Saturday, January 23, 2010

Use Your Cell Phone to Scan For Information!

We've all seen the bar codes that are used everywhere from grocery stores to department stores, from supply houses to small businesses. They are featured on nearly every product you buy and they look like the image above.

Well...get ready for a new bar code called a QR code (Quick Response) that is going to begin having a huge impact on business information and how it is delivered to you via your cell phone in the coming year.

While conventional bar codes are capable of storing a maximum of approximately 20 digits, QR code is capable of handling several hundred times more information.

Expect to see QR codes in magazine advertisements, on billboards, web pages or even on someone’s t-shirt. Once it is "scanned" to your cell phone, it can give you details about that business, or details about the person wearing the t-shirt, show you a URL which you can click to see a trailer for a movie, or it may give you a coupon which you can use in a local outlet.

The reason why QR codes are more useful than a standard bar code is that they can store (and digitally present) much more data, including URL links, pictures, GEO coordinates, and text. The other key feature of QR codes is that instead of requiring a chunky hand-held scanner to scan them, most recent cell phones can scan them. The full Wikipedia description is here.

For a short YouTube explanation by Marcello Di Pietro: click here

Any business, no matter how small or large, could use QR codes in a number of ways. You might auto generate one next to every product on your web site containing all the product details, the number to call and the URL link to the page so they can show their friends on their cell phone.

You could add one to your business card containing your contact details so its easy for someone to add you to their contacts on their cell phone, without any typing!

Below is an example of my business contact information, including a photo, company logo and link to my website. All you need is the READER application which is available for download to your phone at several Internet sites. The QR code can be as small as your thumbnail or as large as a billboard.

Add your QR code to any print advertising, flyers, posters, invites, tv ads etc. containing:

  • product details
  • contact details
  • offer details
  • event details
  • a coupon
  • Twitter, Facebook, MySpace IDs
  • a link to a YouTube video
  • Or, in my case...Access to individual homes for sale, mortgage information, Open Houses, mapping and more.

What is it really all about? Well, some may not see it, but its yet another example of the blurring of the edges of media, as we all continue our journey to a completely connected world.

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Saturday, January 16, 2010

REMV for Marketing Homes For Sale?

REMV, or Real Estate Music Video, is the newest and hottest way of video marketing homes for sale. Like the music videos you see on TV and Youtube, this application can range from hard-hitting impact marketing like this:


...to soft (think James Taylor) and smooth video marketing like this:
(which one do you prefer?)

If you think the above marketing videos are cool, you should see what can be done with a single property REMV. A key component to creating this kind of video is looking at photography in a different way. It's not simply about posting pictures and adding a soundtrack, it's about telling a story and creating a sequence of photos that take the viewer on a ride complete with images of the area as well as the individual property.

If you are considering the sale of your home, now is the best time in years to do so. If you want the most comprehensive marketing available from a real estate company, you need Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage. If you want the most unique and extensive marketing available from a North Shore real estate agent, you need me. Best of all, we are on the same team. Call me for a confidential consultation to discuss your options: 978.233.2828 (direct)




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Scan my QR Code Contact information to your cell phone:



Thursday, January 14, 2010

A Nattering Nabob of Negativism

That's what one disgruntled reader recently called me after I wrote as a guest contributor on a well-known, well-written and well-read Hamilton blog site known as Unquestionably Questionable. Me? A "nattering nabob of negativism"? Ouch!

I did not even know what a "nabob" was so I went to the Internet for clarification. Here is what I found:

na·bob (noun):



  1. A governor in India under the Mogul Empire. Also called nawab. (That can't be it)



  2. A person of wealth and prominence. (Wealth...no. Prominence...I don't think so!)



  3. A rich, powerful, or important man. (Definitely not)
So what exactly did this person mean? What was she implying?

I decided to seek enlightenment at the next most likely site to have an answer: Henderson's Cafe & Coffee Shop in Wenham.

For those unfamiliar with this hot spot of community culture and local politics, it's next to the Hamilton Shopping Center (aka: The Shoppes at Hamilton Crossing) on, as they say...the "other side of the tracks". If you really want to take the pulse of our two towns, you have to visit Henderson's where opinions are never in short supply and politicians that dare to enter can always find answers to their pressing problems.

Which is why I asked several members of what I call Henderson's "Breakfast Club" if anyone knew what a "nabob" was...as in "nattering nabob of negativism".

Wouldn't you know it? A couple of the attendees were familiar with the phrase and explained where it originated, even as a third member of the group looked it up on his Apple iPhone. It seems it is one of the most popular phrases associated with U.S. Vice President Spiro T. Agnew who served under Richard Nixon until resigning in October 1974, after pleading no contest to charges of tax fraud. He is the only Vice President in U.S. history to resign because of criminal charges. Agnew, who had a particularly acrimonious relationship with the press, used this term to refer to the members of the media, whom he also deemed "an effete corps of impudent snobs."

Although the phrase "nattering nabob of negativism" is often credited to Agnew himself, one of the breakfast club members, Phil Stearns, knew that it was actually written by William Safire, the legendary columnist for The New York Times, who was a speechwriter for Richard Nixon and Spiro Agnew.

So...Let's get back to one person's view that this blogger is a "nattering nabob of negativism".

Thank you for that description! Now that I know the phrase was used by an ex-vice president who resigned as a result of charges of fraud to describe the press corp that helped identify and report on those charges, I am quite pleased that you referred to me this way. I can only hope that my blogging will help identify similarly guilty individuals who need to be exposed and written about, for the betterment of our community.

If you think about it, negativism is actually quite important. We need it in order to know what is wrong so that we can correct it.

Perhaps once that is accomplished I will turn into a "Prime Pillar of Positiveness".


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Scan my QR Code contact information to your cell phone:

Sunday, January 10, 2010

(Not So) Transparent Meeting in Process

By now, anyone living on the North Shore that has a pulse has likely heard about the letter of reprimand handed down to the Hamilton Board of Selectmen by Assistant District Attorney Grimes for violations of the Open Meeting rules. The news broke in two separate front page articles in the Salem News, followed by an editorial in the same paper a day later.

That's a lot of press for a small town, but then Hamilton has had more than its share of front page breaking news over the past year. Unfortunately, most of it has been unflattering.

So much has been written in the "Comments" section of the online versions of the three articles mentioned above that this writer feels there is little to add. Instead, I offer the following links to the articles for you to review and form your own opinion of the issue:


In the order in which they were published:


And if you'd like to read another local blogger's take on the issue:

Let's all hope that we can keep our small town out of the headlines for awhile.

Even a week would be nice!

Uh oh!...We did not escape for even a week! Here's what was on the front page of the Salem News on January 12th:

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