YouTube’s New Channel Design Presents New Marketing Opportunities

Perhaps you’ve seen it already: YouTube has allowed channels to change their layouts to accommodate for different screen sizes, an exciting feature that improves the way people see your channel. This redesign, known as One Channel, puts you on the driver’s seat for the first time and allows you to showcase lists of your content on different areas of the screen. It also allows you to customize your channel by including header art, much like the old channel format did.

Once YouTube users click on your channel from their subscription lists, they’re taken straight to your One Channel platform where they can see your lists and features. This gives you a chance to showcase all of your best products on the channel in a way that will be seen by every screen that views it.

But to make your YouTube marketing effective, you also have to optimize your content so that it’s seen. You could have the most awesome channel out there, but people won’t be able to find you unless you use certain practices that will get you at least on the first page of video search results. Room214, a social media marketing company, has worked out some magic that can improve your YouTube channel.

With Room214′s services, you get full search optimization services as well as audits of your channel and the channels of up to three competitors. This also shows you what they’re doing that you’re not, letting you see how you can improve yourself and become a more efficient marketer.

YouTube may be the new frontier for marketing, but it’s quickly become a saturated and competitive marketplace. You need every tool you can get to shove your elbow into competing channels’ sides and get a little room to breathe. Room214 will help you do that from YouTube’s side. What marketing you do outside of YouTube, though, is still vital to making sure that your videos gain a maximum amount of visibility. Users don’t view your videos just from YouTube. You also must make sure that everywhere your video is embedded has the same standard of proficient search optimization.



Facebook Home Unveiled: Replaces Home Screen of Android Devices

facebook home2

At a press event today, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, dressed in his trademark zippered hoodie, announced Facebook Home for Android.  It is something he described as “more than another app but not really an operating system.”  It will change your phone’s home screen and replace it with Facebook updates, making Facebook front and center of your phone experience.

A quick look reveals how useful it will be not only for casual users, but for business communications.

“Instead of our phones designed around apps first, what would it feel like if our phones were designed around people We want to flip that around,” he said.

Facebook Home will be available starting April 12, 2013 on select Android devices and available for download at the Google Play Store, according to TechCrunch. The phones for which it will initially be available are HTC One, HTC One X, Samsung Galaxy SIII, Samsung Galaxy S4 and Samsung Galaxy Note II. The app will be available on more phones and tablets in the coming months.

During the event, Zuckerberg explained the rationale for creating Facebook Home, which consists of software, instead of creating a new hardware device that was centrally built around Facebook, as had been bandied about for days prior to today’s announcement. Building a phone, he said, would limit the company’s reach to most of its audience.

“Even if we did a really good job building a really good phone, we’d only serve one or two percent of our community,” Zuckerberg said. “We’re not building a phone. We’re not building an operating system.”

He said that according to the company’s data, people spend 25 percent of their time on mobile devices using Facebook or Instagram. The new Facebook Home product seemingly aims to keep people connected to Facebook every time they look at their phones by changing the home screen experience on Android devices.

“The home screen is the soul of your phone,” he said. “We think it should be deeply personal.”

Zuckerberg then unveiled Facebook Home before the throng of interested onlookers and excited Facebook employees.

For Android users, the home screen would be replaced with what Facebook determines to be the most visually-rich updates from a user’s News Feed. At the bottom of the Home screen is a user’s Facebook profile picture, which serves as an access point to the rest of the phone, namely its other apps.

facebook home

“We wanted this to feel like system software, not just an app you run,” Zuckerberg said. “We wanted to design Facebook Home so it’s just as easy to get to your apps.”

Facebook Home has notifications appearing on a phone’s Home screen, overlaying the select updates from a user’s Friends that would then be reviewable by swiping from side-to-side.

By tapping one’s profile picture, bookmarked apps, a friends list and the most recently used app are all accessible with one swipe.

Perhaps one of the bigger changes to note from Facebook Home is the introduction of Chat Heads, an applet (of sorts) that meshes an Android’s SMS service with Facebook chat. Instead of accessing a separate SMS app for texting, Chat Heads aligns all active Facebook chat and text messages in small circles that are constantly in view on the screen, even while using other apps outside Facebook.

“Messaging is treated like just another app. We think it should be better,” Zuckerberg said.




YouTube’s New Channel Design Presents New Marketing Opportunities

Perhaps you’ve seen it already: YouTube has allowed channels to change their layouts to accommodate for different screen sizes, an exciting feature that improves the way people see your channel. This redesign, known as One Channel, puts you on the driver’s seat for the first time and allows you to showcase lists of your content on different areas of the screen. It also allows you to customize your channel by including header art, much like the old channel format did.

Once YouTube users click on your channel from their subscription lists, they’re taken straight to your One Channel platform where they can see your lists and features. This gives you a chance to showcase all of your best products on the channel in a way that will be seen by every screen that views it.

But to make your YouTube marketing effective, you also have to optimize your content so that it’s seen. You could have the most awesome channel out there, but people won’t be able to find you unless you use certain practices that will get you at least on the first page of video search results. Room214, a social media marketing company, has worked out some magic that can improve your YouTube channel.

With Room214′s services, you get full search optimization services as well as audits of your channel and the channels of up to three competitors. This also shows you what they’re doing that you’re not, letting you see how you can improve yourself and become a more efficient marketer.

YouTube may be the new frontier for marketing, but it’s quickly become a saturated and competitive marketplace. You need every tool you can get to shove your elbow into competing channels’ sides and get a little room to breathe. Room214 will help you do that from YouTube’s side. What marketing you do outside of YouTube, though, is still vital to making sure that your videos gain a maximum amount of visibility. Users don’t view your videos just from YouTube. You also must make sure that everywhere your video is embedded has the same standard of proficient search optimization.



Tech Thursday (4/4): News From Actionplanr, Dragon NaturallySpeaking and GFI WebMonitor

It’s Tech Thursday from Smallbiztechnology.com. Each week we take a quick look at business and technology news and updates for the small business community and share them with you in a quick and simple round-up so that you stay informed and educated on the things that matter to your business.

Announcing The Official Launch of Actionplanr App

New productivity app helps small businesses control four key areas of workflow

Hware LLC., announces the launch of Actionplanr, a productivity software application designed for helping solopreneurs and micro- businesses in four key areas of their workflow: Task Management, Goal Planning, Work/Life Balance and Integration and Step-by-Step Action Plans.

“As a desktop application, we felt we could build a more powerful and richer interface that would allow solo-users to work offline,” says Brenda Horton, co-creator of Actionplanr and president of Hware LLC., (HumanityWare).

With nearly 200 trial users, Actionplanr is stealthily building a community of a new generation of productivity software users. You can find out more about this new productivity app here.

Nuance Announces Updates to Dragon NaturallySpeaking 12

Greater Compatibility for Microsoft Windows 8, Support for Recently Released Microsoft Office 2013 and Microsoft Internet Explorer

Nuance Communications, Inc. announced updates to Dragon NaturallySpeaking, the world’s best-selling speech recognition software for the personal computer. Dragon 12 now features seamless integration with the Microsoft Windows 8 operating system, and enhanced support for Microsoft Office 2013 and Microsoft Internet Explorer 10.

Launched in July of 2012, Dragon 12 features a 20 percent improvement to out-of-the-box accuracy, faster performance and new features like Smart Format Rules that make Dragon more productive and personal than ever. With this latest update, Dragon allows for greater compatibility with Microsoft Office 2013, Internet Explorer 10 and Windows 8. Among these changes is improved usability for Windows 8, including in its Start screen and full-screen apps.

You can see more about the updates to Dragon here.

