It’s All in the ‘How’ Have you ever wondered how to fix a leaking pipe or a broken light? Or how to check your car’s coolant or radiator fluid? How about maintaining a lawn, or tying a Windsor, or cooking a tasty meal for you or your kids in less than 30 minutes? The answers to these questions and more can be found in self-help sites such as eHow and WikiHow. These sites are databases of how-to articles presented in a clear, concise, and simple manner that anyone can easily understand. Unlike other guides that drown you (albeit unintentionally) in so much technical jargon that you end up completely lost, these sites make it a point to keep things uncomplicated – it’s all about helping you get something done right, and done fast. You can always learn the mechanics of why or how it works after you’ve gotten it done. Here, results are the primary consideration. Both websites offer a variety of subjects to browse through. If you’re looking for a specific topic, simply enter the inquiry in the search box. Certain topics even have video tutorials and/or illustrated guides that make the learning process even easier. However, if you don’t have anything particular in mind, then you can browse through topics that are classified by category. Navigation is intuitive and user-friendly. Another good thing about these websites is that the information is absolutely free – you don’t even have to register an account to gain access to them. And with WikiHow, if you feel like sharing a bit of your own knowledge, you can contribute your own how-to articles and become part of the WikiHow community. eHow also accepts entries that, depending on how you play your cards, can even help you earn a bit of extra money (there’s an eHow article to help you get started). So the next time you find yourself in a spot with anything from a stubborn stain to treating a bee sting, try visiting these sites since they just might have the simple and straightforward solution you’re looking for.
Continue readingWorking Smarter and More Efficiently with Instant Messaging
Are you avoiding instant messaging (IM) for fear that it will distract your employees and cut productivity? In fact, the opposite may be true. What is IM? IM is software that allows you to communicate in real time with other people who have the same software. It’s like email, but instantaneous. IM was originally considered a way to stay in touch with friends and family, but lately it’s taken off in the workplace. That’s because IM offers a fast, convenient way for employees to interact with colleagues or clients in real time. In fact, many cutting-edge employers now encourage their employees to use IM instead of phone calls or e-mails. Benefits include: Increased productivity: Workers can remain at their workstations instead of walking across the office or picking up the phone to obtain information, and the need for time-consuming meetings is reduced. Real-time communication with vendors and customers. Connection of traveling employees through mobile devices. Where can you get it? While there are many free IM services available such as AOL, Yahoo!, Skype, and MSN, many companies now offer solutions specifically designed for business. We can work with you to determine the best solution for your specific needs How to get started: Select a single provider. Expand services as needed. While basic IM may be adequate for some small businesses, others may benefit from expanded offerings, such as text conferencing, pop-up messaging, and email integration. Make sure your information is protected from external threats such as hackers and viruses. Create a usage policy to avoid internal misuse. Ensure that all employees know the rules and have installed the software on their systems. To be effective, your IM application should be carefully integrated with your existing IT system and workflow. Give us a call today and we’ll help you through these steps to implement a secure and productive IM solution.
Continue readingStop Wasting Money with Inefficient Communications
Research conducted by SIS International Research and sponsored by Siemens found that small and midsized businesses (SMBs) with 100 employees could be leaking a staggering $524,569 annually as a result of communications barriers and latency. The study identifies these top five pain points, in order of estimated cost: inefficient coordination waiting for information unwanted communications; customer complaints barriers to communication In addition, researchers determined that the time spent per week dealing with communications issues was more than 50 percent higher in companies with more than 20 workers. In hard costs, your company could be losing up to half a million dollars each year by not addressing employees’ most painful communications issues! The good news: we can help you implement applications and services to greatly improve your inter-company communications, including collaboration tools such as email and shared calendards and address books, social media technologies such as blogs and wikis , and IP-based communication tools such as instant messaging (IM) and Voice-over-IP ( VoIP ). Call us today and let us help you stop this expensive leak.Related articles: Report: SMBs Expected to Spend More Online (searchenginewatch.com) How Collaboration Tools Bring Cost Savings, Business Alignment (searchcio-midmarket.com) Inefficient Communications Costs SMBs $5000 per Employee (SMBnow.com)
Continue readingOnline Fax Service – Why Your Company Should Have One?
Online fax services are becoming extremely popular with business owners. There are several reasons why Internet or online faxing has found favor with the business sector. Mainly because it’s easy, fast, available 24/7, truly mobile and perhaps most of all, online faxing is very convenient to use. No wonder, Internet fax providers like MyFax have reported they’re getting over 15,000 new costumers signing up each month. Many companies, large and small, are switching over to this new way of faxing; while others are adding an online fax service to compliment their traditional office fax machine. Read more at SB Informer…
Continue readingWhen Technology Gets in the Way
For the past few months I’ve been using a variety of wireless, blue tooth headsets, with my cell phone. The latest head set I’m using does not have clear reception. Often times I can hear the person fine, but they can’t hear me so well. I love technology, and in fact, the particular blue tooth headset I’m using is made by one of the premier brands. Read more at Small Biz IT…
Continue readingThree Tools Mobile Warriors Want Now
When you first opened your Smartphone and took it right from the fresh, “new smelling” box (or from the plastic sandwich bag from the friend you bought it used from) it was a tool for speaking, basic scheduling and contacts. However, over time, some of you have found that you could do so much more with the device as you found good software to make it a powerful productivity tool. Some software you might want to consider, to enhance the mobile warrior within you. Read more at Small Biz IT…
Continue readingShould You Ban Tech Gadgets From Meetings?
