Amazon today introduced Skill Blueprints, a new “fill in the blank” way to create personalized skills and responses for an Alexa device. Using a set of easy-to-use templates, anyone can create customized interactions with Alexa, “within minutes,” claims Amazon. The skills and responses you create with Skill Blueprints will be available instantly on all Alexa-enabled devices associated with your account.

How might a small business use it?

The creators of 25,000+ skills have shown there is no limit to fun or productive voice-activated skills. As the skills are linked to one device only, an Echo Dot could serve as a Q & A device for shoppers who want a quick answer to question like, “How much does this blue widget cost?” or “Where can I find the paint department?”

Note | Unlike the publicly-available Alexa Skills developed using the Alexa Skills Kit (ASK), the new Alexa Skill Blueprints are for personal use only and are not published to the Alexa Skills Store. Developers who want to create Skills available to any Alexa user, can register here to start the process to begin using ASK development tools.

Quote via Blueprints.Amazon.com:

“Whether it’s your own answer to the question “Alexa, what is the best city?” or a skill that offers helpful information for the pet sitter,  allow you to build personalized voice experiences with Alexa, helping you make Alexa even more useful around your home.

“Using Skill Blueprints is as easy as filling in the blanks. You can have fun customizing Alexa’s responses to questions like “Alexa, who is the best mom in the world?” or “Alexa, am I your favorite painter?” You can also use Skill Blueprints to create an interactive adventure story with your child as the lead character with the “Adventure” Blueprint, or create a skill to poke fun at Dad’s corny one liners with the “Family Jokes” Blueprint.

Video provided by Amazon.com

Photos: Amazon

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The community-driven travel map,Waze is rolling out “Waze Local,” geo-targetd advertising for small and local businesses. Previously, advertising on Waze was limited to national brands. Designed to be simple to set up and use, Waze Local features three ad units and two types of accounts. 

Waze has a near cult-like following among those who spend their days driving trucks or cars. (Waze fans constantly post articles with subject lines that include, “Google Maps vs. Waze.”) Unlike other mapping services, including Waze owner Google, Waze doesn’t just tell you where the worst traffic between you and your destination, Waze shows you why. How? By allowing a passenger in a car (there are plenty of warnings against drivers doing this while operating an 18-wheeler) tap on an icon indicating if there has been a wreck (or any of a dozen other possible causes) in front of you. For several years, Waze has carried ads from national brands of hotels, fast foods and service stations. The new Waze Local ads will enable local merchants, restaurants and other local companies, to place directional brands on Waze.

Waze Local ad formats

Branded Pin | Provides additional information when clicked.
Promoted Search | gives priority rankings to advertisers in a search context (like AdWords)
Zero Speed Takeover | A banner that appears during traffic stops

Here are mockups of the three ad formats.

(Waze.com via Search Engine Land)

Waze Local accounts are managed on an account dashboard — similar to managing a Google Adwords account. There are two types of accounts (in addition to the current national brand account).

Starter Account | Businesses with fewer than 10 locations that spend a minimum of $2 per day
Plus Account | Businesses with up to 50 locations

How to Attract Summer Vacationing Customers Who Are Traveling to (or Through) Your Town

We’ve never hidden our envy of admiration for people who can draw quickly — and actually get their message across. We’ve even devoted an entire SmallBusiness.com guide to helping people get over their belief that they can’t draw (on a whiteboard). Perhaps that’s why we are impressed to see that some folks at Google have come up with a drawing program called AutoDraw, a web-based tool lets you doodle your version of a drawing, but then provides you the option of substitute a real drawing created by talented artists for your doodle.

It works like this:

1. Go to AutoDraw.com
2. Doodle the item you’d like to draw
3. Keep your eye on the bar of sketches above the drawing panel
4. Whey you see a suggestion that matches what you were doodling, click on it

We doubt that made much sense. So, let’s do a “picture is worth a thousand words”: Watch in the GIF below how a user’s doodle generates a bar of suggested objects. Click on one and bang, you have a drawing.

How do they do that?

AutoDraw Promotional Video from Google

Google’s AutoDraw is coming at a time when traditional stock art services are using more tech-driven approaches to help users find the photos and illustrations they want. For example, istock.com has recently introduced a “search by image” feature that works like  Google’s image search feature. Upload an image and the service will suggest images in its database that are similar to the image uploaded.

iStock’s new image search feature.

Rumors of a complete re-tooling of the iPad Pro product line and the release of a new advertising campaign have Apple watchers pondering the company’s strategy for its workplace, small business-friendly tablet.

(See “Background” at the bottom of this article for earlier coverage of the iPad Pro.)

