Business Local Listings asked:


Web Dot Com Website Development Philippines, Inc. is the official web site developer of Amnesty International Philippines.

Amnesty International is a global movement of people campaigning actively for the protection of human rights and taking action against human rights abuses. Such action comes in the form of information campaigns through communication and media channels, as well as public pressure through mass demonstrations, vigils and lobbying.

Amnesty International Philippines was officially recognized as an Amnesty International section on January 27, 1987. Among its many accomplishments is its role in the repeal of the Death Penalty Law in the Philippines in 2005 and its participation in the successful campaign to get UN approval for a moratorium on executions in 2007, with the Philippines as co-author and signatory of the resolution.

The Amnesty International Philippines web site developed by Web Dot Com is packed with information that is systematically categorized and labeled. Despite the huge amount of data on the entire site, the visitor is not overwhelmed. Perhaps this is because the landing pages are bright and feature a clean layout which clearly displays the various sections. Navigation is definitely not a problem since links are properly labeled.

Given a prominent position is the link to the Amnesty International Report of 2009. There are Spotlights on Human Rights and Poverty, Violence against Women, Counter Terror with Justice, and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). There is a section on News and Updates alongside a section on Appeals for Action. There is a special link to Good News and another one to CampAIgn, the Amnesty International newsletter.

There are buttons labeled Donate to Amnesty International, Join Amnesty International, and More ways to get involved.

There are also several search buttons. One is to select a country where Amnesty International is active and another is to select a country with human rights abuses.

There are buttons leading to the sections on Amnesty International in the Philippines, Act Now, Join Us, Activities and Publications.

The Amnesty International Philippines section is comprised of subsections titled Who We Are, explaining Amnesty International; AI Philippines; Networks, Statute of AI, AIPh ByLaws, UDHR and FAQ.

The Act Now section is comprised of subsections titled Direct Appeals, Urgent Actions and Donate.

The Join Us sections has subsections titled Members, Local Groups, Form a Group and Volunteers.

The Activities section has a list of AI Philippines activities since 1998, categorized by year.

The Publications section contains downloadable materials as well as subsections for the Newsletter, Reports, Library and Archives.

Indeed, the Amnesty International Philippines is a fitting showcase of the web development and design skills of Web Dot Com.

Web Dot Com Website Development Philippines, Inc. has been successfully serving an international clientele from the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, Germany, the United Arab Emirates, Hong Kong, Korea, the British Virgin Islands and the Philippines for the last ten years. From Manila, Web Dot Com offers various business process outsourcing (BPO) services, including outsourcing web development and contact center services.

In the area of web development, the web hosting provider also offers domain name registration and low cost advanced web site development packages. Depending on the client’s needs, this may include advanced interactive database driven web site development, advanced portal development, heavy web based programming, web application development, content management systems, good website design, graphic design and multimedia components including flash animation development, e-commerce site solutions including a shopping cart using osCommerce, web site maintenance and support, search engine optimization, search engine marketing and social media marketing. Its programmers and developers are highly skilled at php, mysql, JavaScript and other internet languages and tools.

Web Dot Com Website Development Philippines, Inc. is your One Stop Shop Internet and Contact Center Solutions Vendor for the Global Market. Make it your own web site developer, as well.

Web Dot Com Website Development Philippines, Inc.

Address:

2nd Floor, BT&T Center

#20 E. Rodriguez Jr. Ave., Libis (C-5),

Quezon City, 1110 Philippines

E-mail: info@webdc.com.ph

Telephone numbers: (632) 634-4625; (632) 635-6104

Business Local Listings asked:


An interactive web site is undeniably more attractive to visitors and holds them longer. It also invariably earns many return visits. To make your interactive web site even more attractive, here are some features you may want to add to it, if your site does not have them yet. According to statistics, they will be even more effective if placed in your landing pages.

Discussion forums

Discussion forums are very popular among online users. Here users united by a certain interest can congregate and have online conversations, encouraging them to return again and again. Eventually, these users form an online community that becomes the solid and loyal base of the website.

Newsletter

You can also build and consolidate a long term relationship with your web site visitors by asking them to subscribe to your newsletter. At no cost, they will be able to receive updates and other useful information by email. Of course, the newsletter will also contains invitations and links to pages you want them to visit.

