It’s out. It’s nice. If you’re using Office 2003 or earlier, it’s time to upgrade.

Office 2010 uses the same kind of ribbons that Office 2007 users have grown accustomed to. The new “ribbon” that you’ll find in Word 2010 is the one that 2007 should have had. It’s called file. The file ribbon gives you all the options and information about the particular file that you’re working on that you could possibly want to know.

For example, as I type this blog entry in Word 2010, when I click the file tab, I have lots of nifty choices like Open, Save, Save as, and Print but the option that is highlighted is Info. Under Info I can Set Permissions (protect the document so that only those who should see it can), Prepare for Sharing (basically let’s me easily strip hidden information that other’s shouldn’t see but that is useful to have for an in house document) and work with different Versions of the document.

I can also see useful information such as how long I’ve been editing this document, add or view the Title and any Tags, see who the creator is, and lots of other information. It is also from the file tab that I can open recent or other documents and do many of the tasks from the old File menu.

As is usually the case, the biggest change comes with Outlook. As the way people communicate continues to change, Microsoft tries to make Outlook the tool to help you do this. Outlook now has its own ribbons (for some reason Outlook 2007 didn’t get the ribbon makeover).

The newest feature here is the Quick Steps box. Basically what this box does is let you create macros or rules on what do with certain messages. Once that rule is created, you can run it by clicking the appropriate button in the Quick Steps box. I’m still experimenting with this but this feature holds potential in helping to tame the email beast.

Access has some nice new features, one that we’re taking a very close look at right now is the Project template. What is nice is that Access is now really designed from the get go to be interactive. I opened the Project template and the first thing I had to do was create a user (myself) and then log in. Then I was off to the races creating and entering information on the project.

The downside is I wanted to watch the video which required SilverLight which I had already installed which Access didn’t recognize as being installed. Still a few issues, it would appear but all in all I like this latest version and could see moving some of our folks to it even before the first service pack.

Other tools that come with the complete version of Office 2010 include OneNote (great for taking quick notes or for having a notebook on a particular task or subject) and InfoPath – the tool for forms – now comes with a Designer part and a Filler part. For business users (those with lots of computers and users), there’s also a new program called SharePoint Workspace. I’m still investigating these but they look to be pretty nifty tools for improved work flow.

The full version “Professional” retails for around $500 but as a productivity tool is well worth it.

Recently I was reminded of the wonderful effects listening to classical music can have on your brain – helping you to think better.

So instead of focusing on the business of web site design, I thought I’d share this tip with you. One of the ways I have found to listen to classical is through Pandora. Simply visit www.pandora.com on your computer or even your smartphone.

You can create a channel or multiple channels. The channel I’ve been tuning in to today is Symphonic, Classical.

Creating a channel. Sounds difficult doesn’t it? Actually its incredibly simple. After the 60 second process to create an account (create a password tied to your email address), you simply type in a genre, artist or song.

That’s it.

I’ve got four channels tied to my account. One is classical and the others are more classic rock oriented. I’ve created a channel based around Bob Seger and another based on the Kiss song “Beth”. But Pandora is pretty cool because just like science has mapped out the human genome, Pandora is mapping out the music genome. They have real people listening to songs and collecting close to 400 different attributes about the music.

So when I listen to my own personal Bob Seger station, I don’t just hear Bob Seger, I hear songs related to the kind of music he plays. For example, I just heard Tom Petty playing Breakdown followed by Eric Clapton and Wonderful Tonight. Whether on my phone or on the computer I can rate the songs (either up or down) and get more information about the particular artist and song.

It’s easy to get started and then you can control how “in to it” you get. It’s free for something like 40 hours a month and after that it’s only $36 / year for unlimited listening and no ads.

Would you build the foundation for your house and then begin to ponder what rooms you should put in the house and where the walls should go?

Of course not.

Yet when it comes to building a web site this is precisely the model that most businesses follow. First they build the site and they begin to think about Internet marketing. “What should we try to accomplish?” “Should we do a search campaign?” “What should the call to action be on this page?” All of these questions are best answered BEFORE you design your site.

You don’t want to have brick walls if you’re planning on stucco. Before you start you need to determine what your goals are for your site. These can be marketing goals – “We want to generate 25 new leads a month through the site” or they can be customer-relationship goals “We want customers to be able to download their portfolio without needing to call us” or a myriad of others. The important thing is to understand the goals as you begin to design the site.
Recently I met with a business owner who thought she had nearly completed her complex membership site. She wanted my help with “the last little piece” of managing the logins. What she had, in fact, was very much like the old western movie sets. Walk down main street and you think you’re really in the old west. Then you open a door to look inside and instead you just see the desert stretching off into the distance.

Facade - What's behind your web site?

She had cobbled together a few pieces that really looked enticing but there was no backend to manage the processes that she wanted. While that is an extreme case of not having a firm foundation, we see again and again how the design and development of a site do not support the goals of the site owner.

Once you have your goals established, you can then envision how they will be attained through the site and this will lead to a site that actually helps your business grow.