Wednesday, July 3, 2013
The Home Spa
True Encounters with the Unknown
Thursday, March 1, 2012
WHY A WEBSITE CAN HELP YOUR BUSINESS
One of the most important details in your business plan should be its Internet exposure. A website should echo your business philosophies, emphasize the best of what you have to offer; and is equally if not more important than the receptionist who greets your customers on the phone or in person.
1. A WEBSITE CAN HELP YOU GENERATE A PROFESSIONAL BUSINESS
A professionally designed website is one of the best ways to instill confidence in your new customers who are not familiar with your company already or even increase the confidence of your existing customer base. It gives the customer the impression that they are dealing with a firm they can trust and will generate a sense of respectability with your service and/or product.
2. BUSINESS INFO IS AVAILABLE 24/7
You are able to communicate address, phone numbers, fax numbers, hours of operation and client’s awareness of special offerings.How much time do you spend on the phone giving out all of this information? Directions, Wat you do and don’t carry, what hours you are open, the price of some service, how one of your services “works”, directions once again, and yes you are open on Sundays too. What if you could hire someone for just a few hundred dollars a year to take an increasing number of those calls for you? You would do it in a heartbeat wouldn’t you? You’d be surprised how much a website will take off your shoulders while simultaneously driving business to you.
3. NO MORE YELLOW PAGES
People don’t use the yellow pages as much as you think and many refer to the overpriced print pages as a dead form of advertising. Almost every employee in the country that gets paid more than $30,000/year has a computer at their desk and a whopping 85% of college students have their own personal PC while few have a copy of the yellow pages nearby. As habit, they will simply type in “Hair Salon Columbia, Missouri” in Google long before they hunt down the one copy of the yellow pages that was left in the break room or on their dorm floor.
4. THE FUTURE IS AUTOMATION (LESS WORK= MORE$$$)
You can highly automate some parts of your business online which in turn will free up other resources to other parts of your business. You could give your customers the option to pay their bills online and check account balances. You can automate deliveries to them. You can allow them to book appointments with your salon online or even make restaurant registrations at their favorite table. You can give customers the option to be notified that their dry cleaning is ready for pickup. It is only getting easier and more convenient for customers to shop at places that serve them around their lifestyle and research shows that Generation Y and even a lot baby boomers are looking for these kind of conveniences when choosing a company to do business with.
5. PROVIDE RESEARCH INFORMATION
Consumers spend hours of time researching potential businesses, products and services prior to making an educated purchase. Don’t miss out on the opportunity to give your customers and potential customers the information they want and need to make an educated purchase decision by foregoing a company website.
6. REACH DESIRABLE DEMOGRAPHIC MARKETS
The World Wide Web is arguably the highest mass-market demographic available. Mostly consisting of college educated or currently being college educated consumers making high salaries or soon to make high salaries. These demographics are the ones who will be going online to do product and service research, looking for general business information, and seeking that automation and convenience I touched on in #4.
7. CREATE A 24 HOUR SERVICE
Web pages serve the client, customer and partner 24 hours a day, seven days a week and you don’t even have to pay it overtime wages either. Consumers are increasingly becoming busier and busier every day and by providing information and services online you are able to attract the people who are simply just too busy to handle all their needs during their 9-5 workday while working around your 8-6 office hours.
8. FEEDBACK FROM THE CUSTOMER
With a good web presence you are able to ask for feedback in a non-confrontational way and receive information instantly without extra cost. This could be something as simple as a dynamic contact and feedback form or individual product and service rating systems that give the customer the anonymity they desire and the information and feedback crucial to your businesses success.
9. EXISTENCE IS EVERYTHING
Without a website, you simply do not exist to the average consumer. Before you look back at all your success and totally disregard what I am saying just hear me out on this. It’s 5:00pm, Friday evening and I have to get my dog groomed this weekend. I type in my favorite search engine at work: “Dog Groomer Columbia, Missouri”. The first two links all look great. I look at their hours, their location, read a little about the company and they’ve been in business for over 20 years, experience is great, so I pick up the phone and make an appointment.
What I didn’t know though is that you run a Pet Groomer just a few blocks from where I’ll be having lunch tomorrow. I didn’t know that because your website either didn’t come up in the search engine or perhaps you do not have a website at all. For me and many other consumers, you didn’t even exist when I was making a decision on whom to do business with.
