companies. Eventually we have to go out and get another 'real' job to sustain our pricing for design).

On the other side of the ring is the templated, out-of-a-box solution. In the old days, these templates were both expensive and buggy, thereby negating any value inherent in using them. However, times have changed, and a quick search on Google for 'wordpress real estate mls templates' brings up a plethora of links for templates, WITH installation and service and an hour of search engine optimization (SEO) thrown in for good measure. The price? Usually under $300, complete for a one time setup, with maybe an extra $90/year for hosting. Or, you can hire an expert, who is used to working with the theme and theme supplier, to do everything for you... basically to take the body and fill it out for that extra competitive edge.

These themes integrate MLS listings and search functions and are attractive and professional in appearance.

Pros & Cons Design:

• PROS
• customized
• more unique appearance
• some standalone functionality possible
• customized support, usually fast, for new features
• CONS
• expensive
• usually a long launch time, 1-3 months typically depending on designer's workload and client readiness with content
• harder to maintain without expert help
• realtor can mess up the design and functionality of the site

Pros & Cons Templates:

• PROS
• inexpensive
• standardized, professional appearance, appropriate to industry
• custom plugins and functionality developed for volume purchase rather than single purchase design functionality; buyer benefits from features developed at request of other users of the template
• highly optimized for SEO
• very functional from the end users perspective, which doesn't always happen in custom designed sites, where the realtor can have far too much say or impact on the design and functionality without understanding how it affects the end user
• easily maintainable
• CONS
• a sense of 'sameness' about the look, or lack of originality
• occasionally creates a dependence on a specific company for the service
• new feature requests must wait for next version release

My recommendation is to go with the templates, unless your business has a very strong and uniquely identifiable brand and innovative ways of interacting with your customers and visitors, in which case the custom route can bring great returns.

Templates mentioned in this article (disclosure: I am an affiliate for some)

• AgentPress from StudioPress.com - requires what's called the Genesis Framework, which aside from sounding pretty biblical and lofty, actually means it's a framework vetted by the creator of WordPress.com & .org's code that takes WordPress to the next level.  <a href="https://www.e-junkie.com/ecom/gb.php?cl=10214&c=ib&aff=49541" target="ejejcsingle">Pick up the template here.</a>;
• Real Estate Themes - more generic wordpress themes, but also one for the ipad/iphone;
• WPRealEstate - PLUGIN for wordpress for integrating MLS, which means you can use ANY wordpress template and then just use the plugin for the listings side of things

Through my work talking with these high-powered professionals actively engaged in measuring quality goals against standards set both internally and externally for mostly for-profit hospitals, I learned all kinds of systems from LEAN process improvement (non-value add is waste), the Baldridge Award, JCAHO (Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations), Six Sigma and others.

Eight years later I am 12 years into the business of self-publishing web directories/magazines and providing web design services to a local market, and I am just beginning the process of examining my own systems, measurement tools, gap analysis, and go-forward process improvements. I need to point out that this process is happening in a business that is self-owned and operating singlehandedly with the exception of the billing and A/R processes, which are handled by my fabulous contract bookkeeper.

Through my involvement in the E-Myth Group Mastery Impact program - a one year business leadership/management/coaching program in a group format that includes international participants; E-Myth Revisited is a must-read book by author Michael Gerber  - I am learning not only that I need to do these things like implementing a quality control program to ensure the success of my business, I need to change the underlying thinking and language of everything I do.

Today I'm learning to think strategically even when I'm acting as a technician. I'm learning that if I say my business is chaotic, I am pointing myself towards that reality, when in fact things are considerably more ordered than the 'great disorder or confusion'. Even the fact that I have taken one step back to look at the word chaos implies a sense of perspective that chaos does not allow.

Where I struggle in my business is figuring how to implement systems and forms of measurement inherent in quality control, when I am both the quality system designer AND the technician applying the program. I am honest enough with myself to know that I have become adept at 'lying' to myself about things I need to address, to the point where it happens subconsciously, thereby undermining every tool or system I seek to implement.

Strategies to deal with this myopia and framework manipulation I have discovered are:

• Gaining a clear understanding of what my customers' expectations are of my business
• Understanding what my 'promise is' and what happens if I fail to deliver it - QUANTIFY!
• Creating a Board of Advisors to whom I can turn for truly frank discussions of what is working and what is not
• Finding mentors with significant business PROCESS experience, preferably even outside of my industry - that way I am implementing tactical changes that are about business structures regardless of what technical tasks are happening inside it
• Talking with peers who also run more or less solo operations to see how they are managing quality

So I'd like to ask you, how are you monitoring and implementing quality initiatives in your business? What tools do you use? What courses have you taken that have made a positive (or negative) impact?

Laurie McConnell, owner/operator of:

www.Bigpacificmedia.com
www.bigpacific.com
www.bigpacific.ORG
www.baddogdesign.com

RELATED READING ABOUT E-MYTH:

I heartily endorse the E-Myth Group Mastery Impact Program to anyone serious about not only being and staying in business, because that's simply a baseline of survival. E-Myth will help you understand WHY you are in business, and assist you with creating the underlying structure of thinking and processes that will enable you to truly be successful, whether that's growing your company, selling it, franchising it, or even finding a new path uniquely suited to who you are in the world and what's important to YOU.

by Laurie McConnell,
BigpacificMedia.com

Social Media: Is It For You?

Social media/social networking (SM) has moved from being a fun way to keep up with friends that most could ignore to a business tool that seems as ubiquitous as the proverbial blade of grass. I can't look at a publication, business directory or advertisements without seeing numerous calls to follow and interact. It's like the Pied Piper, on crack, for small businesses. There's so many tunes whistling out at us we seem to be spinning in circles.

