Big Boom Design Blog

AB Tech Small Business Center’s Annual Jumpstart

carolyn — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 15:52:05 +0000

The A-B Tech Small Business Center will be having its annual Jumpstart event, sponsored by Asheville Savings Bank, at the Haynes Conference Center at the College’s Enka site on Thursday, April 25. For those of you who may not be aware, Jumpstart is a business-to business trade show that is geared towards entrepreneurs and small business people who are looking to connect with those who may have a product of service that can assist them in taking their business to the next level. Product and service providers will have booths on-site and make themselves available for questions that attendees may have regarding their business.

This event, which typically draws around 200 visitors, is FREE to those who would like to attend. Hope to see you there!

Thanks again to Asheville Savings Bank for sponsoring this great event!

Please visit our “Events” page at the following link or contact Duane Adams (7951) for more info.

Schedule:

3:00 – 3:30 PM: Booth Set-Up – Booths will be assigned

3:30 – 4:00 PM: Vendor Networking – NOT OPEN TO THE PUBLIC

4:00 – 6:30 PM: OPEN TO PUBLIC

Check out Big Boom Design’s time lapse of last year’s AB-Tech Jumpstart Event below.

WordPress Tutorial: Content Update 101

boomer — Wed, 20 Mar 2013 03:34:39 +0000

In this video I walk through a basic update on a new WordPress Website that we launched this past fall. I’ve covered how to make simple updates to a post and/or page on the website or blog.

How to make basic text changes
How to Create and break a link
How to Insert an Image with a particular size and alignment

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

Does the Internet Need a Backup System?

boomer — Wed, 20 Mar 2013 03:04:20 +0000

Danny Hillis delivers a great TED talk about the need for a backup plan if the internet was taken down. It’s true that as our day-to-day lives become more entangled with internet connected devices, we are equally as vulnerable to attacks. Hillis does a great job to help raise awareness of the issue without taking a conspiracy theory approach like so many others do.

Boomer Sassmann to speak at Tourism Summit on February 26th in Avery County

boomer — Tue, 26 Feb 2013 04:15:36 +0000

Avery County surpassed all other counties in Western North Carolina when it came to tourism spending increases in 2011, with a boost of 9.55 percent over the previous year. Avery County Tourism Summit will bring local business owners together with experts in tourism and economics so that business owners can get a better idea of what contributed to the increase, and how their businesses can benefit best from what will hopefully become a trend of increasing tourism spending in Avery County.

Source Article

Event Speakers and Presenters

Speakers at this event include Witt Tuttell and Andre Nabors from the North Carolina Tourism Division as well as yours truly, Boomer Sassmann. Sassmann will deliver a 45 minutes presentation on tourism website design for Chambers of commerce, Tourism and Development Authorities and Economic Development Commissions. He will also discuss Social Medias role on the internet today as well as Heat Map Tracking and Website best practices. Be sure to catch this energetic, overwhelming, and extremely informative presentation at this years Tourism Summit.

–>For directions and information look here <–

Social Media Packages—You Gotta’ Have Them

boomer — Thu, 21 Feb 2013 15:01:21 +0000

Social media marketing: this term umbrellas several ways to actively communicate with your clients. Now that you have a website, a space within the internet for you and your business, how are you driving traffic there? Are you fostering the success of your site with the power and influence social media has to offer? Let’s consider some facts:

About One Billion people are on Facebook
The average Facebook user spends over 15 hours a month using it
Twitter adds about 500,000 new users a day
Google + reached over 10 million users in its first 16 days

These statistics speak to social media’s pure volume factors, not to mention the way it affects your relationship with your market. Your clients and potentially new clients are out there “socializing” on the web—for hours a day. Are you a part of the conversation?

The Current Players

Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google +, and Pinterest are the big players. Each social media site has a slightly different approach and form. Our social media strategist will consult with you on which social media avenues are best for your business before planning and then executing a social media marketing campaign to drive more traffic to your site. All the while strengthening the bond between client and business through communication and consistently fresh content. Don’t be stagnant, be social.

Dickson Interactive Social Media Strategy at It’s Finest

If your business or organization is serious about implementing a quality social media marketing campaign, and you want to see results; don’t make your decision without considering Scott Dickson and his team. With social media’s popularity mounting at the rate it is, so is the list of social-media-marketers for hire.

According to Dickson, “You can’t read a book and think you have what it takes to become a consultant. Opinion and theory are great, but no match for years of experience and a proven track record of execution and success,” An Appalachian State Alumni and based out of Winston Salem, you can learn more about Scott Dickson at his website, dicksoninteractive.com.

For more information about creating a social media strategy for your business be sure to contact Dickson Interactive. Social media may be “free” to sign up but if you’re looking to get serious about your businesses digital personality look to the professionals at Dickson Interactive.