10. INEXPENSIVE AND ALMOST RISK FREE
All the above benefits to having a website for your small business are great. When people first began to adopt the internet these benefits would have been very costly and out of reach of the average small business owner. However, while every other advertising medium has increased in price over the past decade, website development and hosting has decreased significantly.
There is virtually “no risk” in website marketing. You don’t have to spend thousands of dollars and wonder if you should have bought a bigger yellow pages ad but can’t change it until the next year rolls around. You can easily customize your website and make changes at your convenience. You can do as much or as little as your business goals and budget allow.
Call us at 3583428 so we can help your business grow.
1. A WEBSITE CAN HELP YOU GENERATE A PROFESSIONAL BUSINESS
A professionally designed website is one of the best ways to instill confidence in your new customers who are not familiar with your company already or even increase the confidence of your existing customer base. It gives the customer the impression that they are dealing with a firm they can trust and will generate a sense of respectability with your service and/or product.
2. BUSINESS INFO IS AVAILABLE 24/7
You are able to communicate address, phone numbers, fax numbers, hours of operation and client’s awareness of special offerings.How much time do you spend on the phone giving out all of this information? Directions, Wat you do and don’t carry, what hours you are open, the price of some service, how one of your services “works”, directions once again, and yes you are open on Sundays too. What if you could hire someone for just a few hundred dollars a year to take an increasing number of those calls for you? You would do it in a heartbeat wouldn’t you? You’d be surprised how much a website will take off your shoulders while simultaneously driving business to you.
3. NO MORE YELLOW PAGES
People don’t use the yellow pages as much as you think and many refer to the overpriced print pages as a dead form of advertising. Almost every employee in the country that gets paid more than $30,000/year has a computer at their desk and a whopping 85% of college students have their own personal PC while few have a copy of the yellow pages nearby. As habit, they will simply type in “Hair Salon Columbia, Missouri” in Google long before they hunt down the one copy of the yellow pages that was left in the break room or on their dorm floor.
4. THE FUTURE IS AUTOMATION (LESS WORK= MORE$$$)
You can highly automate some parts of your business online which in turn will free up other resources to other parts of your business. You could give your customers the option to pay their bills online and check account balances. You can automate deliveries to them. You can allow them to book appointments with your salon online or even make restaurant registrations at their favorite table. You can give customers the option to be notified that their dry cleaning is ready for pickup. It is only getting easier and more convenient for customers to shop at places that serve them around their lifestyle and research shows that Generation Y and even a lot baby boomers are looking for these kind of conveniences when choosing a company to do business with.
5. PROVIDE RESEARCH INFORMATION
Consumers spend hours of time researching potential businesses, products and services prior to making an educated purchase. Don’t miss out on the opportunity to give your customers and potential customers the information they want and need to make an educated purchase decision by foregoing a company website.
6. REACH DESIRABLE DEMOGRAPHIC MARKETS
The World Wide Web is arguably the highest mass-market demographic available. Mostly consisting of college educated or currently being college educated consumers making high salaries or soon to make high salaries. These demographics are the ones who will be going online to do product and service research, looking for general business information, and seeking that automation and convenience I touched on in #4.
7. CREATE A 24 HOUR SERVICE
Web pages serve the client, customer and partner 24 hours a day, seven days a week and you don’t even have to pay it overtime wages either. Consumers are increasingly becoming busier and busier every day and by providing information and services online you are able to attract the people who are simply just too busy to handle all their needs during their 9-5 workday while working around your 8-6 office hours.
8. FEEDBACK FROM THE CUSTOMER
With a good web presence you are able to ask for feedback in a non-confrontational way and receive information instantly without extra cost. This could be something as simple as a dynamic contact and feedback form or individual product and service rating systems that give the customer the anonymity they desire and the information and feedback crucial to your businesses success.
9. EXISTENCE IS EVERYTHING
Without a website, you simply do not exist to the average consumer. Before you look back at all your success and totally disregard what I am saying just hear me out on this. It’s 5:00pm, Friday evening and I have to get my dog groomed this weekend. I type in my favorite search engine at work: “Dog Groomer Columbia, Missouri”. The first two links all look great. I look at their hours, their location, read a little about the company and they’ve been in business for over 20 years, experience is great, so I pick up the phone and make an appointment.
