Today’s tutorial request comes in from Rosie Aiello. Rosie was annoyed that every time one of her videos on Youtube ended it had suggested videos for the viewer. Some were of her own videos and others were from others she wasn’t following or connected to. She didn’t want this option and was curious if you can turn it off.
A quick glance at the calendar can send a shock of stress to the small business owner…how can it be the end of the year already? With so much screaming for your attention, it can feel overwhelming. Don’t worry, with a little organization you CAN get it all done. Follow our checklist to ensure everything is wrapped up nicely by the end of the year.
Team Member Management
team members. Praise their successes. Encourage reflection on their struggles and setbacks. Ask if they are happy with the direction of their role, and if there’s anything you can help them with. Talk with them about their life apart from work. Do everything you can to support them and ensure they feel valued, both as your valued team member and as an individual.Client Relations
for your business to move forward with every client relationship. Weigh a difficult client’s benefits against the time, emotional exhaustion, and stress required to deal with him or her. Sometimes it’s not worth the income. When the costs are too high, it’s better for you and the client to part ways.Business Management
celebrate the past year. Highlight accomplishments and successes of the organization as a whole, and spotlight individuals who went above and beyond. Mention notable changes, like welcoming new staff members or new clients. It’ll be a good refresher for you and your team. Second, build up enthusiasm for the year to come. Talk about goals and the vision for the upcoming year to provide a concrete direction for the business.Self-Care
If you need assistance accomplishing your end of the year administrative tasks, Alpine Small Business Solutions is here for you! We can handle short-term (or long-term) projects, freeing up your time to focus on other projects. Give us a call or shoot us an email today.
Today’s tutorial request comes in from Pat Balvanz. Pat signed up for Hootsuite and is curious how she can watch and follow her competitors in the Hootsuite platform.
There are many costs and concerns to consider when starting a new business, but one that you may not think of is quality images. When building your website, writing a blog, or doing social posts for your business, you will want to add photos to jazz up the look. Imagery is a great way to add imagination and creativity to your website, blog, and social media, but, you need to make sure you are not using copyrighted material. Finding high-quality images can take some time, but it is worth the time to present your business in a good light. (You can also hire a virtual assistant to take the time to find good images and present you with a few to choose from.)
As important as quality stock photos are for any business, you don’t have to spend an arm and a leg to get them. There are many sites that offer quality imagery that does not cost a thing. They may not always be exactly what you imagined, but you can often find something that will cover your needs at no-cost for your business.
Listed here are several sites that offer images with no charge and no issues with copy right. You can use these images for whatever you would like. Your online business manager may have others you can use as well.
Pixabay is a great tool for all your stock image needs. All images and videos on Pixabay are released free of copyrights under Creative Commons CC0. You may download, modify, distribute, and use them royalty-free for anything you like, even in commercial applications.
Morgue File contains free high-resolution digital stock photographs and reference images for corporate or public use. This site allows you to search for specific photos and has a very large archive. Be aware, there are links to other photos that you would have to pay for.
Unsplash is a great resource for high-resolutions photos. You must subscribe to the site, but after you sign up, you get 10 new photos every 10 days.
Gratisogroahy is a free high-resolution pictures you can use on your personal and commercial projects.
Picjumbo is an easy-to-use site full of different categories of photos that are completely free for personal or commercial use.
Startup Stock Photos is an easy site that you can use all the photos from however you choose. It has an archive that you can browse through. The photos are high-quality but the site is relatively new so the archive is somewhat small still.
FreeImages is a free membership to resources for designers’ backgrounds, images, and photo collections.
Little Visuals is a subscription site. You get seven high-resolution images sent in a zipped file to you every seven days.
Life of Pix another site that allows you to use the photos however you choose with no copyright restrictions. They have a fairly large gallery that you can browse through different categories of photos.
Kabookpics is a Great place to get breathtaking Free Pictures for business or personal projects.
Death to the Stock Photo site is large and full of many different categories of photos. They send photos to you every month, but it does have an option to buy a subscription for premium options.
MMT Stock images are a free for commercial use photos by Jeffrey Betts.
Snapwire connects mobile photographers with businesses and brands that need creative imagery. Authentic, Royalty-Free photos created just for you
SplitShire site is run by a photographer who was sick of trying to find quality images that didn’t cost a fortune. It has a premium option that sends all the photos right to your Drop Box, but the site is large and full of categorized photos all for free.
