Office Divvy on Business, Entrepreneurs, Startups

Why we like WordPress and kittens...

2012-02-06T08:30:00.000-05:00

Folks often ask us:
What CMS platform should I build my website on?

The answer is: It depends... It depends on your company's size, needs, and strategy. Free choices such as WordPress, Drupal, TYPO3, Joomla; or services such as Page.ly, all the way to ecommerce solutions such as XCart, Interspire, Magellan could be part of the options you may need to first look at before you narrow.

But when we are asked:
What is your favorite CMS platform?
Then the answer can be as easy as: WordPress!

When our client's criteria includes, "I want to be able to manage my website in-house with the team I have"; "If I get too busy, and have to get help, it needs to be an application that is mainstream enough to find people for hire at a reasonable cost";"I want to be with a winning company that is not likely to go away in a year or two". A brief summary of reasons its a favorite for us and our clients and as to why are listed below:

User-friendliness
One of the biggest advantages of building your website on a CMS platform is empowering YOU --that is the startup founder, the solo-entrepreneur or the solo-practitioner, the small business owner. On average, we've been able to transition websites in as little as 1/2 day training from our team to our client's team, where they are publishing their content, with confidence, live during training.
High-adoption rate and prestige
WordPress powers 1-in-12 of ALL Content Management Systems (CMS) on the web today! WordPress powers sites like the New York Times, Forbes, TechCrunch, TED, multiple CBS station-websites across America, JayZ and Kobe's websites, National Geographic, Pepsi, the PGA....... just to name a few.
It's Open Source baby!
Open Source means the source code is available to developers who have the opportunity to contribute to the improvements of the code and the right to use the software in any way you see fit (obviously keep it legal). There is no one-body or company with the power to restrict in a unilateral way how the software is used; and there is no single entity on which the future of the software depends. It also means, much like what we're seeing in the android-app landscape, open source can lead to all kinds of folks building plug-ins. WordPress has about 11,000 plugins to take advantage of from excellent SEO (Search Engine Optimization) add-ons, to super spam killers (like Akismet), to shopping cart add-ons, and more.
Comment-spam prevention
Inviting comments on your website is a huge plus. However with engagement can come spam -- which creates risk and ties up resources. We've seen in a joomla site the spam-comments got so out of hand that the hosting bandwidth was exceeded and the site often went down as a result (yikes). The plugin Akismet (one of the best to prevent spam) is available primarily on WordPress.

Check out the infographic below for more ways to love WordPress CMS to power your website:

Credits for this awesome infographic go to:

Chase Granberry with Authority Labs; and Jashua Strebel with page.ly.

For free consultation for your website and online strategy, and how a WordPress site can help your business contact the Office Divvy ™ team:

Chinese New Year: Year of the Dragon | 2012

2012-01-23T10:27:00.000-05:00

by Sim Taing
Co-Founder
Office Divvy ™

This year Chinese New Year began on Monday, January 23, 2012, and ushered in the Year of the Dragon.

Unlike the demon that gets slayed in Western literature, the Dragon in Eastern culture is a symbol of good fortune, power, and intelligence. In Chinese tradition, the Dragon is regarded as a divine beast. It is the only one of the 12 zodiac signs governed by a mythical creature rather than a real animal.

The dragon is the most auspicious and powerful of the 12 signs of the zodiac, one associated with high energy and prosperity.

This year is considered especially auspicious because it is the year of the water dragon, something that happens once every 60 years. As such, optimism and expectation for better times are expected in 2012.

The Chinese has observed the dragon years (which included 1940, 1952, 1964, 1976, 1988 and 2000) are followed by economic expansion and prosperity. One type of expansion is certain, Dragon years have generated baby booms. The year of the dragon has long proved to be an impetus for births. For example, China recently reported that the country is anticipating a 5 per cent increase in the number of babies born this year. Officials expect a baby boom not only in China, but in Taiwan and other Asian countries and territories that observe the New Year festival, including Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, Hong Kong and Macau.

Some prominent dragons include Bill Clinton, Joan of Arc, Al Pacino, and Bruce Lee. These individuals are indeed very fitting to be Dragons.

Personally, I look forward to the economic recovery and prosperity the year of the dragon may bring for all Americans and the world. May the year of the dragon bring us lower unemployment, economic stability, higher income, peace, and good health. I feel these are within our reach this year.

* * *

On a separate note, the year of the dragon this year fell on the same day as National Pie Day. I'm telling you, this year will be a lucky one. :)

_______________
Related Blog Posts:

Year of the Rabbit: A positive and inspiring outlook for 2011?
Year of the Tiger: What does it mean for Business?

First Palm Coast Entrepreneur Night of 2012

2012-01-11T08:13:00.000-05:00

...the first Palm Coast Entrepreneur Night of 2012 will take place at the Europa Lounge and Bistro at European Village on Tuesday, January 31, 2012 at 5:30 PM.

Palm Coast Entrepreneur Night is free to attend. The event is sponsored by Office Divvy ™ and typically attended by 40 to 60 participants, who are either entrepreneurs or aspiring entrepreneurs, investors looking for businesses to invest in, and professionals who provide support services to entrepreneurs. participants come from all cities from Flagler County, Daytona Beach, Ormond Beach and other locations.

The Palm Coast Entrepreneur Night Features:

• Complimentary Appetizers provided by Europa Lounge
• Great people to chat, relax, and network with
• Full Liquor Bar (cash bar)
• Prizes / Raffle items

plus:

• A chance for you to pitch your business, or new business idea to an open and interested audience.

You can find a recap of the last event of 2011 and a video here.

For more information call 386.445.4153 or RSVP on meetup.com

Palm Coast Entrepreneur Night Recap | November 2011

2011-12-13T09:00:00.000-05:00

2011's last Palm Coast Entrepreneur Night took place on November 29th, 2011.

Nearly 50 entrepreneurs from Palm Coast and Ormond Beach, along with folks who provide support to entrepreneurs attended the event. It was great being among a diverse group of peers, exchanging ideas, and just being able to relax and enjoy ourselves.

We have uploaded the pictures and a video from the Entrepreneur Night to our facebook page. And here is a video recap of the event:

Next event will also be the first event of 2012. It will take place at Europa Lounge and Bistro in European Village on January 31st, 2012 between 5:30 and 8:30 PM. For more information on the event call 1.888.533.4889

Great Infographic on How Google Adwords Works

2011-11-29T08:13:00.000-05:00

Excellent infographic on how your keywords vis a vis your landing-page content affect your Google Adwords performance:
Source/Infographic by Pulpmedia Online Marketing

An awesome video on Coworking comes from France

2011-11-22T08:18:00.000-05:00

Good video from Mutinerie --a coworking space in Paris, France:

...very well done, kudos!

How to properly send off a team member

2011-11-18T08:21:00.000-05:00

Our time with Chelsea was as sweet as the cupcakes we had in her honor yesterday.

While she was a team-member, she's completed her studies, passed her exams and she's now moving on towards her chosen career-path in the health-and-wellness field.

In her exit interview, Chelsea said:

"I've been here a short time, but I definitely feel I've been a part of something so much bigger than I am."

You are a very special person...

God Speed Chelsea!

Where in the world is coworking?

2011-11-09T08:28:00.000-05:00

Number of coworking spaces worldwide as of October 2011 is 1,129.

North America still has the largest number, 531; and a healthy year-over-year increase of 76% (Oct 2010 vs. Oct 2011). The numbers and this beautiful map is from the 2nd Global Coworking Survey.

Word of Mouth Marketing Online or Offine -- Infographic

2011-11-08T08:10:00.000-05:00

Excellent infographic from WOMMA (Word of Mouth Marketing Association):

Coworking Membership Benefits and more - Survey Results

2011-11-07T10:12:00.001-05:00

Global Coworking Survey by DeskMag shows individuals increase their productivity and networks by joining a coworking space:

93% of repondents said their social circle had increased a lot,
86% said their business network had grown,
76% reported an increase in productivity.
88% said their isolation had decreased.

Excellent work by DeskMag!

Here's the full presentation on the Global Coworking Survey Results.

One key element in Marketing Effectiveness is...

2011-10-31T11:25:00.001-04:00

One key element in marketing effectiveness is right timing --that is right timing for the target prospect to notice and/or consider your offer. The wisdom in repeating your ads/marketing messages is in that if you do it right, you're increasing the chances of finding that right timing for your audience to notice/consider your offer.

Key reasons to repeat your message are:

Your audience tends to forget what they see and hear within two to three weeks.
The market constantly changes: New products, new competition, and new needs are constant.
Your brand and offers are more likely to be remembered when the timing is right for your audience (meaning they ARE ready to buy, rather than you are ready to seel). If you are seen frequently that helps.

But repeat your message without being repetitive!

Yes, doing it over and over again does help; however you must try to repeat your message without being repetitive. Hang on: "Repeat your message without being repetitive" sounds like an oxymoron; doesn't it?

The idea is to create different versions of the marketing message so that you are conveying variations of your message. If your print ads, banner ads, website always look and feel the same, then the audience is likely to block the message.

Any thoughts? Feel free to chime in through the comments below, or share your thoughts with us on our facebook page, here.

Coworking Jelly in Japan? Yes, there is a MAP for that!

2011-10-25T08:39:00.000-04:00

Jelly is a casual coworking event to work alongside other technical, creative, professional and business people in a welcoming environment.Jellies have taken place in over a hundred cities where people have come together to work for the day.

For those who are in Japan, here's where the Jellies take place today:

Are you interested in Coworking in Florida? < check out the link!

Palm Coast Entrepreneur Night is on October 25th

2011-10-24T09:39:00.000-04:00

Join fellow Palm Coast and Flagler County business owners, current and aspiring entrepreneurs, and folks who support entrepreneurs on Tuesday, October 25th at The Humidor in European Village.

Palm Coast Entrepreneur Night Features:

Complimentary Appetizers
Complimentary Pizza from Mezzaluna
Great people to chat, relax & network with
Win Prizes (Raffle)
$2 Draft Beers (Yuengling)
Red and White Wine Selection
Premium Cigars, including Padrons, Fuente, Aston, Rocky Patel, Cohiba and many more! (Popular Special: Save 25% when you buy four cigars)

plus:

A chance for you to deliver an elevator pitch on your company/business to an open and receptive audience...

When?
Tuesday, October 25th, 2011
5:30 to 8:00 PM

Where?
The Humidor at European Village
101 Palm Harbor Pkwy | Palm Coast, FL | 386-445-2221

PS: In case you can't make it, there will be another event on Tue, Nov 29th, so save the date!

Email Marketing: Fundamentals, Best Practices, and More

2011-10-13T09:25:00.000-04:00

Email Marketing Seminars and Workshops are descending on Palm Coast and Flagler County's Business Community this October 2011.

Constant Contact's Pamela Starr will present two back to back sessions at the Flagler County Chamber of Commerce on Wed, October 19th.

The main session starts at 2:00 PM, and it should not be missed if you really want to understand the 5 Ws of Email Marketing:

What, When, Where, Who, Why...

The Power of Email Marketing (2 pm - 3:30 pm)

How email marketing can help your business grow
How to target prospects and customers
How to avoid being seen as a “spammer”
The best ways to build your email list
How to come up with effective content for your emails
How to help ensure your emails are opened and forwarded
How to incorporate Social Media into your Email Marketing Campaign

The cost is $10 for Flagler County Chamber of Commerce members; and $15 for non members. The Venue is the Flagler Room located at the Flagler Chamber of Commerce.

Space is limited. You must call 386.437.0106 to reserve your space.

* * *

A second, bonus session will follow right after, at 3:30 with Pamela getting into the basics of Constant Contact, if that is a platform you would like to use.

* * *

Another bonus is offered by Office Divvy ™ as a Constant Contact Business Partner in Flagler County, whereby we will hold not one, but two FREE Constant Contact Clinics the following week to help you get started off on the right foot.

We will at no cost setup your account, help you import your database, design your template, and send out your first email free of charge along with a FREE 60-Day subscription depending on the size of your database. You will walk away not only with actionable learnings, but totally setup and ready to go for your email campaigns.

The FREE CLINICs will take place at Office Divvy on Thursday, October 27th (5:30-7PM); and Saturday, October 29th (1 - 2:30PM). To reserve your space in these bonus free clinics, call 386.445.4153

Business2Business Expo at Hammock Beach Resort

2011-09-22T09:19:00.000-04:00

Newly opened Palm Coast Business Assistance Center is holding a Business2Business Expo held at the fabulous Hammock Beach Resort in Palm Coast. The one-day expo will take place on Friday, October 7th, 2011; from 9:30AM to 6PM, and will feature:

Vendor Floor with Booths
Lunch
Cocktail
Keynote Speech
And Breakout Sessions

For more information and to register online, visit the Palm Coast Expo page.

Office Divvy has prepaid 3 full participation spots including a vendor booth, and we're raffling those. If you'd like to enter the raffle, you could do so here: Palm Coast Business Expo Raffle.

Facebook makes further changes to its photo utility

2011-09-21T13:24:00.003-04:00

Back in April 2011, Facebook bought the photo-service divvyshot; a company launched within the Y Combinator --a California based private incubator/startup accelarator.

Divvyshot allowed group photo sharing: with capability for multiple users edit albums, particularly grouped around various events and places. As part of the acquisition, the service has shut down (and the domain now points directly to facebook).

So the move in purchasing divvyshot was more about acquiring talent, than needing their services as they provided them.

Soon after the acquisition facebooks photo improvements started, including a lightbox (non-intrusive second layer pop-up) viewing experience.

