I am a 22 year old Senior at the University of Florida. I am an Advertising major in the College of Journalism and Communications. I am from Fort Lauderdale, FL and I used to play baseball at UF. I will be attending law school next year in New York City and very excited about it.
I think that a business of any size should have a website because it allows exposure to your business that you would normally not receive. Improving the amount of clientelle you have is your ultimate goal as a business entrepreneur. The more consumers you have and that know about your product, the more successful you will become.
Podcasting is becoming more and more essential to business of all sizes. Keeping employees up to date on current promotions and marketing activities are essential for companies and the best way to do this when the boss is around all the time is by podcasts. Employees can listen to podcasts from their boss to gain insight into daily operational activities as well as staying current on all new company implementations. CEO's of large corporations can stay in touch with all of the company's employees by having them subscribe to podcasts that would tell them about important upcoming events and provide employees a level playing field because of the up to date knowledge they will all be able to posses by simply listening to a podcast.
Podcasting has a surplus of perks and the best one may be the ease at which you can use it. Podcasting could be a great way for company's to advertise about upcoming events and the release of new technologies and products. It gives the consumer an inside advantage of what to look for from the company and gives them something to look forward to. Keeping the customer involved is a key way to build relationships and brand loyalty. I think podcasting in no way is a hindrance to a company and if used right, could be a great asset that could increase sales.
Email is one of oldest internet applications out there, but unfortunately it was designed in a sphere of trust and it is just now starting to readjust itself for hackers and fraudulent email users.
One major aspect of this is that any person can send you email claiming to be anyone else; the identification of the sender done by your email client is only about as secure as using the return address on a piece of mail carried by the Postal System to identify the sender. Unfortunately, a lot of people have started to take advantage of this lack of authentication and the fact of the matter is that most people are generally trusting and assume email comes from the person listed.
Because of the encryption with the recipient's private key, only the recipient can read the message. Because of the encryption with your private key, the recipient also knows the message came from you. Businesses should take advantage of this because of the security advantage encryption and digital signatures offer. Although it is not a perfect way and still has some kinks, such as being able to be hacked into, it provides a level of security that is not available anywhere else. If businesses continue to use outdated forms of email, they risk losing valuable information to competitors and to hackers that can easily discover valuable information.
Through this project I have learned that the best way for anyone (personal or business) to deal with this blossoming email problem is by adding digital signatures and/or encrypting email and this is most easily done through public key encryption algorithms.
Collaborative computing allows for the growth of team-based organizations through its ability to facilitate the geographically distributed teams to develop, edit and utilize a common database and web site. This allows members of a team, company, and organizations a way to share ideas in a common forum without the hassle of finding a place to meet on a regular basis. Member can share their ideas and opinions at any time, and with email being sent to the members when the site is updated allows for information to be shared pertinently to each person.
Collaborative computing allows for a variety of activities where people interact with one another using desktops, laptops, palmtops, and PDA’s. Computers are best at handling data and allows for a safe place for information to be stored and available to all members at any hour of the day. It is very different from other internet applications such as email because it is only a two-way medium. Collaborative computing on the other hand is a multi-person medium where every person in the group can access and see information daily, which is best for large companies and organizations or when people are in different areas of the country.
I believe collaborative computing is the future that will replace face to face meetings, conference calls, emails and other such applications because the information will be available to all who needs to see it at the click of a moue. By doing this project I have learned that you do not need to meet in person to complete a project. You can do a great job working at the comfort of your own home. You have to keep up with the work and check in regularly, but I believe this made the project and the end result that much better.
By using the application, Microsoft Excel, I was able to create a worksheet for a DVD distribution company. I was able to divide states in geographic regions and was also able to insert useful mathematical information that could be analyzed for unit pricing and unit sales. I found the goal seek application the most useful tool because of its usefulness for businesses. Being able to quickly define quarterly sales goals is crucial for businesses and is a tool I feel every business should implement. The pivot table is also very useful because of its ability to allow you to style the spreadsheet in an easier to read format. I found this project a little overwhelming at first because of all the in-depth analysis, but as I learned to manipulate the functions, I learned just how important this would be in the business environment.
Microsoft Access is a program I had never used, but quickly learned how important this program can be for any business. Through this project I learned the fundamentals necessary to utilize this program for my own benefit and future business opportunities. I was able to organize material by creating validation rules, input masks, and a drop down selection list. This allows for a better way to organize your data and easy ways to change it without having to change all of the tables. The information you input will automatically change and will save you lots of time.
The real power behind Microsoft Access is undoubtedly the queries it allows you to run. You can answer complex requests with a click of the mouse and search parameters to find what you need, when you need it. The queries provide the capability to combine data from multiple tables and place parameters on your new data. Finding data when you need it and not having to goes through countless data entries and tables saves much needed time and allows for better organization of your records.
The final stage of the project was to produce a report. I found this very beneficial because it provides the capability to produce formatted data contained in your tables and queries. This is a great way to keep a hard copy of your records that can be used to show data in an easy to read format for employees and other people that may need to see the information.
