Technician Wanted

By Lindsay
I'm after a technician, part time work to begin with.  Technical ability I can train, attitude I can not.  So a good attitude, someone who has some experience with Windows XP/Vista/7.  Some networking experience including setting up small networks.  Installing Office and antivirus.  Running reports from Remote Management Systems also good.  If you know of someone drop me an email.  Thanks

Who will win the smartphone wars?

By Lindsay
There's a battle going on in consumerland - which smartphone will win the war?  We have 4 main contenders.  The Apple Iphone, Blackberry, Android phones, and Windows mobile phones.  I have set up and configured all of them, and personally I like the Apple Iphone.  But it's not up to me to decide what you should buy.  So I'll pass on my views as to the winning smartphone.

The Blacberry is a closed platform.  It's one claim to fame is that text messages are very secure.  So secure that countries such as India and Saudi Arabia now require that the text messaging servers for Blackberry be in their own countries so that they can decrypt your text messages, check them, then send them out again.  It will be a loser in the smartphone wars.

The Windows mobile phones are very good, easy to set up for email, but, well, no real market penetration.  Second loser.

The Apple Iphone is a fantatsic product.  It's main advantage is the ability to run many applications (downloaded from the app store).  Pricing is expensive.  Being proprietary all applications must be tested on the Iphone before release, so they will work well.  But losing market share to....

Android based smartphones.  The Android operating system is used by all the major cellphone manufacturers.  Issues over applications that may run on one manufacturers phone but not another exist.  But you can't beat it's price.  Android phones will win the war.

The biggest decision a small business owner can make

By Lindsay
The biggest decision a small business owner can make is when they expand.  From 1 to 2 people is a large step.  Not only for the business, but for the IT systems that need to be put in place.

For example a new computer will be needed.  Do you use the old one lying around, or get a new one?  Will you want to share data, or just use USB drives or email to share information?

Will you get a new email address, and if so what will it be?

Will they have access to your accounting system, or will you use another method of recording time/expenses?

Will you get them a new mobile phone or will they use their own?

And if they leave how will you protect your data, contacts, and client history?

My suggestions for the small business (after all I wasn't going to leave you to guess the answers) is a s follows:

• Get a new computer.  If a general purpose computer then any of the Windows 7 computers available at the local computer stores will do.  As for your own computer ensure that it is dedicated to your business, rather than sharing the home computer.  Do not let children use your business computer.  Ensure that you have good anti-virus on your computers.  You should be looking at a product that has some end-point security features, such as web site disabling, removable media disabling.  Sharing data is easy.  I recommend Dropbox (www.dropbox.com).  The US$10/month for 50 Gbytes of data is a good deal.  You can now work remotely, and still have the latest information available to you (both).  It also means your data is backed up.  The free version allows up to 2Gbytes of data to be synchromised, and you can get it here http://db.tt/zvdE9Mb (this is a bit cheeky, its a referral link, if you get dropbox via this link I get extra space on my free dropbox account)

• As for email addresses, you may want to move from the @xtra, @gmail type addresses and get your own domain name (you@yourbusinessname.co.nz).  Options available include hosted Exchange, and at around $50/month for up to 3 users, this may be a start for better email handling.  With hosted Exchange your emails are available on your computer, your smartphone, or any web browser.  And hosted exchange mailboxes are typically very large.  And backed up automatically.

• Access to important business information such as your accounting system needs to be controlled.  A hosted service such as Xero (www.xero.co.nz) allows for controlled user access.  Being web based means that you can access your system 24hrs of the day, from any web browser.  And your data is automatically backed up.  A job management system such as WorkflowMax (www.workflowmax.co.nz) allows time and costs to be tracked, and then either invoices generated from the system, or transferred accross to Xero for actioning.  Both Xero and WorkflowMax can be accessed from any web browser or Smartphone.

• You will buy a new phone for your new employee.  It remains yours so that if they leave, you keep it.  A Iphone or Android phone will be set up to receive your emails from your Hosted email service, access your job management system etc.  In this way you can be running your business 24 hours per day.

• Protecting your data means at the physical level, the employees computer and phone are yours.  When they leave they stay.  Change passwords on your hosted applications, and they can no longer access your data.

In Summary from the IT side, adding a new employee is relatively painless when using the new 'cloud' based services.  As these services are subscription based (excpet for the hardware that you will need), then capital expenses are minimised, and operational costs go in step with the number of employees that you have.

When VOIP Goes bad...

By Lindsay
I use a VOIP (voice over internet protocol) service for my main office number.  My 0800 number also points to my office number.  I use a 'One number' feature so that when a call comes in, it simultaneously rings 3 phone numbers (one of which is my VOIP phone, another my mobile, and a third my alternate home number).  These a pretty good features because I'm close to one of these numbers generally 24 hours per day.  Now I wont mention the VOIP provider (because I'm not sure its their fault), but what happens when it goes bad...like it did this morning.

Well, no calls except direct to my cellphone came in this morning - strange.  So I tested the VOIP phone - nothing.  I called my office number - disconnect tone.  OK something is very wrong here - mild panic!  I tried calling the service provider - same disconnect.  An alternative land line number - disconnect.  Panic levels raised a bit more because I was out of contact except for my cellphone, and email.  I looked for alternative contact methods for the service provider, but I couldnt find anything.

Then a miracle!  it started to work.  Everything is now back to normal.  How long was the service out?  Don't know, at least 2 hours first thing in the morning....

Lessons to be learnt:

• Have a back up number (usually a cellphone number) and make sure its available on your email signature and your website.
• If the phone hasn't rung for a while - check to see that it's operational.

I'll await the reply from the provider about the outage, and then make the appropriate decisions after that as to whether I'll stick with them or go somewhere else.

Into the Cloud

By Lindsay
Moving to the cloud has been an exercise in some frustration mainly because of all the alternatives available to the small business owner.  These were the requirements when deciding on what to use.

• First - the major applications must be local.  Not only for local support, and native speakers, but also because there are some legal requirements for accounting systems that the data must be held in New Zealand.  So this lead to the adoption of Xero (www.xero.co.nz).  
• Second - the major applications must be cost effective.  Cloud based systems usually have a monthly subscription, some based on users, some not.
• Third - There must be alternative methods of accessing the information.  This inludes notebooks, web browsers, smartphones.

To support growth within the business I needed applications that would track and manage my main areas of business.  These are:

• Jobs, time, other costs.
• Computer monitoring - real time, with alerts and remote access capabilities.
• Easy KPI generation.

I'm confident that I made the right choices when it comes to the applications that I selected, and I havent been dissapointed yet!