idaconcpts.com – Page 6 – Ideas and Concepts from Damian Davila

Increasing The Interactivity Of Your Site Is A Profitable Idea

If you are the new owner of a small Internet-based business, you’ll want to know all the details of every trick you can use to increase the interactivity of your website. One of the very best things that a business owner can do to increase the productivity and profitability of their official company website is to ensure that their site is fully interactive.

It’s a good business practice to install an instant messenger on your site so that customers can leave questions, concerns, and comments that can be communicated directly to you. This instantenous and immediate interactivity with your company allows potential clients to address their concerns right away and decreases the chances of those clients leaving your site.

Increasing Your Interactivity Means Increasing Your Credibility

For example, if you outsource to a third party in order to guarantee live chat services for customers who need to deal with you directly through instant messenger, you can ensure a huge increase in the credibility and reputability of your business. Most customers tend to trust a business more if they know that can communicate directly with the owner regarding the goods and services that they purchase from it. Allowing your customers to instant message their questions and concerns goes one step beyond merely letting them write you a note on your Facebook or Twitter page.

Give Your Customers The Option To Speak Directly To You

When you give your customers the option to speak directly with the company regarding the issues they have with your products or services, as well as their wishes for new items, you give them the feeling that they can rely on you to supply them with the service they need. This increases your professional standing in the international business community, and will ultimately give your business the positive reputation it needs to become a major player in the industry. A customer that quickly gets all of their questions answered in a prompt, professional, and courteous manner is one that will visit your site again.

Outsource Your Calls For A Faster, More Professional Response

It’s an excellent idea to outsource your incoming calls for a faster and more professional response. Doing so will free you up to pursue other, more pressing tasks. You can’t really operate at peak efficiency if you are always stopping to answer the phone. Instead of pressuring yourself even further to perform a thousand tasks at once, it’s better to outsource your calls to a trusted professional who can easily handle the ever increasing volume of new customers.

The Sooner You Handle Your Communications Issues, The Better

The sooner you handle all of your developing communications issues, the better it will be for your bottom line. Opening up the lines of communication with your customers is the key to the continued success of your business. Outsourcing your call services to a professional agency is the best way to ensure that all of your customers are satisfied. This is one aspect of your business that you simply cannot afford to ignore.

Image Credit: windows au

The Underrated Role of Analytics in Dental and Medical Marketing

Starting a new business can be incredibly difficult and this is especially true in the dental and medical fields where the competition is so intense. Providing great care for your patients is not the only thing that matters when you are trying to build a successful dental or medical practice. You could be the greatest doctor or dentist in the world and your practice will still fail if the general public does not know you exist.

Therefore, you must also you do everything in your power to promote your practice to let people know who you are and what you can offer them. You will be out of business quickly if you fail to do this. So what is the most effective way to market a new medical or dental practice online using the tools that are currently available? While there are several answers to this question, there is no doubt that analytics are an essential source of information to market your business. Let’s analyze the underrated role of analytics in dental and medical marketing.

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Buy Now or Buy Later: the iPhone 6S vs. the 7

Even with the strong showing of competitors such as Samsung, LG, and HTC, Apple continues to be the trendiest toy on the smartphone block. With rumors constantly circulating about new innovations that the company is attempting to incorporate into its flagship product’s design, it seems as though that, even as the new version of the iPhone is released, consumers can’t help but immediately look forward to next one.

With the holidays fast approaching and iPhone 7 slated for release in September of next year, Apple enthusiasts are faced with the conundrum of upgrading to the iPhone 6S right now or waiting until the 7’s arrival.

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Report on “EMV for a Week Challenge” in Hawaii

In partnership with Gemalto, I spent a week visiting business across the island of Oahu using only a chip debit or credit card for payment. Three other personal finance bloggers joined me in investigating the state of EMV support in their communities.

My “EMV for a Week Challenge” included ten tasks, ranging from buying a magazine at a gas station to hitting a tourist attraction around town. After visiting several neighborhoods and talking with members of the local business community, here is my report on what you can expect when using a chip in Hawaii.

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Gemalto’s “EMV for a Week Challenge” in Hawaii!

By now you should have already received a notice from your financial institutions about updating your debit or credit cards with EMV technology. Cards equipped with “chip” technology have played a key role in reducing payment fraud in many countries, including England where counterfeit card fraud on locally-issued cards went down from a high of 169.8 billion euros in 2008 to 47.8 million euros in 2014.

To showcase the many ways that chip cards make life easier, I’m participating in Gemalto’s “EMV for a Week Challenge”. Starting this weekend I will visit several businesses on the island of Oahu, Hawaii to complete ten tasks using a “chipped” card:

Get coffee at a local (not chain) coffee shop
Make a purchase at a big-box store
Get a meal inside a fast food restaurant
Buy a magazine at a gas station
Get $50 worth of groceries
Buy a tacky t-shirt
Get someone special a bouquet of flowers
Hit a tourist attraction around town
Buy office supplies
Mail the folks at Gemalto a postcard from a local post office

My objective is to provide a real-world take on the EMV card experience. This includes the security benefits EMV cards present, support for the new technology in your community, and other observations I may have while making payments with a “chipped” card.

