Even as you read this, the same few sources of rumor for and upcoming Apple launch, whether it be a new iPad or a merger of the Macbook Pro and Macbook Air, are being overanalyzed repeatedly by every tech blogger on the internet. Some drawing conclusions from nothing. Others honestly citing their sources as a rumor seen in another rumor report validated by a third rumor site that has a source who is the brother of a somewhat reliable rumor mill. With society’s quest for the latest and greatest in fruit labeled aluminum unibody technology, an army of volunteer marketers and advertisers have been created. Each one of them one a quest to get views for themselves and in turn providing free advertising to Apple’s current and future products. This makes the large profit margins of Apple products even easier to achieve.

Imagine with profit reports from Apple would look like if they didn’t have the army of blog-o-sphere advertisers trying to ride the company image to higher readership…

I am here to tell you there is such a company, The PC Doctors, LLC.  The locally owned and operated company recently moved into the Inventrek Technology Park and added two part-time employees to its payroll.  In a weakened economy, they see room for growth.  They see the need in this area for an honest and trustworthy technology service provider.  They have an understanding beyond technology that allows them to provide services from a holistic view – making technology add value to whatever use you have.

For business, they are able to provide exemplary consulting services related to networking.  They can help you create conversations and grow a social media following – eventually helping you convert followers to leads and leads to customers.

I have known the owner of The PC Doctors for several years.  I have worked for him, with him, and even as his competitor.  I can honestly recommend his services and those of his company without hesitation.  I highly suggest that you give The PC Doctors a call the next time you are in need of technology assistance.

To find out more, you can visit them online at www.pcdocsonline.com

You can also give them a call at 765.507.9583 of visit their office 700 East Firmin, Suite 104, Kokomo, IN 46902

While the Droid Pro seems to be at it’s end of life, the device has served me well and I can honestly say I see no need to move on.  The Gingerbread experience on the Droid Pro has been the best mobile OS experience to date.  However, I like to explore the latest and greatest, so I turned to the Android developer community to get my fix.  This afternoon I installed a nice Android 4.0 Ice Cream sandwich rom on to my Droid Pro.  While the build is missing some functionality, namely the camera, I have found it to be a vast improvement over Gingerbread.

The new OS has a sense of polish with a more consistent interface across screens.  The browser is incredibly responsive and has an easy to access option for requesting desktop versions of sites instead of mobile versions.  The email and calendar apps have been redesigned and present a cleaner interface – very much along the lines of the recent redesigns of the Google Web Apps.

Each release of Android seems to grow by leaps in bounds, rapidly catching up to and in some cases exceeding many of the fan favorite features of the market share leader iOS.  Androids breakneck pace of innovation will continue to drastically improve the mobile landscape for years to come – hopefully forcing Apple to begin innovating with its iOS platform in the near future.

More to come as I continue to examine and explore mobile OSes…

To sum myself up quickly for the reader that doesn’t know me, I am a 24 year old  male that is in relatively poor health, significantly overweight, and highly stress prone.  I often overload myself with projects, commitments, and responsibilities and fear greatly of letting others down.  The high levels of unnecessary stress I put myself through have been taking a toll on my cardiovascular system and after a result doctor’s visit, I finally realize it is time to change.  After recent conversations with friends and family, along with a little soul searching on my own, I came to realizations that I need to learn where to drawn the line.

As determined as I am to change my physical health through diet and exercise, I am equally determined to put myself in a healthier state of well-being overall.  I like writing, so I am going to write more.  I have been working on a book for years and this is going to be the year I finish it.  I am going to spend more time connecting with not only my friends and family but my community as well.  I have ideas I want to develop.  I have dreams I want to bring to reality.  I have to realize that in trying to be everything to everyone, I am nothing to myself.  I think this is something that everyone needs to realize.  There is a difference in being self-centered and self-serving and being self-aware.  If you aren’t happy and effective with yourself, how can you expect to be so with friends, family, or co-workers.

2012 is the year I make my stand to change myself.  This is the year that I become me and proud of that me.

Here they are:

Resolutions for 2011

1. Develop further understanding of my beliefs and faith
2. Lead a healthier lifestyle in order to promote a longer and healthier life
3. Do more to help my fellow man (while continuing to spread the word that the private sector is more efficient and effective than government)
4. Continue to advance my education, furthering my skill set to make me a more valuable asset to an organization and myself.
5. Decrease debts by 35%
6. Resume musical studies

Grades for 2011

1. C – While I now have a better understanding of my beliefs and faith, I did not make as much progress as I would have liked.  This one will be rolling over to 2012.
2. B – I was able to improve the numbers that we often relate to healthiness by about 10% for the year.  There is still a lot of work to be done here.
3. F – That’s right. I failed on this one.  This year I closed my business, largely stopped working for free, and stopped writing about the wrongs of government.
4. A – I earned a certification this year, boosting my credentials. I have also started my graduate studies looking to earn an MBA concentrating on IT Management.
5. B – I have reduced my credit card utilization from around 80% at the beginning of the year to around 15%.  I refinanced my hours shortening the term and reducing the interest rate 2%.  Overall these and other changes amounted to a 17% overall debt reduction.
6. C – I have been working on my guitar and piano skills but not to the degree I had hoped to.

