Pensacola Computer Help Technoblog

HireFriday: it’s about community.

This week on Hire Friday chat ( #HFChat ) we have our own local Emerald Coast expert Marie Journey who will be hosting the topic “Hire a Hero, relocation, military vets in the job market”

Marie is a Recruitment Expert and Advocate for Hiring Military Veterans, and will be discussing relocation and how to minimize the disruption to your life.

Since last year’s signing of the Veterans Oppotunity to Work to Hire Heroes Act by President Obama, there has been a strong movement to help get military veterans back into the workforce.  This law provides tax credits for emplyers who hire unemplyed verterans and veterans with service-connected disabilites. Partnering with the Chamber of Commerce as well as the private sector, this movement is making it easier to connect our veterans with the companies that want to hire them.

With people like Margo Rose, the Founder and CEO of the HireFriday Community & Movement, many veterans are being connected with jobs all across the country. “Rose blends social media strategy, and human resources to strengthen job seeker, employee, and employer, and business brands. Margo realized that the strength of HireFriday is in its community. HireFriday increases your findability factor by making you rise to the top of google, bing, and all search engines.  HireFriday optimizes your presence on internet platforms (SEO) on the open web.  HireFriday blends the human resources and social media sphere with seamless continuity.”

Marie Journey can be reached at www.weselectthebest.com/military Everyone should #Follow Marie on Twitter! http://twitter.com/marie4CSWG.

Hire A Hero

Marie is currently in the middle of her own relocation.  With her new job at C&S Wholesale Grocers, she is relocating her family from Florida to corporate headquarters in New Hampshire.  In the past she has moved both nationally and internationally for employment opportunities.  As a recruiter, she has also walked hundreds of candidates through the process for making the most of making a move.

Marie’s past includes working as both a corporate and agency recruiter.  She has worked on behalf of such companies as Microsoft, SAP, Intuit, Dolby as well as providing agency support for clients such as Accenture, Cisco, Chase, and state government needs.

The present and future for Marie is located at C&S Wholesale Grocers.  This company provides first-class warehousing and distribution services to some of the largest supermarket chains in the nation. In 2010 Forbes Magazine ranked it as the 10th largest privately held company in the nation with nearly $20 billion in revenue.  Marie’s role includes executive level recruiting, building talent pools, and being available to connect with those interested in working at an action oriented, high growth, and privately owned company.

With the popularity of social media like facebook and twitter, and the growing use of mobile devices such as tablets and smart-phones, having a website and Internet presence is becoming more important. Many business owners are sometimes overwhelmed with all the information out there and it can get confusing when people start talking about SEO and Places pages, and Facebook widgets etc, but the nice thing about the web is that you can start small and simple and then easily grow as you learn and expand.

I run into people who own small businesses every day who do not have a website and I wonder how much potential business they might be losing because of it. With so many people now using the Internet to shop and to find places to purchase things, having a web presence is more important than ever. Unfortunately, there have been many small business owners who have been ‘burned’ by unscrupulous web designers who have charged them thousands of dollars for websites that are not really worth it, but there are certainly many of dollar wise alternatives available if you do a little bit of research. For many businesses, getting even one customer from it can easily pay for the website, and having a website definitely increases your advertising exposure in one of the most cost effective ways possible.

I had one business owner that called me and asked if I could help him setup a website and he proudly told me that he had gotten his domain name himself. I asked him how much he paid for the domain and he told me that he was happy that he found the name he wanted at a bargain price of $300 (for a year). Unfortunatley, he too fell prey to a company that misled him and sadly I could have shown him where to get that same domain for @ $10 a year.

For a small simple website, you should be able to find a domain for @ $10 year, and then find hosting for it (the server that holds the website files and makes them available on the Internet) for $4 – $10 a month depending on your needs. Of course it takes a bit of research to find the best deals – and the best deals are not always the cheapest. You should always be careful of shared hosting companies that offer a lot for a little, as you may find your website on a server with hundreds of other websites and find that pages load so slowly that people usually leave your website before they even see it! There are however a number of large and reputable companies which offer good deals and good performance for a reasonable price, so a bit of beforehand investigating can certainly save you a lot of time and money in the long run.

Then there is the website itself. Setting up a simple website is not that hard, nor should it be expensive. Personally I tend to stay away from those all-in-one site designers that many companies offer. The built in site designers are often slow, clunky and end up giving you a website that just looks bad. I have found that using a content management system like WordPress is often the easiest and cheapest way to get a professional and easy to manage website up in minimal time. Systems like WordPress allow you to design and edit your website without any special software and there are a ton of free themes and plugins available to help you customize your website.

I have setup many WordPress sites over the past few years for local businesses, and what I like the most about using WordPress is that the websites can be easily customized to be unique and professional, and the business owner or their employees can easily update information on the website without having to call and pay a web developer every time they want to make a simple change. The ability to control your own website is something I think is very important as I have seen far too many business owners who have websites that they hate because they have some developer that they have to call (and usually pay) every time they want to change a line of text or a picture.

At Pensacola Computers, we have helped many local Pensacola area businesses start their own websites and have a lot of insight in the local Pensacola area market with experience in both website design and local search engine placement (getting on the first page of Google search is always a plus!). We are also experts with WordPress websites and have setup a number of websites for local businesses with excellent search engine placement and front page google results. Visit us today at http://pensacolacomputers.com or call us at 850*390*4242