Wow. 2010 is NOT getting a sleepy start when it comes to building opportunities through marketing, networking, courses and public events. If you're not registered or participating in some kind of course, seminar, webcast, or local initiative I have to ask... why not? Remember the great and simple adage: If you do what you've always done, you'll get what you always got.

It's time to take some risks, make some new investment - even if it's just a hypodermic of adrenalin into your business - and start looking at things with a fresh outlook. Do something you've never done before, or something you've previously written off as a time-waster unlikely to show benefit. Ask a business that IS demonstrating new energy how and where they got it, and follow suit.

Here's what's on in the next 4-6 weeks that can help you build your business for 2010 and beyond:

• January 14, Capilano University Sechelt Campus, 3 hours morning session: E-Leadership. Leading by example, creating community, including an element of altruism, developing role as expert, online presence, social media, dos and don'ts + hands on lab work with Facebook, Twitter, Hootsuite, Google Alerts, Google Analytics, Google Adwords/Adsense.
• January 15, World Host training in Customer Service Excellence for Olympic guests. Welcome and cultural protocol for different languages and cultures, tips, highlights, promoting accessibility for disabled visitors. If this seminar doesn't sell out (there's one Saturday morning - 16th - at the Seaside Centre in Sechelt) we are missing out on a fantastic opportunity to be the best we can be, and what does that say about us by extension. Book NOW. There are limited spaces available. Contact the Gibsons Chamber for routing through to organizers. 604-886-2325.
• January 27,  5:30 - 7:30 Magellan's Sechelt (next to the Lighthouse Pub): Infusion 2010 Media Mixer. Meeting marketing experts from every discipline - bring your questions for some great free advice, network with other business owners, create marketing synergy and learn from two well-known Coast professionals about how to approach your 'marketing plan'. $20 networking & nibbles; cash bar.
• January 28th, 7-9pm Lower Gibsons: Enterprising Moms Network Monthly Speaker Meeting. Laurie McConnell will be talking about tracking the success of your online marketing.
• January 29th, Ceillis Irish Pub 670 Smithe Street Vancouver 6pm: ByzHub.com Meetup. For small business owners and entrepreneurs, including Sunshine Coast and Vancouver businesses.
• February 4th, Sechelt's Spirit Square, 9:30 am: Olympic Torch Relay Event. While not being a business event per se, most Sunshine Coast businesses will benefit either directly or indirectly from the Olympics, whether its in the games period running from Feb through the Paralympics in March or beyond. Be there, be enthusiastic, get an infusion of Olympic Spirit to take into your business. Gibsons event begins at 1pm.
• February 11th, Robson Square Vancouver, evening: Sunshine Coast Tourism tells the story of the Coast in HD video and introduces Media to our regional cuisines in a partnered evening event with Tourism Vancouver Island. Make sure you are a member of Sunshine Coast Tourism so your story is part of the message.
• Duration of Olympics, Richmond's BC Street and O Zone: Sunshine Coast Tourism engages visitors and media about the Sunshine Coast. Very exciting. Booth Volunteers needed.
• Duration of Olympics, BC Ferries Langdale/Horseshoe Bay Run: Additional Travel Ambassadors needed for one 4 hour shift per week. Learn on the job with an experienced partner, and have a blast welcoming the world. Contact the Gibsons Chamber of Commerce.

Of course this begs the question: Pizza Hut has fans?

The last time I darkened the door of a Pizza Hut was when I stopped in at the franchise in Richmond British Columbia, hoping to rekindle the nostalgia of my youth, when we used to pool our allowance and ride en masse to the hut for double-cheese and pepperoni. I recalled the great crust, the real cheese, the sense of gut power ramping up for the ride home, fueled by saturated fat and Coca-Cola.

All I can say as a 46 year old is: iiicccckkkk. I could have used the grease that pooled atop the cheapo cheese for womens oiled wrestling. The pizza dough was nothing but dough - no crunch, no 'crust', just lard and flour, like an anvil rocketing down to my stomach. The pepperoni was reminiscent of tire shavings - and not nice tires either, but the kind that come from trucks working in the abbatoirs. I kid you not. The pop was flat and had too much syrup in it; it was a better example of why one shouldn't drink soda than all the dieticians' tomes in the known universe.

