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  • Consumers Increasingly Using Mobile Devices as Their Default Gateway to the Internet

    Consumers are migrating away from PC-based Internet usage and are increasingly using mobile devices as their default gateway to the Internet, according to the latest release of the International Data Corporation (IDC) Worldwide New Media Market Model. The United States leads that trend, with Western Europe and Japan only about two years behind. In the U.S., the number of people accessing the Internet through PCs will shrink from 240 million consumers in 2012 to 225 million in 2016. At the same time, the number of mobile users will increase from 174 million to 265 million.

    In 2015, for the first time ever, there will be more U.S. consumers accessing the Internet through mobile devices than through PCs.

    “In the consumer world, mobile Internet usage is already beginning to displace PC usage, and the United States is leading this trend,” said Karsten Weide, program vice president, Media & Entertainment at IDC. “There has been much talk about how the future of the Internet will be mobile first and PC second. In the United States, that future is now.”

    Additional findings from the New Media Market Model include the following:

    • Online PC activities will also be impacted as consumers take their usage mobile. IDC expects that the share of users accessing social networks such as Facebook on their PCs will decline from 66% in 2012 to 52% in 2016.
    • Worldwide mobile advertising will almost quintuple from $6 billion in 2011 to $28.8 billion in 2016
    • Worldwide business-to-consumer (B2C) m-commerce spending will grow six fold between 2011 and 2016, reaching $223 billion at the end of the forecast period

    “The Great PC Exodus on the Internet is happening because the PC was never truly a consumer product,” added Weide. “Many consumers use them because there was no better alternative. Now, with the huge and growing installed base of more user-friendly tablets and smartphones, there are.”

    The IDC study, Worldwide New Media Market Model 1H-2012 Highlights: Internet Becomes Ever More Mobile, Ever Less PC-Based (IDC #237459), features the most interesting findings from IDC’s latest Worldwide New Media Market Model.

    Source: Karsten Weide, IDC, www.idc.com

  • How to Attract More Customers With Content Marketing

    Are you looking to attract prospects, convert them to customers and keep them coming back?  Then social media and content marketing are a match made in heaven.

    The key to success is to make the connection between content marketing and social media.

    Let’s look at the content needed to get your marketing to that lucrative intersection.

    #1: Attract Prospective Customers

    The first question on a prospect’s mind when considering a purchase is, “What solutions are available?”

    Your goal is to create awareness and make sure that your solution meets the buyers’ need when they’re ready to make a decision.

    According to data from Google and Shopper Science’s Zero Moment of Truth report, consumers in 2011 consulted an average of 10 sources before making a buying decision. That’s up 100% from five sources in 2010.

    zmot sources used
    The number of sources a buyer consults before making a decision doubled year over year.

    Successful businesses are communicating with prospects on social networking sites and directing them to the material the prospects need to make an informed decision. How are they doing this?

    One way is to create informational articles.

    Social network users are constantly sharing, curating and consuming informational content. Often, the headline or a short description of the content appears on the social network together with a link to view the content on a company website.

    Businesses need to share this informational content and have it written for prospects who are in research mode, learning about the solutions that are available.

    Charles Schwab, a financial planning company, distributes links to resources via social networking sites and makes them available for prospective leads who reach out via social media.

    Read More (Source: Russ Henneberry, Social Media Examiner)

  • 6 Reasons to Use Crowdsourcing

    6 Reasons to Use Crowdsourcing BY

    Having difficulty coming up with a new idea or content? Here are six reasons to try crowdsourcing.

    Our company, Wild Creations, is coming up on our six year anniversary. We have a number of new initiatives, and we felt now would be a great opportunity to shake things up and create a new “identity” for the company. We have a comprehensive plan that starts with the simply task of developing a fresh, new logo that captured the new company vision and the free-spirited, adventurous culture we encourage.

    There was one problem.

    Because we had developed our original logo and have been married to it for so long, it has been difficult to break the emotional bond we have to it. Indeed, every attempt we made internally fell short, and we were certain no outside firm could create a respectable replacement for our beloved “eyes.”

    We were a victim of the IKEA Effect.

    Then we decided to try crowdsourcing. Crowdsourcing is the practice of obtaining ideas, services, or content by soliciting contributions from a large group of people, or more specifically, an online community rather than from traditional employees or service providers. We submitted a project on 99designs.com, the “world’s largest online graphic design marketplace connecting passionate designers from around the globe with customers seeking quality, affordable design services.”

