If you are using Twitter check out Twitwheel to help you visualise your network.

You can see the visualisation of my recent Tweets here - and you can also do a search by keyword.

I just received an email about an event taking place this month and hosted by Wicklow County Enterprise Board.

As the details are not on their website here is a summary as I think it could be of interest to some of our readers:

Title: "Developing an Online Strategy for your Business"

Venue: Parkview Hotel in Newtownmountkennedy

Date: Thursday 19th April 2012

Time: 2pm until 5pm 

Cost: FREE

Book your place: online booking for the event is here

Topics:

• How to get your website mobile enabled and how to engage with your market through mobile. 
• Running effective email marketing campaigns
• Website traffic conversion tips.

So if you are in County Wicklow and are looking for some tips to help you with your digital marketing you might want to check out this free event.

MORE FREE TRAINING PROGRAMMES

Remember if you can not attend this event, you can check out my series of FREE content rich webinars taking place in 2012 - our next event is on 18 April 2012 and I will be covering essential tips for using Google Plus in your business.

Here is a great offer I was emailed about today by Miranda of 99designs.com - their designers have developed some free Christmas and holdiay cards that you can download and take to your local printer or even print at home.

Check them out at:

http://99designs.com/free-christmas-cards

http://99designs.com/free-holiday-cards

A great new solution being developed that I heard about from Robert Scoble on Google+ - called Dudamobile and it helps you build a mobile website without having to be gechnical.

You can even register for a beta invitation here - and there will be different templates available. There will be a free and a pid version when it launches at the end of the month.

Watch a video interview with Robert Scoble and the Dudamobile team below:

 

 

Interested in the Internet and the breadth of applicationsit can have in our life? Then you just have to check out the free conference the DotConf, running for a second time and hosted by the National College of Ireland in partnership with the Irish Internet Association and Silicon Republic. Thanks to sponsorship from Microsoft and Mason Hayes+Curran, the event is free to attend.

Here is a summary of some of the things you can look forward to:

• Failure – the motivation to try again - Colm Lyon, CEO, Realex Payments

• Be a Startup, not a F**ckup: lessons from the trenches of startup land - Joe Drumgoole, software entrepreneur

• So you think you need an app? Dermot Daly, CEO, Tapadoo

• How the internet changed my life: Lisa Domican, creator of Grace App for Autism,  Rosemary Mac Cabe, freelance journalist, bloggerr and Andrew Hetherington, Project Director at Business to Arts and co-founder of Fundit.ie
• Panel Discussion: The future of tech in Ireland - John Kennedy, Editor, Silicon Republic, Ellen Dudley, co-founder of CrowdScanner, Paul Rellis, MD of Microsoft Ireland, Philip Nolan, Partner & Head of Commercial Department, Mason Hayes+Curran and Adrian Weckler, Technology journalist, Sunday Business Post

Read the full agenda here.

Book your place to attend the dotconf here - make sure you do so soon as last time the tickets wen in less than 2 weeks!

As they did last year, they have created a great video to tell us all about the speakers and what e can expect - watch it here:

 

As I shared earlier this week on Twitter, now there is no excuse for any irish start up or business not to have a website with the initiative GettingBusinessOnline.ie.

Google, Blacknight, An Post and the County and City Enterprise Boards have collaborated on this initiative with an easy way for you to create your own website offering you a free domain name for 12 months and even website templates that are easy to update.

And if you already have a business, you can apply for €100 Google Adwords to help promote your business online.

It's a great initiative and they have helpful online marketing tips there already - my only problem with the site was that I tried to post into their online form to help promote the campaign - but their form would not accept my URL and to date the person I contacted in Google has not replied to help me help them.

Don't let that stop you making the most of the free service to help grow your business though.

 

 

Looking to get your website ranking higher in search results?

