Internet Seo Blog

When author Nicholas Carr began researching his book on whether the internet is ruining our minds, he restricted his online access and email and turned off his Twitter and Facebook accounts.

His new book The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains argues the latest technology renders us less capable of deep thinking. Carr found himself so distracted that he couldn’t work on the book while staying as connected, as is commonplace.

“I found my inability to concentrate a great disability,” Carr said in an interview.

“So, I abandoned my Facebook and Twitter accounts and throttled back on email so I was only checking a couple of times a day rather than every 45 seconds. I found those types of things really did make a difference,” he said.

After initially feeling “befuddled” by his sudden lack of online connection, Carr said, within a couple of weeks he was able to stay focused on one task for a sustained period and, thankfully, able to do his work.

Carr wrote a 2008 Atlantic magazine piece that posed the controversial question “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” and wanted to dig deeper into how the internet alters our minds.

His book examines the history of reading and the science of how using different media changes our brains. Exploring how society shifted from an oral tradition to the printed word and to the internet, he details how the brain rewires itself to adjust to new information sources.

Reading on the internet has fundamentally changed how we use our brains, he writes.

Facing a torrent of text, photos, video, music and links to other web pages combined with incessant interruptions from text messages, emails, Facebook updates, Tweets, blogs and RSS feeds, our minds have become used to skimming, browsing and scanning information.

As a result, we have developed sharper skills at making fast decisions, particularly visual ones, Carr says.

But now most of us infrequently read books, long essays or articles that would help us focus, concentrate and be introspective and contemplative, Carr writes.

ARE WE LIBRARIANS?

He says we are becoming more like librarians – able to find information quickly and discern the best nuggets – than scholars who digest and interpret information.

That lack of focus hinders our long-term memory, leading many of us to feel distracted, he said.

“We never engage the deeper, interpretive functions of our brains,” he said.

To illustrate, he likens short-term memory to a thimble and long-term memory to a large bathtub. Reading a book is like filling the tub with water from one steadily flowing faucet with each thimble of information building upon the last.
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By contrast, the internet is countless fast-flowing faucets, leaving us grasping for thimbles of disparate information to put in the tub and making it harder for our brains to draw connections and have cogent recall.

“What we are losing is a whole other set of mental skills, the ones that require not the shifting of our focus but the maintaining of our focus,” Carr said.

“Contemplation, introspection, reflection – there is no space or time for those on the internet.”

Carr says for centuries books shielded our brains from distraction, focusing our minds on one topic at a time.

But with devices such as Amazon’s Kindle and Apple’s iPad, which incorporate eReaders and web browsers, becoming commonplace, Carr predicts books too will change.

“New forms of reading always require new forms of writing,” he said.

If writers cater to a society that is chronically distracted, they will inevitably eschew writing complex arguments that require sustained attention and instead write in pithy, bite-sized bits of information, Carr predicts.

Carr has a suggestion for those who feel web surfing has left them incapable of concentration – slow down, turn off the internet and practice the skills of contemplation, introspection and reflection.

“It is pretty clear from the brain science that if you don’t exercise particular cognitive skills, you are going to lose them,” he said. “If you are constantly distracted, you are not going to think in the same way that you would think if you paid attention.”

To be fair, I wasn’t overly surprised to see this as Tarka is the only non-chain restaurant I know of with their own iPhone app; however, I was encouraged to see evidence that this small restaurant is engaging their patrons through email marketing and apparently they’re not alone.

A recent article in the Vancouver Sun showcases the tale of restaurant Local Kitchen & Wine Bar, owned by Vancouverite Michael Sangregorio, and his efforts to spread the word before and after his grand opening. He attributes his email marketing campaigns to helping his business climb into top 10 restaurant listings in Vancouver.

According to the article, Michael’s efforts started even before the doors were open. “Every day people were coming by to ask about us, so we told them to sign up for the newsletter. We got 1,000 subscribers.”

Michael was able to leverage the interest of desperate foodies wandering by his restaurant to help raise awareness and give himself a great marketing tool for future specials and promotions.

Local restaurants have a unique ability to be successful with email marketing. Patrons have wandering tastes driven by frequency, special occasions, and the influence of their peers. By providing timely newsletters showcasing new menu items, special deals, and upcoming events, restaurant owners are able to deliver fresh messaging to a receptive audience.

Unlike online retailers who must deal with shop-and-drop customers only interested in one particular product, local restaurants can have a lasting relationship with their customers. Local restaurant owners also have the added advantage of a sense of community identity that their national counterparts will never achieve. All of this makes customers more receptive to receiving email offers and more likely to act on those offers.

