My Ruby Slipper is a new Social Web Application – By filling in a profile about your favourites in life, personal clothes sizes and life experiences you will not only find out a lot about yourself and be able to share this information with your close family and friends but in turn discover more about them.

This will help you when buying gifts for them and also make you realise there are many ways in which the information you discover about them can be used to create experiences between you which will bring you closer together and strengthen your relationships.

You can sign up for free at www.myrubyslipper.com.

Google+ is Google’s latest attempt at taking on the likes of Facebook and Twitter in the social networking arena – but why do you need another social network?

Like most social networks, Google+ enables you to share content such as status updates, links, photos, video etc. with your contacts – however, where it differs is that you have much more control over who see’s the content you are sharing thanks to Circles.

Circles is at the heart of Google Plus: it is essentially a tool for organising your contacts into different groups – friends, work, family and so on. The key advantage of this is that it enables you to share different updates with different people – unlike Facebook for example, you can separate your personal and professional identities without the need for multiple user accounts. The user interface of the Circles tool makes it incredibly easy to start organising your contacts and the attention Google has paid to the design and interaction produces a very elegant solution to a potentially arduous task.

Facebook has been criticised many times for its lack of privacy controls and Google seems to have taken note. Google+ allows you to very easily select what each contact can and cannot see. Anybody can add your profile to their circles, however – unless you add them to one of yours, they can only see your public posts. Furthermore, you can actually view your own profile from the perspective of a specific contact to check what they can and cannot see.

Other cool features include Sparks (which lets you find the things that interest you and share these with your circles) and Hangouts (a tool which allows you to group video chat your contacts).

A very slick user interface (UI) – incorporating real-time updates to it’s clean design – makes Google+ a ‘nice place to be’. Instantly it appears fresh and clutter-free in comparison to Facebook or LinkedIn. It also comes mobile-ready, with a cool app and web app which make great use of GPS to offer location-based content.

Google+ has huge potential considering its a Google product, however taking on the likes of Facebook and Twitter is something even Google themselves have struggled with in the past (Google Wave, anyone?) A recent poll on The Next Web revealed that two-thirds of early Google+ users we’re already ready to ditch their Facebook accounts in favour of Google Plus.

The social networking site is still very much in it’s infancy so it is very difficult to call whether Google has finally cracked the social networking arena with Google+ but you can bet that Google will be rolling out some great features in the near future. My own evaluation is that Google has potentially cracked it this time – the slick interface and the attention to users controlling what other users can see make it a strong proposition. For many, Facebook has become tired – full of irrelevant and seemingly pointless updates. Google+ addresses this effectively with Circles and the ability to keep professional and personal identities separate – that alone will make many sit up and take notice.

Many businesses are aware that they ought to have a presence but aren’t sure how they should be doing it – that’s why we’ve put together this quick, handy guide.

1. Setup your Facebook Page
Strictly speaking, a business should have a Facebook Page, not a Facebook account. Facebook’s Pages have been designed to allow businesses and organisations to communicate more effectively with their customers. Customers shouldn’t have to ‘friend’ your business, instead they just ‘Like’ it.

Start by creating a Page for your business. Facebook will allow you to upload a profile picture and details about your business. You can also set other administrators for your page, this is especially useful if you intend more than one person in your business to manage the Page.

2. Invite your Friends
Once your page is setup, it’s a good idea to invite your Facebook friends to be the first to ‘Like’ it.

Hint: Once you reach 25 fans, you’ll be able to set up a “vanity URL”, e.g. facebook.com/pixelvectorltd. These are much easier for people to remember.

Go to facebook.com/username and select the Page name from the dropdown menu and then write in the name you’d like to use.

3. Get Existing Customers to Like your Page
Once you’re feeling confident about the look of your Page, your next step is to get some fans from places other than your existing Facebook friends. Use your company mailing list, e-mail newsletter and signature, shop window, website, business cards, etc. — to grow your fan base by publishing your Facebook address, or including a Like button.

For your page to be effective, you need to start amassing plenty of fans. Consider giving people an incentive to ‘Like’ your page. For example; many companies now utilise Facebook apps to offer discount codes which are only revealed when the user ‘Likes’ the page.

4. Engage with your Fans
As you build up your fan base, you will need to keep them engaged with interesting and entertaining content. Think about posting snippits of advice, photos and interesting content.

It’s also worth remembering that most people don’t use Facebook for business so engage with them on a more personable level, give them an insight into the personality behind your company.

Post updates often and make them count. The whole point is to get your fans to interact with your content – the end goal is for your Page to appear in the newsfeeds of your users (achieved by getting them to post comments etc.).

Keyword Stuffing
Over-saturating or repeating keywords in your pages will get you penalised by the search engines. “Stuffing” keywords makes your content inaccessible to the end user. Generally, you should look to make around 5% of your total word count contain your keywords.

Hiding Text
There are certain techniques which allow web developers/search engine optimisation companies to hide keyword-rich text without effecting the overall design of the site. Techniques such as colouring text in the same colour as the background leaves the content unreadable to the human eye. Employing such techniques will get you Blacklisted very quickly.

Gateway Pages
Some SEO companies use the technique of setting up a gateway/portal/bridge page targeted at a particular keyword or phrase. These pages generally serve no other use other than to attract search engines, they will often have a simple “Click here to enter” link. More advanced gateway pages may include an automatic refresh which re-directs you to the actual website after a short period of time.

Cloaking
Cloaking essentially tricks the search engine bot into thinking what they are seeing is the same page that the end-user (human) sees, when in fact they are being delivered a page designed only for the search engine robot (full of keywords/phrases).

Mirror Websites
Setting up two or more websites which use the same content but focus on different keywords/phrases in order to gain an advantage in the listings – this technique will often lead to all of the sites being banned.

Link Farming
Link farms should be avoided – especially Free-for-all farms. If (when!) Google identifies a FFA farm it will eventually devalue on of the sites which are linked on it.

Backlinks
Backlinks are good, however generating them at a very fast pace will make the search engines skeptical about your methods. Backlinks with other websites should be built at a natural pace.

Phishing
Designing a page to ‘look like another’ page in an attempt to steal users personal information is a given no-no.

Adapted from an article originally posted on .net Magazine.

The new website is designed to capture the company’s target markets; Residential customers with building work, commercial building projects such as building work for schools and adapted accommodation.

The development and design of the site centres around strong photography – helping users visualise their future building projects. Testimonials, Case Studies and Project Galleries also feature heavily, giving PA Cornforth the all-important credibility.

The site also utilises JavaScript libraries (jQuery) to provide interactivity and that extra ‘stickability’.

You can visit PA Cornforth at www.pacornforth.com.