One thing most folks liked about the google plus' photo experience has been photos and videos looked larger in one's timeline. Some of the changes facebook released recently adopted capabilities first launched with google-plus, and now, visually multiple photos look better and more predominant in the facebook timeline as well, with larger photo viewing:

A productivity tool to manage your tasks: Hourglass

2011-09-20T09:27:00.002-04:00

Lifehacker has an interesting article on how to use a timer to get more things done by creating a system whereby you dash through your-to-do list; and keep the time as you do it.

Here's an excerpt from the original article: Stop Procrastinating and Dash Through Tasks with a Timer

Trick yourself into starting by deciding to work on the task for just a handful of minutes and guarantee yourself a break at the end of that time. For example, commit to work on your task for 10 minutes. Ten minutes! That's one minute for each finger on your two hands. Anyone can work on anything for 10 minutes, and that includes you and that thing you're putting off.

First, get a timer—an egg timer, a digital watch, a cell phone timer, a software timer, the kitchen timer, whatever's available. Pick your biggest, scariest, most put-off task. Choose the next action, set your timer for 10 minutes, start the timer, and begin.

When the timer goes off at the end of the 10 minutes, stop. Get up, walk around, get a drink, and pat yourself on the back for what you've just done: you stopped procrastinating and got started.

Then, do it again.

I thought this was a fantastic Idea!

So I put it to the test.

We have these great hourglasses at Office Divvy. We typically use them to keep the time in a meeting, facilitated session, panel discussion etc. But today I grabbed the 30-minute and the 5-minute hourglasses to manage my day and tasks.

First, I allowed myself only 30 minutes of play time (which includes having my coffee, checking my facebook and twitter accounts, and writing this blog post). You will see below --from the large hourglass, I'm doing well, time-wise. :)

By the time the hourglass runs out, this post will be up; and I'll move on to my to-do list, using a combination of the 5 and 30 minute hourglasses for different tasks.

What do you think of the idea of keeping a timer as you run through your to-do list?

Do you have other proven methods to effectively manage your day and tasks?

* * *

Related Articles:

by Ky Ekinci | Co-Founder, Office Divvy ™
published on Tuesday, September 20, 2011
Connect: Ky on Twitter | Office Divvy on Twitter | On Facebook

Cigars, Drinks, and Entrepreneurs: Not to miss in Palm Coast!

2011-09-20T08:30:00.000-04:00

Join fellow Palm Coast and Flagler County entrepreneurs on September 27th at The Humidor in European Village for this special event:

Free to Attend!

September 27, 2011

5:30 to 8:00 PM

Enjoy free appetizers, $2 drafts, a large selection of premium cigars, and great people to meet and network with! RSVP here.

This event is proudly sponsored by Office Divvy, and hosted at The Humidor at European Village.

Targeted Facebook Status Update Sharing is not so targeted

2011-08-29T10:56:00.001-04:00

Facebook made a slight improvement to its "update status" module: Who to share a post with is now a little more visible; however the ability to share a post with a "list" is still not there.

Currently, you can decide who to share a facebook status update with based on the following selections:

Public (meaning everyone can see it)
Share it with your facebook friends only
Or a custom selection, such as:

Share with friends AND friends of friends
Specific people (name who to share with among your friends)
You can also name to hide a post from certain people

These are obviously useful selections. Sometimes you can decide to post something only to a few people; or hide a post from someone else (i.e. your mom).

However the ability to share a post with a list is still not there.

As you know you can put your facebook friends into different lists (i.e. family, classmates, coworkers etc. etc.) and "listen to" a particular list when you choose to; but cannot post a status update that goes to the members of a particular list as of yet. Google+ Circles has still that advantage on facebook.

There is no doubt facebook will allow the function of sharing with lists; it's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when. And in this case the sooner is the better.

UX Industry: What is it? Where are the jobs?

2011-08-29T08:16:00.000-04:00

You've heard the term, UX which stands for User Experience, and refers to the architecture and interaction models which affect user experience of an application or device. Here's an awesome infographic showing different kind of careers that exist in interactive device and application fields.

Notice where the jobs are and big gaps of (sometimes several states) in between. Essentially these jobs can be done from anywhere with today's technology. Our challange as a country and business community is to see that done. :)

Credit and Kudos to go to:
Copyright © 2011 by Onward Search. Kudos, and thanks for allowing this infographic to be shared.

How to Use Twitter to Ask Questions and Get Answers

2011-08-23T09:37:00.000-04:00

Twitter is terrific to get answers on things you want to know/learn about. If you have a large following, hopefully you already know that a large following helps because it would get your question on the radar (timeline) of people who are following you.

But what if you have a small number of people who follow you?

Then you have to use the magic of direct-mentions (i.e. "@OfficeDivvy I have a question for you: ....") or the power of hashtags (i.e. "What is the best #Smartphone to buy out there?").

Here's a terrific infographic on how twitter is being used to ask questions:

___
PS: We do not encourage ask questions by DM (direct message) especially to those folks whom you do not know in real life; or have a strong connection with on twitter. Reason why? It comes across spammy.

PPS: Isn't this a pretty cool infographic? The credit goes to InboxQ. And kudos to them for allowing us to use it here, too. :)

Social Media Panel at Flagler County Chamber of Commerce

2011-08-15T09:17:00.000-04:00

On August 11, Palm Coast Chamber hosted a social media panel to a full-house audience of 60 people from Flagler County business world. The panel was moderated by Andy Rice of Creative Consulting and the presenters were:

Ky Ekinci - Office Divvy ™ (on twitter)
Kelly Lohman - SocialSmidge (on facebook)
Cindy Dalecki - Marketing2Go (on YouTube)
Connie Rice - Creative Consulting (on LinkedIn)

Here is a fun, condensed version of Ky's portion on twitter:

n

Twitter launches its own built-in photo-sharing functionality

2011-08-09T15:19:00.001-04:00

Twitpic was a great concept. It's timely launch was admirable. It rode the waves of success thanks to solving a problem on twitter for years. The problem it was solving was the picture sharing on twitter. Then others came, yfrog, instagram, and the like.

Now twitter launches their own built-in photo sharing functionality powered by photo-bucket:

You can learn more about twitter images here.

Happy International Coworking Day!

2011-08-09T09:16:00.000-04:00

August 9th is designated as "International Coworking Day" to celebrate the culture of coworking worldwide! Today you can come in and join other professionals free of charge in our coworking lounge in Palm Coast. Just grab your laptop and join.

We also offer a limited time free coworking in Florida program for anyone to discover the benefits of coworking based on their own schedule. Just follow the above link to obtain your coworking pass(es).

Happy Coworking Day!

Are you too old to be technical?

2011-07-08T17:35:00.000-04:00

Last night a tweet exchange led to a fun new twitter hashtag: #2old2bTech, and a bunch of fun tweets from various users.

Here's the original exchange:

This is how a hashtag was born. According to TweetReach, #2old2bTech already reached nearly 30,000 people in less then 24 hours.

Check out these fun tweets:

Chime in and keep the new fun hashtag alive if you will, that is if you aren't 2old2beTech. :)

7 Things that Randy Pausch Knows About Time Management

2011-06-30T10:06:00.002-04:00

Most people saw Randy Pausch's The Last Lecture through the YouTube videos going around in 2009, 2010.

His book The Last Lecture gives a little more depth to his presentation, his principles, and his life. An interesting chapter in his book is when he talks about what he knows when it comes to time management.

Here are the 7 things he outlines (with some added thoughts):

Time must be explicitly managed like money: Hard to argue against this one; basically his advise is not to invest time on irrelevant details.
You can always change your plan, but only if you have one: Dwight D. Eisenhower says "The plan is useless but planning is essential." Randy is a big believer in to-do lists (and most successful people are) because it helps us break life into small steps/projects to get what we want (or have to) done.
Ask yourself: Are you spending your time on the right things? You may have causes, goals, interests. Are they worth pursuing?
Develop a good filing system: Sounds a bit trivial; but indeed having a good filing system (whether it's in your file cabinet; or in some cloud-filing-solution) proves efficient and leads to increased productivity and decreased frustration.
Rethink the telephone: Living in a culture of excessive holds, voice-mails, conference calls; it's best to have strategies to deal with these situations. There is a very funny cartoon-story by Oatmeal, check it out: 10 Reasons to Avoid Talking on the Phone.
Delegate! We all know that we have to delegate more. Some know more than others; that helps in life and business to learn to delegate better.
Take Time Out: It's not a real vacation if you're reading email or calling in for messages.

Randy Pausch says:

" Time is all you have. And you may find one day that you have less than you think."

You can get his book here: The Last Lecture

Dont' Complain, Just Work Harder ~ Randy Pausch

2011-06-27T09:00:00.007-04:00

"Too many people go through life complaining about their problems. I've always believed that if you took one-tenth the energy you put into complaining and applied it to solving the problem, you'd be surprised by how well things can work out."

Randy Pausch

You can buy Randy Pausch's book here: The Last Lecture

Where do you go when you really need to get work done?

2011-06-14T09:10:00.003-04:00

37 Signals Founder Jason Fried says that the your regular office isn't a good place to do get work done. Your regular office may include your brick-and-mortar daily office location (including your home office).

Where do you really go
when you really need to
get some serious work done?

Fried says he typically gets three kinds of answers to the above question, and the answers refer to either a place or a location, a moving object, or a time of day.

Such as:

A Place: Porch, Kitchen, Coffee-shop, or Coworking space
A Moving Object: A train, an airplane
or A Time Slot: Early morning, Late night etc.

The common thread in these answers is that your regular work environment is not always conducive to get serious work done. In a traditional office there are interruptions and distractions mostly due to managers or scheduled or last-minute meetings. In a home office there are interruptions and distractions such as the clutter in the office, the kids, the pets, the TV, the food in the refrigerator, the chores etc.

Here is the video from TED tals titled: "Why Work Doesn't Happen At Work:"

If you are a home-based business owner, a creative or tech freelancer, or if you even are a slave to a traditional office in Palm Coast and Flagler County landscape, try Office Divvy's private offices or coworking models to increase your productivity and get some serious work done.

For a limited time we're giving away free coworking pass << so click on this link and get yours to try it out.

One More Short Blog Post On Success and Failure

2011-06-13T08:55:00.000-04:00

" It is impossible to live without failing at something unless you live so cautiously that you might as well have not have lived at all, in which case you failed by default."

JK Rowling

Watch this terrific piece on failures ranging from architecture, business, automobiles, politics and more, with the highlight of JK Rowling's speech at Harvard at the end:

...so, if at first you don't succeed, try, try again!

Related Blog Posts on Success and Failure

Tony Bacigalupo on "Co" in Coworking Movement

2011-06-06T07:56:00.000-04:00

Successful movements change the status-quo. Coworking is absolutely one of those movements.

Working independently, alongside others is a simple way of defining coworking. Coworking offers a solution to the problem of isolation that many freelancers experience while working at home, at the same time letting them escape the distractions of home (such as the TV, chores, refrigitator, pets etc.).

Here is a true co-working pioneer Tony Bacigalupo on New Work City (NWC) and Coworking as a Movement:

By the way, if you are looking for Coworking in Florida, we're now offering free coworking passes this Summer. Do click on the above link to get your free coworking pass now from Office Divvy in Palm Coast, FL!

Twitter's email notifications for mentions, retweets, favorites

2011-06-03T11:50:00.000-04:00

Last week I wrote about how twitter announced the upcoming email notifications feature for Retweets, Mentions, and Favorites in my blog post titled "Twitter deals with the shortcoming of new retweet format."

The time seems to have come; the notifications are now active as of June 2, 2011.

Here's the notification received from twitter when our new twitter friend, Mr. Ian Leslie favorited one of our tweets:

Below is a comprehensive overview of the newly introduce notifications, why they have been put in place, and how to ensure they are setup to receive them:

Do you like this blog post? Then "Like" us on facebook.

Related blog posts:

Are you obsessed about delivering value every day?

2011-06-02T16:09:00.000-04:00

Great advice for Entrepreneurs from Matt Heinz, President of Heinz Marketing Inc on Focus:

"Obsess about delivering value daily! No matter what you're selling, this is the most important thing you'll do.
It's about showing up. Treating their business as your own. Constantly thinking about their objectives and how to achieve them (including and beyond the scope of the product or service you're directly offering).
Value isn't defined by you, it's defined by the customer. Or the prospect who might still make a referral. Or the past customer who has a new project for you. The best entrepreneurs I know obsess about value and it permeates their organization."

...very well said Matt! Kudos!

Ashton Kutcher -- the Startup Investor

2011-05-27T08:27:00.003-04:00

Charlie Rose interviewed Ashton Kutcher at the Katalyst Media TechCrunch Disrupt, which took place in NYC on May 24, 2011.

Its not exactly in the interview below, but according to the New York Times, Ashton Kutcher said:

“ I look for companies that solve problems in intelligent and friction-free ways and that break boundaries.”

Now that's pretty specific, smart, savvy and mature. Kudos Mr. Kutcher!

If you're curious about which startups Ashton Kutcher invested in, they include:

Airbnb
Foursquare
Path
Flipboard
Fashism
Skype

...on a side note, at Office Divvy we're courting some international web startups; to bring them to the United States, with the early stage investment and launch done in Palm Coast, FL. So if you have any ambition to become an Angel Investor for investing in Web & Tech Startups, you should contact us. :)

Palm Coast Small Business Assistance Center Manager Joe Roy visits Office Divvy ™

2011-05-26T17:27:00.000-04:00

City of Palm Coast recently established a Business Assistance Center, affiliated with the University of Central Florida Small Business Development Center (SBDC) network.

Established as a UCF SBDC sub-center, under the umbrella of City of Palm Coast, the sub-center will be managed by Joseph Roy.

Joe is a Palm Coast resident. He will be the first new area manager for the SBDC at UCF at Palm Coast.