What I didn’t know though is that you run a Pet Groomer just a few blocks from where I’ll be having lunch tomorrow. I didn’t know that because your website either didn’t come up in the search engine or perhaps you do not have a website at all. For me and many other consumers, you didn’t even exist when I was making a decision on whom to do business with.
10. INEXPENSIVE AND ALMOST RISK FREE
All the above benefits to having a website for your small business are great. When people first began to adopt the internet these benefits would have been very costly and out of reach of the average small business owner. However, while every other advertising medium has increased in price over the past decade, website development and hosting has decreased significantly.
There is virtually “no risk” in website marketing. You don’t have to spend thousands of dollars and wonder if you should have bought a bigger yellow pages ad but can’t change it until the next year rolls around. You can easily customize your website and make changes at your convenience. You can do as much or as little as your business goals and budget allow.
Call us at 3583428 so we can help your business grow.
Thursday, September 1, 2011
Why You Need a Website
Why You Need a Website
Even if you're not planning on selling online, a well-crafted site is essential for any business.
Q: My business is very small, just me and two employees, and our product really can't be sold online. Do I really need a website?
A: That's a good question. In fact, it's one of the most important and most frequently asked questions of the digital business age. Before I answer, however, let's flash back to the very first time I was asked this question. It was circa 1998, during the toddler years of the internet.
I was giving a speech on the impact of the internet on small business at an association luncheon in Montgomery, Alabama. Back in 1998, which was decades ago in internet years, the future of e-commerce was anybody's guess, but even the most negative futurists agreed that all the signs indicated that a large portion of future business revenues would be derived from online transactions or from offline transactions that were the result of online marketing efforts.
So should your business have a website, even if your business is small and sells products or services you don't think can be sold online? My answer in 1998 is the same as my answer today: Yes, if you have a business, you should have a website. Period. No question. Without a doubt.
Also, don't be so quick to dismiss your product as one that can't be sold online. Nowadays, there's very little that can't be sold over the internet. More than 20 million shoppers are now online, purchasing everything from books to computers to cars to real estate to jet airplanes to natural gas to you name it. If you can imagine it, someone will figure out how to sell it online.
Let me clarify one point: I'm not saying you should put all your efforts into selling your wares over the internet, though if your product lends itself to easy online sales, you should certainly be considering it. The point to be made here is that you should at the very least have a presence on the web so that customers, potential employees, business partners and perhaps even investors can quickly and easily find out more about your business and the products or services you have to offer.
That said, it's not enough that you just have a website. You must have a professional-looking site if you want to be taken seriously. Since many consumers now search for information online prior to making a purchase at a brick-and-mortar store, your site may be the first chance you have at making a good impression on a potential buyer. If your site looks like it was designed by a barrel of colorblind monkeys, your chance at making a good first impression will be lost.
One of the great things about the internet is that it has leveled the playing field when it comes to competing with the big boys. As mentioned, you have one shot at making a good first impression. With a well-designed site, your little operation can project the image and professionalism of a much larger company. The inverse is also true. I've seen many big company websites that were so badly designed and hard to navigate that they completely lacked professionalism and credibility. Good for you, too bad for them.
You also mention that yours is a small operation, but when it comes to benefiting from a website, size does not matter. I don't care if you're a one-man show or a 10,000-employee corporate giant; if you don't have a website, you're losing business to other companies that do.
Here's the exception to my rule: It's actually better to have no website at all than to have one that makes your business look bad. Your site speaks volumes about your business. It either says, "Hey, look, we take our business so seriously that we have created this wonderful site for our customers!" or it screams, "Hey, look, I let my 10-year-old nephew design my site. Good luck finding anything!"
Your website is an important part of your business. Make sure you treat it as such.
BY TIM W. KNOX
Even if you're not planning on selling online, a well-crafted site is essential for any business.
Q: My business is very small, just me and two employees, and our product really can't be sold online. Do I really need a website?
A: That's a good question. In fact, it's one of the most important and most frequently asked questions of the digital business age. Before I answer, however, let's flash back to the very first time I was asked this question. It was circa 1998, during the toddler years of the internet.
