You'll find data for places you never knew existed around the world. Check out the Spratly Islands. Might be a nice place to visit.
Enjoy the data!
Thursday, December 24, 2009
New Place Found for Free GIS Data
You'll find data for places you never knew existed around the world. Check out the Spratly Islands. Might be a nice place to visit.
Enjoy the data!
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
North County Times
We are FindItByMe.com, a start-up Community Directory founded in Fallbrook, CA. We are looking for Area Specialists who know their community and would like to help their community and themselves at the same time. We are offering 50% commission on our starter plan for small businesses to the right Area Specialists. Visit the site www.finditbyme.com to get full details by clicking on the "Area Specialists Needed!" button. We have listings for all of California and Alaska so if you live in these two states we can get you started even if you are not in Southern California. More states will be online soon, visit the site often to get the latest news. Welcome aboard!!!
John Graffio, CEO
John Graffio, CEO
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Press Release
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
FindItByMe.com, Inc. is pleased to announce the availability of its beta version Community Access Directory at www.finditbyme.com. As the company’s founder I would like to point out that this is not just a local search engine; we refer to it as a “Community Access Platform”. It will offer a whole family of technologies whose entire purpose is to help businesses, especially small businesses, reach new customers and communicate more effectively with their existing clients.
FindItbyMe.com is a high-technology company started in the small agricultural community of Fallbrook in north San Diego County, California. Our mission is to help stimulate the local economy in every community so that your neighbors can make a more informed decision on where to spend their money – preferably in your local community. While we may not possess the vast resources of other search firms, we also don’t have their overhead and that allows us to offer a unique service at an unheard of price.
Other “local” search engines expect the small business owner to spend all their free time updating their “listings” on dozens of sites, author blogs, go on Twitter and so forth. We can’t see how asking a small business owner to spend more and more time away from their business will help them grow. We do see that taking this burden off the small business owner is a great help and a great relief. We are currently bringing San Diego, Riverside and Imperial counties online. Those who would like to get involved can check the site for details.
Feel free to contact me at 760-801-8518 or by email at John.Graffio@FindItByMe.com.
John Graffio, CEO
FindItByMe.com, Inc.
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
Letter and Offer to Chambers of Commerce
FindItByMe.com, Inc. is pleased to announce the availability of its Local Search Platform www.finditbyme.com. As the company’s founder I would like to point out that this is not just a local search engine; we refer to it as a “Community Access Platform”. It will offer a whole family of technologies whose entire purpose is to help businesses, especially small businesses, reach new customers and communicate more effectively with their existing clients.
FindItbyMe.com is a high-technology company started in the small agricultural community of Fallbrook in north San Diego County, California. Our mission is to help stimulate the local economy in every community so that your neighbors can make a more informed decision on where to spend their money – preferably in your local community. While we may not possess the vast resources of other search firms, we also don’t have their overhead and that allows us to offer a unique service at an unheard of price.
Other “local” search engines expect the small business owner to spend all their free time updating their “listings” on dozens of sites, author blogs, go on Twitter and so forth. We can’t see how asking a small business owner to spend more and more time away from their business will help them grow. We do see that helping the local business community take advantage of technology will help.
We are eager to work with the Chamber to leverage our technology in a way that benefits the Chamber’s and community’s needs. Beyond the site itself, we are currently working on web site controls that allow our search technology to be “embedded” in a Chamber’s existing web site. These controls would help drive traffic to your site. We are also doing live map integration and will soon offer this on all listings for consumers to get driving directions to and from local businesses. We offer our search technology and service at no charge to any Chamber of Commerce that requests it.
While our website demonstrates one way of viewing the listings, our OTHER technology is at work in the background syndicating a business’s profile all over the Internet. Our system carries more than just name, address and phone number. That why the whole process needs accurate and complete listings to get started. We would like to propose a strategy and an opportunity to your Chamber that is a win-win situation for you and the local business community:
1. Employ the Chamber’s existing resources to notify local businesses of our special offer of $19.95 per YEAR for our “Bronze” plan to existing Chamber members.
2. FindItByMe.com will split the sign-up fee 50-50 with the Chamber. Participation takes place only THROUGH the Chamber; businesses that sign up through the Chamber would bear the Chamber’s logo on their listing and would appear first in search results for their categories (and other searches) before non-members (both on our site and on our search controls you may deploy on your own website).
3. When non-chamber members want to sign up for our services in your area, they must submit their information to you and make their payments to you. It benefits us greatly having you as a single point of contact for everything in that we can keep our overhead low and our service levels high.
We’re here to help. Why not take advantage of us?
John Graffio, CEO
FindItbyMe.com is a high-technology company started in the small agricultural community of Fallbrook in north San Diego County, California. Our mission is to help stimulate the local economy in every community so that your neighbors can make a more informed decision on where to spend their money – preferably in your local community. While we may not possess the vast resources of other search firms, we also don’t have their overhead and that allows us to offer a unique service at an unheard of price.
Other “local” search engines expect the small business owner to spend all their free time updating their “listings” on dozens of sites, author blogs, go on Twitter and so forth. We can’t see how asking a small business owner to spend more and more time away from their business will help them grow. We do see that helping the local business community take advantage of technology will help.
We are eager to work with the Chamber to leverage our technology in a way that benefits the Chamber’s and community’s needs. Beyond the site itself, we are currently working on web site controls that allow our search technology to be “embedded” in a Chamber’s existing web site. These controls would help drive traffic to your site. We are also doing live map integration and will soon offer this on all listings for consumers to get driving directions to and from local businesses. We offer our search technology and service at no charge to any Chamber of Commerce that requests it.
While our website demonstrates one way of viewing the listings, our OTHER technology is at work in the background syndicating a business’s profile all over the Internet. Our system carries more than just name, address and phone number. That why the whole process needs accurate and complete listings to get started. We would like to propose a strategy and an opportunity to your Chamber that is a win-win situation for you and the local business community:
1. Employ the Chamber’s existing resources to notify local businesses of our special offer of $19.95 per YEAR for our “Bronze” plan to existing Chamber members.
2. FindItByMe.com will split the sign-up fee 50-50 with the Chamber. Participation takes place only THROUGH the Chamber; businesses that sign up through the Chamber would bear the Chamber’s logo on their listing and would appear first in search results for their categories (and other searches) before non-members (both on our site and on our search controls you may deploy on your own website).
3. When non-chamber members want to sign up for our services in your area, they must submit their information to you and make their payments to you. It benefits us greatly having you as a single point of contact for everything in that we can keep our overhead low and our service levels high.
We’re here to help. Why not take advantage of us?
John Graffio, CEO
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
Picking up where...
I left off. The site is taking its final form. I'm liking the context based location search look and feel. Now to fix the categories and fill in the functionality for all the buttons that are unhooked. The points of interest will be no problem, but the rest of it will take longer. But I'm happy with it now.
Until tomorrow...
Until tomorrow...
Friday, August 14, 2009
Page View Flea Markets
Search Engines 101 Series, Class #1
As I was going through my list of all the "local" search engines that have been cranked out and are still running, I finally realized something that was hiding in plain sight: all the blind alleys I always have to click my way out of when I use the "local" search feature and any search feature in general.
Click my way out of?
If ANY search engine actually could deliver significant results in one or two clicks, there would be nothing to sell on the Internet. The more page views I can deliver, the more money I can make renting out my page-real-estate. So page views are really flea market stalls that I rent out for as much as I can. If I can deliver an answer to a search in the least number of clicks, I can't rent out my stalls or demand big rent from the flea market vendors. The more I lead a user on through a maze of clicks, they are forced to look at the vendors renting space in my page view flea market.
