|
|
While Tiger Woods was playing practice rounds at this year’s British Open a few of us from Bandon got to participate (i.e. stand around a lot and freeze our butts off) in the making of one of Accenture’s newest commercials. A friend said he saw the finished commercial on Fox News. It is also one of two new commercials on the Accenture Web site.
For those who were there (or just interested) here it is: Tiger at Bandon Dunes. The hole he is on is number 16 but in real life there is no tree, fence or talking sheep.
Update: Since Accenture seems to be distancing themselves from Tiger, the link to the ad page is broken.
Over the last couple of years twitter has become one of the mot popular social media phenomenon in the history of the web. I know several agents who have twitter accounts but have not seen them using it much for business. I just ran across this article which is one of the best discussions of using twitter for business that I have read.
I get asked a lot about search engine optimization (getting your site ranked high in the search engines). I just found this blog post and a cheat sheet that covers the basics very well. Read to the bottom as some of the comments are very good. I’ll definately be using the cheat sheet as a checklist for every page I develop in the future.
I have a love hate relationship with golf. I have said that when they come up with a 12 step program I am going to quit (either that of methadone for golf). I guess golfing and being a perfectionist don’t go together.
A friend of my mother loaned her a copy of this book. I picked it up and read a few pages and immediately ordered it. I’m only about half way through it but it is definitely helping. Not with my game apparently, since I shot the worst round I can remember on Tuesday, but it has helped me realize that as a high handicap hacker, I am expected to miss a few shots (quite a few). So even shooting some 25 shots worse than my personal best, I did not vow to quit.
However, not sure I’m ready to buy into Bob Rotella’s “trust your swing” idea. My swing is definitely not trustworthy.
When we first installed OS Commerce for our ReloadingInternational site we tried installing and enabling several languages. Since the site is targeted at “international” customers, we thought this would be great.
The problem with that is, any custom pages have to be translated and maintenance got to be a nightmare any time a page changed. It finally got to the point we had to disable any languages other than English.
I had discovered a jquery plugin that we could use to translate specific parts of pages (or entire pages) using Google’s translation service. I just never quite got around to it.
A couple of days ago with the announcement of the Google Translation widget, Google solved the problem for me. It took all of 10 minutes and the site is now available in 39 languages. Here’s how.
Because OS Commerce includes several languages, it also includes a language selection box. The code for this box is located in catalog/includes/boxes/languages.php. All I did was replace the box contents with the Google widget code. Here is what my finished include file looks like: languages.php
We have had cases where English speaking customers have helped their non English speaking friends place orders so this should be a nice enhancement to the site.
Earlier this summer I won a free pass for two for a Jerry’s Rogue Jetboat trip up the Rogue River in a golf tournament. We took the 80 mile trip to Agnes last summer and it was great fun.
Until now I have held onto the hope that we would be able to do it again this year. But unfortunately summer has gotten away from us and we are not going to be able to use them.
Jerry’s has several length trips and the tickets are good for any of them. You can see details of the trips here. The pass expires Sept 15th so you will only have 2 weeks to use them. Also, some of the longer trips may not be available later in the yeardepending on water levels.
I am offering this pass to the person who can best tell me how they will use them, and will guarantee me that they will be used. And, if you are interested in second place, I also have a $50 VIP discount pass which (depending on the trip) is about 2 for the price of one.
I’m not going to wait long to give these away so if you are interested, better email me today: ken dot gregg at rwre.com.
I live outside the city of Bandon and our water source is a shallow well. Over the past 6 to 8 weeks we have been having some water quality issues. For the most part a little sediment in the toilet bowels and occasional smell to the water has been inconvenient but tolerable. I visited the local well driller but no answers as to why the sudden change. All they could recommend is a charcoal 5 micron filter that didn’t help. But things are getting progressively worse as the odor is getting stronger and we have seen iron stains in cloths.
It has finally gotten to the point where something has to be done. Continue reading How is the Water?
Saw this post on ActiveRain that asks (and answers) this. Some good comments about what agents are doing that are working.
http://activerain.com/blogsview/1088988/are-realtor-com-enhancements-worth-the-money-
I just ran across a couple of blog posts here and here about a NAR decision that Google is scraping listing data from agent’s idx sites.
According to the post:
“Recently, my website was reported for allowing the MLS data on my website to be indexed, which led the Indianapolis Metropolitan Board of REALTORS®, (MIBOR), to issue a cease and desist letter to my broker for both our sites, or they would cut our feed. Since April 10th, Google can not index the detail pages of the IDX on our websites. Our Title tags can not contain any details about the property …
On April 30th, another demand! The description can not contain ANY MLS data, no address, the MLS number, neighborhood, subdivision, price, bedrooms, baths, property type or public remarks.”
Most listings do not get indexed because they only show up behind a search form. However, your RealWorld listings are not siubject to this and it does reinforce some ideas I have about creating static blog type pages for all new RealWorld listings.
Your thoughts and comments are encouraged.
I had every intention of getting to the office early this morning. Didn’t make it because I discovered this on one of the blogs I read:
Service and Selflessness
What we must learn from the monks is a management philosophy that I call “service and selflessness.” It has seven basic aspects.
The first aspect of service and selflessness is having a high overarching mission worthy of being served.
The second principle is selflessness. At Mepkin the mission is so noble, well articulated and continually inculcated that the monks are inspired to focus on it selflessly.
The third element of service and selflessness is a commitment to excellence: At Mepkin Abbey every single egg is packed with a “prayerful attitude.”
The fourth principle is a ruthless dedication to the highest ethical standards.
The fifth secret is faith. Every day, regardless of booms and busts in the larger economy, the monks risk their lives and livelihood faithfully serving their principles while trusting that business will take care of itself
The sixth aspect of service and selflessness is trust. The monks continually amass and replenish their treasury with the most valuable capital that any individual, product or business can possess: trust.
The seventh and perhaps most important secret to service and selflessness is living the life. Service and selflessness are just words on a page without a rigorous methodology for constantly reinforcing these principles, right down to the last egg. And, as luck would have it, the monks have a 1,500-year-old method called the Rule of St. Benedict that supplies just that.
The whole article is 4 parts and fairly long but well worth reading.
http://www.forbes.com/2009/04/14/trappist-business-lessons-leadership-management-mepkin1.html
Read it. There will be a quiz later.
|
