I remember plunking down $1, 500 + dollars USD to get the SLR camera body, a workable lens and an external flash.  Now what???

This modern computer had so many options it can make your mind spin for a bit.  I was left wondering what settings allow me to make extraordinary pictures like I see in the magazines?

All the professional will tell you to shoot in “M” mode.  What does that camera settings mean exactly?  I mean I HEAR what you are saying, USE “M” MODE.  I am not stupid but this is just not computing to me.

OK, so you decided to go brave and you give it a swirl in the “M” or some other mode but why all the pictures so blurry?  beside I see several options on the body, which are the best one(s) to use, when is the best time and why?

You CANNOT seem to get a clean picture when you leave the “Auto” mode…READ THE MANUAL BUT your manual sounds like greek…

THIS—-COURSE—–IS——4——-YOU

This is EXACTLY what this “walking tour” will explain to you, all the greek in english.  I (Stephen Choo Quan) will personally take you by the camera straps and show you.

• Aperture
• ISO
• Shutter Speed

but MORE IMPORTANTLY, not only UNDERSTAND them but to control the camera in a practical way to get the desired results.

You will learn how the experts use

• Exposure
• White Balance
• Composition
• Depth of Field

to do your story telling  for the most memorable photos

After we do the “walking Tour”,  you must go back and read the manual.  The manual will make perfect sense.  You will not be afraid of it any more but it will be your friend.

You will wonder why you never grasped it in the first place… funny how life is like that.  Most importantly is that you will have:

Peace of mind – no worries about what you are doing when you go out on a shoot, you will be asked by your peers maybe what should they do on their camera.

Attract positive attention to your galleries  - impress your friends and family, get invites to special event as a photographer

Capture the best moments – perhaps the best reason of all for having your camera is to share your best moments for eternity with the ones you love.

OK soon to be GREAT PHOTOGRAPHER, drawer of light, here is what you need to do:

1.) Click the “buy now” button below.
2.) This will take you to a PayPal payment page.
3.) Enter in your credit card details and press “PAY”
4.) PayPal will confirm your purchase for $99.00
5.) You will get an email from us with your personalized date and time for us to meet up.

6.) You start getting better…correction…OOMMGGGG SSOOOO much better….at taking pictures.

BY THE WAY…this course is closing THIS MONTH on the 19th….after that, kiss it goodbye Johnny.  So hurry and get it right now! today!

Do You Need Instant Banners That Look Phenomenal And Engage Customers To Click On It?

Then look no further… you’ve just found the company that does the most respected banner work as featured on the web in 2011.

And you should know it’s super fast to order, super simple
to get approved, and is backed by the best Caribbean website company around the World!

Dear Business Friend,

My name is Stephen Choo Quan and I am going to make you a promise…

I promise that I can deliver a banging, cutting edge banners from your print design that will blow your clients away and create interest in your product or service…

…

and I can do it within 3 business days!

I want you to imagine a design that is so fresh and modern that it instantly positions you as the cutting edge brand in your area of work

Now imagine that cutting edge banner being super easy to get. NO hassle of calling the designer 5 times a day to get his response in 2 weeks.

Now imagine this being a reality 3 business days from now!

Forget some lame, slow-poke web designer. Forget building your own amateur banners that does nothing for your business – or your reputation.

————

Thanks

Stephen Choo Quan

www.facebook.com/stephen.chooquan

—-

Here the Problem… See If You Agree…

It’s not practical to learn web design on your off time.

And good web designers are really so busy or the lousy ones just do not get it.

Why pay a complete stranger hundreds of dollars for a basic banner that has no frills, no cutting edge design, and does not engage your visitors?

And why throw away your hard-earned money on a webmaster that has no background in Caribbean Markets and no real desire to help your events or Caribbean business succeed?

Your banner is your sales person, your lead generator, your conversion tool, your automated follow up system and more. Why would you not put your best foot forward?

—-

Why Should You Listen To Me?

My fellow Caribbean business professional – I AM JUST LIKE YOU.

I’ve walked a mile in your shoes.

I know the bad dreams and sleepless night wondering if anyone will attend my event.  I know the struggle of having to explain what I’m looking for to a run-of-the-mill webmaster.  I know what it’s like to wait for days and even weeks while they make simple changes – and forget about larger edits… it took them FOREVER.

I also know what it’s like to try and build your own banners.  I know what it’s like get bogged down in clunky banner building programs and I know what it’s like spending days and days trying to make my banner look semi-decent.

I know what it’s like to have a banner that just sits there. It does not position you as an expert. It does not capture lead information. It does not allow visitors to purchase their own tickets. It does not build brand.

I know what it’s like.

But let’s discovered some banner samples below that will make your brand success.

I pray you enough sun to keep your attitude bright no matter how gray the day may appear.

I pray you enough rain to appreciate the sun even more.

