Pizza Hut on Facebook

Facebook is here to stay and businesses need to adjust to this platform. The traditional approach to Facebook focused on creating company pages and adding friends to your group. Unfortunately, that has proven to be a not-so-good tried and tested attempt to incorporate social networks in the business model. Businesses have to be creative if they want to utilize social media and social networks, especially if they want to go beyond their company website. An example of seizing the opportunities in social media is Pizza Hut.

Pizza Hut, like other companies, has a company page on Facebook with 820,987 fans as of Monday February 23, 2009. Some of the features on this company page are: a) joining a sweepstakes; b) sending an e-gift card; and 3) ordering pizza without leaving Facebook.

Pizza Hut interfaced an order form for Facebook users. After creating a username and providing an address you will be notified if your address is eligible for delivery, carryout and/or dine-in at the local Pizza Hut. However, this Pizza Hut interface will only be useful if your local Pizza Hut has online ordering capabilities. After providing an Aiea address, the interface results revealed that majority of the nearby Pizza Hut restaurants do not have online ordering capabilities. It was a novel idea and one of the firsts in Facebook, however companies still have a lot of catching up to do to ensure uniformity in online applications. This applies to many franchises including Pizza Hut.

Ria Baldevia is the Founder & CEO of The Sensus Group (TSG), a Hawaii-based web development & technologies, and online strategies firm. Email: ria@thesensusgroup.com | www.thesensusgroup.com |phone: 808.927.7824

The 2008 presidential elections revealed a weakness in the New Media department of the Republican National Committee. In the near future, expect the technology gap between the RNC and the DNC to narrow. The newly elected Michael Steele has made RNC 2.0 a priority as Party Chairman. In a January 23, 2009 address focused on New Media in the Party, Michael Steele outlined the goals and objectives for catching up with the DNC online:

• Uniting Activists and Leaders
• Determining & Implementing Best Practices
• Leading through Innovation

The Tech Plan also promotes the hiring of an E-Communications Director and additional bloggers to get the GOP message online. Furthermore, Chairman Steele envisions the RNC website as the go-to site for grassroots organizers and national leaders to learn about e-communications operations in their proposed E-Campaign University.

How do New Media goals in both national parties translate to our local parties and their campaigns? Let’s hope local political candidates embrace this new attitude towards New Media, and create their e-campaign thoughtfully. Candidates need to remember that social media moved into the White House online, and having a pretty picture with a three (3) page website just does not cut it anymore.

Ria Baldevia is the Founder & CEO of The Sensus Group (TSG), a Hawaii-based web development & technologies, and online strategies firm. Email: ria@thesensusgroup.com | www.thesensusgroup.com |phone: 808.927.7824

The online world is an overlooked domain for branding. Have you Googled your name or your company? What does your search engine results page (SERP) look like? A search engine results page is the list of results you get after entering a name or topic in the search engine. If your name or company name is unique then consider yourself lucky. There are individuals who have common names and therefore have a wide spectrum of results generated when they self-search.

What can you do to seize the web for your branding advantage? Here are three pointers:

• Link, link and link: Link your online presence to each other!
• Dynamic content: The adage “time is gold” rings very true in the e-world. Make sure you update your site content as much as you can. Be relevant!
• Get out there and be an online rock-star: Become an expert and share your ideas and thoughts on blogs, comments spaces, etc. Don’t forget to insert your name or company’s name!

Ria Baldevia is the Founder & CEO of The Sensus Group (TSG), a Hawaii-based web development & technologies, and online strategies firm. Email: ria@thesensusgroup.com | www.thesensusgroup.com | skype: ria.lrb | phone: 808.927.7824

Sensory overload is an adequate description of websites that have too much going on at the same time. These sites have flash, background music, Twitter badge, in addition to 3 other videos queuing simultaneously.  TSG offers some advice to owners of these websites: take a chill pill.

With the abundance of information and free web applications, it is very tempting to jam as much as you can on your homepage, but be wary of this tactic. There is a high possibility of your readership tuning out of the website due to too much color, busy-ness, and irrelevant articles.

TSG suggests companies stick to the basics of empowering your customers and to keep the website user friendly. Is it that important to have a Facebook page? Is it important to Twit every move? Also,  is it necessary to post 1000 words per blog? Keep in mind that the current internet readers want their news fast, short and sweet. Do you really think a social network on your site is going to grow in size and help you grow your company?

The key for updated articles is to get the attention of your reader and provide concise and complete information about your article and/or product.

