7 Reasons Why Atlanta Needs Google Fiber

A few weeks ago, Google, the world's largest search engine, said 24 cities, including nine Atlanta cities, were under consideration for Google Fiber, the super-fast internet service. Cities being considered include Atlanta, Avondale Estates, Brookhaven, College Park, Decatur, East Point, Hapeville, Sandy Springs and Smyrna.

Southern Web, an Atlanta-based web design and development firm, is excited about the possibility of Google Fiber coming to Atlanta. That's why we've put together this infographic, which explains all of the positives that Google Fiber could bring to Atlanta and our surrounding cities.

Increased home values, enhanced access for local schools and libraries, customer savings and some of the quickest consumer Internet connection speeds currently available in the country are just a few of the benefits we could see.

The infographic was a group venture between graphic artist Ron Griffel, content strategist Ryan Watkins and Southern Web’s Director of Internet Marketing Cullie Burris.

Ryan Watkins is a content strategist with Southern Web Group, LLC., an Atlanta-based web development, design and marketing firm. In his spare time, Ryan enjoys blogging, staying up-to-date with the latest social media trends and outdoor adventuring.

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Phone, Fax and Web Chat - The Evolution of Customer Service

If there's one job that will always be in demand, it's customer service. We can automate the production of many products, and Amazon is even toying with automating the delivery of smaller products with drones, but there's one thing that machines can't do as well as humans, and that's provide customer service.

Over the last few decades we've seen a huge amount of innovation in customer service, and today there are a huge number of different ways to contact businesses:

• Letters
• Telephone
• Fax
• Email
• Web forms
• Live chat
• Social Media

In spite of all of those contact options being available, most of us still prefer to pick up the phone. In fact, according to Maintel, who produced this fascinating infographic on modern customer service trends and the ways in which businesses are failing customers, around 79% of consumers prefer to pick up the phone instead of using other contact methods.

Over the last 20-30 years, technology has come a long way, but at the end of the day the most important thing in the customer service equation remains the same - dealing with helpful people.

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3 SEO Content Bits to Boost Your Site’s Traffic

Bells and whistles – you’ve managed to fill every page of your site with these. Intricate details sit and stare back at users, site visitors, even to those inanimate bots. Let’s assume you haven’t forgotten to do the same kind of pampering with your content. 

Wait... what?! You did forget. Frankly, you are not alone. A whole bunch of other SEO folks out there (you know who you are) neglect to integrate content in their daily duties. Sure, there are wide ranging SEO techniques waiting to get implemented, right?

But that doesn’t mean you can’t treat content with the same scrutiny and confidence. Content makes the bulk of pages and multiple sites. It is your primary offer to the unsuspecting net user.

To help your content get back to its tiptop shape, here are 3 bits of SEO Content awesomeness:

1. Keywords: the long tail trend

1.  

It’s not that accurate keywords aren’t working anymore. It’s just the trend and the undeniable direction search engines have been prepping for. Most search engines have started to anticipate the coming of human-form search queries: question-like statements.

Long tail keywords support this type of statement queries. Search engines are adjusting in line to this anticipation; it’s time for your content keywords to catch up.

2. Review of existing literature
 
It’s safe to assume that what you’re giving your users is unique. But really, it is no longer safe to think so. In fact, to truly reach the peak of the content’s potential, it is important to assume otherwise: that the rest of the content curators out there are giving the same piece of advice.

Then what? Go act on this belief. If it were true, perhaps, you must study how others have been delivering the goods. If you are planning to give the same piece of advice, think of a different approach to presenting it. Then think of things that you can add in the mix: humor, insider’s tip, so forth.

3. Fusion of eye candy 

Investing in good texts – with zero grammar or plagiarism errors – is an established ingredient for helping SEO pros boosts their sites. But that is not the end of it. Content wordsmiths can do as far as adding videos, infographics, and thought-provoking images.

These extra sweets need to be relevant; otherwise,they only risk creating unhealthy distractions for your viewers. Also, try to create uncanny connections, like a Pokémon Psyduck (a symbol for dilemma and headache) plus a nagging issue. These kinds of connections don’t just reflect clever bouts of awesomeness; it also makes viewers laugh – a better substitute to a yawn-inducing piece of crap in front of them.

Creating powerful or compelling content is a challenge in itself. This is one sufficient reason to stick and work for it. This kind of attribute sits well among SEO pros, particularly, those who love challenges.