GFI WebMonitor 2013 Brings Web Filtering to Off-Network Laptop and Notebook Devices

Businesses can now extend Web browsing policies and filtering protection outside of the corporate network

GFI Software™ today announced GFI WebMonitor® 2013, the latest version of the company’s Web security and filtering solution targeted at small and medium-sized businesses. This new version enables IT managers to deploy a roaming Web filtering agent on laptop and notebook devices. With this new agent, businesses can extend corporate browsing policies to company assets running outside of the corporate network and provide continuous filtering protection whether employees are in-house or on-the-go.

GFI WebMonitor’s new roaming agent extends corporate browsing policies and filtering protection to laptops and notebooks running outside of the corporate network - and does so without compromising connectivity speeds. With this feature in place, IT managers can trust that road warriors, remote employees and workers who take their devices home at night are held to the same Internet usage policies that in-house employees follow. This capability is also beneficial for small businesses that use laptops and notebooks as their primary computing devices.

You can find out more about this new version of WebMonitor here.



Tech Thursday (4/4): News From Actionplanr, Dragon NaturallySpeaking and GFI WebMonitor

It’s Tech Thursday from Smallbiztechnology.com. Each week we take a quick look at business and technology news and updates for the small business community and share them with you in a quick and simple round-up so that you stay informed and educated on the things that matter to your business.

Announcing The Official Launch of Actionplanr App

New productivity app helps small businesses control four key areas of workflow

Hware LLC., announces the launch of Actionplanr, a productivity software application designed for helping solopreneurs and micro- businesses in four key areas of their workflow: Task Management, Goal Planning, Work/Life Balance and Integration and Step-by-Step Action Plans.

“As a desktop application, we felt we could build a more powerful and richer interface that would allow solo-users to work offline,” says Brenda Horton, co-creator of Actionplanr and president of Hware LLC., (HumanityWare).

With nearly 200 trial users, Actionplanr is stealthily building a community of a new generation of productivity software users. You can find out more about this new productivity app here.

Nuance Announces Updates to Dragon NaturallySpeaking 12

Greater Compatibility for Microsoft Windows 8, Support for Recently Released Microsoft Office 2013 and Microsoft Internet Explorer

Nuance Communications, Inc. announced updates to Dragon NaturallySpeaking, the world’s best-selling speech recognition software for the personal computer. Dragon 12 now features seamless integration with the Microsoft Windows 8 operating system, and enhanced support for Microsoft Office 2013 and Microsoft Internet Explorer 10.

Launched in July of 2012, Dragon 12 features a 20 percent improvement to out-of-the-box accuracy, faster performance and new features like Smart Format Rules that make Dragon more productive and personal than ever. With this latest update, Dragon allows for greater compatibility with Microsoft Office 2013, Internet Explorer 10 and Windows 8. Among these changes is improved usability for Windows 8, including in its Start screen and full-screen apps.

You can see more about the updates to Dragon here.

GFI WebMonitor 2013 Brings Web Filtering to Off-Network Laptop and Notebook Devices

Businesses can now extend Web browsing policies and filtering protection outside of the corporate network

GFI Software™ today announced GFI WebMonitor® 2013, the latest version of the company’s Web security and filtering solution targeted at small and medium-sized businesses. This new version enables IT managers to deploy a roaming Web filtering agent on laptop and notebook devices. With this new agent, businesses can extend corporate browsing policies to company assets running outside of the corporate network and provide continuous filtering protection whether employees are in-house or on-the-go.

GFI WebMonitor’s new roaming agent extends corporate browsing policies and filtering protection to laptops and notebooks running outside of the corporate network - and does so without compromising connectivity speeds. With this feature in place, IT managers can trust that road warriors, remote employees and workers who take their devices home at night are held to the same Internet usage policies that in-house employees follow. This capability is also beneficial for small businesses that use laptops and notebooks as their primary computing devices.

You can find out more about this new version of WebMonitor here.



Brian Marcus: EBay Partner Network’s Lessons for Affiliate Managers #AMDays

Brian Marcus is the Director of the Global eBay Partner Network, where he leads one of eBay’s most important and valuable sources of quality traffic. EBay’s affiliate program was established in 2001, and has steadily grown to include more than 300,000 partner websites across 13 countries. Marcus is speaking at the 2013 Affiliate Management Days conference in San Francisco and below are a few questions I decided to ask him prior to the event.

* * * * *

affiliate lessonsQuestion: If you were to emphasize one important issue that every affiliate manager should be paying more attention to, what would it be and why

Brian Marcus: This year, we’re making sure that not only are we delivering for our publishers, but also really focusing on the needs and wants of the end customers. I think that’s a strategy that all affiliate managers can use to make sure their programs are really making an impact throughout their entire lifecycle.

Too often we lose sight of what the customer really needs to be successful, but I think greater success can be achieved if we’re all making sure that those customer needs are really the basis for all decisions. So what sort of tools, access and support do the customers need, and how can we make the process easier and better for them

We’re thinking of this in terms of focusing on creating great experiences for eBay buyers and sellers, whether they’re coming to us directly, or through one of our affiliate partners. I think that’s a strategy that most affiliate managers can also apply in their organizations.

Question: What do you see as the main areas of opportunity for online and affiliate marketers in 2013 - 2014

Brian Marcus: Social and mobile: These two have obviously been big opportunities for online marketers for quite some time now. But we think there are more ways for affiliates to tap into social and mobile channels to build their audiences and monetize content through emerging avenues.

Personalization: These days, there are a number of tools and strategies for creating seamless, tailored experiences for customers as they travel from affiliates sites to advertiser sites. This goes along with the idea that we should be focusing more on the end customer and giving them different ways to customize their searching and buying experiences, based on their specific needs.

Network wisdom: As technology advances, we now have much more insight into data on how online consumers are navigating their experience. With smarter tools and more data insights, online retailers, networks, affiliate managers and publishers can all make more educated decisions and can constantly fine-tune and optimize campaigns.

Question: It isn’t unusual to hear that since affiliates operate in the mix with other marketing channels that merchants use (paid search, re-targeting, social, etc) with multi-touchpoint eCommerce, that the last-click attribution model is not necessarily an optimal one In September 2009, eBay Partner Network (EPN) implemented Quality Click Pricing (QCP), which essentially meant moving from EPN’s previous CPA (cost per action) model to a CPC (cost per click) model.  How did the change to QCP affect the performance of your affiliates What do you think about the last-click

Brian Marcus: Since we are now able to evaluate and reward publishers for driving higher quality traffic rather than focusing on quantity, the overall quality of the program has greatly increased. Because we are rewarding quality, we are able to promote conversions, reduce non-performing traffic and essentially level the playing field for publishers of all sizes.

I think the method of attribution used depends heavily on the advertiser’s business model and how affiliates interact across the channel. While last-click may work best for some, it does depend on your goals, what kind of advertiser you are and who your affiliates and customers are. I don’t think we need to go to one rigid industry standard; there’s a case to be made that we don’t all have to choose the same model. EPN is always looking for better ways to tell the true story of attribution. I think the key is to have analytics in place that can give you a broad picture of the entire purchase journey and draw insights from there.

Question: What do you view as the main areas where affiliates can truly help online merchants, adding value to the pre-sale process

Brian Marcus: Well, the most obvious place where affiliates can add value is by helping merchants extend their reach and find new customers that they aren’t able to reach on their own. Creating quality content that educates, engages and ultimately helps to guide purchasing decisions is another key area. The best affiliates add value by doing both of these things, naturally developing a loyal following of visitors who trust the publisher to provide quality content and recommendations.

