NEWS FROM THE EDGE

Tech Tips and Advice from the Experts at Dynamic Edge

The Facebook ad system is based on a supply and demand bidding system. It can be tricky (and expensive) to get the results you want from your Facebook ad campaign. Here are some tips to get your costs down and results up:

Paying for your AdsCPC vs. CPM:

CPC you pay for each click. CPM you pay for each 1000 times your ad shows up on a profile. I recommend “Cost per Click” for beginners. The only way CPM will be cheaper is if your ad beats the average click through rate.

Bidding: During peak times the suggested bid is very high. It dips in the middle of the night. To get more clicks for less money, post your ad around 4am.
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Planning to travel this holiday season? Taking your laptop along for the ride? Here are some tips to make sure you aren’t asking Santa for your data back.

Before you Leave

Run software updates 2 days before you head out: Installing updates can rejuvenate your machine and help protect it from the latest viruses. However, sometimes an update can have a negative effect on performance. Run it two days in advance to test it out. If things aren’t running smoothly, you can remove it manually and return to the previous version. Microsoft will eventually fix the glitch and you can reinstall it at a later date.
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Who Controls Your Google Listing?

Raise your hand if you still use a yellow book to look up phone numbers….
No one? Well than what has replaced this staple in our everyday lives? We all know its Google. Google has become more than just a $190B company– It has become a verb synonymous for internet searching. Googling is our go-to method for finding…anything.

When someone googles a business, one of the top 2 results is usually the Google Places Page. This page is available for every business that has been indexed by Google. Brand new businesses may not have one yet. Google Places is the new improved “yellow book listing” for the internet age. This is where people go to find your contact information when they are interested in doing business. But who creates this page and who’s responsible for its accuracy? The answer to both questions is… You do.
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Logistics

Today, even industries like trucking rely heavily on strong computer networks.

Recently, a large distributor in Metro Detroit called us for emergency support. All their servers were down and they had a lot of angry customers.  We had not worked with this client in the past so we were essentially going in blind.

The AC had broken in the server room days earlier causing overheating and a forced shut down. This problem could have been easily avoided, but no one was monitoring the servers for warning signs.

To compound the problem, the server cluster had not been set up following “best practices” standards. So when the cluster of servers went down, the active directory controller also went down. This turned what would have been a relatively simple fix, into a major outage.
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SMART TAN – Online and Inperson

Downtown Nashville: Just stopped into the SMART TAN International 2010 indoor tanning industry convention and trade show. The exhibitors’ booths were amazing. Some of them looked like little houses with two stories packed full of tanning goodies.

About three years ago, we built a web application for SMART TAN. We helped them create an online tanning certification system and a web portal for indoor tanning employee training. SMART TAN is consistently a leader in growth and innovation in their industry. Dynamic Edge continues to work with them today — tweaking and improving their web offerings to stay a few leaps ahead of the competition.
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According to a 2009 Symantec Study, cyber crime is now the most profitable criminal activity– just ahead of drug trafficking.

What are they after? Access to your data. They want account numbers, social security numbers and personal information. Today, these threats come from all over the world. No longer is the average hacker a bored college techie. Now, there are warehouses of children in Russia that are paid cash per SSN harvested. They have the time and motivation to exploit any and all weaknesses in our networks.

The worst part is, there is a weakness in every network that no firewall or virus software can eliminate. The people using it. The number one way criminals gain access to your network is by misleading a user into inviting them in. One wrong click and they have everything they need to rob you blind and destroy your business.
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