Joe brings thirty years of executive management and operational experience, along with his own entrepreneurial venture experiences to his new position at the Business Center. He served as President, Senior Vice President of Operations, Director of Manufacturing and Plant Manager for several large companies across the United States, improving profitability and bringing forth fresh perspectives and ideas to improve business performance. Joe has a bachelor’s degree in Education from Norwich University, Vermont, and an MBA from the University of New Haven in Connecticut.

Joe was at Office Divvy ™ today, meeting with Ky Ekinci, co-founder of Office Divvy ™. Joe and Ky exchanged ideas on how to nurture and embrace an entrepreneurial, startup, and small business culture in Palm Coast and Flagler County. Joe also met several Office Divvy ™ members in technology and green energy fields.

We at Office Divvy ™ wholeheartedly support City of Palm Coast's efforts in Economic Development and Small Business Assistance. These good moves and all this work may not yield immediate results, but certainly they are excellent steps in the right direction. Have no doubt, good things will happen and results will come, particularly with the help, support, and the involvement of the business community.

Here's Joe's contacts if you have any questions, have a business need or dilemma, or would like to extend a warm welcome to him:

Joseph Roy, Area Manager
Palm Coast Business Assistance Center
UCF Small Business Development Center
At the City of Palm Coast
386-986-4765

Related articles:

Twitter deals with the shortcoming of new retweet format

2011-05-23T18:49:00.001-04:00

I objected to the new twitter retweet format early on; mainly because it was 'harder' for me to find out who was retweeting my tweets. As time went by, I kind of got used to it. Also the new retweet format made one's twitter stream more colorful. What's that mean?.. It means that I believe a more colorful stream is somewhat an indication of a person who is listening, and who is likely to be a more genuine user. It's just one more way (yes there are other signals) of instantly knowing who is a genuine twitterrer versus a broadcaster or spammer.

See my twitter stream here.

However there has always been one serious shortcoming with the new retweet (aka RT) format, that is the burden is on you to find out who retweeted you. To do that, you gotta log on to the twitter web interface, click on "retweets," and then click on "Your tweets, retweeted."

In the original format when someone retweeted you, it would appear as a mention (i.e. RT @KyEkinci) immediately on your radar. The new retweet format doesn't have that ability to signal the original twitterrer.

Why is so important to know who retweeted you? Because it is!

Well, obviously it is important, that now Twitter recognized the shortcoming of the new retweet format, and announced that they are enabling email notifications for those who retweet you as well as those who favorite your tweets.

As someone who doesn't want to get many emails (I get enough), I will not utilize this feature; but it's a positive step to recognize an issue, and try to fix it. A better fix would have been a standalone "retweet" notification on twitter and hootsuite, and tweetdeck etc. -- you get the idea.

Related posts:

by Ky Ekinci | Co-Founder, Office Divvy ™
published on Wednesday, May 18, 2011
Connect: Ky on Twitter | Office Divvy on Twitter | On Facebook

Friday, May 20th: It's Work from Home Day!

2011-05-20T19:59:00.000-04:00

Today (May 20, 2011) was Work From Home Day! ....okay, it was really celebrated only in the UK this year: May 16th to 20th was officially "Work Wise Week 2011" leading to the finale: "National Work from Home Day" which was today, Friday, May 20th.

If you did go to the office today, you missed out on a great excuse to stay at home and enjoy a day working from home.

British newspaper, The Guardian, just published an article titled: Work from Home Day: Let's Do It Again and announced:

" Working from home is a growing trend, with plans to give every employee the right to request flexible working by 2013."

About 50% of the Office Divvy members work from home full time, occasionally dipping in to take advantage of their business location with private offices, conference and presentation rooms, and coworking space within Office Divvy.

Good idea, and Smart campaign!
We hope it gets adopted in the US in year 2012 and onward.
We'll do our share and help for that.

Logo sourced from Public Sector Nomads.

6 Simple Rules for Talent in Business

2011-05-18T09:40:00.001-04:00

UK Mogul Felix Dennis says there are six simple rules
concerning talent:

Identify it.
Hire it.
Nurture it.
Reward it.
Protect it from being poached.
...and when the time comes: Fire it!

Common Rookie Mistakes that Start Ups Make is a great article by Herb Schaffner published on BNET. You'll enjoy reading it.

...and remember:

“ There are six simple rules concerning talent: identify it, hire it, nurture it, reward it, protect it from being poached. And when the time comes, fire it.”

Email Productivity Tip (for Desktop Email Clients)

2011-05-18T09:10:00.001-04:00

Email and I are not friends... Aside from the fact that I find email a weak way to communicate (particularly when you're dealing with multiple team-members), I just think that there is just too many of it. Plus it's a constant interruption.

I use Microsoft Outlook, and like most people when a new email pops up in my computer, I see it pop up, and feel obligated to look at it; which creates constant interruption in my world, which is not what I need.

So I developed a new method to deal with this issue, which I think can pass as a productivity tip. It's new for me, but it's been working so far...

Here is what it is:

I setup my email-download-interval at 25 minutes.

My outlook used to download every 5 minutes. Now I'm interruption free from email for nearly a half-hour, which is enough time for me to attack most of my daily to-do list items.

The downside? You'll have to call me if you send me a really, really urgent email.

Check out the settings below, and try for yourself. If you need help locating these settings contact me through my office or on twitter.

Do you have other practical productivity tips when it comes to using your email and dealing with it? I'm most interested in hearing about them...

by Ky Ekinci | Co-Founder, Office Divvy ™
published on Wednesday, May 18, 2011
Connect: Ky on Twitter | Office Divvy on Twitter | On Facebook

How to Build A Local Startup Community in Flagler County

2011-05-17T08:42:00.008-04:00

by Ky Ekinci | Co-Founder, Office Divvy ™
published on Tuesday, May 17, 2011
Connect: Ky on Twitter | Office Divvy on Twitter | On Facebook

The "Flagler County Economic Development Summit" concluded on May 13. A document compiled by the 5 focus groups was presented on the final meeting. The five focus groups were:

Robust Entrepreneurial Environment & Organic Growth
Linked Responsive Talent Delivery
Maximize Regionalism
Strong Target Industry Investments
Exceptional Customer Service

Here is the Flagler County Economic Development Summit Presentation as presented on May 13th; which is a compilation of individual focus group suggestions:

You may notice that the ideas are not perfectly harmonious. In that sense, it perhaps is a good beginning than a final product, i.e. a clear road map to success. But it's important to celebrate the effort, and it did take serious effort.

I was involved in the first group to work on "Creating a Robust Entrepreneurial Environment and Organic Growth."

I'm sorry to say that we perhaps missed an opportunity in the focus group I was a member of, to truly champion ideas involving Promoting Entrepreneurship and Encouraging a Startup Culture as a part of this group's suggestions. Instead a different route was chosen as a collective, which you may have seen in the above presentation.

Flagler County Economic Development Summit - May 13, 2011

Going back to the idea of How to Build A Startup Community... Just as the "Economic Development Summit" was concluding in Bunnell on Friday the 13th, Mashable (the powerful technology-and-web-news portal), published an interesting article titled: How to Build A Local Startup Community by Travis Oberlander.

Mashable article puts forth 5 tips for creating/building a local startup community:

1. Don’t Try to be Silicon Valley:

This tip makes a point to embrace the uniqueness of one's city or community. Don't try to be some other community you are not. Instead, focus on what your region is known for and involve the leaders of those industries in the Startup ecosystem.

2. Work Openly

This tip is all about the Coworking phenomenon, which is a tremendous trend in Web and Technology Startup as well as Young Entrepreneur and Creative/Technical Professionals circles. If done right, coworking spaces become incubators and startup accelarators for new businesses and help drive job growth in the area. At Office Divvy, we have been doing coworking and holding free coworking jellies since 2008, which was the breeding ground to many entrepreneurial connections.

3. Get Creative With Regular Events

In the Palm Coast and Flagler County landscape Mixers and After-Hours parties are plenty. They are familiar concepts, easy to host, and easy to attend. However they become monotonous as easily, and are not always the best environment for building relationships. Meetups, tweetups, coworking jellies, startup weekends and any event that thinks outside of the box are more attractive for the startup community.

4. Find a Local Evangelist

Instead of (okay maybe it's more appropriate to say in addition to) tooting the horn of government organizations and public-private partnerships, recognizing the local entrepreneurs who are dedicated to spreading the word about our community. Embrace what they’re trying to do and support their efforts. These people will attract fresh talent and reach out to leaders elsewhere to promote your engaged and thriving community. Influential bloggers, and strong local twitter users/influencers also fall into this category.

5. Pay it Forward

Realize that as a community we are all in this together. Openly support new entrepreneurs or startups in need of help, and that includes my original idea which I proposed to the focus group: A Pledge to Entrepreneurs and Startups by the Flagler County and the Cities in this county. Also support and celebrate the successes of others. Sometimes all it takes is one success to raise the tide for others.

Travis Oberlander says:

" There’s never been a better time to foster a local startup community. With the right ingredients of dedication, collaboration evangelism and support, you’ll set your startup ecosystem on a path for continuing success for decades to come."

I wholeheartedly believe in that...

Two Core Qualities of Entrepreneurs

2011-05-05T10:07:00.007-04:00

According to Susan Desmond-Hellmann, MD, MPH, the chancellor of the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), there are two core-qualities of Entrepreneurs.

They are:

Relentless Tenacity
Relentless, impatient personality; and perseverance mixed with optimism.

Being Unafraid to be Embarrassed
Risk-taking entrepreneurs make choices others may find embarrassing, but entrepreneurs must continue to follow their own path.

Are you relentless, impatient, and not afraid of embarrassment? Then you maybe better suited to be an entrepreneur than staying in the good old job-market...

Guy Kawasaki outlines key points to being likable

2011-05-03T10:07:00.000-04:00

Guy Kawasaki recommends you be likable if you want to achieve success in the business world.

Regardless of how good your product or your service is you need to be likable.

Key points of starting down the path of likability:

1) Improve Your Smile
2) Dress equal to your audience
3) Have a great handshake

Here's the video from Stanford University's Entrepreneurship Corner:

Is QuickBooks® Out To Eat Square's Lunch?

2011-04-27T11:07:00.000-04:00

Quickbooks came up with their own version of a smartphone credit-card device. They call the service GoPayment --with which you can accept credit cards and get paid instantly on your mobile device.

Company is offering a FREE offer to those who respond by 5/14/11, with:

No minimums or cancellation fees
No need to purchase additional equipment
Easy to download transactions into QuickBooks®

There is fine print, so make sure to read and understand the costs before you sign up.

You will remember that in 2010, Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey attracted a lot of attention when he left twitter to launch Square, which was the first mobile payment operation in the US to use apparatus to be added to smartphones for swiped mobile payments. Dorsey since went back to Twitter.

Here at Office Divvy ™ we work with Small Business Owners, Startups, and Entrepreneurs providing them with ready-to-use offices, virtual office solutions, professional phone answering and other outsourced operations. , Serving the small business community we really appreciate the possibilities these mobiles payments provide.

It's important to say that we've become big fans of Quickbooks particularly because of their Quickbooks Online product, which gives us tremendous flexibility. Because it's a cloud-based services, it allows us to use remote team members, and transparency and collaboration between the accounting team and the co-founders. We love it so much that we became a quickbooks affiliate, and recommended wholeheartedly!

Office Divvy ™ joins Northeast Florida Green Chamber

2011-04-26T10:25:00.000-04:00

Office Divvy ™ joins the newly established Northeast Florida Green Chamber (NEFGC) --a chapter of The Green Chamber of the South, which brings together businesses across the Southeast to promote growth, innovation, and success of sustainability.

The Northeast Florida Green Chamber will provide local business owners with education, networking and an easily accessible green supply chain to promote their green business and create a permanent shift toward making the area a hub for sustainable business.

Office Divvy ™ co-founder Ky Ekinci says:

“ City of Palm Coast is well recognized for its green efforts. We applaud the leadership role our city has played in Florida and nationally. It is now the responsibility of Flagler County businesses to step up their game and get serious in their commitment to support green practices and sustainability. We are happy to further lead that commitment by joining The Northeast Florida Green Chamber.”

The first president of the Northeast Florida Green Chamber (NEFGC) is Helen Rake of Collins Capital. We previously supported Helen with her plastic bottle cap collection efforts since early 2010; which resulted in the collection of over 25 lbs. of plastic caps thanks to Office Divvy ™ members.

Memberships in NEFGC are available through reference, and those interested in membership in the Northeast Florida Green Chamber can contact Lisa Ekinci at 1.888.533.4889 in Flagler County.

Survey Monkey acquires Wufoo

2011-04-25T15:19:00.001-04:00

Big News: Wufoo is acquired by Survey Monkey!

Wufoo is a fluid company which carved itself a niche in data collection, html form building, and accepting payments only. Wufoo announced that their team will be moving out to California to work with the team at SurveyMonkey. Congratulations to Wufoo, and we hope that they remain a hip startup culture within SurveyMonkey.

Do you use Wufoo? What's your thoughts?

Giving a try to Domtar Earthchoice® in honor of Earth Day

2011-04-21T11:16:00.002-04:00

At Office Divvy ™ we recycle --and don't just say "big deal" because in Palm Coast and Flagler County a commercial establishment that recycles is rare! There is no mandatory recycling requirement for companies, and most commercial buildings do not have a recycle-bin. Oh, well that's another blog post (and it's coming soon).

So, yes, we recycle; and we conserve energy, give back to the community and support several charities.

And in honor of Earth Day we're giving a try to the new Domtar Earthchoice® Office Paper by Staples®. It looks like this is the real deal when it comes to a "green paper" that is bright white!

FSC certified
SFI Fiber Sourcing Certified
Rainforest Alliance supported
Elemental chlorine-free
Manufactured under alkaline (acid-free) conditions for increased longevity and performance

...and kudos to Staples® for helping this product come out to mainstream; and for offering a great deal, too.