Overall Grade: C

I think publicly posting my resolutions was a big help in keeping them in my mind as I felt there was the possibility that someone could hold me accountable to them.  I plan to do the same for 2012 and encourage others to do the same.  If nothing else, it is always interesting to see what people think they need/want to improve in a given year.

I could rattle on about all of the things I have learned or considered, but I’d rather concentrate on the two I consider to be tied for the most important.  Not only are they the heaviest on my heart, they also give me an opportunity to work in a little social commentary on things that many of us our raised to know but we never really understand until we find them for ourselves.

The first topic is Faith.  I was not raised in a religious household by any means.  My father was (and still is) very cynical when it comes to knowing the Lord or having any similar feelings.  My mother is very hesitant when it comes to the matter, but is beginning to head in a positive direction in her own way.  In high school I began to search out the truth for myself and began my path of Christianity.  Now that I am older I understand more and more the importance of faith in a society.  I fully believe in everyone’s right to believe what they want to believe as far as a deity or religion goes, however I think everyone should find something to believe in – even if you want to just believe that humans are inherently good.  A belief or faith in something will lead to positive moral values in most cases – something I think much of my generation lacks.  Many of the people I know (especially in my age group) choose the easier option or the option that “feels good” when faced with a difficult decision instead of considering what is morally right or how it affects others.  I have made more than my fair share of bad decisions, but I have found myself turning to my faith more and more for answers to what is right when it comes to the tough decisions of life; and, to be honest, sometimes the right decision is hard and absolutely no fun or benefit for me, but it is still the right decision.   Since I have been making a conscious effort to do better at making the morally correct decision, I have noticed more and more things in life settling down and falling into place.  I think if everyone started looking at what is morally right and found a little faith – whatever that faith may be – the world would be a better place.

My second topic is partially related to the first. You must work for everything.  I was raised with this pounded into my head.  My dad’s take was always that you had to work hard for everything because the world was out to get you.  I don’t think the world is out to get me – or anyone for that matter.  I just think that everything worth having is worth working for.  No one is entitled to anything other than their life and freedom, beyond that it is up to them what they make of the precious gift that they have received.  We all have different dispositions in life, but we do not have to be beholden to them.  Each of us is capable of making changes in our lives, finding opportunities, and asking for help, but opportunities and help will only be of assistance if each of us is willing to work hard to make something of it.  I am tired of hearing people I know talk about how they have it “so bad” when they were raised in a middle class family and just simply don’t understand what it means to work for what you want.  They expect something to be handed to them, but when an opportunity is handed to them they don’t know what to do with it because it still requires them to work for something.  Unfortunately this also creates feelings of jealousy in society towards those who have worked hard and come out on top.  They feel they are entitled to some of the results of hard work.  The claims then start flying about unfairness and excuses start piling up as to why they haven’t even made a dedicated attempt to strive for a goal.  I was sitting in my recliner earlier today admiring my Christmas tree and watching football when I began to reflect about my position in life.  I came from a poor family where neither of my parents had a four year college degree.  I am not entirely sure my mother’s parents every graduated high school. Yet here I am, almost 24, sitting in fully furnished house I own in a decent neighborhood, a late model car in the driveway, and working on a Master’s degree.  I have owned a company that was successful at its high point. I have an annual income higher than both of my parents combined and I am beginning to build a career that has a promising path.  I wasn’t given these things. I worked hard for them.  I’ve put in my eighty hour workweeks – my blood, sweat, and tears.  I am in love with wonderful gal and I have some wonderful friends.  Those relationships aren’t easy either.  They require lots of hard work.  Sometimes I just want to walk up to people and lovingly communicate the fact that they would get a lot farther in life if they spent as much time working toward a goal as they did complaining about how much they wish they could change their position in life.

These are both things that many of us claim to know but we don’t understand and therefore can’t practice.  Personally I have a lot of work to do on both of these points, as there is always room for growth.  I have just been thinking about them a lot lately and wanted to share.  Thanks for letting me ramble.

With the economy in the dump, government taking socialist approaches to business, and financial obligations in our own life, it is nearly impossible to justify quitting your day job or taking out substantial loans to start your dream business.  Much of the time a “side” business will form out of these ideas and bring in a little extra income.  In the beginning, this seems great.  However as time goes on and months then years pass and you are in the same spot you started, receiving only a little extra income per month on the “side,” it is easy to get discouraged.

At this point I think it is important to be honest to both yourself and your customers.  Are you truly committed to yourself, your business, and them?  Are you content with the few extra bucks a month or do you really want more?  If you want more and are truly committed, then it is time to sit down and work out a plan for how to get more.  The sitting on the side and being cautious route didn’t provide the growth you wanted but it was much safer than the “all-in” approach.  You need to find something in the middle.  Just think – if you would have looked for middle ground in the beginning, you might be in a better spot.

