Just about anywhere you go -- whether it's the Internet, newspapers, magazines, your next door neighbor -- you'll hear that 2009 was not a good year for most businesses and the economy certainly needed a boost.

Well, it's a new year and many economists are predicting a year of economic growth for 2010. Let's hope that is true. But in the meantime, it's up to you to jump start your business and perhaps make some changes. Here's my list of recommendations from a graphic and web designer's point of view:

If you have a website, review it. Read every page.

• Do you have any typos? These should be fixed immediately.
• Do you know how much traffic is going to your site? If not, you should be reviewing this monthly. If your traffic is low, why? Are you promoting your website in every marketing piece you create? Is it on your business cards?
• Have you asked your clients whether they go to your website? If they don’t, what would make them visit it or recommend it to others?
• Do you have keywords and descriptions in your coding? This allows search engines to find you based on the type of work you do.
• When was the last time your site was updated? I don’t mean a new site. Just new copy or pictures or listing things that have changed in your business. 

If you don’t have a website, why?

• Perhaps this is the year to get a presence on the Internet.  More and more people go to the Internet to find out about a company or even just to find an address and phone number. If you’re not there, your competitors will be. Don’t let them have an advantage over you.

Printed Materials

• Is your business card dating back to 1980? It may be time for a redesign.
• Do your letterhead, envelopes and business cards match? Are you using brochures with an old logo or writing in your cell phone number?
• Have the forms in your office been photocopied 5 million times and you can’t find the original? Get them retyped.
• Remember, you want your clients to think of you as a professional company and you want your marketing materials to reflect that.

So that’s my suggestions for 2010. It’s time to get started and complete some of them. Here’s to a successful and profitable 2010.

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1. Ad-aware - This free version for personal home use gives you malware or spyware protection. If you want added protection there are other choices for this software from plus, pro and business.
2. Ninite.com – This website offers many free software programs that you can download all at once. This was great when I switched to a new computer as I could get many applications installed all at once. (Be sure to look at some of the fine print. Microsoft Office is listed but it is a trial version.) But if you are looking for a quick way to install many free programs you already use, this is the way to go. Note that this is for home use and there is a Pro version of Ninite for businesses.
3. Picasa – I love this program for all my pictures. (Last year I took over 3,000 pictures and it saved me a lot of time.) The program is a free photo editing software. You can have the files on your computer and also upload them to your own Picasa site for friends to look at. Picasa automatically locates all the photos on your computer and you can even tag each photo and search for specific people, places, etc.
4. Google Products – Other than the Google search engine that we are all familiar with, Google offers many free products that are useful. First and foremost, if you need another email address you can sign up for g-mail. You can create online documents, presentations and spreadsheets that can be share easily with others using Google Docs. Check out Google and see what you can use.

There are many more great free programs out there, but if you haven't tried any of these before try them this year! And while you're at it, here's a list of some of my favorite Internet sites to visit.