Employee Internet Addiction: The Cost To Firms And What To Do About It

By GARY M. STERN, FOR INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILYPosted 02/05/2010 06:30 PM ET

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Internet use at work for some employees is bouncing from productive to excessive to just plain out of control.

Some workers check personal e-mails every 10 minutes without realizing it. They send text messages almost unconsciously, then spend time shopping on online sites.

David Greenfield, a psychologist and president of the Center for Internet and Technology Addiction, based in West Hartford, Conn., says that staff who suffer from Net addiction get less productive. So more companies are finding ways to limit the damage.

Many companies aren't as aware of the problem as they should be. E-mails and text messages sent from PDAs, BlackBerrys and cell phones can keep staff engaged with clients and coworkers. Since most companies depend on such technology, they often ignore the signs of Internet abuse.

A Cycle Of Addiction

Staffers obsessed with the Internet start to resemble "a person at a casino. (The feeling) produces a sense of dissociation. They lose sense of time; time goes by unconsciously," said Greenfield. Trapped in this cycle of Internet frenzy, workers overlook their business tasks and are unable to finish work on time.

Psychologically, Greenfield says the>>>

AT&T's iPhone Mess

February 3, 2010, 11:00PM EST

The iPhone has swamped AT&T's data network and sparked a consumer rebellion. What can Ma Bell do?

By Roben Farzad

In mid-December, Fake Steve Jobs, the alter ego of widely read journalist and blogger Dan Lyons, posted the following appeal to his fellow members of iPhone Nation: "On Friday, Dec. 18, at noon Pacific time, we will attempt to overwhelm the AT&T data network and bring it to its knees. The goal is to have every iPhone user (or as many as we can) turn on a data-intensive app and run that app for one solid hour. Send the message to AT&T that we are sick of their substandard network. …Join us and speak truth to power!" Soon thousands of hooligans—or if you prefer, frustrated customers paying AT&T (T) as much as $150 per month—took to Twitter and Facebook to join up.

Operation Chokehold might have been a landmark consumer uprising had the federal government not stepped in. Two days before the planned protest, Jamie Barnett, the Federal Communications Commission's chief of public safety and homeland security, issued a statement warning that to "purposely try to disrupt or negatively impact a network with ill-intent is irresponsible and presents a significant public safety concern." Doing so could interfere with 911 calls. Fearing a boomerang of negative publicity, the Chokeholders called off the stunt, but the popular backlash against AT&T raged on. On the Dec. 20 broadcast of NBC's Saturday Night Live, Weekend Update anchor Seth Meyers noted that Google's new phone might pose a threat to Apple's (AAPL) iPhone and added: "Also a challenge to the iPhone: making phone calls."

AT&T has stumbled into a quagmire. When it secured exclusive rights to support Apple's iPhone on its wireless network in June 2007, investors hailed the deal as a masterstroke. Here was stodgy, safe AT&T positioning itself to gulp profits from a cutting-edge technology. But AT&T and Apple vastly underestimated the iPhone's appeal. At launch, Real Steve Jobs said he'd be happy if the device could grab 1% of the global cell-phone market, or about 10 million units for 2008. Instead, Apple has sold at least 42.4 million—25.1 million in 2009 alone, 14% of the global smartphone market. AT&T, which markets the iPhone in the U.S., simply can't handle the traffic.

Making matters worse is the proliferation of "apps,">>>

Social media marketing part 2: Mediums

Or: what goes where?

If you haven’t done it already, create a Facebook Page for your business (type “Facebook Pages” into the search box when in your personal Facebook account page to find the section, and then click on the “+ Create Page” button to get started). Once this is done, the obvious next step is to get people to become “Fans” of your business:

- Ask all of your friends and family

- Run a contest to past customers, complementary businesses, or local organizations to get some fans

- Offer a promotional rate to Facebook fans

- Promote your Page in your website, newsletter, and any other place folks interact with your business

- Also promote your Page on invoices, receipts, business cards, etc. — just something simple will do.

- Become a fan of partner and other local businesses

Once your Page is set up and you’ve begun promoting it, be sure to consistently post content…

About your business, including events, rates, successes, customer wins, new partners, photos and videos of offerings, links to your blog postings, etc. If your business sponsors things like the local Little League or the Breast Cancer 3-Day, be sure to highlight that.

About your industry, including links to news articles, blog postings, videos, events and happenings – and your review of them.

About local stuff, including local events and happenings (i.e. the 4th of July Parade), what’s coming up, photos and videos of them, your summary of how they went, etc.