Ultimately, content is part and parcel of the most fundamental SEO techniques. That being such, there are no incentives in ditching it. So, why ditch it?

Authir Bio: Hi I am Chris Johnson, an expert-level blogger with a blogging experience of 9 years. I tried several different niches (like business, finance, sports, health). Yet, I chooses to settle mainly for his favourite: the Education niche.

Follow me at:
G+ -https://plus.google.com/u/0/112780820750067389728/posts
Twitter- https://twitter.com/babyChris818
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/johnson.chris808

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So Just What Is Mozilla Up To With the Firefox OS?

Perhaps you have heard whispers of it in passing, or maybe you don’t know anything about the new Firefox open source mobile platform. That’s right. There’s a new kid on the block, so to speak. The Mozilla project was actually created in 1998, with the release of the Netscape browser suite source code.

The idea was to push the idea of the open web, and open source. For those not familiar with the term, open source is software that is “open” to the public, and possibly regulated, but not controlled by any for-profit company. The concept is that this allows thousands of programmers access to what otherwise would be closely guarded corporate secrets, thereby releasing unprecedented innovation in the browser market.
The project spread beyond expectations, first creating Mozilla 1.0, the first major browser from the open community. At the time, over 90% of the market used Internet Explorer for browsing, simply because they didn’t know there were alternatives.

In 2003, the non-profit Mozilla Foundation was created, funded by individual donors and a variety of companies. The role of the foundation was to manage the project and promote openness, innovation and opportunity on the web over competition and profit.

Firefox 1.0 was released in 2004, and in less than a year had been downloaded over 100 million times. New versions have continued to come out, and the popularity has grown. On the tenth anniversary of Mozilla in 2008, Firefox reached a 20% worldwide market share, renewing competition, accelerating innovation and improved Internet for everyone.

Now Mozilla is attempting to do the same thing in the mobile field market. Firefox OS is planned as a community-based platform for mobile devices. It will utilize open standards and approaches such as making HTML5 applications that are just as robust as native apps on iOS and Android.

Though Android is supposed to be an open-source platform, it is not completely so. Windows Phone and iOS are nowhere close. Mozilla has repeatedly said the Firefox OS (nicknamed Boot to Gecko, or B2G) was construed not so B2G would succeed, but the web would. That is, the base motivation is to show that the standards-based open Web, cannot only openly compete with the two (or three) major platforms, but force the same type of innovation the Firefox browser has brought to the web.

Mozilla hopes to bring the browser back to the forefront of a mobile experience, rather than playing second fiddle to the native apps on the phones. The Firefox OS is designed to run apps from web technologies such as HTML5, allowing those apps to run on any handset (or any other device) with a browser, regardless of platform.

For developers this is a boon, because it removes the need to rewrite code for cross-platform operations. For users, it’s great because the apps can be used on whatever device is handy.

Mozilla has been working to introduce the Firefox platform as a cheap under £80 smartphone option in countries with little exposure to smartphones, such as Latin America and Eastern Europe. The idea is that it is easier to introduce a new platform and show its effectiveness in a market where the other platforms have not already secured a foothold.

So can the idea succeed? History and the numbers certainly support it. There are about 100,000 iOS developers and 400,000 Android developers compared to ten million HTML5 developers (roughly). The Firefox browser has just reached version 25, and the innovation charged by this open community has carried over to all the competitors.

Certainly there is still work to be done, but many people’s confidence lies in the advances web technologies have already made in the last 20 years. Things like including interactive animations and imbedding video in a webpage without a plug-in, as you can with HTML5 and AJAX, were less than a concept back in the 1990’s and early 2000’s.

Mozilla is taking on a big challenge, and some mighty big opponents with deep pockets, but as the Linux-system demonstrates, open-source will always have a devout following, and Mozilla is on the path to opening up the entire mobile market.

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Top Reasons Why PlayStation 4 Is An Interesting Choice

Gaming consoles provide great entertainment to gaming lovers. With the advancement in technology, gaming enthusiasts are getting advanced consoles these days. PlayStation 4 from Sony Computer Entertainment is an interesting game console that was released recently.

Sophistication: PlayStation 4 is a highly sophisticated gaming device for the variety of features it has. All options are interesting and the flexibility of usage provides customers great satisfaction.

