Technology Tools to Grow Your Business in 2012

In today's digital world, business and technology are joined at the proverbial hip. A business that does not embrace, and take advantage of, new technology is missing opportunities to grow. From improving operations, communicating better with customers, and expanding marketing reach, here are top tech trends that can positively impact your business in 2012:

Tablet Computers: Not Just for Early Adopters Anymore
With the iPad leading the pack by a wide margin, tablet computers will dominate in popularity and sales, while the PC market in the U.S. slumps. As tablets become mainstream, businesses should use it to increase productivity and engage customers. From sales presentations and surveys to restaurant menus and online orders, the tablets' small size and light weight complements its amazing power.
 
Location-based Marketing: Reach Customers When They Are Right Around the Corner
The ability to "check-in" and broadcast a location from a smartphone is a potential goldmine for small businesses, which can proactively deliver messages to onsite customers and reach potential customers when they're nearby. (Source: Mashable)

Mobile Commerce: Improve Cash Flow with a Single Touch
As a business owner or manager, a primary objective is receiving payment -- the sooner the better. This is now easier with new technology that can transmit secure credit card data directly from a smartphone. Google launched its version, appropriately called Google Wallet, with the Sprint Nexus S 4G smartphone. Partnering location-based marketing with mobile payments could prove to be a savvy marketing move for many small businesses.

Cloud Computing: The Sky is the Limit
Although it sounds nebulous, cloud computing can certainly save a business computer software and hardware costs by moving those functions to the internet and letting someone else install, configure, test, run, secure, and update them. The shared infrastructure means it works like a utility: You only pay for what you need, upgrades are automatic, and scaling up or down is easy.

Mobile Websites: Be Found Anywhere
With more than 35 percent (82.2 million) of the U.S. population owning a smartphone, every business should have a mobile-friendly website or separate mobile-only website to ensure customers can access the information they need from wherever they are. As consumers shift their web browsing to mobile devices, it makes good business sense to craft a mobile-friendly site to not miss out on mobile traffic, and more importantly, sales. (Source: Inman News)

Mobile Video: Show and Tell Your Story
A video tells a story better than pictures or words. New technology makes it easy and affordable for small businesses to use video to promote customer testimonials, demonstrate product benefits and deliver more personal customer messages..

Mobile Advertising: Reach Customers on the Move
Reaching customer on mobile phones has been primarily through SMS, commonly known as text messaging. However, with the rich media and video advertising platform of the smartphone, mobile advertising has been taken to a new level and makes it easy for customers to find your business.

QR Codes: Quick Response Yields Big Results
Quick response (QR) codes may look like a jigsaw puzzle at first glance, but the two-dimensional matrix works similar to a barcode in that when it is scanned with a smartphone, the user is linked to a website or Facebook page, can access a coupon, place an online order, watch a video or other call-to-action. Inexpensive and easily created, this is an effective marketing tool for product packaging, advertisements, signage and company literature.

If you have comments about our recommendations or suggestions of your own, we'd love to hear from you -- send us a video, find us on Facebook, or email us from your iPad.
 

Selecting an Internet Marketing Company.  Does Local or Long Distantance Matter?  

Most communities have a "shop local" program that encourage people to support local businesses and spend tax dollars at home. However, does the same way of thinking apply when selecting a company to design your website, manage your social media presence or handle your online advertising efforts?

Does a Long Distance Relationship Deliver Results?

In today's technology driven world, many would argue you can conduct business from anywhere in the world. However, long distance relationships of any sort can be fraught with challenges and nothing replaces the value of face-to-face communication. With the plethora of unsolicited email offers promising top search engine rankings and low-cost websites, it seems internet marketing has become a hands-off, commoditized business run by unknown entities. Many business owners start out working with a remote company only to realize they didn't receive what they were promised and must go in search of another company to finish the job.

To be fair, there are certainly reputable internet marketing companies in Dallas Fort Worth with the ability to handle business from afar. The point is NOT to select an internet marketing company based solely on price or location.  Below is a checklist of items to consider before hiring an internet marketing company:

• Do you need local or national SEO rankings?
• What are their website hosting capabilities?
• What is their knowledge/experience in the local market?
• How fast will they respond to requests?
• How often will you get reports from them?
• Get a detailed list of what the price includes.
• Look at work samples.
• Request results of online advertising campaigns.
• Speak with current customers.

