In general, the Internet and online communities have skyrocketed to success with no plateau in site. Why is it that some online ventures, such as Virtual Trade Shows (VTS), have not been able to ride the Internet’s coattail to success, no matter how hard they try? VTS aren’t even attempting to take over the live shows that currently flourish; they simply want to co-exist with the advantage of being a 24-7-365 resource. Seems like a great addition for exhibitors internet-savvy enough to make a smooth transition, but for others it remains an alien concept to be kept as far away as possible.

The minimal success of VTS is generally attributed to these arguments:

• Loss of face to face interaction
• Inability to touch or see a demonstration of the product
• Lack of technical knowledge

These are the same arguments so many people used to criticize e-commerce and social networking sites when they were starting out. Fault must lie somewhere within this critique because it has been proven wrong previously. People have learned to shop, network and conduct business meetings online; they even prefer it in many cases. If these cons are seemingly invalid, then what’s the problem…?

There are some great advantages to exhibiting and attending a Virtual Trade Show. Besides the fact that they are engaging and intriguing to new users (its like you are playing SimCity, check out Second Life that lets you go so far as to pick out whether want to wear a suit or jeans for your virtual meeting with Google), they are cost efficient and a huge time saver. Detailed reporting is available of exactly what each attendee is doing, your conversations are recorded and you can monitor what other products attendees are interested in. This means exhibitors don’t have to go back to their office and spend hours deciphering scribbled notes about who they talked to. ROI is tracked and marketing is targeted to people in a buying mindset, mirroring the benefits of online advertising. VTS are significantly cheaper than attending a live event, in fact the total cost is typically cheaper than just the shipping cost for a regular show. There are no travel fees, no hotels, and no food/entertainment costs. In addition, virtual shows are not affected by weather, you can talk to more than one person at a time, international attendance is easier and attendees can linger anonymously and take their time learning about a product. In sum, the person spending the money to attend these shows should be a huge supporter. That’s if the amount of traffic and recognition actually rivaled the live events.

So, what needs to happen to make this work? I personally think that the only groups capable of positively impacting this product are the large trade show producers. These producers, such as The Nielsen Company and Reed Exhibitions, control everything in the realm of conventions. Without their support attendees and exhibitors are not going to feel comfortable investing their time and energy in VTS. There are two major roadblocks in getting the major trade show companies to support the combination of their live events with a virtual companion. The first problem is, the advantages that exist for the exhibitors and attendees do not hold true for the producers. Instead they will loose a great deal of profit if people start deciding they can send less people to the live trade shows and spend less on advertising at the shows. Second, large trade show producers are deathly afraid of the Internet. Most of them are years behind where they should be when it comes to their websites and online advertising. If they have a site where you can find the dates, location, a contact, some pictures and a description they are happy. If you can register online and get some sort of newsletter updates they think their website is the best it needs to be. Many of the trade show producers will be completely at the mercy of the VTS developers.

While virtual trade shows generally have not produced a large profit the future is definitely looking brighter, and so it is not time for them to give up yet. After five years of dismal results, the largest VTS company Unisfair, finally boasted a 350% growth in 2007. This month also marks the first acquisition of a VTS. Worldwide Business Research, who produced over 200 live trade shows last year, acquired the company eComXpo, a VTS for e-Commerce marketers.

My prediction:  Virtual Trade Shows will eventually team up with major trade show producers to find a happy medium. 

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World, we’d like to introduce you to Monolingual.

What is Monolingual you ask?

“Monolingual is a program for removing unnecessary language resources from Mac OS X, in order to reclaim several hundred megabytes of disk space. It requires at least Mac OS X 10.3.9 (Panther) and also works on Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger).”

It’s a very simple to use, open-source program that Josh has convinced many of us Wpromoters to utilize. It goes through every program you have installed on your system and removes the languages you have requested to be deleted.

Around the office, a few of us have saved anywhere from 200 megabytes to 3.2 gigabytes!

So, if you’re running a little low on space, feel free to give Monolingual a spin!

More Mac Tips:

Leopard’s Hidden Features & Secrets (lifehacker.com)

RAM & Macs (Houston Chronicle)

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Prompted by a recent article on Yahoo and the email chain that followed, I have decided to further explore health in the workplace. The Yahoo article described alternatives to diet soda consumption offering fewer calories and no artificial sweeteners. More bluntly, drinks which are better for you.

There are many myths and misconceptions about what is “good” for you. The “8 glasses of water per day” is a perfect example of this. While drinking 8 glasses of water is not bad for you, there is no scientific rational for this exact amount, nor is it clear where this concept even originated.