Are you Heatmap Tracking your Website Visitors?

boomer — Tue, 12 Feb 2013 05:04:55 +0000

This is an overview of how the heatmap tracking works with Crazyegg.com. In this video I use a local Tourism agencies website to show the traffic data onto the website. We monitored and found that by moving a button higher on the page it increased the website traffic to that page by 18%.

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

“Bridging the Digital Divide” from Boomer at AB-Tech Enka Candler Campus

boomer — Fri, 01 Feb 2013 10:00:31 +0000

Boomer Sassmann will teach a continuing education class at Asheville-Buncombe Technical School on February 6th. This three hour class, “Bridging the Digital Divide”, is targeted towards local business owners looking to streamline how they do business on the web. The goal of the class is to benefit rather than confuse; to simplify rather than complicate. All while learning what internet-tools are right for them and how to use them effectively.

Some of these business web-tools covered include: Dropbox, Google Analytics, and WordPress. Be sure to sign up now to secure your seat in the class, and expect to leave with a relevant skill set to improve your businesses online footprint.

The class is free and will be held at AB-Tech’s Enka campus in room 2046, from 3-6pm.

Click Here to Register Now!

Testimonials:

“Boomer is an excellent communicator, an important quality to have in explaining technical/coding/security concepts to many of us non-techies. His clarity and generosity in sharing important security measures helped me understand the importance of implementing basic protection for my (upcoming) WP site.”

-Jane Mitchell

“Clear, pointed, illustrative and smart! I like when there is a “leader” with teaching element – one of many of Boomer’s skills

-Anne

“Awesome! Very informative. Boomer is a great teacher.”

-Nick Andrea

Boomer to speak at the Grove Park Inn to The Southern Association of Orthodontists

carolyn — Wed, 26 Sep 2012 03:04:39 +0000

Friday, September 28^th, Boomer Sassman will speak at the 2012 annual Southern Association of Orthodontists meeting at the Grove Park Inn, in Asheville NC. Sassmann has been invited to be a keynote speaker for this event, and will be joined by Molly Millroy, of Molly Millroy Media. Millroy runs her own Asheville based public relations, and video production business.

Together they will address the audience about how the Orthodontic field can benefit from understanding more about Google, Social Media and CMS Website Design to help expand and strengthen their practice. If you’re attending this event, be sure not to miss Boomer and Molly’s keynote, titled “EmBrace the Digital Divide,” from 2pm to 5pm.

For more information you can visit http://saortho.org/

K Black Orthodontics gets a WordPress face lift

Be sure to check out a recent WordPress website that we just launched for the best Asheville Orthodontist Keith Black.

Joomla Accordion Slider Tutorial

boomer — Sat, 22 Sep 2012 03:25:43 +0000

In this 5 Minute video you’ll learn how to update an Accordion slider plugin on a Joomla 1.7 website. The Plugin has already been installed and this simply show the process of adding the shortcode to an article or module and then filling that accordion with content. The plugin that we use on this site is: Joomla Accordion Plugin

Click here to view the video on YouTube.

Boomer Sassmann To Speak at the Avery County Chamber Quarterly Breakfast

boomer — Mon, 27 Aug 2012 17:45:43 +0000

The Avery County Chamber will host its Quarterly Breakfast, Tuesday, August 28, during the Home and Business Expo being held at the Chapman Center (on the road to the Williams YMCA, Linville the entrance is on the left). We believe this is a great way to network with local businesses and support the Chamber as we promote businesses in our region.

We encourage you to attend the BRUNCH at 10:00am

Speaker for the event will be Boomer Sassmann of Big Boom Design

Boomer (from Big Boom Design) has designed and manages many of the High Country websites – Ashe Chamber, Beech Mountain TDA, High Country Host, Avery County Chamber and several local business.

Come hear a dynamic speaker share….

Why Your Business Needs A Website and what market you may be missing if you do not have a website.

Boomer to Teach Class @ AB-Tech’s Small Business Center : “An Entrepreneur’s Guide to Bridging The Digital Divide”

carolyn — Fri, 17 Aug 2012 18:41:36 +0000

Attention business entrepreneurs!

Owner of Big Boom Design, Boomer Sassman, will be teaching a FREE class this coming Wednesday, (August 22) in the AB-Tech small business incubator facility on the Enka-Candler campus. Don’t miss this opportunity to learn about some of the most useful web tools that can be used to simplify your business.

Don’t run from business web tools! Learn about the relevant ones and harness your ability to use them properly and efficiently. The main objective of this class is to make you feel comfortable with these programs, and to teach you how to implement them into your daily business life. After this class you can become current and confident with the way you integrate the internet and your business with one another.

The class is free, and many of the programs Boomer will be talking about—are also free. So grab your laptop (ideally with a charged battery), notebook, pen, and maybe a friend—and meet us in room 1039 at the Small Business Center at 3:00pm. The class will run until 6:00pm.

