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Special Guest: DG Lion Sharon West

Upcoming events: * Diamond Willow Park Equipment Install * Apr 2012 Community Food Drive (23-28 Apr) * May 2012 Chamber of Magrath Tradeshow (4-5 May) * Jul 2012 Town Celebration (26-28 Jul) Meeting Schedule (upcoming/planned) * 7pm Thu 12 Apr 2012 * 7pm Wed 9 May 2012 * 7pm Wed 13 Jun 2012

Chamber Meeting Notice Tue 13 Mar 2012 7:25am Roosters

Date: Mon, Mar 12, 2012 at 1:19 PM Subject: Chamber Meeting Notice Tue 13 Mar 2012 7:25am Roosters To: All + Chamber Members Meeting Notice Tue 13 Mar 2012 7:25am Roosters [image: Print] Reminder - Early Morning Chamber Meeting Tue 13 Mar 2012 at 7:25 AM at Roosters! If you can make it out to our meeting that would be great! - Trade Show 2 .. We are busy preparing for our upcoming Spring Trade Show, our 2nd annual! - Magrath Pharmacy suggests we consider a New Year's Baby contest sponsored by the Magrath Chamber for the first baby of the new year born in our area. - Welcome to new Chamber Members!

Canada Get Your Business Online see: magrath-ab.ca

I read this on the net the other day and said, hmm I wonder if it works: "Websites are now free for all Canadian businesses. If you’re a business owner without a website, you probably have a good reason for it. Maybe you thought it was too expensive or took too much time? Maybe you were overwhelmed by the technology and didn’t know where to start? Canada Get Your Business Online is a new program that provides businesses a fast, free, and easy way to get online. Google is investing in Canadian businesses by creating gybo.ca and by paying for your .ca domain registry for 12 months. Yola is providing you with hosting, their leading site building tool, and support."

Sure, I thought .. although, I suppose Google does has much to gain by having more businesses online to purchase their services .. so, I gave it a whirl.

1) Free .ca domain name (for first year - thereafter about $30/yr). It only took a few minutes to select and submit magrath-ab.ca and then simply answered a phone call to my number confirming I lived in Canada. Done. Never had to give any credit card information.

2) Hosted by Yola.com website .. also free (for first year - thereafter up to $10/mo). Selected a template (basic) and added an applet (a link to my tumblr blog aka ssdirect.tumblr.com). Previewed and Published. Easy.

3) A while later the website was live on the internet. Wow.

Of course, now they would like to sell us on their 'other services' such as: " To increase your marketing reach, you might consider: • AdWords - Target customers locally or anywhere in the world. Pay only for ads that bring prospects to you. • Google Base - Add your entire catalog to our free product search site. • Google Checkout - Sell online with Google Checkout and increase sales by driving more traffic and higher conversions. Maybe later ..

Lost on the Net ..

Source: http://ssdirect.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=84:lost-on-the-net-&catid=18:internet&Itemid=33

I can't settle on a favorite platform to post my insights on. I like Joomla but all my Joomla websites enjoy the almost exact look and feel. OK for 'my' sites, but not everyone wants to look just like me (he he). I am also testing out tumblr and twitter and facebook and google+ and even wordpress and weebly and google sites.This post is on tumblr which should forward to twitter which should be passed on my 3 friends at facebook, but getting that content back from those sites to links on my websites is unnecessarily awkward. I usually end up double posting the content back where it should end up .. when I get time.

Joomla is a CMS that I never use as one, because I really only have those 3 friends. So most of my sites end up like a large personal blog. Setting up a Joomla site for others to use has been less than successful due to the need to train users in entering passwords and basic html code. Their eyes start crossing and I have to back them slowly away from the computer screen.

Weebly was selected for the Magrath Museum website and it was easily mastered by the summer intern, but needs some full time tending. Content is king and I don't have access to it unless I go work at the Museum (although my kids would say I belong there).

Google Sites has been used with some success for Westwinds Soccer. They only update it during the soccer season (a short season in Canada) and last year I convinced them to use a embedded Google Spreadsheet to report the League Standings with some success. It will remain to be seen if they will be able to update the site for 2012 without some assistance.

The Magrath Chamber of Commerce is a site I am donating space and time to. The primary site is on Joomla with links to Google Sites for projects like the upcoming Tradeshow. This approach allows for quick implementation and presentation of information for chamber projects without major webdesign project on the main site. I simply include a menu link to the Tradeshow on my main Joomla site and back to the Chamber site from the Google Sites page with similar theme and it seems to work ok.

Finally, a word on Social Media .. Google+ vs Twitter vs Facebook. Still find it awkward to use successfully. I would like to use my multiple personalities but these sites want only to know the actual me. I would like to post as Magrath Chamber when acting as there spokesperson and as Soft Serve Direct when wearing my business hat and only as R Davies when posting family news. Similar problem with email: I have Gmail accounts for all these same entities. To their credit, Google is making recent strides in letting me 'switch identity' as needed between my various email accounts.

Meanwhile, my webdesign efforts are much like my kindergarten art projects - various interesting pieces of information glued together in awkward ways with occasional missing links, that once in a while could be considered a masterpiece (by my mom).

Joke number 1251 at the pharmacy ..

Kermit tells all .. who wouldn't have loved him as Yoda?

Watch for Nomination Booths at Hometown Christmas 1 Dec 2011 The Magrath Chamber of Commerce will be reserving Nomination Booths for Citizen of the Year, Youth of the Year, and Business of the Year at the upcoming 6th annual Hometown ...

.. our 6th annual Hometown Christmas late night shopping event is coming soon. Please remember Thu 1 Dec 2011 from 6-9pm all up and down main street in Magrath. Merry Christmas!

Nice article on the tragic accident of last month ..

Macleans Magazine did a 3 page spread on our kids playing football here in Southern Alberta. Cool eh.

Magrath Students Killed in Car Crash Oct 2011

Funeral arrangements for our four Magrath School students are as follows:

Clay Card’s funeral will be held on Thursday, October 20th at 2:00 pm in the Magrath LDS Stake Center (brown LDS church). School will be dismissed at noon that day. Friends may meet with the family on Wednesday evening, October 19th from 7:00 pm – 9:00 pm, also at the Magrath LDS Stake Center.

Danae Gough’s funeral will be held on Saturday, October 22nd at 10:00 a.m. at the Magrath LDS Stake Center.

Jorden Miller’s funeral will also be held at the Magrath LDS Stake Center on Saturday, at 2:00 p.m. Combined meet the family gatherings for Danae and Jorden will be on Friday evening from 7:00 – 9:00 p.m. at the Magrath LDS Stake Center.

The funeral service for Renzo Dainard will be held at the Magrath LDS Stake Center on Tuesday, October 25th at 2:00 pm. School will be dismissed at noon on Tuesday.

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