Silicon Beach Training Blog

Flickr’s on Steroids, Looks Just Like Google+

Aaron Charlie — Tue, 21 May 2013 11:35:24 +0000

So after the big news that Yahoo has bought Tumblr for a staggering $1.1 Billion, comes more interesting developments on another Yahoo platform: Flickr.

It seems almost every social site has undergone a revamp in recent weeks, and Flickr is the latest to completely redesign the way it looks, acts and feels.

It’s all geared towards creating a responsive site that works seamlessly across small mobile screens, mid-size tablets and large-scale, hi-res desktop screens: something which is taught and emphasised on our Responsive Web Design Course.

So what exactly has changed with the ‘new’ Flickr. Let’s take a look:

Flickr’s New Look

The most obvious and striking change is the way the site now looks. Gone are the small images, scattered text and gaping white spaces:

Now we have expansive images, minimal and hidden text and only hints of white space.

It all looks a bit Google+ (post the recent redesign of that site), especially the screen-spanning cover photos at the top. Careful with that though, Flickr will just pick an image by default as your cover photo, so make sure to manually change it if you don’t want to end up with something potentially iffy.

The homepage has taken its cue from sites like Pinterest and Scoop.it with a large central stream of both photos and comments and a minimal top navigation bar.

The entire site is also now accented with striking black borders and lowlights which gives it a more structured, solid feel than before.

It’s pretty obvious what the impetus behind this redesign was: striking that balance between a site that looks great on mobile and a site that looks great on hi-res, large screens, whilst remaining consistent across the board.

It’s a move which has been taken by everyone in recent months, from Google+ to Facebook (still rolling out); clearly it’s the Zeitgeist in web design.

Terabyte of Free Storage

This is quite a bold move from Flickr but one that plays nicely into the burgeoning mobile/cloud, non-traditional storage model that is transforming tech. Any free account holder (new or old) receives this expansive storage facility as part of the deal.

Storage that big means images can be uploaded in super high-res formats and in unfathomable quantity; ideal for professional photographers looking to showcase their full body of work.

But that brings me onto a point that this redesign hasn’t addressed. Despite being geared towards both amateur and professional photographers, Flickr has always had strict rules about the commercialisation of work on their platform, and nothing has changed on that front.

In their guidelines it states:

“Don’t use Flickr to sell.
If we find you engaging in commercial activity, we will warn you or delete your account. Some examples include selling products, services, or yourself through your photostream or in a group, using your account solely as a product catalog, or linking to commercial sites in your photostream.”

Realistically, if Flickr wanted to go after the market that they seem to be hinting at with features like (almost) unlimited high quality image storage, then they’re going to need to rethink their policy on commercialisation.

It’s the photographers that make Flickr what it is, but without the facility to sell, or at least market their product, they’ll begin to look elsewhere.

Flickr’s New Features

There are a couple of other new features which help to make this redesign even more interesting. One is the new full-screen slideshow feature that uses preset transitions and facial-recognition technology, to seamlessly interweave entire collections of images, and focus on key subjects within the images, in an aesthetically pleasing way.

This feature would be fantastic except it currently seems to be very slow and sluggish to load (wouldn’t load at all on my machine); hopefully that’s an issue that will be ironed out soon.

One other new feature is the ability to upload longer, better quality videos. Up to 3-minutes per video in full HD to be exact. I can’t see this really being a deal-breaker for many users though, when there are bigger and better video sites out there (one major player springs to mind!).

Final Thought

Clearly this is a big statement of intent from Yahoo and Flickr. They intend to stay relevant in the quick-pace photo-site world that has seen two behemoths emerge in recent years (Pinterest and Instagram).

With this new look, Flickr could quite easily re-carve out a niche as the the photographers’ photo-site but to do so, it need to rethink its archaic terms regarding commercialisation.

Will it be the next big player in social media? Certainly not. Will it survive, in the face of plenty of doubts in recent time? Almost certainly yes.

If you want to make sure your photos look amazing in the the new Flickr photostream, come on our Photoshop Training here at Silicon Beach.

The post Flickr’s on Steroids, Looks Just Like Google+ appeared first on Silicon Beach Training Blog.

Creative Uses of Excel: From Nyan Cat to Pac-Man

Aaron Charlie — Mon, 20 May 2013 11:18:42 +0000

When people think of Microsoft Excel, they often picture dull figures and charts and just generally lots and lots of data. All very useful stuff but not the most enthralling outside of a work environment.

Some people however, take a different approach. To them Excel can be anything and everything. It’s not just for business and numbers. It can be used to create innovative and original concepts, in all sorts of different ways.