    The service is easy to use. You submit a project on the website with a description of your needs (in our case, a new logo). The online community of graphic artists then springs into action, submitting ideas with the ultimate goal of earning the project fee. Remarkably, for as little as $299, we had access to over 206,000 graphic designers, from all over the world.

    The result was fantastic, and we received over 300 new and unique submissions.  Ironically, we chose a design that did not follow our suggested guidelines (it has no eyes).  It turns out we didn’t know what we wanted from the start, but we knew it when we saw it!

    Crowdsourcing is a quickly growing industry, not only for graphic design but also numerous other services. If you are a small business owner, here are six reasons you should be considering crowdsourcing for your business:

    1. Reduce Cost

    Subcontracting a graphic designer could run hundreds or even thousands of dollars, and there is no guarantee you’ll like any of the designs they submit. Crowdsourcing gives you access to tens of thousands of designers for less.

    2. Eliminate Overhead

    Some businesses prefer to have graphic designers on staff in order to closely control the creative aspects of the business. Unfortunately this can be very cost prohibitive with salaries, payroll taxes, benefits, etc.  As well,  on-staff designers will not be fully utilized during down time.

    3. Minimize Management

    Every new design project needs to be managed, from conceptualization through revisions to final selection. With crowdsourcing, you submit your idea and let the tens of thousands of designers manage the project for you.

    4. Maximize Options

    You will most likely receive tens, hundred, and even thousands of creative options to choose from. While this could be a distraction, sites like 99Designs allows you to eliminate unappealing designs in real time, reducing the number of options as well as providing designers feedback.

    5. Optimize Creativity

    With no paradigms, emotional attachments, or insecurities, the designers are free to be as creative as they want. Indeed, the more creative, the more likely they will get noticed and selected.

    6. Create Buzz

    You can tap your professional, personal, and social networks to vote on your top choices, which will empower your fans and create excitement and anticipation for the contest.

    Crowdsourcing is just starting to get the attention it deserves. It creates wonderful and affordable options for small businesses and entrepreneurs who need short term, creative work done. Indeed, prior to finding a new logo for Wild Creations, we used crowdsourcing to find the logo for our start-up crowd funding website, Jumpoff.co. It works that well.

    Read More  (Source: Peter Gasca, inc.com)

  • Happy Holidays!

    Happy Holidays from everyone here at eTekhnos!

  • Is your website ready for the road?

    Surely you have seen people glued to their smartphone screen while walking across the street or out at dinner.

    But how does business insert itself into such familiar scenarios, knowing today there are literally more smartphones than toothbrushes in the world?

    First consider your website. How will yours look on a smartphone or tablet? If you are expecting people to just “pinch and spread” your website while they are viewing it on a phone, you will rapidly lose mobile visitors. There’s only so much dragging and tapping and flicking a person can endure.

    If your business targets people on the move, such as retailers, restaurants, dry cleaners, Realtors do, you just have to do better.

    There are two ways to ensure that the experience of viewing your website on a smaller device is more pleasing. You may have heard of the two terms for this: Responsive Web Design (RWD) and Mobile. These are two markedly different approaches.

    In creating a responsive website, you basically make your “big” website – your desktop website – adapt to the frame of whatever device a person is viewing.

    With this approach, the site and its content will transform to match the width of the web browser used to view it. This allows the website to be viewed in an optimal way on every device from smartphones all the way up to large computer monitors. Since the site is programmed to conform to the device, horizontal scrolling never is required. Neither are panning or pinching to zoom as they are when viewing fixed-width websites on small devices. Buttons will be the right size to tap on small devices, etc.

    Responsive web design senses the dimensions of the available screen and morphs into that receiving shape. There’s no more pinching and pulling. Everything is essentially visible from the start.

    Still the content is “linearized” so that all people have to do is scroll down.

    However, when people are on the fly, they don’t necessarily want to scroll down on a pre-squeezed page to read the deep content. They really just want the facts, ma’am.

    Read More (Source: Laurie Macomber, Northern Colorado Business Report)

  • Benefit Portals Build Direct Relationships

    Not only is self-service technology helping employer-clients control benefit administration costs, it might also be insurance carriers’ missing link to employee consumers once they leave the workplace.

    This potential is not lost on MetLife, a large New York-based provider of non-medical group benefits with accounts at more than 3,500 organizations. To better service the needs of close to 17 million employees working at its client companies, MetLife embarked on an effort five years ago to build an online employee benefits portal called MyBenefits.

    By all measures, the online self-service portal has been a hit. Recently, MetLife announced that the one-millionth employee had registered to access accounts online through MyBenefits.

