In many ways, Facebook has lost some of its luster as a business tool. It isn’t that it’s not possible to properly market a business on the platform. It’s that the complexity of the EdgeRank algorithm mixed with the touchiness of the advertising formats has many turning autopilot onto their pages instead of investing time or money into them. They just weren’t seeing a return on investment the way that they had hoped. It seems to be an ebb and flow of sentiment. General Motors, for example, decided to dump their investment into Facebook advertising last year before returning to the platform this year….

The advent of global and communications technologies has been at the forefront of business and consumer industries for years, allowing us to share data, ideas and collaborative tools instantly around the world. However, the private sector isn’t the only industry to be revolutionized by the digital age. Technological advances in the public sector has seen a huge growth as the need for reliable communication tools and state-of-the-art devices rises in an effort to save lives and serve the community.   Innovative technology for civil servants A civil servant, being responsible for…

Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) is cited as 82% of today’s cloud investments, and is the deployment model for 84% of new applications, so what is SaaS? SaaS is a software distribution model in which applications are hosted by a vendor or service provider, and made available to customers over a network. SaaS provides the most visible value to end users of the cloud models. SalesForce was created in 1999, and was the first SaaS platform built from scratch to achieve rapid growth. The products and services of SalesForce included customer relationship management, the sales cloud, and the service…

It’s a digital age. The worlds of advertising, branding, and art are all flooded with creative people trying to make their mark in the realm of graphic design. How can one tell whether they have what it takes to join this world? In the flowchart below by Sikich, the answer to that question becomes a little more clear. It’s the type of profession that requires many small decisions to be made before one can make an accurate big decision. Can you visually translate a concept or idea? Do you manage your time well? Do you even like people? These are just some of the questions that you should answer before making…

Content speaks for itself. It speaks for a company. It speaks to the people. Most business websites are sorely short on content. Sure, they have sales content and information about the company, but so few today are actually putting out high-quality content about relevant topics that make their websites more of a resource. Today, people want to trust a company before doing business with them and content is the easiest way for them to understand that you know what you’re doing. It’s not just about having information for visitors to see in order to convince them that you’re an expert. It’s also about…

Facebook has been a challenging venue for marketers and advertisers ever since it started really getting popular in 2009. At that time, it was clear that it was the social network to beat and the company started trying to cash in with different types of advertising options. Most of them failed miserably for the same reason that many marketers continue to fail today: people go to Facebook to be entertained, not to be the recipient of ads. Today, it’s getting easier. People are more accepting of ads. A lot of it can be attributed to the way that Facebook has handled their promoted posts. They have done…

When it comes to point-of-sale, there are a few vulnerabilities that you probably didn’t even know were there. In 2012, the retail industry made up 45 percent of data breach investigations, making it the highest percentage in retail history. E-Commerce sites were the most common target, accounting for 48 percent of all investigations and spanning 29 different countries. Of these attacked businesses, it took 64 percent of them more than 90 days to detect an intrusion. Small businesses are particularly vulnerable to hacking. Sixty-three percent of 2010 cyber attacks were at companies with…

Picture this. You are driving your car on the highway, and you decide to tweet about the lack of traffic on your morning commute. By hitting a button on your steering wheel and speaking when prompted, you can easily tweet to your followers without even glancing at your smart phone. This is technology that we may eventually see in our cars. With social media becoming more and more a part of everyday life, and phone-related driving accidents increasing, it is not crazy to think this could happen. One of the benefits of this feature would be the safety it brings to drivers. Unfortunately, drivers can’t…

Energy is all around us. Even the smallest particles that we cannot see without a microscope have the potential to unleash enough energy to destroy large portions of the world. There’s a huge gas ball that rises over our east horizon every morning, unseen wind currents that can turn power-capturing turbines, and good ol’ fossil fuels that are still in abundance beneath our feet despite decades of massive collection processes. With all of these standard energy sources, it’s still refreshing to see that some people are being creative with the ways that we collect the energy around us. It is a collection…

EdgeRank. It’s a mythical beast in many ways, not because it isn’t real but because it is very misunderstood by many. It’s one of those things that makes total sense once you get it but that can be very misleading before the light bulb ignites. The basic way to understand it in one sentence is this – when your content gets positive engagement, it can be seen by more people, but when it gets negative sentiment, it gets hidden. There is a science behind it but that’s not really necessary for success. When you post good content and the people that do get to see it interact in a positive manner, the chance that…