Harness the Power of the Internet to Expand and Improve Your Business

In little more than a generation, the Internet has revolutionised the way that we conduct our lives and do business, and virtual offices and virtual office services have emerged to help us bridge the gap. In recent times this growing
trend has picked up momentum, and we now turn to the web through various modes
of communication to fulfil so many different tasks.

Methods of communication have made great progress and as postal services will testify, e-mail has now become the communications method of choice. Within many businesses, certain employees may be offered the choice to work from their homes. Costly travel and accommodation expenses are being reduced as organisations elect to utilise teleconferencing for necessary salesand client meetings. All these developments suggest the true strengthof the internet and its ability to make us communicate virtually and far more efficiently.

As technology is revolutionising the way we do business, the world of virtual assistant services has emerged to fulfil a clear need. In our evolving global markets, an online office and the services of a virtual assistant can make sense from a number of different perspectives, and we suggest below some reasons why you might consider their selection:

For either a start-up concern or an established business, the cost of expansion can dig a sizeable hole in a company's financial reserves. While it is hard to acquire new businessto begin with, it can be far more difficult trying to set aside

additional resources to bring in another capacity to service newly acquired clients and customers. If you have to deal with the hiring and training of staff, especially if it’s for short-term projects, you are likely
to encounter obstacles. At the least you will experience a ramp up period during which the employee will likely not be up to speed, and you may also run the risk of discovering that the person is truly not up to the job, or simply does not fit in. A virtual assistant can fulfil all your admin requirements instantly and free your resources to work on some other pressing problem.

The harried entrepreneur quickly finds that he or she cannot be amicro-manager and cannot assume responsibility for everything. There is only so much that one can do in a typical day and you may already have experienced that these days can extend to cover all daylight hours and more. Virtual assistant services are ideally placed to free management from non-essential activities. Imagine a scenario where all routine admin tasks are covered by an efficient, readily available and reactive virtual assistant. By focusing on core values, direct customer satisfaction and new business development, the entrepreneur can concentrate on bringing more money to the table.

As expenditure has taken on a whole new meaning during our recent economic difficulties, it makes sense to trim all overhead costs as much as possible. With competition very much in mind, the organisation that is able to reduce overheads while taking advantage of an online office and/or virtual assistant services will be much leaner, fitter and able to trade more efficiently, as we emerge into more profitable times.

The Away PA provides an "on demand" secretarial and business support service in conjunction with it's online office "Head Office". To find out more about how you can take advantage of a fully supported office, anywhere, any time, visit the Head Office website or The Away PA Website or email info.headoffice@theawaypa.eu or telephone 08450 527565.

Reports Hail the End of the Recession

In the last two years, millions of people have lost their jobs due to the slowdown in the UK and global economies. Many companies were left with no choice but to lay-off employees after the economy suffered a major downturn at the beginning the last quarter of 2007. Many companies who had to borrow money to expand had to close some of their office and branches. There were also companies that could no longer afford to keep many of their employees. The recession has proved a cruel reality for the business world in the last two years.

Reports recently published are hailing the end of the recession, and it is expected that there will be new businesses opening and many existing businesses will start to bounce back in the next few years. Companies that are running on low manpower or have had to let go of employees in the last few years can choose to temporarily hire virtual assistants to manage and deal with administrative tasks and general business processes.

Virtual assistants provide various administrative and other specialised services for clients. They can be very effective support teams for businesses that have had to lay-off employees during the tough economic times. With the help of virtual assistants, a company can continue to run its business operations smoothly, despite only a skeleton number of permanent employees.

Virtual assistants can be the perfect solution for transition periods within the company, as companies slowly recover from an ailing economy. Instead of immediately hiring permanent employees, companies can simply hire virtual assistants on a temporary or short term basis to work within the business.

Even the strongest companies who have not necessarily suffered from low manpower can still benefit from the services of virtual assistants. Many virtual assistants offer specialised services such as SEO, web design, debt recovery, database management, etc. Virtual assistants are incredibly flexible and are in a good position to help businesses, whether they just need simple administrative services or more specialised services, or whether they just need additional manpower during peak seasons and tough economic times. Companies should not overlook the valuable resource that virtual assistants can provide.