    The portal enables employees to log in-either from work or from home-and get answers to frequently asked questions, learn about plans and coverage specifics, obtain price quotes for certain products, and enroll in dental benefits, critical illness insurance, long-term care, life insurance, auto and home insurance, disability insurance, and banking services.

    Users can also check their claim status for certain products, locate a dentist who participates in a MetLife preferred dentist program, or learn about retirement savings options. A popular feature is service e-mail, such as e-alerts that notify employees of claim updates.

    The first iteration of the MyBenefits portal was launched in June of 2000, according to Sachin Shah, vice president of MetLife Workplace Solutions. MetLife has upgraded the portal several times since that initial launch, with the most recent upgrade taking place in 2003. Shah estimates the site is being accessed an average 800,000 to a million times a month, and transaction activity has been almost doubling each year.

    There were three primary considerations in launching the portal, says Shah. First, customer companies were anxious to reduce processing burdens incurred by benefits administration.

    “Our employer customers-plan sponsors, or HR offices-needed to promote more self service, and reduce the related costs of the administrivia with benefit programs,” he says.

    The ability to lower administration costs has been a key selling point to employers, he adds. “In our business, things that we can do to provide employees a better way to manage their benefits, without having to call the HR office, are real winners. It takes work from employers, who would otherwise be getting phone calls and inquiries.”

    Second, organizations are gradually reducing their financial stake in benefits plans. “Employers are beginning to cost-shift to employees, and that cost shifting continues to grow, certainly on a dollar basis, because costs in aggregate for medical programs in particular have gone up,” he explains.

    “That cost shifting has required us to work with employers to begin to provide much more information to employees, and get them to become more aware of, and educated in, benefits offerings.”

    Third, Shah says, there’s a strategic shift occurring in the benefits administration marketplace. “Employers are getting out of the benefits administration business,” he notes.

    “Strategically, the marketplace is moving toward a world in which we have two customers – the employer, and more importantly, the employee. Making a sale to the employer is no longer a guarantee of revenue, as it was in the past. It’s just a point of entry. Ultimately, making the sale to the employee, and keeping the employee as a customer, has become our driver of revenues and earnings.”

    Read More (Source: Joe McKendrick, Insurance Networking News)

  • Employee Spotlight – Sandy Ballou

    sandyThe team we have here at eTekhnos/ Rockstar Technology is our greatest asset to both our company and the clients we serve daily. The Employee Spotlight is to help our clients get to know the staff they work so closely with and rely on personally and professionally! Read below to learn more about Sandy Ballou – in her own words.

     

    How long have you been with eTekhnos/RT and what is your official title?
    Since April 2011.  Technology Support Manager.

    What is your favorite aspect of your role here?
    I like helping our clients sign new clients with the technology we help them offer.  I also enjoy the relationships I have with my clients and co-workers.

    Do you have a favorite sports team?
    The Boston Red Sox and New England Patriots.

    Where is the furthest you have traveled?
    I went to Italy to visit Family when I was 6 and Hawaii when I was in High School.

    What is your passion?
    Right now my 1.5 year old son Scottie and  almost 4 year old daughter Natalie and my Husband Scott take up most of my time.

    What is something people might not know about you?
    I trained in martial arts from the age of 5 until I was 18. I was a Second Degree Black Belt and used to teach classes to young children and also competed in many tournaments.  Also, my first language was Italian – I could not speak English fluently until the age of 6 after taking classes in school.

     

  • Why your Business needs an Intranet

    These days, most corporations have their own intranet, which is somewhat like the internet except for the fact that it’s only accessible to those within the company. However, Intranets are not just useful for large enterprises, SMEs can benefit from them hugely too.

    An intranet means that internal communications within a company are simplified substantially and make for more success in terms of growth, as productivity increases. It’s basically an internal database which every employee can access, with different permissions for various staff.

    For example, it’s doubtful that you want junior office staff to be able to access all of your financial reports and forecasts for the year, so these are just given permissions to access certain areas of the intranet which is relevant to their job.

    According to Microsoft: “In order for a company to succeed, all players must understand its goals. Neither long-term nor short-term goals should be confined to upper management meetings. It’s Business 101. Everyone needs to be working toward common goals”.

    By building an intranet, employees and bosses alike can share information across the board; not only is it easier to set up and share appointments and information, but as a part of an intranet, employees can communicate better, leading to less confusion following meetings, when everyone has to take notes and remember everything afterwards.

