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  • The Benefits of Crowdsourcing for Small Businesses


    Small business owners live and thrive in a world full of buzzwords, trends and fads; and innovators are always looking for the next “it” when it comes to running your business. How many headlines do we see on a weekly basis claiming that your business will sink without marketing method X or that Internet innovation Y will make or break your business in 2012? The world of marketing moves quickly. It’s easy to get hung on marketing’s flavor of the week and obsess over whichever buzzword claims to rake in millions in minutes.

    A business isn’t built on buzzwords, unfortunately. What creates a successful business is patience, innovation and resourcefulness. Take away the smoke and mirrors and one quickly realizes that there’s no shortcut or quick-fix when it comes to entrepreneurship.

    That said, some buzzwords are worth their buzz. Some innovations are worth looking into, and aren’t be-all, end-all if a business wants to get on board; one such example is crowdsourcing. Low-risk, high reward, and flexibility. Sounds like marketing snake oil, doesn’t it? Think again.

    Crowdsourcing. You’ve probably heard the term thrown around on marketing blogs or perhaps just heard it in passing. It sounds like a token buzzword, doesn’t it?

    The concept behind crowdsourcing is rather simple. Need a task done? Outsource it. Who performs the task? The crowd; a group of workers as small or big as you’d like, and most of the time, you don’t necessarily even know who’s doing the work. Sounds problematic, doesn’t it? Worry not, as crowdsourcing allows you to make the rules and determine which work makes the cut. You often only pay for what you need, meanwhile also having the flexibility to do work that needs to be done quickly and easily without relying on employees or in-house resources.

    Read More  (Source: Brent Barnhart, ChamberofCommerce.com)



  • White House To Delay Obamacare’s Employer Mandate Until 2015


    White House To Delay Obamacare’s Employer Mandate Until 2015;
    Far-Reaching Implications For The Private Health Insurance Market

    Excerpt from The Apothecary, with Avik Roy – 7/02/2013

    The Obama administration has decided to delay the implementation of Obamacare’s employer mandate—the requirement that all firms with 50 or more employees offer health coverage, or pay steep fines—until 2015. The mandate was supposed to go into effect on January 1, 2014. This development will have a significant impact on the rollout of Obamacare, the private health insurance market, and the nation’s economy, as I detail below.

    The news was first reported by Mike Dorning and Alex Wayne of Bloomberg this afternoon. The ruling, they say, “will come in regulatory guidance to be issued later this week. It addresses vehement complaints from employer groups about the administrative burden of reporting requirements, though it may also affect coverage provided to some workers.”

    “First,” wrote Treasury official Mark Mazur in a statement, the delay “will allow us to consider ways to simplify the new reporting requirements consistent with the law. Second, it will provide time to adapt health coverage and reporting systems while employers are moving toward making health coverage affordable and accessible for their employees.”

    Read the full article on Forbes.com

     

     

     



  • Benefits Portal Builds 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)



  • 7 reasons your Facebook page is a hot mess


    A state of disarray so chaotic that it’s dizzying to look at. A mess that is beyond the normal range of disarray. Visual clutter that draws attention to itself. It may sound like I am describing Lindsay Lohan heading into court on a Monday morning. But no, I am describing a Facebook business page lacking a strategy without consistent engagement but has potential to become super-hot. Could this be your business’s page?

    Facebook boasts the largest user base of any social network, so if your business doesn’t have a solid Facebook presence, you’re simply missing lead generation opportunities. There are plenty of ways to sabotage your success when it comes to creating Facebook content, and we’ve all been guilty of them at one point in time. Here are seven reasons your Facebook page might be viewed by your fans as a social media hot mess.

    1. You’re not using enough visuals

    2. You’re not using your real estate wisely

    3. You are not tying your posts to offers

    4. You don’t have an editorial calendar

    5. You are not paying to upgrade your reach

    6. You are not experimenting

    7. You are not having fun

    Read More (Source: Jason Miller, www.convinceandconvert.com)



  • Benefit Development Group Website Live


    Here is another of our latest websites, just launched for Benefit Development Group.

