<link rel="icon" type="image/png" href="/somepath/image.png" />

However, if you want a favicon that can be picked up by all browsers you’ll want to create an ICO file. I’ve found various online tools that will convert image files to ICO; Favicon.cc was one that I often used. The downside, all the online favicon generators I found gave me a 16×16 ICO file. I wanted an ICO file with multiple sizes so if the user puts the bookmark on their desktop is uses the larger ICO size. So I decided to find a way to easily create a ICO file with multiple embedded sizes (64×64, 48×48, 32×32, 16×16) and I’ve decided to describe how I accomplished this.

These directions are written for Windows, but they can easily be adapted to other operating systems with minor adjustments. First you’ll need to download two tools.

• ImageMagick – This will be needed to automatically create the appropriate image sizes/formats
• png2ico – This, as the title suggests, will be needed to convert PNG images to ICO files

Installation
ImageMagick: If you downloaded one of the installers, this one is easy. Just run the installer and follow the on-screen prompts

png2ico: This doesn’t really need to be installed, but you need to copy png2ico.exe into your System32 folder (C:/Windows/System32) so it can be used from any directory in the command prompt

Implementation

1. Open up your System32 (where you copied png2ico.exe) and create a file titled favicon.bat
2. Open favicon.bat in a text editor (right click the file and choose Edit)
3. Enter the following into favicon.bat and then save the file
   convert %1 -resize 64x64^ -gravity center -background transparent -extent 64x64 64.png
convert %1 -resize 48x48^ -gravity center -background transparent -extent 48x48 48.png
convert %1 -resize 32x32^ -gravity center -background transparent -extent 32x32 32.png
convert %1 -resize 16x16^ -gravity center -background transparent -extent 16x16 16.png
png2ico favicon.ico 64.png 48.png 32.png 16.png
del 64.png
del 48.png
del 32.png
del 16.png
4. Open the command prompt (Go to Start > Run, type cmd and hit enter)
5. Navigate to the folder with your image (cd foldername) and now type favicon filename.png (replace filename.png with the filename of your image) and hit enter

Now, with that little bit of setup, you can create favicons in seconds. I added a few keys to my registry to make it even easier, but I’ll save that for another time. Also, I will cover story about conversions and why it’s import to use business voip and track leads coming in.

If you own a PC, we have great news for you. This week Microsoft unveiled its new anti-virus software, which offers high-quality protection against spyware, viruses, Trojan horses, worms, malicious software, and other unwanted files. It updates automatically. It upgrades automatically. And…it’s free.

Anyone with a PC can now go to Microsoft’s website and download the anti-virus software free of charge. Versions are available for both Windows XP and Windows Vista, as well as for Windows 7, the new operating system that will be launched in the upcoming months.

Microsoft has stated that they are not releasing this software to compete with paid-for security software, such as McAfee and Norton, but rather to protect users who do not currently have security software in an attempt to avoid the spread of computer worms and viruses. The need for such security measures became apparent after the Conficker virus spread throughout the world due to improper security measures earlier this year in March of 2009.

To obtain your free copy of this security software, proceed to the Microsoft homepage at www.microsoft.com. Then, scroll over the Security & Updates toolbar box, and click on “Microsoft Security Essentials.” Select the “Download Now” button, and follow the instructions that pop up. Select your current location and your operating system. If you do not know which operating system your computer is running, click on the provided Microsoft Support link and following the instructions.

Once you are all set up, the file should download automatically. Double-click on the downloaded icon to set up and install the file. Your security updates are complete without even having to restart your computer!

Yahoo! has always been a major presence in the search-engine world, but has never lived up to its number-one rival, Google. While Google has dominated the search engine market for several years, Yahoo! has always remained second place, though a far distant one.

When Yahoo! and Microsoft announced partnership earlier this year, we here at Promoting Group were interested to see where the pair would go. Microsoft launched the Bing search engine while keeping the Yahoo! one alive, in an attempt to move in on Google’s market dominance.

Now, Yahoo! will launch a $100 million marketing campaign to try and rebuild its status as one of the major search engine and email platforms, using Bing’s encroachment on Google as its foundation. The campaign, which is rumored to be called It’s Y!ou, will promote Yahoo!’s many features outside of the search engine area, including personalized homepages and social media networking decks. Yahoo! will maintain its search engine capabilities, so as not to lose the small slice of the market they currently claim over Google.

The strongest claim that Yahoo! will have over both Google and Bing is the ability to completely personalize a homepage. Registered users will be able to check email, read and update social media platforms, choose daily horoscopes, read the scores and highlights from selected sporting teams, view the day’s weather forecast, read daily headlines from their chosen city or newspaper, and even select options such as having daily recipes, travel tips, or local event announcements appear on their homepages.

