Jud Mackrill

We are huge fans of Google Apps. In fact, we love it so much we are moving as many of our customers as we can to Google Apps. [Its free for businesses who have fewer than 10 email addresses.]

One of the issues with Google Apps is that it creates a bit of a closed environment whereby it is pretty separate from your other Gmail accounts.

Here is how you solve this problem. 

1. Log into your personal Gmail account

2. Go to the settings and select accounts and import

3. Select “add a POP3 email account you own.”

4. Enter your Google Apps email address and select “Next Step”

5. Enter your full Google Apps email address as the user name

6. Enter your Google Apps password

7. Enter pop.gmail.com as your pop server

8. Use 995 as the port number (available in the drop down)

9. Its up to you if you choose to leave a copy on your server

10. Be sure to select “Always use SSL”

11. Labeling your incoming messages is always helpful – especially if you get a good amount of personal email. Beyond this, using filters will be really helpful in creating efficiency.

There you go. Consolidate your emails and make your life more streamlined.

This post is the first in a series that will walk through powerful integrations that help your website make more of an impact for the streamlining of your online presence. 

Many websites are simply a version of an online brochure. The page structures are usually very similar and expected (About, Services, Contact, an so forth…). While there is nothing at all wrong with a normal and expected structure, many sites are overlooking what their site can be doing for them. With this post we are going to look at web forms and what they can do for your website. A web form is simply and online form used to capture some form of data. Most commonly they are used on contact pages where you can enter your name, email and a message. Once you hit submit, a mailto link transmits an email to someone’s email inbox. At that point, that person sees a website inquiry and will then choose to respond (note: many sites will get a lot of spam through web forms). This is where most web forms stop. Today you can leverage the power of third parties to do some pretty amazing stuff with a web form. Before we get to that, here are some alternative uses for web forms.

Other uses for web forms: 

1. Adding mailing list subscribers
2. Selling good’s online/eCommerce
3. Taking users through questionnaires
4. Capturing key documents often too large to be emailed.
5. Lead capture
6. Event registration
7. Lead qualification

Community Bible Church Lead Capture Form

Airtime has been much bantered about for a while by tech enthusiasts and nerds alike. Now it is out in the wild and is available to folks like you.

My question for you: How will Airtime change the way you do business online?

Sure you can already use Skype and other widgets to video chat – but as video chat goes much further mainstream, how will your business capitalize on this new evolution of opportunity?

Having a website is an critical means for your businesses to engage with prospects, customers, and vendors. However, having a website that is slow is noticeable to viewers and can lead impatient surfers away from your site. As someone who has a website, you do not necessarily need to have all the answers to why your website is slow.

Here are our tips for how you can resolve your site slowness.

1. Test for slowness. Knowledge is half the battle. John Saddington goes in depth about the available tools for testing for slowness, most of which are easy to use and free.

2. Make sure your content management system is up-to-date. If you use a CMS like WordPress, Joomla, or Drupal, the open source community that supports these systems releases new editions on a semi-regular basis. Often these enhancements bring speed efficiencies, better code, and communities that will help iterate beta versions to ensure the next release is better than the last.

3. Verify that there are nothing on your site dragging it down. Often many sites use a lot of plugins, add-ons, and extra embedded code to help them accomplish what you would like to present. Fortunately, the web community has worked to develop additional resources to help you pinpoint what is causing the issue. P3 (Plugin Performance Profiler) is one such resource that will help you identify which WordPress plugin is using the most resources, slowing your page load time.

4. Implement page caching. Page caching will allow your site to load more quickly by storing data both in the browser and on the server. Most modern sites (beyond static HTML files) actually work as pieces of software rather than files. As such they require the types of optimization that leads you to cache and optimize your page to run smoothly.

5. Review your web host. Perhaps you are on a lower tier with your existent web host or you are hosting your site on an operating system or hardware that does not play well with what you are trying to do on your site. Contact your host to see if you need to upgrade your hosting package or move to a different host.

6. Consider hosting heavier files and images on another server. Often sites will have large images that are used for sliders, portfolio images, and pdfs. Hosting them on your site will do you no favors with regard to load times. We utilize Amazon Web Services to host files for better distribution and load times – allowing their massive network and content distribution to work for you.