Whatever you want to use Excel for, our Excel Training will give you all the knowledge you need to make the most of this powerful tool and it’s also worth reading this blog post on some hidden Excel tips and tricks.

So let’s take a look at some of the less traditional uses of Excel to give you an idea of what this software can really do.

Art in Excel

Excel can and has been used by artists as a platform to express their ideas and creativity. It may sound like an odd choice of medium but the flexibility and functionality Excel provides is surprisingly suited to artistic endeavour.

Take a look at these magnificent pieces by Japanese artist Tatsuo Horiuchi:

And these Star Wars-themed works by Shukei are out of this world (excuse the pun):

This colourful nature scene takes a traditional art subject and gives it a spreadsheet-styled revamp:

And then there’s Nyan Cat:

Features and Tools in Excel

Excel was originally created to help solve problems. Even today, people are using it to find ways round difficult issues in all walks of life. Let’s see some of the example of this in action.

Firstly, we have one of the more common uses of Excel: Dice.

By combining the Random Number and various AND, IF and OR functions you can create a simple to use Dice. Take a look at this tutorial for more information.

One of the best uses of Excel I’ve come across is an integrated web radio player. It has all the functionality of a ‘normal’ web radio player but just happens to be in an Excel spreadsheet!

You can download it here.

Games in Excel

Surprisingly, Excel can be used as a pretty powerful game-rendering platform. From pixel classics up to strategy masterpieces, who knows, perhaps Excel will be the next competitor to PlayStation and Xbox(!) Let’s take a look at some of the best:

Pac-Man

The classic arcade game, Pac-Man has had some kind of incarnation on pretty much every gaming platform out there. Well now, he makes the leap into cell format with this brilliant rendering:

Conway’s Game of Life

This is quite a classic game in some circles and can be extremely addictive. A sort of low-fi The Sims (a description which will have geeks everywhere shuddering in disapproval). The general idea is to keep a cell ‘alive’ by keeping it in the right conditions, in this case, with the right amount of ‘neighbour’ cells. It’s a very interesting game and one perfectly suited to Excel:

Arena.xlsm

Created by an accountant, this is a particularly impressive and complex game that moulds itself on traditional Role Playing Games of days past. With 1000s of enemies, 31 different ‘spells’ and 4 possible endings, this is an expansive a game as any from the 8-bit heyday of the genre:

Download it here.

So there you have it. Excel being used for all sorts of interesting and creative endeavours. Of course if you’re still struggling with formulas and other basic functions, our Beginner’s Excel Course is a great introduction to the software.

If you have any other creative uses of Excel you think we may have missed, please let us know in the comments. Thanks for reading.

The post Creative Uses of Excel: From Nyan Cat to Pac-Man appeared first on Silicon Beach Training Blog.

Google Grows Up – Google+’s Best New Features

Aaron Charlie — Thu, 16 May 2013 12:45:19 +0000

Fresh off the back of criticism from Reuters for failing to entice brands to the platform, Google+ has fought back at I/O 2013 with a completely overhauled social network.

The changes went live at the conference, meaning that everyone can already get their hands on the new features.

Those new features include:

1. A Slick New Look

2. Redesigned responsive stream (1-3 columns)

3. Automatic Hashtags

4. Revamped Photos

5. Hangouts

Since launching nearly two years ago, Google+ has done little to set itself apart as a social platform, instead borrowing the more successful features from other networks. This hasn’t been enough to entice people away from Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn – possibly because Google+ attempts to be all three at once.

By the end of 2012, Google claimed that they had 235 million active users (550 in total) but the general consensus is Google’s definition of ‘active’ differs somewhat to industry expectations. Many predict that if it wasn’t for Gmail, Android and the adoption of rel=author within the marketing industry (which you can learn about on our SEO courses) then Google+ would be something of a ghost town.

We’ve been testing Google+ out this morning to get used to the new features and the initial impression in the office is that Google has stepped up its game and finally done something to set it apart from other social networks. Let’s dive in…

1. Google+’s Slick New Look

The whole feel of the new design is that of a mobile app. It draws on its own iOS and Android app layouts, as well as those of other sites like Pinterest and, yes, Facebook.

The result is smoother, cleaner, more minimal look with hidden sidebars and flat yet expandable, card-style posts that resemble Google Now.

Everything’s faster too; there’s no longer that agonising wait when clicking between say the Stream and Communities.

In the end, it’s the little things that make the difference like the fixed-floating top bar and the switch from Ariel to Roboto font ( a subtle change but a pleasant one).