It’s never too late to start your spring cleaning for your website. Remember to ask these three questions before applying a widget or plug-in or app or flash to your site:

1) Will this enable the readership to understand the content more easily?

2) Are there two other operational functions of this add-on that will support the company’s marketing/branding/pr strategy?

3) Is it easy to maintain on a daily basis?

If the website owner answers “NO” to any of these questions, TSG highly suggests to re-think the necessity of the add-on.

Copyright ©2009 TSG Publications & thesensusgroup.com.

It may sound too good to be true, but having all your basic PC functions in a very small package is a reality.  MarketWatch (www.marketwatch) predicted that netbooks would be the aim for PC companies in 2009. Acer distributed its Aspire One netbooks at a retail price of $379 in Honolulu in January. The distribution was a huge success with several retail distributors out of stock for the little blue device.

Some PC manufactures released their netbooks last fall. Dell launched the Inspiron Mini and Asus launched its EE PC. Sony also launched VAIO P earlier this month. It appears netbooks are poised to take over the PC market and infiltrate the laptop market as well.

Netbooks make an ideal and practical solution to business owners and students. The bulkiness and weight of many laptops (even the smaller ones) tend to be burdensome for those who are on the go. However, some individuals still prefer a bigger laptop. Cerell Rivera, a graduate student in Manoa,  opts for the traditional sized Apple Mac, “It depends on the purpose of the laptop. Some will prefer the netbook, but others who need certain aspects of a traditional laptop will not follow the netbook trend.”  Yancey Branscome, real estate investor based in Hawaii, agrees “I need a bigger screen for my business when I conduct presentations to client. So, I would stick to the laptop that is much more relevant and useful to my business.”

Other than compatibility between needs and usage, netbooks have some, yet important, pros:

• light-weight and small size
• offers basic necessities such as web and e-mail
• price; most netbooks are less than $500

2009 Copyright TSG Publications/thesensusgroup.com

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer is facing a shutdown in its paper publication. If it is not bought by another company, then the SI will exist only online. Last summer, Honolulu Advertiser cut 54 positions due to a downtorun in advertising. Now, that appears to be the tune in the publication industry: decrease in advertising revenue. Majority of magazine and newspaper publications rely on advertising revenue to keep their businesses afloat. What do these tough economic times for businesses and the news consumption trends reveal about the medium of publications? What are the pros and cons for using the traditional printing paper publication vs. an online publication?

An online publication has several perks that make it appealing and economically viable:

Majority of the initial start-up costs will  be spent on online hosting, formatting and designing

Although this may cost as little as $3000 or up to $15000, the online design can be constant throughout the publishing lifespan without additional costs. With a paper publication, the costs depend on the number of print jobs requested. With this online set up, the business web presence can be shared and linked to other sites, and it is open to an infinite amount of exposures. A publication company can opt to change the layout after a year or two years, but it provides flexibility to focus more on content, substance, and an economically sensible and aggressive online marketing strategy.

Flexibility and Link-ability

The publication company can incorporate blogs for their op-ed contributors, also there is the issue of social media. A company enabling readership participation is always a good thing for retention. The writers and editors can simply upload an article and each article can be “shared” by readers through email or posting on their social networks.

Advertiser’s image can be linked to their website

Companies list their website, phone number, and address when advertising in a newspaper and/or magazine. With an online publication, you can offer the advertiser instant gratification by tracking the number of views/clicks on their advertisement, and you can lead the reader to view the advertiser’s site.

These are just a few of the numerous points that can be argued on behalf of transitioning to an online publication. It saves paper, makes economical sense, and it enables your publication to focus on content and substance.

2009 Copyright TSG Publications/TheSensusGroup.com

The January 2009 edition of Black Enterprise, a magazine focused on wealth creation, highlights several industries that promise to create jobs for Americans.  Brittany Hutson, BE writer, quotes William Spriggs, Ph.D., chair of the economics department at Howard University, “The U.S. must be competitive in manufacturing. Alternative energy is likely to be the big growth factor of the 21st century with growing problems from global warming, declining reserves of oil, and growing demand from India and China.”

Here is the list of promising industries by Black Enterprise:

• Alternative Energy
• Manufacturing
• Construction
• Telecommunications
• Education

Majority of the S2S & TSG Respondents Choose the Honolulu Advertiser Online for Their News.

22 respondents in the Sister2Sister and TSG survey revealed that 68.2% of them utilized the internet every day.