Sorry for the lack of updates over the past few days, but sometimes life just gets in the way.. With less than two weeks until my wedding, things have been absolutely chaotic! But we’re in the home stretch now, and I just have a few loose ends to tie up before we leave. My goal for today? Finish compiling the tax information for my accountant, trick out my new iPhone (ringtones, apps, etc), and setup the Wii I scored yesterday at Best Buy!

The g/f is home sick today, so it’s unlikely I’ll get much accomplished.. Maybe it’s just me, but when she’s at home, I have a hard time staying focused on work. I don’t know how some of you are able to work with your significant other at home, but I just can’t deal with it.

I started this post at 10:15am. It’s now almost 1pm, and I’m just publishing it now. In the meantime, I’ve watched Dirt and Maury, and barely done any work.

A good friend of mine left his full-time job about 4 years ago, and has made his living through his e-commerce site since then. At the time, this particular niche didn’t have a huge presence online, and he was able to make a decent living from it. But over time, more and more competition has threatened his business, and as such his profits have diminished. Couple that with a soft economy (dare we say Recession?), and his business is hurting. The business model is solid, and I believe that with the right SEO, SEM, and Social Marketing initiatives, he could make a name for his business and do VERY well. In the meantime, he’s dabbled in affiliate marketing, making around $9000 last year from his efforts..

The million dollar question: “What do you do?”

The question is made all the harder, as a recruiter recently contacted him and offered him a 2-year contract position that pays $130K/yr! But after 4 years of working without a boss, the thought of going back into the corporate world is daunting.. Yet it’s hard to argue with guaranteed income, especially when it’s paying that much.

I honestly don’t know what to tell him. On the one hand, I truly believe that he has a solid business, and with the right amount of time and nurturing, he’ll be able to make a GREAT living with it - Or even sell it to one of his competitors for a mountain of money! But things aren’t always as simple as they seem, and he might regret not taking the guaranteed money that comes with this contract.

Napolean Hill would have you believe that the mere thought about an exit strategy is setting yourself up for failure, and that you must have absolute faith and determination in order to succeed. What do you think?

I just stumbled onto a pretty cool site today, and thought this might be handy for others who are heavy travelers like me..

Dopplr lets you share your future travel plans privately with friends and colleagues. The service then highlights coincidence, for example, telling you that three people you know will be in Paris when you will be there too. You can use Dopplr on your personal computer and mobile phone. It links with online calendars and social networks.

The service has attracted a following among business travellers around the globe. Jimmy Wales of Wikipedia recently named Dopplr his “favorite non-wiki website” in The New York Times Sunday Magazine: “You put in your travel schedule and link to your friends. It allows you to see where everyone is. I love it.”

I’ll have to take some time and fill in all the different conferences I’ll be at, as well as all the vacations I’ll be taking, but this is a start..

Hacker Safe is a service that scans your website daily to insure that your server and site will provide maximum security for your visitors and potential clients. While this is a good practice on it’s own, having the Hacker Safe logo on your website, reporting the daily scan, and providing a link to confirmation that your site is safe can provide dramatic results in conversions.

Hacker Safe certification increased web site conversion by nearly 10% for PETCO Animal Supplies during a recent A/B split test. The 780-store pet specialty retailer recently ran a test to analyze how the shopping behavior of petco.com visitors was affected by independent certification of its web site security. Out of a total of approximately 9,500 online orders recorded during the test, visitors who saw ScanAlert’s Hacker Safe certification mark while shopping made nearly 400 more purchases compared to the control group that did not see it.

ScanAlert reports that the average conversion increase for merchants is around 14%. We implemented Hacker Safe on our ecommerce site back in December 2007, and saw an absolutely staggering 125% increase in sales! Do the math, and you’ll see that the seal paid for itself in just the first few days.. If you’re skeptical, you can set up your own A/B split test, and analyze your results. If you’re not happy with the product for any reason, you can cancel within the first month or so for a full refund!

And for the SEO obsessed, how about 3 free listings in the PR8 Hacker Safe Merchant Directory? That alone is worth the price of admission!

They’re also offering 20% off monthly and annual subscriptions to this service through our site! Hacker Safe definitely falls into our list of recommended resources. You can find more information and get 20% off by visiting the Hacker Safe site.

Last week’s post was such a hit, I decided to post a few more for your viewing pleasure..

Check back next Friday for my next batch!

An active Internet user since 1994, I still remember firing up Mosaic for the first time. Those were the days. Ugly websites with gaudy animated icons, flashing and scrolling text, under construction pages, sounds galore, and textured backgrounds! Do you remember how websites used to look? Here’s a blast from the past..

10 years from now, people will look back at all of our 125×125 buttons and wonder what was wrong with us..