Click to read more: simon.sharwood@commstrat.com.au (Simon Sharwood) wrote:

Purchasing your communication software and it might become very easy in the future. Apples iPad with its business-orientated functionality is set to become the all in one replacement for Pc, mobile, and desk phone

Click to read more: Anuradha Shukla wrote:

SMBs using a powerful email archiving solution are likely to reap higher benefits with 100% ROI and enhanced work processes. The critical part, however, is in choosing the right archiving solution, given the unlimited choice of well-packaged products for small to medium businesses by vendors and the emerging cloud-based archival solutions.

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Click to read more:Allison Midori Reilly wrote:

Many businesses now run online. Is your business one of them? How secure are you from a cyber attack? Do you have measures in place to protect your data if deleted?

Cybersecurity is necessary because your data and business is at risk to a lot of harmful things.

Over 10,000 cyberattacks take place every single day, crippling businesses both large and small in revenue, customer service, and brand reputation. Does your business have protections in place, as well as a plan, in case a cyberattack does happen?

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Rob Young wrote:

There are a great many sites around the web that went to the extra effort of putting together a mobile version. It makes plenty of sense, with the dramatic rise in mobile access to the web – as high as 10% of all web traffic for some regions. Having a mobile version gives plenty of advantages, including attractive formatting and faster loading. Now, Google Sites – the Google service that lets users easily put together a website – has added an automatic mobile version rendering option.

Users can enable mobile rendering on their site by following these steps:

1. Log into Google Sites at sites.google.com.
2. Go to “General settings.”
3. Go to “More actions.”
4. Go to “Manage site.”
5. Click the check-box next to “Automatically adjust site for mobile phones.”
6. Save the settings.

Your site will now render a mobile version for any Android 2.2+ OS or iOS 3+ device that logs into it. The automatically rendered version will resize the site to fit the size of the screen, align the header appropriately, and put the various navigation elements of the page into easy-access positions for mobile users. You can make additional adjustments to conserve space as well, such as disabling certain navigation elements or bottom-bar links for the mobile version.

Once implemented, site creators can easily access their mobile version of sites in their standard dashboard, site search, or through a mobile preview option in the “More actions” menu.

This isn’t the first Google service to offer automatic mobile versions. Blogger recently added mobile versions of all its templates from the template designer, as well as one additional template that custom templates can default to when accessed by mobile. Google’s services are setting a precedent on the automatic creation of a more mobile-friendly site.

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Klint Finley wrote:

The iPad isn’t just a hot new consumer device, it’s also an increasingly popular tool for business. Each week we take a look at the new or updated business apps for the iPad, and highlight trends in how tablets are being used in the enterprise.

This week we look at a new app for enterprise microblogging, a new RDP client for the iPad and yet another way of building mobile apps. Plus, an advance look at the forthcoming Skype for iPad app.

AccessToGo

AccessToGo is a new RDP client for the iPad from Ericom. It’s also available for other iOS devices and for Android. We previously looked at a few other RDP and remote administration tools here.

Adobe Flash Builder Adds New Tools for Developing iPad and Other Mobile Apps

This week Adobe announced support for building iOS and Blackberry Playbook apps with Flash Builder and the Flex framework. Flash Builder and Flex have had support for creating Android applications since April.

MangoTalk and MangoTask

This week MangoSpring announced a stand-alone versions of its enterprise microblogging\instant messaging app MangoTalk and its task manager app MangoTasks for iOS and Android (I couldn’t actually find MangoTasks in iTunes, so I assume it’s either been pulled or delayed, it is in the Android Market, though).

MangoSpring also announced a few new features for its suite of enterprise social softawre, and new pricing. We previously covered MangoSpring here

Skype for iPad Details Leak

It’s not out yet, but details about Skype’s iPad app leaked on YouTube. According to CNET, which has already published its review of the app, Skype for iPad will be available from iTunes on Tuesday.