Soda is an easy target when declaring common food and beverages bad for your health. I think we all realize that soda is probably not the best drink for a healthy lifestyle, but c’mon! It’s so good! Once it hits your lips it’s so good! The main reason those in the know warn against soda consumption is because of its content of high fructose corn syrup. A common sugar substitute, HFCS is found in almost every food product imaginable today. It is an extremely cost effective artificial sweetener, but it is high in calories and provides almost no nutritional value. Soda is also very acidic, which will cause your body to strip calcium from your bones in order to balance out your internal ph levels. We have a lot of soda here at work and if somehow this article persuades you to swear off soda you may say to yourself, “But what about all of the extra soda we have? I don’t want it to go to waste.” Fear not, I say! For all is not lost! According to numerous household cleaning Websites, soda can clean your toilet, eliminate rust from a car bumper and remove grease from clothing. Whew, dodged a bullet there! Sugar definitely gets a bad rap these days, but it’s really what kind of sugar and where it comes from that matters.

An absolutely wonderful alternative to processed foods are all natural delicious treats. Below are a few great natural snacks for work. You may never have heard of these foods before so I will list them with brief health benefits below:

· Apples - Vitamin A and C, Antioxidants

· Grapes - Vitamins A, C and P

· Bananas - Vitamins A, B1, B2, B5 and C, Potassium

· Peaches – Vitamin C

· Strawberries – Extremely rich source of Vitamin C

· Almonds – Folate, Vitamin E and A, Niacin

· Cashews – Vitamin K, Folate

· Peanuts – Niacin, Vitamin E, Folate

· Pistachios – Vitamin A, Folate

· Carrots – Vitamin A, C, B6, and Niacin

You will receive the most health benefits from eating the above mentioned foods raw and by themselves. So even though carrots and ranch are delicious, you will lose much of the benefit with this crazy concoction.

Besides eating and drinking right what else can be done to improve health in the workplace? Exercise of course!

Now, it may not always be practical to do laps around the office, but much can be accomplished at ones desk. It is also important to get up and walk around. In our case, foosball is not merely a way to take a quick break, but actually improves our health! We have to play foosball in order to stay healthy. This is science in action, people. (All mentions of “science in action” do not refer to the actual field of science and should not be interpreted as fact or anything resembling an informed opinion) All of this healthy goodness does not come without a price. A common side effect of intense “foos” action is the development of massive forearm muscles. I have personally noticed disfigured co workers from this devastating consequence of science in action.

But seriously, cubicle exercises are a great way to get your blood flowing and draw intrigue from your fellow workers or disgust if happen to love a solid lunge workout. Feel the Burn! Simple stretches can do wonders for your day. While sitting at your desk, try some shoulder rolls, neck rolls, upper body stretches, wrist stretches, and practice the 20-20-20 rule. To prevent eyestrain, every 20 minutes take your focus away from your computer screen and focus on something 20 feet away for at least 20 seconds.

Tea is better than Coffee. There I said it. I can already hear the sounds of angels dying. Sure coffee tastes good, smells great, and helps you get through the day, but what about life? Tea, no matter the kind, is packed with antioxidants and disease fighting compounds. Tea has been shown to lower heart disease and stroke rates among daily drinkers. It also lowers LDL “Bad” cholesterol, boosts your metabolism, slows the growth of tumors, improves skin, protects against Parkinson’s disease, and even delays the onset of diabetes. It also contains no calories. To be fair, coffee exhibits some of these same qualities, but tea is still better. Science in action!

Exercise and diet have even been shown to lower stress levels, reduce and the risk of sickness, and can lead to increased productivity at work. An apple a day really can keep the boss away! I mean doctor.

So, next time you are reaching for that bag of chips or standing at the vending machine deciding to go with a Diet Coke or Sunkist Orange Soda, totally go Sunkist! Its delicious! I kid. Instead brew yourself a nice cup of green or black tea and have a red delicious. Who knows, it may just save your life. Also, do the stretches at your desk. Lunge Attack!

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I don’t care how much you love roast beef, garlic bread, square pizza, baby corns and cake for only $9.99, the eat anything and everything business model does not translate well online.

An easy target, Yahoo! is a confused company doing a little bit of everything (and not that well) while Google focuses on search and prints money to the tune of billions.

Recently, I had the privilege of consulting for a very sharp woman with a successful offline business who’s looking to take her success online.

To her credit, she contacted me before getting too deep and it’s a good thing, she was headed to buffet hell. After an hour I was finally able to wrap my head around the 6 things she was trying to do.

Online you have seconds to effectively communicate what you do and why I (the visitor) should do it.

The prospect of making money online is exciting and it’s easy to carried away with 20 products and 10 services. Each page of your site must have a clear purpose and the content must support this purpose, not distract.

Here’s a couple of quick solutions to getting focused -

a) Ask friends, family and enemies to play around on your site - observe what they are doing why they are doing it.  Ask lots of questions and encourage brutal honesty. What you think is obvious, is not so obvious to another.

b) Don’t be too cute or smart. Get to the point and make it about me and how I stand to benefit!

If you wanna do well online, stay away from the buffet style site and focus on making the best damn meal ever.

Be the big fish in the small pond.

To your success,
Scott

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