2. Redesigned Streams

There’s no longer the one endlessly scrollable stream on the home page, there are now three endlessly scrollable streams. What this does is give Google+ a more ‘pinboard-esque’ feel, with clear inspiration from sites like Pinterest and Scoop.it.

What is great about this new stream layout is that it caters perfectly for two of the main uses of Google+: photo-sharing and news consumption. Images are mainly full-width affairs, either encompassing one individual stream or occasionally displayed as expansive, three-stream-filling masterpieces.

As such, it’s the image-based posts which tend to stand out the most, something which I’m sure marketers and photographers will already be beginning to capitalise on.

The news-based posts benefit further from the new…

3. Automatic Hashtags

This is a pretty huge change. Whereas previously (and is the case on Twitter) the user decided which hashtags to use and when, the new system automatically marks-up anything it thinks is ‘hashtag-able’. While that might initially seem like it would detract from the user’s experience, when you think about it makes sense.

If Google are in control of what makes it into hashtags and what doesn’t, it means that hashtags will be even more useful. You’ll only have groupings that collectively make sense and you won’t have mis-labled posts.

Thinking about it from a marketer’s perspective, this opens up a whole world of opportunities for getting ‘indexed’ into relevant hashtags for your niche. With the ability to search both related posts within a hashtag and related hashtags as well, the whole feature is marketer’s dream.

4. Auto Awesome Photos

We didn’t make up that title, that’s Google’s actual name for this feature. And what a feature it is; the name is pretty much spot on.

This is all about making better links between photos and better photos generally. So there are functions like automatic panoramas, film strips and animations. Google will take your photos as they are uploaded and if it notices a pattern, can ‘stitch’ them together in these various ways.

Even more impressive is that if you were to take a series of family portraits, Google will be able to pick out the ‘best shots’ of each individual (currently based on smiling) and mash them together to create the perfect family photo.

Add in Google’s auto-enhance feature that will seemingly do the job of Photoshop in some cases, and you’re left with a very powerful photosharing/auto-editing tool.

5. Hangouts

This change is the sort which makes you scream ‘I WISH MORE OF MY FRIENDS HAD GOOGLE+!’ Hangouts is now a standalone app that oozes useful and innovative features. Integrated photo and video sharing, text messaging and the traditional video call format truly make this the be all and end all of messenger apps.

It has also added the ‘continuous conversation’ aspect that is a key feature of Facebook chat and perhaps most importantly, has cross-device synchronicity: you can be chatting to your mate on your phone and then instantly switch to your desktop when you arrive home. This is something that Facebook does offer, but not as smoothly as Google and without all the extra features mentioned above.

If only more people were on it! Maybe all these changes will convince them. If not, our Social Media Training will. On our course, you’ll learn how to make the most of Google +, why it’s important, and much more.

The post Google Grows Up – Google+’s Best New Features appeared first on Silicon Beach Training Blog.

Mandated BYOD by 2017: Is this the End of Internal Tech Support?

Andy Trainer — Wed, 15 May 2013 09:13:52 +0000

BYOD is the buzzword in business IT at the moment, but is there more to it than just easily spouted rhetoric by a few industry influencers?

A study by Gartner would suggest there is. It predicts that 38% of organisations will stop providing mobile devices to employees by 2016 and 50% will mandate a BYOD policy by 2017. That’s a significant enough portion of organisations for IT professionals to stand up and take notice.

So what does this mean for the tech side of businesses? On our ITIL courses, we emphasise the difficulty in managing multiple and diverse platforms from both a support and security perspective, something which BYOD only increases.

With BYOD getting more and more popular, does this mean that the traditional model of internal IT support and service management will have to be entirely scrapped? Or can it adapt to the challenges it faces with BYOD and continue to be the technical bedrock of any business?

Why BYOD Could Spell the end for Internal IT Support

BYOD throws up all sorts of issues for businesses, and in particular, for the IT crew. In the time of blanket company Blackberries and uniform Dell PCs, IT support was in the most part, a lot simpler: if you could fix a problem on one machine, you could probably fix it on any of them.

These days, to be able to provide full IT support to an organisation, you’d need to be an expert in Windows, iOS, Android and maybe even Blackberry OS. People like this don’t exactly grow on trees.

That’s not to mention being experienced with a swathe of different brands and devices within these systems as well: knowing how to solve an issue on a Windows 8 PC might not automatically mean you’ll know how to solve an issue on a Windows 8 phone. An HTC One is different to a Samsung Galaxy S4 etc

Now, I’m not saying that there aren’t IT professionals who could easily work their way around most/any device, it’s just that these people will have to be highly skilled. And skills come at a price.