The Away PA provides an "on demand" secretarial and business support service in conjunction with it's online office "Head Office". To find out more about how you can take advantage of a fully supported office, anywhere, any time, visit the Head Office website or The Away PA Website or email info.headoffice@theawaypa.eu or telephone 08450 527565.

What is a Virtual Office?

A virtual office network is an office environment that is accessed by way of the web at any time and from any place. A virtual office network provider utilises the power of the internet and technical expertise to offer the user a simulated work environment where the user can access facilities similar to that provided by a more expensive exchange server, such as intranet, company email, shared calendars, shared files and work processes by way of a PC or laptop/netbook and web connection.

So, for example, an employee or work colleague could be out of the office due to business, or may even work from home, but yet is still be able to communicate or transfer data to colleagues and others at the workplace within the office environment. This makes a virtual office an effective tool to add value to your business and make it more systematic and effective.

What makes the virtual office so attractive is that all this is achievable with minimum to zero investment in infrastructure, with the service provider managing the design and development of the virtual office network and taking care of the maintenance and support.

The Benefits of Virtual Office

• The client does not have to bother with costly and time consuming upgrades since the client hires the virtual office service from the provider and the maintenance of which is the responsibility of the service provider.

• The flexibility that a virtual office network provides is unparalleled, as employees only need a laptop/netbook and network connectivity to get in touch with the main office. This functionality is important for mobile businesses and where business activity is conducted from various locations or from home.

• Often security is seen as a constraint in the domain of virtual office networks as corporate data is confidential. However with development in technologies, service providers today utilise highly sophisticated tools, password login systems and authentication management which makes the system more secure than accessing it from your workplace.

• The package that a virtual office network provider can offer includes the deployment, along with support for planning, designing and maintenance. Subscription is on a "pay as you go" basis in the form of a monthly fee.

To find out more about the virtual office service provided by The Away PA, visit: Head Office.

The Away PA provides an "on demand" secretarial and business support service in conjunction with it's online office "Head Office". To find out more about how you can take advantage of a fully supported office, anywhere, any time, visit the Head Office website or The Away PA Website or email info.headoffice@theawaypa.eu or telephone 08450 527565.

New Year brings New VAT Rate

Starting from 1 January 2010 new VAT rates apply, shifting from 15% in 2009 to 17.5% in 2010.

HMRC has provided a detailed guide along with several PDF documents linked from the same web page to help businesses that need to be particularly careful with the shift. These businesses include:

• Retailers
• Businesses that issue VAT invoices
• Businesses operating beyond midnight on 31 December 2009

For each of these categories HMRC provides a separate PDF document available online. There are also certain types of services that require special attention to the changing VAT rates. They include:

• Services you start before 1 January 2010 but finish afterwards
• Continuous supplies of services

Author: The Away PA

The Away PA provides an "on demand" secretarial and business support service in conjunction with it's online office "Head Office". To find out more about how you can take advantage of a fully supported office, anywhere, any time, visit the Head Office website or The Away PA Website or email info.headoffice@theawaypa.eu or telephone 08450 527565.

The Perfect PA is Flexible, Hard-Working and Invisible!

As PCs make us all more self-sufficient, few small businesses seem to need the full-time help of a Personal Assistant or administrator. But what happens at those times when there's just too much work, or a special project requires dedicated help? - A virtual PA or remote assistant is what is needed!

Virtual PAs can work outside regular office hours, provide fast turn-arounds and when time is short, it's possible to have a whole team of people working on a project. The team at The Away PA offers an impressive and broad range of business skills: database management, internet research, editing and proof-reading, mail merge, general secretarial support, travel planning, and more. We can also assist with multimedia presentations, desktop publishing, web page design, and design for print work, and even the development of a full corporate identity.

A virtual PA is especially useful in times of need but it's also possible, of course, to employ one on a regular basis to deal with mundane administrative tasks that might otherwise waste valuable business time. Regular mailings, database management, web maintenance, invoicing - any of the dull, repetitive tasks that eat into workaday productivity can be safely outsourced.

To find out more visit: http://www.theawaypa.eu

Author: The Away PA

The Away PA provides an "on demand" secretarial and business support service in conjunction with it's online office "Head Office". To find out more about how you can take advantage of a fully supported office, anywhere, any time, visit the Head Office website or The Away PA Website or email info.headoffice@theawaypa.eu or telephone 08450 527565.

