Why is there a Google Map Next to my Competitors Link?

If you have ever Googled a service or business or service you may have noticed a listing of results with a Google Map to the left with the business names next to them.  These results are generated by using the Google Local Business Center service.  Add your business listing and details to this service and put your business name into the appropriate category and it will be added to the listing. Google helps you to step through the process very easily with a video and help files.  As part of my Web Design business I do this as part of my service for all clients.

If there is a lot of competition for your market and related bsuinesses have already your site may not appear on the listing and you have to work on regular Search Engine Optimisation techniques to ensure that Google lists you higher.  However if your competition has not added their site then you may possibly be the only listing there.

Here are 5 tips for adding your business to the Local Business Center your site

1. Fill in all the categories that are there for your niche (research your keywords to make sure the categories are accurate).  You can create your own categories if you do not like the ones Google presents to you.
2. Ideally have a local number with the local prefix.
3. The closer your business address is to the city centre the better as Google checks this. 
4. If possible add some additional information, an image or a video as this shows up attractively on the map and also shows that you are not just a spammer.
5. If you have not done so on your site create your address in a hcard format which is an XML standard for writing your contact details.  The current buzz is that this makes your details more accessible to Google and the Business Center.

5 Twitter tools to Waste the Rest of Your Day

Here are some tools that you can while away the whole day on Twitter with looking at who is following who, counting your followers, grading your performance and so on.  One for a rainy day up a mountain with a broadband connection.

• Twitter Grader  http://twitter.grader.com/ - Allows you to calculate your Twitter Grade.  I played with this for a while and basically you have to be tweeting regularly (every day really  as if you stop your grade slides away down) and also you have to be followed by people with lots of followers.  Check out the site.  It is fun to see where you are in the ranking for your area.
• Twellow - http://www.twellow.com It claims to be a Twitter Yellow Pages.  It is built like a ?Yahoo search engine and looks at your profile and then puts you into a section.  Lion taming has no section.
• Doesfollow http://www.doesfollow.com/  Check who is following who.  Its like when you were (or are) a teenager and asked if X was dating Y.  Now you can do this all day long.  I check to see if @Oprah has seen the light yet but she hasn't to date.
• Twitoria - http://www.twitoria.com - Checks your (or others for that matter - strange) to see if they have been sending Tweets.  Useful for cleaning out inactive followers who may have been either spammers or just joined Twitter and  gave up when their fingers or brains got tired.
• Xefer http://xefer.com/twitter - Shows when you tweet and when you reply.  Cool graph if anything else.  No surprise that I don't tweet when I am asleep (well except when I slip in the odd feed).

PowerPoint Tip that You Will Always Use

I use this tip in most PowerPoint presentations that I give. Short simple and effective.

When you are in slide show mode and someone asks a question and you want to focus the audience attention on the question and not on the slide then either hit 'b' (for black) or "w" for white. The screen will go black or white.

This is useful if there is a pause in a presentation as well where the meeting goes off into another discussion but at some stage you will be returning to the presentation.

Try it believe me it is part of your tool kit that you will always use. Short and sweet. Let me know what you think of it.

1000 Updates - Confessions of a Twitterhollic

As this is my 1000th update on Twitter I had thought of doing a thoughtful well written piece on social media Twitter.  But I quickly gave that up as there are hundreds of sites out there shouting out this type of information so whoosh into the bin.

So I thought back to the places where I have sent tweets from to date.  Here are a few that I admit to at least (the bathroom story will have to wait)

In Hospital

I was visiting someone in hospital last week with my wife and as she chatted and my interest in the conversation lagged., my hand drifted to my IPhone and I quietly opened Tweetie.  I saw a Tweet that interested me and quickly re-tweeted it.  Fix complete I returned my dutiful stare to the conversation.  Fix complete.  They thought I was sending an SMS, dream on - SMS is sooo 90s!!

Stuck In Traffic

Most mornings I spend a little time stuck in traffic - same place every time - unfortunately it is in a 3G blackspot but I still manage a couple of Tweets as I edge along slowly.  Don't tell the police please, but my followers are screaming out for those critical stuck in traffic the updates.

First Thing  in the Morning - Last Thing at Night

I open up Twitter first thing in the AM and last thing at night (which is often the AM these days as well) and check my Tweets and more often not send a quick tweet or response to messages.  Right after brushing my teeth maybe even during.  When will they make an IPhone that brushes teeth?

Tweetdeck

Boring I know but in the evenings Tweetdeck is on all the time while I work on my web projects, study for my BA in Spanish or just plain surf the web. 

Beach

I tweeted from the middle of an empty beach last week in Kerry.  Beautiful view of Mount Brandon and of course had to be shared with my followers.  Snap picture.  Quick tweet.  Now back to the view.

What sort of places have you tweeted from?

Downloading Music

This article does not condone the illegal download of music.  It is merely meant to explain how content can be downloaded using the Internet torrents.

A lot of people ask me how to download music and content from the internet so here is a simple step by step tutorial on how to do this.

Torrent Client

First and foremost the best and non visur laden method of downloading content from the Internet is to use one of the many torrent clients that are out there.  I use Utorrent and find it reliable and intuitive. You can download this from www.utorrent.com  Downalod and install.

Find Content

There are many torrent web sites out there but I usually use www.torrentz.net which searches all the torrents sites.  Go to this type in what you are looking for and it will present you with a list of links to torrent sites that have the content you are looking for.

Click on one of these links.

This will bring you to the site.  Many of these sites have unrelated links that you are not interested in.  Click on the link that says Downlaod Torrent.

Once you have done this the link should automatically open up your torrent client (Utorrent in this case).

Download

The speed of the download will depend on the number of seeds that have this content.  The more seeds (or other computers on the Internet) that have the content the faster the download will take.  It can vary between minutes and sometimes hours and also depends on the size of your download.

You can monitor the progress of your download on the client.  From time to time a downalod will fail.  If this is the case go search for another source for your files and try again.

Have fun...

10 Second Tip

Today's Teky Tip is short and sweet they don't all have to be detailed with screen shots.  Its is using PDFs for presentations.  So often we try and convert a word document or an Excel spreadsheet to PowerPoint when if you just use a tool like PDFCreator it will easily allow you t oprint files to PDF and then allow you use the full screen feature of it to present a presentation like report.

Download it, Its free

Save Money Booking Ryanair Flights

Just a tip for those of you who use Ryanair often. The airline charges 10 euro per person when booking flights by credit/debit  card . There is a way around it though If you buy Ryanair vouchers on the website (very easy process) and then use the vouchers to buy your flights, there are no extra charges for using your
card.  When you buy the vouchers, you get the code immediately and then you  just use that to pay for your flights therefore dodging the extra €10 per person for use of a debit/credit card.