Here’s a fact about websites that most of us don’t really consider: all website contact forms discourage people from enquiring. Why? Because no one wants to send off their personal information online, and in particular, not to a business or website they have never dealt with before. And yes, many people do complete online forms, for every successful form completion there will be countless others that don’t fill it out. And for those instances it will often be the form itself is what’s deterring the website visitor from enquiring.

Let’s use the retail industry as an example

Think about this…What would you do if you walked into a book shop and before you were able to flick through the books and scan the backs of the latest publications, you were asked to provide your personal information and contact details? In a short time, that book shop wouldn’t get any people through the door and would fail. But think about it, your contact form is doing the same thing as this book shop – it’s asking for customers’ contact details before they have had chance to touch and feel the products or experience the services.

What we have to accept is that any type of contact form on a website is a hurdle (however small) that must be overcome in the sales process. The form asks for personal information from the customer before they’ve spoken to you or seen you – in other words, they’re still in ‘browsing’ mode and you’re already asking for their personal information. To make matters worse, if your website form then asks for too much information, you are just increasing the size of the hurdle. If you look at your contact forms, do you really need the full postal address at the very first stage of your relationship with the customer? Or do you absolutely have to know what product they’re interested in upfront, or do you really need to know ‘how they found your website’ at the very first step? What is more important? – less enquiries that have a bit more information (e.g. their address and that they found you via Google) or more enquiries without that information?

Remember, just the sight of a long contact form (e.g. 8 rows or more), will be enough to discourage some people from enquiring, and they won’t have even looked at what information that form is asking for. Think about it – if someone hands you a research survey with four pages of questions, are you more or less likely to complete it than a survey with one page of questions? It’s the same principle.

Making contact forms more approachable

To be clear – I like contact forms. They generate more enquiries that just adding your sales email address on the ‘Contact Us’ page. But the more basic and inviting the contact form is, the more likely it is that people will fill it out. So to start with, only include the fields in your contact form that are absolutely required for you to respond to the enquirer, plus a non-mandatory ‘comments’ field so the enquirer can give more detail about their enquiry if they want to.

Also, make sure you give the enquirer a variety of reasons to contact you. Different web pages on your site should have different contact forms asking the visitor to enquire for a variety of reasons. These reasons might include ‘download our latest white paper’, or ‘request a sample’ or simply ‘Request our brochure’. The visitor will feel like they are getting something in return for providing their contact details – they are now contacting you for something specific using a simple and easy-to-complete web form. You might not have completely removed the hurdle, but now it is a lot easier.

To begin with, launch Outlook 2010 and on File menu, click Options.

It will bring up Outlook Options dialog, from left sidebar select Mail and from main dialog window, click Stationary and Fonts.

It will open up Signatures and Stationary dialog, switch to Personal Stationary tab to change default font settings for; New mail messages, Replying or forwarding messages, and Composing and reading plain text message. Here you can also change the generic Theme.

Change Default font styles & settings

For changing default font size, color and family, under New mail message section, click Font.

You will reach Font main dialog, start changing basic font settings; from Font select the font family, under Font style, choose desired style and from Size change the size of font.

Apart from the basic settings, you can also set some extra font settings such as; Font color, Underline Style and Color. From Effects, enable different font effects options. You can see all the changes in Preview pane. Once done, click OK to continue.

Repeat the same procedure for changing font settings for forwarding messages, by clicking Font button, under Replying or forwarding messages section.

Now on opening Mail Compose window, you will see changed default settings, i.e, font family, size, and color.

Applying default theme

For changing theme, move to Signatures and Stationary dialog. Click Theme to open up Theme or Stationary dialog, under Choose a Theme list, select the theme for email message. You can also enable/disable different theme styles; Vivid Colors, Active Graphics and Background Image. Click OK and close Outlook Options dialog.

The theme will be added in the mail compose window.

For a more comprehensive look at everything that has improved in 3.0 check out 3.0′s Codex page or the long list of issues in Trac. (We’re trying to keep these announcement posts shorter.) Whew! That’s a lot packed into one release. I can’t think of a better way to kick off the 3.X cycle we’ll be in for the next two and a half years.

The Future

Normally this is where I’d say we’re about to start work on 3.1, but we’re actually not. We’re going to take a release cycle off to focus on all of the things around WordPress. The growth of the community has been breathtaking, including over 10.3 million downloads of version 2.9, but so much of our effort has been focused on the core software it hasn’t left much time for anything else. Over the next three months we’re going to split into ninja/pirate teams focused on different areas of the around-WordPress experience, including the showcase, Codex, forums, profiles, update and compatibility APIs, theme directory, plugin directory, mailing lists, core plugins, wordcamp.org… the possibilities are endless. The goal of the teams isn’t going to be to make things perfect all at once, just better than they are today. We think this investment of time will give us a much stronger infrastructure to grow WordPress.org for the many tens of millions of users that will join us during the 3.X release cycle.

