Last night I sat down to flip through some channels and try and get my brain to calm down from the annual spring-forward time change where I live.

I stumbled across CNNs almost 24 hour live coverage of the earthquake and tsunami in northeastern Japan. I remembered catching a bit of it in the morning at the kitchen table with my caffeine eye-opener, and I was struck again by the tone and feel of the CNN broadcast.

Yet another young-ish and hollywood-ish anchor looked earnestly into the camera. They're all of a sameness on CNN these days; if Fox is near-retirement age apoplexies in suits, CNN is populated with glossy entertainment-tonight style clones: a uniform patina of makeup, youthful earnestness, and to our society's discredit, an endless thirst for disaster that is all the more disgusting given how they play the foil to Fox' more base and manamimalistic presentation style.

Time and time again, I saw fluff-headed anchors breathlessly badgering reporters (and ireporters) to up the ante on how things are going down in Japan post-disaster. Yes, yes, we all know the potential possible outcomes of what is now becoming clear was a catastrophic quake and insanely, brutishly fast tsunami. Isn't it bad enough as it is?

Like jackals, some media outlets simply eviscerate the story, dragging out of the entrails that is a country - and its people - reeling in the immediate aftermath of something the marjority of us will never have to face. The networks, in this case, CNN, cajole and tease in leadouts to commercials, their somber faces belying the lust for 'the story', the thing that is going to grab those eyeballs, my eyeballs specifically, and drag me into taking an almost participatory ringside seat. Voyeurism never felt so disgusting as it did in that moment. The network's greedy appetite for worse and worse news, extrapolations into the future ad infinitum, was played out across the faces of the shills on the screen: the sheen of hunger on their busily moving lips, their predatory body language as they leaned in so seriously to ask a pointed (and pointless question).

While the networks do post information about how to donate via a variety of charities and methods, it's almost an afterthought. It came across as a repulsive claim to legitimacy, to their right to 'help' - help us supposedly feel our fellow's pain.... and then what? I can send my $20 or my $100 - let's not get our donation recipients confused while we're at it... what was it last month? Oh yeah, New Zealand. That's so Haiti now - but most viewers will not, unless they're hankering for a new Lady GaGa bracelet. Even then it feels somehow like buying a ticket to a show, rather than giving.

Online is no better. Millions flock to YouTube - in schools as did my daughter's high school class Friday afternoon - as over and over, like a record with a jumping needle, the endless footage of waves, of inundation, of carnage, roll endlessly past us.

It feels sickening, this endless parade of disaster through all of these 'channels'. Anyone connected in the grid is as assaulted by the cascading onslaught of images  as to feel one short step away from the disaster themselves. A tsunami of its own.

To what end, I have to ask? I feel farther away from my fellow human being than ever, and now utterly distressed by the repetitive witnessing of their personal horrors. I feel I oughtn't gripe about the daylight savings time stretch, for just think what the Japanese are going through. How dare I? And yet what does my solemnity and silence add to their experience. Does watching a rescue at a car accident bestow some kind of magic protection upon the injured, or is the viewer simply in the way, or worse, entertained by it?

The political correctness, the perfect 'form' demanded of the witnessing, as if we attempted to attend a cricket match wearing clothes all wrong for the season, is stunningly depraved. The media, and our complicit participation in it, has us salivating at the bell of each fresh disaster, and if we don't fall into line, tune in that channel and cry at the images so carefully chosen for us we feel as alienated as if excommunicated.

So I'm going to unplug from the red-hot mainline of carnage culture. I'm going to make my donations, be as good a person as I can be - to myself, my kin and kind and my fellow human beings from every end of the earth - and I'm going to turn my over-avid adrenalin-fueled gaze away from the wreck and stop getting my jollies and water cooler currency from the greasy, overfed and underaged anchor talent at CNN.

Oh, and I'll be away from my desk. I'm developing an app that triggers a warning siren that something terrible has happened, that a new episode of Carnage Culture has hit the airwaves. I'm sure I'll be elbowing all those folks on their way in to see it, but I'm getting the hell out of THERE. Care to join me?

RELATED LINKS:

None. Grown ups know how to make donations to reputable aid organizations without any help from me, or the anchors on CNN.

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.

There's a couple of companies I follow on a regular basis because they regularly innovate, either in WordPress theming, or in developing unique plugins that enhance the user experience for visitors to WordPress-based sites.

Unique Blog Designs started out as a wordpress theming company, and that's where Bigpacific.com went for the design of our first WordPress foray online. They built us a beautiful, custom design that reflected all the beauty of the Sunshine Coast and allowed for extra promotional spaces for advertisers wanting a greater prominence on the site.

Since then, UBD as they are widely referred to today have broadened their themes to serve the affiliate, email and online marketers niches. These are not niches where I generally spend a lot of time, but I did review and test the themes for customers who do wish to work them, and they are loaded with features and plugins that automate and leverage a lot of the elbow grease that goes into running a great blog or marketing site.

Now UBD has launched a new product, a very handy plugin for WordPress sites called 'Highlighter'. If you've ever used an old-fashioned highlighter (don't laugh, some younger people haven't!) you'll be familiar with the concept, now employed in a unique digital format that makes for a novel way to share content online with colleagues and friends.