As part of Gemalto’s #ChipAwayAtFraud campaign, I will be tweeting my tasks through Twitter (@idaconcpts) and posting updates through Linkedin (ddavila). Also, I will post a “wrap-up piece” detailing my experience during the challenge.

During the challenge, I’ll be competing with other bloggers, including personal security and identify theft expert Robert Siciliano and Maryalene LaPonsie from MoneyTalksNews, for the opportunity to win $400 for a charity of my choice. My charity is the University of Hawaii Foundation.

Follow my updates (RTs and @ replies are welcome!) about my EMV card experience in Hawaii and help me win $400 for the UH Foundation.

Let the “EMV for a Week Challenge” begin!

(Image Credit: Aranami)

How To Succeed Post Graduation

Approaching the end of your college career is an exciting time, filled with crucial tasks to accomplish both for graduation and for easing the transition into a career. While there is a lot to do, you’ll find it simpler and easier if assignments are grouped by season. This way you can stay focused on the jobs that are pressing without worrying about spring duties in the fall. Graduation Source has made this easy by creating an infographic to help keep you on track.

For fall, make sure you’ve laid out your year and organized projects in order to acquire improved management skills, reduce stress and increase productivity. You’ll also want to make sure your course requirements will be fulfilled so that nothing prevents you from graduating on time. During winter, prepping a complete resume that competently demonstrates your skills and experience is crucial. This document could help you obtain an internship, whether you find it through professors, your college career office or elsewhere. In the spring, apply yourself with fervor to any internship opportunity by behaving professionally, soliciting feedback and working to gain the trust of your superiors. Once you’ve graduated, you’ll be ready for the summer – whether it’s spent working or taking a vacation – before moving on to the next step in your career.

Image Credit: Andrew Schwegler

How to Select a Marketing Agency for an Addiction Rehab Center

The drug, alcohol and other addiction rehab industry is booming in the United States is booming to the tune of $35 billion in 2014. While there were more than 14,000 treatment facilities back in 2014, existing centers can’t keep up with demand. A total of 2.5 million persons received treatment, but many more need it and facilities are filled to capacity.

Given that there is quite a bit of competition out there when it comes to drug and alcohol treatment centers, many owners of such facilities wonder how to make their treatment center stand out from the crowd and get noticed by the general public. There are many ways that you can go about marketing your facility on the Internet. You can do the marketing yourself or hire a company to do it for you. You can also choose to hire a marketing consultant who will advise you regarding where and how your drug and alcohol treatment facility should be marketed. If you opt for the second option, here are some useful guidelines for hiring the right marketing agency to promote your drug, alcohol or other addiction rehab center.

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Visual Bookmarking: A Better Way to Browse the Web

When you’re on the Internet, you can fall down the rabbit hole of searches. You’re clicking from one topic to another without pause. When you started, you might have been searching for grilling recipes, but when you’re done, you’re on a page about the latest celebrity story. While you might not want to save everything you skim in a day, there’s no way you would be able to replicate the trail you just created, or the interesting articles you want to read later.

At times like this, it helps to save interesting articles, news stories, recipes, celebrity gossip or wallets in one central location. One way to achieve this is through browser bookmarks. While it’s possible to sync bookmarks across all of your devices with certain browsers, including Google Chrome and Firefox, most people never look at their bookmarks after saving a site.

The Solution: Visual Bookmarking

Visual bookmarking services allow you to organize your online interests. They are a place that you can save interesting stories, compelling photographs or tutorials in one place that can be searchable as well as organized into boards or layouts that are easy to track.

When the articles are clipped or pinned to the online organizer, you can gather them by topic for easy viewing later. Some visual bookmarking services may work offline. You can’t always be within range of Wi-Fi or Internet service. If you’re in the backyard trying to grill, you want to be able to view the recipes you’ve saved to your device.

While you are on your laptop at home, you can save a news story about cocktails onto the visual bookmarking service. Later, you’re out for drinks with a friend, and you want to share the story you read. Instead of doing a search for cocktails, your phone is already synched with the data you’ve saved. You can find the board and instantly show your friend the story.

Examples of Visual Bookmarking Services

Clipix.com is an example of a clipping service that allows you to compile links into boards, work offline and compare prices. Clipix can alert you to lower prices on your favorite items, which is something other clipping services don’t offer.

Pinterest.com has over 100 million monthly users, becoming the visual bookmarking tool of choice of most individuals. For comparison, Twitter currently counts 316 million monthly active users and Snapchat hit 100 million this time a year ago, and is now believed to have doubled that.

For additional visual bookmarking options, check this list of Pinterest imitators and this second list of even more Pinterest imitators.

5 Tips to Create a Job Based on Your Personal Knowledge

Finding a decent-paying job you enjoy in today’s market can be tough. You’ve likely heard countless stories from friends and relatives about how professional-level jobs aren’t widely available in their field. Perhaps you’ve even found yourself in such a position.

Fortunately, there’s never been a better time to consider entrepreneurship. The internet allows us to make connections and to broadcast our knowledge widely. This type of advantage may be just what you need to begin a career geared toward your current experience or interest. Whether it’s life experience, academic knowledge or a previous career path, it is possible to leverage that knowledge to develop the position of your dreams. Follow these five tips to create a job based on your personal knowledge.

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