Based on a report by Japanese website Mac Otakar (MacRumors), Apple is planning to unveil a top-to-bottom refresh of the iPad Pro product line next month (March, 2017). New 7.9, 9.7, 10.5, and 12.9-inch models are all said to be on tap, according to the site.

Simultaneously, Apple has launched an advertising campaign (see ads at the bottom of this article) consisting of four 16-second ads that position the iPad as an alternative to a computer. Earlier ads implied the iPad could replace certain types of computer usages with the iPad, but not a computer, itself. As observed by graphic designer and longtime iPad observer, Khoi Vinh, each of the new ads “highlight the device’s suitability as a PC replacement.”

“In past campaigns, the iPad was focused on specific use cases—the iPad as a liberating device for making home videos, dee-jaying, cooking, doing homework, etc. Those ads basically existed in a post-PC world, or at least one that nearly ignored the traditional personal computing. This time, perhaps emboldened by the formidable horsepower of the iPad Pro line or perhaps chastened by declining iPad sales, the spots speak squarely to desktop/laptop-centric issues.”

Khoi Vihn

Background

Starting in late 2015, we began to report on Apple’s attempt to position a new version of its iPad as a business tool, the iPad Pro. Amidst slowing iPad sales to consumers, Apple designed this iPad and an electronic stylist, the Apple Pencil, as a  platform tool for professions like product design and engineering.

While sales of the iPad Pro line had stemmed a slide in iPad sales last year, the lack of new models last fall (2016) caused a slow-down in sales during Apple’s first fiscal quarter of 2017, according to arstechnica,

Video on Apple.com also reflects the “next computer” theme for iPad Pros.

The New iPad Pro Advertisements

In our earlier coverage of the iPad Pro, we noted how it was positioned as a professional, workplace tool. This new campaign focuses more on product features. While in a kinder, gentler fashion, this campaign returns to a theme Apple used in the “I’m a Mac,” “I’m a PC” campaign of the late 2000s. In these, Apple clearly positions the iPad against a Microsoft product–in this case, the Microsoft’s Surface.

The ads:

iPad Pro: Better than a computer

Don’t hunt for wifi

Do more with Microsoft Word (on an iPad)

iPad Pro – No PC viruses

Art: Apple.com

Here’s a helpful new feature if your business uses Google’s paid cloud-based workplace software called G Suite (formerly Google Apps for Work and before that, Google Apps for Business). You can now embed into Slides any video you have uploaded to Google Drive. (Slides and Drive are part of the software suite.)

Why this matters and when you might use it

Previously, if you wanted to use video with Slides, the video needed to be hosted on YouTube. For various reasons, there are businesses, schools, and other organizations that block YouTube. Sure, there were some workarounds, but making this a seamless G Suite feature is far more desirable.

While you can still embed YouTube videos into a Slide “presentation,” there are times (and creative people who dream up ways to use software) when a “presentation” isn’t a presentation — like, for instance, when it is video signage in a restaurant or office or a video demo used at a trade show kiosk. Many people have adapted Slides for various types of display usages that will benefit from a seamless integration between two programs that are native to G Suites. (Multi-location video signage is the topic of an upcoming article.)

How it works

If you don’t have a video saved on Google Drive, upload one as you would any file, then…

1. Open a presentation in Google Slides
2. Click the slide where you want to add the video
3. Click Insert and then Video
4. At the top, click Google Drive
5. Click the video you want to add
6. Click Select
7. Your video will be added to the slide

Once you’ve added the video to a Sheets presentation file, you can choose

• When to start and end it
• Whether it should autoplay when presenting
• Whether it should be muted or play with audio

(Below) To make those choices, simply right-click on the video and select “Video Options.”

NOTE | If someone viewing your presentation doesn’t have permission to view a video embedded within it (a settings option on your part), they’ll be prompted to request access. Also, while you can play Drive videos in Slides on the web and mobile, you can only insert them from the web application. For more details, see the G Suite Help Center.

VIA | G Suite Blog

Google.com

The popular information-organizing web service, Evernote, thought it was announcing a great idea last week. It is adding machine learning capabilities to make the service work more intuitively. However, what turned out to be the company’s clumsy announcement of their plan caused many users to push back hard on Evernote’s privacy policy changes that accompanied the machine learning plans.

Within two days of the announcement, Evernote backed down on their privacy change that gave the company permission to access any content created and saved by its users. “Evernote is reaffirming its commitment to keep privacy at the center of what we do. As a result, we will not implement the previously announced Privacy Policy changes that were scheduled to go into effect January 23, 2017,” the company said in a statement on its blog.