Visual.ly Site Launch: Visualize, Browse, Share Infographics

2011-04-07T17:44:00.000-04:00

Visual.ly made a fresh announcement for their upcoming soft-launch and opened up sign-ups for the early adopter users.

The site's is built as a social site, with the following goals:

Exploring others' infographics
Showcasing and promoting your infographics,
Connecting data-engineers, market research folks with advertisers and publishers

Here's their well-done announcement to create buzz around the upcoming launch:

You can sign up to hear about the upcoming launch at visual.ly.com

What's info-graphics? InfoGraphics (short for information graphics) are visual, graphic representations of information and data; which help present complex data quickly and clearly. Here is an infographic done by LinkedIn --in a honor of reaching 100Million users.

What is an Angel Investor?

2011-03-30T08:27:00.001-04:00

An angel investor, is an individual who would typically invest up to $150,000 in raw, early stage web and tech Startups, and who can stomach significant risk in their investment, and who has entrepreneurial or specific industry experience.

Angel Investors (frequently referred to as "Angels") are affluent individuals who have had extensive business experience in one or more entrepreneurial ventures or in Startup environments. An Angel Investor would typically provide capital in exchange for convertible debt or ownership equity.

The following video provides terrific definitions on Angel Investing; and features Ron Conway of Angel Investors LP, and Mike Maple, Jr. of Maples Investments in a Stanford Entrepreneurial Corner presentation. Mr. Conway and Mr. Maple also explain the difference between an angel investor and venture capitalist, while pointing out why an angel's smaller investment dollars might be a better choice for a Startup:

Because Office Divvy ™ works with Startups, Entrepreneurs, Professionals, and Small Business community, two common questions we receive are "Do you know any Angel Investors?" or "Does Office Divvy ™ do Angel Investing?"

Our mantra at Office Divvy ™ is "Emprowering Entrepreneurs, Startups, and Small Business." We are equally and genuinely interested in a Startup idea, a new entrepreneurial venture, and in any current or prospective Office Divvy ™ member's existing business.

Services we provide at Office Divvy ™ are built around reducing overhead, and helping an Entrepreneur affordably outsource certain operations to our team so they can focus on their core-business objectives. Depending on the business idea or the nature of Startup business, we even provide free services for a generous duration; or create action-based pay-only-with-performance types of scenarios. In our membership, we have successful, functioning examples of both models.

Co-Founders of Office Divvy may also individually or as a collective invest in a business with an entrepreneurial or angel investor role.

If you are an entrepreneur in Palm Coast, Flagler and Volusia County, or anywhere in Central Florida or beyond, and have a Web/Tech Startup Business idea, do reach out to us for mentorship, cooperation, or Angel Investor consideration or connections.

Google Blogger is on the move!

2011-03-29T09:19:00.001-04:00

Google Blogger is announcing big changes and improvements to continue to be a contender. At Office Divvy ™ we have worked on and released a dozen or so powerful Wordpress blogs for our own as well as client properties.

But our current blog here is powered by Google Blogspot, so we're happy to learn about improvements to come. Watch:

...and please do reach out to us if you need Google Blogger help or Wordpress help.

What kind of Funding to Avoid for your Small Business

2011-03-28T08:21:00.001-04:00

A common problem for Small Business in the last few years has been funding your existing business or new Startup business idea.

Banks are clammed up, looking for maximum security and maximum return. SBA tries to fund small business, but only (okay mostly) giving out secured loans, and unfortunately your house doesn't have much or any equity any longer. Grandma is not answering her telephone and not returning your calls because she already took a hit and cannot further afford losses in her savings and retirement funds.

There are other options to fund your business including bootstrapping (that is if you yourself --or your family-- have the funds), bringing in new partners (that is if you can work in a partnership environment and actually find partners), or Angel Investors (that is if your business operates in web or technology startup world and if you have a noteworthy, scalable business idea). By the way I will do a whole series of posts on Angel Investor world shortly.

No matter what you do in funding your operation, try to avoid funding options built around taking what you have. So, avoid transactions like you will see in this classic, priceless video of Abbott & Costello:

...and stay tuned for my upcoming posts on the Angel Investor world as those may offer viable options.

Facebook Enters "Social Media Questions 2.0" Market

2011-03-24T22:19:00.002-04:00

Facebook did a soft release of their new "Facebook Questions" module...

With the success of Social Media sites built around Questions and Answers, such as Quora, FormSpring.me, ThreeWords.me, Quizy.me, Facebook now launched a new Facebook Questions functionality. It allows individual users as well as pages to ask questions.

What's interesting is your facebook friends as well as the subscribers to your business pages can vote on the question, answer it, and share it with their community; and that allows one to cast a much wider net using the new Facebook Questions function!

Facebook will roll-out "Questions" site-wide soon... For now, you can select to speed up that launch and start using it by going directly to the facebook app/function page. This is not a third party functionality --it's facebook's own.

Once you install the app, it puts it among your "share" choices/functions on your profile as well as the pages you administrate:

Once a question is asked, others can answer it, share it on their wall with their community, vote on it, or add additional multiple choice response options to the question that others can vote on:

While asking the question, you can also add survey-style multiple choices:

Facebook is surely going to create a lot of buzz around it's new questions functionality!

Feel free to share your thoughts in comments below...

by Ky Ekinci
Co-Founder, Office Divvy ™
Thursday, March 24, 2011

Connect: Ky on Twitter | Office Divvy on Twitter | On Facebook

LinkedIn Reaches 100,000,000 Members!

2011-03-24T14:25:00.001-04:00

Congratulations to LinkedIn for reaching 100 Million Members.

As impressive is this beautiful infographic they posted on their blog:

The Single Biggest Problem in Communication Is....

2011-03-24T10:59:00.000-04:00

A favorite George Bernard Shaw quote is:

“The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.”

....and here's a "classic" example ---enjoy:

Do you feel this has happened to you? You're not alone!

Flagler County Chamber Members say they are Lucky!

2011-03-23T10:13:00.008-04:00

Palm Coast, Flagler Beach, and Bunnell business community gathered at Finn's in Flagler Beach on St. Patrick's Day for the Flagler County Chamber of Commerce Business After Hours. It was tremendously gracious of Finn's to host the event on St. Patty's day. Hundreds showed up!

Kelly Lohman of Socialsmidge, went around for 15 to 30 second interviews with the Chamber members, asking them why they felt lucky on this St. Patty's Day. The common response was obviously "for being in Florida and enjoying the beautiful Florida weather" along with a few other responses.

Yours truly (moi) also makes an appearance in this video. Enjoy:

...and thanks Kelly for taking the time to shoot the interviews and put this together!

by Ky Ekinci
Co-Founder, Office Divvy ™
Monday, March 21, 2011

Connect: Ky on Twitter | Office Divvy on Twitter | On Facebook

Hiring Tips from Eben Pagan: Who not to hire?

2011-03-21T08:23:00.001-04:00

Who to hire, who not to hire? That is the question...

Have you ever heard an employee tell you they do not like "business." Don't hire people who say things like that! Here's more practical advice from Eben Pagan as to what to look for in a prospective employee, what to ask, and who to hire:

Awesome Video, Awesome Advice by Neil Pasricha

2011-03-17T11:23:00.002-04:00

An absolutely awesome Entrepreneur story is being told by Neil Pasricha, and awesome advice is being given here in this video. His blog 1000 Awesome Things became a celebrated and award winning blog organically from nothing.....well not exactly nothing, but an idea and commitment to acknowledging the small things that make all of us happy and feel positive.

Neil Pasricha's blog was built around life's simple pleasures, and started in times of sadness and stress. His goal was to focus on what was positive in his life to deal with those tough things going on.

In this TED video Neil reveals the 3 secrets (all starting with A) to leading a life that's truly awesome. If you have 17 minutes to spare, watch it, it'll make your day (and maybe all your days ahead) better:

Neil certainly didn’t anticipate that his website/blog would become one with reaching to millions of readers, win two Webby Awards (“the Internet’s highest honor” according to The New York Times), be named one of PC Magazine’s Top 100 Sites On the Internet.

Great learnings here all around!

Seth Godin: Appreciating The Value of Small Failures

2011-02-10T09:47:00.006-05:00

In the following short video Andrew Keen of TechCrunch interviews blogger and best-selling author Seth Godin.

Godin calls the times we live in, "times that anybody or anywhere now has the ability to make something that matters." He answers the question what should people do, with "They should fail!"

According to Godin, people should fail small, and they should fail often. Because if one can fail in small ways frequently, one will discover that it's not fatal. Because cost of failing is going down.

The goal is to take your successes to keep things going, but the goal is to search for new successes -- that choice creates the risk (or the chance) of failure. And that "chance of failing" is what makes it worthwhile. It also makes progress and innovation possible.

Enjoy this short video interview:

Related Blog Posts on Success and Failure

We love our customers: Happy Valentines Day!

2011-02-09T09:11:00.001-05:00

At Office Divvy we do not hide that we love our customers. At every interaction we remember our mantra: "Empowering Entrepreneurs" --and we listen for ways we can help and assist them. But there are other ways to show the love, and what better time to show our love than the Valentines Day coming up.

Here's something sweet to show our love: Chocolate in heart-shaped boxes that say "BFF" or "UR GR8" ...totally reflecting our feeling. There was also the one that said "QT Pie" ---but someone ate those, no need to name names. :)

So.....this is a last call: If you are an Office Divvy member, and did not drop in to pick up your goodies, please do so by this weekend. Otherwise the cookie monster is not responsible!

The Role of Technology in the Post-Industrial Age

2011-02-08T20:18:00.000-05:00

In the following video Andrew Keen of TechCrunch interviews Seth Godin.

This is truly an excellent segment on technology and web 2.0 with excellent examples that put technology in perspective as it relates to your individual "purpose."

Really there is not much more to say.... enjoy:

Year of the Rabbit: A positive and inspiring outlook for 2011?

2011-01-31T18:42:00.001-05:00

by Sim Taing
Co-Founder
Office Divvy

The Year of The Rabbit begins on February 3rd, 2011. The Chinese zodiac characterizes the Rabbit with cuddly, warm and affectionate attributes. The Rabbit is also one of the luckiest signs in the Chinese Astrology chart. As such, the year 2011 holds positive promises for both personal and business prosperity and fulfillment.

2011 will be a refreshing change after the fast-moving and quite dramatic Year of the Tiger.

For most of all us, 2010 was indeed a year of unprecedented changes. For example, over 20% of my LinkedIn connections started something new in 2010 including myself. Personally for me, I began 2010 by taking a new career to re-invent myself after 10 years of being with my previous employer.

As I look back, I realized the momentum during 2010 was quite unsettling. It was a year of constantly being on and on the go. However, I also realized that my accomplishments during the year has set me up beautifully for 2011. This will be a stunning and most favorable year for me, especially in regard to work and career. I have connected and interacted with important and influential people during 2010 that will put me in the position to reap the benefits in 2011 and beyond. The change has energized and inspired me than I have ever been in quite some time.

With such great promises to come and luck running high during the Year of the Rabbit, we must start the year with positive thinking and with a can do attitude. We must truly believe spiritually and mentally that we can achieve great things in 2011. We must envision that our entrepreneurial ideas will bear fruit and our personal relationships will move to the next level. We must be also cautious to not allow our worries over decisions to drain the Rabbit’s vitality. It’s very important to get enough rest, pleasure, and relaxation. We must also remember to call on friends and loved ones for support and advice during any challenging times.

The following are some famous people born in The Year of the Rabbit: Johnny Depp, Francis Ford Coppola, Michael Jordan, Ingrid Bergman, Cary Grant, and Bob Hope.

Let us realize all our dreams in 2011!

Is it a good idea to launch a Startup with your best friends?

2011-01-27T12:07:00.013-05:00

Box.net CEO and Co-Founder Aaron Levie started his company with friends he had known since high school.

In the following 3-minute video, Aaron shares the dangers and benefits of starting an organization with close friends, including the positive "hum" and a high level of trust that can build between group members dedicated to a vision.

Have you had similar experiences? Have you started a company with friends? Would you? What's your take?

video credit: Stanford University Entrepreneurship Corner (aka "eCorner")

Changes and Additions to the Office Divvy Team

2011-01-27T08:29:00.001-05:00

There are big things happening at Office Divvy. Our team is changing, and it's also growing:

Congratulations to LeTeeshia
We will miss seeing you every day...

Join us in celebrating LeTeeshia's new chapter. After two years with Office Divvy, a relocation and new career opportunity will take LeTeeshia and her family to the Lake Mary area. It is not "au revoir" but "abiento," as LeTeeshia will continue to work with Office Divvy as a consultant to train new team members, work remotely on special projects, and via our virtual assistant program.

Introducing New Team Members

Vincent James Baltiero | Operations Specialist

Welcome Vincent! Vincent moved from Pennsylvania to Florida in 1999. He lives in Palm Coast, and excels in all things digital: Social Media, Website Development, Design Work, Online Marketing, Video-work, and even Computer Repair. Vincent's customer service and telephony experience make him a valuable addition to our team immediately. He has been trained by LeTeeshia on all Front-Desk functionalities. He looks forward to meeting each of you and learning about your unique businesses.

Email for Vincent is: Operations@OfficeDivvy.com

Drea Evans | Manager, Back Office

A unique combination of killer skills in accounting and customer service, and a great sense of humor will make Drea the perfect addition to our team. Drea will be handling all billing and receivables. In addition to her deep project management experience, Drea will also be contributing in New Business Development and Strategic Partnerships.

Email for Drea is: Accounts@OfficeDivvy.com

Another addition to the team is also in the works!
Announcement on that will follow soon. Please stay tuned.