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wrote Jonathan Blum :

The high price of inkjet-printer replacement cartridges may be among the highest hidden costs lurking in your small business. While printing giants such as Hewlett-Packard, Lexmark and Epson equip their inkjet models with options that are attractive to small-business users, the annual cost of replacing cartridges can add up. Inkjet cartridges can easily exceed half the cost of the printer itself — or even more for heavier users.

But a new generation of high-quality, low-cost laser printers is bringing the penny-per-page economics of laser printing to even the smallest business. For several weeks, I’ve been testing one such printer, the Brother HL-2270 DW.
At $150, Brother International’s pricing is aggressive, giving businesses the chance to get laser-quality printing and wireless network access for about the same cost as a full-featured inkjet printer.
My verdict: While the unit lacks many of the features of pricier units, it does one important thing well: It prints lots of inexpensive black-and-white pages.

What It Is
The HL-2270 DW is a black-and-white-only desktop laser printer. Unlike inkjet models, which use a small reservoir of powdered inks that are sprayed onto paper using a computer-controlled nozzle, printers using lasers quickly and precisely draw an image onto the paper, which is held close to the toner on a larger rotating drum. Laser models print faster and offer a much lower cost per printed page. They also require less initial maintenance than inkjets, although with heavy use, major components like drums and drive assemblies must be serviced and replaced.
Why You Might Like It
High-quality printing for a reasonable price.
From the first test page, it’s clear that Brother isn’t kidding when it says it’s bringing top-quality printing to the average small business. Although not quite as sharp as printers costing much more, the 2270 DW provides high-quality black-and-white prints at an extremely low cost per page. For example, a high-capacity laser jet replacement cartridge that yields 2,600 pages, or about a year’s output for most small shops, sells for just $44.80 on Amazon.com. That’s less than two cents per page.
The small size.
At 14 inches wide by 14.5 inches deep and 7 inches high, the new Brother model is about half the size of a monochrome laser printer made just a few years ago. The unit can easily fit on a small shelf, where it can also hold 250 sheets of paper. All access ports like power and network options are easily accessible, as are drums and other interior features. Buyers who don’t mind getting their hands dirty can likely service this model without help.
The mix of features and performance.
The printer also has some useful extras. It has USB, Ethernet and Wi-Fi connectivity, so it can be accessed by single PCs or networked groups. And its boot-up-to-print speed is a fast 10 seconds or less. The listed output speed of 27 pages per minute was roughly correct in my testing. The unit also had an option that allows for easy, double-sided printing, which worked well.
Why You Might Not Like It
No color text or images.
The 2270 DW is a black-and-white only printer, so it won’t do the job if you also (even occasionally) need color pages. Output quality is also a step or two below more expensive laser printers. Solid inking found in block letters, for example, had spots and smears, particularly on thicker stock paper. I wouldn’t rely on it for sophisticated presentation work. It also lacks typical features such as scanning and faxing, which can problematic for some small companies.
Set up requires technical sophistication.
Brother is an international firm that doesn’t have the top-grade customer support system you’ll find with rival consumer electronics companies. English is a second language for it, and its instruction manuals are poorly laid out and hard to read. Solving problems, while possible, takes trial and error. Also, don’t expect fancy features like add-on paper feeders. This unit only has a basic tray.
And setting up some of its features can be complex. Wireless networking, for example, works perfectly well, but it takes a firm understanding of service set identifier (SSID) numbers and log-in codes. Any experienced network manager can handle it, but the uninitiated will need professional help to configure these complex functions.
What To Do
If your business does even a moderate amount of black-and-white printing, for $150 you’ll get standard laser quality for just a couple pennies per page, which is on par with the cost of an inkjet. But this model won’t deliver top-quality work and can’t be used for faxing or scanning.

