MINDSCAPE

“Seek first to understand, then to be understood.” Most people recognize this as the 5th Habit of Stephan Covey in his infamous book: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. This habit is the most difficult for me and I would guess for most others too. How often we rush into sharing our thoughts just to get them out there: to impress, to meet our agenda or to challenge. I’m guessing this is a bit more perplexing for those of us with extroverted personalities, or the ones who like to “think out loud.” What do we miss in this process when we don’t try to understand our audience first? Do we share something that has no value? Do we miss an opportunity to really connect and further a relationship with someone? Or do we just waste our time?more

As I’m sure everyone knows by now, computers run on good ol’ 1’s and 0’s. An easy statement to make, but a difficult one to truly grasp in reality and scope. I mean think about it: that shiny new game you just bought, with its whizzing bullets, roaring monsters, vast landscapes, online connectivity letting you frag your friends… that ALL gets crunched down into simple 1’s and 0’s. Pretty staggering that that amount of interaction can be reduced to microscopic electrons flying through a miniature universe the size of your cell phone (or even smaller). So how does it work? Well you’ll need about a dozen years of college and a Masters Degree in computer engineering, to find out! But I can at least give you a small taste of how those 1’s and 0’s form information.more

Let’s face it, in todays world we all what we want when we want it. Those who can deliver are those we choose to do business with. Still, those who are able to address our needs, and provide answers that are helpful are those we can turn to and trust time and time again. There are so many other ways to say no to customer, prospect, co-worker, friend, anyone and avoid saying “no,” “I can’t,” “it’s not possible,” etc. Finding ways to avoid saying no will make you a valuable resource for those you interact with. I’m not saying you need to agree or say yes to everything, simply that there is a better way to say no. When it comes to customers or prospective customers they may want something done immediately, but you’re team, you’re staff or your schedules simply won’t allow for it. What do you say to them, rather than, “No, we can’t do that today, sorry.” How about, “I wish I could do that for you today; we’ll do everything we can, but it’s most likely we’ll get it taken care of for you tomorrow. Would that be acceptable?”more

Customers. They’re our oxygen in business. Without them we don’t make it. Often, our focus on customers are the ones outside of our business. What if we spent the same amount of energy on our internal customers as our external customers? What would our results look like? In human resources, my internal customers are my customers. Yes, I have some outside of our organization as well, but the ones I spend the most time with are in my daily work world. How about you? Are you as thoughtful or responsive to your team members when they have a request as a demanding client. Do you focus on what your team members would say about your performance to your manager? Or are you more concerned about what your clients would say about you?more

I found myself sitting at my desk the other day, and knew that I had to get some work done. The problem was that every time I started, something else distracted me. Each instance I was distracted, it took time to remember what I was doing, build up the context that I had my brain set in before I was interrupted, and get back in the Zone. Interruptions today are easier than ever. Here’s a small list of the interruptions that can find me from where I sit: Email notification Instant messenger for chatting with co-workers Desk phone Cell phone Internet! Facebook Google Reader ESPN CNN USA Today Detroit Free Press Research for my next vacation Meetings A window A grumbly stomachmore

Welcome to the first post in a new series that I am dubbing Acronym Buster. Each post, we’ll take a common acronym found around the web and declassify its meaning. This week we are going to be focusing on FTP. It’s one that you probably hear semi-often, but maybe aren’t entirely sure what it is. Let’s unravel those capital letters… FTP stands for File Transfer Protocol. The main purpose of FTP is having the ability to quickly move files from one place to another around the internet. For casual internet users, this isn’t that big of a concern. You may download a couple files a week, or email some pictures to a friend. However, for web developers and invested web users, life would be very difficult without FTP capabilities.more

My sons started school this week. They came home to tell me lots of stories of locker difficulties, new friends, great lunch food options and cool Mac technology. Their excitement, mixed with anxiety, reminded me of the new Contributing Team Members (CTM’s) we hired in the last month and how they probably had similar feelings.more

Every once in a while, I look at the date and wonder how fifteen years have passed since I graduated high school. Looking back at those four adolescent years, they feel more like four decades. It is crazy to experience the speed of life. The software we build wonders the same thing. Has it really been seven years since that website was built? Wasn’t it just yesterday that Ajax was the thing of the future, and IE 7 was the greatest step forward in Internet history (ok, maybe that was never the case). Time and Technology stop for no man, and it certainly does not stop for the applications we build. So what can we do to keep them fresh and healthy? It’s not so different from the additional exercise, better diet, and regular checkups that we do for ourselves. In the case of technology, the key is to keep up on blogs, product releases, and to continue to use the application so you can understand its needs.more

If you haven’t heard the word “gamification” yet, you’re not alone. But if you’re played Angry Birds on your phone, Draw Something on your iPad, or checked in someplace on FourSquare you’ve definitely been gamed.more

Storytelling. We’re introduced to this concept at a young age, before we can make sense of the characters on a page, or tablet or phone. Because of this, we have to trust the person relaying the story.more

If you’ve ever had to buy a new computer or laptop, then you’ve probably been bombarded with acronyms and metrics that may not be familiar to you. RAM, HDD, CPU; the list could go on and on. Now, salesmen X at computer retailer Y will try to sell you the best so that his commission can buy little Joey a new Xbox. But let’s break down what each of these measurements are, what they mean, and how much you should have.more

I was having a discussion about great literature the other day, and something that was said struck me as very applicable to software development.more

Oh no, I thought, not again. As I hung up the phone last week, I realized I’m now currently dealing with four B2B clients who recently unveiled a really pretty new website design (not Mindscape projects), but now realize nobody can find their site in search. Or that it will cost thousands to update and edit content on a regular basis. Or that their site visitors are bouncing off their beautiful new site like its rubber.more

It’s so easy to get caught up in an online search. You begin with one topic and soon you’re submerged in many more. Sometimes it may even take a while to get back to your original topic because of all of the other connections you made along the way.more

Request.URL can be used in .NET to get the value that the web browser used to access a page. However, there are many different properties to choose from, and sometimes it is difficult to know which property to use.more

If I had a nickel for every time I’ve talked about PPC (pay per click advertising) alone in the last week… This is a question that comes up all the time for web marketers and businesses. And, it’s time to set the record straight on how we feel about things at Mindscape in regards to search engine marketing (that covers both organic and paid).more

Back in February, we were buried under a mountain of work. It’s not a bad problem to have, but it sure made for quite the logistical nightmare. It was not easy to schedule dozens of projects for dozens of team members and still make sure we hit our deadlines.more

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If you’ve been an active internet user over the past decade, you’ve probably heard a lot of talk about the many different types of web browsers available to consumers. Many people just stick to the default browser because they believe the other browsers are too fancy or techy for them. However, taking the time to try out a new browser can lead to a much more enhanced browsing experience. Mindscape is here to give you a basic overview of the browser options available to you, as well as make recommendations based on your internet experience level.more

I recently reviewed an article by Marketing Sherpa. In that article, they shared research results of a survey asking marketers what were some of their more important inbound marketing tactics that generated leads.more