Question: If you were to leave online advertisers, merchants and affiliate managers with one piece of advice, what would it be

Brian Marcus: My advice is to truly take the time to understand why your customers are going to affiliate sites in the first place. Affiliates help to fill the gaps in areas in which we may not necessarily excel.

If your customers are going to an affiliate site, they’re probably doing so for a reason. By understanding your affiliates’ strengths, you can also uncover some of your own weaknesses, allowing you figure out how to work with affiliates to provide a richer overall experience for your customers.

* * * * *

The Affiliate Management Days Conference takes place on April 16-17, 2013 in San Francisco, CA. Follow @AMDays or #AMDays on Twitter. When registering, make sure to use the code SBTAM250 to receive an additional $250.00 off your two-day (or combo) pass.

See the rest of the interview series here.




Zimana Helps You Build The Best Digital Marketing Strategy With Google Engage and Search Metric Services

Bill Gates is believed to have said, “The Internet is becoming the town square for the global village of tomorrow”.

We, at SmallBizTechnology, will go further and say, “It’s that town square you should be hustling at, right now”.

Digital marketing is the ticket to the future, and to have a strategy that works is a “must-do” right now. Yet, many businesses don’t get to do it. If they do, they aren’t in a position to gauge their performance since they lack the resources to collect actionable data and then analyze it for taking corrective steps of action.

For most businesses, in a nutshell, analytics and data sound like fancy pant terms instead of this data working at the very core of their businesses and to shape their business decisions.

Admittedly, data management and analytics gets complicated beyond the executive capabilities of many small business owners and that’s when service providers, like Zimana, step in to help you out.

Zimana  provides tools and services for small businesses to gain insights from data, use analytics to drive their business decisions, and provide everything that a business needs to refine its digital marketing strategy.

Here’s how the company achieves that:

Leverage SearchMetrics Suite

SearchMetrics  is a software suite that helps organizations gain unique insights on keywords and key phrases they target while working on Search Optimization. It adds unique representation across 123 countries and also makes inroads into world’s leading social media portals. Zimana now provides the utility of the Search Metrics Suite along with its other paid or open source tools and services such as GA Data Grabber, Quantum Buzz, Custom Dashboards, Keyword research, Paid Search Management, Heat map testing, and a host of other services.

Zimana With Google Engage

Google Engage  is a new Google initiative for helping business grasp the enormity of digital marketing strategies including Paid search, organic search optimization, and general online marketing. The Google Engage program provides businesses (for you and for your clients if you are in the digital marketing strategy business) with full-time support, introductory offers on AdWords and Google’s other programs; online training courses (including webinars and physical events); and sales tools along with marketing collateral.

Zimana is now a part of the Google Engage program and provides you with support for conducting Ad Word Campaigns, keyword research, pass on Google Engage’s special offers to your business, provide you with strategic marketing support, and much more.

Social Search, Analytics, and Intelligence

Performance is like a half-baked cake if there’s nothing to measure it. Analytics helps you determine the effectiveness of your marketing campaigns. Effectiveness of your campaign, by the way, doesn’t have anything to do with how many fake fans and followers you manage to buy into; what it means is to measure the extent of growth “organically”.

Pierre DeBois - Chief Digital marketing Strategist and Founder of Zimana - has a video on All Analytics, which you’ll do well to check out.

The data is always present. Checking your analytics data periodically instead of doing “Before and after checks” or “sporadic checks” the best possible way to keep track of intelligent data that matters to your business. That intelligence helps you to keep pulse on conversations, real engagements, and relationships.

What does your digital marketing strategy look like



Zimana Helps You Build The Best Digital Marketing Strategy With Google Engage and Search Metric Services

Bill Gates is believed to have said, “The Internet is becoming the town square for the global village of tomorrow”.

We, at SmallBizTechnology, will go further and say, “It’s that town square you should be hustling at, right now”.

Digital marketing is the ticket to the future, and to have a strategy that works is a “must-do” right now. Yet, many businesses don’t get to do it. If they do, they aren’t in a position to gauge their performance since they lack the resources to collect actionable data and then analyze it for taking corrective steps of action.

For most businesses, in a nutshell, analytics and data sound like fancy pant terms instead of this data working at the very core of their businesses and to shape their business decisions.

Admittedly, data management and analytics gets complicated beyond the executive capabilities of many small business owners and that’s when service providers, like Zimana, step in to help you out.

Zimana  provides tools and services for small businesses to gain insights from data, use analytics to drive their business decisions, and provide everything that a business needs to refine its digital marketing strategy.

Here’s how the company achieves that:

Leverage SearchMetrics Suite

SearchMetrics  is a software suite that helps organizations gain unique insights on keywords and key phrases they target while working on Search Optimization. It adds unique representation across 123 countries and also makes inroads into world’s leading social media portals. Zimana now provides the utility of the Search Metrics Suite along with its other paid or open source tools and services such as GA Data Grabber, Quantum Buzz, Custom Dashboards, Keyword research, Paid Search Management, Heat map testing, and a host of other services.

Zimana With Google Engage

Google Engage  is a new Google initiative for helping business grasp the enormity of digital marketing strategies including Paid search, organic search optimization, and general online marketing. The Google Engage program provides businesses (for you and for your clients if you are in the digital marketing strategy business) with full-time support, introductory offers on AdWords and Google’s other programs; online training courses (including webinars and physical events); and sales tools along with marketing collateral.

Zimana is now a part of the Google Engage program and provides you with support for conducting Ad Word Campaigns, keyword research, pass on Google Engage’s special offers to your business, provide you with strategic marketing support, and much more.

Social Search, Analytics, and Intelligence

Performance is like a half-baked cake if there’s nothing to measure it. Analytics helps you determine the effectiveness of your marketing campaigns. Effectiveness of your campaign, by the way, doesn’t have anything to do with how many fake fans and followers you manage to buy into; what it means is to measure the extent of growth “organically”.

Pierre DeBois - Chief Digital marketing Strategist and Founder of Zimana - has a video on All Analytics, which you’ll do well to check out.

The data is always present. Checking your analytics data periodically instead of doing “Before and after checks” or “sporadic checks” the best possible way to keep track of intelligent data that matters to your business. That intelligence helps you to keep pulse on conversations, real engagements, and relationships.

What does your digital marketing strategy look like



NYC Events: Upcoming Business and Technology Events (4/5 - 4/11)

Here is a listing of NYC Business and Technology Events for the upcoming week (3/22 - 3/28) that we thought would be beneficial to our small business community in the Greater NYC area.

Have a business and/or technology event coming up in the New York City area that you’d like us to add to our weekly post  If so, email us at eve...@smallbiztechnology.com.

Business Intelligence in SharePoint 2013

Monday April 8th, - 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM - Microsoft NYC Offices, 1290 Avenue of the Americas, between 51st & 52nd st., New York, NY

Over the course of this session we will show you the improvements that Microsoft has made in the 2013 stack to take this new focus from being a “nice idea” to a truly powerful reality.  We will explore the improvements made to Excel, PowerPivot & Power View, & Reporting Services.  We will explain the underlying technology that makes the new features possible and walk through demos of some of the shinier toys.  At the end of the session you will walk away with a better understanding of what is new in 2013 for business intelligence and an extreme desire to build reusable data model that will undoubtedly bring real value to your business.
 

BMA-NJ’s 2nd Annual B2B Marketing Summit

Tuesday April 9th, - 9:00 AM to 1:30 PM - Weehawken, NJ

Look around and you’ll see us all carrying a smartphone or a laptop. Some of us carry those and an iPad too! Or multiple smartphones! Without question, the mobile revolution continues to sweep the planet at an unprecedented and unbelievable pace. This offers B2B marketers increasing numbers of outlets to reach target customers more quickly and more creatively. BMA-NJ’s 2nd Annual B2B Marketing Summit focuses on using digital marketing through these business tools to increasingly engage our target customers. And you’ll come away with actionable ideas to solve your own digital marketing challenges. 