It Takes a Village

I’m proud to acknowledge the contributions of the following 218 people to the 3.0 release cycle. These are the folks that make WordPress what it is, whose collaboration and hard work enable us to build something greater than the sum of our parts. In alphabetical order, of course.

Committers: azaozz (Andrew Ozz) (prof), dd32 (Dion Hulse) (prof), donncha (Donncha O Caoimh) (prof), iammattthomas (Matt Thomas) (prof), josephscott (Joseph Scott) (prof), markjaquith (Mark Jaquith) (prof), matt (Matt Mullenweg) (prof), nacin (Andrew Nacin) (prof), nbachiyski (Николай Бачийски) (prof), ryan (Ryan Boren) (prof), westi (Peter Westwood) (prof), and wpmuguru (Ron Rennick) (prof). Contributors: aaroncampbell (Aaron Campbell) (prof), akerem (prof), alexkingorg (Alex King) (prof), amattie (prof), ampt (Luke Gallagher) (prof), andrea_r (prof), andreasnrb (Andreas Nurbo) (prof), anilo4ever (Angelo Verona) (prof), apeatling (Andy Peatling) (prof), apokalyptik (Demitrious Kelly) (prof), arena (André Renaut) (prof), barry (Barry Abrahamson) (prof), batmoo (Mohammad Jangda) (prof), beaulebens (Beau Lebens) (prof), belg4mit (prof), bigdawggi (Matthew G. Richmond) (prof), blepoxp (Glenn Ansley) (prof), brentes (Brent Shepherd) (prof), briancolinger (Brian Colinger) (prof), bumbu (prof), caesarsgrunt (Caesar Schinas) (prof), camiloclc (prof), CAMWebDesign (prof), carbolineum (prof), caspie (prof), catiakitahara (Cátia Kitahara) (prof), CharlesClarkson (Charles Clarkson) (prof), chdorner (Christof Dorner) (prof), chrisbliss18 (Chris Jean) (prof), chrisscott (Chris Scott) (prof), cnorris23 (Brandon Allen) (prof), coffee2code (Scott Reilly) (prof), computerwiz908 (prof), cyberhobo (Dylan Kuhn) (prof), dancole (Dan Cole) (prof), Daniel Koskinen , deepak.seth (Deepak Seth), demetris (Δημήτρης Κίκιζας) (prof), Denis-de-Bernardy (prof), dimadin (Milan Dinić) (prof), dndrnkrd (Dan Drinkard) (prof), docwhat (prof), dougwrites (prof), dphiffer (Dan Phiffer) (prof), dragoonis (prof), dremeda (Dre Armeda) (prof), dtoj , dougal (Dougal Campbell) (prof), duck_ (Jon Cave) (prof), dxjones (David Jones) (prof), eddieringle (Eddie Ringle) (prof), edward mindreantre (Edward Hevlund), eoinomurchu (prof), empireoflight/Ben Dunkle (prof), ericmann (Eric Mann) (prof), etiger13 (Eddie Monge Jr.) (prof), filosofo (Austin Matzko) (prof), firebird75 (prof), frankieroberto (Frankie Roberto) (prof), Frumph (Philip M. Hofer) (prof), garyc40 (Gary Cao) (prof), gautam2011 (prof), Gary Ross (Gazzer) , GDragoN (Milan Petrovic) (prof), greenshady (Justin Tadlock) (prof), GIGALinux (Dennis Morhardt) (prof), hakre (prof), husky (prof), iandstewart (Ian Stewart) (prof), ipstenu (Mika Epstein) (prof), jacobsantos (Jacob Santos) (prof), jamescollins (James Collins) (prof), jane (Jane Wells) (prof), jbsil (Jesse Silverstein) (prof), jdub (Jeff Waugh) (prof), jeffikus (Jeffrey Pearce) (prof), jeffstieler (Jeff Stieler) (prof), jeremyclarke (Jeremy Clarke) (prof), jfarthing84 (Jeff Farthing) (prof), Jick (James Dimick) (prof), jmstacey (Jon Stacey) (prof), jobjorn (Jobjörn Folkesson) (prof), johanee (Johan Eenfeldt) (prof), johnbillion (John Blackbourn) (prof), johnjamesjacoby/jjj (John James Jacoby) (prof), johnjosephbachir (John Joseph Bachir) (prof), johnl1479 (John Luetke) (prof), johnonolan (John O’Nolan) (prof), JohnPBloch/wmrom (John Bloch) (prof), joostdevalk/yoast (Joost de Valk) (prof), jorbin (Aaron Jorbin) (prof), joshtime (prof), jshreve (prof), junsuijin (prof), kallewangstedt (Karl Wångstedt) (prof), keighl (Kyle Truscott) (prof), kevinB (Kevin Behrens) (prof), koopersmith (Daryl Koopersmith) (prof), kpdesign (Kim Parsell) (prof), ktdreyer (Ken Dreyer) (prof), kurtmckee (Kurt McKee) (prof), laceous (prof), lancewillett (Lance Willett) (prof), lloydbudd (Lloyd Budd) (prof), lriggle (prof), markauk (prof), markmcwilliams (Mark McWilliams) (prof), markoheijnen (Marko Heijnen) (prof), markup (Sasha Mukhin) (prof), mattsains (prof), matveb (Matias Ventura) (prof), mdawaffe (Michael Adams) (prof) , mentel_br (prof), messenlehner (Brian Messenlehner) (prof), miau_jp (prof), Michael (Michael Heilemann) (prof), MichaelH (prof), mikeschinkel (Mike Schinkel) (prof), Miloslav Beňo , minusfive (prof), miqrogroove (Robert Chapin) (prof), misterbisson (Casey Bisson) (prof), mitchoyoshitaka (mitcho (Michael 芳貴 Erlewine)) (prof), MMN-o (prof), momo360modena (Amaury Balmer) (prof), morganestes (Morgan Estes) (prof), mrmist (David McFarlane) (prof), mtdewvirus (Nick Momrik) (prof), nadavvin (prof), Nao (Naoko McCracken) (prof), nathanrice (Nathan Rice) (prof), neoxx (Bernhard Riedl) (prof), niallkennedy (Niall Kennedy) (prof), ninjaWR (Ryan Murphy) (prof), noel (Noël Jackson) (prof), nomulous (Fletcher Tomalty) (prof), ocean90 (Dominik Schilling) (prof), Otto42 (Samuel Wood) (prof), pedger (prof), PeteMall (prof), pampfelimetten (prof), pnettle (prof), PotterSys (Juan) (prof), prettyboymp (Michael Pretty) (prof), ptahdunbar (Ptah Dunbar) (prof), ramiy (prof), RanYanivHartstein (Ran Yaniv Hartstein) (prof), reaperhulk (Paul Kehrer) (prof), reko (prof), remi (Rémi Prévost) (prof), rlerdorf (Rasmus Lerdorf) (prof) , rmccue (Ryan McCue) (prof), rooodini (prof), rovo89 (prof), ruslany (prof), sc0ttkclark (Scott Kingsley Clark) (prof), scottbasgaard (Scott Basgaard) (prof), ScottMac (prof), scribu (prof), SergeyBiryukov (Сергей Бирюков) (prof), ShaneF (prof), sillybean (Stephanie Leary) (prof), Simek (Bartosz Kaszubowski) (prof), simonwheatley (Simon Wheatley) (prof), simosx (Σίμος Ξενιτέλλης) (prof), sirzooro (Daniel Frużyński) (prof), sivel (Matt Martz) (prof), skeltoac (Andy Skelton) (prof), snumb130 (Luke Howell) (prof), solarissmoke (Samir Shah) (prof), sorich87 (prof), ssandison (prof), stencil (prof), stephdau (Stephane Daury) (prof), tai (prof), TECannon (Tracy Cannon) (prof), technosailor (Aaron Brazell) (prof), tenpura (prof), thales.tede , TheDeadMedic (prof), thee17 (Charles E. Frees-Melvin) (prof), thetoine (Antoine Girard) (prof), tinkerpriest (c.bavota) (prof), TobiasBg (Tobias Bäthge) (prof), tomtomp (prof), tychay (Terry Chay) (prof), typeomedia (prof), uglyrobot (Aaron Edwards) (prof), UnderWordPressure (prof), usermrpapa (prof), Utkarsh (Utkarsh Kukreti) (prof), validben (Benoit Gilloz ) (prof), Viper007Bond (Alex Mills) (prof), vladimir_kolesnikov (Vladimir Kolesnikov) (prof), willmot (Tom Willmot) (prof), wahgnube (prof), waltervos (Walter Vos) (prof), wds-chris (Christopher Cochran) (prof), williamsba1 (Brad Williams) (prof), wnorris (Will Norris) (prof), xibe (Xavier Borderie) (prof), yoavf (Yoav Farhi) (prof), zeo (Safirul Alredha) (prof), znarfor (François Hodierne) (prof), and zoranzaric (Zoran Zaric) (prof).