Working with a Virtual Assistant Saves Time - Your No.1 Resource

Are you a small company with limited resources and perhaps with a limited, or no workforce? If this is the case, then maximizing time may be a problem. But as a small company, you needn't be discouraged - instead you can find ways to maximize your time.

Hiring a virtual assistant is one of the easiest ways to gain a workforce and the added time needed to complete the endless task list of any business owner. With a virtual assistant, you, the business owner, no longer need to work those extra long hours. The time consuming tasks can be outsourced to your VA so that you can focus on other, more important, revenue generating activities.

Having a VA means that you are not limited to what you can achieve within the working time given to you. You will have an assistant that can help you do more in your business. Having a VA to assist you can mean a lot of good things for your business including less stress for you, better products and services for clients and better profitability for the business.

Author: The Away PA

The Away PA provides an "on demand" secretarial and business support service in conjunction with it's online office "Head Office". To find out more about how you can take advantage of a fully supported office, anywhere, any time, visit the Head Office website or The Away PA Website or email info.headoffice@theawaypa.eu
or telephone 08450 527565.

Remote Working with a Virtual Desktop

Many people don’t know about a rather new technology called "Virtual Desktops" which gives SMEs access to enterprise class technology, allowing staff to work from anywhere, as if they were in the office.

How do Virtual Desktops work?

With the traditional model you have a PC on your desk and all of your programs and data are stored in this PC – you could call this a physical desktop. With a Virtual Desktop programs and data are stored centrally and you access this “Virtual” desktop remotely using the internet with a connection device such as a laptop, another PC or a mobile device.

It doesn't matter where you are, if you can access the internet you can access your hosted desktop – and work.

How much does this level of IT cost?

Actually, virtual desktops can save your business costs. Plus it is a per user, per month package. With this type of outsourcing your company can scale easily, and only pay for what you need.

What are you waiting for?

Virtual Desktops are cheaper, more reliable and more secure and, you can use the same desktop in the office, at home, in a hotel or on holiday. Contact Head Office to find out more!

Author: The Away PA

The Away PA provides an "on demand" secretarial and business support service in conjunction with it's online office "Head Office". To find out more about how you can take advantage of a fully supported office, anywhere, any time, visit the Head Office website or The Away PA Website or email info.headoffice@theawaypa.eu
or telephone 08450 527565.

Why collaborate with a Virtual PA?

• Collaborating with a Virtual PA brings value to you, your business and your clients.
• Collaborating with a Virtual PA gives you all the benefits of working with a partner without giving up ownership of your business.
• Collaborating with a Virtual PA brings another point of view, another opinion and another mind to the table.
• Collaborating with a Virtual PA allows you to keep an eye on the whole of your business whilst being able to focus on those areas of your business that needs your particular expertise.
• Collaborating with a Virtual PA gives you the freedom to delegate those areas of your business where your particular expertise isn't needed and to just one just individual rather than a host of individuals.
• Collaborating with a Virtual PA expands your personal productivity, giving you more opportunity to grow your business.
• Collaborating with a Virtual PA saves you money - not because working with a VPA is cheaper than hiring an employee (which it is), but principally because a VPA saves you money tackling the work that doesn’t require your expertise, at a cost effective rate.
  
• Collaborating with a Virtual PA enhances your image with your clients as well as with your business.

If yours is a small business and your uppermost concern is cost, it might be "penny wise and pound foolish" to ignore the value a Virtual Personal Assistant can bring to your business.

Author: The Away PA
http://www.theawaypa.eu/services.htm

The Away PA provides an "on demand" secretarial and business support service in conjunction with it's online office "Head Office". To find out more about how you can take advantage of a fully supported office, anywhere, any time, visit the Head Office website or The Away PA Website or email info.headoffice@theawaypa.eu
or telephone 08450 527565.

Ceate Effective Sales Presentations

Do you often need to make sales presentations, but usually don’t have the time to create outstanding sales presentations? Have you considered hiring a Virtual Assistant or freelance PA to help you? A Virtual Assistant can help you prepare your sales presentation and include materials for hand-outs to help you make a good impression with clients and customers.

