“You’re The Best Around Grasshopper”

It’s great to be back writing. As one can tell it has been a few months since I last made an appearance on the blog front at Matt Long Incorporated, A Serial Entrepreneur. Life can become busy and sometimes different priorities take control. (One of my recent projects involved consulting for a business start-up in China that is working on branding their web site to communicate to a specific industry of leaders in China. Right now we are learning about Chinese Domains. If you know anything about that, send me a message!) Anyways, the leaves are turning different colors in Madison now and it has been unseasonably cold for the month of October. And the most disappointing thing about it is that the boat sits cold and alone, ready to be put away for hibernation. (tear, tear  Goodbye Summer!)

I recently stumbled upon a great new service that I want to write about (and also give the reader a disclaimer I was listening to “You’re The Best Around” by Tony Esposito while writing this entry).  For those of you who are not savvy on music that song is the theme song from the Karate Kid movie. The song seemed to stick in my head and aligned with the company I wrote about below.

Grasshopper has done a really nice job “Rebranding” itself from gotvmail. The company is currently based in Needham, Massachusetts and as of this date, they are hiring! Benefits seem to be overly generous. For example, a Wii room (good for those dev guys! Gotta keep them happy and fit), treats for the rest of the crew along with generous time off (who wants to work with Mr. Crabby Pants!), and the list keeps rolling along– take a peek for yourself.

This company has some marketing gurus doing great promotions for the rebranding. Besides their nice web site design, check out their crazy promotion involving real grasshoppers: they sent 5,000 real chocolate covered grasshoppers to people who they believed to be influencers for their product. Wow! It almost makes me want to create a new company with a catchy name and critter to cover in chocolate. On top of that, this company is really exciting, I love their “Entrepreneurs Can Change the World” video.

I wish I would have known about this service years ago. It truly is marvelous service to have available for a small start-up or home-based business. Here is how it works:

1. Figure out what your needs are for a telephone number. Grasshopper allows the client to pick from a new Toll Free number, local number or porting one of your existing numbers. From the perspective of wanting to be known as a local company with one’s customers, picking a local number is a nice feature (especially if your target markets are in small towns).
2. Set-up your main greeting. Yep, whether you are that closet entrepreneur holding that 9-5 working for a living to pay the bills while dreaming of leaving your boss this is perfect for you. Not only does the customer have the option of choosing to use his own voice but he can also choose one of Grasshopper’s warm overly- professional greetings. If that is not good enough, Grasshopper opens their doors even further for you and offers to work one-on-one with you to establish custom greetings.
3. Here’s the fun part: now create your extensions. Maybe you are a serial entreprenuer who has a few different businesses and it is not bad to market them indirectly to your callers because you operate in the same industry. For example, one who operates a large wedding services business and brands each of those businesses differently. Or maybe you have many staff members who work remotely and need them to be available by extension or by voicemail. This seems perfect.
4. Now “You’re The Best Around, Nothings Ever Going to Keep You Down”. Now the perception of bad customer service can be avoided especially if you are a closet entrepreneur who can’t always answer the telephone. In addition, the company provides each account holder voicemail, call forwarding, faxing capabilities and on-hold music. Plus voicemails that are left are automatically converted to MP3’s and can be accessed by computer or smart-phone.

Finally, let’s discuss pricing. their pricing ranges from $9.95/month to their unlimited package which is $199 per month. The item that did not impress was the $25 activation on their entry level and their most popular middle level service. Why not take the activation fee and either include it in the per month service cost or come up with an additional feature to add it onto? An activation fee makes me feel like the customer would be dealing with a large conglomerate telephone company. Who likes that?

Since we are a community blog and I want your input, let me know what other fledgling services are out there like this, outside of the already well-known Skype and Google Voicemail.

 

Use This Free Tool When Voicemail & Email Just Aren’t That Sexy Anymore

Has there ever been a time when you had to get a message to someone but a voicemail or email was not enough to communicate what was needed?  I think we have all run into a scenario similar to this. This idea of using a visual video mail is so simple offers a great solution for this common problem. I am surprised that larger international companies have not moved toward this technology especially in the business world. I know my companies will be using this technology especially if it continues to be FREE with TokBox. (An update, in one of my web projects, we are utilizing this technology because we are able to not only reap the programs benefits but also archive our old videos for reference.)