There comes a point when gadgets detract from meetings. Or does there? Companies are coming up with different strategies to manage technology in the meeting room. Read more at Entrepreneur…
Continue readingMicroprojectors: Small But Mighty
Whether it’s to clinch a sale, show off a new product or discuss a potential acquisition, the digital projector is major part of everyday corporate work. Welcome to the era of the microprojector. Read the story on PCW Business Center…
Continue readingThe Benefits of Having an Intranet Server
Reading this article will help you understand just what an Intranet is and how it can help your company be more organized and your teams more productive. And Why Should I Care? People are your most valuable and expensive resource – are they working smart and in a well organized way? Intranets are not new, and they are very popular among companies of all sizes. Intranets are a technology companies tend to love because of their easy implementation and the many benefits they offer at a low cost An Intranet is an internal network built using the protocols and standards of the Internet. It’s an intra-company network that offers access to the same type of resources as the Internet but is limited to company’s employees (or selected outside users) only. Intranets are not expensive to implement and they offer many benefits, which probably explains why they are so popular. Some of the benefits of having an Intranet include: Better communication . Having an Intranet server where all the relevant information your employees need stored in one place reduces the time spent in locating information through normal, people-dependent channels. With Intranets, you just go to the server and get what you want. Increased productivity . When all the information your employees need is easily accessible, they spend less time communicating unnecessarily and more time doing their immediate jobs. Improved teamwork . Intranets are great for facilitating teamwork because when everybody has access to the same information, it is easier to be a more effective team player. Improved learning and knowledge management . Constant learning is a prerequisite for success in almost any business, and if you want to keep your employees in top shape, you need to make their learning experiences as easy as possible. When all the information they need is updated regularly, and above all is kept in one place, all it takes to learn is a desire and access to the location (i.e. your Intranet server’s knowledge base). Cost-effective . Unlike many custom applications, Intranet solutions are not expensive, yet they come packed with useful features and functionalities. Easy to use . The fact that Intranets use the technologies of the Internet means that your employees will not have to learn new programs. Actually, very often the only thing one needs in order to use and Intranet is a Web browser! Easy to adapt to your needs . While it is true that there are many Intranet servers and not all of them are equal, most of the best on the market provide extensive customization possibilities. If you implement a Intranet server that is packed with features, in the beginning you might have some difficulty figuring out what exactly you need. However, your IT Consultant will know your company’s needs and will select the features you need to use right away, and then gradually enable new features as you need them. If you’re wondering what it takes to implement an Intranet, the answer is easy – just some time and a small investment. There are many Intranet-ready solutions and one of the best for a company of up to 50 computers or so is the Microsoft Windows Small Business Server (SBS). Microsoft SBS includes many nice features and one of them is an Intranet. So if you are already using SBS for your company network, just ask your IT Consultant to enable the Intranet features. What Now? Evaluate your business and talk to your team about your common workflows and document organization to find areas where you could be working better. Work with you IT Consultant to implement the best Intranet solution for your company’s needs.
Continue readingInbox Rules
Reading this article will help you take control of email by reducing unwanted email and making your email time more productive. If you’ve never experienced the feeling of drowning in emails, then you are an exception. If this has never happened to you, publish your email address in a couple of sites where spambots get emails for spamming from and you will see how it feels to get dozens of junk emails a day. However, even if you are not drowning in spam, you still can receive many other unwanted messages a day, and soon you will discover that if you don’t know how to manage your inbox, the information overflow can be enormous. Here are some tips on how to manage your inbox effectively: Create separate folders for separate projects/people . One of the ways to deal effectively with information overflow is to separate the different streams of information. If you keep all your messages in your Inbox folder, soon it will contain thousands of messages, and it will be more difficult to find the message you need. You can create separate folders for different projects/people and file the emails into these folders. Create rules . Rules are one more way to optimize the flow of emails. Different email programs have different rules available, so you may want to check with your particular program to see which it offers. Almost always you can at least set rules for automatically moving/copying messages to/from a certain person to a separate folder. Use new message alerts . Very often you can configure alerts for new messages. If your email program does not have this feature enabled by default, you should consider enabling it. Manage spam filters . Spam filters are also part of inbox management, and depending on the amount of spam you receive, managing spam filters could take a lot of time. However, one of the important issues you must have in mind is that if your spam filters are not properly set, they could cut legitimate messages as well. So, set your spam filters with care. Use flags . Flags are a really useful way to separate a message from the rest. As with many of the other advanced inbox tricks, different email clients offer different flag systems, but almost any program offers flags for marking incoming messages as important, urgent, etc. If you have never used flagging, you will be surprised how easy and effective it is. There are many more tips, all of which are good to know. Actually, we are just scratching the surface and we could add more ways to optimize your inbox use! But if you apply even the tips above, you will experience significant improvement in terms of effective email use. Isn’t it time you took charge of you email?
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