Internet Marketing Services Close to Home

In most cases, there are internet marketing companies in your community with the experience, expertise and manpower to provide local businesses with the services they need at competitive prices. More importantly, you can shake their hand and look them in the eye before making a decision. While a smaller company may not offer all of the services of a larger organization, most are willing to partner with another vendor or outsource to meet all of your needs. Below are the benefits of working with a local internet marketing company in Dallas Fort Worth:

• Knowledge of local market
• Face-to-face meetings
• Fast response to problems
• Support local community
• References from other local businesses

At the end of the day, the success of all business relationships comes down to one thing: trust. It is much harder and takes longer to have faith in someone you know only through email and telephone. Although internet marketing companies pride themselves on being forward-thinking and technologically advanced, nothing replaces good old-fashioned  face-to-face communication to get the job done.

New Customers are Online. Are You?

Where do people go to search for a product, investigate a business, or solicit a recommendation for everything from a doctor to digital cameras? Yes, the internet. While this comes as no surprise, it is surprising that many business owners have not yet incorporated internet advertising into their overall marketing strategy. According to a recent report by eMarketer, businesses not advertising online are missing the proverbial boat. Or more significantly, new customers. The logic is simple: People spend more time online today than they do reading the newspaper, watching television or listening to the radio. So, doesn’t it make good business sense to go where your customers are?

Like all technology, internet advertising has evolved during the past few years. Once regarded with skepticism, it has become a highly targeted and measurable advertising medium, ideal for small businesses promoting local products and services.

Search Advertising: Help Your Business Be Found

Commonly known as pay-per-click, search advertising refers to online ads that appear at the top and along the side of a search results page. When someone clicks on the ad or link, they are automatically delivered to the company’s website or dedicated landing page with more information and call-to-action. Each time a click occurs, the company is charged a fee, ranging from a few cents to a few dollars, depending on the category and competitiveness of the search term. What makes search advertising especially appealing is its ability to target specific geographic areas, ensuring the ad will appear to local customers searching for your products and services. And, pay-per-click is still the only guaranteed method to achieve top search engine rankings.

Display Advertising: Build Your Brand

The overall surge in online advertising is due to the increase in display ads, which refers to banner ads, video, rich media and sponsorships. Different from search advertising, which is considered primarily for direct response marketing, display advertising boosts brand awareness. Advertisers spent an estimated $6.23 billion on banner ads in 2010, a figure that will grow to an estimated $7.61 billion—or 24.3% of total online ad spending—this year, eMarketer estimates. The fastest growing segment of display advertising is online video which is expected to surpass classifieds and directories in market share—putting video behind only search and banner ads in terms of overall online ad spending. Video is a great way to not only tell, but show, your company’s story.

Facebook Advertising

Another form of internet advertising that is quickly gaining traction is Facebook ads. As the world’s largest social network, Facebook is a natural conduit to promote consumer products and services. Offering display advertising, Facebook is able to target customers by geographic area and demographics.

Planning an Internet Advertising Strategy

If you are looking for new customers, it is no longer possible to ignore the internet. The key to online advertising success begins with determining the appropriate type(s) and adequate budget for your business. From there, you will need a professional team of SEO experts, copywriters, graphic designers and videographers to communicate your message. As part of your business’ overall marketing program, online advertising is another way to reach new customers and provide the information they are seeking – how, when and where they want it.

This blog  topic is a bit dated, but the information is still good...

National retailer J.C. Penney recently landed in The New York Times, and the bottom of Google’s search results, as a result of deceptive search engine optimization (SEO) tactics. For months, the company appeared in the number one spot for everything from dresses to bedding to luggage. An investigation by The New York Times revealed the company’s stellar SEO ranking was the result of thousands of inbound links to the company’s website, the majority of which were placed on obscure sites completely unrelated to J.C. Penney’s products, and most disturbingly, all were paid for by J.C. Penney’s search engine consulting firm.

The practice of paying for links is known as “black hat” optimization and is a big Google no-no. While not illegal, J.C. Penney was penalized for its black hat SEO tactics by being severely de-ranked in search engine results pages within days of Google being notified of the infraction.
 