The technology platform for TokBox is video mail and as I said earlier it is quite simple.  There are so many ways this tool can be used.  For example, Don Kassner who is the President of Andrew Jackson University uses TokBox to communicate to the masses.  (Interested in following him, he can be found on Twitter at AJU President.)  There are times when he makes a Tweet to his followers to obtain a new message that he has left.  TokBox and Twitter allow their users to post it’s URL’s on Twitter and it executes correctly on ToxBox.

Not impressed enough yet? After exploring TokBox further, I found this tool can also be used to communicate one on one with another party privately. For example, one use I have implemented is for certain contractors that I work with on various projects.  Many of their projects occur at night and end in the early morning.  Instead of creating times that are inconvenient for both parties to communicate following their work, instead, for our nightly synopsis, the contractors use TokBox to send their messages to my email address.  First thing the next morning, I am able to watch and listen to the nightly reports, and feel that I am able to understand the bigger picture for the update. I can see the emotion of their faces in addition to hearing or reading the words they express. I appreciate and find it invaluable that this tool does one thing that voicemail and email cannot do and that is catch some of the non-verbal communication from the other party.

Additionally, you can archive each message.  This is especially useful when if notes are not being taken in a meeting or a follow-up email is not sent, the parties can always reference the message in TokBox.

Does it meet my requirement of not having to download any files to operate? Yes but it does require the users, if sending messages, to have a web camera and also Adobe Flash.  Own a Mac? No issues as this program was designed well for use with both a PC and a Mac. Other nice features include the ability to embed videos on web sites and also set privacy controls.  The other interesting feature is that it can be used as a live conferencing tool, similiar to Google Chat/Video, Skpe, and some other tools listed in this blog.  The main advantage with TokBox though is the ability to send targeted messages and archive them too. In addition to that, the users are able to communicate up to 25 other users at the same time.

At this time, TokBox is free and perfect for entrepreneurs and business people who can communicate effectively within a 10 minute range.

The company is based in hilly San Francisco and appears to be a relatively small start-up backed by some Venture Capitalist like Sequoia Capital, Bain Capital Ventures and Youniversity Ventures (which helps first time entrepreneurs with funding, and leadership).  Finally, I was sad to read that the company let go 23 of its employees recently according to Jordan Golson at GIGAOM dot com. However, according to Mickey at ToxBox on August 6, we were advised that it was not 23 employees and just 9.  Either way I found it to be a bit ironic that the this new information was brought to light via an email comment versus a member of ToxBox not using their own tool to send me a message. COME ON GUYS, DOES YOUR MARKETING DEPARTMENT KNOW ABOUT THIS?

Another major move also cited in Golson’s article was about one of the company’s co-founders, Ron Hose.  I hope that TokBox can keep their founder’s visions and continue to build this product with more features so that maybe a larger telecom company, hint AT&T or one of the other Bell companies, can implement it into our national telephone system.  Can you imagine the possibilities on a larger scale? Or what about Apple’s iPhone?

Check out Tokbox’s blog.

 

Mikogo – the other FREE Business Social Media Desktop Sharing option

After writing my last post, I was contacted by Andrew Donnelly of Mikogo. He brought to my attention another FREE Desktop Sharing Tool by the name of Mikogo.  I have to admit that I had not heard of this company before and was again surprised that this tool was available for not only the general public but also to anyone in business for free.

After reviewing this product, the company has made its case for superiority.  However, I am not willing to give them the full prize at this point even though they do not lock up the user for using it for business like TeamViewer.  When I reviewed this product, I found that the product did not connect to the server well and in some cases was spotty in its connection with the server at Mikogo.  Quite simply, similar to what I have experienced with using Zoho Meeting.

Just to rule out my connection, I tested some of the other applications I discussed previously in my blog and I did not have the same issues. Bottom line, my experience demonstrates either a highly successful company is experiencing volume which is slowing their servers down or plain and simple that it is not reliable enough yet. Please note the reader’s situation, connection times and use may yield different results and my disclaimer is that the review is from my point of view.

All in all though, I think this company is on to something.  Let’s see, free use for personal or business with not locking up the computer if being used for business, a user guide available for learning on its web site, support for both PC and Mac which was reviewed by both platform machines and cross platforms, and file transfer. Additionally, the base of product features is here among the remote keyboard/mouse control, meeting scheduler, switch presenter, etc.