Are You Winking In the Dark?

2011-01-19T13:01:00.001-05:00

My friend Mike Ellis is not just a twitter power-user, but his tweets are often full of wisdom and substance.

He covers a wide range of subjects in his tweets, from homelessness, to personal issues, religion, emergency management, marketing, to small business, and social media. When I acknowledge what I call his "twitter gems," he typically responds by picking up on my use of the phrase "twitter gems" and teases me by calling them Tater Tots.

Mike had the following tweet today which I'd like to share with you:

What Mike did not know when he tweeted this, is that, our advertising budget for 2010 has been about 10% of our total revenue (yes, you heard it correctly). And he did not know that for 2011 we're even allocating a larger dollar figure for our advertising budget; and we will spend some of our budget to help some of our new clients advertise their businesses.

Office Divvy provides Virtual Office Solutions and Co-Location Office Space along with outsourced operations and business support services to entrepreneurs and small business owners in Palm Coast, Flagler Beach, Bunnell and beyond.

Choosing a membership at Office Divvy, vis a vis a traditional office model can save a Flagler County small business startup, literally tens of thousands of dollars a year. Despite this fact, we notice, some of the new Office Divvy members may be extra conservative when they are trying to get their business off the ground. Some of these folks skimp on advertising, which is a dangerous game to play especially for a new business.

Knowing how important advertising is for a new business, we are now actually allocating a part of our budget to help fund the advertising budget for some of these new-member startup businesses. Yes, we are paying for their ads in certain publications, early on during their new membership, so that they can launch their business successfully and give it a fair chance to survive.

So, sometimes one tweet calls for a whole blog post, and Mike's tweet today was one of those. So, let us remember Mike's wisdom on advertising; particularly if you are starting a new business:

" For business not to advertise is like winking at a girl in the dark. You know what you are doing but no one else does."

...and if you are in Palm Coast, Flagler Beach, Bunnell or elsewhere in Flagler County, thinking about starting up a new business, come talk to us, we can help you in more ways than you may think...

by Ky Ekinci
Co-Founder, Office Divvy ™
Wednesday, January 19, 2011

Connect: Ky on Twitter | Office Divvy on Twitter | On Facebook

5 Marketing Sins to Avoid in 2011

2011-01-14T10:38:00.000-05:00

...a guest blog post by Brad West
Brad West has has over 15 years of retail management experience. Originally from Southern NJ and Central PA, Brad lives in Palm Coast, FL. and is currently a manager with Barnes & Noble in St. Augustine. He is also a marketing and advertising consultant in Real Estate. He has made name for himself as the Technology and Small Business blogger. You can find Brad on twitter: @bwest2 | Note: An unedited version of this post has previously appeared on the Palm Coast Blog. A link to the original post is provided at the bottom of this page.

Most of my marketing and advertising experience focuses around Real Estate, but as I speak with authors and other managers here and there I see some common "denominators" when it comes to mistakes in marketing and advertising that put up barriers to success.

Most of the time I find people looking for this generic "Step-by-step" approach of "one size fits all" --especially when it comes to the Internet. The truth is that "one size doesn't fit all" and that type of mindset should be avoided. Let's take a look at the top 5 mistakes most make when it comes to marketing and advertising:

1. "Marketing and Advertising are one and the same."
       Marketing is best defined as "telling the story of the product". Advertising therefore is the mechanism in which that story is delivered to the consumer. How one "tells the story" within the advertising is made up of a combination of things such as images, descriptions, features, benefits of those features, data, etc. When you approach the two separately, you are able to develop a more comprehensive and effective plan. When you simply lump the two together a lot often gets missed.

2. "Everyone is my target customer."
       There is often this notion that products apply to everyone. I hear this a lot with authors of books. Not every reader is the same, and every book written will not appeal to every reader. Maybe everyone should read the book, but the reality is that everyone will not. The same goes for other products and services. If you are not sure exactly who your target market is, find a starting point from similar products or services. As you venture out to deliver your message to them through advertising you may find your target market being something other than you initially expected. At which time, you can tweak your strategies. Books are a great example here. "Harry Potter" was written for young readers. The "Twilight" series was written for teens. Both found a very strong adult reading audience as well although that wasn't what was originally anticipated.

3. "I Think People Will..."
   My wife and I have a little saying we go by when it comes to marketing and advertising, "It's about what I know. NOT what I think." When you begin applying the "I think" attitude, you are basically applying only what you personally respond to and expect. You are not everyone, and you are not every one of your customers. To avoid this you have to look at the data and "listen" to what customers are telling you through the data to effectively deliver your message.

4. "Attention always gains you business."
   Gaining attention alone is never a guarantee that you will gain business. In fact, some attention can create undesired results and actually lose business. I've come across blogs by professionals that are plastered with the industry they are in and the topics are filled with negative political perspectives that have little or nothing to do with their industry. Sure they may have created attention, but have not attracted business because the message has no relevancy to the actual consumer.

       In fact, they are probably alienating more business than they realize. The notion of "Brand, You" comes to mind here as well and not one I find is executed very well often times. When it comes to the individual, I focus more on building reputation based upon the expectations of consumers.

       I find that when individuals start focusing on this "branding" of themselves they tend to get overly creative and the message of benefit to the consumer is never effective. Brand focus in my opinion is more effective when it is built and centered around the message of relevant and beneficial products and services to the consumer.

5. "Advertising is an expense."
       All businesses have necessary expenses to keep the business operating. But not everything a business pays for is an expense. Advertising is one of those things, and should be approached as an investment. Like any investment an individual or business makes, you should expect a return. For example, if I spend $100 on a print ad with a coupon discount and I receive a large response that increases my sales 20% over last year . . . the ad has paid for itself and provided a return. Now if I spend $100 on that ad and never receive any response, my advertising is an expense and should be re-evaluated. So you need to measure your business advertising and know which mechanisms are delivering a response from consumers which will allow you to maximize your investment and provide the most return. The difficult thing here too is that not all advertising returns are so direct as the example above. Some of those returns may be more indirect or realized over time. For example, business cards are still relevant and handing them out is a beneficial means of advertising. You may not immediately gain business from the recipient or the recipient may pass it on to another who ends up doing business with you. Therefore, when it comes to business cards I look to get as many as possible at the lowest cost with the best appearance. The investment is low and the return is therefore huge.

So if you are revisiting your marketing and advertising initiatives for the new year, take a moment to see if any of those items are you. Now's the time to make a change and get off on the right foot for great possibilities in 2011.

Original blog post here: Top 5 Marketing Mistakes NOT To Make in 2011

Is doing a Press Release a waste of time?

2011-01-10T07:59:00.001-05:00

How many times did you do a press release that went nowhere? Some people say doing a press release is a waste of time and money. Even the best selling author, blogger and thought leader Seth Godin has a quote which goes something like:

" No one cares about you, not even your mother-in-law. No one is eagerly waiting your press release."

If it sounds right, and it feels right, it's right....but is it really?

The truth is in doing the press releases right. Remember though, nothing "done right" is easy.

There is no overnight success, even when it comes to press releases. It's all about building the relationships with the editors and writers, bloggers, and journalists in your industry, getting a database going and keeping up your database, getting the right person or people (team) in place, using the right services, writing good and interesting content, and outsourcing some of that press release work to competent people --especially if you are a small business.

There is terrific WISDOM in doing online press releases (aka newswires) from a Search Engine Optimization (SEO) standpoint. Those SEO benefits alone make doing press releases worthwhile. But just because you're doing a newswire online, it doesn't mean that you will reap the benefits of SEO; because SEO is a science, and if you are not a "scientist" operating in that field, heck it can actually even hurt you. Plus it can get expensive, some services charge up to $2,000 per newswire. That's why you should seek the advice or the services of a genuine, experienced professional.

The reality is that you can have an online press release done in the range of $125 to $250 each including professionally written content, optimized SEO links, and get it out to dozens, and sometimes hundreds of websites and right in front of tens of thousands of people. Feel free to reach us out on twitter or facebook if you need help, and we will gladly help you, or refer you to someone who can help.

posted by Ky Ekinci
Co-Founder, Office Divvy ™
Monday, January 10, 2011

Connect: Ky on Twitter | Office Divvy on Twitter | On Facebook

Membership Benefits and Fringe Benefits at Office Divvy

2011-01-08T11:37:00.005-05:00

What we do at Office Divvy ™ is hard sometimes for people to process, and it's even hard for us to define in a nutshell. The range of services we provide to Small Business and Entrepreneurs is wide, very wide.

Also remember that for the typical business-person, the idea of running your business from the base of a nurturing, collaborative, cooperative model does require a paradigm-shift and "a-ha" moments.

For instance people look at us with a big question mark when we say: "We do not really rent or lease office space. or we are not exactly a Palm Coast Executive Offices provider."

Yes, we are a membership model, and yes, we provide furnished offices, virtual office solutions, and office hoteling, and coworking space within our co-location facilities in Palm Coast; but the biggest differentiator of what we do is the fact that we're NOT in the Real Estate game, we're in the SERVICES BUSINESS.

Our mantra is:

" Empowering Entrepreneurs."

We are reminded of our mantra daily, and we truly live that every day! Office Divvy ™ is a small-business and start-up incubator, virtual office provider, office-hotel, coworking space, and startup accelerator all in one!

Today, Office Divvy ™ has dozens of members across 18 industries; and there are many benefits which come with the membership, including business location functionality; mail and mailbox service; use of furnished, wired, equipped, and staffed offices; use of printers, copiers, scanners, faxes etc. etc.

But I particularly like the fringe benefits of membership which I think are really priceless:

Tremendous boost of professional image.
Having a staffed business location that is open 50-hours a week even if you're not in. This is huge! People can leave things for you, drop off a check, pick up a document. You don't need to preside over every transaction --this is all good professionally, good for the soul, and good for the business.
Unlimited coworking space-use: Yes, do you solo-work, but side-by-side with others. Leaving the isolation or distractions of a home office (when you want to), and the ability to have a, so called, "water cooler conversation" and bouncing ideas off of other professionals can be a tremendous benefit.
Ability to be in business instantly, effortlessly, and affordably.
Being referred business from fellow members.
Ability to access resources instantly and at a discount. You need a web-design guy? Boom! You need a computer-repair person? Bam! You need an SEO person? Boom! You need a logo-design? Bang! Such profiles are instantly accessible through members or within Office Divvy team-resources....and all at special discounts because you are a member!
Discounted co-op advertising in Palm Coast Observer, Flagler County Pennysaver, Volusia/Flagler Business Journal, multiple online properties with tens of thousands of subscribers, and more.
Increased access to press and journalists' ears.
Networking opportunities, events, free workshops and clinics.
Ability to do business at the speed of light with Palm Coast FiberNET.
Great business publications to enjoy while you're in the office.
Free gourmet coffee, tea, and snacks.

...speaking of coffee, I am a fan of coffee, I do not overdo it, but I like good, strong coffee. We feature both fresh brewed esspresso-grade Cafe Bustelo brew, as well as French Roast and Decaf Coffee, along with a selection of green and black teas. Grab a snack or sweet with that, read the Wall Street Journal, the Entrepreneur or Inc. Magazine.

We encourage you to come in for a tour and meet the team...

By the way, are we connected on facebook? Do connect with us on facebook here. And if you are on twitter, connect with us here.

Thank you for listening. :)

posted by Ky Ekinci
Co-Founder, Office Divvy ™
Saturday, January 8, 2011

Connect: Ky on Twitter | Office Divvy on Twitter | On Facebook

What was on the Entrepreneur's Wish List this past Christmas?

2011-01-05T10:58:00.001-05:00

If you are reading this blog post, based on the demographics it targets, it probably means that it's been a while since you wrote a letter to Santa. But, Wall Street Journal's Sarah Needleman had an article titled "Entrepreneurs Ask Santa for Loans, Lower Taxes," which asked the question:

What do small-business owners want most for the holidays?

The newspaper did an online survey/poll based on the article.

Choices were:

A bank loan or line of credit
An affordable health plan
New equipment
Lower Taxes
All of the above

33% wanted "All of the Above."

29.6% chose "Lower Taxes."

Because the poll only allows for one choice, that really means that 62.6 percent of the Small Business and the Entrepreneur community wants taxes lowered. Because typically a company doesn't really pay taxes in the case it's losing money, I find the results most interesting based on the slowdown in the economy in the last two years.

I'm still processing the results. What are your thoughts?

posted by Ky Ekinci
Co-Founder, Office Divvy ™
Wednesday, January 5, 2011

Connect: Ky on Twitter | Office Divvy on Twitter | On Facebook

Somebody isn't thinking - Patton | Photo Quotes

2011-01-04T12:10:00.000-05:00

Good to keep this great Patton Quote in mind:

" If everyone is thinking alike, then somebody isn't thinking."

George S. Patton

Smart or Dumb? MySpace + Facebook Mashup

2010-11-25T10:49:00.000-05:00

Will this move breath life back into MySpace?

Maybe?

Flagler County Chamber of Commerce Business After Hours

2010-11-21T15:33:00.000-05:00

Here are some sights, smiles, and sounds from the Flagler Chamber's Business After Hours Event hosted by Office Divvy in Palm Coast, FL on October 28, 2010:

Klout is extremely accurate!

2010-10-21T18:50:00.000-04:00

Klout is a website/application that measures one's twitter influence.

The company says:

" Our goal is to accurately measure that influence and provide context around who a person influences and the specific topics they are most influential on. Klout tracks the impact of your opinions, links and recommendations across your social graph. We collect data about the content you create, how people interact with that content and the size and composition of your network. From there, we analyze the data to find indicators of influence and then provide you with innovative tools to interact with and interpret the data."

...and indeed they absolutely do a great job in delivering on that promise. Founded by Joe Fernandez, we find Klout to be extremely accurate.