While users customize their homepages, Yahoo! will then also be able to use their selections as a guide for targeted advertisements. The user who chooses to learn about daily recipes might see ads for cookbooks, while the user who reads the scores for several sporting teams may see ads for ticket vendors or sporting equipment. The personalization feature works for both the user and for Yahoo! in this way, helping to generate revenue and appeal to people’s desire for personalized features.

Five years ago, Google began collecting out-of-print books from various sources to convert into digital downloads, ensuring their survival into the digital age. Some of these books are considered public domain, such as Herman Melville’s classic Moby Dick and all of Shakespeare’s works. Since these works were published before 1923, their copyrights are no longer valid. Other books in Google’s collection are harder to find and have been out of print for years.

Google obtained these novels by asking to borrow the books from libraries around the world, including Harvard University’s Widener Library, which recently surpassed the JFK Library as the world’s largest. It is estimated that Google managed to download about 6 million out-of-print books.

Taking old novels and scanning them into a digital database has a its benefits; it ensures that even the world’s rarest books will survive into the future, even if the libraries holding the physical copies suffer from fire, water damage, or other disaster. This has been a great idea, especially for books that only survive in a few physical copies.

Now, Google is advancing the idea even further, allowing customers to buy paperback copies of these novels, printed from Google’s set of digital copies by a speedy printer. The printing machine, called The Espresso Machine, is located in Google’s headquarters in Mountain View, CA. The machine can print a paperback-bound book of about 300 pages in under five minutes, making it perfect for people who desire an inexpensive copy of the classics or a version of a hard-to-find book. At the moment, only the 2 million non-public domain books in Google’s collection are available for paperback printing, but Google is working on obtaining the printing rights for its other digital books as well. Google has suggested a retail of $8 per book, but the retail store will have final decision on pricing. For each book sold, Google will keep $1 of the proceeds, to be donated to charities.

Next Wednesday, September 16th, a great opportunity to learn marketing tips from the pros will available to all, and we here at Promoting Group highly recommend taking advantage of it. Marketing industry experts Bryan Eisenberg, Craig Danuloff, and David Brussin will be holding a webinar at noon Eastern, 9AM Pacific Time to discuss marketing efforts during the recession, geared specially toward internet marketing. The webinar is free, though you must register online to attend.

“Recession Marketing: From Pre-click to Post-click” is sponsored and hosted by Monetate, Inc., and will feature discussions and commentary from three of the industry’s most highly-regarded business gurus. Bryan Eisenberg is the Chief Persuasion Officer and Co-Founder of FutureNow, Inc, and a best-selling author. He will be discussing and teaching the ins and outs of what he calls “persona marketing,” or rather building a persona or business image brand that will sell, along with your products and services. Craig Danuloff, President and Founder of ClickEquations, Inc, is an expert on internet marketing and search engine optimization techniques. David Brussin is the CEO and Co-Founder of Monetate, Inc., and will be hosting the discussion as well as sharing his views on how to best maintain and act on your business identity or persona.

The details of the webinar can be found below:

Title: Recession Marketing: From pre-click to post-click

Date: Wednesday, September 16, 2009

Time: 12PM Eastern / 9AM Pacific

Place: Online, register at https://www2.gotomeeting.com/register/985238170

Presenters:

Bryan Eisenberg, Chief Persuasion Officer and Co-Founder of FutureNow, Inc

Craig Danuloff, President and Founder of ClickEquations, Inc.

David Brussin, CEO & Co-Founder, Monetate, Inc.

There is a reason that the flow of users on the internet is referred to as “traffic.” Just like traffic on highways and interstates, internet traffic has slow times and rush hours, peaks and ebbs. During the summer, internet traffic is fairly steady, as the younger generation (which comprises a good deal of total internet traffic) is free from a set schedule, out of school and home from college. However, now that the fall is here and kids are back in school and schedules have been set, we here at Promoting Group would like to offer you a few tips for making your blogging and website updating plan coincide with the reinstated internet traffic rush hours.

If you are planning on updating your website or blog, it may be smartest to do so first thing in the morning (before school) or between 3 and 4 in the afternoon, when most students return home from school, for youth-oriented websites. For websites geared toward an older crowd, updates should be held off until later in the evening, after work and dinner hours are over. Most adolescents check their emails and favorite websites upon returning home from school, while adults tend to check their favorite websites towards the end of the day, when they are beginning to unwind. Updates that are fresh tend to garner better results on search engines, and while adults will quickly glance at updated websites during breaks or lunch hours at work, they will linger over website updates later in the evening, when they have more time.

This schedule is not limited to website or blog updates either. If you regularly send email blasts to a large number of people, sending these emails after school or work means that the emails will land in the top of user’s inboxes when they finally log on.