The beauty of this scheme is that everyone uses it (almost everyone) and nobody notices how dirty their browser windows have become. Someone emailed Yahoo and asked why their local search results had so much outdated information. He indicated that he was stonewalled and got no answer to this question. The reason is simple: accurate data = less clicks = less page views = less money.
Remember this when you do searches of any kind from now on. Count the number of sponsored links and other flea market vendors cluttering up your search result pages. Then you'll realize the Internet is not free, you are paying for it by agreeing to be bombarded with virtual flea markets.
Is there anything wrong with this? No...as long as you know how the deck is stacked. As long as I'm paying to display pages, I should be able to rent them out if I see fit. But you shouldn't be misled into thinking someone has data that is useful to you when in fact it is not. That is what the "local search" sites without exception attempt to trick you into believing.
Next class: comment bombs defused
As I was going through my list of all the "local" search engines that have been cranked out and are still running, I finally realized something that was hiding in plain sight: all the blind alleys I always have to click my way out of when I use the "local" search feature and any search feature in general.
Click my way out of?
If ANY search engine actually could deliver significant results in one or two clicks, there would be nothing to sell on the Internet. The more page views I can deliver, the more money I can make renting out my page-real-estate. So page views are really flea market stalls that I rent out for as much as I can. If I can deliver an answer to a search in the least number of clicks, I can't rent out my stalls or demand big rent from the flea market vendors. The more I lead a user on through a maze of clicks, they are forced to look at the vendors renting space in my page view flea market.
The beauty of this scheme is that everyone uses it (almost everyone) and nobody notices how dirty their browser windows have become. Someone emailed Yahoo and asked why their local search results had so much outdated information. He indicated that he was stonewalled and got no answer to this question. The reason is simple: accurate data = less clicks = less page views = less money.
Remember this when you do searches of any kind from now on. Count the number of sponsored links and other flea market vendors cluttering up your search result pages. Then you'll realize the Internet is not free, you are paying for it by agreeing to be bombarded with virtual flea markets.
Is there anything wrong with this? No...as long as you know how the deck is stacked. As long as I'm paying to display pages, I should be able to rent them out if I see fit. But you shouldn't be misled into thinking someone has data that is useful to you when in fact it is not. That is what the "local search" sites without exception attempt to trick you into believing.
Next class: comment bombs defused
Friday, July 10, 2009
The Search Economy and the Tower of Babel by John C. Dvorak
The Search Economy and the Tower of Babel
Shared via AddThis
My comments on the article:
The Internet is a sea of digital dog-doo with a few islands of reasonably authoritative content. That will be where most people crowd onto, those islands of reliable information. If I were Google/Microsoft/Yahoo/etc, I would be developing algorithms to determine the characteristics of an authoritative site. There would be protections in the form of site audits that check to make sure spam and junk don't leak in.
Authoritative information has a lot of value attached to it, so maybe the content is not just sitting in indexable web pages but stored in a server. That is where RDF (Resource Description Framework) abstracts would be very useful, providing search engines enough information to index with some affiliated rich content that RDF provides for. If you wanted the full rundown, then you could click through and the site would generate the full content.
I don't see any other alternative. I might still want to do a free-flung search for fun, but if I want definitive data, I want to have a check-box that says "Authoritative Search?" that only searches "authoritative" sites per their definition.
"Let the Searcher Beware" is always the first rule of thumb. But I should have a choice of where I want to search if I want to have confidence in the results.
Shared via AddThis
My comments on the article:
The Internet is a sea of digital dog-doo with a few islands of reasonably authoritative content. That will be where most people crowd onto, those islands of reliable information. If I were Google/Microsoft/Yahoo/etc, I would be developing algorithms to determine the characteristics of an authoritative site. There would be protections in the form of site audits that check to make sure spam and junk don't leak in.
Authoritative information has a lot of value attached to it, so maybe the content is not just sitting in indexable web pages but stored in a server. That is where RDF (Resource Description Framework) abstracts would be very useful, providing search engines enough information to index with some affiliated rich content that RDF provides for. If you wanted the full rundown, then you could click through and the site would generate the full content.
I don't see any other alternative. I might still want to do a free-flung search for fun, but if I want definitive data, I want to have a check-box that says "Authoritative Search?" that only searches "authoritative" sites per their definition.
"Let the Searcher Beware" is always the first rule of thumb. But I should have a choice of where I want to search if I want to have confidence in the results.
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
Friday, May 1, 2009
Servers on the Move
Yes...it always happens, even to the most innocent of us. Our web sites finally grow to the point where the kitchen table is no longer the best platform to operate a regional community resource.
So for the next 24 hours or so, FindItByMe.com will be in transit to new facilities that are hosted by the wonderful folks at Time Warner Cable San Diego.
We now have over 12,570 active listings that cover four communities in North San Diego County: Fallbrook, Bonsall, Vista and Temecula. In the next few weeks we'll be integrating listings we have for the balance of San Diego County and cities into our active database, which will give us around 119,000 active listings.
As I have indicated before, the difference between FindItByMe.com's efforts and everyone else's is that our goal is to make our listings 100% authoritative. Yes that means hand verification of all listings by a real person. Yes it is a lot of work. Yes it is worth it. We don't publish millions of pages of inaccurate data so our indexing and link stats look impressive. Statistics for our site will NEVER look impressive to machine generated analytics.
So with that in mind I am proud to announce that our roving photographer Randy Hetrick has almost completely photographed everything in the greater Fallbrook/Bonsall area. He's clicked off over 1,500 pictures to bring our total photographic coverage to over 6,700 images. While he was clicking pictures he was also recording the exact latitude and longitude of each picture, so we now have recorded the EXACT latitude/longitude of each correlated listing in our system. When we introduce our mapping and routing application in the coming quarter, we will route you exactly to the listing's location, not to the middle of an empty lot. We will introduce some other really INCREDIBLE features at the same time, but you'll have to wait to see because they are so groundbreaking we have to keep them top secret right now.
There are new people working with us on new aspects of our business that are themselves so groundbreaking that again I cannot reveal everything right now. All our lines of business and technology are for one purpose only: to connect the public with the things around them they need.
Stay tuned and you'll be glad you did.
Technorati Profile
So for the next 24 hours or so, FindItByMe.com will be in transit to new facilities that are hosted by the wonderful folks at Time Warner Cable San Diego.
We now have over 12,570 active listings that cover four communities in North San Diego County: Fallbrook, Bonsall, Vista and Temecula. In the next few weeks we'll be integrating listings we have for the balance of San Diego County and cities into our active database, which will give us around 119,000 active listings.
As I have indicated before, the difference between FindItByMe.com's efforts and everyone else's is that our goal is to make our listings 100% authoritative. Yes that means hand verification of all listings by a real person. Yes it is a lot of work. Yes it is worth it. We don't publish millions of pages of inaccurate data so our indexing and link stats look impressive. Statistics for our site will NEVER look impressive to machine generated analytics.
So with that in mind I am proud to announce that our roving photographer Randy Hetrick has almost completely photographed everything in the greater Fallbrook/Bonsall area. He's clicked off over 1,500 pictures to bring our total photographic coverage to over 6,700 images. While he was clicking pictures he was also recording the exact latitude and longitude of each picture, so we now have recorded the EXACT latitude/longitude of each correlated listing in our system. When we introduce our mapping and routing application in the coming quarter, we will route you exactly to the listing's location, not to the middle of an empty lot. We will introduce some other really INCREDIBLE features at the same time, but you'll have to wait to see because they are so groundbreaking we have to keep them top secret right now.