Please be advised that the user needs to download the application to run off the user’s computer.  This may be one disadvantage for business companies who limit their assets from downloading applications to their lap and desktops.  Usually this bothers me and I try to keep unneeded software off my computers.  However, if the reader chooses to experiment with this program further, one might be able to make a good case to have it added to the approved software list.

My experience with this review was overall more positive than negative.  I found that the  user interface was set-up well and it was easy to use.  So easy, I would feel comfortable giving these directions to a Baby Boomer with limited experience on a computer and feel confident that he or she would be able to utilize the program with ease.

Company information:
Mikogo started in 2007 and is an offshoot of “BeamYourScreen”. Founded by Erik Boos and Mark Zondler of Germany, Mikogo is a free application allowing users to share desktops among a slew of other free features for the common user.

BeamYourScreen GmbH
Mikogo
R 3, 4-5
68161 Mannheim
Germany

Lastly, from an entrepreneurial standpoint for smaller firms this might be a good route to check out for a Zero Cost tool.

 

Free Team Viewer App supercedes Vyew & Zoho for HOT APP – She’s SMOOTH

About 2 weeks ago, I was pleasantly surprised with this new tool find.  In my past blog entries, I wrote about some tools that can be used for free desktop sharing.  I went through the uses of Zoho Meeting, GoTo Meeting, Live Meeting, Adobe Connect and proclaimed Vyew the winner.  However, after seeing the user interface on TeamViewer, it is quite clear that even your mom could run this application with you successfully.

I was not aware of this software package at the time of my last entry on Vyew. It is amazing how many tools are out there to help us and half the battle is that they need to be invented but rather they need to be found. And I am confident that there will be other tools out there in the future that might be better.  So stay tuned as we learn new things and contribute new things to our readers. I discovered this tool through working with some developers from Chennai, India.  They were using Team Viewer for everything and so we gave it a try.  The only caveat though is if you are using it for commercial purposes, you have to purchase a usage plan.  That’s right, if you do not, you will be unpleasantly surprised with a computer lock up.

This German company knows its stuff! Own a Mac? No worries, that is how I tested this companies software initially and it worked beautifully until it figured out I was using it to build my own company.  Team Viewer’s main uses include desktop sharing (essential in today’s business environment with travel expenses on the rise and company budgets being trimmed); desktop remote sharing (this is handy for helping someone who needs live assistance and you can do the work. Heck, I recently would have liked to have this program as I tried to upgrade another one of my WordPress blogs and messed it up.); plus it even does file transfers that work on any computer regardless of the company security structure (IE it works behind firewalls and NAT proxy).

So at first I was a bit skeptical of this software package because I do not like to download programs and bog down any of my computers – PC or Mac.  However, I also learned that if both people run TeamViewer that there is no need to run the installation package. So for personal use this is a great FREE program.  If one wants to pay and use it monthly it is $200 or which seems like a better option a perpetual license for about $1400.  For business the Net Present Value (NPV) or Pay Back period for those finaciers out there it should not take that long per employee to justify this purchase.  Here’s more information on their current pricing plans.

For those of you out there that are not tech saavy, no worries as TeamViewer has video tutorials on their web site.

Company information:

TeamViewer GmbH

Kuhnbergstr. 16D-73037 Göppingen

Germany

USA / Canada +1 (800) 951 4573

 

You are turning into an Ol’ Man, Hurry Up & Stop Wasting Time!

I have been thinking the last week since I arrived home from my trip to Los Angeles about what new technology or company I should write about in my blog.  However, as I was sitting last night at a Design Madison event about Red Interactive, it suddenly came to me that some people might like to read about what was on my mind instead and venture off our usual path.

Now, I will be the first to admit that I do not know everything there is to know about a variety of topics.  And in many cases I think some of the readers might disagree with the following philosophy that I think it is better to be a person of 1,000 hats / talents than to specialize in just one thing.  Yes, you read it, DO NOT SPECIALIZE!  It limits you in variety, could possibly keep you in the same town for the rest of your life, and might even burn you out over time.

A prime example of this are postal workers, insurance claims adjusters, some teachers (who were never meant to be teachers), and others who are tied to their 401k and pension retirements.  Our country has changed.  Beware if you are one who is putting your full faith into a company.  We are currently operating in the age of people running large businesses without morals. For example, Bernie Madoff, Kenneth Lay, and too many others to list here. More and more people need to take the approach of being FREE AGENTS! (I recently watched an awesome PBS special on how more and more people will become free agents by Steve Pogorzelski, former CEO at Monster.