Recently my twitter feed blew up with the news of the newest competitor to join the personal cloud storage race, Google. While Google’s offering looks strangely simliar to nearly everyone else, we can gain one thing from this news. Google is taking the threat of cloud storage seriously. The reason being is that if Dropbox, Box, and Microsoft (yes – even Microsoft) gain market share in one area, they are likely to gain it in other areas. So, it was as good of time as any to ship Google Drive.

With all these cloud storage providers on the market, which one should you choose?

Here are the top players in the space (with Google being added based on their other properties and the prior adoption of Google Docs).

Dropbox

Dropbox was one of the top companies to this race and has gained considerable marketshare (over 50M users). The best thing I can say about Dropbox is that it is extremely simple to use. As someone who works with Dropbox nearly daily, training those that are foreign to it and sometimes not tech savvy at all, Dropbox is a king. It installs as a drive on your machine and works like it was meant to be there. You can also roll out links to share a particular file or invite a friend to an entire folder. If said friend is new to Dropbox, Dropbox tells you thanks by giving you some free additional storage.

Strangely enough, there are still companies (large and small) that do not utilize any sort of shared folders. Perhaps this is due to the lack of know-how, sense of need or a real desire to want shared storage. Needless to say, Dropbox gives you a really straight forward experience and after a few weeks of using it, you will forget what life was like without it.

Dropbox has also allowed for developers to build onto its functionality – creating their own apps, widgets, and tools that turn Dropbox into much more than a shared drive.

Box

I have been a user of Box for a long time. That said, I have barely used it. The reason being is that it is not that useful. The UI itself is pretty simple, however I find myself having to login and navigate much more than Dropbox. Today you will find my Box account holding a ton of backup data as they tend to give away free storage 50 gigs at time – so why not using it as my own free version of Carbonite?

I will give Box lots of props for getting the app community out and active, integrating with many of the web 2.0 companies like LinkedIn, Salesforce, and Google Apps. My primary use for Box in the past was to host my resume in my LinkedIn profile while being able to track some basic analytics (location and time) on who downloaded this resume. As URL Shorteners like bit.ly and goo.gl became more prominent, this feature became less useful. The most genius thing that one-upped Box would have to be the add a friend, add more storage concept used by Dropbox. Coupled with a simple conversion/sign-up, enrolling in Dropbox is really a pleasant experience.

Box also offers some much more sophisticated sharing features that are nice touches when you are working on multi company/vendor projects as well as private labeling.

Google Drive

An immediate plus for Google Drive is that Google leveraged much of their already existent functionality in Google Docs and rolled it into a drive user interface. In fact, when Johnny and I first looked at Google Drive our immediate response was “they turned Google Docs into a drive.” Simple. This is a great thing unless you know Google’s track record for a lot of their products. Its honestly as if Google thinks that they own the internet and that when someone else is offering something that they dont have either they need to 1) buy them or 2) replicate them. Sadly, this looks a bit more like the second option. Don’t get me wrong, Google is great. Its just that there are lot of other really great innovations available that are better than some of the things that they build as a bit of an afterthought.

Other Options:
Amazon S3 

Backblaze Business Online Backup

CloudLayer Storage

Data Protection

DynaVol

Mozy

Nirvanix Enterprise Cloud Storage

Online Storage by Rackspace

Sugarsync

Windows Azure Storage

Zmanda Cloud Backup

Tips for selection:

1. Choose a cloud storage option that you can explain to other people. If you cannot easily explain it, it is likely overly complicated.

2. Choose a service that will give you want you need. Look for something that will give you what you need and grow with you. If you are looking for something for your organization, make sure it meets all of your internal security requirements.

3. Look for an option that will be seamless for you. With the growing popularity of cloud storage, there are plenty of reviews (like this one) that can help you out. Youtube will even provide you demos of people using each service.

4. Can you access your data when and where you need it? Is there a mobile app for this service and will that app actually allow me to use the data? Make sure you look at reviews and screenshots in each appstore before you make your decision.