This is really the crux of the issue.

Currently IT support and service workers range from the highly skilled to the semi-unskilled. Often, internal IT Help Desks will have more individuals that lean toward the unskilled side of things with perhaps a manager or two who are more skilled. This means the organisation can justify paying the majority of the team a lower salary, which means less costs for the business.

The more skilled (and diversely skilled) a worker is, the more the company will have to fork out. If BYOD then requires multi-specialists, the costs of hiring will go up.

This is only one of the issues that BYOD throws up. Factor in security and payment/remuneration issues, and BYOD becomes a real headache for employers and workers alike.

The Solution?

Organisations may have to start looking externally for their support and service solutions. Plenty of companies offer support for various platforms, devices and software and because their sole purpose is to ‘sell’ IT support, they can afford to employ more costly specialists. In fact it’s integral to their business plan.

Another potential avenue is to pay for support for each individual platform, from the platform-makers themselves. Apple offer business support for their iOS for example.

The issue with this is that it can be costly to use brand services and even more costly to use multiple ones.

It may be the case that companies do just have to bite the bullet and pay more to employ more skilled IT staff. While it may prove to be expensive, it won’t be as bad as paying for multiple external support systems and comes with the added perks of being in-house (quicker solutions, greater contextual understanding of the business).

With a solid service strategy and skilled workers, BYOD becomes much easier to deal with. A great way to improve skills and understanding of IT service strategies is to earn an ITIL qualification. Our Foundation Course is the ideal place to start and our Service Strategy and Service Design Training are perfect for learning how to cope with the challenges posed by BYOD, among much else.

Conclusion

So internal IT support may not be dead, but the industry will likely have shape up and get more skilled in the process. BYOD can be manageable but it takes those with plenty of understanding of the intricacies involved in providing comprehensive support to multiple and different devices for it to be accommodated effectively.

For some further reading, it’s worth checking out Gartner who offer some great tips and advice for Help Desks needing to adjust to and manage BYOD.

So really, BYOD isn’t the end for internal IT Support at all. In fact, things are just getting interesting.

The post Mandated BYOD by 2017: Is this the End of Internal Tech Support? appeared first on Silicon Beach Training Blog.

Adobe Drops Creative Suite to Focus on Creative Cloud

Aaron Charlie — Mon, 13 May 2013 09:04:06 +0000

Huge news coming from Adobe in the last week. After 10 years of service, it will be dropping its Creative Suite product entirely, in favour of pushing the Creative Cloud service that was introduced last year.

Here at Silicon Beach, we’ve already updated to Creative Cloud and so all our Adobe Courses, including our Photoshop Courses, will be completely up to date.

This is a massive shift in focus from Adobe, whose business model had until the release of Creative Cloud, followed the ‘traditional’ software licencing model. So what exactly does all this mean for consumers and what’s new?

What is Creative Cloud?

Last year Adobe released Creative Cloud which at first appeared to just be an alternative payment option for existing Adobe products, rather than an entire product in itself. As it has transpired, Creative Cloud will be the sole focus of Adobe from now on.

The next release in June will see them scrap the ubiquitous CS (Creative Suite) moniker that has been attached to Adobe programs since 2003 and instead each product will be branded as CC (Creative Cloud).

There will be no ‘full’ update system in place as their is currently (CS4 to CS5 to CS6 etc) but rather more frequent, less substantial updates each remaining under the CC brand.

It’s worth reading Adobe’s Creative Cloud FAQs to get completely up to speed on the the changes.

Why the move to Creative Cloud?

So why exactly has Adobe decided to take this path? There are few clear cut reasons:

1. ‘Balancing’ Income – A huge portion of Adobe’s sales come during the 6 months to a year after a new release, as you would expect. This means that in the years after that between updates, their balance sheet isn’t looking so great.

By creating a perpetual subscription service, they’ll be able to ‘stabilise’ the income so that there is a steady flow all year round.

2. Combating Piracy – Piracy is an enormous issue for Adobe – there are cracked and torrent versions of every Adobe product freely available all over the web. Some estimates in recent years state that 60% of Photoshop users are using a pirated version. By introducing a monthly subscription model, pirated versions of the products will dwindle (although not completely disappear). Basically, it means more money in their pockets. And that’s what business is about.

3. Following Trend – The subscription model is rapidly becoming the norm for software and app-makers. Microsoft have Office 365 and services like Spotify and Netflix lead their respective markets.