Lorna Brett wrote:

It can be argued that the beginnings of cloud computing can be traced back to when Salesforce launched its automation software as a service. Indeed prior to this, most businesses of any size were content to buy software that needed to be installed on servers located at the business’ premises. As history tells us today, cloud computing is not restricted to a specific industry or category of business.

Nowadays small-to-medium businesses continue to embrace the new opportunities that cloud technologies can offer. Companies in the Asia-Pacific region (excluding Japan) are expected to invest US$11.4 billion into cloud computing solutions, according to the latest research conducted by AMI Partners.

AMI predicts the market for cloud solutions will grow at more than twice the rate of traditional ICT technologies in 2011 in the Asia Pacific markets. In addition, this region is expected to lead worldwide expansion of cloud computing markets, thereby providing ICT vendors with a strong, sustainable growth potential.

With increasingly favourable economic and infrastructural conditions, countries in the Asia Pacific region, including Australia, provide strong annual growth potential. The proliferation of broadband Internet and high-speed mobile networks provides SMEs with more options to access cloud solutions, allowing a completely new segment of SMEs to adopt ICT functionality for the first time.

What is cloud computing?

Research company Gartner defines cloud computing as “a style of computing where scalable and elastic IT-related capabilities are delivered as a service to consumers using internet technologies.” An early analogy for cloud computing is the utility industry where consumers pay for their electricity water or gas on a consumption basis. Consumers do not need to know the source, nor do they care. What is important is that the service remains uninterrupted and is available on demand.

Similarly, cloud computing services are delivered on a pay-per-use model. Customers connect their client computing devices to the cloud service provider via the internet. The service, whether messaging, business application, storage capacity or computational resources, flows uninterrupted and customers get paid for services consumed at the end of the billing cycle.

In recent years, the popularity of the hype surrounding cloud computing has also made the term a catch-all-phrase for other services that are delivered via the internet. These include shared web hosting, messaging and collaboration solutions, virtualised infrastructure services, and software-as-a-service (SaaS).

• Shared Web Hosting refers to the building and managing of websites without the need to have in-depth technical knowledge of servers, email, or databases.

• Enterprise-class messaging and collaboration solutions enable companies to use email, voice and calendar to run their daily operations.

• Virtualised Infrastructure Services refer to off-premise IT infrastructure without the cost and resource burden that the typical in-house IT department incurs.

• Software as a service (SaaS) refers to business applications that are accessed via the internet and for which customers pay on a per user, per month basis. Customers do not have to worry about buying servers to host the application or managing the application, including patches and upgrades.

At the heart of any cloud computing service is the concept of shared resources. Vendors that sell cloud computing services may decide to package their service at a relatively low cost to the individual customer. But each customer loses the right to exclusive access to the application delivered as a service. As a shared service, a customer understands that he is just one of many thousands of customers using the same application.

One critical tenet of cloud computing is data privacy by which the vendor guarantees that your data remains exclusive to you alone. In fact, cloud service providers take great measures to ensure that your data is kept within secure containers that only you and your authorised users can access.

Why is cloud computing good for my business?

Cloud computing offers SMEs a number of benefits one of which is the access to enterprise-class compute resources without the enterprise price tag.

Low total cost of ownership: Most enterprise-class business applications like CRM or ERP are expensive to acquire, install and maintain. In a cloud computing model, these applications become very affordable from day one.
You don’t have to invest in a data centre, including servers, storage and software. Since you don’t own any hardware or software, obsolescence is non-existent. You don’t have to sign annual maintenance contracts and neither do you need to worry about software patches or version upgrades.
The only requirements are client devices like PCs and laptops. Even the network switch is supplied by your ISP. Just to be clear, peripheral devices like printers and scanners are not typically part of a Cloud service contract.

In a recent survey conducted by Enterprise Management Associates (EMA), six in 10 cloud computing customers say that they have been able to reduce their IT capital costs. The survey also shows that cloud deployments help improve service quality, reduce IT operations costs, and reduce IT management complexity.