5. Don’t be afraid to add another cloud storage service. This can be done for the sake of your own curiosity or creating redundancy.

Which one of these do you use and which would you recommend?

Recently I spoke to a group of students concerning the last chapter of Nehemiah – specifically addressing the idea of failure.

Essentially, the progression of Nehemiah is pretty remarkable. This guy has a huge heart for/commitment to his home city that was in completely ruin. Nehemiah prays about what to do, seeks out his boss (the king of Persia) and is granted fully commission/funded permission to return to his homeland. Upon his return, he enlists the help of the remnant of people (who were completely defeated, starving and hopeless) to rebuild the city. In 52 days, they rebuild the walls (using ordinary, untrained laborers), restore the functionality of the city and manage to fend off those that wished to harm them. Once the wall was built, the people had a major return to the spiritual truth that they had abandoned – which ultimately led to their prior defeat. Through weeping and repentance, the people returned to following the truth. However, this is where the story takes a bit of a turn. At the end of the book of Nehemiah (chapter 13), Nehemiah finds the people falling back into compromise, weakening at the knees of what they should do and ultimately turning away from what Nehemiah had directed them to do. Needless to say, Nehemiah was upset. Nehemiah felt failure.

Nehemiah, however, is far from a failure.

Even though this seems like a failure, failure it’s self is natural. If we think we are immune to failure we are either (1) delusional or (2) lying to ourselves.

Building a business, you need to plan for failure. Not just think about the what-if’s but plan for them. Practice failing.

In fact, the most successful people and organizations are often the best at failure. Not failing and quitting but failing forward, moving on to the next iteration, fix, or cycle. All along the way building a better product, service or experience.

As our business has grown we have invested in a need for planned failure.

• Each website we host has a weekly backup (some sites are backed-up daily if they are being managed actively).
• Weekly backups are stored in a separate, redundant and offsite location.
• To prevent email failures, we are providing choices with our email hosting. You can now either have your email in our virtual private server environment or you can host your email directly with Google Apps.
• To prevent and detect any hacks or intrusion to your site, each site is equipped with CodeGuard which monitors and restores your site to ensure that everything remains as it should be. Malware scans are run regularly as well.

Failure is reality and perfect is a lie. The best plan for failure, build on failure and understand it as a part of life.

Google Plus rolled out a new update to its user interface and has been getting rave reviews thus far. While many have had an aversion to Google+ or have simply failed to see a point in adding ANOTHER network to their life, the continued improvement to this site has been impressive. While Google can be commended for creating more of an arms race within the social sphere, some may see the challenge of Google Plus as a shameless ripoff of Facebook.

While Facebook has been gradually rolling out its timeline enhancements and Facebook Pages/timeline integration, using gradual, temporarily optional enhancements – Google is proving to be close on their heals with its enhancements only with a bit more forceful system of upgrading.

Note: You can make forceful upgrades to a user interface when your users have no sort of emotional connection. The obvious difference here is that Facebook users have an emotional relationship with the Facebook UI. Perhaps that is part of Google Plus’ new direction. I’m not sure that Google would really care to listen to the laments of teenage girls upset about switching to timeline though.

There are some things where Google Plus is simply playing in a different arena than Facebook (at least for the time being). If you have a Google Plus profile, go take a look. With their use of HTML5 and CSS3, they have been able to add enhancements that most of us have only seen within Apple’s Mac OSX. For example, the navigation buttons are movable/arrangeable, giving you control freaks a bit more of what you need. Additionally, Google has done a nice job to consolidate their iconography between their new Gmail user interface and the rest of their products – clearly speaking to the corner they have on the market long before the social craze.

If you are yet to jump on Google Plus, you may want to consider it. Even though the level of interaction isn’t anywhere near Twitter and Facebook, it has potential and value if you use Google Talk and Google Reader.

What are your thoughts on the new Google Plus? Is Google adding value or just ripping off the other guys?