With cloud-based products the present and future of tech as well, this a bold but not all that surprising move from Adobe.

How Much is Creative Cloud

Creative Cloud will be priced at $49.99 a month (or £46.88) for regular users, but current owners of Adobe CS3 and and above will get a special discount price for their first year if they upgrade, which will be $29.99 (£27.34).

Offering a discount to current users is a decent idea from Adobe but hasn’t totally allayed concerns that many have.

How will Creative Cloud Affect my Course at Silicon Beach?

There’s no need to worry about how it will affect the course. Here at SBT we have been upgraded to CS6 through Creative Cloud for the last 4 months or so. That means all of our public Adobe Courses are entirely up-to-date including:

However, if you would prefer to learn on one of the previous versions, we can run any of the courses above privately on versions CS4 and above. Similarly, all of our exclusively private courses like our Lightroom Course and Advanced Illustrator Training can be run on any version dating back to CS4.

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Biggest Challenges Faced by New Managers

Andy Trainer — Thu, 09 May 2013 08:07:50 +0000

Landing your first management role is an exciting and rewarding experience. You’ll have more responsibility, more power and more money. You’ll be given more freedom to act on your own decisions too.

It’s not all a bed of roses though. Management can be a tough and gruelling profession whatever the industry, and one which needs to be fully understood and prepared for in order to succeed.

Coming on our Management Skills for New Managers Course is a great idea and our Leadership Training will get you started on the path to success but I thought I’d reach out to a selection of managers and professionals from a variety of industries, asking them what they think is the biggest challenge they faced in the first few months/year in the job. Hopefully this will help those starting out in management understand the issues they may have to deal with.

First up we have someone who has only been in management for a day (or had when I spoke to her at least)!

Building Relationships and Understanding the Company

Laura Evans, Marketing Manager at Create.net

“Joining a new place is nerve-wracking but Create have been especially welcoming. Having a dedicated internal HR person has been useful here as it meant they were very supportive in checking I have everything I needed.

As a marketing manager it’s a challenge for me to have good connections with everyone I work with across the business, especially heads of customer service departments and the product manager, as well as those I work more directly with.

I bought donuts for everyone on my first day (which went down really well!) but I realise these relationships are something that need to be built up over time and will take long term attention to grow and maintain.

My upcoming challenges are to really understand how the company works, the internal processes and customers. Once I have a clear picture of what works and what doesn’t I can implement changes where necessary and build upon that base.

It’s a challenge to get everyone on side, including senior management so I’m spending time with them to understand and create business objectives. I can then set targets for my department based on those.”

Firing

John Martin Moore, Soft Skills Trainer

“It was many years ago when I was Managing Director of my own company (1999); for that management position the problems were quite different from when I worked in a large organisation as a training manager for LTSB.
For example in my own company I had the task of managing and delegating the workload, designing process flow and monitoring progress while at the same time dealing with my own customer key accounts.

Within the larger organisation these processes were already defined and it was just a case of keeping to a schedule.

One of the first things I had to do on my first day as a training manager for LTSB was to sack one of the trainees, this isn’t something I was comfortable with but when the ‘big boss’ tells you to jump, you have to jump. It should have been handled by HR but I wasn’t given the option and had to let the guy go without any real explanation as to why, I simply didn’t have one. The ‘boss’ just took a dislike to him and I was made executioner.

Of course this didn’t make me popular and as it was my first day it gave me pause to think about whether I was cut out for this type of work.
So, one thing to remember if you do become manager is you cannot get too close to your team because this can lead to them taking small liberties which in turn can backfire on you and if that happens then one of you will have to go, if your boss says so.”

Thinking Ahead

Martin Manser, Business Skills Trainer

Martin thinks that the toughest challenge new managers face is staying ahead of the game.

“(You need to) think at least 2 steps ahead!” he says, which is very true. It’s all to easy to get bogged down in the minutiae of a task or equally, go the other way and take a too ‘big picture’ approach and miss important details.

Management is all about finding that goldilocks zone and thinking ahead is key to this. Time management is a major aspect of this too, take a look at these 10 Time Management tips for help on that front.

Shifting Relationship From Co-worker to Boss

Steven Bonacorsi, Lean Six Sigma Consultant, Process Excellence Network

Steven initially struggled with the change in relationship with fellow workers but ultimately overcame it to flourish in management-

“One of my challenges I first encountered in management was that prior to being a manager, I was the top performing employee. I was also highly respected by the employees, we would all bond during breaks; it was a hard working job but also fun because I liked those I worked with.

