Jason Toff, associate product marketing manager for Google, wrote a blog post in 2009 about web browsers. He conducted an informal survey of his friends and found that, despite their spending much more time on the Internet than they did in their cars, more of them knew what kind of car they drove than which Internet browser they used.

Image by Matrixizationized

As counterintuitive as those results seem, they are completely believable. We use web browsers every day, but few people know what they are. Web browsers are applications that allow users to access the Internet. They convert HTML and other programming languages into graphical representations we know as webpages. Your web browser is the application you open when you get on the Internet.

In the early days of the Internet, Internet Explorer enjoyed much of the market share. However, it has new competition today as browsers like Mozilla Firefox, Opera, Apple’s Safari and Google Chrome come to the forefront. Each browser has its strengths and weaknesses. There are several websites you can visit to learn more about each type of browser and determine which is best for your business.

Like web browsers, many people use search engines but few know how to do so effectively. Performing basic searches on Google, Yahoo, Bing or other search engines is easy, but won’t always get you the results you’re looking for. Here are a few hints that will make your Google searches more productive.

• Specialized searches. Google has several branches you can use to search, including Google Maps, Books, News, Shopping and more. Narrow your search with these tabs to get the specific information you’re looking for.
• Quotation marks. Putting quotation marks around phrases will indicate that Google should look only for that exact phrase, not the individual words. For example, if you’re searching for information about George Mason University, putting the phrase in quotation marks will help eliminate results for George Clooney, the Mason-Dixon Line and Harvard University.
• Not. Use the minus (-) symbol to indicate you don’t want results for a certain term to show up in your results. This is useful when using ambiguous terms in your search. If you’re learning about the Greek alphabet, for example, you might include “-airlines” in your search for “delta.”

PMI‘s e-learning curriculum is designed to give you the knowledge you need to build a business from square one.  As you’ve probably noticed from looking at the coursework, there’s a lot that goes into building a great business.  Enrolling in PMI’s courses is just like going back to school – there are quizzes, workbooks, and homework.  Learning how to build a future for yourself in real estate or on the internet is exhilarating, but it’s can also be overwhelming.  One of the best ways to help yourself learn and remember the things covered in the coursework is with mnemonic devices.

Mnemonic devices are psychological tools you can use to help yourself remember things you have learned.  You probably already know and use several mnemonics on a regular basis.  If you’ve ever tied a string around your finger to help you remember to run an errand, or made a grocery list to remember what to buy, you’ve used mnemonic devices.  Creating external reminders for yourself is a great way to remember lists of items like to-do’s, keywords to test, or property bidding criteria.  Lists and other physical reminders are the most basic form of mnemonic device, but they are effective and easy to create.

Any child that has taken music courses has learned how to use acrostics and acronyms.  Acrostics are sentences in which each word is indicative of an item to be remembered.  Acronyms are words in which each letter signifies something to be remembered.  The acrostic “every good boy does fine” is one that music students learn to remember the lined notes on the treble clef.  The acronym “FACE” signifies the space notes on the treble clef.  With a little creativity, you can create acronyms and acrostics to remember any series of items you like.

If you need to remember a person’s name that you’ve just met, a great mnemonic device is to create wordplay with their name.  If you meet someone named Courtney Brown, you could imagine her spilling a quart of chocolate (brown) milk on her knee – quart, knee, brown.  It sounds silly, but the sillier the better if you want to really remember something on the fly.  Then, it’s important to review the names and wordplays you’ve made within a few minutes of creating them to make sure they really stick.

Learning new information is always challenging, but mnemonic devices can help you recall and retain information easily.  The brain is like a muscle, the more you use it and challenge it, the stronger it gets.  The more you use mnemonic devices, the easier it will be to create them on the spot and to retain information in the long run.

Email correspondence should generally be treated with the same formality as handwritten correspondence.  Though emails are much less intrusive than phone calls, they should be returned with the same level of urgency.  Promptly returning an email lets your recipient know that you respect them and their time.  When you go to answer an email, make sure to take note of all of the questions asked within the message and address all of them in your response.  If you receive a message that you feel the need to forward, select your recipients carefully and add a personalized message at the beginning of the forward to ensure it doesn’t end up in your contact’s trash bin before they bother to read it. 

Pay attention to grammar and punctuation.  Most email programs provide a spell checker, so spelling should be easy to monitor.  If you need help with grammar, refer to one of the many grammar guides available online or you can plug your message into a word document to check for obvious problems.  Sometimes people title urgent or important emails in all caps, but this can cause your email to be filtered out by a spam blocker, so avoid caps in titles (and within the message – it can seem like shouting) and make sure that your email titles are relevant to your message. 

Use the “reply to all”, Bcc and Cc functions appropriately.  “Reply to all” should be used only when you are sure that everyone on your recipient list needs to hear what you have to say.  Bcc (blind carbon copy) is best applied when you have to send a message to a group of people who are not familiar with one another and may not be comfortable sharing their email address with the other people on the recipient list.  Cc (carbon copy) is best when sending a message to a group of people who are familiar with one another and when it is useful for recipients to know who else has the information.