This is a must attend event hosted by DCU Business School Techspectations programme - it's a full day event with Gillian Muessig (CEO, SEOMOZ) who will be covering best practice in Search Engine Optimisation, SEO Tools and work through live examples.

This workshop is free to attend and is on 7 March 2011 - it starts at 8.30am and finishes at 6pm.

This is an event it's worth re-organising your diary to attend if you want to boost your online visibility in 2011.

But remember it's not just about attending the programme - it's about the implementation afterwards.

Register to attend here.

Are you looking for funding for your creative projects? Then check out the soon to be launched by the Business to Arts programme Fund it - which they comment is the first ‘crowdfunding’ web platform in Ireland whose aim it is to raise funds from the general public for creative ideas from all over the island.

Fund it will allow people to share their ideas for creative projects with their online and offline communities, offering unique rewards for different sums pledged. Projects, which can come from any art-form or any creative process, including art, architecture, craft, design, events, festivals, fashion, film, TV, food, games, media, literature, publishing, music, performance, theatre, opera, dance, science or technology, will be available to view on www.fundit.ie.

The project creators will promote their ideas to the public, initially through their own contacts and social networks, with a view to reaching their financial goal within a time period of their choosing – typically between 4-8 weeks.

The Fund it project is designed to support greater individual giving to the arts, culture and creative industries and sectors in Ireland however, funders of projects can be from anywhere in the world.  

Project creators can submit your project to the website and If the project meets Fund it’s guidelines, it will be uploaded on to the website for a defined period, during which the creators will promote the project to their network of supporters who can help them fund it.  

When the deadline for a project is reached, if the target is not met, funders’ pledges are cancelled and the project does not get funding.  If the target is reached or exceeded by the deadline, all pledges are processed, and income raised is credited to the project creator - there is a 3% commission to cover the costs of the financial transactions and a 5% commission for Fund it to be able to provide the service in the future. 

The Fund it project will be operated by Business to Arts, a not-for-profit organisation working to support sustainability in the cultural sector through research, innovation and partnership. Fund it is a service created by Business to Arts, developed with the support of a Technology Grant from the Department of Tourism, Culture and Sport, and private foundation investment.

So if you are looking for funding for your creative project head on over to the Fundit.ie website where you can subscrive to their mailing list to keep up to speed with their programme - you will also find them on Facebook and Twitter.

Fund it Introduction from Fund it on Vimeo.

 

Here is an interesting pitch I received last week that I thought I would share - from JoBurger.ie who are opening a new popup restaurant called Crackbird on Monday 21 February 2011 on 19 Crane Lane, Temple Bar in Dublin.

They are encouraging you to Tweet them to access a free fried Chicken meal - you and your party get a main and shared side and sauce each and you can book a table once over the twelve week period that crackBIRD is open - you can use the able for one or with up to five friends - but you can only avail of the offer once. Just Tweet:

"#tweetseats @crackBIRDdublin"

with details of your name, reservation date, time and number of people to them and they will get back to you if they have availability.

At the time of writing I don't have any picture of the venue and haven't tasted the fried chicken - but I'd recommend you Tweet them soon as by the looks of the their Twitter stream places are filling up fast.

Are you confident that your technology infrastructure in your small business is both secure and helping you be as productive as possible?

In this FREE webinar I will be joined by Christian Kortenhorst (CKSolutions.ie) and will be covering 7 key areas for you to review in relation to your technology infrastucture.

We will be covering:

1. 3 common mistakes small businesses are making in terms of their technology infrastructure

2. How to select an effective anti virus programme and why it is important to your business

3. Tips for using passwords online to ensure that we protect our data

4. The importance for backing up your software and your files and recommended software to use

5. The benefits of cloud computing for small businesses and what we need to consider when working in the 'cloud'

6. Recommended tools to improve our productivity

7. Three tips to ensure that we maintain security of our own identity and our business records online.

So if you want to make sure that your technology infrastructure helps rather than hinders your profits this year join me for this FREE one time only webinar.