I pray you enough happiness to keep your spirit alive and everlasting.

I pray you enough pain so that even the smallest of joys in life may appear bigger.

I pray you enough gain to satisfy your wanting.

I pray you enough loss to appreciate all that you possess.

I pray you enough hellos to get you through the final good-bye.

Dedicated in Loving Memory of Peter Choo Quan (29 April 1978 – 19 June 2011)

Competitive edge has many variables.  Two of the most powerful that drive edge are team work and speed.   Of course there are others like technology but of all factors these two seem to be consistent over the years where as the others tend to change with the era of operation.

Here are my sentiments on these two topics

Team Work.  I am a true believer that you can defeat a team if you can contain the top 3 players but how can you contain or defeat a team that has 12 outstanding players?  The odds of success become much higher.  The best companies have the best people and the second best companies have the second best and so on.  We need these people filters to work together for one common good. When this happens energy is released, synergy that carries everyone much further than anyone could go by themselves.

Speed.  There are three distinctive positions you can be in with regards to speed. You can be early, on-time or late.  In the case of internet broadcasting you can be future oriented, breaking news or just plain late.  Future oriented website tend to lead trends where as late websites tend to behave like story books.  Story books sites just are there like archives of what happened and it is good only from the perspective if it is task oriented and can tell someone how to repeat that task.  They are great for HOW TO DO sites but entertainment websites needs to be either trend setters or with the breaking news.

If you get these two executed with perfection then you must become a championship organization.

Stephen Choo Quan

In Loving Memory of Peter Choo Quan (29th  April 1978 – 19tth  June 2011)

Analytic Apps involve industry specific knowledge, this business acumen is translated to best practices then decomposed into information architecture and design guidelines that can be applied across multiple domains.  This type of long term thinking makes repeatable workflows for common analysis able to fly faster and more frequently.  Client are anxious to become more real time so they are not doing review mirror analysis and reacting later than they would like.  While dashboards does translate the business acumen into dazzling insightful visualizations it does not put an emphasis on being easily repeatable and scalable.  It does not model to speed and in some cases high volumes.  This is where competitive decision making can be done.  If we get the data 2 weeks ahead of you and can react in that time to the information then that can seem like an eternity to the competitor.  The competition will feel like they are behind the 8 ball.  This is seen today in “high speed trading” where  super computers are getting the information seconds ahead because of it proximity to the trading center.  This advantage can make the difference in millions of dollars.

A dashboard may not cover workflows in the same manner as Analytic apps because it might be limited to one subject matter domain.  It does not seem to stress on the data design principles in the long run.  I think it is natural as business matures to move from dashboards toward analytic applications.

There are 3 drivers pushing this movement

1. More frequent updates on the dashboards
2. More industry best practices in workflows
3. Users ability to morph workflow as the business dynamically changes

Consider the following in making a jump across the chasm.

1. Will the app fit the company needs?
2. Is there user acceptance, education and adoption?
3. Is the insight making the company more competitive?
4. How easy is it for custom development?
5. Is this strategy future proofed? does it lend to devices and mobile easily?
6. As the ERP (source) upgrades does the Analytic App stay lock step support wise?
7. Is there ROI?  cost: all things being equal, the final decision will be cost and support.

Stephen Choo Quan

Web 2.0 really became popular in 2008.  This is when Facebook was enjoying its heavy growth phase. This success was based on the features of web 2.0.  I would summarize this to be as follows

1. Create Content that is centric to a secured community
2. Create and invite initial members to this exclusive secure community
3. Let members rate content
4. Let members discuss content among community
5. Let members interact and meet new people and display their value, make new friends
6. Push the interaction to members of the community so everyone stays aware in real time about interactions

Notice that web 2.0 interaction and engagement has nothing to do with Business intelligence (BI).  BI which began its traction in 2000 from the roots of Decision Support Systems (DSS) of the 80′s, refers to computer-based techniques used in identifying, extracting and analyzing business data, such as sales revenue by products and/or departments, or by associated costs and incomes.  BI tends to highlight trends in business processes to see where things are doing well or is broken.  The insight derived by BI fits well to then flow that kind of detailed insight with the right level of access into secured web 2.0 communities where data can be shared and discussed and value derived.

Dash-boarding which has been the buzz word since Jack Welch spoke of it in his book “Straight from the gut”. He said that this was the future of business and in one sense he was right.  I would suggest that dash-boarding is the most specialized and highly tuned version of alerting that a mature business can have.  This alone is too rigid for a business to innovate and change especially when secondary questions arise based on the initial indicated sore spot.  Therefore this alone can only present a microcosm of BI and of the future.  This brings up the next phase of BI now termed Analytic Applications which encapsulates dashboards, reports and repeatable workflows.  Dash-boarding seems like a great fit for operational work.  The stages involve summarizing data, formatting then communicating the results to interested people.  The full value of BI can only be derived when we funnel the issues found into the people filter and openly discuss how to make things better.  In the end, People come first and technology runs a distance second.