With the highlighter plugin, the barriers are removed for user engagement.Visitors to your site can highlight a word, phrase, sentence - even an image - and instantly share it online, with a comment via Facebook, Twitter or Email. The Highlight Box packs all the related comments and sharing in one handy spot - and the webmaster can moderate highlights the same as comments.

You can also collect email addresses with the Highlighter tool integrated with Aweber, MailChimp or GetResponse.

This is a FREE tool that will increase visitor engagement, build your email network and create conversation points in novel ways.

Use Highlighter on this post and share it with friends!

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.

So here's my tips for preparation, power conservation, and emergency backup measures:

MOBILE PHONES:

• Turn off 'Ask to Join Networks' on iPhones, Blackberries and other smartphones.
• Turn down brightness on display or put on auto-brightness.
• Turn on airplane mode and enable access only when you can group your posts, social network updates, and uploads
• Turn off GPS location based features
• Turn off Bluetooth unless it is in use - most people forget and leave it on when they don't need hands-free access
• For the iPhone consider a charging skin/case, such as the Mophie, which can double battery time
• Avoid games and long calls, and writing lengthy emails, which can cause the screen to stay lit for long periods of time
• Buy a regular battery powered phone charger, such as the one sold by Energizer, the Energi to Go. Use rechargables in the Energizer device to reduce toxic waste.
• On the iPhone turn off audible sound effects for key clicks etc.
• Turn off push notifications for applications
• Turn off 3G if not available
• Minimize auto-lock time so the screen darkens as fast as possible after use
• Turn off camera apps when the shot is complete! The camera will stay on even if it's in a dark pocket.
• Shut down apps before locking on the iPhone, by pressing the home button. Otherwise the app is still running in sleep mode, drawing power.
• Turn off vibrate setting - vibration takes a lot of juice. Just check your phone visually more regularly.
• Turn off the equalizer on iPhones in the music settings.
• Bring a power charger and plan a coffee break in a wireless enabled cafe that is plugin friendly. Starbucks and Blenz are two chains in Vancouver where mobile users are frequently seen availing themselves of this tool. Better yet, bring a 4-plug power plugin - if all the plugs are taken by other users they'll happily share if you have the hardware.
• Special note: BC Ferries has cubicles on board with power outlets for laptop and mobile charging use, and they're free. No wireless coverage yet however; there's a black hole lasting about 20 minutes on the Horseshoe Bay/Langdale run for example.
• Update the firmware for your phone. We all hate this chore, but developers are always making improvements to the code that runs our phones, and often in the areas of battery usage and conservation.

CAMERAS

• Invest in a double or triple set of rechargeable batteries for small HD video cameras. Have two differently marked bags for keeping hot/good or cold/dead batteries so you don't have the wrong ones in for that important part you absolutely have to cover. Turn off the camera between shoots as keeping the display lit drains the batteries quickly. Don't review the footage on site unless you have to - better to do reviews, edits, purges at home with a card in a reader or with all footage downloaded to a computer and wiped off the device.
• Have a second lithium ion battery charged for any digital SLR cameras that use them. Bring it with you, even if you're sure the one in the camera is also charged. Better to have it than be gnashing your teeth in the middle of an event with a paperweight around your neck.
• Double-check your camera before departure to ensure the memory card and battery are actually IN IT. I once hiked up a brutal trail in a scratchy forest, lugging my Nikon D70 - with its spare lens - and got to the top only to discover the battery wasn't even in it. Turn the power on and off and take a test picture before you leave in case there's any problems with the card.
• Bring a spare memory card, and don't go more than 4gb in size unless you're a professional shooting in RAW mode. Better to split your shots on multiple cards in case one gets damaged or fails. Carry them in a proper case - especially the small and easy-to-damage SD cards.
• If you're covering something truly epic, bring a storage device you can download images into to keep space open on your cards, and your images backed up.  You can either go with a standard portable hard drive of 500gb - 1 terrabyte, or you can invest into an actual photography-specific storage device, such as the Epson P-6000 Multimedia Photo Viewer, which offers instant shoot and save, RAW file support, and a large viewer so you don't have to port them into a computer just to review them.
• Take every opportunity to do this kind of housekeeping and charging whenever you can, and even ask at restaurants or hotels if they provide such a service either for free, for a fee, or with your meal.

GENERAL TIPS AND TRICKS:

• Research your transportation route on a computer before you leave home so you're not looking things up on your phone
• Know where the closest electronics stores are relational to the route you'll be traveling
• Be prepared to spring some cash if you don't do your preparation beforehand. My camera battery died en-route to the Olympic hockey venue for the much-anticipated Canada/Sweden womens hockey game, and we happened to see a Best Buy along the skytrain route. Hopped out and $60 later were back on board with the exact lithium ion battery my Nikon needed, and it was pre-charged to half strength. I guess I can take comfort from the fact that there's enough people like me to constitute a market for this product.
• FREE BUT PRICELESS TIP: label all your chargers with white tags that denote the device it's for and store accessories by device and not by type (ie. charger, spare battery, extra lens for camera all together; charger and mophie pack for iPhone together - NOT all chargers together - that's a recipe for a distastrous mixup.

If you have some tips to share, please send them along. As for me, on day 7 of the Vancouver Winter Olympics I finally feel properly prepared to take in all the sights, sounds and events with my gear.

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