Click here to register, click this link and see steps listed below:

You should land on the “Continuing Education Screen”, click “OK”
Click “Continuing Education Students” on the right.
On the next screen, on the left side there will be two tiny links, click the one that says “Economic & Workforce Dev/Continuing Education Classes”
For the “Start Date”, enter “Spr/Sum April 1-August 31”
The only other field you need to fill out is the “Search Course Code Number” field
In the “Search Course Code Number” field enter: SBC-2400-100EN
Click “Submit”, and all the information you will need for the class is right there!

Official course description listed below:

“This course will help to educate business owners on web-based resources and tools that can help streamline day-to-day operations for their business and alleviate stress from the digital world. The goal is to help raise the level of comfort and understanding when it comes to the internet as it continues to embed itself into more and more areas of one’s business. Topics covered include: website tracking using Google Analytics, Search Engine Optimization, blogging platforms, WordPress, social media basics, and many web-based applications that are free to use online (Evernote, Dropbox, AnyMeeting, Mint, etc.).”

Make Your Website Mobile and “Thumb-Friendly”

carolyn — Fri, 13 Jul 2012 15:18:13 +0000

Worldwide, more and more consumers are buying and using smartphones. It’s a new staple in our modern culture. Of course, it’s still essential for your business to have its own website and social media presence in order to be successful. However, the next hoop you should consider jumping through is that of the mobile website. Compare the size of your computer monitor to a smartphone screen. Yup, there is definitely a difference, there. Mobile websites condense the size and look of the original design, dispensing all the information users want with fewer buttons and megapixels— producing a cleaner, simpler look. A mobile website, without question, will enhance the smartphone users experience.

More than 8% of digital traffic comes from a smart phone or a tablet and you can only expect that number to grow. The market is trending towards a variety of mobile devices that can both easily access the internet and are sized to be more portable. Ebooks, tablets, and smartphones appeal to consumers because they offer the access of the world wide web while being small enough to tote around just about anywhere.

More consumers are purchasing smartphones and mobile commerce is growing at a rapid rate. In developing countries, a higher percentage of the population owns and frequently uses their smart phone to access the internet. The American smartphone user has a higher income level, and smartphones cover a wide demographic—from teenagers to aging baby boomers. Across the board, mobile digital traffic is booming and you don’t want to be left out.

So we know that apps are cool (and offer potential profit centers), websites are a must-have, and social media is an essential communicating tool for clients. However a mobile website is the new big player when it comes to having a proper internet presence. A mobile website will attract new users, keep your old ones, and give off the overall impression that you’re in tune with the current market and you’re taking care of business. If users don’t have to “pinch and zoom” to get info because your site is “thumb-friendly”, compared to the many that are not, you will automatically become set apart from the rest of the market in the consumer’s mind—or at least up to speed.

CMS (content management system) built sites like WordPress and Joomla have options to customize your site and create a mobile version. Interested, or want to know more? Contact Big Boom Design today to discuss how we can give your site a mobile-friendly-make-over. Want a visual perspective of how effective and sensible mobile websites can be? Check out these examples from topdesignmag.com, notice how the most used options are condensed into a few “thumb-friendly” choices.

http://www.topdesignmag.com/30-examples-of-mobile-optimized-websites/

264,000 Internet users will get bumped off-line on Monday. Are you one of them?

Boomer — Fri, 06 Jul 2012 13:43:55 +0000

It’s estimated that over 1/4 of a million internet users are currently infected with a virus called The “DNS Changer”. This number is down from over half a million users at the height of this infection. The virus redirects infected users to websites setup by the hackers in order to earn affiliate traffic and referral fees to the tune of about $14 Million dollars.

In November the FBI charged 7 men with the creation and execution of this DNS Changer virus and seized over 100 servers that were handling the “rerouting” of these infected users. Two servers have been setup to help redirect these infected users to the correct locations although this is getting ready to change. On Monday the FBI will shut down these server sending all infected users to a dead page.

Find out if you have been infected with the DNS Changer Virus by clicking on one of the testing sites below.

http://dns-ok.gov.au/

http://dnschanger.detect.my/

Host site with many testing links to choose from

http://www.dcwg.org/detect/

Pay Your Big Boom Invoice Online

carolyn — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 17:44:28 +0000

Going paperless is not only environmentally friendly—it saves time and postage too. To pay your invoice online, click the “Let’s Talk” page, and located at the bottom there’s a button reading: “Pay Invoices Online”. Rather then adding another thing to your to-do list, purchasing postage, and physically mailing your payment—with a few clicks you can securely pay online, helping all of us stay on time.

New Help Desk Feature

carolyn — Tue, 19 Jun 2012 20:18:14 +0000

Need help with your site? Did your hosting overlap? Want to add a new plugin? The quickest and most efficient way to communicate with us on these issues is through the new “Help Desk” feature. When you visit the Big Boom Design website, located on the left of your screen is a red tab labeled “Help Desk”. Simply click here and a small text box will become available; then fill out your question, comment, or concern. This will help streamline all of our client’s needs into one area. Use it today!