Stephen Choo Quan

Mobility is really the mantra for 2011. Yes the wired web has transformed the world but ironically the un-wired web is really going to weave us together.  We no longer need to plan as much but we can coordinate on the fly.

How do I get to your location? When your car GPS fails to meet the details of a back road maps then we can use google maps and if that fails, we can get real time updates via phone with the client and also on time of arrival.  We get real time information on the actual location of your clients and not be wasting productive hours.

Why say it if you can show it. I was in a meeting and a line manager was complaining about an issue to her boss.  She the line- manager simply pulled out her mobile device and handed the client email over to her boss in the palm of her hand.  Paperless, Real time and Factual.  Watching this first hand is evidence of how mobile is transforming the way we work and our productivity.

The best camera you have is the camera you have on you. I love to take pictures but lugging about the 5 pounds of SLR camera and accessories is sometimes not feasible when you are trying to dress sleek.  Mobile cameras get the job done well especially when you do the trade off.

Shopping and doing reviews real time. I have seen many people doing product reviews now in the isles of stores.  Everyone needs the right information, at the right time in the right format.  This is how we make decisions, this is how we respond to our crises of getting a new vacuum cleaner.

We know what is really important to us by looking at the things we carry with us.  Keys, Wallet and Phone.  This last one is really the bat-man utility belt come to life.  Music, Games, Video, Information for decisions, Social Connecting with friends in text, email or internet applications like facebook.  Now when travel is at its best, it is all about being mobile.  As designers we need to create an open architecture so that all devices can plug into the Matrix and pull out value.

Stephen Choo Quan

According to a McKinsey report, “From 2004 to 2009, the Internet’s contribution to GDP in mature countries averaged about 20%.” That’s quite astonishing. Really. We really are talking about the engine of the future.

GDP of countries has historically averaged about 2.5-3% per year.  Since the 1900 it has really began to ramp up and now in the information age 20% increase is insane.  The only way to really appreciate this is to look back over time to see man’s journey from at one time almost becoming extinct to commerce to these now these massive GDP jumps.

It is about ability to share information and transcend distance and geography.  We create value for that culture, for that society, for that location as we share in websites.  Let’s be clear that technology enables this movement but it not the movement itself.  You’ve installed SharePoint. Big deal. You haven’t created any value. In fact, you might end up destroying value. You’ve bought Google search. Big deal. You’ve achieved nothing. You’re now on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.  So what? No value creation. Zilch. Nada. Nothing.

Don’t measure the technology. Don’t measure the content.  Whopie you add 5 pages of content per week.  Measure the use. Measure the output not the input.  That’s where the true value of any website lies.

If you are a small business owner then does it make sense to have “yourcompany@gmail.com” or to have “yourname@yourcompany.com”.  I mean this sounds like a no brainier for the cost of a lunch but I would not understand why someone would not consider doing this.  If this is an issue because you do not know how to get it done or you are not computer savvy then please contact Stephen at 302 312 4611.  There is something to be said for the old adage that “perception is reality”.

Well once you get past the inertia of getting things done right then we can show you how to go about selecting the name that reflects your style.  it is a known fact that the length of your name should range around 11 characters to be easy to remember.  DesignandExecute is 16 characters but still easy to remember. Call Stephen to discuss how you can have your professional email account and enhanced image NOW.

Stephen Choo Quan

The reason we spend money on Advertising is to not only make awareness for our product or service but more importantly to get customers to buy. Here is the dirty secret about event promotions. Customers attend events that they either know or that their friends are going to.

Let’s look at the case of “The customer knows about your event”. This can only be if you had done 1 of 2 things or both.

1. You had the event last year and others documented and remember the event.
2. You marketed so far in advance so now the event seems familiar to the client, like it was always there.

In the first case you need to be remarkable and memorable in your execution. You also need to get it documented for others to see. Did you take photos? Did you have it blogged about?

In the second case, it is not about putting your event all over the most popular websites. By the way, websites are great because it saves you time and energy getting the word out about your event. You do not need to stand outside parties at 3AM to hand someone your flier and watch them throw it carelessly on the floor. This might hurt you for all your effort is on the floor but worst yet you can be fined for littering in NYC. Most promoters then seek to splash websites in the last weeks of the event hoping that if they scream more and it is super visible then more people will attend the event. See the article ” why time is better than placement”.

I would like to share some humble thoughts on the matter. See point number 2 above. This strategy does not accomplish this task. It is far better to start 6 months in advance and progressively deliver more and more details about the upcoming event. The key here is anticipation. That is the hallmark of a good experience. So if you want to market, you can do it well with the web or really well using progressive web campaigns.

Stephen Choo Quan