Online guestbook

An online guest book may take the place of a discussion forum or may co-exist with it. The difference is that comments by visitors on a guest book are about the web site and their experience on it. This may be password-protected to allow you to screen and approve or disapprove comments. This could also be a way of gathering your visitors’ email addresses if you do not have a newsletter.

Site search engine

A site search engine allows users to more easily search for something within your site. This encourages them to explore your site, too.

News column

A news column adds value to your web site by flashing up to the minute news to your visitors. This could also spark discussion with and among your visitors.

Personalized postcards

You can offer a selection of free postcards on your site, preferably with a theme related to your topic. It would be best if your visitor is able to send the postcard to an unlimited number of recipients, with a personalized message. Of course, each postcard contains a link back to your site.

Online calendar

The online calendar is particularly effective for web sites with registered users. Each one gets an individual calendar customizable with his or her appointments and alerts. This will entice the users to spend more time on the site and to check in regularly.

Calculator

A calculator is particularly handy for web sites that sell online. The user can use the calculator to figure out costs and totals before deciding on buying.

If you still do not have an interactive web site, or any web site for that matter, Web Dot Com Website Development Philippines, Inc. can help you. Based in Manila, this web site developer and web hosting provider offers domain name registration services as well as low cost advanced web site development packages. These packages include advanced interactive database driven web site development, advanced portal development, heavy web based programming, web application development, content management systems, good website design, graphic design and multimedia components including flash animation development, e-commerce site solutions including a shopping cart using osCommerce, web site maintenance and support, search engine optimization, search engine marketing and social media marketing. The company gives employment to highly trained programmers and developers equipped with skills in php, mysql, JavaScript and other internet applications.

Web Dot Com also provides business process outsourcing (BPO) services to companies from around the world outsourcing web development and other back office and front office business processes. Indeed, Web Dot Com Website Development Philippines, Inc. is your One Stop Shop Internet and Contact Center Solutions Vendor for the Global Market. You can rely on it to create your interactive web site.

Web Dot Com Website Development Philippines, Inc.

Address:

2nd Floor, BT&T Center

#20 E. Rodriguez Jr. Ave., Libis (C-5),

Quezon City, 1110 Philippines

E-mail: info@webdc.com.ph

Telephone numbers: (632) 634-4625; (632) 635-6104

Flor Ayag asked:


DO YOU prefer working regular hours under a reasonable supervisor in a well-established city office? Many people do. A person with such employment may enjoy greater security than one starting out fresh in a business of his own.

In the Philippines, however, there are those who prefer taking the risk. They want to enjoy working hours suited to their needs. There will, of course, be no promotions, no occasional raises in salary and no possibility of receiving a gold watch upon retirement. But this does not particularly concern these individuals. They find satisfaction in making a living by using their own skills and sound business sense. For them, nothing can compare with the opportunity of working with wife and children all day long and counting their blessings together when evening falls.

Filipinos often start a small business right at home. Consider what some of the possibilities are.

What Kind of Business?

Do you have a hobby that could become a full-time job? Perhaps you make toys for your children. If so, could you also make toys for other people’s children? In the Philippine city of Cebu, the production of toy guitars is not simply a hobby but a profitable business. The craftsmen work at home, producing toy guitars, ukuleles, bandurias and even very professional guitars that are sold at airports and music shops. Often at the end of the workday, the hills come alive with the music of thousands of stringed instruments, as family after family plays together.

Industrious Bicol folk produce handbags, slippers and numerous ladies’ accessories from abaca fiber. Deft hands in Bulacan and Quezon provinces weave buntal hats out of the petiole fibers of the buri palm tree. Here, try this on. Cool and dignified, is it not? Here is another one. Why, it makes you look 10 years younger!

Beneath Zamboanga’s lazy blue waters are found the tapering “antlers” of black coral. Craftsmen in Quezon City and Manila fashion the coral into tiepins, cuff links, rings, earrings, bracelets and necklaces. In the sandy seabeds off Surigao, Samar, Leyte and Panay, one can discover a treasure trove of shells—tiger cowrie, conch, lupo and kapis. Nimble hands make these into curtains, lampstands, windowpanes and chandeliers, which inhabitants of Paris, London or New York city would be proud to display in their homes.