Here's Office Divvy's own LeTeeshia's Klout Score and Summary:

Her twitter profile, @AskPalmCoast really focuses on "Professional and Business life, events and tips in Palm Coast, Bunnell, Flagler Beach and Flagler County, Florida." She aggregates content along those lines and shares with fellow Palm Coasters and Flagler County residents. Since 2009, she's become the spokesperson of Palm Coast and Flagler County on twitter and facebook.

Even though her overall Klout skores appears to be low (5), the application, Klout, categorizes LeTeeshia's "Ask Palm Coast" twitter account as a "thought leader" saying:

" Palm Coast Concierge is a Thought Leader: You are a thought leader in your industry. Your followers rely on you, not only to share the relevant news, but to give your opinion on the issues. People look to you to help them understand the day's developments. You understand what's important and what your audience values."

This is extremely accurate. LeTeeshia's twitter account is very concentrated in focus, so many in the twitterland know her. It's good to see that you can be categorized as a thought leader with a low klout score.

Klout is built in to many twitter applications, which helps making the twitter's "follow" experience better. Next time before you follow somebody on twitter, remember to check their Klout score and summary.

A big Kudos to Klout!

posted by Ky Ekinci
Co-Founder, Office Divvy ™
Wednesday, October 21, 2010

Connect? Ky on Twitter | Office Divvy on Twitter | On Facebook

New Facebook Feature: "Page Browser"

2010-09-29T16:40:00.000-04:00

New "Facebook Page Browser" makes finding new facebook pages a bit easier, faster, and simpler, and it's nice to look at, too:.

Finding facebook pages have been a challange. The search function to find new facebook pages have been problematic. Facebook doesn't allow exclusive Page Names. There could be many pages named exactly the same (though vanity URL's are unique obviously --but that's another blog post).

Here is how to use the new facebook page browser:

"Neither Success not failure is ever final" ~ Roger W. Babson

2010-09-26T14:14:00.001-04:00

Success and failure continually occupies the mind of any entrepreneur. Many believe "Success Breed Success" and "Failure Breeds Failure" and some belive "Failure Breeds Success."

Here's an interesting quote that stands out, and it's a very good reminder for those of us in business, by the founder of the famed business school, Babson College in Massachusetts, Roger W. Babson:

In addition to being a founder of Babson College, Roger Ward Babson was an entrepreneur and business theorist in the first half of the 20th century. He founded Webber College (now Webber International University located in Babson Park, Florida), and the now defunct Utopia College, in Eureka, Kansas.

Related Posts on Success and Failure:

Randy Seitz's Powerful Quotes on "Failure"

Biggest Successes Often Bred from Failures?

And the verdict for the New Twitter Web Interface is...

2010-09-23T22:55:00.000-04:00

Received the notice earlier today that the new twitter interface is available for the @OfficeDivvy twitter account.

After half-a-day of use, here is our multi-dimensional, and totally scientific results based on our own user testing:

★★★★★ First impression
★★★★★ Functionality
★★★★★ Ease of Use
★★★★★ Ambiance
★★★★★ Food Quality

Thumbs Up For...
Aside from all the obvious and wonderful improvements (such as the ability to see images and video in the twitter stream), one thing I like is the single-click individual follower statistics. In the old twitter interface, learning about a follower was burdensome. Now, a single click shows me who the follower is, making me decide whether or not to follow back.

Overlooked?
It appears the "tweet source" field is no longer there. The old interface showed where each tweet came from, i.e. Hootsuite, Tweetdeck, Twitterfeed, API, facebook, etc. etc. Because I am hyper sensitive to absentee tweeting (to me if the source is showing API or twitterfeed or similar, I'll totally discount your twitter account), I find this information very useful. Though it seems the tweet source is not showing in the new web interface. I'm hoping this is temporary and will be fixed.

Of course there is always room for improvement, but I like the new direction and the new set of functionalities, and that gets the new twitter a very high rating from me. Further, much of the improvements seem more oriented towards "listening" (tuning into other people's tweets), and that puts the core of twitter right where the core of twitter should be...

posted by Ky Ekinci
Co-Founder, Office Divvy ™
Thursday, September 23, 2010

Connect? Ky on Twitter | Office Divvy on Twitter | On Facebook

Twitter's Big Announcement: Merging Rich Media to Timeline!

2010-09-14T19:36:00.002-04:00

A tremendous improvement on the part of Twitter has been formally announced: Inline Mulltimedia (images and videos) will be available right on your twitter timeline.

Twitter says:

" We've learned something since starting twitter: Life Doesn't Always fit into 140 characters or less."

Here is Twitter founder Evan Williams' timeline breaking the news as he was announcing the changes at twitter:

Twitter Announces built-in URL Shortener

2010-09-02T08:57:00.000-04:00

Twitter announces they are soon to release t.co --twitter's own URL shortening service built-in to the twitter's own web interface.

Other than convenience of doing it all in one place for those folks who tweet using twitter's own web-interface Primary, it appears primarily security is on twitter's mind:

" Twitter’s link service at http://t.co is used to better protect users from malicious sites that engage in spreading malware, phishing attacks, and other harmful activity. A link converted by Twitter’s link service is checked against a list of potentially dangerous sites. When there’s a match, users can be warned before they continue."

Twitter seems to still mention and even endorse their strategic (?) partner, bit.ly, however in long term as they improve the service and reporting and metrics, it is certain that they will eat bit.ly's lunch.

You can read Twitter's official announcement here.

Angel Investor, Ex Googler, Aydin Senkut on Google & Angels

2010-09-01T19:48:00.000-04:00

Good interview with Aydin Senkut, and ex-googler-turned-angel-investor; founder of Felicis Ventures. Whether you are a startup founder, an entrepreneur, an angel investor, or angel wannabe, you will enjoy this video interview...

To give you a taste, here is one gem (one of Aydin's quotes) that I though stood out:

To be a good angel investor, " you need to be able to relate to the founders, and good at closing deals."

Aydin also says that back in the day he worked at Google, one interesting view was:

" Any project that can't be done with three people in three months, shouldn't be done; or the team is bad."

Without further ado, enjoy:

posted by Ky Ekinci
Co-Founder, Office Divvy ™
Wednesday, September 1, 2010

Connect: Ky on Twitter | Office Divvy on Twitter | On Facebook

25 "P"s of Social Media and New Media Marketing...

2010-07-31T18:24:00.004-04:00

You probably heard about the 5 "P"s of Marketing:

Product: The products or services offered to your customers/clients.
Price: The pricing strategy for the desired profit margin.
Place: Distribution --getting your product/service to your target market.
Promotion: Communicating with your customers.
People: The value of your people and people at large (i.e. influencers)

Now with the New Media the same list has been re-purposed for the social media channels such as twitter, facebook, linkedin, foursquare etc. etc. Some folks talk about the 3 P's some talk about the 4 P's...

But if you think about it, Social Media is different; with Web 2.0 it is no longer a monologue, it's now a dialogue, so there really are more than just a handful P's in Social Media and Social Media Marketing.

So let's take it up a notch, shall we?.. Here is the 25 P's of Social Media we can think of:

Provide: Something of value...
Petition: Demand innovation, make folks, platforms, messages better!
Productize: Yes, new word! Make your offer easy to understand!
Promote: Your product, service, business, events, news (don't overdo).
Personalize: Let them see the "real" you.
Participate: Interact and engage (your audience)
Play: Take it easy, it's not all strategy... :)
Pace: Take it easy, don't over do it. Just don't!
Protect: Protect your brand, industry, service, peers
Plan: Yes, plan --don't just do it!
Propel: Initiate discussions, bring the best out in people.
Pamper: Recognize players, collaborate, give credit where credit is due.
Partake: Answer questions, participate in discussions/chats.
Peer: Do not underestimate players based on their followers, community
Penetrate: Cover all aspects
Patrol: Entire landspace --correct & clarify statements and behaviors
Perform: Do it! Just do it!
Persist: Don't give up!
Predict: Think what's next...
Pioneer: Don't hold back, try different things (white hat rule though!)
Practice: Don't be afraid, practice makes perfect; learnings await you!
Propose: Propose ideas, solicit business (humbly), ask for collaboration.
Punctuate: Don't be afraid of repeating your point, though not bot-like.
Pursue: Follow up; be persistent to engage: to get answers, be heard.
Pay Attention: To influencers, trends, competition, customers.

Also pay attention to the fact there are are more letters in the alphabet! Why is the letter "P" significant? The answer is, it is not! We just wanted to expand on the existing discussion on Social Media and on Marketing based on our own thoughts and learnings, that's all... :)

..and you know what the biggest P is?

Be Positive!

Hey, speaking of 'P's, can you think of more Ps?..

______________
Connect with us: Office Divvy on twitter | on facebook

One of the things we do is Social Media Consulting, Marketing, and Outsourcing for Small Business. Reach us out for online strategy and social media for a free, confidential consultation!

Mail Never Stops! Feel frustrated over your email inbox?

2010-07-30T21:15:00.000-04:00

Remember the famous scene from Seinfeld?

George Costanza: Why do the Postal Workers go "postal" and shoot everybody?

Newman: Because the mail never stops! It just keeps coming and coming and coming... There's never a let up, it's relentless!

Do you feel this way about your email inbox?

Or now that the new media is here, maybe even about your twitter or facebook timeline?

We can give advice here on productivity and time management and how to tips to deal with your email or on how to tune in and listen to folks on your twitter and facebook timeline; but we won't. Because no matter how hard we try, we are on the same boat as (almost) anyone out there!

What are some of the ways YOU deal with your inbox and twitter and facebook timelines?

Tweetdeck Souped Up? No, it's just the real time twitter activity!

2010-07-28T21:37:00.000-04:00

This super-edition of tweetdeck shows twitter activity in real time (meaning it's not sped up). You better believe your eyes:

Twitter to include rich media in your timeline... Maybe?

2010-07-26T21:13:00.000-04:00

This is truly exciting news -- Mashable broke the news today that Twitter will include pictures and videos in the twitter timeline. It truly enriches an otherwise what could be a very dry twitter experience.

Once concern from the community is: "Can the already stressed out twitter infrastructure handle this kind of move?"

Or does it mean that we will see more of this?

The "inline media" was made available to select accounts for a few hours; though, almost as soon as the news broke, it sounds like twitter rolled it back.

Mashable says they received a note from twitter saying:

“ We’re constantly exploring features and settings. What you saw was a small test of a potential consumption setting for inline media. We show inline media on our own iPhone and Android apps.”

7 Select Articles on Startups, Entrepreneurship, Small Business, and Technology

2010-07-18T16:51:00.000-04:00

Here's a compilation of select articles and blog posts on Startup, Entrepreneur, and Small Business matters which came on our radar recently

We typically share much on twitter and facebook, but the particular news, articles, and blog posts that really stand out, we compile them here on our blog every Sunday.

Are Successful Women Entrepreneurs Different From Men?
Yes! Women are entrepreneurs too! But how do they differ from the men? There are differences, and researchers are left surprised by results.

Why Morning People Rule the World
Not that evening people are life's losers; some of our best friends are evening people... But studies show there are many advantages your "morning-ness" can give you. Don't have morningness? You may be able to change that...

7 Steps to Creating a Successful Online Business
Running a business online today is the modern thing for most entrepreneurs, and with 7 steps like these, you can run one, too. But why? Maybe it's the passive income, or the ability to fulfill yourself by earning money doing what you love.

How We Can Encourage More Female Entrepreneurship
Over 50% of consumers on the internet are women... that gives [female entrepreneurs] a huge competitive advantage. But stuff like their natural fear of taking risks is holding them back. How can we change this?

You're No Steve Jobs, So Look Before You Leap
"Iterate, iterate, iterate." If you don't know what that word means, find out now! That's what entrepreneur Wadhwa says CampfireLabs.com is doing. He predicts that they have "a better than average chance of becoming a Zynga or Facebook."

10 Ways the Next 10 Years Are Going To Be Mind-Blowing
We made it through the first decade of the 21st century alive, let's hope we can do it again, because soon you may not need to change out of your clothes into a bathing suit to swim. In fact, your car might have tiny solar panels all over it as you drive to work. And if you go on vacation, you might be staying in a resort that moves.

Google's Schmidt Undaunted by Apple or Facebook
Google has some things to clear up. And from Schmidt's standpoint, Google seems very confident and not worried by innovations and pressure coming from Apple and Facebook.

Stay tuned till next Sunday, or let us share news, events, articles with you in real time!

You should connect with us on facebook, here.
We're also on twitter, as @OfficeDivvy. Please say hi.

5 Select Articles on Social Media...

2010-07-18T16:35:00.000-04:00

Here's a compilation of select articles and blog posts on Social Media which came on our radar recently..

We typically share much on twitter and facebook, but the particular news, articles, and blog posts that really stand out, we compile them here on our blog every Sunday.

52 Cool Facts About Social Media
Danny Brown compiles 52 facts (one fact per week of the year) on facebook, twitter, linkedin, YouTube, and Blogging. Facts such as "90% of Internet users know at least one social network" or "The average social user has 195 friends."

Facebook Games: Office Wars
Nope, we're in no way, shape or form fans of Facebook games. But this one sounds really funny, so we thought it's worth sharing.

How Facebook will take over the world
Facebook will announce its 500 millionth user any day now, but to reach one billion users the firm needs to expand in developing markets. by Jemima Kiss of Guardian.

Man Claims to Own 84% of Facebook
A man with a contract claiming at least 50% of Facebook. Read how he did it with just $1,000.

How to Optimize Your Site for SEO
Here are some tasks that need to be completed for great Search Engine Optimization. In fact, some of them are pretty simple...

Stay tuned till next Sunday, or let us share news, events, articles with you in real time!