So I've been trying to think what this college intern is going to do all summer. Talk about a good gig if you can get it! Given that the maximum character count on a message is 140 and that there is a limit, hypothetically, of just how many twitter messages about bad pizza or anything remotely related even the most rabid fratboy with no taste can manage, this job would account for what, say 2 hours a day if we are being generous?

What else could happen in the twittersphere to dominate this non-announcement? Well, acting just like its moniker, Dominos has thrown down the funny little pockmarked rectangle and plans to twitter too.

Now that all the major brands (companies and people) have seen the twitter light, we can all look forward to the mindless consumerist surge finding its next path of least resistance and littering up what equates to the Internet's bicycle lane with enough billboards to create a stairway to the moon.

Time for a new frontier, again!

Here's a brief description of each of the three major ways to conduct social networking and how it benefits you and your customers:

• Twitter, or 'micro-blogging' (journaling)
• Facebook
• Blogging (journaling)

TWITTER:

Twitter is just like it sounds - short, socializing messages (tweets) whistled out to the universe much like the birds do it in spring. These messages are 140 characters or less, and can be sent through your account at Twitter, via a special email address to Twitter from your personal cell phone (or related downloadable application, like TwitterBerry), or through 3rd party software that you install on your computer to help you organize the twitters based on groupings of friends and contacts. Twitters can keep people informed about changing weather conditions, sale pricing on merchandise, special events, and small items of interest that keep you communicating with your customers. Tweets are public to anyone following you and your permission is not required for them to do so.

FACEBOOK:

Facebook is a free-access social networking website where users can post photos and videos, share links, show event calendars, start or join groups around a specific topic, etc. You set the level of privacy for your information on Facebook, ie. only approved friends can see your information, friends of friends can see it, or it's public. Most social facebook pages are friends only, and businesses tend to set it at friends-of- friends for broader reach. Politicians would be an example of someone who would choose the public setting.

The benefits of Facebook are that you can share a LOT of information with a LOT of people very easily and with a minimum amount of work, you can keep track of what your 'friends' are doing via their status updates, and you can advertise events and track RSVPs through the invitation function.

Remember that when you give access to someone they can post publicly on YOUR wall of comments, so be careful about what level of access you provide. Kids and people with poor social skills are prone to posting content that at best can be trivial and annoying, and at worst, harmful to your business. You may wish to have one facebook page for you personally and one for your business (though I must advise that violates Facebook's terms of use - however, millions do it!).

BLOGGING:

Blogging, or online journaling, is the most commonly known tool for networking and communicating with customers and customers-to-be. I use WordPress for all my blogging - WordPress has achieved critical mass and there are so many great add-ons, hosting setups, and tips and tutorials that's it's just my favourite tool.

Blogging is not private - the very function of it is to push your content out into the Internet and get it passed around, syndicated (RSS = Really Simple Syndication), linked to, even excerpted and linked to. Blogging is where you tell the story of you and your business, because blogging is a one-to- one connection and it's about the human contact.

People not only want to know about what you're selling, sales, specials, getaways etc.... they want to know that you had to stop cleaning your accommodation early this morning to simply stare out the window at the gorgeousness of your little corner of the coast. They want to know that you've been kayaking for 10 years and still, every day, you want to be out on the water because that's where you feel free.

BUILD IT FOR ME

What if you want all of these powerful traffic-building tools added to your business, but you don't have time to figure it all out?

Bad Dog Design offers a one-stop development program that includes:

• wordpress site setup, as a 'static' web site, or blog, or combination of both, using free or for-purchase designed themes, plugin/widget installation, and set up with a self-hosted version with your own domain name and hosting
• twitter setup, with customization of your background to match your business
• facebook setup, with uploading of your basic data and installation of up to 6 Facebook plug-in applications

Call 604.885.5913 and request an information packet for more details - please leave the name of your business and email address, or write webmaster@bigpacific.com. This is a custom process, so please allow for 2-4 weeks for discussions and setup. Pricing starts at $999. Twitter and/or Facebook can be setup without a site/blog, approximately $299.

For UNIQUE, fully-customized blogs - capable of being your entire online presence and not template designed - we'll refer you to a top-notch online company with a range of packages from blog-add-on to full comprehensive site development. Prices start at $1999 for the basic branding package.

Bad Dog Design Inc.: Designing for Small Business and the Internet Since 1997.

If you let it. It's also an incredibly effective tool not only for brand building, but for functional application of ideas that have always worked well offline.

