Best free 30 seconds pitch builder!

You have 30 seconds to explain your business to an audience. You need to communicate your message quickly and clearly. Here is a tool to help you do it developed by the Harvard Business School.

They call this user friendly tool the HBS Elevator Builder and here is how it works.

First it separates your commercial in 4 parts:

• Who - Describe who you are
• What - Describe what you do 
• Why - Describe why you are unique
• Goal - Describe your goal

Then it assembles all the parts together and presents the whole text indicating the word count, the pitch length in seconds and the number of repeated words used. You can easily edit your text and see how it affects the estimated time to deliver it.

Why just one?

You can use this tool to develop a hand  full of 30 seconds commercials, especially if you belong to a business referral network, like Letip where you present your 30 seconds commercial weekly to the same audience.

Take it further

Once you have practiced your 30 seconds commercials, or elevator pitch, you can save them on video and upload them to your website. Besides helping to improve your page's ranking on the search engines, it will be available 24/7 promoting your business and telling everybody who you are, what you do and how you can help them. If you need help uploading your video to your website Blue Square Web will be glad to help you.

How to access the tool

Click here to go to the HBS Elevator Builder.
NOTE: the HBS tool has been written in Adobe Flash Player. To be able to use it you need to have it installed in your computer, phone or tablet.
iPads and iPhones do not support Flash Player.

Small businesses can raise money on the internet

The law has been signed since April 2012 by President Obama as part of the JOBS Act. The provision makes it legal in The United States for small businesses to sell stock and other securities over the Internet directly to the public, otherwise known as "crowdfunding". As President Obama stated: "For the first time ordinary Americans will be ale to go online and invest in entrepreneurs that they believe in."

Before this law existed, all companies were required to register with the S.E.C. to be allowed to sell securities to the public, which kept small businesses out of the loop because of the costs involved in the hiring the services of lawyers accountants and investment bankers.

The law exempts issuers from the registration process when offering and selling up to $1 million in securities during a year's period. The transaction must be conducted through a broker or funding portal that complies with specific requirements of this law. It also needs to satisfy other conditions in the JOBS act, some of which require rulemaking by the S.E.C. This means that until the S.E.C.adopt rules to implement the new exemption "any offers or sales of securities purporting to rely on the crowdfunding exemption would be unlawful under the federal securities laws."

The S.E.C. states that "the JOBS Act directs the SEC to adopt rules to implement Title III within 270 days of enactment of the Act." That period ended on December 31, 2012.  So as of today the S.E.C. is 17 days behind the deadline. Meanwhile the existing crowdfunding websites are limiting their operations to requesting donations or offering rewards.

Free update after ORACLE fixed JAVA

Oracle Corp. repaired bugs in its Java software and urges computer users to install the latest version of the program as soon as possible.
This action came several days after computer security experts found flaws that opened PCs to attacks by hackers.
As the news spread, many PC users started acting fast to protect their computers from computer viruses that are able to evade anti-virus software.
Java is a language that enables programmers to write code that will run on any type of computer.
It is mostly used on the Internet so that Web developers can make sites accessible from multiple browsers running on Windows (PCs) or Apple's Macs.
The free update is available through this link to Oracle's website.

Disable JAVA plugin NOW! (JAN 2013)

First, the facts

On January 10th 2013 the US-CERT, the agency in charge of managing cyber risks to the nation, has issued an alert (TA13-010A) instructing all PC users to limit their usage of the Java Runtime Environment (JRE), unless required for business reasons, or to remove it entirely, including disabling Java plug-ins in web browsers.
The Java development platform has become a favored target for hackers, leading to a growing list of Java-specific vulnerabilities being discovered and exploited by various malware.

How can it affect you

According the the alert, this vulnerability "could allow an attacker to execute arbitrary commands on a vulnerable system".
"Reports indicate this vulnerability is being actively exploited, and exploit code is publicly availabe". It is estimated that this vulnerability may now be present on over 400 million systems.

What can you do?

Disable Java now, and keep it disabled. Based on the US-CERT vulnerability note VU#636312 these are the steps for disabling the Java plug-in in web browsers:

Mozilla Firefox
From the main menu bar, select 'Tools' > 'Add-ons' (or 'Ctrl+Shift+A').
Look for Java plugins and click the 'Disable' button.
Restart the browser.

Chrome
Type 'about:plugins' into the address bar.
Look for the 'Java' plugin and click the 'Disable' link next to it.

Safari
Go to 'Preferences', then 'Security tab'.
Uncheck 'Enable Java'.

Internet Explorer
Go to 'Tools', then ' Manage add-ons'.
Highlight all 'Java' add-ons,  then click on the 'Disable' button on the lower right corner of that window.
Click 'Close'.
Restart the browser.

It is also recommended to disable Java from the Windows Control Panel.
Open the Control Panel and click on 'Java'.
In the Java Control Panel, select the 'Java' tab and click the 'View' button. For any JRE versions listed, uncheck the 'Enabled' box. Click 'OK'.
In the Java Control Panel, click 'Apply' or 'OK'.

What if I need to use it for work or to manage my bank account?
Designate one browser with Java enabled exclusively for that purpose and use the Java disabled browsers for all your other activities.
You can also enable the Java plug-in while visiting sites that require it and disable it immediately after you left it.

Viral Videos 5 steps

Here is a short list of things that you can do to help you improve the chances of getting your videos to go viral on the internet.

1. Make it different.
If you expect people to share your video with their friends, it must have something different about it. Just ask yourself..."Would you share it?"

2. Make it short.
Try to keep it down to 30 seconds and never go beyond 2 minutes.

3. Use a catchy attention-grabbing title.
Be creative on the title and it will help people open your video just out of curiosity.

4. Get comments.
Get as much comments as you can, which in turn may entice other people to comment back.

5. Share, share, share and create a buzz around it.
Tweet about your video, share it on Facebook, ask your friends to tweet it, 'like' it and share it.
Put it on your webpage and blog about it on your site and blog.
Go to forums, recommend it and post it.
Get other bloggers to write about it.
Send an email blast to your list. Link the video recommending that people watch it and forward it.
Use all sharing outlets available. There are more than 300 ways of doing it (great subject for another post!).

A different kind of internet.

Google is launching Google fiber starting with a connection speed 100 times faster than today's average broadband. At 1000 Mb per second Google Fiber allows you to get what you want instantaneously. That means instant downloads, crystal clear HD and endless possibilities.

Although Google Fiber is not yet available to residential customers, select Retail Partners in Kansas City went live this summer. Google is now accepting pre-registration for Kansas City residents.

The plans and pricing start at FREE INTERNET at today's average speeds (with a one time $300 fee that can be divided up in 12 payments of $25) up to $120 a month for Gigabit + TV.