When I was promoted to Manager, I got a lot of congrats but I then at break, everyone seemed hesitant to talk about the work items we used to goof on each other about. I was no longer their “buddy” and as the Manager I needed to be in more places than just as a worker. There were times my team was falling behind and they knew my skill at the job would save them, and I did save them, and that turned into new problems.

As I was covering one area, other areas that needed me were neglected. I spoke to the General Manager about this and they gave me advice that was hard to take at first but later saw the wisdom in his words. “You are a Manager now Steve, you no longer do the work, now your job is to coach/manage others in doing that work. They will never be able to perform as you did if you don’t let them.”

So the next day when the rush period came and help was needed, I gave it to them, by helping to organize their area so they had what they needed, when they needed it, and in just the right amount. I shifted other resources around so they could help where others were falling behind. The team was stressed, they were calling for me to help and I brought them cold drinks and pointed out where they were doing really well.

I also collected customer feedback and then I immediately shared that with the employees. That made them so proud. I took pictures of them when it was chaotic too and then took pictures of the happy customers and put them all on the wall. The energy created was amazing.

It was true, I was no longer their buddy, nor their backup, instead I became their coach, The one that gave them feedback, the one that removed issues and barriers, I became their manager. I even welcomed the management jests every day too, it was all respectful but it was their way of saying, you’re doing okay boss.”

Getting Others to Work to Your Plan

Paul Naybour, Business Development Director, Parallel Project Training

Paul explains how sometimes people and project plans don’t go together.

“The biggest challenge I had when I started managing projects was getting anyone in the project head to work to the deadlines in the plan. Despite repeated reviews on the deadlines, and me talking about them all the time I found it really hard to get people to recognise the importance of hitting the dates.

This was even worse when working with cross functional teams, because they would take very little notice of my target dates. I found the best way of overcoming this problem was to carry a paper copy of the plan with me where ever I went until everyone got bored of me referring to it.

Interestingly I still have the same problem today when working with clients and other organisations. Only last week one of the people working in one of my clients hadn’t read the plan I sent him, and he is head of project scheduling.”

Prioritising

David Mount, Corporate Trainer and President, Core Training Solutions

David thinks it’s all about priorities:

“The single biggest area that I see new managers struggle with is how to prioritize their own new responsibilities, as well as the team, facility, and customers they now manage.

Most new managers have a tendency to put their own schedule and organization aside in favour of proving they can keep everyone else on their toes. This quickly leads to a feeling of overwhelm and stress to do it all by their own efforts instead of getting results through the efforts of others.

They fail to see that first defining their goals and top payoff activities, then organizing their time and work space, keeps them prepared to face each day with clear vision and purpose.”

Changing Your Own Mindset

Charles Crawford, President & General Manager, CBD Business Development

For Charles, it comes down to one word:

Adjustment.

“Becoming a manager and actually becoming a manager internally are two very different things. Changing the mindset and accepting the challenge is the tough part. The rest is learned through experience. Wins and losses. Correct decisions and total failures. Accepting the good with the bad, and still moving ahead with authority each and every day.

All the while treating your crew with authority and respect.”

Not Fully Understanding Your Responsibilities

From a source who’d like to remain anonymous:

“(A) major challenge (for me) was that the company didn’t fully explain my new responsibilities. I only learned after taking on the role that I had to do detailed financial reporting on the team’s activities, which was hugely time consuming… partially because I didn’t know how to do it/never got formal training.

If I had known what I was letting myself in for I would not have accepted the position.”

Not Being Ready

Credit Steven Cotterell

Sarah George, Crossland and Dudson Training

Sarah had a bad first experience in management -

“My first (and possibly last) management role left me with this advice for others. Do not allow yourself to be bullied into taking a role you know you are not yet ready for. It is a huge step up from a team leader role and without proper training and the support of your management team, it is a very lonely path to travel.

I was totally out of my depth, so much so I had no idea how I was going to meet my responsibilities. They say there are 4 stages of competency: Unconscious incompetence, Conscious incompetence, Conscious competence and Unconscious competence. I never made it out of the incompetence stages before I stood down.

I felt totally overwhelmed. I have learnt a bit since then and when I have finished my studies (currently Cert Ed., then hoping to move on to a Learning and Development degree) maybe, just maybe I’ll try again.

So advice for those considering a management role: get training, learn the tools and skills required to be an effective manager and together with a natural talent you will do better than me.”

Don’t let that put you off though. As Sarah says, training and development of skills is key and our Management Courses here at Silicon Beach are a great place to start and take a look at these tips for Managing your First Team too.