In Michael’s case, he used Canadian company Upaknee to deliver and track the success of his email campaigns, but there are many other companies specializing in email list, broadcast, and analytics including Constant Contact, iContact, and Bronto.

Small businesses often find online marketing challenging. Tracking offline conversions through search marketing is difficult enough, but combine that with the schedule of a restaurateur and you start to see why many of these business owners stop with the creation of their website and maybe some reputation management on Yelp. Email marketing offers these busy individuals an easy way to engage patrons and promote their business with timely and targeted offers.

I have not tried every single system out there. However, I have tried a few and have discussed the better ones in another section of this website. And since I have not personally tried every software available out there, the goal of this article is to provide a general overview of what to look for in an email solution provider to determine if the email marketing tool is suitable for your and your business’ needs.

Basically the entire process boils down to four key components. If you can check all four for any given email marketing system out there, go ahead and start playing with it!

Assess the email Marketing Company’s Service and its Compatibility with You and Your Business

Read about the solution provider you are contemplating using both on their website as well as other discussion forums and online communities to corroborate what the company is saying to what people have experienced personally. If something doesn’t smell right at this stage, chances are something isn’t right indeed. So take your time with the due diligence.

If you know other business owners like yourself, reach out to them and ask them about what email marketing solution they are using. Find out what they like and dislike about it. Find out what feature(s) they wished their email marketing system provided.

Most importantly, get a good feel for the provider’s feasibility of use and customer service and support. As an entrepreneur you have very limited time on your hands and the last thing you want to do with that little time is to spend it troubleshooting email marketing software related issues.

Ensure that the company you go with has a good “functionality” track and in the instance it fails, that there is a good customer support program in place that will “fix your problems” with minimal interruption to your operations.

If the system you are evaluating does not pass this first test, I would simply turn back at this point and move on to candidate number 2. Don’t forget – Time is the equivalent of money!

Ensure Double Opt In email Marketing Functionality

Make sure that the system you choose has double opt in technology. Many email marketing system users bypass the double opt in option not deeming it important enough when implementing email marketing campaigns. Contrary to practice, this is actually one of the most important options to implement within your campaign. Double opt in ensures that your subscriber will respond to a automated confirmation email sent to their email address by your email marketing system when the subscriber requests to be signed up to your mailing list.

The only tricky thing here could be that you may already have an existing email list, in which case you will have to provide that list to your email marketing system company. Now some companies will go ahead and add the list to their database. However others will require you to send those individuals an email requesting confirmation. The risk here is that you may have some folks who don’t get see the message or simply do not respond for whatever reason.

If this happens you will definitely loose some email addresses. I would keep track of these and to the extent possible, follow up with these customers personally (hopefully you have retained their contact information). I know it’s a pain but this is the upfront risk of moving onto something bigger and better.

Why would you want someone who has not specifically asked to be on your list anyway? It costs money to send emails so make sure you aren’t throwing money away. Double opt in ensures that your email list is as clean and lean as it can get with only relevant and interested subscribers. Remember, it is not about quantity here, rather it is all about quality.

How Feasible Does Your email Marketing System Work?

Two components are key when evaluating feasibility; ease of email creation and amount of follow-up service required on your end. You can make your life a lot easier if your email marketing system provides multiple email templates you can choose from to craft your newsletter or article. This is a key factor to look out for especially if you are not a web developer who has minimal experience coding in HTML. The last thing you want to do is waste your time designing and tweaking the look and feel of your email message.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s important for your email to be professional and aesthetically pleasing. However, you just don’t have to spend your time on non-value add activities that can be satisfied by a good email marketing system. Oh yeah, these templates should come at no additional cost to you.

You also want to ensure that your email solution provider has a proven track record of good performance and longevity in the industry. Those qualities mean that your system is reputable and likely accepted and respected by most email providers (paid or free). Often what happens is that email providers (i.e. Hotmail) will not accept any emails generated/sent by a particular email marketing system because of its reputation or lack thereof (maybe because it has not been around long enough).

Basically, what you want is an email system that delivers 100% of the time. You want to see your email make a landing on your reader’s Inbox, not their Trash, Junk Mail or Spam folder. You should be just fine if you put in the time researching and conducting your due diligence upfront.