Trade Brooklyn - Brooklyn’s Business Trade Show

Wednesday April 10th, 9:00 AM to 3:00 PM - Stage 6 @Steiner Studios, 15 Washington Ave, Navy Yard, NY 11205

Trade Brooklyn is Brooklyn’s largest business to business trade show creating opportunities by bringing together premier businesses from Brooklyn, NYC, Long Island and the greater metropolitan area with national corporations, entrepreneurs, non-profits, government agencies, business advocacy groups and the media.  

 

Engage: The NYC Digital Storytelling Conference

Wednesday April 10th, 1:00 PM - Crosby Street Hotel Theatre, 79 Crosby St., New York, NY, 10012

The execution of how to tell a good story has changed. New technologies have created new opportunities for advertisers, brands, and platforms to engage audiences and provide new contexts in which audiences, brands and advertisers can converse and interact. This cross flow is enabled by technology and how content is served up digitally (mobile, video, social media, web, video games, connected TV’s, social TV platforms, tablets and film). Hardware by which we tell stories has changed. What does this mean for the people who create the stories, the people who watch them and the advertisers who enable them. This is the Digital Storytelling Conference.

How Online Services Can Save Your Business Time and Money

Thursday April 11th, 8:30 AM to 10:30 AM - 16 west 23rd Street, New York, NY 10010
Join Ramon Ray (Infusionsoft) and Michael Spadaro (Profound Cloud) as they showcase how online services, such as Google Apps, and other tools and solutions can save you time, save you money and increase your productivity! Join them and learn!


Dell SecureWorks becomes latest to warn about Android malware

More malware targeting Google's Android mobile operating system has been discovered - this one aimed at mobile banking and money transfers.

The malware, called Stels, was identified by Dell SecureWorks' Counter Threat Unit (CTU). It is distributed via the Cutwail botnet, which also distributes the infamous Zeus banking Trojan. Users receive an email that claims to be from the US Internal Revenue Service (IRS), which tempts users into clicking on a link.

The link takes users to the Blackhole exploit kit, which attacks the Windows operating system. However the Blackhole exploit kit does not work on Android, so users on that operating system are tricked into downloading a fake Adobe Flash Player update. 

Once the fake app is launched on the Android device a message is displayed claiming the phone does not support the update and that set-up has been cancelled. The icon is then deleted, tricking the user into thinking the app has been uninstalled.

The Stels Trojan is capable of downloading and executing files, stealing the contact list, reporting on information such as the phone number, operating system and IMEI, making phone calls and sending, monitoring and recording SMS messages.

Dell SecureWorks believes that the ability to intercept SMS messages means it could be used in conjunction with traditional banking Trojans such as “Zeus to bypass two-factor authentication systems that rely on mobile TAN numbers (sent via SMS) to complete fraudulent Automated Clearing House (ACH) and wire transfers from victim accounts.”

It can also make money for its creators by sending SMS messages and making phone calls to premium rate numbers.

Dell SecureWorks researchers said they ran the malware through 10 major mobile anti-virus programs available for Android but none managed to pick it up. None of the 44 anti-virus products tested through VirusTotal picked it up, either.

The researchers warned that mobile threats such as this will continue to increase. “As mobile devices increase in popularity, they become a lucrative target for cyber criminals. The Google Android platform is a common target due to its large market share and ability to run applications outside of the Google Play app store without jailbreaking the device.”

“The CTU research team anticipates attacks against Android devices will continue and advises customers to remain vigilant,” the group said.

Dell acquired SecureWorks in 2010 for an undisclosed sum as part of its big push into the security space. Other acquisitions include Quest Software, SonicWall and Credant.

Earlier this week it was revealed that Android malware targeting prominent members of the Tibetan community had been discovered. It is strongly believed that China was behind the malware attacks even though Citizen Lab, who made the discovery, did not name the country directly. That news came on the back of a similar discovery by Kaspersky Lab, although it is thought the two are not technically related.



NYC Events: Upcoming Business and Technology Events (4/5 - 4/11)

Here is a listing of NYC Business and Technology Events for the upcoming week (3/22 - 3/28) that we thought would be beneficial to our small business community in the Greater NYC area.

Have a business and/or technology event coming up in the New York City area that you’d like us to add to our weekly post  If so, email us at eve...@smallbiztechnology.com.

Business Intelligence in SharePoint 2013

Monday April 8th, - 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM - Microsoft NYC Offices, 1290 Avenue of the Americas, between 51st & 52nd st., New York, NY

Over the course of this session we will show you the improvements that Microsoft has made in the 2013 stack to take this new focus from being a “nice idea” to a truly powerful reality.  We will explore the improvements made to Excel, PowerPivot & Power View, & Reporting Services.  We will explain the underlying technology that makes the new features possible and walk through demos of some of the shinier toys.  At the end of the session you will walk away with a better understanding of what is new in 2013 for business intelligence and an extreme desire to build reusable data model that will undoubtedly bring real value to your business.
 

BMA-NJ’s 2nd Annual B2B Marketing Summit

Tuesday April 9th, - 9:00 AM to 1:30 PM - Weehawken, NJ

Look around and you’ll see us all carrying a smartphone or a laptop. Some of us carry those and an iPad too! Or multiple smartphones! Without question, the mobile revolution continues to sweep the planet at an unprecedented and unbelievable pace. This offers B2B marketers increasing numbers of outlets to reach target customers more quickly and more creatively. BMA-NJ’s 2nd Annual B2B Marketing Summit focuses on using digital marketing through these business tools to increasingly engage our target customers. And you’ll come away with actionable ideas to solve your own digital marketing challenges. 

Trade Brooklyn - Brooklyn’s Business Trade Show

Wednesday April 10th, 9:00 AM to 3:00 PM - Stage 6 @Steiner Studios, 15 Washington Ave, Navy Yard, NY 11205

Trade Brooklyn is Brooklyn’s largest business to business trade show creating opportunities by bringing together premier businesses from Brooklyn, NYC, Long Island and the greater metropolitan area with national corporations, entrepreneurs, non-profits, government agencies, business advocacy groups and the media.  

 

Engage: The NYC Digital Storytelling Conference

Wednesday April 10th, 1:00 PM - Crosby Street Hotel Theatre, 79 Crosby St., New York, NY, 10012

The execution of how to tell a good story has changed. New technologies have created new opportunities for advertisers, brands, and platforms to engage audiences and provide new contexts in which audiences, brands and advertisers can converse and interact. This cross flow is enabled by technology and how content is served up digitally (mobile, video, social media, web, video games, connected TV’s, social TV platforms, tablets and film). Hardware by which we tell stories has changed. What does this mean for the people who create the stories, the people who watch them and the advertisers who enable them. This is the Digital Storytelling Conference.

How Online Services Can Save Your Business Time and Money

Thursday April 11th, 8:30 AM to 10:30 AM - 16 west 23rd Street, New York, NY 10010
Join Ramon Ray (Infusionsoft) and Michael Spadaro (Profound Cloud) as they showcase how online services, such as Google Apps, and other tools and solutions can save you time, save you money and increase your productivity! Join them and learn!


SEC Letters Give Nod of Approval to Online Venture Capital

Getting angel investment or venture capital has always been tough for entrepreneurs. One reason is that it’s simply hard to find investors willing to plunk down money on your company, unless they are family or friends.  The options are especially limited for startups based outside of venture meccas such as Silicon Valley.