Bonus

If you’ve made it this far, check out my 2010 State of the Word speech at WordCamp San Francisco, it’s jam-packed with information on the growth of WordPress, 3.0, what we’re planning for the future, and the philosophy of WordPress.

PC Authority test six of the most popular services.

A NAS drive is ideal for sharing documents and media with all the PCs on your network, but for critical data it’s worth remembering that hard disks can fail. Once you factor in the possibility of theft and fire damage, it pays to back up your most vital data remotely. Using an online service is never going to be as fast or convenient as backing up to a local hard disk, so it’s best viewed as complementary to a NAS device.

Mozy
Mozy is the most basic here and offers 2GB of storage for absolutely nothing, and unlimited storage for a bargain US$5 per month. There are various presets to tick, depending on what you want to back up: various office file types, My Favorites, media collections or there’s a file-tree to create your own.

Scheduled backups can be set, but Mozy works best by monitoring modified files. However, it will only back them up differentially, when the system is idle. It uses 448-bit Blowfish encryption and you can use the Mozy key or enter your own as long as you keep it safe. Locked files can be backed up from NTFS-formatted disks, while older versions of files are kept for 30 days before they’re deleted, and backups can be restored onto any PC via the website.

But few things in life are free: the user interface is painfully basic, plus the fact that it doesn’t continuously back up files as they change makes Mozy less effective for vital work.
3/6

Carbonite
Carbonite, on the other hand, is well worth paying for. Taking the view that people are inherently lazy and don’t want to pick and choose files to back up, the US-based firm charges a flat annual rate of US$50 regardless of how much you back up. After initially choosing what to store, the user interface is barely needed, as the software integrates with Windows Explorer. Colour-coded dots on files keep you up to date with the backup progress, and all selected files are encrypted with a 1024-bit Blowfish key before transfer.

Backup is continuous rather than scheduled, and you can alter the Internet priority to prevent it disrupting your work. Modified files are sent after ten minutes of inactivity, but only generally once in a 24-hour period; however, you can manually force a constantly changing file to back up immediately if it’s vital. Your Carbonite virtual drive appears in My Computer, letting you browse and restore individual files with ease.

That ultra-low price is per PC, and your backup is locked to the PC it was taken from, so sharing files isn’t possible. But Carbonite is purely a backup service and, thanks to its set-up-and-forget convenience, it offers great value for home users.
6/6

Boomerang
Boomerang is the consumer arm of UK-based DATABarracks, and features a well-designed and flexible user interface. A wizard lets you select from organised lists of file types and helpfully integrates with Outlook. Backups can be scheduled or files backed up when the PC is idle for a few minutes.

When restoring, you can view thumbnails of your files, and unlimited differential file versions are stored in case you need to roll back. The account integration allows you to change your details or upgrade your plan without leaving the client software, and you can log in to the website and restore files using any PC.

Boomerang’s added control and flexibility makes it well worth paying the £24 ($60) over Mozy. It takes a different approach to Carbonite, but the fact that it can be used on an unlimited number of PCs widens its appeal. Bear in mind at the time of review it was in the final beta stages with a few significant bugs, so wait for the final release.
4/6

BullGuard Backup
Early 2007 launches are expected from McAfee and Symantec, but security expert BullGuard has got there first with its online backup module. Prices are tempting: just $50 for 2GB, plus you get an extra 1GB free for signing up, and each further gigabyte costs $25 up to a maximum of 5GB.

A wizard walks you through the process of selecting what to back up, including Outlook integration, and you can choose to save files daily, weekly or monthly. As it’s aimed at home users, there’s no continuous backup function, but each backup set can be given its own quick-start Desktop icon, and the resume function worked flawlessly throughout our tests.

BullGuard sends full differential files and keeps past versions, and your online drive can be accessed simply via Explorer. Alternatively, use the website to restore files onto any PC with an Internet connection. Your account details are accessible via the client software, as is the superb free 24/7 live chat support, which is a service no other home product comes anywhere near matching.

The flat rate per gigabyte means the value diminishes as you add more storage capacity, and the 5GB cap limits its appeal somewhat for power users. But the simple software – which integrates into any existing BullGuard security suite on your PC – and great prices at smaller sizes make BullGuard a good choice for home use.

Building on Commonwealth Bank’s vision of banking in 2013, the Group is announcing its next digital innovation with the release of its iPhone augmented reality application for anyone buying or selling a home, or simply looking to keep on top of the property market.

The new iPhone application will take property search to a new level, revolutionising the way home buyers search for a home allowing them to make smarter property decisions with virtual reality insight in to any Australian home anywhere, anytime.  