There are new people working with us on new aspects of our business that are themselves so groundbreaking that again I cannot reveal everything right now. All our lines of business and technology are for one purpose only: to connect the public with the things around them they need.
Stay tuned and you'll be glad you did.
Technorati Profile
Thursday, April 16, 2009
Local Search 100 (101 is for next time)...
This article concerns what I have observed about local search engines which now number in the low fifties. As I mentioned in my last blog, it's not local search if it's not authoritative. There are three reasons why no one (except FindItByMe.com) is very happy to carry unverified data:
- Web statistics = sales potential for web-only advertisers.
- Non-paying business owners have no leverage against social networkers who can torpedo and sand bag at will for which the business owner has no recourse (except in a limited way by Yelp).
- The public has grown accustomed to putting up with outdated, inaccurate and unreliable data.
Web statistics are the great lever against which a local search engine can exercise price points for advertisers looking for a lot of page views. The more page views, the more money the Typical Local Search Engine gets. There is no real business reason to ever clean up your data. You can act concerned and put a "Claim This Listing" button next to each business you display, but this is meaningless in practice. The more page views you can mislead someone into viewing in their vain attempt to find what they were looking for, the better it is for you and the web-only advertisers.
The social networking craze has made it even better for the Typical Local Search Engine by allowing reviews and ratings to be applied to any and all local businesses. Now the humble searcher of local establishments is treated to a shouting contest between a businesses' supporters and detractors. Even if a business could "Claim This Listing" and post replies to refute the negative comments, the comments are picked up by search engines and are part of the record forever. In any case, social networking means more page views which means more advertising banners and links for web-only/non-local advertisers.
The public's acceptance of inaccurate and misleading information is the biggest tragedy. It allows the Typical Local Search Engine to continue on their path of page views = $$$ with no regard to real local search whatsoever.
A business owner always has a large personal, financial and physical investment in the success of their business. Bad comments and negative press are sometimes warranted, but only if a sincere effort has been made to bring the matter to the attention of the business owner and there is no recourse left. I lay the blame squarely at the foot of the "free" search engine which uses unverified data to drive traffic to their sites and then sell ad space based on the statistics.
Business owners should not be tempted to find all these various search engines and submit their current information. It only helps drive business to other advertisers and allows you to be a target for malicious social networkers. Regrettably, the folks who post good comments can never override the effects of the negative ones.
In my next blog, I'll demonstrate clearly how to avoid this trap and be properly represented.
Sunday, April 5, 2009
It's Not Local Search if It's Not Authoritative
I just found another local search engine that says it has 13 million listings for the US. In fact, you can buy a list for a state for a flat fee. I was tempted, but then I tried to see how the good the data is. I did a search for "avocado" for Fallbrook, CA and it came back with no results found. I also tried some business names which I know to exist, but nothing found. I did some category searches for restaurants, and two of them have been out of business for over two years. Another replay of roll-your-own search.
What I don't get about all these people is how they expect a local business person who has never heard of them to log into their web site and then authenticate their listing. That might work for a business that does exist and the owner just "happens" to find every possible search engine in existence that would allow them to log in and correct their information. But what if a business moves or ceases operation? Do you think the owner of the now defunct operation will go to all the trouble to update every single search entity with the fact that he no longer exists? This expectation is silly at best and tragic at worst.
There is still only one way for this to work, and that there has to be people on the ground in each locale that is responsible for keeping the database accurate. I really can't understand how it can be any other way. You can dress up functionality on the site any way you want, but without authoritative data, it really is useless. And that goes not only for listing data, but GIS data as well. Not keeping up with street re-alignments and other surface changes is absolutely essential to a well-kept search engine. If anybody in search land disagrees with me, please give me a convincing argument for not having accurate data. I'm really anxious to hear it.
What I don't get about all these people is how they expect a local business person who has never heard of them to log into their web site and then authenticate their listing. That might work for a business that does exist and the owner just "happens" to find every possible search engine in existence that would allow them to log in and correct their information. But what if a business moves or ceases operation? Do you think the owner of the now defunct operation will go to all the trouble to update every single search entity with the fact that he no longer exists? This expectation is silly at best and tragic at worst.
There is still only one way for this to work, and that there has to be people on the ground in each locale that is responsible for keeping the database accurate. I really can't understand how it can be any other way. You can dress up functionality on the site any way you want, but without authoritative data, it really is useless. And that goes not only for listing data, but GIS data as well. Not keeping up with street re-alignments and other surface changes is absolutely essential to a well-kept search engine. If anybody in search land disagrees with me, please give me a convincing argument for not having accurate data. I'm really anxious to hear it.
Thursday, March 26, 2009
Beast Almost Slain
Yikes!
Category search is almost done, folks. I'm engineering in some pretty cool stuff, like "abc" and "def". I'll explain later when it works. But it will be like the system will give you choices if you enter an ambiguous term. It will also split street searches into logical segments like East/West/North/South. And maybe soon I'll throw in landmarks. You'll see!
FindItByMe.com's web hits are up 5,000 this week alone. So let the good times roll. And this is still on the old web site. So wait until the new release is done. Enough for now, this is just a quick update.
Category search is almost done, folks. I'm engineering in some pretty cool stuff, like "abc" and "def". I'll explain later when it works. But it will be like the system will give you choices if you enter an ambiguous term. It will also split street searches into logical segments like East/West/North/South. And maybe soon I'll throw in landmarks. You'll see!
FindItByMe.com's web hits are up 5,000 this week alone. So let the good times roll. And this is still on the old web site. So wait until the new release is done. Enough for now, this is just a quick update.
Monday, March 23, 2009
My God! It's full of stars!
We have a year to go before Jupiter turns into a star. But before that, I can promise you that maybe even this week, the new and improved FindItByMe.com will debut. It will have easy and fun category drill-down, and much more to follow. If you would like to be the first to know about it, watch the site, join my email list John (dot) Graffio (at) FindItByMe (dot) com, or just watch the blog.
Soon!
Soon!
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
Rooster Time
Ok, I just had to let everyone know about my web site showcase that is being referenced all over the place. First of all, there is the actual case study on the GIZMOX web site and you can read it here: FindItByMe Article.
Next, here is an article published by Marissa Levy of www.sys-con.com. Thanks Marissa!!! And here is an article on weblogs.asp.net. Not to be outdone, here is an article on www.ajaxeconomy.com.
The folks at GIZMOX will be submitting my case study to IT World. So when that happens the rooster will come back out.
The next major release is still in the works, and it will be even easier to use and feature the ability to do more granular local searches. New press release when that is out. Thanks to all the people all over the world who have visited the site.
Next, here is an article published by Marissa Levy of www.sys-con.com. Thanks Marissa!!! And here is an article on weblogs.asp.net. Not to be outdone, here is an article on www.ajaxeconomy.com.
The folks at GIZMOX will be submitting my case study to IT World. So when that happens the rooster will come back out.
The next major release is still in the works, and it will be even easier to use and feature the ability to do more granular local searches. New press release when that is out. Thanks to all the people all over the world who have visited the site.