Preparing a good sales presentation complete with a visual aids and hand-outs can take a lot of time. If you are a “solopreneur” running your business on your own, creating a good Powerpoint presentation may be something you simply don’t have the time for - sometimes you’re just too swamped to put all your good ideas into action. It is important that a presentation is clear and compelling. With a competent Virtual Assistant, who specialises in Powerpoint presentations, you can have your ideas fleshed out in video or Powerpoint without having to spend precious hours on it.

All you need to do is discuss your ideas with your Virtual Assistant, provide the necessary information and let your VA do all the work! Having your Virtual Assistant create a presentation for you means that the presentation will be professionally-done and will be able to convey the message that you want to express. Outstanding presentations can help you build a good image with customers.

Don’t struggle with finding the time to put together an outstanding sales presentation- simply hire a good administrative assistant to take care of the details of presentations, brochures, hand-outs and other sales materials for you!

Author: The Away PA
http://www.theawaypa.eu

The Away PA provides an "on demand" secretarial and business support service in conjunction with it's online office "Head Office". To find out more about how you can take advantage of a fully supported office, anywhere, any time, visit the Head Office website or The Away PA Website or email info.headoffice@theawaypa.eu
or telephone 08450 527565.

Want to cut operations costs? Then maybe you should think about moving away from Microsoft Office

Being a Microsoft Office Trainer, I guess maybe I shouldnt' be advocating a move away from Microsoft Office, but to be honest, busnesses today may need to think who really needs Micrcosoft office and who could benefit just as well with any one of a number of other free offerings in order to reduce costs.

For years Office used the menu/toolbar, metaphor that so many of us have grown up using. There's nothing wrong with change per se, but when Microsoft moved to the ribbon metaphor a couple of years ago, they changed the way people interact with the software completely. That meant the new version required companies to train their users to find the things they had previously understood instinctively - at a cost.

Even before the release of Office 2007, there were numerous options such as Google Docs and Zoho to name just a couple of online alternatives and OpenOffice, the open source office suite. Google has a low-cost enterprise version of Docs available and Zoho is a full-blown, low-cost suite of business tools. OpenOffice offers all of the tools you most need in your office suite: word processor, spreadsheet and presentation program, FOR NOTHING!

The downside of these tools is you have various degrees of compatibility with Microsoft Office users (and when 80 percent of the market is still using MS Office, that's an important factor), but if you keep it simple without advanced formatting options (such as animations in presentations), exchanging documents between various products works fine most of the time.

Let's face it, most users keep it very simple and for them, you could choose one of the free or low-cost alternatives. You don't have to give up Microsoft Office completely, just reduce the number of licenses. You can still have MS Office licenses for users in your accounting department, for example, who absolutely need Excel and its advanced features, but you can move everyone who really only need, say, simple wordprocessing tasks and an occasional presentation to the alternative.

Microsoft Office isn't going anywhere any time soon, but if you're looking for ways to cut your operations costs, it makes a lot of sense to look at moving those employees who don't really need every bell and whistle under the sun to an alternative package, while providing a limited number of of Microsoft Office licenses for those users that absolutely need it. It's a smart approach and it could save your business of money.

Author: The Away PA
http://www.theawaypa.eu

The Away PA provides an "on demand" secretarial and business support service in conjunction with it's online office "Head Office". To find out more about how you can take advantage of a fully supported office, anywhere, any time, visit the Head Office website or The Away PA Website or email info.headoffice@theawaypa.eu
or telephone 08450 527565.

Intelligent Help on Hand

http://www.theawaypa.eu
email: info@theawaypa.eu
Tel: 08450 527565

The Away PA provides an "on demand" secretarial and business support service in conjunction with it's online office "Head Office". To find out more about how you can take advantage of a fully supported office, anywhere, any time, visit the Head Office website or The Away PA Website or email info.headoffice@theawaypa.eu
or telephone 08450 527565.

The Perfect PA is Flexible, Hard-Working and Invisible!

As PCs make us all more self-sufficient, few small businesses seem to need the full-time help of a Personal Assistant or administrator. But what happens at those times when there's just too much work, or a special project requires dedicated help? - A virtual PA or remote assistant is what is needed!