The post Biggest Challenges Faced by New Managers appeared first on Silicon Beach Training Blog.

Downloadable Link Removal Guide – When to Remove Links

Aaron Charlie — Tue, 07 May 2013 13:40:54 +0000

One of the most common reasons that small businesses attend our SEO Courses is that they’ve had a Google link penalty - manual or algorithm – which have become part and parcel of SEO since the Panda update first reared its head.

With the increase in penalties has come an increase in link removals, but it’s not always easy to know when to remove links, or even which links to remove. After all if you remove all your links then you’re not going to rank for anything at all!

We decided to clear up the confusion surrounding link removal by creating a downloadable guide to removing links. Simply work your way through the guide to decide if and when to remove bad links, and how to go about doing it.

Click the image below to download the full PDF:

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It’s important to remember that links are no longer the be all and end all of SEO anymore. Personalised results based on location, preferences and search history now mean that no searcher has the same results. This is even more true for mobile searches, which is why we’ve just launched our one-of-a-kind Mobile SEO course that focused specifically on the mobile side of search.

Have You Had a Manual Link Notification?

Check your Webmaster Tools account for unnatural link penalty notifications, which mean that Google have taken manual action against your site.

If you haven’t set up Webmaster Tools then it’s essential you do; use this guide to setting up Webmaster Tools and make sure you set up email alerts so you don’t miss important messages.

Do You Think Your Site Has Been Hit by Penguin or Panda?

If your search engine traffic has noticeably dropped but you haven’t had a manual notification, it is likely that you have fallen foul of an algorithm update.

Panguintool.com is a great tool for checking to see if you’ve been hit with an algorithm penalty. It overlays algorithm updates onto your Google Analytics traffic.

If drops in traffic line up with algorithm updates, it’s likely you’ve been hit. SEOmoz’s Mozcast is also useful for keeping an eye on any fluctuation as a result of algorithm updates or data refreshes.

Run a Link Audit to Find Bad Links

Once you’re certain that you’ve received a penalty, it’s time to find the bad links that caused it.

Majestic SEO, Open Site Explorer and AHrefs are all tools we recommend, but there are plenty of other options available.

For a step-by-step walkthrough of running a link audit, check out these Search Engine Land and Search Engine Watch posts.

Can You Remove the Links Yourself?

Many links can be manually removed – by deleting a comment or stopping participation in a link wheel.

As mentioned in the Link Removal Guide, this is where a database or record of forum and site passwords comes in handy. If you haven’t got a record of the password, your best bet is trying to reset it.

If you can’t do that, it’s time to get in contact with the webmaster.

Can You Contact the Webmaster?

Check the site for contact information. If there’s none there then try whois.domaintools.com which will tell you who the site is registered to, although often this information is set to private on the spammiest of blogs, or the host information is shown instead of the webmaster. Bear this in mind with your link removal requests as often the person you are emailing will have nothing to do with the link you want removed.

Be friendly in your email and remember that you/ your client/ a previous agency built the link in the first place.

We often see a heavy handed approach where the initial email includes a threat – ‘If you do not remove the link we will add your site to our Disavow Links report which will cause Google to penalise your site’. We don’t recommend this approach, it’s only going to get people’s backs up and they’re not going to want to cooperate with you.

Will They Remove the Links?

If you do manage to get in contact with the webmaster, they may agree to remove the links but for a price – sometimes as much as £500 per link!

If you’re willing to spend to get rid of the links then that’s up to you. This discussion in the Webmaster World forum, as mentioned by Barry Schwartz on his site, might convince you otherwise though.

Use the Disavow Tool

The disavow tool should really only be the last resort after exhausting all the options above. Ex-Google employees claim that Disavow Link requests are only checked alongside Reconsideration requests. These require proof that you have gone above and beyond to remove the links, so don’t bother just adding all your links to the tool without putting the hard work in.

Remember that disavowing links is no guarantee that the penalty will be removed, although this article on SEO Wizz sings its praises. Even if your penalty is lifted, if the spammy links were the ones that pushed you to page one then you have to start from scratch.

Take a look at Google and Bing’s guidelines for information on how to use the tool and this post, written when Google’s Disavow Tool was announced, for more general information about it.

Hopefully that’s helped you to better understand how and when to remove links.

If you’ve found this useful, please share it and let us know how you got on. What was the ‘worst’ link you found? What was the most money someone asked for to remove a link? Let us know in the comments.

The post Downloadable Link Removal Guide – When to Remove Links appeared first on Silicon Beach Training Blog.

