There’s always something new and interesting to read in the blogosphere. Here are some posts that caught our eye this week.

Darren Barefoot takes us for a stroll down memory lane, proudly displaying his first business card. It was for a high school production way back in 1991, clearly demonstrating how far the “socially-awkward 17-year-old” has evolved since then.

Tyler Cruz gives us his first update on the weight loss challenge he’s participating in with Paul Piotrowski. Thus far, Tyler has the upper hand, but he still has quite a way to go to reach his goal of losing 30 pounds. The good news is that Tyler has adopted healthier dining choices than his competitor.

Rebecca Bollwitt may now live in Vancouver proper, but she grew up in Surrey. As such, she’s proud to showcase the summer festivals set to take place in Surrey this year. From Park Play Palooza to Surrey Fusion Festival, there’s a lot of fun to be had.

Betshopboy decided to take some time off with his family recently, making their way over to Sunway Lagoon. This is a massive theme park located in Kuala Lumpur, featuring interesting water rides, a huge shopping mall, five different themed parks, and the world’s longest pedestrian suspension bridge. He has lots of photos, so check those out.

Bevan Bird finishes off this week’s collection with a post asking, “Why won’t small biz go social?” Small businesses need to realize and capitalize on the potential offered by social media, a platform that is largely free to use and can provide huge returns. They just have to learn how to use it well.

It is certainly more economical to shoot a single commercial or put together a single type of ad banner to use across all your different ad placements. It’s easier to run the same full page ad in the local newspaper, a trade journal, and a popular magazine. However, this may not be the best implementation and it may not reap the greatest rewards.

Consider the captive audience and how you can best utilize that opportunity. I was driving around town the other day when I saw an ad on the back of a bus. Instead of being generic, it asked if I was stuck in traffic again. It then reminded me that the oil change service location was open late every day, telling me that there was still time for to get the proper maintenance on my car. That’s timely and appropriate, given the likely situation I’d be facing if I was reading the ad on a back of a bus.

Another great example comes from the movie theater situation. If someone is sitting in an auditorium waiting for their selected feature film to begin, they may represent a certain demographic and a certain type of customer. If you’re a candy company, you can remind them that your snacks are available in the lobby. If they are there to watch a movie, there’s a good chance that they may also be interested in subscribing to your movie channel on TV.

Yes, it may be more costly to put together these “specialized” or highly targeted types of advertising, but they could bear more fruit than the generic ad you have running across all media possibilities.

Any site owner will tell you about the importance of tracking your site’s performance. By and large, people have come to rely on Google Analytics for this purpose, as well as other services for tracking affiliate marketing, advertising campaigns and so forth. Another option you may want to add to the mix is Social Metrics.

This WordPress plugin effectively works as a “social media analytics tool” for your blog. Using it, you can keep track of how your site (and its various pages) are performing on popular social networking websites and services. Currently, the plugin supports such networks as Twitter, Facebook, Google Buzz, StumbleUpon, Digg, LinkedIn, and the recently launched Google +1.

While in the administrative panel for Social Metrics, you can see exactly how many times each individual post or page has been “shared” across these networks. This is quite different from the public display option offered by other WordPress plugins. This is particularly useful for newer or growing sites, as you may not want to show these metrics publicly to your readers. You can also filter the results based on categories and month.

Find out more information about Social Metrics on Riyaz.net, including a useful FAQ and installation guide. You can then go to the WordPress Plugin Directory to find the free download link.

You may have heard the recent news about Taiwanese food products being pulled off the shelves around the world. These include bottled drinks, fruit preserves, and other food products, due to a scare regarding DEHP, a chemical that may be carcinogenic. This has certainly hurt Taiwanese exports, but how does this affect other businesses around the world too.

This is just one example, but it demonstrates a very common scenario for multinational corporations and companies that import products from around the world. When there is a public concern about a certain product that you sell, you may feel pressured to pull it from your shelves. This is for your customers, to be sure, but it can also have a negative impact on your relationship with the manufacturers and importers.

How do you balance these two priorities? On the one hand, you certainly don’t want to sell a product that may be tainted or otherwise dangerous in some way, but you also don’t want to cut ties with a supplier either. To help sustain certain levels of orders with these suppliers, you may ask about alternative products that they may also provide.

The exact same thing happens when news stories break with controversial working conditions, poor environmental responsibility, and other issues that may mar the reputation of any given company, supplier, or product. It is a very delicate situation and should be handled accordingly.

Do you want to get into the Android craze but just can’t get yourself to spend $500 or more on one of the newer tablet devices? While you may still want to get a Xoom or Eee Pad, the Archos 28 Internet Tablet is a much more affordable option. It’s also much more portable.

That’s because it utilizes a smaller 2.8-inch color touchscreen, making for a more compact form factor. Notable features include the 4GB of storage capacity and wide range of file format support, allowing you to play everything from MP3 to Ogg Vorbis, H.264 to WMV/VC1 files. You connect to the Internet via Wi-Fi.

You’ll also notice that the Archos 28 runs on Google Android. This application framework provides an email applicaiton, web browser, media player, customizable homescreen, live wallpapers and 3D games. You don’t have to worry about updating to the latest version of Android either, as the the device will detect and download those for you.

So, how much does it cost? The Archos 28 Internet Tablet is currently on sale for $84 through Amazon.ca, including free shipping. That’s one-fifth the price of many other Android tablets!

When it comes to running a successful business, of course it is important to have good products, good customer service, and a good business plan. However, it is also very important to have the right infrastructure and to have your basic operational needs addressed. Printing plays a vital role.

Serving customers in the Guelph, K/W, Cambridge and Brantford areas is Ribbon Encore, the company that serves as the Bluefur Customer of the week. Ribbon Encore focuses on selling high quality cartridges for your office printers, photocopiers, and other related devices. They also help customers when it comes to basic repair and preventative maintenance for your printers.

More so than ever, customers want to support companies who look beyond the bottom line for the greater good. That’s why it’s good to see that Ribbon Encore is dedicated to environmental concerns. They offer a free cartridge recycling program; some of those cartridges can be remanufactured and reused by various charitable and non-profit organizations. Ribbon Encore currently supports Michael House, a local crisis pregnancy home.

Do you use BlueFur to host your websites? Let us know and we can feature you in a future blog post. Send an email message to blogfeature@bluefur.com with your name, website URL, and a brief description of what you’d like to see highlighted.