Virtual PAs can work outside regular office hours, provide fast turn-arounds and when time is short, it's possible to have a whole team of people working on a project. The team at The Away PA offers an impressive and broad range of business skills: database management, internet research, editing and proof-reading, mail merge, general secretarial support, travel planning, and more. We can also assist with multimedia presentations (see our own fun promotional presentation on YouTube) , desktop publishing, web page design, and design for print work, and even the development of a full corporate identity.

A virtual PA is especially useful in times of need but it's also possible, of course, to employ one on a regular basis to deal with mundane administrative tasks that might otherwise waste valuable business time. Regular mailings, database management, web maintenance, invoicing - any of the dull, repetitive tasks that eat into workaday productivity can be safely outsourced.

To find out more visit: http://www.theawaypa.eu or email: info@theawaypa.eu or telephone 08450 527565

The Away PA provides an "on demand" secretarial and business support service in conjunction with it's online office "Head Office". To find out more about how you can take advantage of a fully supported office, anywhere, any time, visit the Head Office website or The Away PA Website or email info.headoffice@theawaypa.eu
or telephone 08450 527565.

Engage a Virtual Assistant / Off Site PA

You probably are a sole trader or an entrepreneur who started a small business sometime back. However, being on top of your game you have been growing consistently and growing fast. A typical problem that arises in such situations is that your focus now gets divided. In the initial stages, due to limited exposure and work, you could handle all the functions single-handedly or in-house. With the business expanding, the non-core functions start sapping away a lot of your time and energy distracting you from expanding your business - which should always be your prime objective.

The dilemma that many small and medium businesses face at this point is whether to employ an administrative assistant or secretary. You may not have the financial resources to afford one, especially given that as a full time employee you will have to pay a salary plus taxes, etc., but at the same time, you know that you cannot carry on without some help to deal with your administrative work. In such cases a Virtual Assistant, or off site PA is your best option.

Virtual assistants are resources that you can exploit online and who can help you with a lot of your routine work. They can be a substitute for an on site personal secretary. Virtual assistants are equipped to handle your appointments, schedule meetings, manage your calendar, sort your emails, filter out spams, send out notices, advertisements, brochures, and deal with general correspondence. In short, they can handle all the less important jobs on your behalf professionally and leave you to take care of the important ones. Imagine the time that you can save with such services and the time and energy you can dedicate to your core business.

Another excellent advantage with VAs is the payments. You can either hire a VA on a monthly subscription plan or pay for a one-off project by the hour - the key is you only pay for actual time spent, and VAs will utilise specialised software to record this time and can provide detailed time log summaries to support their charges.

Lastly, VAs are highly professional and organised, who usually have worked for some years at senior level in their career and specialise in providing such services. Reputable and highly rated VAs would have a track record of successful client engagements and good knowledge of their duties. They would also employ the best practices in the business giving you the optimum service. So what are you waiting for? Go look for a VA, and save hours from outsourcing your trivial work!

For more information about VA services, visit: http://www.theawaypa.eu or email: info@theawaypa.eu, or telephone 08450 527565.

The Away PA provides an "on demand" secretarial and business support service in conjunction with it's online office "Head Office". To find out more about how you can take advantage of a fully supported office, anywhere, any time, visit the Head Office website or The Away PA Website or email info.headoffice@theawaypa.eu
or telephone 08450 527565.

Why are you doing everything yourself?

Owning your own business requires wearing a lot of hats. But it seems that when many people leave their jobs to "go solo", they think they must work completely solo as well. They insist on doing everything themselves - even tasks that perhaps they know they're not really very good at.
They try in vain to design websites and brochures, write copy or manage mailing lists and personally respond to every call or mailing. Pretty soon, they find themselves running around like the proverbial "headless chicken".

What eventually happens is that their love for their work - the reason they started their own business in the first place - drowns in a flood of administrative trivia. Freelance PAs, Virtual Assistants, or self-employed Girl-Fridays - whatever you want to call them - can take care of all that "busy work" for you. What could you delegate?

Try keeping a log of all your activities for the next week or so, then sit down for a thorough review and decide which activities are TRULY ones that only you can do. As for the rest.......