You should connect with us on facebook, here.
We're also on twitter, as @OfficeDivvy. Please say hi.

Twitter User Names of Coworking Spaces and Space Owners

2010-07-18T15:41:00.000-04:00

Very cool list of twitter accounts of people and spaces involved in Coworking.

You know to find us on twitter under @OfficeDivvy, but this list is great to connect with other co-working folks:

Coworking.pbworks.com/Twitter

Coworking Rocks!

This is why Twitter Direct Messages (DM) are a nuisance...

2010-07-13T22:53:00.001-04:00

In an earlier blog post titled "3 Biggest Problems with Twitter are…" I wrote an open letter to twitter (coincidentally on their 2nd birthday):

Twitter, we know you are not perfect. You have your shortcomings. We all do. If you are picking some things to work on here’s number 2:

Direct Message: Auto Respond
We often times would have to disregard our DM box, as it was full of so many “Thanks for following – join us at 8am Monday through…." kind of nonsense. Plus the phishing, and hacked accounts through DM.

In the same blog post, I also discussed "Absentee Tweeting" as a big problem.

Now, look at this Twitter DM we received:

One picture says a thousand words. Do I need to say more?

This fellow is not only sending our @OfficeDivvy twitter account an unsolicited, unnecessary (and really useless) auto-DM, but he isn't even able to automate it properly, with the %DISPLAYNAME% field still showing as a field.

Why inconveniencing others is still allowed on twitter? The current twitter DM-module enables and empowers that. If some folks don't have common-sense or any courtesy; why do we not have a twitter-option to shot-down the DM module completely, or create filters to block certain DMs?

Well, I must admit I actually have a system. Do you know how I deal with unnecessary, auto, and spam DM? I unfollow the person immediately! We show zero tolerance for this kind of users, as such DMs show we're not a match, and there is no need to sweat it...

Are you burdened by "DM" in similar or different ways? Please share your thoughts...

posted by Ky Ekinci
Co-Founder, Office Divvy ™
Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Connect? Ky on Twitter | Office Divvy on Twitter | On Facebook

7 Select Articles on Startups, Entrepreneurship, Small Business, and Technology

2010-07-11T17:04:00.000-04:00

Here's a compilation of select articles and blog posts on Startup, Entrepreneur, and Small Business matters.

We typically share original content as well as good finds on twitter and facebook, but those particular news, articles, and blog posts that really stand out, we compile them here on our blog every Sunday...

How to Name Your Startup
Naming your company can be challenging and time consuming. Here are 10 tips from Ross Kimbarovsky, co-founder of crowdSPRING, published on Tech Cocktail.

5 Lessons from Startup Pitches
This is an excellent read if you're planning on every starting a new Startup, or going after VC or Angel money. By Jason Cohen, the founder of Smart Bear Software.

US Job Growth Entirely Driven by Startups
New firms add an average of 3 million jobs in their first year, while older companies lose 1 million jobs annually. Kauffman Foundation of Entrepreneurship says: "When it comes to U.S. job growth, Startup companies aren’t everything. They’re the only thing."

Why Startups Fail?
New ventures have only a 50% chance of making it through the first five years. Many would-be moguls just aren't prepared for the reality of running their own businesses. by Lisa Smith of Investopia.

8 Questions to Ask Before Building a Business
Are you thinking of starting a new web business? Before you start, ask yourself the following eight questions. The advantage of this is that you can quickly see if the idea you’re going to throw your money and soul into is likely to work.

S.B.A. Lending Plunged in June
With the expiration of stimulus provisions that made Small Business Administration loans more attractive to borrowers and lenders (and with efforts to renew the those provisions stalled in Congress), SBA-backed lending all but collapsed in June. (New York Times)

Sam's Club to Offer Small Business Loans
Associated Press reported that Sam's Club said Tuesday it will offer loans of up to $25,000 to its small business members.

Hope you enjoyed the above links. Stay tuned till next Sunday, or let us share news, events, articles with you in real time:

You should connect with us on facebook, here.
We're also on twitter, as @OfficeDivvy. Please say hi.

Job Growth in the U.S. Driven Entirely by Startups!

2010-07-08T13:08:00.002-04:00

Job Growth in U.S. Driven Entirely by Startups, according to the findings from the Kauffman Foundation Study that is.

" New firms add an average of 3 million jobs in their first year, while older companies lose 1 million jobs annually. "

When it comes to U.S. job growth, Startup companies aren’t everything. They’re the only thing.

It’s well understood that existing companies of all sizes constantly create – and destroy – jobs. Conventional wisdom, then, might suppose that annual net job gain is positive at these companies. A study released by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, however, shows that this rarely is the case. In fact, net job growth occurs in the U.S. economy only through startup firms.

The new study, The Importance of Startups in Job Creation and Job Destruction (PDF), bases its findings on the Business Dynamics Statistics, a U.S. government dataset compiled by the U.S. Census Bureau. The BDS series tracks the annual number of new businesses (startups and new locations) from 1977 to 2005, and defines startups as firms younger than one year old.

The study reveals that, both on average and for all but seven years between 1977 and 2005, existing firms are net job destroyers, losing 1 million jobs net combined per year.

By contrast, in their first year, new firms add an average of 3 million jobs.

Further, the study shows, job growth patterns at both startups and existing firms are pro-cyclical, although existing firms have much more cyclical variance. Most notably, during recessionary years, job creation at startups remains stable, while net job losses at existing firms are highly sensitive to the business cycle.

“These findings imply that America should be thinking differently about the standard employment policy paradigm,” said Robert E. Litan, vice president of Research and Policy at the Kauffman Foundation. “Policymakers tend to focus on changes in the national or state unemployment rate, or on layoffs by existing companies. But the data from this report suggest that growth would be best boosted by supporting startup firms.”

Because startups that develop organically are almost solely the drivers of job growth, job-creation policies aimed at luring larger, established employers will inevitably fail, said the study’s author, Tim Kane, Kauffman Foundation senior fellow in Research and Policy. Such city and state policies are doomed not only because they are zero-sum, but because they are based in unrealistic employment growth models.

And it’s not just net job creation that startups dominate. While older firms lose more jobs than they create, those gross flows decline as firms age. On average, one-year-old firms create nearly one million jobs, while ten-year-old firms generate 300,000. The notion that firms bulk up as they age is, in the aggregate, not supported by data.

Note: This post is based on the July 7 Press Release by Kauffman Foundation
Download: The Importance of Startups in Job Creation and Job Destruction (PDF)

New Hootsuite Has "Klout"

2010-07-05T13:18:00.000-04:00

The popular social media tool to manage Twitter and Facebook status updates, Hootsuite, released their newest version: Hootsuite 5.0. There were some hiccups at first, folks (including us) did not like the new RT format being chosen as a default. Hootsuite corrected the problem relatively fast, giving the users the option to choose from the new or the old-school RT format.

One interesting feature is "Klout" with twitter-user scores based on Klout.com's klout-scores, which is the influence metric. It measures overall influence through 25 variables broken into three categories; True Reach, Amplification Score and Network Score.

Klout tracks the impact of the user's opinions, links and recommendations across their social graph. It collects data about the content one creates, how people interact with that content and the size and composition of one's network.

From there, the tool analyzes the data to find indicators of influence and then provides the user with innovative tools to interact with and interpret the data.

Good job Hootsuite! Well done...

What tool do you use to manage your twitter account(s)? Hootsuite, Tweetdeck, Seesmic, or others?

NWC2.0 -- New Work City 2.0

2010-07-03T09:24:00.000-04:00

Here are two emails came through from the Coworking Group with exciting news for New York City based New Work City, but also highlighting interesting approaches to funding for coworking spaces, the coworking world (coworkers, space owners, and those who plan to have their space) will enjoy reading about:

The first email is from Alex Hillman, a co-founder of Philadelphia-based coworking space, Independence Hall (aka IndyHall). And the second email is from Tony Bacigalupo, the owner of New Work City (aka NWC) in Manhattan.

Here we go:

Alex Hillman | Jul 02 10:15AM -0400

For those who haven't heard, New Work City (our coworking friends in Manhattan) have announced a big move: Tony Bacigalupo's Blog Post

Manhattan has some of the most challenging real estate economics in our country and Tony has done a good job of keeping a bootstrap mindset and always coming up with creative ways to overcome the challenge while keeping their growth and approach organic.

Their latest move includes not only the usual high costs associated with space in NYC, but renovation costs as well. I was impressed by one approach they took to financing their move and build-out:
Darrell Silver's Blog Post

In short, and Tony can feel free to correct me here, one of the long time members/supporters they have invested cash in return for ownership of a few memberships...memberships that subsidize his company's costs of having a workspace in Manhattan. When New Work City can afford to (it sounds like there is a goal of one year), they will buy those memberships back from Darrell.

"I don't know the details of this deal beyond what I've read on Darrell's blog."

I don't know the details of this deal beyond what I've read on Darrell's blog, and Tony has a lot on his plate with opening a new location in 2 months, but I was particularly impressed with the creative approach to
financing and thought that instead of just ask him for more info on my own time, he could share with all of us at once. :)

When IndyHall performed its similar growth/move last year, we also raised money from within our membership in the form of a loan. This isn't completely dissimilar, but the tone of the exchange is more organized and mutually beneficial, I almost wish we'd thought of it ourselves!

The main reinforcing concept that I see here are mutual benefit of having members bought in on a much deeper level than renting desks.

Alex
indyhall.org
coworking in philadelphia

* * *

Tony Bacigalupo | Jul 02 08:37PM -0400

Alex, thanks for bringing this up... I figured someone would beat me to spilling the beans about our new space on here :)

NYC is indeed a very difficult place to build a coworking space while keeping it truly community-run. Point of fact, many of the proto-coworking spots that have appeared in NYC in the past few years have been directly or indirectly tied to external interests.

My goal with NWC was to keep us truly independent and self-sustaining.

The deal in our new space was the closest we were ever going to get to a perfect storm of all the right factors: location, price, size, environment, timing, and, most importantly, a landlord who was on board with what we're doing.

The special deal you're referring to was Darrell's idea, and it was a really smart one (he's a really really smart dude). It works out really well for both of us-- he saves a bunch of money for his startup in the form of free
memberships, while we get the benefit of both a critical infusion of early cash as well as a group of great guys to help fill up our big new space.

By the time their free occupancy starts to really hurt our bottom line, we'll be generating enough cash flow to start paying off the loan-- and by then, Darrell and his team would have gotten enough benefit to justify the
risk of the loan.

Darrell also, of course, wants to support us, and he knows that the economics of starting up a coworking space in NYC is damn near impossible if you don't have some help.

So his help was the critical piece I needed to feel comfortable signing the lease.

That being said, we still have a very, very long way to go. To pay for what will be a very significant amount of construction and outfitting, we are going to have to pull out all the stops.

My aim is to go for the most community-reinforcing routes first. We'll be taking a lot of membership prepayment (two of my members have already paid for six and twelve months respectively, before I even started asking), that being the best money since it is sourced by the community itself and represents commitments on the part of the members.

Next up is loans from individuals who are willing to take a little risk to help make it all possible. They will be simple loans with low interest rates and long repayment terms; in other words, these are going to be loans from people who don't care so much about making a cash ROI as they do with helping us succeed.

Beyond that, I anticipate that we will still have a significant gap to close-- we're looking into sponsorships, partnered programming, auctioning off members' services, taking money for dares, and more.

I'm not going to lie, I've had my share of panic attacks about all this. But we hit a point at which it was clear that we were as close as we were ever going to get, and I decided that we were close enough that I could rely on rallying the community together to figure out how to get across the finish line.

So far, I've already been pleasantly surprised by the dedication and support of some of my close friends in the community. If we catch a few more breaks, we'll be there.

And then we're going to have something that never could have existed in NYC otherwise-- a true community center based on coworking. The impact we're going to have with this new space is going to be well worth the hard work and risk that are going into it.

We are the future, people.

Much more to come! Would love some help on creative fundraising ideas.

Nighthawk Solar to export Solar Lights to Pakistan & Afghanistan

2010-06-22T21:58:00.000-04:00

Office Divvy ™ provides co-location facilities and outsourced operations to Startups, Entrepreneurs, and Small Business. In a ceremony on June 22, 2010, Office Divvy ™ member Nighthawk Marketing (the maker of the Nighhawk Solar Light) assigned representation and distribution to Karachi-based Equip International for solar light distribution in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The signing ceremony took place in Palm Coast, FL. Nighthawk Solar co-founder Tim Howard, and Equip International representative Anjum Ahmad were accompanied by press, select business-people, and government and economic-organization leaders including,

Palm Coast Mayor, Jon Netts
Vice Mayor and Councilwoman, Mary DiStefano
Councilman, Holsey Moorman
Councilman, Frank Meeker
Councilman, Bill Lewis
Palm Coast City Manager, James Landon
President of Flagler County Chamber of Commerce, Doug Baxter
Enterprise Flagler Director, Greg Rawls
Palm Coast Economic Development Team Leader, Beau Falgout
Office Divvy co-founders, Lisa Ekinci, Sim Taing, and Ky Ekinci

Here's a slide-show from the event:

_______________________________________

Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg: "Email is going away!"

2010-06-17T21:13:00.004-04:00

Facebook's Chief Operating Officer, Sheryl Sandberg says "email is going away."

Ms. Sandberg says only 11% of teenagers today email daily, and that the notion "I can't imagine life without email" is going away:

Huffington Post ran a survey based on this speech. It seems most folks do not agree that the email is going away anytime soon. Here's a capture of the survey results as of June 17th:

What do you think?

Is email going away anytime soon?

Foursquare - A Smartphone Game that's good for Business

2010-06-16T17:22:00.001-04:00

I'll tell you from get go, that I like Foursquare... What is Four Square? It's an adorable geo-location based game, exclusively played through smart-phones, in real life, with real people, involving real locations and venues.