Encyclopedia Blogtannica
Remember the old days when the Encyclopedia Britannica was the authority on everything, and every family had a set of these important books? No? Ok, I'll take you back down memory lane. It used to be that during the golden age of door-to-door salesmen, the Encyclopedia Britannica was guaranteed to get a sale in almost every home he visited. Parents wanted their kids to have access to the most authoritative source of information available. This was really key when doing homework assignments and they were fun for general reading also.
Now for the new days of the Wikipedia and the World Wide Web in general. I give credit to the Wikipedia in terms of concept, if not for the drawbacks of the implementation. Anyway, the crux of the matter is that all the web sites that all the Big Searchers do such a good job of indexing is nothing more than a giant bulletin board of unverified information. The "machines" don't know a fact from an opinion. In fact, I can create a web site that appears to offer authoritative information, but could in fact be completely bogus.
So here is what we are reduced to in the World Wide Web Space: finding people who are as confused or as eccentric as we are. Yes, it all just becomes a social interaction club. I know in the hiearchy of knowledge that the World Wide Web will never equal the authoritative content of the old encyclopedia products. I know that when I do a search for something, I have to apply my "junk content" filter to everything that comes up. I know that what comes up first is the result of SEO scamming. I have to apply inverse-SEO logic go my queries so I can find something that is exactly what I want.
Is there an easy way out? No. When you listen to the news, you know you are being talked to by a producer who is crass, sensationalistic, panders to sexual urges and whose interest in the context of an event and other sides to the issue comes in dead last in its presentation. Remember when you used to think Walter Cronkite was authoritative? Now I have a ditsy little 23 year old college graduate whose vocabulary tops 1,000 words with great makeup and incredible cleavage explaining complex world issues to me in three sentences.
So it is natural to turn to the web because you free from a news broadcast that forces you to watch twenty-seven minutes of commercials to see ten minutes worth of news which you have to wait until the very end of the broadcast to see. I refuse to let these idiots waste my time. So when I go to the web, I expect to get more content. I do. But I also found that most news outlets filter the news in such a way that I know for sure politics is the main influence. So now that I know I'm being scammed here too, I end up looking at opinions in people's blogs, because a blog is a personal sharing (usually). And someone sharing a personal opinion is already not claiming to be authoritative, but as a word-of-mouth source, we give them great weight. So that is why blogs are the number one source of information on the Internet today.
Those who we consider methodical and put forward well reasoned arguments become authoritative in our minds. And in each case, we follow those blogs which provide us with the information we value or which entertain us. So I conclude the following, that the Encyclopedia Britannica has been supplanted by the Encyclopedia Blogtannica. Are we better off now than we were before? I don't know...I'll let you know when we get there.
Now for the new days of the Wikipedia and the World Wide Web in general. I give credit to the Wikipedia in terms of concept, if not for the drawbacks of the implementation. Anyway, the crux of the matter is that all the web sites that all the Big Searchers do such a good job of indexing is nothing more than a giant bulletin board of unverified information. The "machines" don't know a fact from an opinion. In fact, I can create a web site that appears to offer authoritative information, but could in fact be completely bogus.
So here is what we are reduced to in the World Wide Web Space: finding people who are as confused or as eccentric as we are. Yes, it all just becomes a social interaction club. I know in the hiearchy of knowledge that the World Wide Web will never equal the authoritative content of the old encyclopedia products. I know that when I do a search for something, I have to apply my "junk content" filter to everything that comes up. I know that what comes up first is the result of SEO scamming. I have to apply inverse-SEO logic go my queries so I can find something that is exactly what I want.
Is there an easy way out? No. When you listen to the news, you know you are being talked to by a producer who is crass, sensationalistic, panders to sexual urges and whose interest in the context of an event and other sides to the issue comes in dead last in its presentation. Remember when you used to think Walter Cronkite was authoritative? Now I have a ditsy little 23 year old college graduate whose vocabulary tops 1,000 words with great makeup and incredible cleavage explaining complex world issues to me in three sentences.
So it is natural to turn to the web because you free from a news broadcast that forces you to watch twenty-seven minutes of commercials to see ten minutes worth of news which you have to wait until the very end of the broadcast to see. I refuse to let these idiots waste my time. So when I go to the web, I expect to get more content. I do. But I also found that most news outlets filter the news in such a way that I know for sure politics is the main influence. So now that I know I'm being scammed here too, I end up looking at opinions in people's blogs, because a blog is a personal sharing (usually). And someone sharing a personal opinion is already not claiming to be authoritative, but as a word-of-mouth source, we give them great weight. So that is why blogs are the number one source of information on the Internet today.
Those who we consider methodical and put forward well reasoned arguments become authoritative in our minds. And in each case, we follow those blogs which provide us with the information we value or which entertain us. So I conclude the following, that the Encyclopedia Britannica has been supplanted by the Encyclopedia Blogtannica. Are we better off now than we were before? I don't know...I'll let you know when we get there.
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Highway Hypnosis on your Monitor
I've received a lot of good advice on how to make my search engine simple and easy to use. In fact, in a few short days you will see for yourself. But before you see that, I want you to think about something involving searching for things.
If you use Google (and you know you do), you know the routine you follow. Here is what I do:
First, I try to phrase my request so I don't get too many sponsored links.
Second, I have one finger on the control key (IE User) so my results always appear in a new tab on the browser. I just love when I go to a site that won't let me go back to where I was. That should be a hanging offense.
Third, I look at the "Did you mean...." message which tells me the search engine doesn't believe what I asked was valid.
Fourth, I never click on "I feel lucky".
Fifth, I repeat this process many times starting at step one because I have to trick the search engine into returning meaningful results instead of what a whole bunch of SEO activists have pickled the search engine into returning.
So what is the upshot of this flowchart? The seemingly "simple" interface of Google hides the exercises you have to go through in order to get good results. This never happens on the first try. And it is not Google's fault. They all do it. Until every web site is marked up with a valid, authoritative ontology (look that up on Google), we will never escape the search trickster merry-go-round.
I think the only way around this problem is to have a search engine which cannot be scammed, slammed or flammed into returning ten pages of the same web site for any related term you type in. I've been dreaming of this since I thought up FindItByMe.com. Local search is not local search unless everything in an area is listed. And you can't rely on the businesses in that area to all self-report their correct information. Someone has to do it.
There simply is no way around this. Any commercial directory will always be 30% wrong on average, according to each informal test I've run. So now the search engine providers have done their duty: you still use their services, but you don't take the results too seriously at the same time. It's a good thing we don't pick surgeons that way.
I challenge anyone to really count the number of times they have to refine searches and filter out nonesense results. I really want to get you to where you want to go or find what you want to find in as few steps as possible. So let me know if you agree that search should be more meaningful to what you asked for. I'm really curious what you think.
If you use Google (and you know you do), you know the routine you follow. Here is what I do:
First, I try to phrase my request so I don't get too many sponsored links.
Second, I have one finger on the control key (IE User) so my results always appear in a new tab on the browser. I just love when I go to a site that won't let me go back to where I was. That should be a hanging offense.
Third, I look at the "Did you mean...." message which tells me the search engine doesn't believe what I asked was valid.
Fourth, I never click on "I feel lucky".
Fifth, I repeat this process many times starting at step one because I have to trick the search engine into returning meaningful results instead of what a whole bunch of SEO activists have pickled the search engine into returning.
So what is the upshot of this flowchart? The seemingly "simple" interface of Google hides the exercises you have to go through in order to get good results. This never happens on the first try. And it is not Google's fault. They all do it. Until every web site is marked up with a valid, authoritative ontology (look that up on Google), we will never escape the search trickster merry-go-round.
