Episode 6 of the Sitepro Podcast is now available. The Sitepro Podcast was created to help educate clients and the community about various aspects of web, video and other multimedia content. This is the third of four episodes of the podcasts that will on the the Grace Lutheran Foundation and all the multimedia work that Sitepro has produced for them. Be sure to subscribe to get all of the episodes of the Sitepro Podcast.

Bing search service launched in early June by Microsoft. It is their version of Google. It is different because you can ask it questions, as opposed to Google, where you mainly search for just information. Bing is capable of answering questions; it is like a decision maker.

You’ve put together a brilliant blog post illustrating your company’s newest product, or an upcoming event guaranteed to make your business the talk of the town. The post goes live, and then a couple of hours later you check back and notice a comment sitting at the bottom. Expecting lavish praise, you find instead someone claiming your company cheated them, did a poor job, or (worse yet), fired them for no reason. This isn’t a nightmare, it’s an opportunity.

After spending a little more time with the mobile web, there's a bit more to be said about issues surrounding designing websites for the mobile browser.  Differences in phone technology as well as new software technologies in development are changing the field of mobile web design.  This post takes a look at some of those phone issues and new developments.

A few months ago, I developed a ColdFusion/Mach-II implementation of the reCAPTCHA API.  This type of CAPTCHA requires the person to enter two words rather than a single sequence of random letters.  In addition to protecting your website from spam, reCAPTCHA helps digitize text books.  They do this by using a mystery word as one of the two words, until there is a consensus about what the correct answer for that word is.

     Armed with a tag cloud and an RSS feed spitting your company’s insights into the twitterverse, you might think you’re good to go. Don’t. Like most things, there is always something else you can do to make your social media presence more effective. The first of these is a flickr widget.

Episode 5 of the Sitepro Podcast is now available. The Sitepro Podcast was created to help educate clients and the community about various aspects of web, video and other multimedia content. This is the second of four episodes of the podcasts that focus on the the Grace Lutheran Foundation and all the multimedia work that Sitepro has produced for them. Be sure to subscribe to get all of the episodes of the Sitepro Podcast.

    Continuing my series on company blogs, I’m now going to describe for you the myriad benefits that come from what MTV might call "Pimping Your Blog". These nifty techniques have nothing to do with the words you write, but rather how people see, interact, and (most importantly) broadcast them around the web.

I have been heard saying that from time to time when I am photographing weddings, senior pictures or any portraits with children.  My son says he is going to need therapy when he is old because of the nagging dream he has of his mother saying, “just one more!”  Kind of like the dreams of being chased by something and not being able to run.  

With the rise of the iPhone, Google Android, Palm, Blackberry and several other touch screen phones out there that are not only web enabled, but offer a browsing experience similar to the one we are familiar with on desktop computers, the need for mobile friendly websites is becoming greater. I've had several web enabled phones, but the most recent one I purchased has given me a much more fluid and intuitive web experience. It's shown me, though, that most websites aren't coded with mobile phones in mind.

Your Company Video: The Pro’s and Con’s of YouTube Hosting

This is part 2 in an onging series  called "YouTube Video 101". See this post and others to learn how hosting videos through YouTube may apply to your business.

Social media is all the rage these days. From building company Facebook profiles to placing videos on YouTube, a lot of businesses are jumping on board. YouTube is a great medium for putting the right kind of video on (I’ll get in to what may be the right kind of video in another post). With an audience of nearly 330 million user’s world wide, the format cannot be ignored. You can use YouTube hosting to present your video content to this audience as well as embed video feeds from YouTube in your company website. While YouTube presents some incredible new possibilities, there can be some drawbacks that companies may not be fully aware of. This post explores both the pros and cons of using YouTube’s service in business applications.

     In my last post, I overviewed a few of the ways to get your company blog in front of interested people. In this one, I'll try to help you find enough material to keep them coming back.

     If you're not a media company, you're wrong. Every business has news and events, products or services to sell and a need for the public to know about them. And if you think that your latest contract or the opening of a new plant in Oklahoma isn't worth talking about, just take a look at what we're saying on Twitter every minute. Believe you me, there are eyes out there that want to read what you can provide.

Episode 4 of the Sitepro Podcast is now available. The Sitepro Podcast was created to help educate clients and the community about various aspects of web, video and other multimedia content. Hosted by Sitepro's own Steve Allingham, the next four episodes of the podcasts will focus on the the Grace Lutheran Foundation and all the multimedia work that Sitepro has produced for them. Be sure to subscribe to get all of the episodes of the Sitepro Podcast.

We’re not going to focus on the design or the layout of a website, although we may mention some basic elements that will relate to the design, but more importantly, we’re focusing on how the website is structured so it can be successful.

There’s no question on arguing how a website can help you obtain a successful online presence and that it’s the most effective marketing strategy one can have as a designer or a company. A successful website should already have basic information where a site visitor can learn, identify and quickly understand how you can help. Essentially, a website provides a solution to a problem.

There are millions of blogs out there, with more created every second. Yet, it's still vital to the health of your company to have one. The key to success is not to join the rest of the blogs in yelling for the world's attention, but to whisper into the ears of those who matter most to your business.

This isn't so daunting as you might believe. No matter what industry you're in, there's likely already blogs or forums full of passionate people discussing your field. For example, a simple Google search of "welding forums" turned up over 7 communities, on the first page. Any one of these would make, for a welding company, an ideal place to make a social media mark.

CNN Money is reporting that Microsoft and Yahoo have reached an agreement to integrate search technologies and share revenue in their ongoing battle for search supremacy. Both companies trail Google, who currently enjoys a 65% market share. Even though Microsoft attempted to purchase Yahoo last year, this is a somewhat surprising development in the world of search advertising.

Read on past the break for more details about this new deal!

5 years ago clients typically wanted videos in a format that they can easily hand out such as DVD or interactive CD. As a multimedia supplier, Sitepro.com was unique from other production companies in that we were streaming videos within client websites as well. While physical deliverables and inter-website distribution have still been a stronghold, more clients are inquiring about services like YouTube, Facebook and other social media applications.

While there are lots of other social video sites out there, YouTube has proven to be the top of the crop. Did you know that YouTube is the number one video site on the internet? Get this: It’s the 4^th largest internet destination in the world and the #2 search engine behind Google and before Yahoo…….just huge. Often clients ask me questions like :

"How can I get my Video on YouTube?"

"How can we create a Facebook account and put my videos in it?"

"We just want to make some simple videos and upload them. Where do we start?"

Follow this series, YouTube Video 101, to gain some insight on these questions as well as thoughts you may not have considered when developing videos for social media and website use.

Photography is a key element to any website.  A good image captures attention, conveys emotion and can even tell a story.  In the last Blog “A Picture is worth a thousand words” we talked briefly about what actually makes a good image.  Cropping, using black and white versus highly contrasted color, and using natural lighting were just a few things that can help make a good image, but what makes the best image for your client’s website?  

"I've never had a hard drive crash on me."  That is the phrase I kept using as an excuse to put off setting up a backup system for my home computers.  That and the tons of space that I would need to fully backup my important data.  Images, mp3s, videos, important files, etc., on multiple computer... oh the logistics!  Well you can pretty much imagine what I'm going to say after the break...

Have you ever wondered who’s been on your site?  Well, I suppose it would be nice to know names and addresses of people who browse your site, but that’s not possible – yet.  I’m talking more general terms, specifically, how often your site gets visited.