To sum up, keep your target audience in mind when updating websites, posting new blogs, or sending email blasts. For youth, updates and emails should be scheduled to appear when children return home from school. For adults, updates and emails will be best received in the early evening. Websites that are updated in the middle of the day tend to get lost in the shuffle of the day, so make sure to keep your schedule fresh and in sync with internet rush hour!

The fact that Wikipedia pages can be edited by anyone who surfs the web poses both a benefit and a problem. Opening the information pages up to the public means that over time, a page collects a wealth of information much more detailed and broad than any single author could produce. Little known facts and useful tidbits pop up over time, making reading a Wikipedia page similar to discussing a particular subject with a large group of friends. No one opinion dominates a page, and most of the time false information is overwritten by other authors with more accurate information.

Sometimes, however, false information is not removed quickly, much to the downfall of those looking to gather accurate facts from the site. Pranksters have been known to declare healthy celebrities dead, to include racy anecdotes in the biographies of saints, and to become a virtual mourning site for the recently deceased.

Wikipedia is now attempting to rectify this situation without overly censoring their large number of public authors. This article mentions that “at-risk” sites, such as Michael Jackson’s page, are more tightly monitored than others in some countries, and now Wikipedia is trying to take this security a step further. For the next few weeks, all additions and modifications to standing Wikipedia pages will have to be approved by a moderator before they are added to the web page. If the system seems to go well, it could become a standard Wikipedia security measure.

Hopefully, this procedure will weed out the pranksters and hoax-starters and leave behind a cleaner, more accurate website. However, there is also a chance that the moderators may wipe out some of the more interesting and little-known facts that make Wikipedia such an interesting website. Hopefully a balance can be struck that will be beneficial to all.

The glossy Apple styled icon has been the trend for quite some time, and now we are making your life easier in creating the iPhone icon using the template we created. What you need to do is plug in your logo or icon and make an icon like the one we showed above.

What you need to do is paste the image of your choice onto the “clipping” layer, and save it as PNG format. That will allow you to put the icon on colored background without running into any problem. Enjoy!

Adobe Illustrator Template

Adobe Photoshop Template

Here at Promoting Group, we have written many blogs about using Twitter to promote your business and get in touch with your clients. However, when used improperly, Twitter posts, or “tweets,” can be…well…annoying. So how do you construct a tweet that is effective?

We have several tips for creating tweets that will both get across your intended message, and also not annoy your “followers” with unnecessary blathering.

The main problem with Twitter is having too many updates. Twitter should be used to keep your business fresh in your clients’ minds and to share important information, not to bombard people with useless information every hour, on the hour. Stick to updating your Twitter account once a day at most, once a week at least.

Say something useful. It is better to not post a tweet at all than to post a tweet that does not give your clients any new or interesting information. Announce what new projects you are working on, declare an ongoing project finished, and describe new products. Tweets that read “Great day at work today,” or “Heard a great song on the radio,” are not interesting to clients, and may eventually lead clients to unsubscribe from following your Twitter account.

Twitter only allows for 140 characters per tweet. If you find yourself abbreviating words or phrases to fit in your whole idea, take a step back. Abbreviations and shortened phrases are fine for Miley Cyrus, but have no place in the business world. If you can’t fit your tweet into 140 characters, rethink what you want to say. Do not tweet until you can fit your idea into one concise sentence! Simplify, simplify, simplify.

With these three ideas in mind, you should be able to tame Twitter and keep your clients checking in. Just remember, do not tweet too often, say something interesting and informative, and mind the 140 character limit carefully. Twitter should be an ally, not a pitfall.

Google has certainly seemed to dominate the World Wide Web for the past several years, though both Microsoft and Yahoo! have put up a good fight. Microsoft recently launched its own search engine, called Bing, and Yahoo! reformatted its home page to include a whole slew of social media applications. Google held its own however, announcing plenty of its own new applications such as a social media platform called Google Wave and even its own operating system to be launched next year.

While the three companies competed, it seemed just like your average, run-of-the-mill battle of the brands. Now, however, Microsoft and Yahoo! have joined forces to try to take down the Google Empire once and for all. Though it still seems unclear as to whether the Yahoo! search engine and the Bing! search engine will be combined into one entity or whether they will work separately to dominate Google, it is fairly certain that all responsibilities for the Yahoo! search engine have been turned over to Microsoft. How Microsoft will choose to use this new power is still unknown.

Currently, Microsoft and Yahoo! combined only make up for 28% of the nation’s internet searches, whereas Google holds a whopping 65%. While this Microsoft-Yahoo! deal surely means some trouble for Google, it seems premature to assume that they will be able to dominate Google’s huge lead, even with their combination. All that is clear is that the world of search engines is changing, and changing rapidly. We here at Promoting Group are interested to see how all of these new products, services, upcoming plans, and forged bonds will play out and change the face of the internet as we know it.