Here is my recommendation for how to approach a business: Do NOT go it alone.  It is much easier to find and justify a balance of “all-in” and “safe” when you have help.  Everyone involved should be in a spot where they can contribute to the company, but not rely on it financially for some time – if ever.  Once you have your team together, set realistic goals for each month or quarter and develop a plan to get there.  Once you have your plan – implement it.  Don’t spend too much time planning because nothing will get done.  Once again, the name of the game is balance.

So far we have honesty, balance, more balance, and one remaining item to level out of thinking.  That item is honesty.  It is important to be open and honest with your customers.  As a small business you can’t always compete on price, but you can compete on the human level every time.  Develop a relationship with your customers.  Let them know where the company is and where you would like to see it go.  (Obviously you don’t want to share every detail of the company, use your sense here.) Take feedback from them.  Being honest with them will build trust, which will prove to be more important in growing your company than any other factor.

When I was running a small business, I tried a competition by price model and shrouded the company in mystery.  I have been using the feedback from my company to develop themes to consider for others developing businesses.  I don’t have any answers, but I have a lot of ideas to share so check back regularly.

“Circles” is a feature in Google+ that allows you to EASILY manage your friends, coworkers, family, and other contacts. Finally, a way to organize those random people that “friend request” you that you don’t know, yet accept out of curiosity. Unlike the annoying and hard to use lists on Facebook, you are the only person that knows which circle people are in. I find this to be the best feature of the entire system. Another great feature is something Google seems to be calling “Data Liberation.” You can easily export any and all pieces of your Google+ account and download them as fairly common file types.

While I am still very early in my exploration of this new Google product, the integration of the Google account with this new social networking tool could have profound and powerful uses and implications for both Google users and competitors. The changes that Google has been making to the look of it’s other core services has been in preparation for the launch of Google+ and providing a consistent ecosystem for all users. I am hopeful this product offering will cause Facebook to become truly innovative with its product offerings and get away from bolting half finished features to a slow and overloaded horse.  Let the social network race begin!

If you would like an invite to Google+, I would be happy to give you one. All I ask you do is to use the contact form located here.

Here are some tips that I think are important for people to follow when dealing in the social networks. While by no means comprehensive, I think you will find that you get a better response when abiding by a few of these simple suggestions.

1. Don’t re-tweet everything you see!

This is important!  Unless you are building a service as a professional re-tweeter, use some care when retweeting.  Reposting 90 tweets in the matter of 6 seconds, while impressive, can show that you can’t come up with original content, but want to say “Hey!  I’m here! Hey! Look at me!”  If there are a lot of good things that you want to share (and there always are), spread them out through our the day a bit.  You should find that the message will reach more people by nature of your tweet not occurring the same time as the original.

2. Don’t let your multiple Twitter (or other social network) accounts look the same!

This is one of my personal social network pet peeves.  There are people out there doing social marketing for multiple companies or brands.  They are quickly trying to build a list of followers, so what do they do?  Mirror content!  Unfortunately this presents several problems.  One, it is easy to figure out which companies or brands are using the same social marketing person.  If the brands and companies are related, that may not be a bad thing. However, if you are looking for a different image for each brand, then you are in trouble.  If you managed to get the same people to follow all of your brands, what will they think when they log in to social network “x” and all they see in the news feed is the same story/post from six different accounts?  Instead of building a brand socially, your are degrading them to those followers.  It is okay to mirror content, just space it out. Don’t make accounts look exactly the same.

3. Be careful about linking your social network account together!

We all know the guy that has four twitter accounts, mirrors the same content on all of them, and have them tied into his Facebook page.  You log in and see a new post from Bill that came from Twitter and then underneath it you see “175 more posts from Twitter.”  Odds are these are all from Bill and the news feed just decided to give up and that people probably don’t want to just read about Bill and is rapid retweet ability.  While linking accounts together is a powerful and effective tool, each social network is different.  Some will collapse multiple posts in rapid succession from the same source, while others don’t care.  We all know the goal is to get the message out and engage followers, fans, people and turn them into customers, readers, dancers, whatever.  How effectively are you doing that if a social network is collapsing your messages together instead of displaying them at the same rank as Susie’s “I love my bff Josie” post?

4. Scheduling tweets: I can tweet without being here and link all my networks together!?!?

Yes you can.  This is a powerful tool when done effectively.  Just remember the first three tips when doing this.  Also, don’t schedule re-occurrences of tweets that aren’t useful to people. Scheduling tweets about a free local business directory is a good idea, while scheduling tweets about the awesomeness of bff Josie is not a good idea.  A schedule tweet letting people know about an event is a great idea too, just make sure the tweets stop when the event is over.  Remember to keep your content fresh though, no one wants to look at a feed that is riddled with the same tweets over and over again.  Tweets can get stale faster than a bag of open chips.

5. Timing is everything!

The fifth point is really the moral of the post.  People like lists that end in fives, so I thought I would oblige. Timing is everything when trying to engage the social face-blogging-tweet-in-linked-book-o sphere that is the modern social network.  Using some common sense and some great timing can go a long way in transforming your presence from annoying your followers and fans, to actually engaging them which should be the true goal of any social marketer.

I’d love to hear your comments!