I think the only way around this problem is to have a search engine which cannot be scammed, slammed or flammed into returning ten pages of the same web site for any related term you type in. I've been dreaming of this since I thought up FindItByMe.com. Local search is not local search unless everything in an area is listed. And you can't rely on the businesses in that area to all self-report their correct information. Someone has to do it.
There simply is no way around this. Any commercial directory will always be 30% wrong on average, according to each informal test I've run. So now the search engine providers have done their duty: you still use their services, but you don't take the results too seriously at the same time. It's a good thing we don't pick surgeons that way.
I challenge anyone to really count the number of times they have to refine searches and filter out nonesense results. I really want to get you to where you want to go or find what you want to find in as few steps as possible. So let me know if you agree that search should be more meaningful to what you asked for. I'm really curious what you think.
Sunday, March 8, 2009
Press Release: FindItByMe.com Connects Collector with Artist
It can now be reported that due to FindItByMe.com's increasing reach as a search engine, local Fallbrook, CA artist Drew Keys of Eagle Eye Fabrication has been commissioned by an anonymous collector to create a sculpture in metal entitled "The Blessed Hand of Unity". The sculpture can be described as a pair of hands, partially cupped but pointed skyward in such a way as to create a feeling of being protected and yet also unified with the Divine.
The collector, who declined to make his identity known at this time, was impressed with Drew's expertise as depicted in his listing on our web site. The project will commence in a few weeks but will formally begin with a multi-denominational ceremony. At this ceremony, representatives of all the major faiths will be invited to bless the stainless steel and other raw materials that will go into the eight foot tall sculpture. Further details will be available here in this blog and also on Eagle Eye Fabrication's listing on FindItByMe.com's listing for them, which can be reached by following this link: www.FindItbyMe.com?EagleEyeFab.
Personally I cannot think of a better recipient of this important commission. In a later post I will make available an artist's conception of what the sculpture is anticipated to look like. Please join me in excited anticipation as the progress of this beautiful sculpture proceeds. Drew has been given full creative control of this commission by the collector, including the most interesting requirement by the collector, that Drew only work on it when he feels he is deeply inspired to do so. I for one cannot wait to catch a glimpse of each stage of the project. Please join me in congratulating Drew Keys and everyone at Eagle Eye Fabrication in having received this distinctive honor.
Please stay tuned for more developments as they happen!
The collector, who declined to make his identity known at this time, was impressed with Drew's expertise as depicted in his listing on our web site. The project will commence in a few weeks but will formally begin with a multi-denominational ceremony. At this ceremony, representatives of all the major faiths will be invited to bless the stainless steel and other raw materials that will go into the eight foot tall sculpture. Further details will be available here in this blog and also on Eagle Eye Fabrication's listing on FindItByMe.com's listing for them, which can be reached by following this link: www.FindItbyMe.com?EagleEyeFab.
Personally I cannot think of a better recipient of this important commission. In a later post I will make available an artist's conception of what the sculpture is anticipated to look like. Please join me in excited anticipation as the progress of this beautiful sculpture proceeds. Drew has been given full creative control of this commission by the collector, including the most interesting requirement by the collector, that Drew only work on it when he feels he is deeply inspired to do so. I for one cannot wait to catch a glimpse of each stage of the project. Please join me in congratulating Drew Keys and everyone at Eagle Eye Fabrication in having received this distinctive honor.
Please stay tuned for more developments as they happen!
Thursday, March 5, 2009
Sit anywhere you want...
How many of you have gone to a restaurant and heard that supposedly friendly phrase?
Or have you heard the famous, "waddya want?!" from a surly proprietor?
Or is it the icy look of indifference that greets a new customer?
I remember going into a Denny's in Maryland and waiting fifteen (15) minutes for someone to seat me (and there was a very prominent sign saying I had to wait to be seated) while workers behind the counter looked at me like I was an idiot for waiting to be seated.
There there was the time I went to a restaurant in northern San Diego County and having a flashback experience to my Maryland Denny's ordeal. I asked the kind waitress if there was a take-out menu, some bauble or brochure I could take with me since I was traveling incognito as the CEO of FindItByMe.com. She quickly and without thinking said, "No". This is in a heavily traveled tourist spot. I left cheerfully and with nothing to show for my visit.
I have some advice for small and local businesses in these slow economic times: unless your customer comes in with a tatoo across their forehead that says, "I am a serial killer", treat each customer who wanders into your store by mistake as though they are Solomon's lost gold mine.
Ok, I know. So there's only a 3% margin on what you just sold or that meal you served. Let me clue you in on a little secret: ANYONE who walks over your threshold expects a little human kindness since chances are where they just came from they got none. You are not just selling a product or a service. You are selling an experience. Yes, that is the key to everything. You are selling an experience. You are creating a state of mind for your customer. I know there are folks who come in and want to argue over a few pennies or waste your time. They are not in the majority, and you already know how to deal with them.
But when someone comes into your cute little place and your employee says with an air of indifference, "Sit anywhere you want," here is the translation of that phrase: "I don't care that you came in here. I don't care that you are alive. You could drop dead and when we have time we'll drag your body outside."
Maybe I'm on the over-sensitive side of the scale. But at the very least this is off-putting. Here is an example of how it should be, and these will be a real live examples. I always get a good response and feeling and service from Farmhouse Coffee, Eagle Eye Fabrication, The Other Office and also the folks at Wiseguy's Window Detailing in Fallbrook, CA. I'm going to start keeping of list of my favorites on the finditbyme.com site.
I will never mention anywhere I had a bad experience. I'll tell you why: first is that I have to give someone a chance over time to be consistently rude. And there could be good reasons for it, like they have a health problem and are in chronic pain. Or their life is just painful. I get it. But then there are people who are not unhappy or unhealthy who just treat customers like larger versions of the common roach. I get that too. So again, my advice is to treat each customer like a messenger to the world of how good a proprietor you are.
Does anyone disagree? To you I say: "Sit anywhere you want!"
Or have you heard the famous, "waddya want?!" from a surly proprietor?
Or is it the icy look of indifference that greets a new customer?
I remember going into a Denny's in Maryland and waiting fifteen (15) minutes for someone to seat me (and there was a very prominent sign saying I had to wait to be seated) while workers behind the counter looked at me like I was an idiot for waiting to be seated.
There there was the time I went to a restaurant in northern San Diego County and having a flashback experience to my Maryland Denny's ordeal. I asked the kind waitress if there was a take-out menu, some bauble or brochure I could take with me since I was traveling incognito as the CEO of FindItByMe.com. She quickly and without thinking said, "No". This is in a heavily traveled tourist spot. I left cheerfully and with nothing to show for my visit.
I have some advice for small and local businesses in these slow economic times: unless your customer comes in with a tatoo across their forehead that says, "I am a serial killer", treat each customer who wanders into your store by mistake as though they are Solomon's lost gold mine.
Ok, I know. So there's only a 3% margin on what you just sold or that meal you served. Let me clue you in on a little secret: ANYONE who walks over your threshold expects a little human kindness since chances are where they just came from they got none. You are not just selling a product or a service. You are selling an experience. Yes, that is the key to everything. You are selling an experience. You are creating a state of mind for your customer. I know there are folks who come in and want to argue over a few pennies or waste your time. They are not in the majority, and you already know how to deal with them.
But when someone comes into your cute little place and your employee says with an air of indifference, "Sit anywhere you want," here is the translation of that phrase: "I don't care that you came in here. I don't care that you are alive. You could drop dead and when we have time we'll drag your body outside."