The incident garnered national media attention due to the fact that SEO has become a primary marketing tool for businesses of all shapes and sizes. In simple terms, SEO is the process of increasing the amount of visitors to a website by obtaining a high-ranking placement in the organic search results (versus a paid advertisement) page of a search engine. The higher a website ranks in the results of a search, the greater the chance that the site will be visited by a user (source: Webopedia.com).

The most obvious question for business owners is, “How do I get my website at the top of the list?” The correct answer is by using legitimate steps a search engine marketing firm can take to improve SEO results, known as “white hat” approaches:

• Make pages primarily for users, not for search engines. Don't deceive your users or present different content to search engines than you display to users, which is commonly referred to as "cloaking."
• Avoid tricks intended to improve search engine rankings.
• Don't participate in link building schemes designed to increase your site's ranking.
• Don't use unauthorized computer programs to submit pages, check rankings, etc.
• Avoid hidden text or hidden links.
• Don't send automated queries to Google.
• Don’t load pages with irrelevant keywords.
• Don't create multiple pages, subdomains, or domains with substantially duplicate content.
• Don't create pages with malicious behavior, such as phishing or installing viruses, trojans, or other badware.
• Avoid "doorway" pages created just for search engines or other "cookie cutter" approaches such as affiliate programs with little or no original content.
• Provide unique and relevant content that gives users a reason to visit your site first.

Most reputable Internet marketing firms take Google’s quality guidelines very seriously and use white hat techniques only. If a company is in a competitive environment for its search terms, achieving first page ranking using white hat practices may take time that some businesses cannot or are unwilling to wait. For any business, search engine rankings must be considered a long-term strategy, which must be implemented and nurtured to achieve success. 
 

Choosing the right web hosting provider is a critical step to ensuring a successful online presence and Internet marketing strategy. Many business owners treat hosting as a commodity decision, believing anyone can do it. However, this is not true. Make the right choice and you should enjoy a quality service that will be an asset to your business. The wrong choice could cost you time and money. 

As defined by Wikipedia, web hosting is “a type of Internet hosting service that allows individuals and organizations to make their own website accessible via the World Wide Web. Web hosts are companies that provide space on a server they own or lease for use by their clients as well as providing Internet connectivity, typically in a data center.” Put simply, if you have a website then you must also engage a hosting company to share it with the world.

Below are the most common types of hosting services available:

1. Free web hosting: While this sounds appealing, these companies accommodate only basic websites and do not offer virus protection, customer support and other services most businesses need.
   
   
2. Shared web hosting: The website is placed on the same server as many other sites, ranging from a few to hundreds or thousands. Typically, all domains share a common pool of server resources, such as RAM and the CPU. The features are extensive and suitable for most business websites.
   
   
3. Dedicated web hosting: The business has its own server and gains full control over it; however, the user typically does not own the server. Websites with custom applications are hosted on dedicated servers.
   
   
4. Hosted exchange servers: The business uses Microsoft Exchange to not only host its website, but interface with other devices and share files and calendars amongst all users. The exchange server syncs information in real-time and provides ample space available per user.
   
   
5.  Cloud hosting: A new type of hosting platform that allows customers powerful, scalable and reliable hosting based on clustered load-balanced servers and utility billing. Removes single-point failures and allows customers to pay for only what they use versus a set maximum.

No two websites are the same, which is why there is no universal hosting service. Below is a checklist to use when selecting a website host provider:

ü  Architecture: This refers to the software used to design the website platform, which will dictate, to some degree, the type of hosting service needed.

ü  Type of server: Basic websites can be hosted on a shared server, but websites with custom applications require a dedicated server.

ü  Disk space and bandwidth: The more complex the website (video, shopping cart, etc.), the more space you’ll need to keep the website operating at optimal speed.

ü  Data back-up: Ask the provider how often data is saved (hourly, daily and weekly are typical options) and where it is stored in case your system crashes and you need to retrieve it.

ü  Equipment: The host provider should have modern equipment to prevent server failure and back-up generators in case of disaster.

ü  Firewall and virus protection: This should be provided as part of the hosting agreement to protect the site from hackers and ensure a secure environment for customers.

ü  Reporting and statistics: The host company should provide detailed monthly statistics of website activity.

ü  Physical location: Ask the provider where the server is located, who owns the building, security measures in place, etc.

