Date: 26th September 2007

Time: 09:30 – 16:30

This full day workshop is designed to give an overview of the Internet legal issues and risks facing business start-ups, entrepreneurs and small businesses. This is not going to be a dry overview of the law – but instead a practical session full of examples and checklists so that you can stay on the right side of the law.

Does your website comply with all the relevant Internet laws in the UK?

How well are you complying with legislation covering email?

Are you selling legally, honestly, decently, and truthfully?

Bring your questions along with you; there will be plenty of
time to discuss your concerns.

This workshop will give you an overview of business legal topics including:

• Legal issues to consider when creating your website
• Domain name concerns
• Email and your business
• Spamming
• How to sell online safely
• Your terms and conditions
• Acceptable Use Policies
• Data Protection Act checklist
• Companies Act checklist
• Disability Discrimination Act checklist
• Protecting your content
• Copyright, patents and trademarks
• Sources of further information

RSS feeds. Wikis. Blogs. Pocasting. Social bookmarking. XML. Webinar. Cookie. Avatar. Web 2.0

How many of these Internet buzzwords can you say you really understand? And how many are you actually using for the benefit of your business?

Or are you irritated by all these Internet buzzwords?

Within Internet marketing, there is still a tendency to talk about the underlying technology, rather than the benefits the technology brings. There is a residue of geekiness that puts normal people off.

And as a result there is resistance on the part of businesses to adopt these new technologies. Business owners don’t understand the jargon, and frankly, they just don’t care.

But when these technologies are demonstrated in a real live working environment, then the penny drops for many business owners. They can see what the technology can actually do for their business.

They understand the benefits.

They may think the word blog sounds vaguely rude, but they are very interested in telling people what’s going on in their business in a cost effective way.

They may not care what Web 2.0 is, but they want to convert more sales on their website.

Internet marketing is still at a stage where the jargon and geekiness is still hindering adoption.

And as a result, so many small businesses are not reaping the rewards of relatively cheap, easy to implement solutions.

I am travelling this week, teaching in beautiful Wales. I should be enjoying the inspiring sea views and engaging with my brilliant students on their intensive marketing course, but instead I’m worrying how I’m going to work. How I’m going to keep in touch.

I am a slave to technology.

Emails. Voicemails. Texts. Answerphone messages. Blog postings. Wireless Internet access. It’s all supposed to make my life easier, but actually if I’m not careful it can make for a 24 hour constant-contact hell.

It’s called device creep, and the best article I’ve ever read on the topic of Cyberserfdom was published in the New York Times way back in 2001.

I’ve just had a chance to re-read it, and it still rings true.

The conclusion of the article is one I strongly agree with. It really isn’t for me to adapt to the technology, but rather for the technology to adapt to me, and the way I want to work.

What do you think? Are you a cyber-slave?

I’m going to let you in on a little secret. I’ve re-enabled the Comments facility on this blog.

Once upon a time I allowed comments, but the nasty blog spammers filled it with adverts and horrible self-serving links to their own sites. And so I turned Comments off.

But I have had a number of requests from genuine readers of this blog asking for the ability to contribute to the conversation, and stop it being a one-way stream of verbage from me.

So, comments are back on, but in the interest of protecting my own business and sanity, I’ve resorted to creating my blog comment policy.

• I welcome comments because they are the heart and soul of blogging space. Please feel free to join into the conversation.

• I always delete spam and am forced to moderate your messages by hand because Blogger does not offer a proper anti-spam tool. This means your comments may take some time to appear on the site.

• I reserve the right to edit or delete comments that I consider to be offensive, rude, off-topic, hateful, or using bad language.

• Go ahead and include links in your postings; relevant links improve the conversation and help us all to keep learning.

• Links in comments will not add to your inbound linking campaigns; all links will automagically use the rel="nofollow" tag, so they’ll receive no PageRank boost in an effort to stop blog comment spam

I’ll be working on the layout of the blog to improve comment legibility, and your comments and suggestions for layout would be most welcome.

Google have updated their Webmaster Central service to alert you of spam violations in your website. You will be notified of pages that have been removed from the Google index, the reason why, and how you can get reconsidered for inclusion.

The new Message Centre in your Webmaster Central account will contain correspondence from Google in the event that Google has spotted some hidden text or other violation on your website.

Currently, you need to be a verified owner of the site and logged in to your account in order to receive this information. Google are planning to resume sending out email notifications shortly.

The spam violation service had been around since 2005, with notifications provided via email. But with spoof messages flying around, Google decided to halt the service.

Once you have made any necessary corrections to your site, then you need to go through Google’s Reinclusion process. I think it is well worth noting that Google asks what search engine optimisation (SEO) company you are working with that led to the violation:

Tell us more about what happened: what actions might have led to any penalties, and what corrective actions have been taken. If you used a search engine optimization (SEO) company, please note that. Describing the SEO firm and their actions is a helpful indication of good faith that may assist in evaluation of reconsideration requests. If you recently acquired this domain and think it may have violated the guidelines before you owned it, let us know that below. In general, sites that directly profit from traffic (e.g. search engine optimizers, affiliate programs, etc.) may need to provide more evidence of good faith before a site will be reconsidered.

Last Christmas, the John Lewis website took more cash in a single week than the Oxford Steet branch. The website employs 150 people, compared to the department store branch employing more than 700 people.

So I thought it worth mentioning last week’s launch of the new JohnLewis.com web design.

They are describing the redesign as a ‘more aspirational look’ that tries to be more like the in store experience.

So, what does this mean in practical terms?

1. A new Liquid layout means that the site stretches to fit any user’s particular screen resolution, resulting in a consistent design looks great no matter what width it’s looked at. I’m pleased to report the Hallam website became liquid about 18 months ago.
2. Greater access to John Lewis’ greatest asset: it’s associates (that means the sales people.) Real staff have been recording podcasts; indeed the fitness equipment podcast nearly persuaded me to part with two grand, except for the fact the check out wasn’t working….
3. Lighter, brighter design with less of the grey around the logo and navigational areas
4. New site navigation that offers clusters of choices within each sub menu.
5. Lots more products, images, and content.

And my personal views of the changes?

1. For some reason as yet unknown to me, I can’t checkout. I put gloriously expensive stuff in my basic, click Checkout, and I pop back to the Home page. Frustrating, to say the least.
2. I’m not too keen on the new drop down menus. My forty-something coordination means as I recklessly aim for items on the far right of the new drop down sub menus, I inadvertently end up closing the menu by accident. Damn.
3. But overall I love the new design. Wonderful pictures, sensible menu suggestions, oodles of useful information. It makes me trust the .com site in just the same way I trust John Lewis.

And that, trust, is what it’s all about.