Maybe I'm on the over-sensitive side of the scale. But at the very least this is off-putting. Here is an example of how it should be, and these will be a real live examples. I always get a good response and feeling and service from Farmhouse Coffee, Eagle Eye Fabrication, The Other Office and also the folks at Wiseguy's Window Detailing in Fallbrook, CA. I'm going to start keeping of list of my favorites on the finditbyme.com site.
I will never mention anywhere I had a bad experience. I'll tell you why: first is that I have to give someone a chance over time to be consistently rude. And there could be good reasons for it, like they have a health problem and are in chronic pain. Or their life is just painful. I get it. But then there are people who are not unhappy or unhealthy who just treat customers like larger versions of the common roach. I get that too. So again, my advice is to treat each customer like a messenger to the world of how good a proprietor you are.
Does anyone disagree? To you I say: "Sit anywhere you want!"
Monday, March 2, 2009
How to Sell Cat Food
I had an interesting conversation with a local merchant not too long ago. I went there to talk about the benefits of our website www.finditbyme.com as it pertains to local search. While waiting for the meeting to start, I started exploring and found that they carried the brand of cat food my cat likes. I also found the brand of cat litter I use. Sounds exciting so far?
When I went there, I had NO expectation of finding cat food, cat litter or anything pertaining to pets because I was at a fertilizer store. So how do you buy cat food? First you have to know where cat food is sold. Next question is, can you get the size of cat food that you want? There is one other store (that I know of) that sells the brand of cat food that I want. The largest size bag is four pounds. The new discovery of cat food at the fertilizer store is available in 8 pound sizes. My cat goes through eight pounds of cat food in about five weeks. I prefer getting the larger size for obvious reasons, like it is cheaper in large quantities and I can wait twice as long to resupply.
Acquisition Cost
I know how all of you are praying that this story goes on forever, but I'll stop here to make my point: what is the acquisition cost for a new customer? Here is what is involved:
When I went there, I had NO expectation of finding cat food, cat litter or anything pertaining to pets because I was at a fertilizer store. So how do you buy cat food? First you have to know where cat food is sold. Next question is, can you get the size of cat food that you want? There is one other store (that I know of) that sells the brand of cat food that I want. The largest size bag is four pounds. The new discovery of cat food at the fertilizer store is available in 8 pound sizes. My cat goes through eight pounds of cat food in about five weeks. I prefer getting the larger size for obvious reasons, like it is cheaper in large quantities and I can wait twice as long to resupply.
Acquisition Cost
I know how all of you are praying that this story goes on forever, but I'll stop here to make my point: what is the acquisition cost for a new customer? Here is what is involved:
- Advertising: This involves letting my audience know I have what they need. It can be via print, radio, Internet, signage or word of mouth.
- The Sale: If I can get them into my store, how likely is it that they'll buy something?
For local businesses in a small community like Fallbrook CA, there are often unique circumstances. For Fallbrook, there is a larger community about ten miles away called Temecula. There is also other surrounding communties in close proximity to Fallbrook: Vista, San Marcos, Oceanside, Escondido to name a few. Some of these are closer to people in Fallbrook, some are further away. East of Fallbrook the main road leading to I-15 is Mission Road. There is only one traffic light in the middle of it on the way to the I-15 (plus three new ones before or at the on-ramps). So it is a relatively straight shot to the I-15 and then to Temecula where SR79 South leads to major shopping opportunities, and that is true for the next two exits at Rancho California Road and Winchester Drive. The other communities mentioned above require a minimum of ten traffic lights to reach, some substantially more. So the path of least resistance for Fallbrook shoppers is Temecula.
My friend Bob Leonard, the CEO of the Fallbrook Chamber of Commerce told me once that people don't feel like they're going out to eat unless they drive ten miles or more. I have to agree with his learned observation. That being said, what about other things that I want or need that I might "go down the hill" for? Before I learned about other places in Fallbrook that carried the cat food my cat likes, I ALWAYS thought I had to go to Temecula to get this cat food. Now I know I don't, but only by accident. The round trip to most places in Temecula is around 22 miles. Most cars don't get good mileage for the first 30 minutes of driving, so for example my car will get around 12 miles per gallon for the first hour of driving. So for me, I burn two gallons of gas for this round trip. At an average price of $2.20 per gallon for unleaded, my travel cost is $4.40. So the cat food I buy in Temecula is now $4.40 more expensive.
Oh, but I get more than one thing when I go to Temecula!
Yes, that is the solution. You visit more than one place so you spread the travel cost around all the things you spend money on in Temecula. So your average purchases per trip may reach hundreds of dollars to "make the trip worthwhile".
I have no complaint about what the merchants in Temecula are offering. I go there myself for various reasons. But consider this: if I knew as a merchant I could cut down on one Temecula purchase per week for a Fallbrook resident, it means for one bag of cat food about $20, for me that would be $160 per year. So this one fertilizer store now can keep $160 in the local economy instead of outside the local economy. I hate arithmetic, but let's do some anyway.
One shopping trip per family per week equals $200 spent outside the community. Now say 1,000 families per week in Fallbrook leave the community to shop, so that's $200,000 per week that leaves the community. Per year that's $10,400,000 leaving local coffers.
The amount above can actually be much greater. But anyway, some are probably thinking I'm on an anti-Temecula kick. Not at all. Each community has its own unique attractions. Put it another way: when it's 110 degrees in Temecula in summertime, it's usually only 75-80 degrees in Fallbrook. Do we have nice places for folks from Temecula to come and visit, enjoy the sights, see our vast avocado groves and enjoy our local restaurants? Yes we do. Do they know about them? No they don't. So the same way Fallbrook residents can get educated about what is available to them in Fallbrook, Temecula residents can get educated on what is available to them in Fallbrook.
Full Circle
So now we come full circle. One bag of cat food at a time, Fallbrook's local merchants can start to acquire and keep customers in their shops. And www.FindItByMe.com was created for this purpose. Is it possible to keep ten million per year in the local economy? Absolutely. Will it cost the local merchants a lot? Absolutely not. The web site www.FindItByMe.com has almost ten years of development behind it. As a work in progress, it will always keep to its mission of helping the local merchant at the lowest possible cost.
We intend to offer this service to every small community in America. Small town values center on honest, friendly, personal service. When you shop at a large retailer, you shop for what you believe is a commodity. However, to the super-store's management, YOU are the commodity. You are a statistic, a footnote on some corporate accountant's balance sheet. YOU get the proud distinction of being a "purchasing unit", or belonging to a unique "demographic cross-section". If you don't believe me, download any publicly traded company's year end report. Then you'll see what the big retailers really think of you.
Local merchants, you have more power than you think. If you would like to help your local community, be it from Key Largo, FL to Wasilla, AK, FindItByMe.com is ready to help you help your community. Contact John Graffio, CEO of FindItByMe.com to find out how easy it is to get started.
Wild Places Spend Money
I was out driving in the desert yesterday, north on I-395. I noticed that Adelanto is getting more traffic signals, but I was lucky and made all the way through town on green lights. I then passed through the communities of Kramer Junction (4 corners for you desert rats), Red Mountain and finally Trona. On the way I saw temporary cities of motor homes and camp trailers where families bring their kids to ride dirt bikes, quads and bicycles from what I could see. In one spot I counted fifty trailers, and since it was Sunday afternoon, many of them leaving. So there had to be many more on Saturday.
