Here’s a new game for you to play! Ammo Ambush 2 is a shoot ‘em up game where you are stuck behind enemy lines with your trusty sniper rifle and a whole lot o’ bullets! You need to make your way to the rescue helicopter and take out enemy soldiers, mines, and more along the way. As with all our games, it was tested and approved by my son David. I admit to playing it, but shooting games really aren’t my thing. I don’t know what David was thinking when he picked this one as he knows my taste but hey, Game Checker is his official title so who am I to argue! It is also available as a free download so you can play it offline whenever you like.

The following list is some of the things that you can do with a web site. It is in no way a complete list, but it should jump start your ideas and imagination!

• Reduce advertising costs. Think of your web site as a full-page interactive phone book ad without the outrageous monthly costs. A web site shouldn’t replace all your offline advertising, but it should work alongside it.
• Increase your customer base. With a web site, you aren’t limited to customer’s who live or work near your business.
• Be open 24/7. A web site can be there to answer customer questions or take orders 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year.
• Give customers the information they want when they want it. Customers don’t need to call and ask you the same questions over and over again if you’ve already answered them on your web site.
• Announce specials. No need for a rushed and expensive advertising campaign when you are running a special, just announce it on your web site.
• Offer coupons. Putting printable coupons on your web site for use in your shop increases sales and awareness of your web site and keeps local customers visiting your web site looking for more specials.
• Provide employees with what they need. Put employee manuals, documents, and forms in a private section of your web site and save time, money, and paper.
• Display your complete product line. Maybe your shop is too small to display every color, size, and shape of your product line but your web site can do that with only a few extra pictures.
• Find new industry contacts. Link to those you work with (distributors, warehouses, shippers, etc.) and you may find new business and new contacts by having them link back to you. Six degrees of separation isn’t just about Kevin Bacon!

If you have any ideas you think should be added to the list please drop us a line, or leave a comment. We want to hear your ideas!

If you don’t visit your own site, how can you expect people or the search engines to find anything there worth coming back for? How do you get people to return to your web site? Well, here are some ideas to help you entice a return visit:

• News. Post updates on your products, services, latest happenings in your field, links to news articles and your take on them and how they affect what you do. Use RSS feeds and Blogs to do this. Blogs are highly recommended as they provide a user friendly interface that will let you do the posts yourself and thereby keep your costs down as you won’t have to hire your web designer to constantly keep your site updated. Search engines love feeds and blogs that are updated regularly and your visitors will rely on you to keep them informed and/or entertained.
• Articles. Share your knowledge and expertise and not just with your site’s visitors as you can offer your articles to other sites, newsletters, and blogs. For more information, check out Publishing = Rankings Part I and Publishing = Rankings Part II.
• Newsletters or Mailing Lists. Put your news, site updates, articles, etc. into a newsletter or mailing list emailed to customers and published on your site.
• Emails. Add opt-in email notifications for announcements, news, site updates, specials, etc. Only do opt-in, do not get into SPAMming.
• Contests, Incentives, or Specials. By offering contests etc., you provide current customers with a reason to visit your site. You also open the doors to new customers who have to fill out a contest form in order to enter and you thereby get a potential new customer.
• Partnerships. Link to sites that add value to your site, such as other businesses or services you use or work with all the time, and make sure you add text around the link that says why the link is there and why the site is recommended. If your customer’s trust you, then they will value your recommendations.
• Join forums. Volunteer to moderate on a forum in your area of expertise. Every post you make has your site’s URL in your signature which equals free advertising and tons of links back to your site.

Never focus on just getting the search engines to visit your site. If you work on getting people to come back and visit your site, the search engines will follow suit, trust me!

Here’s a new game for you to play! In Tetris you have to rotate the falling objects to fit them into complete rows so the rows vanish or else your stack gets higher and higher and … game over!

The following is from the SpamStopsHere Newsletter and has been republished with their permission. We thought you should know.

We have detected a new spam tactic in which MP3 files are used to promote stocks.

In the first multi-media spam, spammers have begun attaching MP3 files which are named after popular recording artists and songs. After a recipient has opened the attachment, an electronically enhanced voice delivers a message promoting a stock for a particular company. The message is designed to encourage the recipient to invest in a particular company. The spam perpetrators then sell their shares after the stock price has risen briefly. This is typically known as a “pump and dump” scam.

To listen to an actual MP3 spam message, please use the following URL: http://www.spamstopshere.com/spam.mp3

We believe that what we are seeing right now is just a test by spammers to determine the effectiveness of MP3 spam. We do not believe that MP3 spam will be the wave of the future. It is unlikely that people will fall for an MP3 spam more than once or twice, whereas text and image spam is hard to ignore because it is in the body of the e-mail. We do not think that MP3 spam on iPods is feasible, but spammers certainly are looking to target the new Apple iPhone.

If you decide to give SpamStopsHere a try, let them know that High Aspirations, Inc. sent you! If you are one of our clients, let us know and we’ll take care of everything for you!