Enhanced Experience: PS4 is integrated with advanced graphics chip and processor. It also has an HDMI port and this facilitates playing games by connecting the console to high definition televisions of the day. This gives people a highly interactive playtime experience.

Rich Features: PS4 has a flash card reader and the hard drive can be upgraded. The inclusion of new features has given people high level of excitement.

Configurations: PlayStation 4 is available in two configurations including basic and premium. Premium configuration provides advanced features and specifications and is therefore expensive.

PlayStation 4 can throw away people from boredom. It is a great feel to sit with family and play games and spend time in gaming. And, PS4 has created great buzz in the entertainment market with highly advanced features and people love it a lot.

Christina Jones is a professional technical blogger and she writes regular shopping review for gaming consoles.

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How To Make Videos Responsive with CSS

A responsive website means It will respond to your browser sizes or I can browser stretches. The basic idea of it is to give optimal viewing experience to visitors, nowadays you will rarely see a unresponsive website. If you remember a Jquery snippet I posted about detecting browser real time size It is also responsive. So basically in order to make websites responsive on load you need a meta tag that helps you to stretch/resize the elements of your website but It's not required for this tutorial.

So for this tutorial, only videos with iframe, embed or objects works. You can get the iframe code of any videos from popular websites like YouTube, DailyMotion, Vimeo, MetaCafe etc.

Let's make our style, here's the css we need(if you are a beginner make sure you put the codes within <style>) :

 .Responsive-Video {
    position: relative;
    padding-bottom: 56.25%;
    padding-top: 30px;
    height: 0;
    overflow:
    hidden;
}
   
.Responsive-Video iframe, .Responsive-Video object, .Responsive-Video embed {
    position: absolute;
    top: 0;
    left: 0;
    width: 100%;
    height: 100%;
}

So after adding the css to your web page, add your video embed code within the div class given below(I know this is NOOB! )  :

<div class="Responsive-Video">

    </div>

Example :

<div class="Responsive-Video">
    <iframe width="760" height="720" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/Mu4ARzSZOmg" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
    </div>

Screenshot : 

If you're using Blogger or Wordpress you can just add the css code within the body and whenever you post a video in your post you can add the embed code within the div class.

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3 Weeks Warning to Business Owners by Google to Save Their Listing

Google has taken many steps to stop link spam and it not only crushes link networks but a large number of businesses are also hurt. It includes many networks who offer link exchange services to the clients but now the situation is changed to great level. Now it would be the wastage of money to buy links before realizing the right condition. On the other hand there are certain businessmen stating that they have got emails from Google asking them to make legitimate progress and save the listing by avoiding illegal means.

It is reported that these mails are legitimate and are coming from Google. The subject line of these emails is “Action Required: You have three week to save your Google Places Listing”.

Jade Wang explained from Google that they are making changes in Google places for Google Maps and Business. So on the basis of these changes, Google is asking business owners to submit reliable information about them. So they are asked to review and confirm their information in Google places accounts. Her further added;

Don’t worry if you have received this email. You should login and review your business information, change it or update it if necessary and then press submit. It is required to perform this step to save your listing and to stay in Google Map on or before February 21, 2014. Otherwise you have to undergo the process of PIN verification and Google Places. There might be certain reasons of it and some might be;

• · It is possible that Google is testing a new variable which is looking to add in the algorithm with the name of “response time” and wants to see that how quick business owners respond it.
• · Google does not believe on its algorithm, actually it is said that Google wants to weed out bogus businesses so it needs help.
• · It can be a test to know that how many SEOs are still following the updates and wanted to remove those who are no more active from its SERPs.
• · Google is trying to refine its list by removing irrelevant listings and keep only those who pick the phone when you call them.
• · It is not an effort only to provide the right results and information to the users but the quickest one in performing it. There are people who take too much time on their queries so they can get quick results in less time with the help of these updates.

 

 

Author Bio:
Asjad Afzal
CEO
YourSeoCompany Australia
http://www.yourseocompany.com.au/
support@yourseocompany.com.au

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4 Myths About Cloud Computing You Should Know

 

Cloud computing is a term that involves delivering hosted solutions over the internet. These solutions are broadly categorized into three groups: IaaS, PaaS and SaaS. So, we can see that cloud service come in different forms. This might have probably caused some entrepreneurs to be doubtful about how this technology will have an impact on their companies. I am sure it is because of this ‘doubtfulness’ and lack of proper knowledge about cloud computing, that various myths have proliferated, concealing the true benefits it provides, like reducing expenditures and enhancing business agility.