New Old Stock has many photos that are popular or fairly well known. This site works under “no known copyright restrictions.” This basically means that the copy rights have expired or aren’t likely to be enforced, but they take no liability for their use.
RGBstock site requires registration, but is very large and full of photos that are categorized and have a search option available. The only restriction they have on the photos is that you can’t use them for anything in a resale form. In other words, you can’t print and sell their photos.
Freepik offers users, high quality graphic designs: exclusive illustrations and graphic resources carefully selected by our design team in order to provide our users with great content that can be used in both personal and commercial projects.
AllTheFreeStock is the one place to find all the FREE Stock Images Stock VideosSound EffectsIcons & more.. Get all the Free Stock Images, Videos, Music and Icons in one location. All of the sites under [ Free Stock Photos ] offers images listed under the Creative Commons Zero license, so you are free to use these images in commercial projects. [ Free Stock Videos ], [ Free Sound Effects ] & [ Free Icons ] offer different licenses.
I am sure there are many more great sites out there that have quality images free of charge that can be used in your small business, however, your creative heart desires. Share your favorites with us in the comments below.
Yes, I know…it is the next big thing…AGAIN! We have heard it several times that Google+ is going to be huge, yet you don’t use it or really even know what it is. So why do you want to be on it now?
Usually, you want to use social media outlets your target audience is active on. Not always. Insert Google+, the failed social media platform created by Google to compete with Facebook and Twitter. It comes and it goes without you ever really noticing. So why would I push you to be active on a failed platform? Sure, Google+ lacks the prevalence into popular culture that Facebook and Twitter can rightly brag about. But it offers unique benefits to marketers for growing your business, enough to justify the minimal time it takes to grow a thriving Google+ presence.
But first, what really is Google+?
While Google+ is a unique social media platform, it can be helpful to think of it in terms of other more familiar platforms. It offers an easy way to curate and organization information (like Pinterest), the option to follow anyone without needing them to follow you back (like Twitter), and the ability to create a personal profile and a business page (like Facebook). Unlike other social media platforms that are relationship driven (connect with people you know), Google+ is more interest driven (connect with people who share similar ideas/interests). What really sets Google+ apart, though, is that it’s created by Google. And Google rewards users who consume their social media platform, resulting in the biggest benefit of Google+ being its SEO benefits.
Google+ SEO benefits
Google+ improves your SEO through a few ways. First, posts that are high in shares and +1 (the Google+ version of “likes” and “favorites”) rank higher in search results. So when you publish content high in shares and +1, that content is seen more by individuals and increases the chances they check out your website, become a customer, etc.
Second, through the use of Google+ Circles (similar to friending someone or liking a page on Facebook). If an individual is logged into Google and they added you to their Google+ Circle, your content is more likely to show up in their search results.
Third, your Google+ posts are immediately indexed into search results, translating into SEO benefits quicker than if you were to post the same content on another platform.
When your content shows up higher in search results, more people can discover your content. More eyes on your content means more visits to your website, more conversions into customers, etc. SEO is a crucial aspect of business building, and Google+ is a great way to strengthen your SEO.
While SEO is the biggest benefit to Google+, it is definitely not the only benefit.
Audience Segmentation
Google+ offers a feature called “Google+ Circles” which allows you to organize contacts into specialized groups. Each time you publish content, you get the option to only share with relevant group(s). This allows you to provide solid content specialized for individual users, providing them high benefit without oversaturating their feeds.
Target Audience Finding
Another great Google+ feature is “communities.” These are similar to Facebook groups. They are created by individuals and members within communities share and engage with content. Communities are categorized into different topics, such as football or photography. Posts are organized into sub-topics (for example, in a freelance writers’ group there are topics of marketing, writing tips, and writing tools) to help users sort through the high quantity of information.
Say you are a healthy food blogger. You can join communities such as healthy recipes or vegetarian eating. Individuals in these groups are targeted audiences who may want to consume your content and use your services. You can post regularly quality content (such as recipes) in hopes of directing members of the community to your blog. It’s applying the content marketing strategy (provide quality free content to be seen as an expert in your industry and increase the likelihood consumers will use your business when they need to buy a product/service) to a highly targeted audience. As a result, your content marketing efforts are more efficient.