Shoemaking may seem like an unlikely venture. But, in 1884, young Kapitan Moy bought a sturdy pair of British shoes. Back home he got more interested in the shoes. So he took them apart, and then put them back together again. Soon he set up a shoemaking shop and began sharing his new skills with neighbors. Almost a century later, the town of Marikina is going full speed ahead in the shoe-manufacturing business. In many, many homes of this town, grandpas, grandmas, papas, mamas and children home from school, busy as bees, are making the shoes that some of us will probably be wearing tomorrow. “Today,” says the Marikina Shoe Trade Commissioner, “we export shoes to many countries, including the source of Kapitan Moy’s shoes which he bought back in 1884.”

The growth of Marikina’s shoe trade has meant more business for other towns. For example, Meycauayan in Bulacan supplies Marikina with much shoe leather. In turn, Marinduque, Masbate, Mindoro, Palawan, Romblon and other islands keep Meycauayan supplied with hides from cattle and carabaos. They also furnish alligator, goat, pig and snake skins for shoes, handbags and belts.

Many Filipinos open small stores or operate stalls in the public markets. Family members usually take turns tending these stalls in the markets of Kamuning, Cubao, Tondo and elsewhere. Divisoria Market in Manila is said to be the biggest market of its kind in the Philippines. It is not one vast supermarket owned and run by a single individual or company, but consists of thousands of small family stores under one roof. Haggling over prices here is an art honed to perfection.

The Government Lends a Hand

Aware of the potential of “cottage industries,” the Philippine government offers some aid to enterprising Filipinos. There are free seminars on various crafts. A course is even offered on raising mushrooms.

Government assistance is also provided to help people to improve the quality of their products. In Albay, for instance, many have advanced from making clay pots to the study of ceramics. In Ilocos Norte, people are learning how to make bricks and tiles.

The Philippine Daily Express, in an August 17, 1974, editorial, reported that the National Science Development Board has sent food-training experts to 39 Philippine provinces, “propagating different methods of food processing, so that items like coconut water, excess vegetables, seasonal fruits and small fish may be put to commercial” uses. This has resulted in the formation of “18 cottage industry cooperatives.”

Cooperatives? Yes, these are formed when several small businesses join together for mutual protection and profit. They are duly registered with the proper government bureau. The government encourages the establishment of cooperatives by granting them tax exemption and various forms of protection. These cooperatives enable the group to buy at factory prices, to sell at lower prices than they could individually and then mutually to share the profits.

For people who still prefer to be in business on their own, help is offered through the National Cottage Industries Development Authority (NACIDA). This agency gives valuable pointers on making Philippine handicrafts. The government also grants a five-year tax exemption for those registered as having their own “cottage industry,” enabling many to continue in operation and to prosper.

Financing the Business

But where do people get the money to start in business? Actually, very little may be needed. For example, a young man sold a ring. With the proceeds he started a small jewelry business. Today he can also sell, not only jewels, but even the dust in his workshop for good money. Why? There is gold in every pinch of it!

Another man discussed the matter with his in-laws. They liked his project and provided some 200 pesos (about $30, U.S.) each. Now his coral craft brings in a sizable income, and all share in the profits.

Some banks maintain lending offices in public markets to assist stall holders financially. Wise Filipinos avoid unscrupulous money lenders whose high cumulative interest rates can quickly gobble up not only profits but the entire business capital as well.

Is It for You?

Going into business for yourself has some advantages. A person is usually freer to make his own daily schedule for work and recreation. He is not responsible to any supervisor and he may have more time to relax with his family. By choosing the type of work that appeals to him, he avoids being tied down to a boring job just to make a living. He can also enjoy the challenge to his ingenuity that his business provides.

But there are risks. A person can lose his capital through bad management or unforeseen problems. Competition or inflation could cut profits. Then there is the anxiety about being successful, since running one’s own business may lack the security of being in someone else’s employ. It may be, too, that more time has to be spent in caring for the business than had been anticipated.

Christine Layug asked:


 

Since as long as we can remember, the lechon has been always there to brighten up every occasion or special event that we when into. In every festivity that we have gone through, there is always a lechon lying down on the table, ready to be eaten. But what are lechons anyway? And where did it start?

