New Year - New Tech

By Hector Cisneros

Tech 3 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Last year proved to be a real zinger for technology. Both good and bad guys were out in force. The NSA was recording all and criminals were providing hack-a-thons against big businesses and banks in an unprecedented way.  SAAS and Cloud Computing moves to the forefront as ubiquitous services for daily use. Landline telephones see the asteroid coming their way as their use is giving way to Smartphones and VOIP in large numbers. Twenty fourteen will make last year’s tech jumps seem like '50s reruns.

Is Humor a Weapon of Mass Distraction or Attraction?

By Carl Weiss

The Good Humor logo used until 2000 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

One of the big questions you see marketing people debate is whether humor improves the sale of products or detracts from the sales of products. Even in our firm, we debate this issue. I believe that done properly, it does both. People are always looking for that magic bullet to get an edge over their competition and I should know.  

Being an Internet authority means speaking in front of groups of business people from time to time.  Whether the topic du jour is related to search engine marketing, blogging for business, social networking or the ins and outs of pay-per-click matters not.  What is a certainty is that as soon as the presentation is finished I will find myself buttonholed by someone who wants to know the secret of success online.  It’s as if my dissertation was meant to be an appetizer and the real meat and potatoes of online marketing could only be revealed to those bold enough to corner me after the fact.  “Okay, you got me.  If you really want to generate a million clicks, this is what you have to do...” As much as I wish there were three-magic-beans that could magically transform a stale web presence into a rock star, for the most part there is no such animal.  (As I like to point out to a number of people, I am a technician, not a magician.)

The Next Generation - Putting Your Best Robot Forward

By Carl Weiss

Courtesy of world.honda.com

I don’t know about you, but I grew up watching all the cool and scary science fiction movies featuring all kind of fantastic things especially and killer monster robots that were ready to take over the world. Companies around the world are furiously work hard to bring robots to life, (not the killer kind but their more benign helpful counter parts). We have been using industrial robots for the better part of 20 years now but none of these robots have been the walking talking, come along with me and do this job for me kind. Well robots are getting ready to take the next step in their evolution. I am talking about the walking, talking, climbing, and looking more like people kind. In this article, we will explore the next level of robot evolution. So read on and meet our 21^st century robotic contestants.

Is Google Watching You?

By Hector Cisneros

Courtesy of flickr.com

Is Google watching you?  

A better question is, “Who isn't watching you?”  You hear about it in the news every day. The NSA is grabbing tons of consumer information without any legal authority. Weekly you hear about security breaches at large corporations like Target and other major department stores.  Banking institutions are being hacked for millions of dollars, yet billion of consumers are passively giving up their privacy to free email services, social network subscriptions and smart phone applications. Software applications have had "so-called" artificial intelligence installed since the late '90s. Word processors guess at what you mean while you type. Smartphones often do the same. What does all this mean to your privacy? This article will explore how the internet has removed most of your communications privacy. Now Google, social networks and the major software players all have their sites trained on what you're doing with the intention of getting more of your money. Worse of all, legions of criminals and even our own government is spying on all of us. So read on and learn. Forewarned is forearmed.

The Best of the Best in Internet Marketing - Events to Remember!

By Carl Weiss

Courtesy of fightcampconditioning.com

With Christmas only a day away, that means that New Year’s Eve can’t be far behind.  So as a little something extra for your Christmas stocking I thought a little retrospective on some of the topics we covered this year would be in order. 

Our Top 10 List

Hector's the Connector’s Predicts Social Media changes for This Year and Beyond

By Hector Cisneros

Courtesy of blog.buzzoole.com

Social media has seen radical changes over the last three years. Their level of acceptance and use has Social networks now have the eyes and ears of billions of subscribers. The impact of organic search ranking is indisputable today. Also, its effect on product acceptance, adoption and loyalty has become so important that large companies are spending vast amounts of advertising money to create and measure its influence on their product sales and profitability. Cyber criminals are also taking advantage of this mass migration to social networks. My last two prediction articles have come in with a 95% accuracy rating and this year I am going out on a limb with a few of my prognostications. So read on and find out what I foresee the New Year will ring in for Social Networking in the year to come (including Facebook, Google+ LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube, Pintrest and Blogger).
exploded. Many of the top social networks are now monetized and have become publicly held companies.

Hector The Connector has Predicted Internet Marketing Evolution 98% of the Time & These Changes are Still Valid Today

By Hector Cisneros

A correct reading will be given (Photo credit: ian.crowther)

Every year I make internet marketing predictions based on my research and intuition for the coming year. I have been right 98% of the time so far. 2013 proved to be a wild ride for businesses engaged in internet marketing. Social Media was a roller coaster of updates, upgrades and growth. Reputation management jumps to the forefront as businesses realize they are vulnerable to negative social press. Blogging and YouTube became mature services with widespread adoption taking place. A little birdie named Hummingbird shook up the search market significantly and many venerable household icons like TV news, and retail brick and mortar sales gave way to their digital counterparts. So if you think these events were out of this world wait till you see what's coming next year in 2014.

The Byte Before Christmas

By Carl Weiss

With apologies to Clement Clarke Moore.

New-York Historical Society: Clement Clark Moore’s desk, on which it is believed that he wrote “’Twas the Night Before Christmas” (Photo credit: Chris Devers)

T'was the byte before Christmas,

When all through the house

Not  creature was stirring,

Not even the mouse.

Now that Black Friday and Cyber Monday are behind us, let’s take a look at what is shaping up to be a very merry Internet Christmas in 2013.  So far this year Internet sales are up 19% over last year and 30% of those sales are attributed to mobile purchases. This is also the first time that brick and mortar sales are lower than the year before.