Last week Google released a video demoing their self-driving car. The video itself is interesting, has a good soundtrack (using on of my favorite bands, the Album Leaf), and overall has a good way about it. It is not over or under produced, while remaning personable and relatable. As you watch this video, take time to observe what catches your attention and how it can speak to how you present your business, product, etc. Ask yourself, am I marketing to everyone while forsaking those that may be on the fringe that could also benefit from what I am doing?

Maybe you are not building the next automated car, creating the next cancer drug, or joining Richard Branson’s quest for space supremacy. However, maybe you are building something that can be used differently by certain people? I’m not saying that you are to exploit people with disabilities (and this is certainly not Google’s intention). What I am saying is that most every product can be used in multiple ways.

Are you too focused on a single use and forsaking how others could really benefit from what it is you provide?

Photo credit to David Hasselhoff Fan Blog, http://www.dhasselhoff.net/blog/?p=1015.

The Bible states that:

“where your treasure is, there your heart is also.”

Its not like this passage is just buried in an obscure passage – its actually stated in two separate instances (Matthew 6:21 and Luke 12:34) and it is stated by none other than Jesus Himself. So what?! Well, I’ll take that to mean that it is important. And like pretty much everything else in the Bible, it is applicable not just to our personal lives but to all areas of our lives.

How does this principle apply to my business?

Great question. Thanks for asking.

All of us in business likely are not in business for the love of corporate calling systems, Microsoft Outlook and cubicles. (Just a guess.) We are in business because we want to achieve something, get paid doing it, provide for our families financially and emotionally, and hopefully make some level of impact.

Somewhere along the way we start to treasure things. Maybe we treasure our ability to be independent and make our own decisions. Maybe we treasure our salary and want more of it. Maybe we treasure our technology and want to integrate more and more of it into our lives. Somewhere along the way we start to build our own identity that may or may not have a right set of priorities, a proper understanding of work, or the value that we place on our teams.

How can you have a proper balance in this area in your business?

1. The best way to have a right understanding of “treasure” in your business is to first acknowledge that everything belongs to God. EVERYTHING. That means that you’re just along for the ride and He chose you to be part of a specific adventure – all to be used for His glory. If you read through the context of Matthew 6:21, Jesus is talking in terms of eternity – stating that we should put or treasure in things that are unperishable. 
2. It is critical to see your business as more than a financial object and your people as more than just cogs in your revenue machine. If you run a team or own a business, you have been blessed with an opportunity to serve others, treating them as you would want to be treated and coaching them in a way that makes your service, product and work environment something that others want to be part of. If this is able to happen, it is likely that you will also see your profits rise because your team can start to look beyond the financials to see the lifetime of value they can gain from being invested in what you’re doing as a company or ministry team.
3. Those that have a proper balance in this area have a right understanding of the difference between spending and investing. Spending indicates a one time transactional activity. Investing indicates that you have a long term objective in mind – and also a willingness to assume some level or risk in order to capture that ROI. If you view your staff compensation, expenses for marketing, or rent as a spending – you are likely to be cheap in one of those areas. However, if you take an investment mindset, you can then see that the commitment (financial and time) you are making has a long term goal in mind.

Are you saying that I’m wrong?!

Likely.

In fact, we all struggle to have a right understanding of our priorities – working to balance them in our business and then achieving whatever it is we planned to do when we started out. If you have an area that comes to mind when you read Matthew 6:21, take a step back and really look at what you would say you treasure. Then, muster up some courage and ask those that know you (likely your spouse and a couple good friends) about what they would perceive you value most. It may surprise you, it may not.

From there, give yourself some grace and then make some measurable goals that will help you to reposition your thinking to a right understanding of your work, your team, and your end game.

One of our customers, Vinelight Business Intelligence recently rolled out a video to discuss their fire intelligence offering. Having known this company since its inception, there are a lot of details that make up their value proposition. To help better communicate their message, Vinelight worked with our friend Darrin Dick to produce and release the following video. We will take credit for the branding and some of the icons but the rest is all Darrin and Vinelight working to produce quality content that effectively presents the value that they bring to fire departments. If you are ever looking for top tier video animation, Darrin provides you with a seriously excellent product.

VineLight Fire Intelligence from VineLight Business Intelligence on Vimeo.

How can video help your prospective customers better understand what you’re all about?