About products or services used before, in conjunction with or after yours, including news article links and links to blog postings, videos, reviews, photos, customer comments and the like.

Also encourage content submission from your Fans, such as…

Q&A with past, upcoming or potential customers.

Customer testimonials describing how great you or your products and services are.

Customer photos or videos of them using your product.

Polls of fans, where you post an open-ended question that encourages engagement and responses

Once your community on Facebook is thriving, always be responsive! Be active in your community. Respond to comments and popular items. Be interactive by using “liking” (the “thumbs-up” feature) and commenting on posts from active community members.

Create a Twitter account for your business>>>

Five Successful Strategies for Monetizing Blogs

Tax Rivals Square Off in Social Media

TurboTax and H&R Block are gearing up to do battle again

Feb 2, 2010

TurboTax and H&R Block are gearing up to do battle again during the tax season, with each banking on social media as a cornerstone of its marketing efforts.

Intuit's TurboTax has bet big on Facebook and Twitter integrations, inviting users to review its products and then share their thoughts with their social networks. It hopes to goose that along by unleashing Team TurboTax, consisting of 40 experts to address tax questions posted on Twitter. The company has an ambitious marketing goal this tax season: get 150 million earned media impressions thanks to consumer chatter.

"As a marketer we want to get out of the way and let our customers talk about us," said Seth Greenberg, TurboTax's director of national media and digital marketing.

H&R Block, meanwhile, is taking a different approach to its social media outreach. Last year, it looked to answer tax questions on Twitter and Facebook, but this year it has set up a dedicated "Get It Right" site for its tax advisors to answer questions. H&R Block has enlisted 1,000 of its advisors in the effort, according to Zena Weist, director of social media at the company, and has signed up 65,000 members and answered 50,000 questions.

The Q&A site replaced a>>>

Zap2it.com Scoops Up Top Celebrity Blog, 'The Dish Rag'

Creator Elizabeth Snead Joins Zap2it's LA-Based Editorial Team As Awards Season Heats Up

LOS ANGELES, Feb. 2 /PRNewswire/ -- Zap2it.com, the leading TV and celebrity news web site from Tribune Media Services (TMS), today announced it is the new home of popular celebrity blog, "The Dish Rag," previously, the number one page view driving blog for The Los Angeles Times and its awards season coverage site, The Envelope. Created by Elizabeth Snead, former LA Times and USA Today entertainment journalist and E! Online, Us Weekly and InStyle contributor, The Dish Rag takes readers onto the red carpet at awards shows, beyond the velvet rope at Hollywood premieres and parties and behind the scenes at film festivals and entertainment industry events.

The Dish Rag is now available exclusively on Zap2it at http:/blog.zap2it.com/thedishrag/. The transition was completed just as awards season, a favorite time of the year for both Zap2it readers and journalists, heats up.

The acquisition of The Dish Rag marks significant progress by Zap2it in a strategic push to increase its original editorial content and enhance its celebrity coverage. Satisfying high reader demand for first-hand celebrity news and gossip, The Dish Rag offers engaging posts, photo galleries and video documenting the doings of the famous and wannabe famous in the world of entertainment.

Delivered with the sharp wit and incisive humor characteristic>>>

Integrity Capital Partners Launches New Social Media Platform, Website and Blog

BETHESDA, Md., Feb. 2 /PRNewswire/ -- Integrity Capital has started 2010 with a large push for new cases and new buyers along with a fully integrated web experience. "In the first month of the year we are currently working with an excess of $400 million dollars of traditional settlements in our pipeline and have lined up two new funding sources whose parameters are beginning to expand," Rob Finfer, CEO of Integrity, commented. "We are also working on over $100 Million in new life sales."

The purpose of the new and improved website and social media platforms (Twitter, blog, and Facebook) is to provide visitors, clients, and advisors with the most comprehensive overview of the ever changing marketplace within Life Settlement, Premium Finance and Insurance products. The site was updated with ICP clients in mind.

As a leader in the Life Settlement and Insurance industry, Integrity is proud to reveal our new and innovative blog, http://integrityp.com/blog. It will cover topics regarding our Life Settlement Changes, New Premium Finance and Estate Planning ideas. "As our industry continues to evolve and change we plan on using an easier information pathway to inform our clients on our company, its principals, our industry, regulatory laws, and industry events," commented Finfer. ICP has set out to create an information portal that allows our readers to get up to date current industry information from the inside perspective of our CEO Robert Finfer who has over 20 years of experience in the financial services industry.

Over the past couple of years it has become>>>