Mobile professionals who are on the road all the time probably know that it’s not the brightest or safest idea to be driving around with one hand on the wheel and the other on a cell phone. That’s where Bluetooth headsets come into the picture, but the ear loop can become uncomfortable after extended periods of time. Bluetooth speakers, then, are a fantastic solution because they allow you to keep both hands on the wheel while chatting it up with business associates and clients.

The newly announced Motorola ROKR T505 Bluetooth Speakerphone is a handy handsfree device that clips to your car’s visor. It will pair with just about any Bluetooth-compatible cell phone, but that’s not all. You’ll notice that it carries Motorola’s signature “ROKR” branding, meaning that it is musically-inclined. That’s because the ROKR T505 fully supports stereo Bluetooth A2DP, receiving the tunes that are streaming from your music phone. What’s more, it can re-broadcast this signal back out over FM airwaves, acting as an intermediary between your music phone and your car stereo.

Motorola claims that the ROKR T505 has a 20 hour battery life, but I’d imagine that if you have the streaming music going on the whole time, that figure would decrease considerably. No word on how much this will cost, but given that Motorola was showing off the ROKR T505 Bluetooth speakerphone at their Holiday 2007 show in New York, we can safely assume that it will be released in time for Santa to make his rounds.

Congratulations to this weeks geek Christian who scored on our Geek of the Week questions. This weeks questions are:

1. Where does Microsoft get the names for it’s Server Os software?
2. What GPS components does the iPhone use?
3. Who is Patrick Gavin and what company does he own?
4. What new site did Guy Kawasaki launch recently?
5. What new features does USB 2.0 have?

As more and more personal blogs come online, how serious should the none blogging community take your posts?

The reason this is a discussion this week is more people are being fired and being issued warned for what they post on their personal blog.

I know a nurse who had blogged about a patient that had caused her great frustration. She excluded the name, location and any identifiable details from the post. A few months later she received a warning that if she was to post anything again about patients she would be let go.

I also remember infamous blogger Jeremy Write was fired for blogging.

Do you think that people should be fired for posting on their personal blog?

I have a big problem with this. How hard would it be for anyone of us to start-up a fake personal blog to then have another employee fired?

With that said where is the line and how would you deal with it?

Another cartoon created by creative genius  Matthew Schmoll. 
If you have an idea for a future comic or would like to submit your own BlueFur cartoon let us know in a comment.

TGIF, everyone! It’s time for another whirlwind tour of the blogosphere, so let’s see what people are chatting about this week.

Moo-moo-mooing his way to the top is John Cow. Sometimes, you just need a break from munching on the same cud out in the pasture. After trudging through the blogging game for a while, you may run out of post ideas and you won’t know what to do or where to turn. Thankfully, the beef is bringing the goods with 6 blogging burnout cures. The last suggestion may surprise you.

Derrich is in the process of opening a bar in San Antonio, but he’s been having some trouble coming up with a name. After much deliberation, he’s decided on something rather clever: ReTox Bar. ReTox is clearly a play on “detox”, except, well, it’s telling you that you need to “tox” again. This is definitely a name that sticks. Check out the funky logos he has going on too!

Marisa is a wife, mother, and grandmother. Over at her Dandelion Patch, she has discovered an activity that she describes as a boy thing. It’s the thing that boys do when they’re alone in their rooms. It involves their bodies and it’s something that a mother may not want to see, even though we all know that nearly every boy does it. Don’t worry, the link is totally work safe.

The self-proclaimed root of all evil John Chow discloses what has been his biggest online income killer. Even though he’s pulling in over $10,000 a month on John Chow dot Com alone (not to mention the cash he rakes in through The TechZone), he has suffered a huge hit to his online income because of this evil thing, costing him hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost income. The worst part is that there is absolutely nothing he can do about it. Can you guess what this income killer is?

RT Cunningham from Untwisted Vortex reminds us that while quality content is absolutely integral to the success of a blog, grammar, spelling, and punctuation are equally important. You’ve got to proofread. You’ve got to make use of that spell checker. You’ve got to dot your I’s and cross your T’s. Now if only we could convince John Chow to do that.

Well now you should have a unique business model, a concise business plan and a clear understanding of your target market. So now your ready to start selling, but how?

Selling is really a numbers game. If you connect with 100 customers of those 100 depending on the product 1-10 will buy or be interested in buying your product or service.

Here are the steps I would go about to start selling:

1. Have a basic understanding of the product or service I want to sell. Do not get hung up on knowing every single exact detail on the product or service. Later if you get asked something you don’t know you can always find out and get back in touch with the perspective customer later.
2. Create a list of people to contact that fall into the target market for my product and service. For example if I am selling to Soho start-ups I would go to the local city hall and request a list of new businesses in my area.
3. Design a follow-up email that explains as simple as possible how to find out more details on my product or service. My email would not be more then 3 lines and include a link to our site. I would create this before contacting people to ensure that when I am calling that I can send the details right away.
4. Turn off all distractions, lock the door and set aside a straight hour or two to do calls. This is very important to do your calls in clumps. This keeps you in a groove and ensure that it really gets done. Make it a contest with yourself and see how many sales or emails you can send out each day and see if you can do better it each day.
5. Write down all details and do what you say you will do. After you hang up with a customer be sure write down all the details. Do not write (or type) while you are the phone as you will most likely miss what is said or not sound professional. If in your call you said you would send an email, call back or send a brochure then be sure to do it that day.

These are the basics of selling. I will do a follow-up next few week with tips on how to develop your sales skills.

Bonus Tip - When talking with a customer try and do less talking and more listening. Instead of talking and talking and talking and talking. Engage your customer with questions about them.