Quick W.I.T.S.

Hello, friends and followers. It's been a long couple of months, I know. Mea culpa! This is just a quick update to let you all know that I am starting up my social media activities again as of today, including more helpful and interesting business articles. I haven't decided yet whether I'm going to resume posting 5 days a week yet, or what my exact schedule is going to be, but I'll figure that out over the next week or so. In the meantime, I hope everyone had an excellent holiday and new year, and please stay tuned for more content very soon.

Hello, readers. Just a quick note to say I have some personal stuff to take care of this week, so there will be no blog post today. Normal posts will resume next week, and part three of Tools of the Trade will come out on Thursday, November 16th. Nothing's wrong! I'm just busy. Have a great weekend.

Since I started this blog several months ago, we've talked extensively about many subjects related to running a modern small business, but almost all of it has been focused in some way or another on web design. We've talked about why businesses need a site, methods and design philosophy for the building the site itself, how to write good content, how to market yourself, and what makes good social media content. Starting this week, in my new Tools of the Trade series, we're going in a slightly different direction. For those who don't know, I worked as a Business Analyst and Project Manager for 20 years before I started Whistler IT Solutions. My job was to help companies streamline and optimize their operations, which included making custom reports, automating mundane tasks, reviewing and updating processes, and creating other custom software solutions to improve the level of information managers had access to and help them make better decisions. A lot of the skills ...

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone. I hope your weekend and your Turkey Day are both excellent. And to my American friends and followers out there... happy Columbus Day? :) I'll be back with a new article on Thursday, the final installment of our Design in Detail series. If you haven't read it yet, it's well worth your time. We take an in-depth look at all the major pages of a standard website, talk about design philosophy, and go over tips and tricks to make the most of your customer interactions on each page. If it sounds interesting, check out the first article  here . Thanks for stopping by!

As I sit here writing this, it's nearly 10am on the first day of school. My wife is at the office of her new job. The kids are all packed off with their school supplies, all the last minute crises have been handled (missing money for the yearly agenda book, wet socks from an unexpectedly deep puddle), and the house is empty and silent. Over the last 2 months of summer break, I often thought about how hard it was to get work done with the house so full and the constant noise of life in progress. Now, in the silence and the stillness of a house with no one in it, all I can think about is how much I wish there was someone here to fill the silence. It's a necessary evil of running your own business that you are always busy, even when you're home. There is no such thing as "off duty," no matter how hard you try - paying work is far too important to pass up when you're still new and growing. Last week, if you would have asked me, I would have told you I could...

Well, it's been a pretty crazy week for Whistler IT Solutions. I'm currently working on two websites, and was just contacted yesterday to possibly build another (still hashing out the details). In addition, we're taking a short family vacation this weekend, so I've also been running around trying to help get ready for that. So I haven't had as much time as I'd like to dedicate to non-billable work. Needless to say, researching and writing the articles for this blog takes way more time than anything else I do besides actual paying work for clients, so as much as it pained me, the blog had to take a back seat this week. That being said, I still want to apologize for re-posting an article this week instead of having a new article for you. I'm quite proud of my social media tips article, and it's by far the most popular entry I've made since I started this blog (thanks, readers). But I still feel bad for not having any new content this week. Mea ...

So needless to say, things haven't exactly gone as I planned with the blog. I've been busy dealing with some personal issues, as well as working on getting the business itself up and running. I won't go into long-winded explanations here - those who know me, know what I'm talking about. That said, things are starting to get a little bit more back to "normal," whatever that is, so I'm going to try to start this up again. I've been using the built in blog function that came with my site's builder tool, and it's okay, but I'm looking for something with more options. I like how Blogger works, and I'm comfortable with it, so I'm going to continue using that for writing the blog itself. The only real problem I have now, is that I haven't found a satisfying way to embed the blog into my site so far. I don't like the idea of linking to it instead of just having it in the actual site. The navigation tool from the sitebuilder does...

Well, this is a big day for me indeed. My business is up and running, and my website is officially launched. It's a little daunting, to say the least! Over the weeks and months to come, I intend to turn this blog / news page into a resource for other small businesses who are looking for tips and tricks to make their business more effective, whether it's ways to improve their search listings online, or recommendations for new technology tools they can take advantage of. Hopefully, this page will become an eclectic resource that will be beneficial to everyone. Stay tuned! And thanks for stopping by. :)