But the legal door just opened a crack, to make it easier for investors and startups to find each other and come together â€" using online platforms.

Late last week the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) issued what is called “no action letters” to FundersClub and AngelList.  (More here.)  Both companies operate online venture capital or angel capital platforms.  Both companies had sought the SEC letters, to clarify their legal positions.

The upshot  The letters give the nod of approval to online venture capital platforms and angel capital platforms â€" if they are set up exactly the way either FundersClub or AngelList are set up.

online venture capital

FundersClub CEO Alex Mittal is quoted at Techcrunch as saying this about the letter his company received:

“The letter is a win for accredited investors, startups, and the VC industry, and strong validation of the business model of FundersClub â€" to bring the transformational impact of the Internet to venture capital. It allows FundersClub to do something online that historically venture capital advisers have only done offline. Via the no-action letter, the SEC has officially recognized the legitimacy of online VC….”

Both AngelList and FundersClub list pre-screened startups seeking investment.  The sites accept applications from prospective investors.  The platforms facilitate investing relatively small amounts â€" as little as $1,000 â€" in exchange for equity. AngelList, for example, says on its home page that it has raised over $10 million for startups just this month.

AngelList and FundersClub accept accredited investors only, today.  Accredited investors are individuals who earn at least $200,000 annually or have a net worth of $1 million.

What The SEC Action Means, And What It Doesn’t

Both the FundersClub letter and the AngelList letter deal with highly complex legal issues (for just how complex, read one lawyer’s perspective).  On top of that, a “no action letter” is very narrow in scope. So let’s understand what the SEC letters mean â€" and don’t mean, in layman’s terms:

  • Not a sweeping endorsement of all crowdsourced venture capital.  A “No Action letter” from the SEC  simply means the SEC will take no action of enforcement against FundersClub and AngelList, provided they do precisely what is described in the letters.  The letters don’t say anything one way or the other about unrestricted crowdsourcing of venture capital â€" something that crowdfunding advocates have been pushing for.
  • Does not open the door to lower net worth or lower income individuals investing online. Traditionally, securities law has restricted venture investing to “accredited investors,” meaning those who are high net worth or high income.  This law is designed to protect financially-unsophisticated members of the public.   These letters don’t change that.  Both AngelList and FundersClub deal with accredited investors only.
  • Nothing to do with the JOBS (“Jumpstart Our Business Startups”) Act.  Under the JOBS Act passed in 2012 and taking effect this year, those with lower net-worth and lower incomes (i.e., not accredited investors) will be able to invest relatively small amounts.  However, the SEC has yet to issue regulations to fully implement the JOBS Act. Until that happens, don’t look for crowdfunded venture investment the way most people think of it, i.e., open to the masses to invest. These letters don’t invoke the JOBS Act at all.
  • Still, it’s a step closer to opening up equity investment to more investors.  For startups, it means a bigger pool of investors and potentially more startups able to get funded â€" especially if other online platforms pop up following the AngelList or FundersClub models.



SEC Letters Give Nod of Approval to Online Venture Capital

Getting angel investment or venture capital has always been tough for entrepreneurs. One reason is that it’s simply hard to find investors willing to plunk down money on your company, unless they are family or friends.  The options are especially limited for startups based outside of venture meccas such as Silicon Valley.

But the legal door just opened a crack, to make it easier for investors and startups to find each other and come together â€" using online platforms.

Late last week the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) issued what is called “no action letters” to FundersClub and AngelList.  (More here.)  Both companies operate online venture capital or angel capital platforms.  Both companies had sought the SEC letters, to clarify their legal positions.

The upshot  The letters give the nod of approval to online venture capital platforms and angel capital platforms â€" if they are set up exactly the way either FundersClub or AngelList are set up.

online venture capital

FundersClub CEO Alex Mittal is quoted at Techcrunch as saying this about the letter his company received:

“The letter is a win for accredited investors, startups, and the VC industry, and strong validation of the business model of FundersClub â€" to bring the transformational impact of the Internet to venture capital. It allows FundersClub to do something online that historically venture capital advisers have only done offline. Via the no-action letter, the SEC has officially recognized the legitimacy of online VC….”

Both AngelList and FundersClub list pre-screened startups seeking investment.  The sites accept applications from prospective investors.  The platforms facilitate investing relatively small amounts â€" as little as $1,000 â€" in exchange for equity. AngelList, for example, says on its home page that it has raised over $10 million for startups just this month.

AngelList and FundersClub accept accredited investors only, today.  Accredited investors are individuals who earn at least $200,000 annually or have a net worth of $1 million.

What The SEC Action Means, And What It Doesn’t

Both the FundersClub letter and the AngelList letter deal with highly complex legal issues (for just how complex, read one lawyer’s perspective).  On top of that, a “no action letter” is very narrow in scope. So let’s understand what the SEC letters mean â€" and don’t mean, in layman’s terms:

  • Not a sweeping endorsement of all crowdsourced venture capital.  A “No Action letter” from the SEC  simply means the SEC will take no action of enforcement against FundersClub and AngelList, provided they do precisely what is described in the letters.  The letters don’t say anything one way or the other about unrestricted crowdsourcing of venture capital â€" something that crowdfunding advocates have been pushing for.
  • Does not open the door to lower net worth or lower income individuals investing online. Traditionally, securities law has restricted venture investing to “accredited investors,” meaning those who are high net worth or high income.  This law is designed to protect financially-unsophisticated members of the public.   These letters don’t change that.  Both AngelList and FundersClub deal with accredited investors only.
  • Nothing to do with the JOBS (“Jumpstart Our Business Startups”) Act.  Under the JOBS Act passed in 2012 and taking effect this year, those with lower net-worth and lower incomes (i.e., not accredited investors) will be able to invest relatively small amounts.  However, the SEC has yet to issue regulations to fully implement the JOBS Act. Until that happens, don’t look for crowdfunded venture investment the way most people think of it, i.e., open to the masses to invest. These letters don’t invoke the JOBS Act at all.
  • Still, it’s a step closer to opening up equity investment to more investors.  For startups, it means a bigger pool of investors and potentially more startups able to get funded â€" especially if other online platforms pop up following the AngelList or FundersClub models.



Bitcoin value hit following DDoS attack

The recent meteoric rise in the value of Bitcoin has been hit following a DDoS attack on Mt.Gox, the world's largest exchange dealing with the digital currency.

As the value of Bitcoin surged to $142 per coin, Mt.Gox announced on its Facebook page that it had been under a sustained distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack for a few days. The Japan-based exchange suggested the attacks had two motivations - financial gain and to destabilise the virtual currency.

“Attackers wait until the price of Bitcoins reaches a certain value, sell, destabilise the exchange, wait for everybody to panic-sell their Bitcoins, wait for the price to drop to a certain amount, then stop the attack and start buying as much as they can. Repeat this two or three times like we saw over the past few days and they profit,” the statement said.

“It is not a secret Mt.Gox is the largest Bitcoin exchange with more than 80 per cent of all USD trades and more than 70 per cent of all currencies. Mt.Gox is an easy target for anyone that wants to hurt Bitcoin in general,” Mt.Gox added.

The attacks have resulted in what Mt.Gox called the “worst trading lag ever,” which saw the value of Bitcoin drop from a high of $142 back to $117. Other issues caused by the DDoS include numerous 502 errors and users not being able to log into their accounts

While the company continued to fight off the attacks with help from the likes of Prolexic, Mt.Gox has admitted there is not a lot it can do. “There are a few things that we can implement to help fight the attacks,” the company added, “such as disconnecting the trade engine backend from the internet. By separating the data centre from the Mt.Gox website, we will continue to be able to trade.

