New maintenance plans
Time Matters SQL database maintenance is often overlooked and undervalued until problems cause a loss in productivity or a catastrophic data failure. Our maintenance offering has been designed to be an annual service which includes quarterly attention. This product targets the Time Matters Enterprise customer who wishes to proactively address potential issues or existing but unknown problems that impact the performance and integrity of their Time Matters environment.

We will complete nine verification scans to determine the health of your TM SQL database and will correct identified issues before they become problematic. This service also comes with several reports that detail our findings. more info...

We are opening this up to the CIC community at a reduced cost. If you purchase this service for your customers then we will reduce the posted price by 250.00 as long as you make your purchase by September 30. We will perform this service in the name of your CIC organization and will bill you directly if you prefer. This frees you up to provide a value add for your users without having to perform the work yourself while still allowing you to resell the product at the rate that you feel is appropriate.

Fee structure 1-20 users:

Year 1: 1650.00 (includes one time reporting software fee of 250.00)
Ensuing years: 1400.00 (does not require the purchase of reporting software)
Includes 2 hours of service time per quarter.

Fee structure 21-40 users:

Year 1: 2350.00 (includes one time reporting software fee of 250.00)
Ensuing years: 2100.00 (does not require the purchase of reporting software)
Includes 3 hours of service time per quarter.

I am ReallyWho I say I am
That Bob Butler is at it again. His newest brain child is a uniquely complex but oh so simple foray into the social networking world. As our sister article (see below) points out, this is the hottest form of communication in popular culture at the moment.  Tapping into just one percent of the 300 million social networkers out there would yield incredible results.

So why do we need this service? With the recent stories of identity hijacking of late with such famous names as Tony La Russa, Kanye West and Steven Tyler it seems apparent. Those names belong to individuals who have the resources to protect their names when misused but do we?

The idea behind reallywho.com is to provide these networking website users with some peace of mind in who they are communicating with. This is done by a seemingly simple verification process which scours various pubic records sources and cross references the information that you provide at sign up with what these sources have on file. An example of this, at least in the experience that I had with setting up the service, was handled by providing me with a few previous addresses that I had been known to occupy and asking me which of the following were not from my past. Successfully answering a half a dozen or so questions correctly validated me and allowed me to progress to the next step.

I was then asked for my login information for the most common social sites in use. I provided this info for my facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter accounts (Blogger, Wordpress and others are also supported) with some hesitation. This was dispelled as I read through the FAQ and realized that this information is only used to authenticate the account and then it is deleted. Two points to ReallyWho for taking privacy and security into account here.

The punch to my wallet was relatively low at only 5.00 per year which makes this affordable for any user. I also found their support team to be quite responsive with regard to several suggestions and support questions that I had sent. The response was quick and came from a flesh and blood person right here in the good old US of A as opposed to a canned bot response which is refreshing. I did not see a way to call them for support but feel that this may be overkill considering the type of service that they provide.

So what do you get for your 5 smackers? ReallyWho provides you with an account which is hosted by their servers as well as a "verified" banner that is placed on the respective sites photo. If this catches on then you will know that the person that you are sending potentially personal information to is who you think they are. That is a big boon for me especially when it comes to sites such as LinkedIn where we are constantly networking for our business. You can test the relaltwho.com site by performing a simple search on www.reallywho.com for Scott Reese. You can also pull up my partners mug by searching for Bill Ayres (I believe that Bill was the first customer on their site). Go ahead and have a look at the final product. I'll wait right here until you get back...

The bottom line is that not only have the folks at ReallyWho developed a unique niche product but they have found a way to make it operate properly and effectively.

Good luck, Bob. We appreciate your last endeavor and look forward to future projects.

Follow you, follow me
Many, if not all, CIC firms rely on the Internet to help customers beat a path to their online door. With the advent Google Adwords, bing.com, SEO (oh yeah, you need to learn about this black art), and  a myriad of "__ For Dummies" books it seems that we are under constant assault with the digital equivalent of the old time circus barkers just aching to separate us from our hard earned dollar. 

There is good (and free) news looming in the electronic age, however. We refer to it as social networking and its here with a bang! It started with the ubiquitous My Space (filling now as you read this with ads for free prescription drug ads and adult oriented materials) and topping off with those bleeding edge Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn offerings.

The latter three (at least as far as my experience goes) are just a tad shy of providing the same addictive satisfaction from a fresh post that a heroine addict must receive from, well, you know...

So how do we take advantage of such an endless (and did I mention free?) source of electronic bull horn announcements?  This is where it gets pretty simple. Sign up. Yes, that's it. Just sign up. Here is what we did...

I recently found myself with the time to be able to explore these sites a little and have changed my point of view from "these are a teen-agers time vampire" to "how did I ever manage without this"? I started my LinkedIn profile first and immediately found myself on that oh so familiar yet highly elusive trek to compile a list of contacts that would make Bill Gates blush. Impossible? Absolutely. But this is about the journey and not the destination.

My LinkedIn account directed me to suggested acquaintances most of who are either past or present employees of LexisNexis. I did spend the last 10 years there so I suspect that would be a natural fit. As I baited my contact requests in hopes of being accepted into their circles I started to see how this could be used to broadcast our products and services in a way that is not as "spam-ish" as many of the other online marketing gigs.

I took advantage of the LinkedIn Groups concept and started the AlliancePCG group which gave me a springboard for connecting with those that had affiliated with the group. We have broadcast several discussions which are broadcast to our constituents (I just ran out of ways to say connections).

This was soon followed up with a Twitter account. We have found much more of an ability to get our messages out to the masses through Twitter. Its quick, easy, and immediate. One post was picked up by several other vendors and re-tweeted out to over 1400 others who were not directly associated with AlliancePCG. Score.

These are all accessible through the Blackberry which allows us to post at the very moment when creativity strikes. Now Bill and I can thumb up our tweets while standing in line at the grocery store.

Twitter is available via several client apps for the Blackberry at http://crackberry.com/twitter-roundup. I use Twitterberry which is very easy to navigate but make sure that the car is in park before using it on the go.

LinkedIn is semi-portable as a mobile Web page which can be found at m.linkedin.com from any Web enabled phone. There is also a Facebook app that I use for my personal account...

And now we pause for a shameless plug to get more connections. Just send us a request and we will reciprocate in kind. Consider this an opportunity to expand your own friends list :)

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