Large attachments can cause problems if your message recipient is not expecting them.  Spam filters will often throw out messages with large files attached and you could even clog someone’s inbox, causing them to miss messages sent after your attachment.  Also, be mindful of how you address your recipients.  Most professional people nowadays are comfortable using first names at the beginning of a relationship, but it’s always a good idea to err on the side of formality.  Stick to “Mr.”, “Ms.”, and “Dr.” until you are invited to use a first name.  It is also a good idea to create a professional sounding email address for yourself.  Addresses like “ilovecats” or “soccermom77” are fine for sending messages to friends, but not to professional contacts. Most email services will allow you to add a second address to the same account, so you can receive all of your messages in the same box regardless of which address they are sent to.  If you choose to add a second account, make sure you select the correct return address for each message you send.

Every couple of months, I expect to get a phone call from one of my grandparents about a computer problem they just can’t figure out on their own.  Normally the problem is a simple fix – something like changing their user preferences or just figuring out the right-click on the mouse.  Every time I help them out, they apologize profusely for “bothering me” or “taking so much of my time”, but I always assure them that it’s no problem.  Really, I get it.  It’s a well known fact that children learn things, from playing the piano to picking up a second language, much faster than adults do.  I grew up with technology, and for me, sending emails and using search engines second nature.  But for them, learning how to use a computer is like trying to learn Japanese.  Whether you grew up surfing the web or internet interactions feel like a foreign language, most of us could stand to learn more about the network we use to send and receive information every day.  Understanding the way the internet works will help you use it more effectively and understand the problems you run into as you surf.  Here are some great websites to teach you more about the internet whether you are a novice or a seasoned pro.

www.learnthenet.com – This is a great website for beginners who want to gain a solid knowledge of what the internet is, how it works, and how to use it.  The site provides information on how to use the internet, the basic anatomy of a web page, how to use bookmarks, how to subscribe to Rss feeds, and how to send emails.

www.wikipedia.org/wiki/internet – This is a one-page article about the internet – including the definition of the internet, a brief history, a basic outline of the internet’s uses and structure, and internet-related terminology.

www.isoc.org – This is the homepage of the Internet Society and is geared toward individuals with a basic understanding of the internet who want to learn more about the history of the internet and the laws the govern it.   Visitors to the site can join communities of internet users and discuss the latest web related issues.

www.forbes.com/technology – This is the technology section of the famous Forbes magazine website.  This site is filled with articles about current internet and business related events and opinions, and will be most appreciated by people with knowledge of the internet and an interest in its effect on business and the economy.

www.internet.com – This website is geared toward technology professionals with a keen interest in internet development and its impact on the future of technology.

Based on the public reaction to Facebook’s recently changed privacy policy, you would think first-born children and playoff tickets were unknowingly being signed over to Mark Zuckerberg. In fact, what are being turned over to the social media guru are drunken pictures, uncouth status updates, and embarrassing “likes.” (You’re a fan of The Rosie O’Donnell Show? Really?)

Let’s not kid ourselves; no one is worried that a potential employer finds out they’ve read Catcher in the Rye or listen to The Who – although that may not be the case if you read Twilight or listen to Nickelback. When dealing with a website designed solely for the sharing of information, the concern isn’t that good, flattering, or impressive details about our lives are now out there for the Internet to see. The concern is that our little indiscretions or moments of weakness may make it to the eyes of teachers, parents, bosses, or worse.

This duality of life is nothing new. Decades ago, people still had to be discreet about who they associated with and where they were seen. The Facebook of the previous generation was women sitting around playing bridge, men around the water cooler, and phone lines (you know, the kind that occasionally produced busy signals).

The June Cleavers and Carol Bradys of the world would tell you the answer to such a predicament is to stop doing those kinds of things you wouldn’t want your superiors finding out. Does that same advice apply in today’s modern landscape?

What people are concerned about, whether they realize it or not, is maintaining their personal brand – their name, their image, their work. When a complete stranger comes across them – whether through digital or analog means – they want to be able to portray a specific attitude and personality. But with Facebook’s new privacy policy, that task will now require work.

If someone posts an incriminating picture of me, I’m going to have to contact that individual and ask them to take the picture down. If they refuse, I may have to be persistent. If someone makes a disparaging remark about me, I may have to approach them to discuss the reason for their comment and try to resolve any personal concerns they may have.

This requires effort on my part, which is exactly what maintaining a brand requires. Companies pay millions of dollars each year to maintain and promote their brands. They’ll occasionally pay even more in order to counteract (or cover-up) negative press surrounding their brand.

A personal brand is no different. Friends, coworkers, and siblings have been sharing incriminating pictures and telling embarrassing stories for a long time. Facebook has made their audience much bigger, but the process is no different.

And just like you can’t shut down the diner where stories are passed along or raid the homes where gossip is shared, you can’t control the online medium used to damage your ego.

You can either work meticulously to control the online profiles of you, your friends, their friends, anyone you may encounter, and anyone they may know, or just stop doing bad things.