Tags: Hosting Website

Social networks: we’ve all heard of them, and most of us are at least familiar with the basic principles of all the major ones—Facebook is the biggest, YouTube is the place to watch videos, Flickr is for pictures, and Twitter is, well, Twitter. But enough about the basics! We’ve compiled a list of fun social media trivia that’s sure to make you the most popular guy or gal at your next party. Or help you answer a Final Jeopardy question. Or at least make you say “hmm.”

2,330,000,000 – Number of results Google returns for the search term “blog.” The top result is Blogger.com, a Google-owned blogging service.
4,920,093 – Number of people that follow @aplusk (aka: Ashton Kutcher), Twitter’s most popular user.
750,000 – Number of people who joined the group “Students against Facebook News Feed (Official Petition to Facebook)” when the news feed was introduced in 2005. Twitter, which was introduced in 2006, is a relatively close approximation and simplified version of the Facebook news feed. It currently boasts over 105,000,000 users.
50,237 – Number of times the most popular story on social news site Digg.com has been dugg. The story, entitled “Digg This: 09-f9-11-02-9d-74-e3-5b-d8-41-56-c5-63-56-88-c0,” featured a string of code that could decrypt HD DVD format DRM. It was removed after Digg received a cease and desist notice.
11,091 – Number of results Flickr returns for the search term “platypus.”
2003 – Year Friendster, the site that defined social networking as we know it today, was launched. Friendster is still active today. Approximately 90% of its traffic comes from Asia and it continues to work on expanding its Asian presence.
1998 – Year LiveJournal, the granddaddy of all blogging platforms, was introduced.
130 – Average number of Friends a Facebook user has.
37 – Percentage of users who update Twitter using their mobile phones.
4:3 – Ratio of funny children videos to funny cat videos on YouTube. (Funny children may dominate YouTube, but the most dugg video of all time was, you guessed it, a cat video.)
0 – Number of followers many Twitter users had on May 10, 2010. After discovering a bug that allowed users to force other users to follow them without their consent, Twitter admins reset many account holders’ follower counts to zero while they resolved the issue.

Since at least 2002, domain owners from Maui to Miami have been receiving so-called “courtesy” e-mails and letters from a company called Domain Registry of America (DRoA) reminding them that their domains are about to expire and encouraging them to renew with DRoA for the bargain basement price of $30/year. Often times, people don’t think twice about making the payment—after all, the DRoA name sounds official; the e-mails, letters, and DRoA website look legitimate; the 800 number DRoA offers connects callers to a real customer service tech; and many people don’t remember the last time they renewed their domain and certainly don’t want to allow it to expire and be snapped up by one of their competitors. What these people fail to realize, however, is that they’re not really renewing their domain names; they’re actually transferring them from their original domain registrars to DRoA and getting scammed out of quite a bit of cash (a $30/year asking price is actually an obscene amount of money to ask for a domain).

Many people tend to forget where they’ve registered their domains once they’ve had them for a while, so when these official-looking “courtesy” notes come in, domain owners assume they’re from their original registrar. Red flags should go up when the owner receives another e-mail after he’s made his payment asking him to confirm the transfer (rather than the renewal that was advertised), but if the flags fail to launch the transaction will go in DRoA’s books and the domain will be in its clutches.  

Once a domain owner realizes he’s been duped, it’s often quite difficult for him to transfer the domain back to his former, fairly priced registrar. DRoA’s customer service reps are notoriously heinous to work with, and why wouldn’t they be? DRoA wants its customers’ money, not their satisfaction.

DRoA claims its e-mails and letters are simply part of a marketing scheme, but the FTC has gotten involved and slapped DRoA’s wrists for its deceptive practices. In response, DRoA added an almost imperceptible  note to their correspondences to let sleuthy customers know that DRoA had taken some liberties with the English language and is using “renew” and “transfer” interchangeably. Today the company continues to send out bogus e-mails and letters that mislead countless domain holders.

If your website is maintained by an outside management company, it’s almost inconceivable that they wouldn’t keep tabs on when and with whom your domain will need to be renewed. If you manage your own site, keep a record of where your domain is registered and when it’s up for renewal. And any time you receive an email requesting payment from a source you’re not immediately familiar with, do a bit of research to ensure it’s not a scam: you’ll almost always discover that the 12 enslaved Nigerian princesses who are trying to raise funds to purchase an inflatable raft that they can use to paddle to freedom aren’t actually princesses at all.