So I did some calculating. These folks take the time to drive from all over Southern California in their temporary homes and get some R&R even in these economic hard times. Which means that they are stopping along the way for food, gas, snacks, etc. Accounting for fuel, groceries, cooking fuel, and refreshments, each family group spends an estimated $500-$700. So a collection of 75 of these families would spend between $37,500-52,500. If you consider there at least fifty of these groups around southern California deserts on any one weekend, you get at total expenditure of $1,875,000-$2,625,000 during a three day period.
Ok, the numbers are huge. But this is for only one weekend. Let's say that half the weekends per year are suitable for these outings, around 26. So now the numbers are $48,750,000-$68,250,000. So between $48 million and $68 million in round numbers per year is spent on this ONE form of recreation per year, probably more.
My question is this: are the local communities on the to and from routes getting any benefit from this? My guess is that they are not, judging by the ramshackle condition of the small motels, gas stations and convenience marts that dot the major travel routes. This is really a shame, since a small fraction of this money would at least put a new coat of paint on their places and make them more inviting. The fact is that folks who shop at Costco and Walmart are not likely to patronize a place that looks like a dive because they would rightly assume that there is no selection and the prices will be high. But they should be the major beneficiaries of all this fabulous wealth that is being spent on California's excellent recreational opportunities.
We are in the process of talking to these folks (the small proprietors on the well traveled routes) to let them know what we are doing at FindItByMe.com. Since we are multi-regional, we can speak to the various recreational groups that travel great distances to enjoy their favorite pastime. And I haven't even mentioned the hunters, fishermen, amateur gold prospectors, bird watchers, nature photographers, sightseers, treasure hunters, hikers, rock climbers, bicyclists and motorcycle clubs that also head into the back country and travel the scenic routes. If you use those numbers, you can see that the potential yearly expenditure could climb to $1 billion per year just for Southern California!
Ok...how does it work? What can FindItByMe.com do to support the small proprietors and outdoor enthusiasts? Stay tuned for the publication of the FindItByMe.com roadmap. This document will detail how we intend to proceed on development of features for users, advertisers and subscribers.
So I did some calculating. These folks take the time to drive from all over Southern California in their temporary homes and get some R&R even in these economic hard times. Which means that they are stopping along the way for food, gas, snacks, etc. Accounting for fuel, groceries, cooking fuel, and refreshments, each family group spends an estimated $500-$700. So a collection of 75 of these families would spend between $37,500-52,500. If you consider there at least fifty of these groups around southern California deserts on any one weekend, you get at total expenditure of $1,875,000-$2,625,000 during a three day period.
Ok, the numbers are huge. But this is for only one weekend. Let's say that half the weekends per year are suitable for these outings, around 26. So now the numbers are $48,750,000-$68,250,000. So between $48 million and $68 million in round numbers per year is spent on this ONE form of recreation per year, probably more.
My question is this: are the local communities on the to and from routes getting any benefit from this? My guess is that they are not, judging by the ramshackle condition of the small motels, gas stations and convenience marts that dot the major travel routes. This is really a shame, since a small fraction of this money would at least put a new coat of paint on their places and make them more inviting. The fact is that folks who shop at Costco and Walmart are not likely to patronize a place that looks like a dive because they would rightly assume that there is no selection and the prices will be high. But they should be the major beneficiaries of all this fabulous wealth that is being spent on California's excellent recreational opportunities.
We are in the process of talking to these folks (the small proprietors on the well traveled routes) to let them know what we are doing at FindItByMe.com. Since we are multi-regional, we can speak to the various recreational groups that travel great distances to enjoy their favorite pastime. And I haven't even mentioned the hunters, fishermen, amateur gold prospectors, bird watchers, nature photographers, sightseers, treasure hunters, hikers, rock climbers, bicyclists and motorcycle clubs that also head into the back country and travel the scenic routes. If you use those numbers, you can see that the potential yearly expenditure could climb to $1 billion per year just for Southern California!
Ok...how does it work? What can FindItByMe.com do to support the small proprietors and outdoor enthusiasts? Stay tuned for the publication of the FindItByMe.com roadmap. This document will detail how we intend to proceed on development of features for users, advertisers and subscribers.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
And then there were seven!
Hello to One and All,
There are now seven ways to search for something on www.finditbyme.com:
1. Name of the Listing (usually the business name)
2. Name of a street (this gives a listing of everyone/everything on that street)
3. A search term (category)
4. Phone number of a listing
5. A URL Hotlink (like www.finditbyme.com?EagleEyeFab) or by using the Hotlink in the search box.
6. An actual web address in the search box on the site itself
7. A name of someone associated with the business (first name, last name, or full name)
There will be other searches to follow:
8. Landmark Name (can be a strip mall name, industrial park name, outlet mall name, covered mall name)
9. Leasing/rental agent name (will show vacant commercial properties for that agent/agency)
If anyone has had problems with response time on the site, like it seems to freeze up on occasion, I can confirm it is an issue with Time Warner's network, as I spent about two hours on the phone with their tech support folks getting the issue run down. I have to say they really have some good guys working there.
There will be more frequent posts to this blog from now on. So stay tuned to this and the other channels I am setting up for communications (like YouTube, Flickr, etc.)
Later!
There are now seven ways to search for something on www.finditbyme.com:
1. Name of the Listing (usually the business name)
2. Name of a street (this gives a listing of everyone/everything on that street)
3. A search term (category)
4. Phone number of a listing
5. A URL Hotlink (like www.finditbyme.com?EagleEyeFab) or by using the Hotlink in the search box.
6. An actual web address in the search box on the site itself
7. A name of someone associated with the business (first name, last name, or full name)
There will be other searches to follow:
8. Landmark Name (can be a strip mall name, industrial park name, outlet mall name, covered mall name)
9. Leasing/rental agent name (will show vacant commercial properties for that agent/agency)
If anyone has had problems with response time on the site, like it seems to freeze up on occasion, I can confirm it is an issue with Time Warner's network, as I spent about two hours on the phone with their tech support folks getting the issue run down. I have to say they really have some good guys working there.
There will be more frequent posts to this blog from now on. So stay tuned to this and the other channels I am setting up for communications (like YouTube, Flickr, etc.)
Later!
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Now on YouTube
Yes! You heard right...
We now have an account on YouTube, so pretty soon you'll see some new material that will be pretty fun to watch.
The address of the YouTube site is http://www.youtube.com/FindItByMe.
See? It's pretty easy to Find It By Me on www.FindItByMe.com.
Watch this blog for cool new stuff. Please check out Eagle Eye Fabrication on our site at www.finditbyme.com?EagleEyeFab. Drew Keys is the owner, Mike McCormack the senior advisor, and have they got some cool stuff in store in the invention and arts departments.
Want incredible custom clothing with inspired creations? See Crown Creations at this address: www.finditbyme.com?www.crowncreations.net. Carol Guttman will lead you through her inspired writings and creations on one of our best listings.
We're working on some REALLY COOL STUFF for the next release. Stay tuned!!!
We now have an account on YouTube, so pretty soon you'll see some new material that will be pretty fun to watch.
The address of the YouTube site is http://www.youtube.com/FindItByMe.
See? It's pretty easy to Find It By Me on www.FindItByMe.com.
Watch this blog for cool new stuff. Please check out Eagle Eye Fabrication on our site at www.finditbyme.com?EagleEyeFab. Drew Keys is the owner, Mike McCormack the senior advisor, and have they got some cool stuff in store in the invention and arts departments.