    Not only that but intranets have evolved dramatically over the past decade as CMS and social are added and the introduction of cloud computing often means that an intranet can be accessed from anywhere. This is ideal in these days of BYOD and telecommuting, as it makes for a more flexible workforce and again, ups productivity

    That’s even before we go into the benefits presented by ROI, which can be substantial, depending on what model you use and the size of your business.

    Developing an Intranet

    It’s a good idea to carry out sound planning before implementing an Intranet; whilst they can and will benefit a business of any size, needs vary and so it’s worth investing primarily in a decent consultancy firm. These will be able to carry out an audit of your company and recommend what will benefit your business the most.

    A modern intranet should be well organized and easy for users to navigate, especially if you don’t want to spend a fortune training your staff; again, this is something that can be discussed with a consultant.

    A well planned business infrastructure is much more likely to be a successful one and one that your company can see clear benefits from. The ability to share internal information across the whole of your staff often does away with the need to constantly send internal memos and emails.

    Discussion boards on an intranet can also help staff to come up with collaborative ideas before meetings or when working on a project, cutting down the time needed for physical meetings as everyone is aware of their position on a project.

    Read More (Source: Kerry, elcomcms.com)

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  • Everyone Benefits from an Employee Portal

    Not so long ago, it was only large corporations that could even consider setting up self-service portals for their employees. But now, thanks to the outsourcing model, companies with only a handful of workers are taking full advantage of employee portal technology.

    They’re saving everyone involved – employees, the HR department, management – significant time, money, and effort.

    Perhaps best of all, by reducing paperwork and speeding access to important information, such employee portals are helping companies to boost employee satisfaction and loyalty – and, in turn, productivity. Here’s how:

    LESS WORK

    Think of the employee portal as your HR department embracing the power of e-commerce. That means eliminating the tedious filling out and shuffling of paper forms and having to decipher employees’ scrawl. And it means no re-keying of data into a computer. In addition, most follow-up phone calls are done away with, as well.

    Instead, workers can visit their company’s employee portal via any web-equipped computer or hand-held device and gain direct – and entirely secure – access to a wide range of useful work-related information all on their own, with practically no need for anyone in HR to get involved.

    INSTANT ACCESS

    Employees can view insurance benefits, 401(k) plans, company policies, you name it, all with just a few clicks of their mouse. And they can browse or print out any number of important documents, such as the employee handbook. Likewise, should their employer decide to make it possible – and many do – employees may enter and update their HR-related data all on their own. They can change their withholding status, enroll for new benefits, or update time and attendance records.

    Naturally, all of this employee portal activity is controlled with the latest in security techniques. Each employee can be assigned his or her own, unique log-in ID and password for authorizing entry to the portal. In addition, the HR department can specify exactly which data and documents are to be made available to each particular employee.

    MORE PRODUCTIVITY

    Clearly, this kind of employee portal pleases its users. They no longer have to waste time filling out form after form or waiting on hold when calling HR for, say, an explanation of their medical plan. Moreover, the people in HR are freed to devote their time and energy to productive tasks, as well. It’s win-win for everyone.

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  • Keep It Fresh: Steps for Updating Your Website Content

    Stale content got you down? When was the last time your website got a little TLC?

    If you’ve been putting off a website refresh, stop it already. The time is now. And here’s how.

    Game Plan

    Wrap your head around the situation that is your website. You know what you want it to do for you: assist your business. Now get specific about the goals your website should accomplish for your business and its visitors.

    Define conversions: You may already have done this at some point but it’s worth doing again — from scratch. List the conversions you want performed on your site and then compare that list to your previous site goals. Maybe they’ve changed. Maybe you forgot about something that you needed to be reminded of. If you didn’t have a list of conversions as part of your website strategy from before, now you do. Let it guide your site design and content offerings.

    Conversion examples are:

    • phone call
    • quote request
    • store locator
    • schedule an appointment

    Assign priority: Take a list of site pages and silos and give them a rank of importance to the business goals. On a spreadsheet, indicate the goals a landing page or silo is responsible for. Key pages and/or sections of your site can be addressed first. You can use this spreadsheet throughout the refresh project to manage the updates to keywords, body content, Meta data and calls to action. Create a column for each of those essential elements on your spreadsheet as well.

    Set deadlines: This is simply time management 101. If you have set dates for when you want certain pages or sections of the site reviewed, edited and published, the project is likely to keep moving forward.

    Read More (Source: Virginia Nussey, Brue Clay, Inc., bruceclay.com)