Joe Taylor Jr.

  • PPC Management Offers New Practice-Building Strategy for Attorneys

    Advertising has always been a tricky business for legal professionals. While the most storied law firms rely on long-time clients and on personal referrals, new practices often make hard decisions between keeping up appearances or bowing to the pressure of the marketplace. Loud ads on television, in the yellow pages, and on bus stop benches…

  • Christmas Eve in Athens, GA: Five Years Later

    Christmas Eve in Athens, GA: Five Years Later

    Five years ago tonight, I posted the original version of this image to my Flickr stream. This is what you see when you drive through the center of town at midnight on Christmas Eve: festive decorations, welcoming shop windows, and no people. I found myself at this intersection on the way home from the hospital,…

  • How to Use Wawa: Four Rules for Philadelphia Visitors

    A client confirmed for me what anyone who has spent time in Philadelphia knows by heart: Wawa is more than just a convenience store, it’s the nexus for peculiar Philly culture. Philly natives know the drill at Wawa. It’s full of contradictory cultural norms. The Wawa Door Hold. You must hold the door open for…

  • Credit Card News Updates

     Recent updates from my credit card news blog at CardRatings.com: Fewer card delinquencies expected in 2010. (It could be because we all lost our shirts in 2009.) Choose between higher fees and lower credit scores. Buy that smartphone with your credit card to protect against theft. Bank of America mails Clarity Commitment letters. (Is that…

  • Have you been rate jacked by your credit card issuer?

    We just posted a new feature to the front page of CardRatings.com: Credit card rate hikes have become a popular strategy for lenders who want to purge their portfolios of less profitable accounts. New federal credit card regulations give consumers the power to reject a credit card rate increase, but only at the expense of…

  • First Snow of Winter

    Even though it's our second winter back north, it still feels like a surprise to wake up to this. Especially since it was 65 degrees out earlier in the week.

  • Credit Card News Updates for October

    From my newsblog at CardRatings.com: Shrinking Credit Card Defaults Cheer Issuing Banks RevolutionCard Enlists Fifth Third Bank for Credit Card Security Overhaul Outsourced Credit Card Programs Help Small Banks Attract Customers Capital One Confirms Credit Card Interest Rate Freeze American Express’ New Charge Card Offers Triple Reward Points to Frequent Flyers

  • My New Kenmore Dishwasher Has Arrived!

    Right now, it’s still in a box that doubles as a handy kitchen island for unloading groceries. Tomorrow, it’s getting fully installed, and the old, broken Kenmore dishwasher is being hauled away. A few weeks ago, I wrote about the havoc caused by my not-yet-six-month-old Kenmore dishwasher. I really got to that point where I…

  • Running a Canon PIXMA MP620 Wirelessly Under Snow Leopard (For Now)

    Folks have been asking for details ever since my happy tweet… Until this all gets automated, this process should work if you had already set up your Canon wireless printer/scanner under Mac OS X 10.5: 1. Reinstall the 10.5 versions of the IJ Network Tool and the printer and scanner drivers posted on Canon’s site.…

  • CRM Systems Thrive with Five Kinds of Data

    First-time buyers of CRM systems often wonder what makes customer relationship management software tick. Effective CRM tools go beyond lists of names and addresses. They collect and help teams interpret five critical types of data… Read more on the Small Business CRM Software Blog…

  • CRM Software Helps Drive Customer Loyalty

    A third of consumers make purchasing decisions based on the level of customer service offered by companies with effective CRM applications. Recent results from a British consumer survey suggest that retailers must do more than institute reward programs to maintain customer loyalty during a recession. Although the latest generation of customer relationship management software makes it…

  • Social CRM Software Helps Companies Evolve Customer Contact

    While business leaders grapple with Twitter and Facebook interactions, experts advise companies to master the art of the direct message in under 140 characters. CIOs and other company leaders with questions about their investment in social CRM applications can review previous innovations to understand the importance of communicating with customers using their favored systems.  Read the…