Here are some examples of what a remote assistant (virtual assistant) could do to help you:

• Respond to customer emails and make follow up calls
• Schedule business appointments, interviews, travel
• Keep your book-keeping up to date, reconciling banks statements, paying bills, tracking expenses, etc
• Internet research
• Organise seminars / speaking engagements / handle registrations
• Create sales reports
• Write blogs and other articles
• Design powerpoint presentations
• Personal stuff such as researching holiday destinations, purchasing gifts, organising workmen.

You'll have more free time to focus on marketing and growing your business, developing product ideas and income streams. You'll think much bigger and have much more creative energy. So what are you waiting for?

To find out what kind of projects can be completed by a virtual assistant in just one hour, visit: http://www.theawaypa.eu/one_hour_projects.htm

Cloud Computing - IT Modernisation and Lower IT Costs

Cloud computing is a great solution for small to mid size companies. Cloud Computing, otherwise known as hosted services, web services, Software as a Service (SaaS) and managed services, allows IT modernisation and scalability, and access to enterprise class systems. There is no better time to look at cloud computing services to save IT costs, enhance business services through technology and gain a market edge. Read more ...

Head Office is a an affordable hosted internet office and is a good substitute for a traditionally networked Microsoft Exchange environment.

To find out more about software as a service and the Head Office internet office solution, visit: http://www.head-office.net, or email info@head-office.net or telephone 08450 527565

How does spam find it's way into your inbox?

Having recently been plagued with a swathe of spam, I decided to investigate how and why I was receiving these unwelcome messages.

People who send spam - spammers - collect email addresses in different ways. One way is by good old fashioned guesswork. This is more high-tech than it sounds, using specially developed software to generate likely email addresses by putting together known forenames and surnames, often using webmail domains such as @hotmail.co.uk. Another type of software beloved of spammers uses technology similar to that used by search engines. Instead of picking out keywords, it scours the web for email addresses posted in newsgroups and on websites. They may also buy email address lists from other spammers, or from unscrupulous companies that misappropriate personal information users provide online when they sign up for a service. This is illegal in the UK but proving where a spammer obtained an address is nigh-on impossible!

Spam often contains offensive material and images and can contribute to online fraud, including phishing scams (where an email that appears to have been sent from the receipient's bank, for instance, asks them to "confirm" their account number or email). To effectively identify and protect yourself from spam, it is imortant to know why it is sent and what its hallmarks are. Often they try to sell you something fairly improbable and beware of emails from senders you don't recognise offering things like discounted medication or cheap software!

Some spam messages appear to be complete gobbledegook and are often little more than strings of random words that convey no coherent message. This is because some spam is sent to check if your email address is real and in use. These typically contain a tiny image embedded somewhere in the body of the message that isn't visible to the recipient. The image is stored on the spammer's website and when the message is opened or viewed in the preview pane of an email application, that email application visits the website to retrieve the image. This tells the spammer the message sent to your email address has been viewed and the address is active. This is valuable to the spammer, eithe to use or to sell on to other spammers.

It is also possible to harvest email addresses from email chain letters. As well as emails promising luck if you send them to five friends within the hour, there are those promising a free iPod if you forward them to 10 people, as well as those warning of fictitious viruses and improbable personal safety warnings. As the forwarded email addresses become embedded in the email's history, this will provide a bumper crop for the spammer behind it.

How to spot spam

Identifying spam amongst the legitimate emails can be quite difficult because spammers commonly use a technique known as "spoofing", to retain their anonymity. Spoofing makes it appear that an email has been sent from a completely different email address to the one it has really been sent from. The spammer changes the information attached to the email - called the header - that shows where it originated from, to make it look like the email has been sent by someone else. Sometimes the email address is non-existent, but sometimes the spammer will have guessed at an email address that is actually in use. The first time the real owner of the email address discovers this is when they receive irate messages from strangers demanding that they stop spamming them.

Be aware that it's not just the name at the beginning of an email address - the John.Smith bit - that can be spoofed. Looking for a credible or recognised domain - the bit after the '@' - in the From: line of an email isn't enough to guarantee its authenticity. Spammers are also able to spoof domains, which is why in a phising scam, the fraudster can pose as a company the recipient does business with.