Improving Your Knowledge
Communities aren’t just for you to share information-you can use them to gain knowledge too! First, you can improve the relevance and quality your content. See what types of content other similar businesses post to gain new ideas for blog posts. Find out what topics individuals respond to, and tailor your content to fit that. Second, you can join communities related to content marketing, social media, and the like to stay up-to-date with the latest marketing trends and tools.
Using Google+
Google+ offers many rich benefits to marketers who take advantage of it. If you’re really strapped for time, you can connect your Google+ account to Hootsuite and share every Facebook post to Google+ as well. If you’ve got more time, however, the recommended strategy is to treat Google+ as its own social media platform. The style of posts that resonate most with your audience on Google+ will be different than the posts that resonate with your audience on Facebook, Twitter, etc. You can take content you’ve already made (such as blog posts or newsletter copy) and share on Google+.
Ready to take advantage of Google+ but aren’t sure where to start? Alpine Small Business Solutions is here for you! We’d love to help you with Google+, or any aspect of small business building. Simply give us a call or shoot us an email today!
As of July 7th, 2016, Facebook will be deleting many of the photos you took using a smartphone unless you swap to its new Moments picture sharing service and anyone who used Facebook’s ‘syncing’ feature is at risk.
The function stored all the pictures taken on a smartphone in a special private folder, so users could decide whether to share them publicly at a later date or just store them for their own personal keeping.
The only way to keep them is to download the new Moments app, which collects pictures based on when they were taken and who is in them. The social network began notifying users that it would soon delete all their synced photos if they did not install the app, which was released in June 2015.
The process actually started in January when Facebook discontinued support for automatic syncing of photos from the main Facebook app, forcing users to install the Moments app should they wish to continue automatically uploading their photos.
Rest assured though, the removal of the synced photos won’t affect any photos or videos shared on Facebook separately from the synced album, while users are being given the chance to download the photos before they are deleted to those that are synced. Actually, Facebook recently did a very similar thing with its Messenger app by removing chat from the main Facebook app and forcing users to install the Messenger app to keep sending Facebook instant messages.
These changes help Facebook by giving them other platforms to endorse and promote which in turn builds their name along with new apps that are now showing a rise in users such as the Messenger app and soon the new Moments app. Nonetheless, if you love your selfies, you should probably make sure they are saved permanently on your computer especially if you don’t fancy using Moment.
Anyone who’s used Facebook’s auto sync feature in the past has until July 7th to download Moments or a zip file of their synced photos. Otherwise, they’re going to disappear.
Not sure if you have any synced photos to be worried about, Facebook actually sent out an email to all its’ users telling them they are getting ready to retire the “synced photos” feature and in order to save them you must download and use the new Moments app.
“Synced photos” is a feature that you had to take the time to turn on and it would sync the photos on your phone with Facebook in a private album. If you never turned it on, you have nothing to worry about. Facebook will not be deleting any photos you’ve shared with friends in albums or uploaded to your timeline. If you deleted the message from Facebook or never remember getting one it can be tough to know just how many photos will be deleted. However, there is a pretty easy way to see how many of your “synced” photos are at risk of being deleted.
First, make sure you’re logged into your Facebook account, then go to: https://www.facebook.com/photos. Now, look above your photos for a link that says “Synced from Phone” and click that. If you don’t see a link for “Synced from Phone” then you never used the feature and you don’t have to worry about this.
Look for the link that says “delete them permanently” and click that. (Don’t worry, it won’t delete them instantly)
Then you should see a popup window with a count of the photos that have been “synced” to your account.
Facebook should then show you the actual photos you have synced so you can make an informed decision as to whether you need to download Moments to save them but they don’t.
Therefore, from here you have two decisions to make – you can follow the other link to “download your synced photos” and toss them into your other backup service like Google Photos/iCloud or you can download the Moments app to actually see the pictures in question.
If it’s a low number I suggest just using the download link but if it’s a larger amount of pictures and you want to see which ones are at risk of deletion you probably want to download the Moments app.
While users will be able to save their photos if they wish, the forceful methods used by the social media network has drawn criticism from users, with claims that Facebook is using its enormous leverage to force users to install its apps.
Facebook is a fantastic invention-you already love it, but there’s a lot hidden beneath the surface. We’ve dug deep into Facebook to find the top 10 hidden secrets.
