Labor Day weekend 2011, we decided to re-do the kitchen. We read the product literature from Rust-Oleum as well as several blogs. Living in our home for almost seven years, it was time for a kitchen facelift.  But Rust-Oleum Cabinet and Countertop Transformation Kits versus a full replacement of all cabinets and countertops?  Would it work? Would our kitchen look worse?

We are not risk adverse. We thought if it didn’t work, we could always do a “real” re-do of the kitchen. We planned our weekend in advance. Here’s what we wanted to accomplish over the four day weekend:

1. Complete the kitchen cabinets with the Rust-Oleum Cabinet Transformation Kit
2. Complete the countertops with the Rust-Oleum Countertop Transformation Kit
3. Repaint the kitchen to complement the Rust-Oleum Cabinet and Countertop Transformation Kits
4. Start Friday afternoon and finish Monday afternoon.

For the Rust-Oleum Cabinet Transformation Kit, we chose Meadow.  And for the Rust-Oleum Countertop Transformation Kit, we chose Charcoal. As pointed out in the video, the Rust-Oleum Cabinet Transformation Kit was the easiest of the two. Cleaning the cabinets well before de-glossing is the key to a great finished product.  The Rust-Countertop Transformation Kit is a bit more challenging, but doable.  I recommend viewing Rust-Oleum’s enclosed DVD that comes with each kit at least three times before starting.  Have your plan of attack and consumable items (e.g. rollers, brushes, drop cloths) on hand before you start.  Further, I recommend that you review the next step in the DVD before starting it.

Who can benefit from the Rust-Oleum Cabinet and Countertop Transformation Kits?  In tight economic times these kits can help when you:

Time is valuable. Every person who works should be able to quantify what an hour of their time is worth. I oversee two businesses, Merchant Services Inc and Rebel Without Applause LLC.  I write, speak, do sales and marketing, and when I have a chance, I answer incoming calls.

Tonight, I had a call come in from “Ted” (not his real name). Ted was looking to save $10 or $15 a month on his credit card processing fees.  He processes $800 a month in Visa and MasterCard. Our average customer processes about $15,000 to $20,000 per month.  While every existing and potential customer deserves to get the best service and cost-effective pricing, sometimes the clients who consume the majority of your time are those you get the least amount of revenue.

Jack Welch, the former GE CEO, taught me to fire your unprofitable customers. Over the years with Fortune 1000 companies, that simple strategy has saved me millions.  Prospects, I have found, can be the same way.

This incredible no oil vegan salad dressing is low in fat and high in flavor.  I quadruple this recipe and put it in a plastic dispenser bottle.  I keep at work and one at home.

Description:

Ingredients:

• 2 pitted dates
• 1 tbsp tamari
• 1 tbsp mustard (any kind)
• 1 tsp Worcestershire
• 1 tbsp agave nectar (amber)
• 2 tbsp Nutritional Yeast
• 3 tbsp balsamic vinegar
• 1/4 cup orange juice (other citruses like lemon, lime will work well also)
• 1 tbsp wheat germ

Instructions:

Use a food processor or finely dice dates.  Place the remaining ingredients in the processor or whisk together in a bowl.

Secure, Redundant and Available – Google Apps for Business

When we collaborate with others, we become more efficient and productive.  It’s the power that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts.

In business, collaboration tools share information for increased efficiency and productivity.  These tools should be secure so they cannot be hacked by competitors or people with malicious intent. It is more important today to understand security.

Collaboration tools are often very broadly defined.  So for the purpose of this article, we will stay focused on secure and compliant email, calendars, document sharing and messaging.

Three years ago, in Internet time is like moving from the Stone Age to Space Age, cost effective collaboration tools really didn’t exist.  Microsoft Exchange and Lotus Notes are great tools, but have very high price tags.  Enter Google Apps for Business.  For just $50 per user, per year, you get a full featured set of applications for your business.

Secure Email

There are two predominate methods of email communications.  They are POP3 and IMAP.  POP3 (Post Office Protocol 3) is meant to remove the email off the server when it is downloaded to a client, such as Outlook Express and Eudora.  The client tool, like Outlook Express, sends a confirmation message to the server that it has received the email, at which point the server deletes the email from its hard drive.  It is a store and forward system. In essence, the server stores the message until the client software is online.  At that time, the server forwards the messages to the client.