Blogs are absolutely soaring in popularity these days. It seems like everyone from our airlines to our hairdressers are publishing something online. But why? What makes blogs such an important social media tool that Marriott and Coke have decided to adopt them? And more importantly, what separates a good blog from a not-so-good one?

The first thing every social media person should know before diving into the blogosphere is what a blog is and what a blog isn’t. Technically what a blog is is a website that people update semi-regularly with news, information, commentary, or just general day-to-day details. Blogs can either be professional or personal, and both types have their own unique set of guidelines. As far a business bloggers are concerned, a proper blog is—

A Whole Slew of Pages that Search Engines can Index
Any blog platform worth its salt will give each of your posts its own unique URL, which means that every entry you post will be a page that Google can index. If you’re a chef and restaurant proprietor, odds are that you didn’t devote a main page of your site to your love affair with Wusthof knives. However, if you write a post about why you love your Wusthof Le Cordon Bleu sandwich knife for slicing cucumbers, searchers could potentially find your restaurant by way of Googling  a combination of Wusthof + knife + cucumber + sandwich (trust me, stranger search combos have been Googled).

A Place Where You Answer Frequently Asked Questions
If you hear a question a lot, why not post a thorough answer on your blog? You should answer the customer queries immediately, of course, but you could also direct them to your blog if the answer is particularly long or complicated. And chances are, if many people are asking you, many more are asking Google, and wouldn’t it be nice if a few of those Googlers happened upon your company’s blog and used your services?

A Place Where You Demonstrate Your Expertise
When potential customers visit your website, they want to know that your company is the best one for the job. If your blog is full of well-written, informative posts, customers will know immediately that the people behind your business are capable and competent.  

Updated Regularly
I’m not saying you have to update your blog every day, but if there are month-long gaps between posts, old readers will lose interest and you won’t accumulate any news one. A loved blog is an effective blog, so try to keep your update schedule consistent.

Now for what a proper blog is not—

A Billboard
Entries about why your creamed corn/seared tuna/artichoke dip is the best and/or better than the creamed corn/seared tuna/artichoke dip down the street aren’t going to be all that useful. Sure, you can post an occasional announcement or promote a product, but by and large blogs aren’t really intended to be hubs for blatant advertising. If you want to post about the 22nd Annual Half-Price Oyster Week at your restaurant, consider doing so in an interesting way (perhaps you could post about how Oyster Week grew into the tradition that it is today or about which wines go best with fried and raw oysters).

A Will/Business Proposal/Other Official Document
A blog is a pretty informal thing, so have fun when you’re writing it! Use contractions and colloquialisms when they’re appropriate. Joke with the reader. Just remember that the voice behind your blog is the voice of your company, so keep it professional and keep it consistent with your company’s image.

Remember that above all else, good blogs are the ones that people find interesting and valuable. If people like what you’re saying, they’ll come back for more, and there’s a pretty good chance that if something you write is especially useful or fresh, it will get passed around, which could translate into more exposure for your business and potentially more money in your pocket.

You’ve probably noticed that Facebook’s been making some changes to their Pages of late. Now, instead of becoming a “Fan” of something, we can “Like” it. According to Facebook, this change “offers [users] a more light-weight and standard way to connect with people, things and topics in which [they] are interested.” In other words, it’s all about semantics rather than functionality. Personally I’m not a fan (har har!) of the new name because I think it can be easily confused with Facebook’s other “Like” feature that corresponds to videos, status updates, pictures, etc. (“Liking” the Cheetos Page is not the same as “Liking” a picture of your friend’s new baby. “Liking” a Page is the equivalent of subscribing to it forever [or at least until you decide to opt out]; “Liking” friends’ activities is more spontaneous –it’s commentary that’s there today and gone tomorrow.)    

Most of that’s neither here nor there, of course, since it won’t really affect how you go about your Facebook business. What’s really important is the change that Facebook is still rolling out: the Community Page.  

The Facebook Pages that we know and love (Facebook calls these “Official Pages”) are intended to help us connect to the artists, performers, organizations, and products that we like and are created and maintained by third-parties (PR people, business owners, and marketers) in the interest of promotion. The Community Pages that are in the works are different: they are meant for causes and issues rather than brands. Anyone can create a Community Page, but Facebook has already made 6 million Community Pages for a variety of activities, interests, places, etc. While they’re still intended to be places for like-minded people to gather and talk about a shared interested, Community Pages also supposed to be collections of information on whatever topic they’ve been created for. (Each Community Page will feature its related Wikipedia article.)