Higher productivity gains: SMEs are notoriously frugal when it comes to investments where the return on investments is not obvious. Most small businesses already outsource their IT needs to a third party, and often complain about the time-shared service. Mid-sized businesses that have an internal IT team often complain about the time spent on support and maintenance. Imagine freeing up those resources to develop business applications. When you outsource to a cloud service provider, routine IT and network management tasks are performed by your provider.

Flexibly scale up or down: Cloud computing is patterned after a utility business model where you use only what you need. Most businesses are cyclical in nature. And this fits very well into the cloud model. When you need additional resources, you just ‘rent’ them. As soon as your business goes back to normal, you scale back on your compute rental. You will not see servers sitting idly in your data centre. It is a true pay-per-use model.

So how do I sign up for cloud computing?

Cloud computing is a paradigm shift in the way companies use technology. As such you will need to plan for this very carefully. Every business owner will need to change the way they think about IT. Many SMEs that start on the path to cloud computing do so with few or no legacy on-premise applications.

• Start small

Because scalability is an intrinsic attribute of cloud computing, start small. Identify one area of your computing needs to test the waters. The two most common applications companies begin with are email or website.

• Minimise your risks

Every choice/option   involves a risk, including cloud computing. Find a reliable hosting or Cloud service provider by asking your business partners or peers for some recommendations. Check online forums for reliable hosters with good service track record in your locality. Ask them about their backup and recovery services in the wake of disaster?

• Evolve your strategy

As you pick up experience, evolve your cloud strategy. Plan to roll out other services into the Cloud bearing in mind that there is no need to rush through the transition process

We are still in the early days of cloud computing. But many companies of all sizes and shapes are already harnessing the power of cloud computing to their benefits. AMI Partners predicts the ASEAN region to hold the fastest opportunity for cloud computing services. Their findings also show that once a company has started its journey into the cloud and has deployed the first-use case successfully, they are very likely to explore broader use of additional cloud infrastructure and application solutions.

–John Eng is VP Marketing and Alliances, Parallels Asia Pacific.

Rob Young wrote:

Fans of Gmail likely know that the service allows for simple video chatting directly in your browser. While the Gmail-based video and voice chat isn’t seen as a strong competitor with industry leaders like Skype, the technology being used demonstrates some capabilities – and implied possibilities – for Google. It seems those possibilities are now coming to fruition, thanks to the WebRTCsoftware purchased by Google last year. It seems that Google’s Chrome browser will shortly be receiving support for a variety of real-time video and audio chat programs that are built using simple HTML and JavaScript APIs.

The technology originates from the buyout of Global IP Solutions last year. It seems that Google is thrusting that tech into the open source community, allowing for the use of the APIs by developers around the world. However, work is needed both on the WebRTCand browser end. Since Google has a vested interest in both, it’s clear that Google Chrome will be the first browser with the real-time chat capabilities.

Really, the advancement here isn’t in what can be done, but how it’s done. Previously, as noted by Clint Boulton, real-time chats required “proprietary signal processing technology delivered through plug-ins and client downloads.” That will no longer be the case, and as the WebRTC technology sees broader adoption, it’s likely that these chat features will become a standard part of many web interfaces.

Google Chrome won’t be the only browser that supports WebRTC. Much like the WebM technology, both Opera and Mozilla are on board. With Microsoft Internet Explorer, the leading browser in the world, being left off this list, it may be that one of Google’s motives is expanding the comparative capabilities of Chrome when contrasted with IE9. However, the technology also benefits Google on numerous other fronts, including in web apps. Considering the importance of high-powered web apps in the success of both the Chrome browser and Chrome OS, the improved functionality here may be motivation enough.

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Allison Midori Reilly wrote:

The majority of small businesses, 76 percent, agree their ideal marketing mix includes a combination of physical and digital communications, according to a new survey from Pitney Bowes Inc., Nearly three quarters surveyed, 72 percent, say they would do more of it if they had the right customer communications management tools.