In another blow to Bitcoin, a website called Instawallet, which lets users store their Bitcoins, was forced to close after its database was hacked. A statement posted on its site said the service was “suspended indefinitely until we are able to develop an alternative architecture.”

The site will shortly open a claims process, enabling users to retrieve their Bitcoin balance.



14 Keys To Social Media Dominance

A couple of weeks ago I was at a Project Enterprise event, in Brooklyn New York for small business owners. My opening comments were 14 keys to social media dominance for new users.  Here are those quick and simple, 14 keys for you to use on your quest to the top:

1. Frequency
2. Consistency
3. Relevancy
4. Use Images and other engaging elements (polls, questions, etc)
5. Have the basics first (email newsletter, good website, blog)
6. Have a good profile image (no hidden face or your children or dog)
7. Test and test and refine
8. Don’t worry about being on every social network
9. Measure your work with the social networks analytics or your own (ie. Facebook Insights or Dlvr.it )
10. Don’t worry about the tech details when you first start out
11. Blogging is not a job - it’s a means to an end
12. Use great headlines - think like a front page story newspaper editor
13. Highlight others (it’s not all about you)
14. Focus on your personal brand and share accordingly - don’t write about jewelry, bread making and dog groomig if you’re a lawyer

By following these 14 points, you can put you and your business on the road to Social Media dominance, too!



14 Keys To Social Media Dominance

A couple of weeks ago I was at a Project Enterprise event, in Brooklyn New York for small business owners. My opening comments were 14 keys to social media dominance for new users.  Here are those quick and simple, 14 keys for you to use on your quest to the top:

1. Frequency
2. Consistency
3. Relevancy
4. Use Images and other engaging elements (polls, questions, etc)
5. Have the basics first (email newsletter, good website, blog)
6. Have a good profile image (no hidden face or your children or dog)
7. Test and test and refine
8. Don’t worry about being on every social network
9. Measure your work with the social networks analytics or your own (ie. Facebook Insights or Dlvr.it )
10. Don’t worry about the tech details when you first start out
11. Blogging is not a job - it’s a means to an end
12. Use great headlines - think like a front page story newspaper editor
13. Highlight others (it’s not all about you)
14. Focus on your personal brand and share accordingly - don’t write about jewelry, bread making and dog groomi if you’re a lawyer

By following these 14 points, you can put you and your business on the road to Social Media dominance, too!



14 Keys To Social Media Dominance

A couple of weeks ago I was at a Project Enterprise event, in Brooklyn New York for small business owners. My opening comments were 14 keys to social media dominance for new users.  Here are those quick and simple, 14 keys for you to use on your quest to the top:

1. Frequency
2. Consistency
3. Relevancy
4. Use Images and other engaging elements (polls, questions, etc)
5. Have the basics first (email newsletter, good website, blog)
6. Have a good profile image (no hidden face or your children or dog)
7. Test and test and refine
8. Don’t worry about being on every social network
9. Measure your work with the social networks analytics or your own (ie. Facebook Insights or Dlvr.it )
10. Don’t worry about the tech details when you first start out
11. Blogging is not a job - it’s a means to an end
12. Use great headlines - think like a front page story newspaper editor
13. Highlight others (it’s not all about you)
14. Focus on your personal brand and share accordingly - don’t write about jewelry, bread making and dog groomig if you’re a lawyer

By following these 14 points, you can put you and your business on the road to Social Media dominance, too!



The Social Media Battle Heats Up With New Features From All The Players

The war of social media giants continues as the biggest players in the game continue to try to “one up” each other with new features and functionality on their sites.

According to a recent article in the Wall Street Journal, Facebook is currently testing the popular hash tag symbol (#) on their site. The feature will give users the ability to search for similar topics of interest to them like “#charliesheen” or “#popefrancis.”

For the last five years, the hash tag search has been a feature found most commonly on Twitter feeds, but with Facebook’s 2011 purchase of the popular photo-sharing application Instagram, it’s starting to become a familiar presence across all news feeds. This includes the likes of sites like Google+ and even just recently, the professional networking site LinkedIn.

Hash tags help to keep a user tuned in to the site for a longer duration of time, and Facebook knows all too well that how long a user is tuned in is increasingly important to their shareholders. The more time on the site means more time viewing their advertisements. And as we’ve mentioned before, Facebook is working diligently this year to make sure their site is friendlier for businesses.

On the flip side, the team over at Twitter is not idly standing by watching other sites increase their functionality, they are also adding sales staff and releasing more new features to their site. This is in an effort to please both advertisers that purchase advertising directly through their site as well as through third party vendors.

Even Pinterest is joining the battle by implementing analytics to their platform as well as revamping their look and enabling better search features.

Facebook has declined to comment on the recent reports regarding the hash tag implementation, and instead has focused attention onto the recent release of their new site design. Company executives say the new layout focuses on the company’s goal of becoming a “personalized newspaper” for their users.



Four Reasons To Consider One Of These Three Cloud-Based Accounting Apps

One of the most time-consuming aspects of running a business is managing daily expenses and revenue streams. Hiring someone to do the job is certainly an option, but it can still prove to be cumbersome for the business owner to keep a tally. Alternatively, small businesses should consider acquiring a cloud accounting app .Cloud accounting has emerged as a cost effective solution for managing financial transactions in a hassle free manner.

In simple terms, cloud accounting apps allows you to manage your books remotely through the internet. All you need to do is enter the details of revenue and expenses into the software and your accounting information gets processed by remote servers. There are various benefits that cloud accounting software can offer small businesses:

  • Ease of Access:  You can use these applications anywhere, anytime, from your desktop or mobile phone. You can manage your accounts even while travelling.
  • Reduced Cost: These applications come cheap and are highly effective.
  • Better Business Performance: With the application taking care of your financial transactions, you are free to use your time and resources to manage other important business activities
  • Data Safety:  Your business information is backed-up in the cloud so you never again have to worry about a missing expense file

Cloud accounting apps for Small Businesses

FreshBooks: With over 5 million users already managing their accounts and billing through FreshBooks, it is one of the most popular applications available. It is an easy to use accounting application via which small businesses can track time spent on a project, expenses incurred, raise invoices and receive payments online. It also offers some advanced options like profit/loss reports, sending payment reminders, customizing invoices and project management features. It has a trial version for 30 days, and the paid packages start at $19.95 per month.

As per Mike McDerment, FreshBooks co-founder and CEO, “Small business owners want to focus on serving their customers and on doing what they love, not on accounting”. In line with this perspective, FreshBooks has recently launched a feature called the Automatic Expense Import. What this allows you to do in essence is collate expenses directly from your bank account, PayPal or credit cards. No longer the pain of feeding in expense data; all you need to do is link up your accounts with FreshBooks and the software will automatically calibrate your overall expenses over the last 30- 90 days (depending on the availability of data from your bank or credit card company). This feature is currently supported across 9000 financial institutions in the U.S and Canada and if you wish to know whether your bank is among them, simply contact FreshBooks.

QuickBooks: This is one of the popular accounting applications, which is extensively used for book keeping and billing. It allows you to track your income and expenses as well as pull transactions from your bank accounts. With QuickBooks you can gather all your tax data in one place and simply download a copy of the file for your accountant. They too offer a 30 day free trial, and the basic paid package costs $12.95 per month. The desktop version is far more comprehensive than the cloud version. Compared to FreshBooks, it lacks ability to accept online payment, and does not have invoicing feature.

 Kashoo: This application offers a comprehensive set of features that are required of efficient book keeping. These include budgeting, double entry accounting, general ledger etc. Apart from the basic accounting features, it has an amazing feature that pulls the revenue and expense transactions automatically from the financial institutions However, it does not have a billing function. The basic package is priced at $16 per month.