Here is this weeks most important questions for you:

What are you doing to improve yourself?

I am not starting a new blog theme here.  If you want Career Advice and fit into the “Generation X / Y” category then I will send you to Rebecca Thorman’s blog, Modite.  She is an engaging blogger who has carved a nice niche out for herself as an engaging blogger.  She has an interesting perspective on job hopping (plus a video) or what I like to refer to myself as being a Free Agent!

Here are some ideas on how to improve yourself:

>Sick of the man? Start a business.  It does not have to be a brick and mortar institution.  Every individual should be running some type of home based business because it has so many financial advantages.  It also provides an opportunity to make extra money on one’s own terms.

>Find organizations that align with your long-term goals. For example, join a Social Networking group.  I recently became a member of Design Madison.

>Go back to school but have a plan.  Schooling costs money and most importantly time.  Make sure to investigate your options. If you have a free agent mentality, maybe having your employer pay for your schooling is not the best scenario.

>Log your time.  This sounds so simple but this will tell you how much time you are spending on doing tasks to improve yourself versus tasks that are wasting your life away.  Toggl Timer has a really good widget that one can implement into their web site portal.  Not only is it reliable and effective, but it is also free.

>Network and find a mentor.  Quite simply, I learned this at an early age.  My dad always told me, “More often than not, it is not what you know but who you know.”  If you are in Madison, we are blessed to have some great organizations in this big little city.  Here are a few: MAGNET, Design Madison, Madison Community Recreation – runs many sport leagues, and many others.

>Join a Gym. Time is one of your most important assets, however, in order for one to use that asset correctly it is important to have a healthy body. Understand your priorities.  If you want to feel better physically and most importantly mentally, working out for more than 30 minutes everyday can keep your body and mind healthy and endorphins keeping you leveled and happy.  Additionally, I am a big fan of the YMCA of Dane County.  Their new location near Madison’s east side is very nice and cost effective.  Plus, you might even be able to make some new friends there.

>Trade conferences. Find time to attend a conference you are interested in that involves a passion. This is not only a great way to meet new people, it also enables you to learn new things.  If you are in a job you do not see yourself in for the long-term, the best way to move into a new industry is to learn about it while making new contacts at a trade show.  If you are interested in business and technology, I am a big fan of South by Southwest Interactive that takes place in Austin, Texas.  After attending that event this year, I felt that not only should young people attend college but they should also not move into the job field until attending this type of show.  I learned more there in a week than I have at some jobs or even a year at college.

Here is a question for you?
Tell me what you have been doing to improve yourself?  This way we can motivate other people with new ideas.

Happy Easter!

 

You gotta see this – It’s Awesome Baby!

Sweet times at SXSW 2009

 

FREE Web Conferencing & Collaboration Tool

Have you ever had a meeting scheduled and time runs out?  So you quickly scramble to your conference line while trying to launch the web conferencing tool before your meeting stakeholder comes on the line.  However, by the time they come online you are stalling because the web conferencing tool you or your company uses is too slow?  I think this issue is pretty common within the business world.  On top of that, you know either you or your company is paying a hefty amount to have account access.

I know with my most recent start-up I worked with in Middleton, we had over 70 people sharing 10 accounts with GoTo Meeting.  The funny thing though was that this company was operating financially well but ran lean.  I wish I had known about this product back then as this would have saved me a lot of headaches and potentially the company money by endorsing our subject topic, Vyew.

This week I will be writing about a great web conferencing and collaboration tool.  From the standpoint of an entrepreneur, not only does this tool offer just about everything that the current marketplace but also Vyew offers their basic services for FREE!  It is much different than the competition because most of the competition offers trial periods; Vyew has taken a more interesting path by offering their services for free.  Can you imagine not renewing your subscriptions to GoTo Meeting, Web Ex, Live Meeting or Adobe Connect?

Vyew is owned and operated by Simulat, Incorporated based in Berkeley, California.  The company was founded by a group of entrepreneurs from the University of California Berkley.  Their application allows its users to meet online to present and collaborate.

