NEWSFLASH: The Internet is a global resource!
Not exactly news, is it? Even the rawest beginner is well aware that the Internet and the World Wide Web are communications media that span the globe — and thus ALL TIME ZONES.
So why is it that so many businesses and information publishers seem to forget that there’s anyone out there outside their own local time zone?
For me, the World Wide Web is an important information resource. I frequently want to tune in to online broadcasts and webinars, and there are a vast number of people who want to do the same thing.
Yet how often have you seen events, particularly online events such as webinars, announced to the world in only the date/time local to the event holder?
If you are an online merchant who ships worldwide and who is about to hold a 24-hour special promotion, wouldn’t it be in your own best interests not to have people on the other side of the planet turning up a day late because of Time Zone confusion? Or just ignoring your notification because they can’t be bothered doing the conversion of your event time into their own local time?
If you’re holding a time-sensitive event, you probably send out an e-mail or write a blog post to announce it to your prospects. If you make it easy for people to know exactly when to attend your event, regardless of their global location, you substantially improve the chances of them attending.
Obviously listing hundreds of local times would be a real PITA, and just not feasible. But there are much, much easier ways to keep everyone happy and improve your attendance numbers. Here are two:
1. Add to Outlook Calendar
This technique involves you providing an iCalendar attachment which, when opened, adds an appointment item to the calendar section of the Outlook e-mail client. The date/time of the event is automatically converted into the appropriate local date/time of the recipient of your notice. You can create the iCalendar attachment (which is a small .ics file) from within Outlook itself; there are plenty of tutorials available to tell you how to do that. This technique works fine, but has limited acceptability. For one thing not everyone uses an e-mail client that can accept iCalendar attachments.
2. Event Time Announcer
A much better alternative that works for everyone.
This is a completely free online resource that provides a list of about 150 Time Zone equivalents to the time you set for your event, and it is simplicity itself to use. You first fill in a few fields on a webpage, like this:
Setup Screen
When you click the Show Result button you’ll get a page that looks like this:
Results Screen: Click image to see the actual webpage.
Copy the URL of that Results page and paste it into the e-mail or blog article you are using to notify of your upcoming event. Anyone who clicks on the link will get the same results page, where they can look up the local date/time for their particular location. Simplicity itself!
You can see the actual webpage for the above “Christmas shopping notification” by clicking the image.
So PLEASE…
If you follow any online business, Internet marketer or information provider who periodically offers online events, PLEASE forward them a link to this article, in their own best interests and yours (and mine) as well. Event Time Announcer is so quick and easy to use that there is no excuse for NOT going the extra yard for your customers, subscribers, fans & followers.
Find event time announcer here:
http://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/fixedform.html
