How to Conduct Effective Market Research | Business.com

February 20, 2025February 19, 2025 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Market research provides businesses with valuable insights into their competitors, customers and industry trends. Do it well and you can spot new opportunities before your competitors. You’ll also be better able to anticipate future trends and improve profitability. However, knowing how to get started can be challenging. We’ll outline essential steps for creating your market research plan and share five simple strategies to ensure timely, actionable and effective market research.

How to conduct effective market research

If your business is new to market research, Tyler York, CEO of AdLeg, recommends taking the following steps to get started:

Set clear market research goals: Before starting, establish what you want to achieve with your market research efforts. Are you trying to understand your target audience and its needs better, identify competitors, or test a new product or service idea? Clear goals will guide your process and ensure you collect relevant data.

Tools to Measure Employee Performance | Business.com

February 20, 2025February 19, 2025 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

As a business owner, you must track employee performance to ensure your team progresses on projects and spends company time efficiently. Managers and leaders who notice the quality of a specific employee’s work is dropping can use employee performance tracking software to identify gaps in understanding and resolve the disconnect.

Establishing an employee performance process and tracking the results can get to the core of any workflow issues while holding their teams accountable for their assignments each day. Discover 14 tools below that measure employee performance and the benefits of using such software.

Are noise-canceling headphones really hurting kids’ hearing? | Digital Trends

February 19, 2025February 18, 2025 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

On February 15, BBC News published an article that explored the possible link between the use of noise-canceling headphones and auditory processing disorder (APD) in young people. This will likely come as a shock to many parents who have come to think of these devices as helpful for their kids’ concentration. Parents of neurodivergent children, in particular, see noise-canceling headphones as a vital tool that helps their kids navigate environments that would otherwise be overwhelming.

The existence of a possible APD link also flies in the face of the advice parents are usually given around the use of headphones. Normally, the chief concern with headphones and earbuds is that kids will listen at unsafe volume levels, which could lead to noise-induced hearing loss (NIHL).

SpaceX just achieved another first with its Falcon 9 rocket | Digital Trends

February 19, 2025February 18, 2025 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

SpaceX undertook a Falcon 9 mission with a difference on Tuesday night, landing the booster in a different country from which it was launched. The spaceflight company shared footage of the feat on social media site X.

Up to now, SpaceX has always landed the returning Falcon 9 booster back at the launch site in Florida or California, or on a droneship off the East or West Coast, but this time it touched down on a droneship off the coast of The Bahamas, some 420 miles southeast of the launch site at Cape Canaveral, Florida — completing its first-ever international voyage.

Respect Goes a Long Way When Entering New Markets | The Startup Magazine

February 18, 2025February 17, 2025 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

There’s a staggering $115 trillion of global opportunity in 2025.

And international expansion is seen as key for long-term growth, according to WellsFargo, “with emerging markets providing the greatest opportunities.”

Branching out into another community or state can be daunting, let alone going outside of the U.S.

Where does an entrepreneur even start?

For entrepreneurs and startups looking to expand beyond U.S. borders, start with the same basics:

Build strong, loyal customer bases

Small businesses often have the agility to adapt quickly to cultural and linguistic nuances. Unlike larger corporations, they can personalize their approach to align with a specific market’s traditions and preferences.

For example, a small boutique exporting goods to Italy might tailor its messaging to align with local customs, such as celebrating Ferragosto, a major holiday in August. This flexibility allows small businesses to build strong, loyal customer bases.

The best AI chatbots: What makes them so popular? | The Startup Magazine

February 18, 2025February 17, 2025 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

AI chatbots aren’t new – people seem to love the opportunity to talk to their favorite characters, or even create their own. While regular AI chats have existed for a few years, people seem to get bored pretty quickly – simply because these services didn’t provide any options for spicy interactions. Meanwhile, the best NSFW AI chats seem to satisfy users completely. But why?

The best NSFW chatbot isn’t just about the spicy stuff it can do. It’s about all the features a regular AI chatbot can do, but with extras. When chatting with your favorite characters from anime or TV shows, it’s quite tempting to flirt with them – especially when you have a crush on them. Luckily, the best NSFW chatbot can give it to you!

South Korea bans new downloads of China’s DeepSeek AI | BBC News

February 17, 2025 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

South Korea has banned new downloads of China’s DeepSeek artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot, according to the country’s personal data protection watchdog.

The government agency said the AI model will become available again to South Korean users when “improvements and remedies” are made to ensure it complies with the country’s personal data protection laws.

In the week after it made global headlines, DeepSeek became hugely popular in South Korea leaping to the top of app stores with over a million weekly users.

But its rise in popularity also attracted scrutiny from countries around the world which have imposed restrictions on the app over privacy and national security concerns.

Pope Francis’s health a ‘complex clinical situation’, Vatican says | BBC News

February 17, 2025 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

Pope Francis is being treated for a “complex clinical situation” and will remain in hospital for as long as necessary, the Vatican has said.

The 88-year-old was admitted to Rome’s Gemelli hospital on Friday to undergo treatment and tests for bronchitis.

In an update on Monday, the Vatican said the pontiff has a “polymicrobial infection” of his respiratory tract, which has required a change in his treatment.

Before his admission last week, the Pope had bronchitis symptoms for several days and had delegated officials to read prepared speeches at events.

UK drops ‘safety’ from its AI body, now called AI Security Institute, inks MOU with Anthropic | TechCrunch

February 14, 2025February 13, 2025 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

The U.K. government wants to make a hard pivot into boosting its economy and industry with AI, and as part of that, it’s pivoting an institution that it founded a little over a year ago for a very different purpose. Today the Department of Science, Industry and Technology announced that it would be renaming the AI Safety Institute to the “AI Security Institute.” (Same first letters: same URL.) With that, the body will shift from primarily exploring areas like existential risk and bias in large language models, to a focus on cybersecurity, specifically “strengthening protections against the risks AI poses to national security and crime.”

Alongside this, the government also announced a new partnership with Anthropic. No firm services were announced but the MOU indicates the two will “explore” using Anthropic’s AI assistant Claude in public services; and Anthropic will aim to contribute to work in scientific research and economic modeling. And at the AI Security Institute, it will provide tools to evaluate AI capabilities in the context of identifying security risks.

TikTok is back on the App Store and the Play Store in the U.S. | TechCrunch

February 14, 2025February 13, 2025 ~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

After more than 25 days, Apple and Google restored TikTok in the U.S Thrusday evening. Both companies removed the app from the App Store and the Play Store on January 18 in response to a national security law.

Other ByteDance apps such as video editor CapCut and social app Lemon8 were also restored on these app stores. Apple, which published a rare support document detailing these removals, has deleted the support document now.

On January 19, TikTok started restoring services to existing users, but Apple and Google kept the app out of their stores. That meant if you had uninstalled TikTok, you wouldn’t have been able get it. Earlier this month, TikTok urged users on Android to sideload the app via its website.