In a nutshell, Vyew enables the user to “Meet, Present, Review, Annotate, Educate and Train” depending on which user target one might be coming from. Below, I have listed some of the other features I thought were important.  According to Vyew’s web site, they do offer additional service levels that range from $6-14 per month.  The service that I analyzed was their free service.

Many of the readers here might be thinking, what about Zoho’s web conferencing software, ZohoMeeting.  I will admit Zoho is a power house like Google, maybe even a sleeping giant on its way up.  However, my experiences with ZohoMeeting have been unreliable and often irritating.  I have found it does not work when I need it to work and often requires one or all parties to download additional software in order for it to run.  If one is looking for a one stop shop, then Zoho may be the place.  However, if one is looking for a reliable, fast and intuitive web conferencing and collaboration tool then keep reading.

More details about Vyew which help me:

• 100% browser based – one does not have to make a launch or download and wait minutes. That is frustrating (from my experiences with GoTo Meeting, Web Ex, etc.)
• 100% browser supported on both a Mac and PC
• Application can be accessed online, as a hosted model (better for privacy and security) or by their Enterprise Appliance box.
• Customize the user interface with colors and one’s own logo. An additional opportunity for one to create additional branding.  More touches!
• The application can be powered perpetually.
• Nimble from the stand point of adding information to a collaborated document (for example a power point)
• Chatting capability during meetings (privately or for all attendees to view)
• Web camera and conference line enabled.  Your parties can dial into a designated number and code provided by Vyew for a meeting while activating a web camera.
• Multi lingual support for those of you who do business abroad!
• Multi file availability for uploads:

• .PPT (MS PowerPoint)
• .DOC (MS Word)
• .XLS (MS Excel)
• .TXT (Raw text file)
• .PDF (Adobe Acrobat)
• .JPG (Image)
• .GIF (Image)
• .PNG (Image – w/alpha channel)
• .SWF (Flash Movie)
• .FLV (Flash Video)*
• .RTF (Rich Text Format)

Below I have copied Vyew’s comparison breakdown from their web site for your review.  I think it says everything that is needed.

Comparison

	Vyew	Adobe Connect	GoTo Meeting	Microsoft Live- Meeting	WebEx
Price	FREE/$	$$$	$$$	$$	$$$
System Requirements
100% Browser Based	X
“Supports any browser on Windows, Macintosh and Linux”	X	X
Hosted and on-premise versions	X	X			X
Conferencing Features
Live conferencing – synchronous	X	X	X	X	X
Desktop sharing	X	X	X	X	X
Instantly change presenters	X	X	X	X	X
Application sharing (remote control)		X	X	X	X
Screen capturing	X			X	X
Session recording	*	X	X	X	X
Synchronized and unsynchronized page navigation	X
Supports up to 100 participants in a meeting	X	X	X	X	X
Telephone conferencing	FREE/X	X	X	X	X
Built-in voice over IP (VoIP)	X	X	X	X	X
Webcam	X	X		X	X
Collaboration Features
“Persistent collaboration – asynchronous, anytime”	X	X
Multiple on-demand sessions	X	X
Public and private text chat	X	X	X	X	X
Whiteboarding and annotation tools	X	X	X	X	X
Filter whiteboard drawings by user	X
Searchable contextual sidebar forums	X
Voice notes	X
“Hand raising, slow down, away from meeting buttons”	X				X
Exam and poll creation	X	X		X	X
“Plug-ins (e.g. graphing calculator, equation editor)”	X
Content Management Features
“Flexible, PowerPoint-like authoring”	X
Broad file-type support (including audio and video)	X			X	X
Native upload of documents (no prior conversion required)	X		X	X	X
“Dynamic creation, reordering, intermixing, adding and deleting various file types in a single workbook”	X
Printing	X	X		X
Publishing (embeddable sessions in any web property)	X	X
Administration
Detailed participant permission settings	X	X	X	X	X
Logging of participant usage statistics	X	X	X	X	X
Easy to invite meeting participants	X	X	X	X	X
Always-on session management dashboard	X	X
Extensibility
Application programming interface (server-side API)	X	X	X	X	X
Ability to create plug-ins (client-side API)	X
Customization
Custom session URLs	X	X			X
Custom branding	X	X		X
Custom color themes and custom banner ads	X	X			X

 

V-Blog’s So Great You’ll Flip! My Web 2.0 Introduction

more about “V-Blog’s So Great You’ll Flip! My Web…“, posted with vodpod