Don’t be Afraid to Pay for a Good email Marketing System

It takes money to make money – I am sure you have heard of that saying before. Although it is not always the case, it is the case most of the time. If all the tests till now have been met satisfactorily, then don’t hesitate to pay for a good email solution. As long as the pricing is reasonable (and you are the best judge of this subjective measure), there is no reason not to engage a well qualified provider and risk loosing more time and money in the long-run.

There is no denying that you need a good email marketing system to have a successfully Customer Relationship Management (“CRM”) program. So go ahead and be cautious, but please don’t be cheap when it comes to selecting the right email marketing partner. Using the best email marketing system for your needs is the number one email marketing secret my friend.

Sunil is the author of the Dubai Information Site, Easy Extra Money Online and Sue the Airlines; comprehensive content focused websites. Having created and sold two successful websites in the past, the Author’s focus on these websites is strictly educational. Information is provided in a casual instructive format and is 100% Free.

Video is one of the most engaging formats from a marketing standpoint, and while email marketers have still utilized video in their promotions, the true potential has yet to be realized- until now.

The problem begins with email clients, which strip JavaScript and Flash embeds due to security concerns.  Because of this, email marketers have been forced to link to videos from a static image within emails to a landing page containing a video player.  The next best solution, and currently the most widely used, is to deliver video through an animated GIF file.  Both solutions will suffice, but neither are ideal.

With the evolution of HTML5, however, the limitations are lifted due to the fact that HTML5 videos are built directly into supporting email clients and browsers, making security a non-issue.  Using the emerging technology, email marketers can deliver full-motion, high-quality video directly to the inbox, with audio and basic player controls as well.

As for broad-range compatibility for viewing HTML5 video, we’re not there yet, but getting closer.  For instance, Outlook doesn’t support the rendering of video of any kind in emails, but newer clients such as those found on the iPhone, iPad, most new mobile devices and in Apple Mail will support HTML5 perfectly.

As the technology continues to evolve, it will one day become ubiquitous, but until then, segmentation will still be required in order to achieve broad compatibility among mail clients.  Still, this is a huge step forward for email marketing and the evolution of its engagement capabilities.

One item spotted in the latest iPhone 4.0 Beta is a new configuration page for Internet Tethering. The page alerts AT&T customers that in order to set up internet tethering, you need to contact AT&T at 611 or visit AT&T’s website. The new message seems to indicate that AT&T may finally be ready to deliver tethering to U.S. customers.

Internet tethering was a feature introduced in iPhone OS 3.0 and is supported by many international carriers. It allows users to share their iPhone’s 3G internet connection to other devices such as their laptops over Bluetooth or USB. AT&T, however, has been slow to roll out the feature to its customers due to concerns about increasing strain on their networks. iPhone 4.0 is due for public release this summer.

Direct email marketing is one of the powerful online marketing solutions for any kind of business or products. You need powerful email marketing software to deliver your valuable newsletters to your subscribers.

There are hundreds of email marketing software tools available in the internet. Choosing the right tool may be difficult and it depends upon your expertise in the market. It is important that you should know how to select and use the best email marketing software, so that you can have the right benefit that it can give you.

Why email marketing is important?
? To target specific audiences.
? Promote your business/products/services to your subscribers.
? Improve site traffic and sales.
? Close relation with existing customers.
? Advertise new product announcements.

Most of the email marketing solutions are online based and requires monthly subscription. This kind of email marketing software may not be suitable for small scale business organizations while considering the marketing budget.

There are lots of downloadable email marketing software tools with similar online email marketing features available in the market with affordable cost. This kind of direct email marketing tools are more reliable than online based products as it will run on your desktop, so that you can see what is actually happening during email delivery process.

Start your email marketing by email marketing software express today with just 4 steps. Configure email account settings, add subscribers, create newsletter message, create and send campaign. Email marketing software express fulfils newsletter campaign in one place – on your desktop; not on invisible server backend. It is great to see the campaign running in front of me and i I can see my email delivery reliability.

Fast message delivery by multiple connection threads and asynchronous message delivery. Clear and simple reports with sent, unsent, yet to process list. Extract bounced email list and update email list. Thanks for providing email opened reports to see who and when my newsletter was opened.

Newsletter editor with numerous email templates. Message personalization based on first name, last name, name, date and email id.

Email Marketing Software Express is not only an Email Marketing tool but is also a built-in email spider that can extract email ids from your POP3/IMAP accounts, outlook, local folders and UR/HTML files.

Suitable for any kind of organization such as
? Email Marketing companies,
? Individuals looking newsletter software,
? Product promotion Companies,
? Advertisement companies, etc.