The technology is supported by two industry leaders realestate.com.au, the nation’s number one property portal and rpdata.com, Australia’s leading property information and analytics company.

The core functionality of the application utilises ‘augmented reality’ where rich data including past sales history (on more than 95 per cent of properties in Australia), current property listings and recent sales, is mapped on to a real world view through the iPhone’s camera.

Users can also switch to a list or bird’s eye view to pull in insights on properties matching their search criteria. Home hunters can then track their ‘dream house’ in their favourites, send to a friend and make informed decisions with access to detailed suburb profiles revealing demographics, median price, property hotspots and capital growth trends.

According to Mark Murray, General Manager Consumer Marketing, “We are leveraging new technology and continually innovating to deliver convenient, relevant and real-time services to make buying a home easier.

“As Australia’s biggest home lender we have teamed up with rpdata.com and realestate.com.au, to help Australians make an informed decision when it comes to making their biggest financial commitment.

“The new iPhone application will be an industry first in Australia.  Home buyers and sellers can easily access a host of customised information, tools and insights on every home in Australia – for free.

“The application is a significant milestone in our 2013 vision of banking, bringing virtual reality property search to customers right here, right now,” added Mr Murray.

A video demo of the iPhone augmented reality application will be available next week with the application available for download from the Apple App Store, coming soon.

Well, the answer is a bit confusing as all webmasters have different views about the three CMS systems. This difference in their opinions simply baffles the online marketers further, making it a lot difficult to make their own choice for their websites. Well, here below is a small review about the three CMS systems and their easily available templates.

WordPress: For most webmasters, WordPress is the first choice for all their online marketers and other clients. The reason being, it is simple, easy to install, extremely user-friendly and offers its users a range of plug-ins and customized templates for their new websites. You do not require any technical guidance or support for managing your WordPress powered website.

However, using too many WordPress plug-ins in your website or blog may cause certain PHP errors or even crash your website.

Joomla: Another highly preferred content management system, Joomla is specifically designed for the huge masses. This new CMS system recently became extremely popular mainly due to its classy visual interface. The system like WordPress is easy to install and also offers a variety of plug-ins for additional function in your website. You can also avail various Joomla templates on the web for giving your website a fresh new look.

On the contrary, the Joomla CMS system and templates is perfect for only those online marketers who have some technical skills on managing websites and its content. The system is a bit complex than WordPress.

Drupal: The latest CMS launched after WordPress and Joomla, Drupal is technically the most advanced system available on the web. It is strong, secured, speedy and highly effective. Moreover, the layout and the presentation of Drupal are less restricted than that offered by wordpress and Joomla. If you are skilled enough in HTML and PHP, only then Drupal is your perfect choice. The Drupal based templates can be largely found on the web only on special orders by the marketers for their website.

As compared to WordPress and Joomla, Drupal is far more technical and hence, is preferred only by the highly skilled webmasters.

This tutorial shows you how to set up Microsoft Outlook 2003® to work with your e-mail account. This tutorial focuses on setting up Microsoft Outlook 2003, but these settings are similar in other versions of Microsoft Outlook. You can set up previous versions of Microsoft Outlook by using the settings in this tutorial.

To Set Up Your E-mail Account in Microsoft Outlook

1. In Microsoft Outlook, from the E-mail Accounts menu, select Tools.
2. On the E-mail Accounts wizard window, select Add a new e-mail account, and then click Next.
3. For your server type, select POP3 and then click Next.
4. On the Internet E-mail Settings (POP3 window, enter your information as follows:

Your Name

Your first and last name.

E-mail Address

Your email address.

User Name

Your email address, again.

Password

Your email account password.

Incoming mail server (POP3) mail.yourdomainname.com

 

Outgoing mail server (SMTP) mail.yourdomainname.com

Click More Settings.

NOTE: “Some internet service providers like bigpond block your SMTP port 25 in which case you can change it from 25 to 26 or you can use the outgoing mail server for your Internet Service Provider. Contact your Internet Service Provider to get this setting. Please be advised that if your SMTP port 25 is blocked you will not be able to send email.

5. On the Internet E-mail Settings window, go to the Outgoing Server tab.
6. Select My outgoing server (SMTP) requires authentication.
7. Select Use same settings as my incoming mail server. If you changed the user name and password in the SMTP relay section of your Manage Email Accounts page, select Log on using and enter the user name and password.
8. Go to the Advanced tab, and then change the Outgoing server (SMTP) port to 25 or 26.
9. Click OK.
10. Click Next.
11. Click Finish.

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ns2.bgtech.swiftdns.com.au 111.67.15.152

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