POP3 was a good tool when your host provider limited how much email you could store.  It kept your POP3 email accounts on the server from getting so large that it may reject new incoming email because the user account was at its storage limit. With disk space today costing pennies on the megabyte, Yahoo, MSN, Google and hosting companies have raised their disk space storage at no cost to the user.

A limitation of POP3 is when it deletes the email off the server.  Most of us have either personally experienced or know someone who has lost their laptop, had a computer hard drive crash or a disgruntled employee leave.  In any case, the email is gone and you’re pulling your hair out wondering, “How do I get it back?”

An alternative solution is IMAP, Internet Message Access Protocol.  IMAP allows a local email client to access email on the remote server.  A significant difference from POP3, IMAP generally leaves the email on the server until the user explicitly deletes it.  So, when you are using a tool like Outlook, Thunderbird or Apple Mail, the email you see in your software, is actually still on the server.  IMAP has an offline and online capability that allows users to perform email functions when they are not connected to the internet.  The client and server synchronize when the user goes back online, receiving and sending any email that may have been performed while offline.

The government . . . “We’re here to help.”

Existing regulations such as Sarbanes-Oxley and HIPAA treat email equally to paper documents in terms of being valid and admissible in a court of law.   The Electronic Discovery (eDiscovery) request refers to any process in which electronic data is requested, located, secured and searched with the intent of using it as evidence in a civil or criminal legal case.  Now it is imperative that your business can easily locate specific email with confidence it hasn’t been tampered with.

eDiscovery should not be your major concern, but rather good solid business continuity plans that include email archiving across your enterprise.  Email archiving should not be left up to the user.  Whether it that stolen laptop, crashed hard drive or disgruntled employee, you need to be in control of when, where and how archiving is accomplished for the protection of your business.

For email management, discovery, archiving, spam and virus prevention, Google Apps Premium for Business comes with 25Gb of storage per user and Postini.  Postini, which has been around since 1999, takes care of your email behind the scenes.  By storing your email in a redundant, secure Google data center, your disgruntled employee can delete email all day long . . . but that email will be restored.

You are in control of your email through Google Apps Premier for Business.  To ensure emails are compliant and secure, you can and should force all domain users to use the Secure Socket Layer (SSL) that is part of the service offering.

Calendars

When we started this business in 2005, desperately missing was a shared calendar where we could see and schedule appointments.  Accustomed to Lotus Notes and Microsoft’s Exchange Server, everything available was too expensive or didn’t compare in form, feature and function.

Google Apps changed that for our business.  We can share our calendars with whom we want.  We can share what we want (just free / busy time or details).  We are also able to have an assistant schedule appointments and manage our calendar for us.  But wait, it gets better!

We use cell phones that utilize  Android and Windows Mobile operating systems, so we can read Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents sent to us while on the road.  Google has a synchronization tool that syncs up your calendar and contacts.  As you change information in Outlook, Google pulls that information into your online Google Apps.  When a change is made to any calendar or contact entry, it updates our PC, phone and online Google App!

Have you experienced a customer appointment you set; only to find later you are double booked and you have to reschedule or cancel one of the appointments?  Ah, no longer with Google Apps as everything is shared.  You set the synchronization schedule to your needs.  We use every 15 minutes and it works well.

Your number one salesperson is nowhere to be found.  Well look at their Google Apps calendar and you’ll see there on an appointment with your newest customer.

Document Sharing and Messaging

Does this sound familiar?  You are working on a collaborative document with your colleagues and you find there are 27 versions and you don’t know which one is the latest version.

With document sharing you can control if the file is shared outside of your domain.  For example, if one of your users creates a document inside your domain that contains confidential information, you can make sure that the document is not shared outside the domain.

You can share presentations, word processor documents, spreadsheets and other types that should grow as Google Apps expands.

Google Apps also has a messaging capability through video and text.  This is great if you have people you are collaborating with in another city, state or even country.  Keeping everyone connected, engaged and focused is what business is all about.

Final Thoughts

We’ll be writing articles on our favorite plugins for Google Apps. For the price, redundancy and security, you can’t beat it.  It does require some basic knowledge of Domain Name Servers (DNS) and CNAMES to setup.  If you don’t know how or don’t want to undertake the task, give us a call.

For $50 per year, per user, we would spend far more in software and hardware purchases, personnel to manage the server and business continuity backup costs for an offsite location.  Google Apps Premier also includes technical support, which is not included in the free version.

We were early adopters and have used Google Apps for Business for almost three years.  I’m glad we did.