Product features

HTML Email Templates
Create professional newsletters and campaigns from our 100+ HTML Templates. Ease up your product promotion and save time and money.

Contact Management
Extract email ids from all sources. Group contact lists for different target audiences. Build your new contacts or delete. Keep your contact lists up-to-date by removing the list of bounded emails addresses.

Extract Email address
Extract email ids from your Outlook, POP3 or IMAP server, URL (local). Harvest email ids from any locally stored folder or file.

Manage your contact list
Create contact list from scratch. Create as many list as you like. Divide the contact list by demographics or line of businesses. Merge the list of emails and avoid duplicates. Remove bounced emails from the list.

Import Email list
Add email address one by one. Import the email list (in txt or csv format) you have.

Email Campaigns

Crisp message and perfect layout makes effective email campaigns. Use the available templates and create eye-catching campaigns.

Email Delivery
Success of the email campaigns depends on deliverance of the emails to the customers. See who’s viewing your campaigns.

Track Opens, undelivered and bounces
View who opened and clicked through your emails. Track who unsubscribed. See which emails bounced.

Why email marketing software express is the Best Product for Internet Marketing?
Life Time License, Low Cost: Email marketing software express is activated only once and used for optimizing any number of sites.

Online forex trading allows you to invest and make money from the comfort of your home. It is more profitable than traditional forex trading. All you need is a computer and internet broadband connection. To begin trading, the investor will register for an account with a researched broker and pay the signup fee. After that, he can invest the desired amount. If you want to be successful in forex trading, it is necessary to choose the right forex trading platform.

Since your details will be stored on the forex platform, it is important that it is secure. If the trading platform is not secure, your sensitive information will be susceptible to hackers and identity thefts. Some of the security features include firewall and password encryption. The forex trading platform should offers credit card payment option so that you can pay conveniently. Sites that implement secure payment usually display a padlock symbol in the address bar.

The platform must record the fluctuation of the exchange rate accurately. In this way, the rate at which you trade will be be locked. If the exchange rate plunges, you will lose a lot of money.

The platform should have a user friendly interface. It doesn’t have to offer the sophisticated tool but it should contain basic tools. If the interface is too complicated, a beginner will have problem accessing the tools.

Each trading platform has a different leverage. For example, some platform allows you to purchase $100,000 currencies for only $1000. The higher the leverage, the more profit you will make. Normally, the trading platform will offer leverage such as 50:1, 100:1, and 200:1.

In addition, the platform should offers good customer service. It is best that it offers support for customers 24 hours and 7 days per week. The customer representative should respond quickly to each query.

If you have access to a computer, you’ll want to consider a web-based platform. On the other hand, if you don’t have access to the internet, you should signup for a non web based platform. Before signing up for a platform, make sure you try the demo accounts so that you can determine whether it suits your needs.

With a trading platform, you no longer have to go through a broker. Online forex trading a small scale investor can make money safely through online investment. In online forex trading, the brokers communicate with their client through chat rooms and email.

These days, more and more business owners are starting to see the benefits of using an email marketing service.  From customized message templates that utilize your company logo and a personalized message to send a professional  looking email to customizable mailing lists that send messages only to customers with a history of ordering the product types listed within the message, these services are easily tailored to meet your specific needs, making them suitable for most businesses.  Perhaps one of the best features of email marketing services, however, is the ability to track each email from start to finish.

Email tracking is a very beneficial feature for many reasons.   It helps you determine which emails were successfully delivered and which were rejected by their ISP.  In addition, the tracking service will also provide you the code and reason for the rejection.  This will help you know if the message bounced due to an invalid email, a closed account, a server timeout, or another reason.  This can help you keep your mailing list updated and keep you from paying to send emails that are not being delivered.

Another benefit of email tracking is knowing who is opening each message.  Email tracking will let you know who opened a message and who deleted it without opening it.  This will provide valuable information for a number of reasons.  In addition to showing you what customers continually ignore or delete messages, it also shows you what subject lines result in the most opened emails.  This can help you better title your messages to ensure that more of them get opened and read.

The tracking aspect of email marketing services also lets you know who clicks the links in your messages.  This can further help you to understand what is most successful about your messages and what customers are fully reading the messages and interested in the products or services advertised therein.  The rate of clicked messages will help you understand the rise in sales of products advertised in your messages.