Not every message that’s sent to you on Facebook shows up in your inbox. Messages sent by someone you are not friends with on Facebook go into a “message request” section.
To access these, click the 
at the top right of your screen. Then click “message requests” (to the right of “recent”).
Sometimes we find great content on Facebook . . . right when we have the least amount of time to actually read it. Never fear-the save button is here! The save button allows you to privately save links to read later.
If the post you want to save popped up on your news feed, simply click the to the right of the post and click “save”.
If you’re viewing the post from a page, click … and click “save.”
To view your saved posts, go to the left menu and click “saved” (or you can go to Facebook.com/saved).
When you want to delete a post, go to the “saved” posts section. Click “archive” at the top and click next to the post you want to remove, then click “delete.”
It’s no surprise that Facebook stores a lot of data on its consumers—A LOT. While you can’t stop Facebook from storing this data, you can access it (or at least some of it). Facebook allows users to download their information, which includes information you can see by using your account (such as posts you share and your activity log) and information you cannot see from your account (such as ads you’ve clicked on and IP addresses that are logged when you use Facebook).
Facebook provides a long list of what types of data is available in the downloaded information (which you can access here: https://www.facebook.com/help/405183566203254) but there are a few key subjects that may be of the most interest to people: searches you’ve made on Facebook, removed friends, pending friend requests, any friends apps or pages you’ve hidden from your news feed, list of people who follow you, and a list of topics that you may be targeted against based on your status likes interests and other timeline data.
To download the information, go into your settings section. Click “download a copy of your Facebook data” below your general account settings. Click “start my archive.” Depending on how long you have been on Facebook and how much you post, it may take a while, but they will email you when it is ready for you to view.
While it’s uncomfortable to think about, it’s important to decide what you want to happen to your Facebook account when you pass away. Facebook provides two options: delete your account permanently or leave up the account and allow loved ones to share memories on it. For the later, you’ll need to designate a legacy contact. They’ll be able to write a pinned post (which can be used to provide memorial service information or share a message on your behalf), accept new friend requests from loved ones, and update the profile picture and cover photo. They will not be able to remove any friends, read your messages, change or remove past posts, or actually log into your account.
To add a legacy contact, log into your settings and click “security” and then “legacy contact.” Type in your designated contact’s name and click “add.” If you later decide you want to change the contact, you’ll be able to click on the contact and click “remove.” Then you can add your new legacy contact.
It’s difficult, but important, to think about what will happen when you pass on. If you run a business, be sure to check out our post on how to prepare your business for an unexpected life crisis: link to post here.
Ads can be annoying. Ads that relate absolutely nothing to your life or preferences are even more annoying. Fortunately, Facebook allows you to edit your ad preferences. Simply click (www.facebook.com/ads/preferences/edit/). The link will bring you to a page listing topics and sub-topics that Facebook picked based on your activities on and off Facebook. You’ll be able to delete irrelevant preferences, as well as add preferences from a set list of topics.
Yes, you read that right. You can now send money to people through Facebook Messenger without a charge! First, you need to add a debit card. Click “settings,” then click “payments,” then click “add new debit card.” Currently, the only way to pay through Messenger is debit. You can also add a PIN if you wish for an extra security measure (click “settings” then click “payments” then click “PIN”).
Once your debit account is activated in Messenger, you’re ready to send money. Create a message and click the $ icon and enter the payment amount. Click “pay” in the top right to send it.
To receive money for the first time, open the conversation and click “add card” in the message to add your debit card.
Just like with other transfers, it may take up to three business days for the banks to make the funds available.
Did you know you can embed public Facebook posts onto your website? It’s simple and a great way to add visual content to your site. First, navigate to the post and click “embed post” from the drop down menu.
A box will pop up with a code, which you will need to copy and paste into your website.
Embedded posts are a great way to post testimonials, include examples, quote sources, show off your best content, and more!
This feature was developed during a Facebook Hackathon. It is basically a timeline, but for a relationship instead of one person. It gathers all the communication (posts, replies, tagged photos, etc.) that involve you and a friend you choose, and places it all in the Friendship Page. You can view these posts, and even personalize the cover photo and profile picture.
To access the page, go to your friend’s profile and click and select “see friendship” from the dropdown.
Who doesn’t love a competition of intelligence and strategy between friends? Simply type “@fbchess play” into a conversation with a friend and Messenger will bring up a game of chess. To move type in the phrase “@fbchess” followed by the letter of the piece (K for king, Q for queen, B for bishop, N for knight, R for rook, and P for Pawn) and the letter and number of the location‑For example, “@fbchessPe4” would move a pawn to square E4. If you get confused, type in “@fbchess help.” If you wish to end a match, type in “@fbchess resign.” To pick which color to start with, type “@fbchess play white” or “@fbchess play black” (white goes first).
Maybe chess isn’t your thing. How about a friendly basketball competition? Simply send a friend a basketball emoji and then click on the sent image to begin the game. The scores will be logged in the message feed so you can brag (or listen to bragging) easily.
To play the game, flick up on your phone to launch the ball into the hoop and try to get as many in as possible.
Facebook for personal use offers hours of endless entertainment, from dominating at a basketball game to reminiscing over old memories when viewing the Friendship Page. Facebook is a great tool for businesses as well. If you’d like help utilizing the benefits of Facebook for your business, simply call us or email us today! We are here to help with any aspect of business building, including social media marketing through Facebook.
To the joy of marketers everywhere, Facebook finally altered the 20% text rule! This recent change will provide more flexibility and freedom to marketers, while likely impacting the ad experience for Facebook users. Below we break down some common questions about this recent change.
Previously, Facebook rejected ad requests where more than 20% of the image contained text. This caused frustration among marketers whose ads were rejected for containing just barely too much text, and for brands whose logo was text. Some arguably creative and effective ads were also rejected due to containing too much text.
Facebook, as it repeatedly claims, is all about the user experience. Part of the user experience is the appearance and feel of the timeline. The line of thinking from Facebook went something like this… if ads appeared on timelines containing massive amounts of text, the timelines would appear cluttered and users would be less satisfied with the look of their timelines. Preventing advertisers from using too much text also helped push advertisers to make more creative ads that focused on “showing” rather than “telling,” since you rely on words to “tell.”
Marketers are now given the option to use photos in their ads that contain more than 20% text. No longer will beautiful ads be rejected for containing just a little bit too much text-marketers rejoice! The new change means Facebook will not stop advertisers from using an image simply because of an abundance of text (other restrictions, such as inappropriate images, still apply). However, Facebook still is pursuing the user experience as the priority. While it removed the “stick” form of motivation (punishing users for ads with too much text by preventing those ads from being published), it simultaneously implemented a “carrot” approach of motivation (providing an incentive to still use ads with minimal text). So even though it may not be a requirement, they still are going to make sure marketers keep limiting text at the top of their minds.
First, ads with too much text are not visually appealing. They make the photo appear cluttered and busy, two things you want to avoid because viewers will likely skip over it. Of course, there are exceptions where the cluttered and busy look is used to make a creative point, but generally speaking it’s a good idea to limit text from a graphic design standpoint.
Second, using too much text will negatively affect the amount of people who see your ad. Facebook has said that, given the same budget, ads with more text will reach a lower number of individuals than ads with less text. Hence the carrot again. They will motivate you to do what they like by giving you more views. Facebook won’t stop you from using too much text, but it makes it clear it is in the best interest of the marketer to continue using minimal text.
Images uploaded for ads will be placed into one of four categories. The one marketers should aim for is “image text: OK” because it will see no negative impact on reach. These photos contain no or minimal text. The next category “image text: low” sees a slightly limited ad reach. The third category “image text: medium” may see limited ad reach. The fourth category “image text: high” may not even reach the intended audience at all. When advertisers upload a photo in the grid tool, Facebook will let the user know which category the photo falls into.
You’ve probably noticed by now the new lovable little emojis popping up on your Facebook feed similar to the “like” button. It’s part of a significant redesign of Facebook’s iconic “like” button to provide users with a variety of quick empathetic responses.
Users can still use the traditional “like” button if they wish, but can also choose “love,” “haha,” “wow,” “sad,” and “angry” buttons. Simply hover the cursor over the “like” button and these options will pop-up.
If you are working on a mobile device, you have to just hold the “like” button and the options pop up.
