Infotrade

Ask any sales leader how selling has changed in the past decade, and you'll hear a lot of answers but only one recurring theme: It's a lot harder. Yet even in these difficult times, every sales organization has a few stellar performers. Who are these people? How can we bottle their magic? To understand what sets apart this special group of sales reps, the Sales Executive Council launched a global study of sales rep productivity three years ago involving more than 6,000 reps across nearly 100 companies in multiple industries. We now have an answer, which we've captured in the following three insights: 1. Every sales professional falls into one of five distinct profiles . Quantitatively speaking, just about every B2B sales rep in the world is one of the following types, characterized by a specific set of skills and behaviors that defines the rep's primary mode of interacting with customers: Relationship Builders   focus on developing strong personal and profe...

It’s inevitable, right? With cameras becoming ever smaller and storage becoming ever cheaper, there will come a day when all of our life’s memories are digitally preserved. Memoto , a Stockholm-based startup inspired by the Quantified Self movement, is taking a stab at this opportunity with a postage-sized camera that wearers will carry around with them constantly. It snaps a photo every 30 seconds, keeping a visual trail of your everyday life. A companion online service will store everything, catalog it by time, date and place and even help you pick out the most visually interesting moments. The company’s launching a campaign on Kickstarter to draw interest. They’re hoping to retail the camera for $279 next year in three colors of graphite grey, white and bright orange. Early backers will get the camera and a one-year web subscription for $199. So questions: Isn’t that creepy? Maybe, but actually the company behind Memoto thought about voyeuristic or awkward social...

Worldwide spending on information technology will break through the $3.7 trillion level in 2013, propelled in large part by an increase in spending on big-data technology and on cloud computing, according to the latest prediction by the research firm Gartner. Gartner made its  latest prediction  at its annual Symposium and ITxpo in Orlando today. If that number feels a little familiar, it’s not your imagination. It was just this April when Gartner said IT spending in 2012 would be  exactly that same figure: $3.7 trillion . Turns out it was $3.6 trillion. So what’s a $100 billion between friends? Anyway . Here’s another prediction: By 2015, there will be 4.4 million jobs worldwide devoted to the support of big data, of which 1.9 million will materialize in the U.S., says Peter Sondergaard, Gartner’s global head of research. Even better, he predicts that each job created by big data will generate three more outside of IT, working out to a grand total of about six mil...

City dwellers have more contacts and accumulate them at a faster rate than those who live in smaller conurbations, say network scientists. You don't have to spend long in a metropolis like New York, London, or Tokyo to sense the dramatic pace at which the locals live their lives. If you already live in one of these places, you'll get the sense by heading out into the countryside where life slows down. But while this pace is easy to sense, it is notoriously difficult to quantify because of the practical difficulties in making the huge number of necessary measurements. Consequently, nobody has pinned down the nature of this "pace of life" or why it accelerates in cities.  Today, Markus Schläpfer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge and a few buddies take a big step towards a better understanding of this phenomenon. These guys have found the first evidence that humans in cities interact more often and with a greater number of other people t...

3D printers are being used to produce insoles and splints which could help millions of people with disabling foot and ankle conditions. A team at Glasgow Caledonian University is "printing" devices which are more supportive and quicker to make. Normally, making foot and ankle splints is a long and laborious process - a model of the foot is made, often from plaster, then plastic is moulded around it by hand. This process can take anywhere up to six weeks, with patients waiting in considerable pain. Prof Jim Woodburn, a specialist in foot problems at Glasgow Caledonian University, said: "Our goal is based on, for example, the Specsavers model so what we would like to do is ideally provide the patient with the device on the day." The 3D printers can produce a range of devices to help patients, including splints The team are using 3D printers to build foot and ankle supports with a new degree of precision. This new manufacturing technology builds up l...

Google says the First Amendment should apply to its search results — even if this allows the company to favor its own products over those of its competitors. Is this a legitimate argument? photo:  Aaron Amot Rumors are swirling that the federal government is about to sue Google over claims that the company rigs its search results. Google has responded by invoking its right to free speech — but not everyone is buying this. Tim Wu, a prominent law professor at Columbia, is not convinced that Google is invoking its First Amendment rights in good faith. He suggests that Google and other big companies are cynically invoking constitutional freedoms as part of a corporate deregulation agenda. “We’re living in a golden age of First Amendment opportunism,” said Wu, speaking Friday at a Penn Law School conference titled  “The Evolving Internet.” In Wu’s view, search results are not really speech in the first space. Instead, he argues, Google’s algorithms are closer to oth...

Dr. Michio Kaku talks about brain-to-brain communication, recording videos of your thoughts and the fears of science fiction. There’s no doubt that the internet is creating what is called an intelligent planet, that is, the skin of the planet earth is becoming a network by which intelligent creatures communicate with each other. But that’s just the first step. Some people think that the next step in the coming decades is not going to be the internet. It’s going to be Brain Net because we’re at the point now where we can actually connect computers to the living mind. In fact, I was just at Berkeley a few weeks ago where I had a demonstration of this: we can actually create videos of your thoughts. These videos are not perfectly accurate, but I saw a demonstration in a laboratory at Berkeley where you can actually see in a video screen what people are thinking.

The caregivers of a child with a rare genetic disorder use a range of technologies like tablets and smart phones to help her learn, track her care and provide consistent learning experiences. London was born with a rare genetic condition, but with the help of everyday consumer technologies - from tablets, smart phones, apps and social media - she's learning new skills at a rapid rate. An experimental concept called The Connected Child enables London's caregivers to ensure that they're all on the same page with everything that she does, tracking her learning approaches to see what works and what doesn't. At nine years old, London is developmentally similar to a three-year-old. Tetrasomy 18p is so rare that there hasn't been enough research to determine the best approaches to help her learn basic academic and independent living skills.  The Connected Child is an experimental program using video models, a blog,  Facebook and a web app that keeps each caregi...

Parents know that reading, writing and arithmetic are all important. But there's a subject that can impact a child for life and it's rarely taught: entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurship can give your child the skills to thrive. Even if they don't become an entrepreneur as adults, the skills learned will help them in every endeavor in life, from being a good parent to excelling in their career. The following is a list of benefits your child can gain from learning about entrepreneurialism. Self-Worth: The entrepreneur must create value, whether that means building a better mousetrap, offering a unique service or providing a product that's cheaper, faster or better. Learning how to do this helps a child understand that they can make or do things that other people consider valuable. With that understanding comes a personal sense of worth. Also, engaging in entrepreneurial work gives a child an opportunity to solve problems, come up with ideas, deal with people and make an inc...

It is a lot of fun being an entrepreneur.You work for yourself day and there is no boss to report to. Since it is your own business, you give in your 100% to be successful. I have to confess, it is not easy to become an entrepreneur. It requires a lot of dedication and hard work day in and day out to plan for your venture and take it from ground. It is said that “Entrepreneurship to a man is quite close to what pregnancy and child birth is to a woman”. What it means that starting a venture of your own is almost as fun and painful experience as a childbirth can be. To see your venture grow may provide similar amount of satisfaction as to see your child grow. Entrepreneurs is also a lot challenging in terms of handling multiple things at a time, tackling financial issues and host of problems. When you became an entrepreneur you need to leave out ‘herd mentality’ behind while picking up new skills on the way. The questions that may come to an new born entrepreneur’s mind ar...

Feathery Plumes No. 22 watercolor painting When shopping online, your customers don’t have the luxury of trying on your products, touching them, feeling them or asking you questions about them. This can leave them unsure if they should purchase from your site. To make sure that your customers click the ADD TO CART or BUY NOW button, here are 10 things you  must  have on your product page: The  cost  of the product Pictures  of the product – preferably more than one picture, with the ability to zoom in and get up close to see all the details of the product). Your pictures should be taken by a professional photographer (unless you are a professional photographer) who is familiar with lightning and product photography. Benefits  of the product – a short paragraph or a few sentences about how your product will make your customers look, feel, how it will help make their lives easier, why they should buy it right now, what makes your product special ...