The Best Google Glass Photos and Videos So Far

Jackson Rawlings — Fri, 03 May 2013 09:03:13 +0000

In the last few weeks, Google Glass has rolled out to a limited number of developers and beta testers known as ‘explorers’.

Because of this, we’ve begun to see more and more photos and videos emerge on social media giving us (non-explorers) some idea of what life through Glass is like.

Us non-explorers are still very much attached to our smartphones though and with a booming app market, coming on our Android App Development Training and learning how to make apps would be a smart move.

Much of the skills learnt will be transferable to Glass too!

With fascinating new apps mooted by the day and many wearers waxing lyrical over its epochal potential, but also pervading concerns over privacy, it’s clear (pun intended) that Glass is going to dominate tech news for quite a while.

We thought we’d take a look at some of the best snaps and videos captured through Glass so far, which we found by searching through the hashtag #throughglass on both Twitter and Google +: from free-running to shower-taking and plenty in between!

Dentist’s Glass

This is both a cool and a creepy shot at the same time. It immediately raises questions about legal and etiquette issues. Is it okay to record or take photos with Glass during medical procedures for example? (Clearly this dentist doesn’t mind).

What about interference with medical equipment? It’s a whole can of worms that will have to be answered as the explorers go on using Glass day to day.

Philip Glass Orchestra(?!)

Sorry about that title, best I could come up with. Okay so this sort of thing isn’t particularly new. Youtube is absolutely littered with videos like it. What is new is the perspective it’s been shot from.

What’s great about the video is it shows off both the sound and video recording quality of Glass, as well as giving some idea as to the sort of creative endeavours it could be used for.

Glass-ketball

This is one of my favourites, partly because this guy is pretty darn good at basketball, but mainly because this is exactly the sort of thing Glass was made for.

There’s no real precedent been set prior to this for in-game recording from a player’s perpective.

The potential for Glass integrated into sport is staggering (okay so it might not work so well in Boxing or Rugby!) and it wouldn’t surprise me if the big sports companies like ESPN and SkySports are already thinking about the possibilities of a ‘Glass-cam’ option in-game.

Driving Glasses

One of the more controversial issues that has arisen from Glass’ rollout is whether it’s safe to drive with. This is kind of a great photo in that sense because it shows that the police are clearly as yet non-plussed (or unaware) of Glass.

It’s certainly something that will have to be examined further and tested robustly; although if Google’s other headline technology (driverless cars) comes out any time soon, then it won’t be an issue! That could be the masterplan.

Driving Glasses II

Robert Scoble has kind of become the guru for all things Glass, posting up various activities done through Glass all over Google+ and other places. In fact he loves it so much, he’s taken it into the shower with him! (it was to prove that it’s waterproof, after going out in Glass in heavy rain had made him curious).

What’s great about this particular video though is that it answers some (not all) of the questions raised by photos like the previous one (no not the shower one, the one before that).

He seems to be driving with about as much care and caution as any ‘normal’ driver. It’s also interesting to hear him say that he thinks it would be less distracting than a dashboard or centre-console-mounted sat nav.

Segway into Glass

Robert Scoble again here, and there’s something almost poetic about this image.

The abandoned, misfiring Segway – the personal transport revolution that never was – snapped by Google Glass, a technology already being branded the Segway of the ‘smart-device’ world.

Only time will tell if Glass goes the way of the Segway, but this author’s going to put himself on the line and say it won’t. Okay, I hope it won’t. I really hope it won’t.

Move ‘yer Glass

Another Glass/Sport fusion here and we have a great video of a parcour-ist(?) in action #throughglass.

This video shows that Glass will be tough enough to endure a suitable amount of rough-housing and most importantly (and I think I can speak on behalf of everyone here), it doesn’t fall off your face when you jump over a wall.

Phew. That was definitely one of the biggest concerns we all had right?

A Clear Day on a Rollercoaster

Another really fun video, Glass gives us a great perspective of what it’s like to be on a rollercoaster. I mean, you could go on the rollercoaster yourself but where’s the fun in that?

No, watching a rollercoaster ride #throughglass is my preferred method of enjoying such an activity: only a slight hint of nausea, I can turn the sound down so I don’t have to deal with incessant screaming and if I get bored I can pause it come back to it later. What’s not to love about that?

If you want to get ready for Glass’ full rollout, coming on our Mobile Development Training will give you a good start – many of the coding practices for Mobile will transfer over to Glass!

The post The Best Google Glass Photos and Videos So Far appeared first on Silicon Beach Training Blog.