I keep running into business owners who talk about being bewildered, even overwhelmed, by the amount of information coming at them. Especially in smaller, rural communities where - it seems almost unbelievable given the constant learning required at this point in technological history - we are slower to adapt and adopt. While in major urban areas social media applications are in widespread and diverse use and have already achieved a certain level of critical mass, in the small outlying communities, some businesses are still waiting for high speed Internet to arrive. I even know a few sorry souls still on dial-up. There's no cell coverage, or no 3Gs coverage, rendering these discussions moot for some.

For the rest of us we're left with a bewildering array of marketing and communication web sites and apps that seems to be proliferating faster than we can even imagine, never mind keep up with. Even for those of us working in the technology sector, the amount of available time for evaluating and benchmarking these tools is but a single blade of wheat in a vast acreage of it.

So how do you know if social media is right for your business?

First, what IS it?

Wikipedia defines it as: "Social media uses Internet and web-based [and increasingly, mobile/cellphone-based - my note] technologies to transform broadcast media monologues (one to many) into social media dialogues (many to many)."

This in itself marks a fundamental change in business practices. The expectations of the consumer regarding your business bears about as much resemblance to the established way of doing things as a current cell phone does to the old shoe-sized monolith we used to hold up and shout into. This is the post-meltdown era, where if we can't have job security, have trouble making our mortgages, and are experiencing a real fear of the future, at least we can be recognized.

These days it's all about personalized customer service and proactive selling. These days you're not just competing with the big box store that recently moved into your community; you're vying for customers with businesses from around the world. People will still buy locally, but increasingly their expectations for the relationship are getting more and more refined.

The hallmarks of the typical modern consumer:

• High expectations for service standards
• Willingness to shop around with easily available tools online
• Enjoys the game of finding the best prices
• Desires a personal relationship with the companies they buy from
• Communicates in real time about their experiences
• Provides access to their peer group at a nominal cost if their expectations are met or exceeded
• Enjoys novelty, finding new and different things, experiencing them in surprising ways
• Much more sophisticated than consumers of the past
• Makes a connection between the money they spend in your business and your personal benefit from it
• Much less loyal, constantly wooed by your competitors

The hallmarks of businesses aggressively capitalizing from these shifts in relationship:

• Actively seeks input from consumers, via in-store data collection, online surveys, newsletters, instant media
• Finds ways to personalize service
• Responds hyperfast to complaints, often apologizing publicly for the consumer's experience
• Offers many ways for consumers to connect
• If traditional in approach (standard/shortened hours of opening, traditional marketing), ups the in-store service through careful retention of key employees and a strong company culture that focuses on personal relationships with customers
• Develops, adopts and measures on a regular basis customer service, including developing operations manuals for all positions and standardizing delivery regardless of individuals involved (the same experience every time for the consumer)
• Looks for innovative - and measurable - ways to interact with customers

The bad news is a customer can walk into your store, have a bad experience with one of your staffers - or even you - and literally while you are watching they can post their experience to multiple channels in their personal (and often public) networks. Worse still, if you're not participating in social media, you won't even be aware of it, never mind take steps to address it. (Read a recent story in Inc. for one small business owner's nightmare with the Yelp social network. )

The good news is that you have access to some incredible intelligence about your products, service and reputation that can transform your business. Out of that chaff can come new product or service ideas, the opportunity to see and hear what's being said about you and your business, in real time, and to respond proactively before long-term damage has been done. You can test product ideas and have customers vote on what you should sell, driving your buying decisions and leading to reduced inventory and returns. You can keep an eye on your competitors.

For these reasons I weigh in as a 'Yes' on businesses participating on Social Media, and here's some tips for how you can do it without getting hopelessly tied up with information or tied into technology.

If all you do as a small businesses in a rural area is these 5 things, you will be ahead of most of your competitors.

1. Sign up for free accounts on Twitter.com and Facebook.com, the two largest and most active social networks.
2. Set up a free account at Google.com/accounts.
3. Search for your business or niche on Twitter and listen to what's being said about you and respond directly.
4. Collect some friends on Facebook and watch how people interact and what/how they share
5. Set up a Google Alert at Google.com/alerts and get emails of links that include your business name or industry

Set yourself a goal of 1-3 months of perhaps 5-10 minutes per day to watch and learn, and when you feel ready, start participating. Make sure you do this BEFORE you hire someone to run a social media campaign for you, and be sure to ask them what tools they use to track campaigns and what kind of reporting you can expect to receive. Once you understand social media's purpose and behavior you're more likely to pick the right service provider.

Sign up for the Bigpacific Media Connections Blog to learn more about how your business can benefit from participating in these and other technologies.

Thus, despite Canada's strong statistical showing in personal use of the Internet (only Scandinavian countries exceed our usage of the Internet), our businesses are astoundingly slow to move online, even with the equivalent of a brochureware web site.

The highest percentage sector using a web site? Education, followed by Information and Cultural Industries. No surprise given the Web's early start as a research and teaching tool, but where is retail, or tourism?

According to the research, despite tremendous gains in online reservations, only 44% of accommodation businesses have a web site. The same for restaurants/food services. 46% of Canadian retail businesses are online.

It's time for this to change. Web sites, for most small businesses in Canada, are ridiculously inexpensive in comparison to what they provide in terms of 24/7 information, connection with consumers or trade partners, and web traffic/usage statistics that are critical to measuring marketing and other strategies.

According to the Canadian Internet Project, "sixty-two percent of users rank the Internet as their highest source of information, with magazines and radio being the lowest. It has also been shown that Internet users spend less time with traditional media, meaning that an online presence is that much more effective."

Next post: Bumping the percentages and moving into the future