“We announced a change to our privacy policy that made it seem like we didn’t care about the privacy of our customers or their notes. This was not our intent, and our customers let us know that we messed up, in no uncertain terms. We heard them, and we’re taking immediate action to fix it,” said company CEO Chris O’Neill.

O’Neill indicated the company was still moving forward on machine learning projects but told , “If any human is going to be involved, it’s going to be on an opt-in basis, period” O’Neill told IDG’s Blair Hanley Frank.

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Machine Learning Projects Point to a Future of Data-Driven Small Business Strategy

As Christmas is just around the corner, perhaps it’s time for you to ask Santa to throw a new bag for you into that giant bag of his.

Apple’s Siri  helped turn the long-predicted tech concept of a “virtual assistant” (or, digital assistant, chatbot, etc.) into a reality loaded onto millions of smartphones. But it has been Amazon’s Alexa, made popular by the Amazon Alexa, that has convinced a growing number of users that accessing internet services and information doesn’t require a keyboard, screen or app. It can be as simple talking. Like Siri, Alexa is the chatbot software that enables a user to interact with online information or “the internet of things.” Earlier this year (2016), Amazon opened up the Alexa platform so that third-party developers could create “skills” that will connect a command or question delivered via Alexa with a developer’s content or capabilities. Within three months, Amazon announced that 3,000 skills had been developed. Many of these skills can be helpful to those who own or manage a small business. (Note: In an upcoming article, we will explore other voice-command “digital assistant” software on other platforms, including Google Assistant and Microsoft Cortana.)

Devices that enable a user to tap into Alexa skills

Again, it is important to understand that “Alexa” is software. It powers the voice-activated interface you will use to ask for information or use to control a wide array of smart devices like thermostats and sprinklers (WeMo, Philips Hue, Samsung SmartThings, Nest, ecobee, etc.). The hardware that allows you to use Alexa is today limited to three devices. (While there are apps that allow you to control settings on a device, there is no app that is an Alexa interface.)

Here are the current devices that are Alexa enabled:

Amazon Echo | The original Alexa device that is also a wi-fi speaker. (NOT battery powered, plugs in. Current price $179. 10.17.2016)
Amazon Echo Dot | A smaller version of the original Alexa (NOT battery powered, plugs in. Current price $50 or six for $250, 10.17.2016)
Amazon Tap | (Battery powered, charging cradle included. Current price $130, 10.17.2016)

How to find and enable an Alexa skill

1 | Go to Alexa.Amazon.com
2 | Select Skills in the left navigation bar
3 | After finding the skill you want, click or tap “enable”

A Few of The Alexa Small Business Skills You Can Enable

This is just a small sampling. For more, enable the skill called “Skill Finder” and ask Alexa if a skill exists for what you are trying to accomplish.

Summon an Uber driver

“Alexa, ask Uber to request a ride” and one will be on its way to your location in minutes.”

Change the temperature

If you have a Nest thermostat: “Alexa, cool down the reception area” will start lowering the temperature.

Check the air quality

With the Air Quality Report skill enabled, you can look up the current air quality in any 5-digit US ZIP code—just say “Alexa, ask Air Quality Report for (zip code)”

Find the distance between two places

“Alexa, how far is it from Santa Fe to San Francisco”?

Improve your spelling

There are several spelling skills that work like this: “Alexa, how do you spell ____?

Translate into another language

Enable the My Translator skill and you can ask for help translating a foreign term.

Check your commute traffic

Alexa can tap into local traffic reports, enabling you to ask how your commute is looking (You must set up home and work locations through the device).

Create your own skills

If you are a tech-savvy do-it-yourselfer, creating your own Amazon skills can be easy with the Alexa Skills Kit. If you use IFTTT, you can create even more.

VIA | Amazon.com, Business Insider

 Last month, we shared some of our favorite online tools and invited users of SmallBusiness.com to send us some of their favorites (Tips@SmallBusiness.com). Niraj Rajan Rout, founder of the Gmail-powered collaborative platform, Hiver, took us up on our invitation and invited the team members of his startup to contribute their suggestions. As Niraj and his team are working on an online tool others find helpful, we asked that he start off with describing his product, Hiver.

1 | Hiver

While most other task/project management tools don’t completely integrate with your email, causing you to have to go to and fro between your inbox and the tool, Hiver operates right out of the inbox. The tool has a simple and neat design, which will not clutter the inbox in anyway. We keep adding new features to the tool, the most recent one is called, “shared mailbox, which allows you to turn your email into a helpdesk. There are a number of other features such as shared notes, email snooze, shared contacts, etc., which really enhance the abilities of your email.