Five hundred small business owners in the U.S participated in the survey. Of those 500, 74 percent had nine employees or fewer. The survey also found that those businesses sold products and services online were much more likely to embrace digital communications compared with those that don’t sell online.

 

Pitney Bowes surveyed 500 SMB owners about their marketing efforts, and these are the results. The two employee columns show the percentage of respondents who use that channel, while the online percentages show how many utilize that method, but sell/don’t sell online.

“Customers want to be reached through more than one channel,” said Debra Thompson-Van, Vice President of Marketing at Pitney Bowes. “Yet, channels in use two to five years ago are still being used today. There’s been no drop in the use of traditional marketing.”

Thompson-Van said that this is because different marketing communications serve different marketing purposes. Direct mail and advertising are proven methods that work that also reach a broader audience. Email marketing and social media are cost-effective and easy to use, but are also better are targeting individuals.

Pitney Bowes also noted that 12 percent of respondents added mobile marketing in the past year, and another nine percent added QR codes. Thompson-Van said this wasn’t bad for marketing methods that weren’t even being discussed 12 months ago.

“There’s an interest of combining the physical medium with the digital medium,” she said. The most common ways SMBs are doing this is by adding QR codes to direct mail and to business cards. Thompson-Van also recommends that SMBs combine direct mail and email marketing.

“Send an email and a hard copy at the same time,” she said. “It increases the likelihood of your message getting across, and response rates go up because of it.” An example of this combination is in health care, where a doctor can send an email about test results while using direct mail to send the actual reports.

“It’s far more effective than just doing one or other other,” Thompson-Van said.

Pitney Bowes also has released a suite of products to help SMBs embrace the newer marketing platforms and to reach these customers effectively. These resources include the pbSmart Connections, the pbSmartPostage, and pbSmart Essentials, a new small business blog.

“Small business owners are increasingly challenged to effectively communicate with their customers and prospects in ways they want to be reached. As a result, businesses are recognizing the requirement, and opportunity, of adding new customer communications channels. However, they need tools that are easy to implement and more information on how to use them to help build their business,” said Thompson-Van. “Our focus is on providing them the tools and guidance needed to get them passed those hurdles and effectively manage their customer communications.”

Lorna Brett wrote:

Optus has launched a range of cloud services, designed to assist small and medium businesses in managing their communications, collaboration and marketing.

The OfficeApps service will give business owners access to vital applications on-the-go, via a single web portal on a range of devices, whilst eliminating the cost and hassle of managing IT.

Available now is the Optus OfficeApps Email and Collaboration Suite, which includes domain name registration, Google Apps for Business such as email, calendar, documents, spreadsheets, presentations, instant messaging, and dedicated Optus OfficeApps Support.

Optus promises IT problems won’t impact the cloud service thanks to its OfficeApps Support, which offers 24/7 support via online chat, phone and screen-share.

“One of the biggest challenges small businesses face when considering cloud services is simply not knowing where to start, so we’ve invested heavily in support to take the worry out of connecting to and working in the

cloud,” Optus Small and Medium Business Managing Director Rohan Garneson said.

“Small businesses can take advantage of the same technology tools and support available to big businesses, but at a lower cost and without the IT worries,” he added.

Optus OfficeApps is available to both existing Optus and non-Optus SMB customers on a 12-month contract or monthly subscription basis on an introductory plan. Starting from $10 per month, there are three pricing options

available depending on the connection fee and level of Optus OfficeApps Support required.

On the $25 Email and Collaboration Suite package, customers pay no connection fee, have unlimited 24/7 Optus

OfficeApps support for every user and also receive a 12-month TrueLocal.com.au business advertising package to assist in promoting their business online.

To purchase Optus OfficeApps, customers can visit www.optusbusiness.com.au/officeapps or call 1300 093 869.