Among the many popular dishes here in the Philippines, the Philippine Lechon is considered to be the most popular among the Filipinos. The Philippine Lechon is a popular Filipino cuisine that is commonly reserved only for special occasion such as festivities or celebrations.

The name Lechon was derived from the Spanish word meaning suckling pig, which is a piglet that is killed between the ages of two to six weeks and traditionally roasted. And like the Philippine Lechon, it’s usually reserved for special occasions. But unlike a suckling pig, a Philippine Lechon is usually a whole adult roasted pig. Visit the In Lechon Philippine to get a taste of the Philippine lechon culture.

Though a Philippine Lechon is typically a whole roasted pig, Philippine Lechon also involves chicken or cattle aside. A typical process of Philippine Lechon involves the whole pig/piglet, chicken, or cattle/calf being slowly roasted over charcoal.

Philippine Lechon is usually cooked during national festivities (known as fiestas), the holiday season, and other special occasions such as weddings, graduations, birthdays and baptisms, or family get-togethers. A Philippine Lechon is commonly served with liver-based gravy or sometimes served Chinese style with steamed buns and a sweet plum sauce. Send a lechon to your loved ones back home with the help of In Lechon Philippine.

Philippine Lechon is usually the main highlight of festivities or other kinds of celebrations, and it is the most popular dish in the event. Other versions of a Philippine Lechon include the Philippine Lechon kawali which is cooked in a large frying pan and cooked to a crisp.

Leftover Philippine Lechon can be easily recycled into another delectable Filipino dish called Philippine Lechon paksiw. Philippine Lechon paksiw involves cooking left-over Philippine Lechon by boiling it in vinegar or gravy making the meat moist and the skin very soft. Visit the In Lechon Philippine to learn how to send some premium lechon to your loved ones back home.

Though a Philippine Lechon is popular among the Filipinos, finding a shop that sells this can be tough. The easies place to buy some Philippine Lechon in the Philippines is in La Loma Quezon City. But if you cannot get there, then you could always buy some Philippine Lechon then have it delivered on your door steps. And the best place for that is with Express Regalo. If you want to know what Express Regalo and In Lechon Philippine can do for you, then visit Express Regalo at www.expressregalo.com.

Dan Eggers asked:


If your Asia tour includes a long stay in the Philippines, we suggest that you add in a visit to Ongpin or Chinatown, which is how most people call it as well, as part of your travel program, especially if you’ll in Manila – the capital city of the country – for a while yet.

Ongpin or Chinatown may not be as popular as other places in the Philippines but that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be part of your travel schedule. Not only is a visit to Ongpin guaranteed to be delightful in more ways than one, it also won’t cost you much because prices in Ongpin are more affordable than what you’d find in other cities like Makati or even Quezon City.

Ongpin is also mainly a residential town so it’s easier to tour the place rather than other cities, which would require you to take on huge buses and six-wheeler trucks just to cross the street.

Because Ongpin is not that big a town, the streets are mostly narrow, winding and filled with people. If you’re planning to drive your own car to Ongpin, you might be forced then to park somewhere and walk for the rest of the time you’ll be spending in Binondo. But that’s not really much of a punishment – except for your feet, if you’re wearing high heels! – because a lot of people really prefer to wander around Ongpin by foot.

Food Shopping

Fruits – Almost all kinds of fruits are sold in the streets of Ongpin and if you’re feeling a bit adventurous, you could try out some of the exotic fruits being offered by street vendors such as the mangosteen or the huge apple-mango. Highly popular with the Filipino Chinese residents of Ongpin are rambutan, longgans, lanzones and chicos. When you get to Ongpin, be sure that you do try all those fruits and more since one can never get fat with fruits, anyway.

Delicacies – When you get to Ongpin, do be sure that you’ll be able to make a pit stop at any of the Chinese food stores of Ongpin. One of the most popular stores of this type is Eng Bee Tin. There, you’ll be able to find all sorts of Chinese delicacies that people back home would surely be delighted with.

Main Dishes – Tired after walking nonstop for an hour or so? If that’s the case, we suggest that you try relaxing your feet on any of the restaurants located in Ongpin. Try out popular Chinese dishes and the exotic ones as well so your trip to Ongpin will be truly memorable.