Using Windows Live Writer

With the current trend of social networks and companies enhancing their online profile, creating and maintaining a company blog is a great way to raise your online profile. Microsoft’s Windows Live Essentials is a great resource to create and publish a professional blog for free.

First, download the software package for Windows Live Writer here.

After doing so, you want to choose a blogging platform. You can select a service you currently use (we use Blogger), or pick a new one. WordPress is very popular as well. Enter your login information and you will have an editing window that looks very similar to Word or Outlook. Make a title and starting typing your post.

You can add images and video with ease. Choose “Picture” or “Video” from the toolbar and select the source where they are stored. You can also click on the “Insert” tab for additional multimedia options.

Once you are ready done adding and editing your post, click the “Publish” button and your blog will have successfully added the content! We will continue to keep you informed about other functions that Windows Live Writer offers in order to get the most exposure for your business.

Top Tips to Stay Safe on the Internet

Here are some tips that can ensure your Internet security is not compromised. We hope you find them useful and please feel free to contact us if you have any questions.

• Create different passwords for various accounts, so that if a hacker gets into one account, they can’t get into another. Password management tools like LastPass are available to help save all your usernames and passwords in one database.

• Beware of advertisements that seem “too good to be true”. These are likely frauds and scams and could lead to you voluntarily giving out your information.

• Similarly, be careful of sharing information that is sensitive, such as birth date and social security number.

• Be sure that your anti-virus software is up to date. While this isn’t bulletproof, it will certainly decrease the odds of malware infecting your computer.

• Also keep your software up to date in order to best prevent security breaches. These updates keep viruses and malware away on a continuous basis.

• Keep your browser up to date as well.

• Enable a firewall and have it configured appropriately. Many operating systems will have one built in, otherwise you can purchase it from various venders.

Virtual Collaboration

In today’s work environment, we are often working with people who aren’t in the same physical location. This could include coworkers in the same building or across the globe. Here are some popular tools you can use in order to work with in order to keep in touch.

Instant Messaging

This works similar to email correspondence, except you can see who is online at a given time. Many IM programs are associated with free email accounts, such as Google, Yahoo! AOL Instant Messenger, and Windows Live. Your email address is used to log in to your account. If a coworker doesn’t belong to the same email domain, programs like Pidgin, Spark IM, or Digsby work across multiple platforms. Secure chat options are available with Microsoft Lync Server and ensure that your messages don’t leave the corporate intranet. A free 180-day trial period is available.

Central Storage

An online file cabinet can bet set up to keep documents in a single location. Applications like Microsoft Sharepoint, Dropbox, ADrive, and Box.net ensure secure access to your group’s files.

Track Changes

In Microsoft Word, you can make changes to a document and observe what changes have been made and by whom. This can include an explanation as to why those changes were made, which can be helpful during the stages of revision.

Conferencing Tools

For meetings, consider an audio and visual conferencing tool such as GoToMeeting. This allows attendees to view documents and presentations, while also recording them for future reference.

We hope you find these tips helpful to ensure your team collaboration is efficient.

Web-Based Presentation Tools

While Microsoft PowerPoint is always a popular type of presentation software, there are many tools on the Internet that can be graphically pleasing and engage your audience. Here are some options that we recommend!

Google Docs: These web-based resources includes presentation tools, which makes it easier for collaborative work. You have the ability to import existing PowerPoint slides, and easily incorporate multimedia. Furthermore Google Docs is free to use!

SlideRocket: This offers more advanced functions than PowerPoint or Google Docs, such as automated Flickr searches, and the ability embed RSS feeds. You can also track data about your presentation, such as how many hits each slide received and how long users spent on each slide. Presentations can become interactive with the embedding of forms and polls. SlideRocket is free for the “Lite” version.

Prezi: This tool has become increasingly more popular and allows for more customization of flow, with features such as zooming, spinning, and motion-based depictions. You can easily customize fonts, backgrounds, and more. Prezi works very well with the touch-screen functionality of the iPad too. The basic version is available free of cost.

Cloud Collaboration

A major advantage of cloud computing is the ability to work collaboratively from anywhere, granted you have an Internet connection. Have you ever gone back and forth between a coworker with multiple drafts of a document and have to sort through your email for the most current version? Using the cloud allows you to store this document in one place with up-to-date comments and changes.

Microsoft SharePoint 2010 is a powerful tool that specializes in cloud-based collaboration and content management. It provides a central place for data storage, access, and management. In addition, SharePoint works very well with Microsoft Office, web content, and multimedia.

The system offers simple methods for tagging content, enforcing retention schedules, declaring records, and applying legal holds. This is beneficial for businesses that are subject to regulatory compliance.

This is our final QuickTip on Cloud Computing and we hope you have found it both enjoyable and informative.

Cloud Computing & Scalability

Businesses often are hesitant to commit to large purposes, but many of the resources associated with cloud computing offer a pay-as-you-go model. Since businesses lease space and bandwidth on hardware owned by the cloud, they now need to only lease the amount of resources necessary to satisfy their immediate needs. They no longer have to buy a top-of-the-line server in hopes of maximum future-proofing only to use 10% of the machine’s processing power.

Now you have the option to instead pay a stable and predictable monthly fee to the cloud provider. This easy and inexpensive scalability also includes storage and RAM upgrades. An increase in disk space or processing power is just quickly within reach.

Many of the providers of top business software either already have a cloud-based version or will soon. Several offer free trial periods, but if that’s not enough, you’ll still most likely only pay a monthly fee, not a full upfront price.

Now leveraging the latest and greatest technology for your company no longer requires huge up-front costs, allowing small businesses to access tools previously available only to corporations with substantial IT budgets.