 If it hasn’t done so already, Facebook will soon suggest both Official and Community Pages to you based on the location, school, activities, interests, movies, music, and television shows you’ve listed on your profile (for instance, if you’ve listed your hometown as Dallas, Texas, Facebook may suggest that you connect to the Dallas, Texas Community Page). If you choose to connect to these Community Pages, Facebook will replace the text on your profile with links to the Pages. The idea is that eventually, most of the information on your profile will be visual and connected to other pages within the site. In other words, Facebook doesn’t want your profile to be an island anymore—if your profile says you're from Dallas, Facebook wants to connect you with others from Dallas.

You can select as few or as many Community Pages as you’d like to display in your profile, and you can always delete or add Community Pages as your interests and favorites change. Once you make a connection to a Community Page, it will have access to anything you post about it, so if you label a video as “My brother driving a Ferrari thru Dallas, Texas!” that video will show up in the “Related Posts” section of the Dallas, Texas Page that you’re connected to (for you Twitter users, think of it as Facebook's version of "Real-Time Search Results"). Also, unlike Official Pages whose administrators send out messages to their Fans’ (oops, “connections’”) News Feeds, Community Page updates will not show up in the News Feed—you will actually have to visit the Page to get information. 

As I mentioned before, Facebook is still in the process of making the switch to Community Pages and connected profiles, so their impact, true functionality, and the public’s reception really remain to be seen. 

On April 3, Apple released the newest member of its uber-popular family into the world, and technophiles were so jazzed that they snapped up over 600,000 iPads in five short days. But Apple-hungry consumers weren’t the only ones who were excited about the iPad—most* of the web’s biggest social players were pretty darned enthused as well, and they weren’t afraid to show it:

Google: To take full advantage of the large iPad screen, Google reformatted Gmail. The two-column display is basically an enhanced version of the single column Gmail for Mobile app that was created for the iPhone and Android. (Some Gmail users even argue that Gmail for the iPad is an enhanced version of traditional Gmail and are going to great lengths to make it their desktop default.)
Flickr: The photo and video sharing site gleefully announced on its blog that it would be making its videos iPad-compatible by introducing HTML5 playback. (Until very recently, nearly all websites embedded videos using Flash, but since the iPad doesn’t support Flash, sites are switching their vids over to HTML5 to keep up.)  
WordPress: WordPress also trumpeted its foray into iPad territory on its blog (a move that was actually quite apropos and vaguely existential). The blogging website has released a new version of its iPhone app that’s compatible with the iPad and comes equipped with all sorts of fun features like the ability to geotag blog updates.
YouTube: I found nary a peep about the iPad on the YouTube blog, but Apple was very vocal on the video giant’s behalf. The iPad comes with a built-in YouTube app, which, like big brother Gmail, is formatted to suit the iPad screen.
Facebook: Facebook has been making apps for Apple products since the beginning of time, so everyone was waiting to see what it had in store for the iPad. As it turns out, what it had in store was nothing. More accurately, a Facebook app was in the works for the iPad, but its life was cut short when its programmer took issue with the App Store screening process and quit the project. Some Tom, Dick, or Steve did create a Facebook app called Facebook Ultimate, but it developed a horrible reputation among iPad users (and infringed on the Facebook copyright to boot) and Apple has since removed it from the App Store. There is a bit of hope for the disgruntled Facebook user, and it comes in the form of http://touch.facebook.com/, which is a stripped down version of regular old Facebook that fits better on the iPad screen.
    
*Twitter is conspicuously absent from this list, and with good reason—the micro-blogging phenom didn’t go to any lengths to adapt itself to the iPad. Happily for tweet-o-holics, however, the App Store has been flooded with third-party Twitter apps (the ones from TweetDeck and Twitterific are said to be particularly excellent) that pick up the slack. 

If you’re one of the lucky few techies who’s already gotten his hands on an iPad, go ahead and tweet, blog, email, or update your Facebook status about how you’re tweeting, blogging, emailing, or updating your Facebook status with your all-powerful fingertips. Those of us old-fashioned mice-and-keyboard folks will be mighty jealous indeed.