Here I have discussed some common myths and misconceptions about cloud computing to give a reality check on it.

When compared to on-premise alternatives cloud computing is less safe

A common hesitation in migrating into the cloud lies in the issues of privacy and security. Because of the cloud system’s deployment of essential business data to the internet, IT professionals see on-premise system as being less susceptible to risks and security breaches. However, contrary to the notion, cloud computing is safer than on-premise system deployment.

Cloud computing is appropriate only for small businesses and consumers

Unlike small firms that have lesser system-data, which need to be migrated to the cloud, big companies generally have legacy systems with a huge data-pool and more requirements, which slow the cloud adoption to some extent. This kind of complexity might have given the notion that cloud is not right for big businesses, when in reality; it leads to development of cloud services, which are inclusive and meet stringent rules. Integrating the cloud computing with on-premise systems in two-tier ERP model has proven to be useful for large enterprises, while running subsidiaries, particularly on a global basis.

Cloud computing is not apt for mission-criticalsituations

Businesses that are involved with mission-critical events run completely on Groupon, Amazon, cloud-Netflix, and Google to name a few. In the Asia-Pacific region, mission-critical apps continue to move into the public cloud like CRM, human-resource management and ERP. This provides better business agility in comparison to the traditional delivery models or public clouds.

Private clouds provide cloud-computing benefits withoutany shortcomings

The conception that private clouds can offer all the advantages associated with public clouds without any issue of privacy is not completely true. Private clouds have disadvantages like limited scalability and a continuousrequirement forsupportsolutions. Public clouds even offer OpEX (Operating Expenses) based pay-as-you-go model in comparison to CapEX (Capital Expenditure) intensive nature of private clouds.

When switching to cloud computing, it is vital to distinguish reality from myth and comprehend the many pros that the cloudenvironment provides. It is even wiseto keep in mind that though not all cloud providers are equal, there is a cloud solution, which definitely suits every organization.

Author Bio: Koustuv Roy is an expert in iPhone app development having worked with a leading mobile app company.He doubles up as a seasoned tech writer, reflecting on topics like web design and development, the future of wireless communication. Get in touch with him Facebook, Google+, Twitter, Linkedin

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3 Digital Marketing Tips In Shaping Your Business

Just like your body, you need to give your business a good shape in order to entice more customers, thus giving your company the chance to grow. There are many ways in which you can improve your digital marketing campaign system. It's time to gear up your site and get it into shape. I want to share to you the 3 digital marketing tips that will certainly revamp your website and help you achieve your marketing goals for 2014.

Here are 3 digital marketing tips that may help you in shaping your business and keeping it on track.

Watch out your Analytics
Analytics is the complete data regarding the statistics of your website. It is important for a business owner to track down the analytical data of his website. There are various websites which offer analysis of a site and allow its owner to know the different important data about his site. Knowing them can the owner of the business a lot because they will see if something is wrong about their website. An example is that when the owner observed that the traffic is exceedingly going down, maybe there is a need for him to create blogs to other channels that will redirect it to his or her website. Other than that, problems with social, search ranking, mobile, etc. may also be known by Analytics.

Focusing your Efforts
Giving efforts for your business to grow is vital. You need to offer your time for advertising and marketing so that more and more customers will come and purchase your product. But all of these efforts will be useless if you don’t have focus. You need to know who your audiences are and who the potential buyers of your product are.

For example, you are selling dental supplies. Your qualified leads (people who have the intent to purchase your products) are dentists or dental students. Why would you want to advertise these things to engineering students?

Therefore, when marketing or advertising, be sure that you discuss the information about your product on potential buyers and not just for any people out there. If the qualified leads are high, then there will be more sales for you.

Better Nothing than Junky Something
Putting something on your website doesn’t mean that it is already good. It should do something there and not a just a piece of thing standing on your site. An example is the contents on your site. Having high-quality contents in your site is an advantage for your marketing strategy. If you have content in your site that is not essential, it is best to change or remove it completely. It will just disappoint your customers and they may think that your site is not reliable. This is also true, especially if all of the things on your site are not right. You will not gain their trust and therefore more and more customers will stop from subscribing your product.
I hope these tips help you in achieving your marketing goals!

This article is written by Dorothy Matthews.

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