2 | Dropbox

Dropbox is an obvious choice for us–it is so essential to our daily process and so integrated into our work that it deserves a mention anyway. While it has competitors in the cloud storage space, Dropbox is special because it keeps evolving and adding new features to play with. It is an incredible productivity booster and a great way to store information.

3 | Trello

The very visual nature of Trello is highly appealing and gives you sense of clarity and direction. With any type of collaborative team, there is a lot going on at any given moment. Plotting it all on a Trello board simplifies your vision and gives you a roadmap of work to complete. The neat, simple and minimalistic interface is just amazing.

4 | Buzzsumo

This is a great tool for smart marketing. It can help you figure out content trends, what is scoring on which social media, who are the influencers talking about your keywords, and much more. It can help you thoroughly analyse your content and help you factor in all the aspects necessary to come up with engaging, value-packed, quality content and smart ways to promote it too.

5 | KISSmetrics

As a business, we adhere to the philosophy “what can’t be measured, can’t be improved.”  So it’s no surprise we extensively use KISSmetrics to track our sales and marketing activities. The live view feature is especially great to get a broader view of what’s going on with your users and modify your strategy according to the suggestions given by the tool. They also provide excellent customer service.

6 | Mailchimp

This is another tool we extensively use for our email marketing campaigns. I prefer using Mailchimp for the way in which it lets us send emails, collect the stats and improve the performance–all with just this one tool. It almost eliminates the need of any other tool to manage your newsletters. It is extremely easy to set up and just as easy to start using. The stats collected by this tool can help you optimize your strategy and can help you figure out what’s working and what isn’t.

7 | Upwork

We often use freelancers whenever there is an increased workload. Upwork has been quite handy for this. It is widely used by many freelancers, which gives you a lot of options to choose from. The interface is simple and is very easy to navigate. Tip: Do not publish open jobs if you don’t want to get flooded with spam mails from job recruiters.

8 | SurveyMonkey

Here’s an easy-to-use tool to conduct surveys and get feedback. There are quite a number of survey templates to choose from and you can add as many questions as you like to  the template. The whole survey building process is broken down to a  simple workflow. All you have to do is come up with the questions for the survey, everything else is set in place. Although the premium version comes with complex features such as the skip page logic, the basic version is quite useful too.

9 | WordPress

This reliable, user-friendly, and simple-to-use tool has become an integral part of Hiver and millions of small businesses. No wonder–it is one of the most commonly used content management system (CMS) on the web. The array of  customization options for setting up and designing your website (or blog) makes it unique. But even for those who don’t want to customize, there are hundreds of themes and designs already available to choose from. I feel that it makes the whole content management process much easier and you can quickly figure out its many features and put them to use.

10 | Clear

Another important aspect of being a productive organization is encouraging your employees to work towards boosting their own productivity. I suggest apps like Clear for employees to manage their day better. I like this app because it is fairly straightforward and extremely user-friendly. It allows you to easily drag and re-order your to-do list and add a new task with just a click and all you have to do is swipe the task right once you are done with it. Your to-do lists syncs over iCloud and making it easily accessible for you.

There are a gazillion tools out there to choose from. Choosing the apps which perfectly fit with your company and business goals is certainly the key here and no one can make that choice for you. However, most of these tools have had good success and excellent reviews and so probably, this is a great place to start.

Would you like the chance to share your favorite online apps, obscure but helpful calculators or tools, or fascinating resources for those who own or manage a small business, email us at Tips@SmallBusiness.com

Google Duo, a person-to-person video calling app, is launching today (8/16/2016)  for Android and iOS. (Available in U.S. today, rolling out worldwide over the next few days.) “Duo takes the complexity out of video calling that you can be together in the moment wherever you are,” said Google’s Justin Uberti, Duo’s principal software engineer. Google still provides a multi-user video conferencing platform, Hangouts, a separate product that is marketed as part of the Google Apps for Work productivity software suite.

All you need is a phone number

To get started, all you need is your phone number and the app.  No separate account is required–it work’s with your phone’s contacts list–so you can sign up in just a few steps. From there, you can instantly begin a video call with a single tap.

“Duo is built to be fast and reliable, so that video calls connect quickly and work well even on slower networks,” said Uberti. “Call quality adjusts to changing network conditions–when bandwidth is limited, Duo reduces the resolution to keep the call going smoothly.”

• Duo will switch between Wi-Fi and cellular data automatically without dropping your call.
• You can start your call at home and continue seamlessly even when you head out the door.
• A feature called Knock Knock lets you see live video of your caller before you answer

Photo: Google.com