Cloud accounting software is an efficient way for small businesses to manage their financial records while keeping costs under control. FreshBooks is a great option if you have to do a lot of invoicing, time tracking or if you wish to receive payments online. For book keeping, Quickbooks is a better option. Some businesses prefer using more than one accounting app for different purposes.



‘Personal Branding For Your Small Business’ Webinar from Ramon Ray and Viewbix

Ramon Ray, editor of Smallbiztechnology and Regional Director of Development for Infusionsoft, recently got together with the good folks at Viewbix for a webinar on ‘Personal Branding For Your Small Business’.

In this webinar, Ramon speaks directly from his experience of building his own brand and the mistakes and successes he’s had along the way. He shares tips and ideas and a step-by-step plan that will help you create a personal brand for your small business. 

You can watch the entire ‘Personal Branding For Your Small Business’ webinar here.

Viewbix has a series of webinars, that take place every Wednesday  designed to help small businesses grow in various areas of their business. You can view all of their past webinars and see upcoming webinars on their website, here.



The Social Media Battle Heats Up With New Features From All The Players

The war of social media giants continues as the biggest players in the game continue to try to “one up” each other with new features and functionality on their sites.

According to a recent article in the Wall Street Journal, Facebook is currently testing the popular hash tag symbol (#) on their site. The feature will give users the ability to search for similar topics of interest to them like “#charliesheen” or “#popefrancis.”

For the last five years, the hash tag search has been a feature found most commonly on Twitter feeds, but with Facebook’s 2011 purchase of the popular photo-sharing application Instagram, it’s starting to become a familiar presence across all news feeds. This includes the likes of sites like Google+ and even just recently, the professional networking site LinkedIn.

Hash tags help to keep a user tuned in to the site for a longer duration of time, and Facebook knows all too well that how long a user is tuned in is increasingly important to their shareholders. The more time on the site means more time viewing their advertisements. And as we’ve mentioned before, Facebook is working diligently this year to make sure their site is friendlier for businesses.

On the flip side, the team over at Twitter is not idly standing by watching other sites increase their functionality, they are also adding sales staff and releasing more new features to their site. This is in an effort to please both advertisers that purchase advertising directly through their site as well as through third party vendors.

Even Pinterest is joining the battle by implementing analytics to their platform as well as revamping their look and enabling better search features.

Facebook has declined to comment on the recent reports regarding the hash tag implementation, and instead has focused attention onto the recent release of their new site design. Company executives say the new layout focuses on the company’s goal of becoming a “personalized newspaper” for their users.



Four Reasons To Consider One Of These Three Cloud-Based Accounting Apps

One of the most time-consuming aspects of running a business is managing daily expenses and revenue streams. Hiring someone to do the job is certainly an option, but it can still prove to be cumbersome for the business owner to keep a tally. Alternatively, small businesses should consider acquiring a cloud accounting app .Cloud accounting has emerged as a cost effective solution for managing financial transactions in a hassle free manner.

In simple terms, cloud accounting apps allows you to manage your books remotely through the internet. All you need to do is enter the details of revenue and expenses into the software and your accounting information gets processed by remote servers. There are various benefits that cloud accounting software can offer small businesses:

  • Ease of Access:  You can use these applications anywhere, anytime, from your desktop or mobile phone. You can manage your accounts even while travelling.
  • Reduced Cost: These applications come cheap and are highly effective.
  • Better Business Performance: With the application taking care of your financial transactions, you are free to use your time and resources to manage other important business activities
  • Data Safety:  Your business information is backed-up in the cloud so you never again have to worry about a missing expense file

Cloud accounting apps for Small Businesses

FreshBooks: With over 5 million users already managing their accounts and billing through FreshBooks, it is one of the most popular applications available. It is an easy to use accounting application via which small businesses can track time spent on a project, expenses incurred, raise invoices and receive payments online. It also offers some advanced options like profit/loss reports, sending payment reminders, customizing invoices and project management features. It has a trial version for 30 days, and the paid packages start at $19.95 per month.

As per Mike McDerment, FreshBooks co-founder and CEO, “Small business owners want to focus on serving their customers and on doing what they love, not on accounting”. In line with this perspective, FreshBooks has recently launched a feature called the Automatic Expense Import. What this allows you to do in essence is collate expenses directly from your bank account, PayPal or credit cards. No longer the pain of feeding in expense data; all you need to do is link up your accounts with FreshBooks and the software will automatically calibrate your overall expenses over the last 30- 90 days (depending on the availability of data from your bank or credit card company). This feature is currently supported across 9000 financial institutions in the U.S and Canada and if you wish to know whether your bank is among them, simply contact FreshBooks.

QuickBooks: This is one of the popular accounting applications, which is extensively used for book keeping and billing. It allows you to track your income and expenses as well as pull transactions from your bank accounts. With QuickBooks you can gather all your tax data in one place and simply download a copy of the file for your accountant. They too offer a 30 day free trial, and the basic paid package costs $12.95 per month. The desktop version is far more comprehensive than the cloud version. Compared to FreshBooks, it lacks ability to accept online payment, and does not have invoicing feature.

 Kashoo: This application offers a comprehensive set of features that are required of efficient book keeping. These include budgeting, double entry accounting, general ledger etc. Apart from the basic accounting features, it has an amazing feature that pulls the revenue and expense transactions automatically from the financial institutions However, it does not have a billing function. The basic package is priced at $16 per month.

Cloud accounting software is an efficient way for small businesses to manage their financial records while keeping costs under control. FreshBooks is a great option if you have to do a lot of invoicing, time tracking or if you wish to receive payments online. For book keeping, Quickbooks is a better option. Some businesses prefer using more than one accounting app for different purposes.



‘Personal Branding For Your Small Business’ Webinar from Ramon Ray and Viewbix

Ramon Ray, editor of Smallbiztechnology and Regional Director of Development for Infusionsoft, recently got together with the good folks at Viewbix for a webinar on ‘Personal Branding For Your Small Business’.

In this webinar, Ramon speaks directly from his experience of building his own brand and the mistakes and successes he’s had along the way. He shares tips and ideas and a step-by-step plan that will help you create a personal brand for your small business. 

You can watch the entire ‘Personal Branding For Your Small Business’ webinar here.

Viewbix has a series of webinars, that take place every Wednesday  designed to help small businesses grow in various areas of their business. You can view all of their past webinars and see upcoming webinars on their website, here.



The Social Media Battle Heats Up With New Features From All The Players

The war of social media giants continues as the biggest players in the game continue to try to “one up” each other with new features and functionality on their sites.

According to a recent article in the Wall Street Journal, Facebook is currently testing the popular hash tag symbol (#) on their site. The feature will give users the ability to search for similar topics of interest to them like “#charliesheen” or “#popefrancis.”

For the last five years, the hash tag search has been a feature found most commonly on Twitter feeds, but with Facebook’s 2011 purchase of the popular photo-sharing application Instagram, it’s starting to become a familiar presence across all news feeds. This includes the likes of sites like Google+ and even just recently, the professional networking site LinkedIn.

Hash tags help to keep a user tuned in to the site for a longer duration of time, and Facebook knows all too well that how long a user is tuned in is increasingly important to their shareholders. The more time on the site means more time viewing their advertisements. And as we’ve mentioned before, Facebook is working diligently this year to make sure their site is friendlier for businesses.

On the flip side, the team over at Twitter is not idly standing by watching other sites increase their functionality, they are also adding sales staff and releasing more new features to their site. This is in an effort to please both advertisers that purchase advertising directly through their site as well as through third party vendors.