Want incredible custom clothing with inspired creations? See Crown Creations at this address: www.finditbyme.com?www.crowncreations.net. Carol Guttman will lead you through her inspired writings and creations on one of our best listings.
We're working on some REALLY COOL STUFF for the next release. Stay tuned!!!
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Cool Stuff
Hello World!
New stuff in the search engine, I call it HotLinks. Here is how it works:
http://www.finditbyme.com/?EagleEyeFab
What does that do? It does a redirect automatically to the Eagle Eye Fabrication listing in the search engine. It allows you to use the above link on your business card or email signature, and anyone clicking on it will get redirected automatically to your listing bypassing the normal search mechanism (which can still be used after the search is displayed).
Here are some other ones:
http://www.finditbyme.com/?EagleEyeSculpture
http://www.finditbyme.com/?CrownCreations
http://www.FindItByMe.com?CrownCreations.net
http://www.finditbyme.com/?LovingMemoryPets
Well, I think it's cool!
New stuff in the search engine, I call it HotLinks. Here is how it works:
http://www.finditbyme.com/?EagleEyeFab
What does that do? It does a redirect automatically to the Eagle Eye Fabrication listing in the search engine. It allows you to use the above link on your business card or email signature, and anyone clicking on it will get redirected automatically to your listing bypassing the normal search mechanism (which can still be used after the search is displayed).
Here are some other ones:
http://www.finditbyme.com/?EagleEyeSculpture
http://www.finditbyme.com/?CrownCreations
http://www.FindItByMe.com?CrownCreations.net
http://www.finditbyme.com/?LovingMemoryPets
Well, I think it's cool!
Saturday, February 14, 2009
It's 5:00 O'Clock. Where is your search engine?
So what's new?
- Membership organizations (like Fallbrook Chamber) now have an active link under Memberships that shows all their members (if known). Clicking on the Members button will show all their members in the lower search grid. So you can go through the list and explore, but you can go back to the main membership organization when you want to by clicking in the already still displayed link in the upper search box.
- Displayed languages reduced to English and Spanish (for now).
- Pets link partially working; need to work on category to listing associations.
- Starting to work on BHO (browser helper object) for IE. More on this later.
Comments anyone???
Friday, February 13, 2009
Latest Changes
Pretty soon I'm going to publish a road map (no pun) of how this site will progress. In the meantime, here is a list of changes since the last update:
- Menus almost fully multi-lingual.
- Site material and labels almost fully multi-lingual.
- The main skin's layout has changed slightly. See the site for an example.
- Image classification now working for a single broad category.
- I'm loading my Death Valley pictures a few at at time onto the site (total now is around 550).
- Eagle Eye Fabrication, Cynthia Graffio, Helena Bongartz, Farmhouse Coffee Co have also been rudimentarily categorized.
- Single clicking on an image thumbnail loads the main window image. Single clicking on this brings up the large image window.
- Double clicking on an image thumbnail does the above in a single action; fill small display window and then loading the full resolution image in a pop-up window.
- There is now a "Map" menu item. Right now it brings up the vicinity of the Fallbrook Post Office. Later it will be fully navigable with controls, etc.
Next to come into production will be the ability to log into the site as a consumer, but also as a subscriber to be able to update your listing yourself. Also working on the tour planner application...
I think now this website www.finditbyme.com is starting to get fun. Stay tuned!!!
John Graffio
Thursday, January 22, 2009
Press Release!
John Graffio, CEO and founder FindItByMe.com, Inc is excited to announce the immediate availability of its flagship service, the FindItByMe.com local directory search engine. Currently featuring listings in Fallbrook and Bonsall, California, the web site provides unique benefits to both consumers and business subscribers. The search part of the web site was developed over a ten year period by Mr. Graffio and allows a visitor to the site to search by street, category, phone number or name of business. Featured listings are showcased in banners at the top of the site. Quick links to interesting categories are listed for quick and easy access to frequently requested categories. Listings feature the name of the business, their location, main phone number, hours of operation, and images of their business, products and services with captions, associations the listing is a member of, a written summary of the listing and a street map with an aerial view of their surroundings.
The FindItByMe staff is always searching out new businesses and verifying that information on existing businesses is current. The company plans to release significant enhancements to its offering before the end of the second quarter: ability to search for multiple items at once, driving directions to and from listings, search for businesses that are currently open, maps of parking lots that are adjacent to each listing’s physical location, search in multiple languages in addition to English and making the service available on GPS units and cell phones. The benefits to business subscribers include the ability to get on-demand reports of how, when and how often their listings were found and accessed as well as the ability to make online updates to their listings. Four very affordable plans are offered to the business subscriber in addition to a very basic free listing which anyone can sign up for.
The primary goal of the company is to assist consumers in their search for local goods and services and for small businesses which want to attract local consumers who may be leaving the area when they don’t have to. Mr. Graffio states that large retailers often have virtually unlimited advertising budgets that small to medium sized businesses simply cannot afford. He also states that small businesses can always create a web site, but they often find that the initial and ongoing expense and lack of control over their own content distracts them from actually spending time on their own business. This is simply too great a burden for a small business to bear, and an unnecessary drain on their time and money. Mr. Graffio believes that small and medium sized businesses deserve a more level playing field when it comes to advertising and communicating with their customers, so FindItByMe.com was born.
The company plans to offer the same benefits other to communities in the near future and is drafting a franchise plan that would allow area specialists in other areas to make very comfortable incomes affordably serving the needs of their own communities. Mr. Graffio observes that the news is full of announcements of large companies happily shedding tens of thousands of “positions” at a time without regard to the domino effect their actions have on actual “people” who now can’t pay their mortgage or feed their family. Mr. Graffio adds that small businesses always have employed the majority of people, and we need to get back to that. FindItByMe.com will play whatever role it can to make that dream a reality.
The FindItByMe staff is always searching out new businesses and verifying that information on existing businesses is current. The company plans to release significant enhancements to its offering before the end of the second quarter: ability to search for multiple items at once, driving directions to and from listings, search for businesses that are currently open, maps of parking lots that are adjacent to each listing’s physical location, search in multiple languages in addition to English and making the service available on GPS units and cell phones. The benefits to business subscribers include the ability to get on-demand reports of how, when and how often their listings were found and accessed as well as the ability to make online updates to their listings. Four very affordable plans are offered to the business subscriber in addition to a very basic free listing which anyone can sign up for.
The primary goal of the company is to assist consumers in their search for local goods and services and for small businesses which want to attract local consumers who may be leaving the area when they don’t have to. Mr. Graffio states that large retailers often have virtually unlimited advertising budgets that small to medium sized businesses simply cannot afford. He also states that small businesses can always create a web site, but they often find that the initial and ongoing expense and lack of control over their own content distracts them from actually spending time on their own business. This is simply too great a burden for a small business to bear, and an unnecessary drain on their time and money. Mr. Graffio believes that small and medium sized businesses deserve a more level playing field when it comes to advertising and communicating with their customers, so FindItByMe.com was born.
The company plans to offer the same benefits other to communities in the near future and is drafting a franchise plan that would allow area specialists in other areas to make very comfortable incomes affordably serving the needs of their own communities. Mr. Graffio observes that the news is full of announcements of large companies happily shedding tens of thousands of “positions” at a time without regard to the domino effect their actions have on actual “people” who now can’t pay their mortgage or feed their family. Mr. Graffio adds that small businesses always have employed the majority of people, and we need to get back to that. FindItByMe.com will play whatever role it can to make that dream a reality.
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