Self-discipline online is up to each individual and company. Speaking as an easily-distracted self-employed business owner, I know the traps after a dozen years working online. Every day something new and exciting hits the web, and some are destined to truly change business and society. Well, maybe 1% of them. The other 99% are super-crackers, bursting on to the dark stage of the web with a crash of cymbals and lights, and their goal - whether by design or a changed trajectory of ambition - is to capture as much market share and $$$ as they can manage in the short window the flavor-of-the-day environment offers. In that funnel is the lost productivity of workers, at a scale impossible to calculate.

That's the downside.

The upside is that Twitter, used properly in the business setting, is incredibly effective at building brand, communicating with customers, and even driving immediate sales.

For example... let's say you're a brick-and-mortar real world business renting kayaks and selling outdoor marine gear. How can you use Twitter effectively in your company?

Firstly, post your twitter link everywhere you go online, with a "Follow Me On Twitter" tagline that takes visitors to your twitter page where a one-click push gets them in your 'twitter list' - or twist, as I call it. Now you're building your list.

What do Twitter users want when they follow someone?

NEED: A feeling of direct relationship with your company. As fast as you can get news out, they care enough to be the first to receive it. GET: instant information and being part of the 'inside crowd' for your business - a friend, even, of your company, often with the loyalty friendship suggests.

NEED: First mover advantage. GET: Blast a Tweet to a group you designate your best customers and let them know first about the launch of a new product, and perhaps even combine it with a real-time social networking wine & cheese after hours for your Twitter followers only.

NEED: You need to move product to make room for this season's incoming items arriving this afternoon. GET: Run a timed sale... give a start and end time, with discount and what items are covered and send it to your tweet list.

NEED: Your mailing list to grow. GET: Start or grow your list by offering a service like weather tweets, guide tweets out on the water, or discounts if someone brings a friend into twitter who buys something.

So you can see how powerful Twitter can be in comparison to traditional methods of communication such as newspaper advertising (do you really want to wait until Friday to start your sale?) or email newsletters (are they checking their mail? did you get caught in their spam folder?).

So think hard about how YOU can use social networking in your business and then build it into your schedule responsibly (I twitter once a day, on my coffee break and have alerts about who has joined my list turned off on my phone to minimize distractions).

Related post: Twitter Add-Ons

Technorati Profile

Most of the people I talk with in small business - unless they are specifically an online marketing business - have no idea of what twitter is at best. At worst, they've heard all the worst stories about Twitter and all other social networking tools and have dismissed them entirely.

I say: NOT SO FAST.

One should never dispense with gaining an understanding of a product or service that might be relevant to a business. Knowledge is power, and if you don't understand something, how can you possibly decide whether it might offer a benefit?

Twitter.com

So, first: What the heck is Twitter?

It doesn't help that the name of the app sounds inconsequential or cutesy. It is what it describes, for sure... quick social commentary. If you've been at a party and someone important has walked into the room, causing a sudden surge of whispered comments, or a pal called you up with a hot news flash, you're hearing the real-world version of twitter.

Online twittering happens by SMS text message - and really that's all it is, a big dressed up version of text messaging, with a whole bunch of bells and whistles the online environment can provide. For example, you can blast a twitter to a group of friends at one time, set up different groupings of twitter contacts, time delay your tweets, add pictures, and follow conversations with individuals instead of having everything all lumped together in one big inbox - like the one I have to wade through on my Blackberry.

Twitter is also often referred to as a 'micro-blogging tool', whereby authors post mini blog comments with a restriction of 140 characters or less. This month there were an estimated 6 million users of Twitter, and the service is the third-largest social network, behind only Facebook and MySpace.

For the full background and current development of everything Twitter, check out the Wiki.

Next post: Does Twitter Have a Place in Business?

1st Annual Shorty Awards

The awards honored 'short and sweet' tweets that had a significant impact on events and issues. Award winners, selected from 50,000 public nominations, voted on by tweets included Justin Hart for politics, Wendy Leidhecker for business, Phil Pearlman for finance, MC Milker for green, and Charles Trippy for humour. A full list of nominees is available at the CNN Web Site.

The Shorty Awards web site gives all the info, including links to all of the actual winning tweets. Here's to 2010!