When you actually visit a real venue (bar, restaurant, hotel, club, conference center etc.) you pop up your smartphone, and "check in" using Foursquare, indicating that you are at that establishment at that given time. It broadcasts your location to other users you're connected with on foursquare, and you can even set it up to send the announcement to your facebook and twitter friends.

Foursquare serves as a game, pairing virtual rewards with real activities. Users earn badges as they visit different spots. When you visit one location enough times you become the Mayor.

I proudly hold the mayorship of 17 places in Palm Coast. That's the advantage of being on 4 Square in a small town, there is little competition. :) By the way, if you are on Foursquare, you can find me and befriend me: Ky on Foursquare

Now, let's get to the real meat here, which is Business! Foursquare is good for business. As a business owner, when people check in at your venue you're getting a free visibility out there = Free Marketing! You can also add specials, even broadcast messages to those who check in at neighboring establishments.

Here is an example: The other day I was at the Taco Bell in Palm Coast, at the drive-through line. I visited twice before the week prior, and became the Mayor of Taco Bell. When I grabbed my Blackberry to check in at Taco Bell on Foursquare, I noticed the following message, alerting me that there is a "Special Nearby" other than where I was, that is a Taco Bell.

When I clicked on it, I saw this:

Basically, Starbucks in Palm Coast, FL was humoring me for being the Mayor of Taco Bell, and offering $1 off a Frappuccino. Now if you ask me, the offer is not good enough, and Starbucks, a giant corporation, is obviously running a centralized campaign that include all Starbucks locations on Foursquare because I've seen this elsewhere also.

But think of it from the standpoint of a small business owner, how powerful a small business can be on foursquare. I'll even give you examples if you're familiar with Palm Coast, FL:

Life Thyme Cafe or Dominic's Deli at City Walk,
Mezzaluna in European Village,
Jim's Hot Dog Cart located at Sears parking lot

These are the establishments in more or less the same neighborhood that can dominate the Foursquare-landscape with specials, and do well, too.

There is so much opportunity for small business owners to use Social Media and make real connections, acquire real customers, and create loyalty. Foursquare is just one social media & networking application, but it can be a tremendous platform for Small Business, especially if you own a cafe, restaurant, bar or club type of venue...

* * *

On a side note, today (June 16, 2010) there are 350 plus foursquare meetups taking place in over 60 countries with thousands of people attending. Office Divvy ™ is hosting a Foursquare Meetup in Palm Coast between 5:30 PM and 7 PM.

________________________________________

posted by Ky Ekinci
Co-Founder, Office Divvy ™
Wednesday, June 16, 2010

Connect? Ky on Twitter | Office Divvy on Twitter | On Facebook

________________________________________

Social Media = Positive ROI

2010-06-15T19:47:00.007-04:00

Not many words needed here:

America Loves Small Business!

2010-06-13T10:00:00.007-04:00

"Small business" love of Americans is clear in these Gallup poll results -- 95% of Americans have a positive image of Small Business!

The love is shared both by Republicans and Democrats:

It doesn't matter if you're a conservative, moderate, or liberal, you still love Small Business:

So, it's safe to say:

________
Resources:

Original Gallup Study Results from February 2010

Twitter Search Now Reads URLs behind Shortened Links

2010-06-12T21:43:00.000-04:00

Twitter Search is improving quite a bit. It's now able to read the URL behind the shortened link from both bit.ly and Hootsuite's ow.ly.

See the example below...

In two of my tweets there are no keywords or phrases that match "Flagler County." However, the URL in both links is pointing to http://palm-coast-flagler-county-florida.blogspot.com/ and the twitter search is able to pickup the "Flagler-County" portion of the URL from behind the shortened links:

Next time you're searching something on twitter if the results do not contain the keywords or the phrases you're searching for, don't be surprised; it's not a miracle, it's just that twitter search is adding value by looking at the actual URL. :)

For those who are new to twitter (and for those who are not on twitter), how do you search twitter? There are many ways, but you can start with using the twitter search engine at http://search.twitter.com

________________________________________

posted by Ky Ekinci
Co-Founder, Office Divvy ™
Saturday, June 12, 2010

Connect? Ky on Twitter | Office Divvy on Twitter | On Facebook
________________________________________

What motivates your employees -- Money? Think again!

2010-06-04T15:41:00.002-04:00

In this lively "RSA Animate" episode, adapted from Dan Pink's talk at the RSA, the hidden truths behind what really motivates us at home and in the workplace gets illustrated...

This is a must watch (or your money back):

________
Resources:

How to Hide/Unhide Your Friends' Farmvile Updates on facebook

2010-06-01T19:46:00.004-04:00

Few days ago I wrote a blog post titled, "How to Hide Friends' Annoying Farmville Updates from Facebook" and since then at least a dozen people asked me if I could do a quick video on that showing how that works.

Games like Farmville seem to intrude your fleeting facebook wall by default, showing status updates by your friends on your timeline with automatic updates as your friends play the game.

So here is how to disable these game updates, not just for Farmville but for the rest of them, from appearing on your facebook timeline:

I hope this helps. :)

By the way, we're doing a series of twitter and facebook workshops in Palm Coast. If you're anywhere in Flagler or Volusia County (Flagler Beach, Daytona, Ormond Beach etc) and plan on using facebook or twitter for professional and personal branding, you might want to attend these small-group workshops: www.OfficeDivvy.com/Workshop

____________
Related Posts:

posted by Ky Ekinci
Co-Founder, Office Divvy ™
Monday, May 31, 2010

Connect? Ky on Twitter | Office Divvy on Twitter | On Facebook

How to Remove the Google Blogger Navigation Bar from Your Blog

2010-05-31T12:44:00.006-04:00

Do you find the Blogspot navigation bar annoying? If you blog on Google's Blogger platform, chances are, you have asked yourself how you could get rid of that. It's actually as simple as dropping some short code to your style-sheets.

Here's a detailed video I put-together with step by step instructions to remove the navbar from Blogspot:

posted by Ky Ekinci
Co-Founder, Office Divvy ™
Monday, May 31, 2010

Connect? Ky on Twitter | Office Divvy on Twitter | On Facebook

Office Divvy Daily Twitter from Palm Coast & Flagler County

2010-05-30T23:55:00.001-04:00

14:45 How to Hide Friends' Annoying Farmville Updates from Facebook in Two Easy Steps: bit.ly/bZMWNn #
14:46 @myapptsetter ..interesting service! Let's connect, would like to understand how what your service offering packages are. #
14:50 @ormondseafood @EPSFoamPro @FLNativeMom ..hello neighbors, nice to connect with you: bit.ly/twttrfollow #
14:52 "Palm Coast with Julie" introduced: bit.ly/a1MAyy | ...did you connect with her on facebook yet? facebook.com/PalmCoastJulie #
17:20 From WhiteNoise to LinkedIn, Top 10 iPhone (and iPad) apps for the busy, work-at-home moms: ow.ly/1RRuo | #Mompreneur #
17:38 Good find Steve! disq.us/do86x #
21:34 "Be nice to nerds. Chances are you'll end up working for one." ~ Bill Gates .... ow.ly/1RTz5 #
23:46 13 Truths About Social Media Measurement: ow.ly/1RVeu by @AmberCadabra #

Connect with Office Divvy on twitter @OfficeDivvy, or "like" us on facebook, @OfficeDivvy... Much thanks for listening...

How to Hide Friends' Annoying Farmville Updates from Facebook

2010-05-30T12:57:00.010-04:00

If you are a Farmville lover, this post is probably not for you...

But if you are one of the 6 Million+ fans on the "I dont care about your farm, or your fish, or your park, or your mafia!!!" facebook page, you'll probably be interested in this "facebook how to tips" to hide your friends' annoying game and application feeds from appearing on your facebook timeline.

Did you know that you actually are only two clicks away to have a peace of mind, and to stop the annoying application updates? Here's how:

Step 1
Hover your cursor over the upper right corner of your friend's farmville accomplishment (sorry to be sarcastic), and a "Hide" button will appear. It will look like this:

Step 2
Click on the "Hide" button, and two more buttons will appear. First one is to hide the actual friend (and his or her entire status updates from your timeline), and the second one is hide the application's automatic updates from your news feed / facebook timeline. It will look like this:

Click on the latter, and it will prevent all stories from that particular application from appearing on your home page regardless of which friend the update is coming from.

Now take a deep breath, exhale, and relax. You're freed from the annoying application updates!

Remember, Farmville is a very common one, but others are into Mafia Wars, Country Life, Family Feud, Fishville (I made that up, is there a fishville?). You will need to repeat the process for each additional application as the updates appear.

Now what do you do if you change your mind and want to get back the updates? That's a whole another blog post, and I will save it until I actually see people commenting on and requesting tips for how to unhide and get back the Farmville updates. :)

____________
Related Posts:

Is Farmville Responsible for Facebook beating Google's Traffic?

posted by Ky Ekinci
Co-Founder, Office Divvy ™
Sunday, May 30, 2010

Connect? Ky on Twitter | Office Divvy on Twitter | On Facebook

Entrepreneur advice by Kauffman Foundation's Bo Fishback

2010-05-29T12:51:00.003-04:00

"Find a foothold and go for it" says Bo Fishback of the Kauffman Foundation in this quick interview with Wall Street Journal Small Business Editor, Colleen DeBaise:

Office Divvy on Business, Entrepreneurs, Startups

Why we like WordPress and kittens...

Chinese New Year: Year of the Dragon | 2012

This year is considered especially auspicious because it is the year of the water dragon, something that happens once every 60 years. As such, optimism and expectation for better times are expected in 2012.

First Palm Coast Entrepreneur Night of 2012

Palm Coast Entrepreneur Night Recap | November 2011

Great Infographic on How Google Adwords Works

An awesome video on Coworking comes from France

How to properly send off a team member

"I've been here a short time, but I definitely feel I've been a part of something so much bigger than I am."

Where in the world is coworking?

Word of Mouth Marketing Online or Offine -- Infographic

Coworking Membership Benefits and more - Survey Results

One key element in Marketing Effectiveness is...

Coworking Jelly in Japan? Yes, there is a MAP for that!

Palm Coast Entrepreneur Night is on October 25th

Email Marketing: Fundamentals, Best Practices, and More

Business2Business Expo at Hammock Beach Resort

Facebook makes further changes to its photo utility

A productivity tool to manage your tasks: Hourglass

Cigars, Drinks, and Entrepreneurs: Not to miss in Palm Coast!

Targeted Facebook Status Update Sharing is not so targeted

UX Industry: What is it? Where are the jobs?

How to Use Twitter to Ask Questions and Get Answers

Social Media Panel at Flagler County Chamber of Commerce

Twitter launches its own built-in photo-sharing functionality

Happy International Coworking Day!

Are you too old to be technical?

7 Things that Randy Pausch Knows About Time Management

" Time is all you have. And you may find one day that you have less than you think."

Dont' Complain, Just Work Harder ~ Randy Pausch

Where do you go when you really need to get work done?

Where do you really go when you really need to get some serious work done?

One More Short Blog Post On Success and Failure

" It is impossible to live without failing at something unless you live so cautiously that you might as well have not have lived at all, in which case you failed by default."

Tony Bacigalupo on "Co" in Coworking Movement

Twitter's email notifications for mentions, retweets, favorites

Are you obsessed about delivering value every day?

Ashton Kutcher -- the Startup Investor

“ I look for companies that solve problems in intelligent and friction-free ways and that break boundaries.”

Palm Coast Small Business Assistance Center Manager Joe Roy visits Office Divvy ™

Twitter deals with the shortcoming of new retweet format

Email Productivity Tip (for Desktop Email Clients)

The Single Biggest Problem in Communication Is....

And the verdict for the New Twitter Web Interface is...

Friday, May 20th: It's Work from Home Day!

" Working from home is a growing trend, with plans to give every employee the right to request flexible working by 2013."

6 Simple Rules for Talent in Business

“ There are six simple rules concerning talent: identify it, hire it, nurture it, reward it, protect it from being poached. And when the time comes, fire it.”

Email Productivity Tip (for Desktop Email Clients)

How to Build A Local Startup Community in Flagler County

Two Core Qualities of Entrepreneurs

Relentless Tenacity

Being Unafraid to be Embarrassed

Guy Kawasaki outlines key points to being likable

Is QuickBooks® Out To Eat Square's Lunch?

Office Divvy ™ joins Northeast Florida Green Chamber

Survey Monkey acquires Wufoo

Giving a try to Domtar Earthchoice® in honor of Earth Day

Visual.ly Site Launch: Visualize, Browse, Share Infographics

What is an Angel Investor?

Google Blogger is on the move!

What kind of Funding to Avoid for your Small Business

Facebook Enters "Social Media Questions 2.0" Market

LinkedIn Reaches 100,000,000 Members!

The Single Biggest Problem in Communication Is....

Flagler County Chamber Members say they are Lucky!

Hiring Tips from Eben Pagan: Who not to hire?

Awesome Video, Awesome Advice by Neil Pasricha

Seth Godin: Appreciating The Value of Small Failures

We love our customers: Happy Valentines Day!

The Role of Technology in the Post-Industrial Age

Year of the Rabbit: A positive and inspiring outlook for 2011?

Is it a good idea to launch a Startup with your best friends?

Changes and Additions to the Office Divvy Team

Are You Winking In the Dark?

5 Marketing Sins to Avoid in 2011

Is doing a Press Release a waste of time?

Membership Benefits and Fringe Benefits at Office Divvy

What was on the Entrepreneur's Wish List this past Christmas?

**" Time is all you have. And you may find one day that you have less than you think."**

Where do you really go
when you really need to
get some serious work done?