    They realized the importance of having an easy to navigate website with lots of up to date information to help their clients and prospects.

    Special Feature – The addition of the FAQ section is a great way for agencies to be found by search engines when people are asking questions related to a certain business topic. FAQ pages are full of great content and keywords related to your agency that when tied to your Google Analytics account can really help move you up in the Google search engines.



  • The Importance of the Tablet Market, Today and in the Future


    Were you a good boy or girl last year?  Did Santa leave you a shiny new tablet under the Christmas tree?  Chances are that he did as there are now over 56 million of them in the US alone with an estimate of that figure rising to 90 million by 2014 (Techcrunch).  Consumers now have the option to browse and comparison shop whenever the mood takes them…waiting for kids, a coffee break, on the subway, etc – instead of having to allocate a time to sit down in front of a traditional static computer.  This is a marketing angle that no business can afford to ignore.

    An article by Julia Peterson (Why You Should be Targeting Tablet Users) further highlights the reasons why being tablet friendly is now more important than ever and asks pertinent questions such as “how can you attract tablet traffic” and “why you should be targeting tablet users”.   A persuasive argument when you realize the sheer spending power of the average tablet user, as more than half of all tablet users have a household income of over $75K.  This is a big indicator that sites that are not mobile friendly or tablet compatible are missing the opportunity of connecting with these 50 million consumers.



  • Introducing Responsive web design


    Adding the ability to view your website on mobile devices and tablets just got much easier – introducing Responsive web design.
    [embedplusvideo height=”356″ width=”584″ standard=”http://www.youtube.com/v/tYiNPrBHDgM?fs=1″ vars=”ytid=tYiNPrBHDgM&width=584&height=356&start=&stop=&rs=w&hd=0&autoplay=0&react=1&chapters=&notes=” id=”ep6638″ /]



  • Are you mobile ready?


    So… how does your website look on a smart phone or tablet? 

    Very few firm sites are truly mobile friendly due to technology at the time of the site building. Those days are over and you can go MOBILE OPTIMIZED easy with a little help.

    Responsive web design means crafting your website to provide an optimal viewing experience-easy reading and navigation across a wide range of devices from desktop computer monitors to mobile phones.

    A striking 87 percent of smartphone owners check the Internet or email on their phones, including 68 percent who do so generally every day, and 25 percent say they “mostly go online using their phone, rather than with a computer.” – NBCnews.com.

    New developments in code and technology behind your website means we can optimize your existing site – in HTML or WordPress much quicker and less expensive than ever possible before.

    Key Details
    * Very quick turnaround – less than 3 weeks
    * Very little needed from your staff – just hosting info
    * Low cost – only takes us between 3-4 hours to optimize.
    Join us for a free 30 minute webinar March 19th or 20th to learn more and see examples. We will talk Mobile optimization as well as utilizing the UBA resources into your site with ease.

    Webinar #1 – Tuesday 19 March 2.00 pm CST

    Webinar #2 – Wednesday 20 March 10.00 am CST

    Email jeffh@etekhnos.com or call 817-509-0004 to join the webinar or set up a time for us to talk over the options with you.



  • Check out our updated portfolio!


    It has been a busy start to 2013.  We have updated our portfolio with some of our latest employee benefit web design projects.

    To keep up to date with the latest news and releases from eTekhnos and Rockstar Technology don’t forget to follow us on Facebook.

     

     



  • Boss Saves New Employee At Euless Office « CBS Dallas / Fort Worth


    Jeff’s non-profit organization, Mission CPR was in the news when an employee who attended one of our free CPR demonstrations saved their employee.
    Read the CBS article and see the video here!

    Boss Saves New Employee At Euless Office « CBS Dallas / Fort Worth.