Don't get me wrong - the configuration instructions at Spam Arrest are quite clear, I was having trouble figuring out how to deal with several kinds of spam: garden variety, spam generated by my own server as I hunt down and close all the relays spammers are using to spoof my address (thank you Verio, for all the great support), and trash to a bunch of aliases I just can't shut down in case the one random person tries to reach me.

When you manage a number of high-traffic web sites and your own virtual server, it gets pretty complex figuring out what rules to use, whether to allow mail from your own domain (I frequently 'mail' myself things between computers when my remote file transfer is buggy). For the average user though it is dead simple to set this system up, and customize the message your users get when you're asking them to take an extra step of adding themselves to your safe sender's list by completing a one-time captcha routine.

So far, I am picking through my unverified box a few times a day and finding 'real' addresses to authenticate, but on the good side, I got 10 pieces of mail today that landed in my Outlook inbox!! If I can keep it up, I'll soon be able to add this critical email account to my blackberry.

http://www.spamarrest.com

However, in my naivety and short pants, I made the fatal mistake - like many did back in the day - of making my main email address the root address for the domain. Webmaster@. The legacy of this lives on today, in the approximate 1600 pieces of spam I receive each and every day, even running SpamAssassin on my server.

I recently read uber-blogger  Tim Ferris' post about outsourcing email (when my ratio of 'real' mail exceeds my spam I'll take another look at outsourcing) and noticed he doesn't suffer much from spam. This is the best-selling author of The Four Hour Work Week (now in its 40th printing, in 33 languages), an international speaker, adventurer and networker extraordinaire. To say he's not suffering from spam is like the Post Office saying everyone takes their flyers home instead of dumping them in the recycling bin. My first reaction? Yeah, right.

So I will be the first test case with Spam Arrest. I'm off to set up my 30 day trial account and I'll update this post with results as I get them, hopefully in a much leaner inbox!

Have you tried other encryption tools for email and found them overwhelmingly complex, involving each party passing hard-to-remember keys back and forth?

Have you successfully sent a large file only to have it bounce at the recipient's end because it's crushing their inbox? Did your message even arrive (everyone loves turning off 'message received' functionality in their email programs)?

Why, might I ask. Especially when there is an affordable, encryption based service like E-Courier.ca as an alternative?

Never mind security concerns that include identity theft, legal liabilities from mail read by parties not intended as recipients, and the like. For that reason alone if you have a company and conduct sensitive business through email channels, you need this service. Many of the companies you deal with have failed to implement even the most basic of security measures, such as encryption of laptops, or running networks without firewalls. Can you really trust that your personal or business information is secure?

Offer your clients and customers the security of military-grade encryption, and be a leader in protecting their information. Work in a format that anyone can use - no special software to install, or complex instructions. For businesses working with large or sensitive file data - architects, accountants, mortgage brokers,  IT developers, the legal field - this type of application is a no-brainer.

One of the greatest things about E-courier? Your clientele gets to use the system for FREE. That means if you're an architect working with 5 contractors or homeowners, they can receive, edit/comment and return the documents securely through your E-courier pipe.

What do you need to take advantage of E-Courier? An email address. An internet connection. A web browser. It's that simple.

For more information, contact E-Courier.ca and quote the Bigpacific Promotional Code. I've tried the system and it is bonehead easy (which means it's for me... I loathe messing around with encryption on the local computer side - blech.).

Turned on to it by my partner, who had picked up Entrepreneur in an airport bookstore to pass the time and then immediately created a nifty show linked to a Facebook account, I was intrigued.

Created by TV and film producers, Animoto offers all of the slick production values you're used to seeing in those mediums or created by really talented people using semi-professional software and apps such as SlideshowPro, Slideshow Producer, and the Adobe/Mac products - for FREE, or for really affordable $ if you want all the bells and whistles and ultimate control over the product.

It exports to DVD/CD, is completely automatic (if that's the option you choose), and no two videos are the same. The software intelligently maps the music you choose and creates unique transitions and elements with the pictures you upload. For commercial users, there's a large library of royalty-free music and the ability to include text (in sophisticated fashion) over your images, unlimited dvd-quality videos, call to action incorporation, spotlight feature and suppression of some of the Animoto branding. No whitelabel version yet but who knows - just ask.

I've purchased the business level version as I want to run shows on my commercial regional portal, www.bigpacific.com.

Here's my first slideshow, in the freebie version: