Apple made news last month when they talked about syncing all Apple devices (e.g., if you buy a song from iTunes on your computer, it will show up on your iPhone and your iPad). How do they do this? In the cloud, of course.

This isn't a new concept -- companies have been offering storage on their servers (aka "the cloud") for a while. Carbonite backs up your hard drive on the web, Google stores your photos in a Picasa web album and your Gmail. Businesses, large and small, are taking advantage of the cloud to store data so that they don't have to own and manage the servers or invest in other IT infrastructure. This is particularly helpful if a business doesn't need lots of storage all the time, but only once in a while.

Todd Wasserman, at Mashable, discusses "The Pros and Cons of Moving Your Business into the Cloud". There are many advantages for a business, but there can be some disadvantages. He recounts the turmoil back in April when Amazon Web Services had an outage causing problems for Foursquare and Hootsuite, among others.

Bottom line -- definitely worth looking at, but make sure you understand the pros and cons. Next month I'll talk about my new, favorite cloud storage -- Dropbox.

One of my favorite bloggers/tweeters is Ike Pigott (aka Occam's RazR). Recently he wrote a blog "Four C's for Community Cultivation"; in other words, how do you get people to come and read what you're putting out there.

The four C's are content, context, connect, and comment. Content is the value you bring to your audience. Context is how your content relates to your audience (why do they want to read it). Connect is how you help your audience connect with and learn about others (just like I'm connecting you to Ike). And comment is how you develop a dialogue with your audience (e.g., when someone comments on your blog, comment back.) Read Ike's article to learn more (and read some of the other things he wrote, you'll enjoy them.)

Do you have a LinkedIn profile? Many people use LinkedIn to find a job, but you should also be using it as one of the marketing tools for your business. Not sure how to do that? I can review your LinkedIn profile and show you how to make it better. And if you aren't on LinkedIn yet, I can help you set-up your profile. Make an appointment today and let LinkedIn work for you!

Are you interested in trying e-mail marketing? I am a Certified Constant Contact Expert and a Constant Contact Solution Provider. Which means I can help you with your e-mail marketing -- whether it's helping with set-up, writing the content, or doing something more advanced. I can even set up your contact lists, help you choose a template, and develop your e-mail schedule. To learn more, click here.

E-mail marketing is a way to stay in front of your customers. Whether it's an e-letter (like this one), notice of a special event or sale, or just a holiday greeting, e-mail marketing should be a part of your marketing package. Let me help you get started.