While this offers more options for consumers and casual Facebook users, what do these mean for a business’ social media? Will these provide any benefit for the businesses, or will it actually hurt a business trying to see more engagement or comments? It’s too early to tell whether this will be overall beneficial for businesses, but below are some pros and cons of this Facebook change:
PROS
CONS
People have asked Facebook for a “dislike” button for years, and this is their response. Right now, it is new and exciting, but time will be the judge on how well this new engagement works, and more importantly, how it impacts the business side of Facebook. We do know that this will impact the field of social media marketing and the numerous organizations relying on social media for advertising, whether it will be a positive impact is left to be determined.
If the thought of trying to understand and master yet another drastic change to social media makes your head spin, don’t fret! Alpine Small Business Solutions is here for you. We can handle your social media marketing, or any other aspect of business building you would like assistance with. Just shoot us an email or call us up.
What is a Press Release you might ask...Well, it is a story a company or person wants to share that provide news worthy information about a particular event, service or product. There are many methods of getting the Press Release out to the masses and many of them cost to have your Press Release syndicated over the internet. There are also a myriad of sites that offer internet syndication for free…you just have to find them.
Below I have a list of 10 Press Release sites that are free of charge to submit to. Some have restrictions on how many Press Releases you can submit each day, or have some features disabled unless you upgrade your account, but free is free. You can’t really complain, right? Below are 9 easy to use hassle free websites you can submit your next Press Release to at no charge.
Don’t have time? Does all this info makes you dizzy? No problem, we got you covered. Contact us, today and let Alpine Small Business Solutions take care of all your Press Release Submission for you.
Click the icon to be taken directly to their website for more detailed information.
PR.com is a unique website where companies can promote literally everything about their business in a one stop shop business marketplace. A cross between a public relations and advertising entity, PR.com is a directory of businesses, products and services, a press release distribution service, job search website, and online publication of articles, reviews and celebrity interviews. With a full company profile, each business listed on PR.com has a powerful means by which to generate quality leads as well as gain worldwide and local exposure for all of their products, services and other business information.
PRLog was founded to help small, medium and large businesses and organizations in their online activities. Currently, the website offers following services press release distribution, press room hosting, business directory, job listings, and an expert directory.
Online PR Media was born a news announcement broadcasting solution that offers a perfect blend of traditional PR and SEO marketing. Online PR Media offers affordable multimedia press releases that achieve high search engine visibility — putting your message in front of the right people at exactly the right time. We’ve combined all of the features that internet marketers, business owners, and journalists have asked for in an online press release distribution site.
Newswire get your press release published on 7000+ News and Media Outlets. Your story is syndicated to a wide range of business, financial and news outlets to increase your presence online and in search. From our Basic Press Release to our Premium Distribution, you can select from a wide range of plans. Choose from the many affordable options we offer for distribution. New features include your own Newsroom, Email campaigns and Social Media. Submission is easy. Fill out one form and your press release is ready to be reviewed by our editorial staff. Detailed metrics provide insights on your content’s views and engagement. Premium submissions enjoy a detailed PDF report of your press release syndication.
Submit your free press release to an audience of millions with PressReleaser. PressReleaser is the hot new way to publicize your events, new products and other announcements. It only takes a few minutes to launch your free press release out to an audience of millions.
Directions Magazine is the geospatial industry’s oldest and most respected source of information and news. Engage with their articles, social media and webinars covering the latest trends and solutions. Directions is ready to share your message with their geospatial audience, 150,000 professionals around the world. They will target their 50,000 email subscribers, share on their growing social media channels, promote in their bi-monthly magazine digest, and display registration prominently on their website.
ThomasNet News® is a news service publishing news on new industrial products, services and industry news. If you would like to submit your new product, service or other industry news for review by the editors. If the new product release meets the editorial criteria, the editors will write a 400 to 500 character news summary of your product and you will be notified when they publish if you provide an e-mail address. Industry news may be published as submitted without notification.
PRZOOM is a press release & news distribution online submission service to corporations, PR agencies, market research reports, business journalists, freelance writers, news content providers sites. Their mission is to ensure that every organization has access to the media, regardless of size and geographic location.
Openpr.com reaches a large and constantly increasing number of decision-makers and policy-makers, which makes it an interesting platform for your corporate communication.
Furthermore, your article also appears regularly on Google News, often just a few minutes after its release on openPR.
PR*Urgent is a free press release and news distribution website. We publish high quality press releases, that gets you visibility in major search engines and news sites including Google News, MSN, Yahoo, Bing and much more.