Even Pinterest is joining the battle by implementing analytics to their platform as well as revamping their look and enabling better search features.

Facebook has declined to comment on the recent reports regarding the hash tag implementation, and instead has focused attention onto the recent release of their new site design. Company executives say the new layout focuses on the company’s goal of becoming a “personalized newspaper” for their users.



‘Personal Branding For Your Small Business’ Webinar from Ramon Ray and Viewbix

Ramon Ray, editor of Smallbiztechnology and Regional Director of Development for Infusionsoft, recently got together with the good folks at Viewbix for a webinar on ‘Personal Branding For Your Small Business’.

In this webinar, Ramon speaks directly from his experience of building his own brand and the mistakes and successes he’s had along the way. He shares tips and ideas and a step-by-step plan that will help you create a personal brand for your small business. 

You can watch the entire ‘Personal Branding For Your Small Business’ webinar here.

Viewbix has a series of webinars, that take place every Wednesday  designed to help small businesses grow in various areas of their business. You can view all of their past webinars and see upcoming webinars on their website, here.



Four Reasons To Consider One Of These Three Cloud-Based Accounting Apps

One of the most time-consuming aspects of running a business is managing daily expenses and revenue streams. Hiring someone to do the job is certainly an option, but it can still prove to be cumbersome for the business owner to keep a tally. Alternatively, small businesses should consider acquiring a cloud accounting app .Cloud accounting has emerged as a cost effective solution for managing financial transactions in a hassle free manner.

In simple terms, cloud accounting apps allows you to manage your books remotely through the internet. All you need to do is enter the details of revenue and expenses into the software and your accounting information gets processed by remote servers. There are various benefits that cloud accounting software can offer small businesses:

  • Ease of Access:  You can use these applications anywhere, anytime, from your desktop or mobile phone. You can manage your accounts even while travelling.
  • Reduced Cost: These applications come cheap and are highly effective.
  • Better Business Performance: With the application taking care of your financial transactions, you are free to use your time and resources to manage other important business activities
  • Data Safety:  Your business information is backed-up in the cloud so you never again have to worry about a missing expense file

Cloud accounting apps for Small Businesses

FreshBooks: With over 5 million users already managing their accounts and billing through FreshBooks, it is one of the most popular applications available. It is an easy to use accounting application via which small businesses can track time spent on a project, expenses incurred, raise invoices and receive payments online. It also offers some advanced options like profit/loss reports, sending payment reminders, customizing invoices and project management features. It has a trial version for 30 days, and the paid packages start at $19.95 per month.

As per Mike McDerment, FreshBooks co-founder and CEO, “Small business owners want to focus on serving their customers and on doing what they love, not on accounting”. In line with this perspective, FreshBooks has recently launched a feature called the Automatic Expense Import. What this allows you to do in essence is collate expenses directly from your bank account, PayPal or credit cards. No longer the pain of feeding in expense data; all you need to do is link up your accounts with FreshBooks and the software will automatically calibrate your overall expenses over the last 30- 90 days (depending on the availability of data from your bank or credit card company). This feature is currently supported across 9000 financial institutions in the U.S and Canada and if you wish to know whether your bank is among them, simply contact FreshBooks.

QuickBooks: This is one of the popular accounting applications, which is extensively used for book keeping and billing. It allows you to track your income and expenses as well as pull transactions from your bank accounts. With QuickBooks you can gather all your tax data in one place and simply download a copy of the file for your accountant. They too offer a 30 day free trial, and the basic paid package costs $12.95 per month. The desktop version is far more comprehensive than the cloud version. Compared to FreshBooks, it lacks ability to accept online payment, and does not have invoicing feature.

 Kashoo: This application offers a comprehensive set of features that are required of efficient book keeping. These include budgeting, double entry accounting, general ledger etc. Apart from the basic accounting features, it has an amazing feature that pulls the revenue and expense transactions automatically from the financial institutions However, it does not have a billing function. The basic package is priced at $16 per month.

Cloud accounting software is an efficient way for small businesses to manage their financial records while keeping costs under control. FreshBooks is a great option if you have to do a lot of invoicing, time tracking or if you wish to receive payments online. For book keeping, Quickbooks is a better option. Some businesses prefer using more than one accounting app for different purposes.



6 Time Saving Tips to Shave Hours Off Your Week

time saving

[Click for full version]

When you’re running a small business, time is literally money. Without a salary or a clock to punch, the only time you’re making money is when you’re working. Unfortunately, this leads too many small business owners to work extra hours - and eventually burn out.

This infographic from Maven Link demonstrates the value of time for small business owners. A few highlights:

  • 72 percent of small business owners work evenings and weekends.
  • 53 percent say the hardest thing about their business is wearing multiple hats - and 46 percent fill 3 to 4 employee roles on a given day.
  • 25 percent, or 1 in 4, say that one extra hour in a working day is worth more than $500 to them.

There’s no question that if you want your small business to succeed, you need to put in the work, but it doesn’t have to be 60 to 80 hours’ worth every week. Follow these tips to squeeze more hours out of your working days and get more done in less time.

Go Mobile

Your smartphone can let you work on the go, anywhere you happen to be. There are plenty of timesaving apps for small business owners, and many will also help you automate tasks and keep things organizedâ€"saving more precious minutes.

Look for apps that cover tasks like bookkeeping, invoicing, appointment scheduling, document sharing and more. You’ll be surprised by how much time you save. A study by the Small Business and Entrepreneur Council, Saving Time and Money With Mobile Apps (PDF) finds that apps save small business owners an average of 5.6 hours a week.

Don’t Stay Attached to Your Phone

You’ve probably heard the popular time management advice to limit the number of times you check your email. But are you applying this advice to your phone

Text messages can suck up just as much time as your email. How much time would you save if you didn’t pick up your phone every time it buzzes or chimes If you have a hard time ignoring incoming texts or messages, try turning your phone off during business hours until you need it.

If your cell is your primary business line, limit interactions to calls only and designate a few times a day to go through texts.

Tackle Your To-Do List

To-do lists are a great way to keep you focused and on target. Schedule a short block at the end of the day to go through your list, check off what’s been done, and add tasks for the next day. But don’t beat yourself up if you haven’t finished everything. Simply move incomplete items to tomorrow.

You can save even more time with a to-do list app. Check out this top 10 list from PCWorld, most are free.

Don’t Multitask

For a long time, multitasking was touted as a highly productive strategy for any busy professional. However, it’s been shown that most people can’t fully concentrate on more than one task at a time. In fact, the University of London’s Institute of Psychiatry found that when you’re drowning in texts, emails and phone calls, your IQ drops ten points.

By concentrating on just one task at a time, you’ll ensure that it’s finished correctly and save yourself the trouble and time of redoing it later.

Schedule Tough Stuff During Your High Energy Time

When are you at your best Do you power through tasks in the morning and slow down after lunch, or does it take you a while to get up to full steam Identify your most productive time of the day, and tackle your big, complicated items then.

Though it’s tempting to handle the fun, easy things when you’re feeling productive, try to resist. You’ll feel better and save tons of time when you get through the difficult tasks while you’re operating at full capacity.

Make Sure You Punch Out Every Day

It’s important that your business day has an actual end - the point where you disconnect completely by shutting off the computer, putting the mobile devices away and relaxing. While you may have times when quitting isn’t an option, you should strive to leave the office behind for the day as often as possible. Ask yourself whether what’s keeping you working is truly an emergency, or if it can be moved to the next day’s to-do list.

When you commit to developing time saving habits for your small business, you’ll end up happier, more relaxed and more productive than ever.

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