Your tracking ability also shows you who forwards your emails.  Forwarding of messages shows that you have a product that is appealing to customers.  Your tracking program allows you to also see who clicks the links and forwarded messages, further helping you to track the success of each message and helping you to create a messaging formula that will be the most successful for your business.

There are many reasons why it is recommended to use an email marketing service, from cheaper advertising per person to a higher success rate.  Perhaps the best reason of all, however, is the ability to track each message.  Knowing how many messages were opened and how each message performed in regards to increasing sales is very beneficial to any business.  In all, email tracking is only one part of a marketing package, but when combined with the other aspects that are also included, it is part of perhaps the most valuable marketing tool available.

These days, more and more business owners are starting to see the benefits of using an email marketing service.  From customized message templates that utilize your company logo and a personalized message to send a professional  looking email to customizable mailing lists that send messages only to customers with a history of ordering the product types listed within the message, these services are easily tailored to meet your specific needs, making them suitable for most businesses.  Perhaps one of the best features of email marketing services, however, is the ability to track each email from start to finish.

Email tracking is a very beneficial feature for many reasons.   It helps you determine which emails were successfully delivered and which were rejected by their ISP.  In addition, the tracking service will also provide you the code and reason for the rejection.  This will help you know if the message bounced due to an invalid email, a closed account, a server timeout, or another reason.  This can help you keep your mailing list updated and keep you from paying to send emails that are not being delivered.

Another benefit of email tracking is knowing who is opening each message.  Email tracking will let you know who opened a message and who deleted it without opening it.  This will provide valuable information for a number of reasons.  In addition to showing you what customers continually ignore or delete messages, it also shows you what subject lines result in the most opened emails.  This can help you better title your messages to ensure that more of them get opened and read.

The tracking aspect of email marketing services also lets you know who clicks the links in your messages.  This can further help you to understand what is most successful about your messages and what customers are fully reading the messages and interested in the products or services advertised therein.  The rate of clicked messages will help you understand the rise in sales of products advertised in your messages.

Your tracking ability also shows you who forwards your emails.  Forwarding of messages shows that you have a product that is appealing to customers.  Your tracking program allows you to also see who clicks the links and forwarded messages, further helping you to track the success of each message and helping you to create a messaging formula that will be the most successful for your business.

There are many reasons why it is recommended to use an email marketing service, from cheaper advertising per person to a higher success rate.  Perhaps the best reason of all, however, is the ability to track each message.  Knowing how many messages were opened and how each message performed in regards to increasing sales is very beneficial to any business.  In all, email tracking is only one part of a marketing package, but when combined with the other aspects that are also included, it is part of perhaps the most valuable marketing tool available.

Emails are a wonderful thing. It is so simple to contact someone, send them information and receive a reply in just a matter of seconds. No waiting for the postman and no costly postage stamps. If you are wanting to contact a lot of people in a short period of time, this is simple to do with email. It is also very simple for people to contact you also. Sometimes this can be a bad thing. If you become the target of scams, identity theft, harassing emails or a bad computer virus, then you know that having an email address can be a pain. But did you know that it is possible to find out who has been sending you these malicious emails? Read on to discover how to do a reverse email search.

It is important that you familiarize yourself with the components that make up an email address. Arming yourself with this knowledge will make it easier when you begin to study how to track an email address.

The first part of an email address is the header. This is the most important piece of information that will provide you with the clues that you need to trace an email. So let’s look at a header more closely.

Uncovering the header to the email is not always easy. Some email providers will have the headers clearly revealed and others will make it a little harder to discover. The best way to find out how to uncover your email headers is to do a search for your email provider and find out how to uncover the header. Each email provider will have a different way of uncovering your headers.

Now that you have the header opened, you need to find the part that says received from. This is where the gold lies. It will have two sections that you are looking for, “from and by”. The “from” part shows you which machine is sending the message and the “by” part will show which machine is accepting it.

In this section of the header, you will see an IP address. You can easily spot this because it is a series of numbers that are broken up by periods. This IP address can be plugged into a reverse DNS lookup service that can be found on the Internet. There are a few free to use service providers available. This IP address will reveal the user’s ISP or employer.

Another thing that you can do once you have the ISP address is to locate a service that will show you where the ISP is located geographically. You can narrow this down by city and state which will make it easier to track down the sender.

That is the basics of how to do a reverse email search. On occasion, it will not be helpful if the sender is using a economizer that will cloak the IP address. Spammers will often place fake “received from” headers in the emails that will make it almost impossible to be able to track an email address. But if you have access to the right information, you can learn how to do a reverse email search.