I was giving a speech on the impact of the internet on small business at an association luncheon in Montgomery, Alabama. Back in 1998, which was decades ago in internet years, the future of e-commerce was anybody's guess, but even the most negative futurists agreed that all the signs indicated that a large portion of future business revenues would be derived from online transactions or from offline transactions that were the result of online marketing efforts.
So should your business have a website, even if your business is small and sells products or services you don't think can be sold online? My answer in 1998 is the same as my answer today: Yes, if you have a business, you should have a website. Period. No question. Without a doubt.
Also, don't be so quick to dismiss your product as one that can't be sold online. Nowadays, there's very little that can't be sold over the internet. More than 20 million shoppers are now online, purchasing everything from books to computers to cars to real estate to jet airplanes to natural gas to you name it. If you can imagine it, someone will figure out how to sell it online.
Let me clarify one point: I'm not saying you should put all your efforts into selling your wares over the internet, though if your product lends itself to easy online sales, you should certainly be considering it. The point to be made here is that you should at the very least have a presence on the web so that customers, potential employees, business partners and perhaps even investors can quickly and easily find out more about your business and the products or services you have to offer.
That said, it's not enough that you just have a website. You must have a professional-looking site if you want to be taken seriously. Since many consumers now search for information online prior to making a purchase at a brick-and-mortar store, your site may be the first chance you have at making a good impression on a potential buyer. If your site looks like it was designed by a barrel of colorblind monkeys, your chance at making a good first impression will be lost.
One of the great things about the internet is that it has leveled the playing field when it comes to competing with the big boys. As mentioned, you have one shot at making a good first impression. With a well-designed site, your little operation can project the image and professionalism of a much larger company. The inverse is also true. I've seen many big company websites that were so badly designed and hard to navigate that they completely lacked professionalism and credibility. Good for you, too bad for them.
You also mention that yours is a small operation, but when it comes to benefiting from a website, size does not matter. I don't care if you're a one-man show or a 10,000-employee corporate giant; if you don't have a website, you're losing business to other companies that do.
Here's the exception to my rule: It's actually better to have no website at all than to have one that makes your business look bad. Your site speaks volumes about your business. It either says, "Hey, look, we take our business so seriously that we have created this wonderful site for our customers!" or it screams, "Hey, look, I let my 10-year-old nephew design my site. Good luck finding anything!"
Your website is an important part of your business. Make sure you treat it as such.
BY TIM W. KNOX
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
Lumina Skin Surgicenter
Beauty and Beyond, Welcome to Lumina Skin and Surgicenter
104 Timog Avenue, Quezon City (inside Auto Trend)
Phone 928.2175 Fax: 928.2175
Logo design, website design and development by Desktype Asia Design Studio.
Thursday, August 25, 2011
ProengineerPortal
ProengineerPortal provides a full range of medical product development services to startups, OEM’s (Original Equipment Manufacturers), IP (Intellectual Property) professionals, and dynamic entrepreneurs who want to introduce their product into the market place. ProengineerPortal specializes in complex and high tech medical device designs.
http://www.proengineerportal.com/
Logo design, website design and development by Desktype Asia Design Studio.
Thursday, August 18, 2011
Contemporary Jazz in the Philippines
Contemporary Jazz in the Philippines: 1970 to the Year 2010 by Richie Quirino (Anvil)
In the third volume of his chronicle of Pinoy jazz, musician and writer Richie Quirino takes the story of this unlikely art form up to the present era. The previous volumes "Pinoy Jazz Traditions" (2004) and "Mabuhay Jazz: Jazz in Postwar Philippines" (2008) relied extensively on interviews with surviving musicians and archival sources.
"Contemporary Jazz," however, gives a fuller and livelier account of the local jazz scene. After all, the author was an active participant during the birth of Pinoy jazz fusion in the 1970s, and its resurgence in the last decade.
Taken in its entirety, the series illuminates a heretofore obscure corner of Filipino culture, and confirms our genius for adapting foreign forms to our own needs and tastes. Eric S. Caruncho
Cover Art Painting by internationally renowned artist and Presidential Medal of Merit Awardee Juvenal Sansó. Book design by Desktype Asia Design Studio
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