There are, however, various hallmarks of spam emails that can be used collectively to help identify spam. In unsophisticated cases, the email address in the From: field is often a bit of a mess, containing an email address that is often just a random string of letter and numbers folowed by a webmail domain, eg sf3ffwr23w@hotmail.com. Also, look out for email addresses that appear to have been sent from different email addresses, but have identical subject lines or ones that make no sense. While the majority of email programs have built-in spam blockers, there will be the odd piece of digital dirt that repeatedly breaches security and makes it into your inbox. In this case, the most effective means of prevention is to block emails arriving from a specific sender or domain. See how to do this.

How to filter your email.

The Phenomenon of Twitter

When I first noticed the presence of Twitter on the web, it was via an interest I had in a particular blog - the author added "follow me on Twitter", and out of curiosity I clicked on the link, read her profile and the few postings displayed at the time. My immediate thought was "what rubbish, it will never catch on" and immediately forgot all about it!

BUT.... there are already believed to be around 12 million Twitters at the time of writing, and I am one of them - now an incurable addict!

So What is Twitter and How Does it Work?

At its simplest, Twitter allows users to do two things: post short messages about what they are doing, and to read other users' updates. It's easy to set up a Twitter account and it's free. It's best to use your real name so people you know can find you easily.

Accounts can be made private so only friends the user has authorised can see them - this is a great way to collaborate with colleagues on a project and keep in touch in a more immediate way than by, say email. Links can be included to documents and/or project workspaces. You can also choose to go public so you can be found and generate a list of followers you don't know as well as those that you do.

If you find friends on the service then you can choose to follow them and you will be shown their updates as they happen. When someone decides to follow you, an email is sent to the address you registered to let you know. Users can block people if they don't want them as a follower.

Like most social networking sites, the settings page lets users customise the look of the profile page by changing the background picture or adding a photo.

For users of Twitter one of the most appealing features is the range of ways updates can be posted and received. Updates can be posted from a mobile phone and Twitter users can sign up to receive updates from people they are following via RSS feeds, social networking sites such as Facebook and various widget applications, such as Twidget.

Despite the musings often being completely insignificant, and sometimes even banal, Twitter has been credited by some as providing an essential tool in breaking news. It is argued that Twitter has allowed journalists to pick up on stories they have have had to wait for on the news wires. The site was credited with being the first to break the news about the plane that crash-landed in the Hudson River in New York, after a passenger on a nearby ferry posted a picture.

Are you guilty of "Death by Powerpoint"?

The term "Death by Powerpoint" denotes a presentation that has the effect of killing audience interest, instead of inviting lively curiosity: the presentation induces boredom and drowsiness, and instead of communicating key messages, it may leave the audience decidedly unattentive, and looking forward to the coffee break! Where the presenter hopes for a healthy response to his delivery, in reality, apathy and disinterest prevail in the auditorium.

Perhaps you have a presentation that's overly busy, filled with complex charts and diagrams, and crammed with lots of bulleted text? It’s sad to say, that this is the state of a great number of today’s presentations, but many people simply don't know how else to present their message.

Read more ....

Need help with a presentation? Contact: info@theawaypa.eu or telephone 08450 527565.
Visit us at: http://www.theawaypa.eu

A study into spam has blamed it for the production of more than 33bn kilowatt-hours of energy every year, enough to power more than 2.4m homes.

Did you know, the Carbon Footprint of e-mail Spam report estimated that 62 trillion spam emails are sent globally every year.

This amounts to emissions of more than 17 million tons of CO2, the research by climate consultants ICF International and anti-virus firm McAfee found.

Searching for legitimate e-mails and deleting spam used some 80% of energy.

The study found that the average business user generates 131kg of CO2 every year, of which 22% is related to spam.

Unwanted traffic

ICF say that spam filtering would reduce unwanted spam by 75%, the equivalent to taking 2.3 million cars off the road.

However, the ICF goes on to say that while spam filtering is effective in reducing energy waste, fighting it at the source is far better.

The Spam Report follows only a few days after Symantec's bi-annual Internet Security Threat report, which found that spam had increased by 192%, with bot networks responsible for approximately 90% of all spam e-mail.

The vast majority of spam is sent via botnets.

Author: The Away PA