Jon Perry is the CEO of Merchant Services Inc and Managing Partner at Rebel Without Applause LLC. He is a speaker, writer and columnist. You can connect with Jon on LinkedIn, follow him on Twitter or learn more about him on Facebook Profile or Facebook Business.

Description:

Ingredients:

Small Businesses are the heart of the U.S. economy. Getting the word out about your business using social media can be daunting. Subscribe to our newsletter, Facebook, Twitter or RSS Feed to receive free tips and articles that keep your business on the forefront of your customer’s mind.

Rebel Without Applause LLC is prepared to help your business with top line revenue, bottom line performance and improved customer service through the Internet and social media.  Our staff has impressive credentials and include:

• Industrial Engineering
• Masters of Business Administration
• Google AdWords Certified
• WordPress Expertise
• Social Media Strategists – Facebook, LinkedIn, Yelp, Twitter and more

Cost effective with a quick, positive Return on Investment (ROI), call us today for a free consultation.  Don’t let your competition snag your customers. Act now and call 877.577.3775.

Before we start building, we work with your company to understand the form, fit and function the website will provide to your company.  In other words, we want to ensure we understand how you will use this powerful marketing tool.  Such as:

1. Acquisition of new customers.
2. Communicating with potential customers through your website and social media.
3. Email, calendaring and other collaborative tools to increase productivity.
4. Assisting your sales funnel.  Getting suspects to prospects; prospects to qualified prospects and qualified prospects to customers.
5. Displaying your company with the respected brand that you created and want to leverage.
6. Complementing the colors of your website to your brand and logo.

Options include:

• Google Apps.  Using Google’s gmail as your business’ email engine.  There are two methods for email integration with Google.
  • The first is Google Apps Standard.  This provides you with 50 individual email accounts.  Group accounts, email addresses that go to multiple organizational recipients (e.g. sales <at> mycompany.com), are setup at the same time.
  • The second option is Google Apps Premier.  Premier is $50 per user/per year payable to Google.  Google Apps Premier allows synchronization with most smart phones, Postini spam prevention and other tools for the organization that requires a higher level of secure, compliant email at the fraction of the cost of a Microsoft Exchange server.
• Social Media Package.  We set up or take your existing social media profiles and bring them into your website.  This package includes a Facebook Fan Page, which should not be confused with a Facebook personal profile.   The Fan Page is an incredibly powerful marketing tool.  It is the number one social media site in the world.  It allows you and your friends and your friend’s friends to spread the word about your product and services, while pointing them back to your website.  Depending on your business, we will recommend the social media sites that apply to your company’s industry, such as LinkedIn, Yelp, Twitter, etc.
• Newsletter/Email Campaigns Integration.  Communicate with your customers, prospects and value added vendors through your newsletters.  Your customers and interested parties opt in and sign up for your newsletter through your website.  We create a template that complements your logo and brand.  Through our portal you can communicate with your audience, typing as you would in almost any word processor.
• Keywords Search. We research keywords for your business as potential customers actually search for keywords.  We baseline your website with up to five competitors, along with their keywords. This is a manual, labor-intensive process that evaluates keywords for your particular products and services.  These keywords are used on your posts and pages to acquire higher organic ranking from the search engines.
• Search Engine Registration.  We register your website with Bing, Google and Yahoo, the three major search engines.  We create the site maps for your website and notify the search engines to schedule scanning and indexing.
• Website Metrics.  Get a quick heads-up display of where your customers are coming from, what they are searching for and how many visitors you are getting.  More importantly, determine how long they are staying on your site.  Knowing how long they stay and what web pages they visit are important marketing data that allow you to refine and improve your website content, as well as improving your customer conversion ratios.  Don’t guess where your customers are coming from or how long they are staying.
• Mobile Ready.  One in three cell phones have access to the Internet.  With over 277 million cell phones in the United States, have your website present pages in the Smartphone/iPhone format.
• To see good social media at work check out Jon Perry for Fort Worth City Council

This past week I wrote, if you have a resolution, make it anytime during the year. Yesterday, I met with a dear friend, Toni Allison of the non-profit Knowledge for Success.  We spent almost two hours brainstorming and writing down how we can improve the keystone class New Quest.  Both Toni and I are both passionate about continuous improvement, so it was both fun and insightful.

Background

New Quest is a program is designed for individuals wanting to start their own business and/or small business entities with less than three (3) years in business. It’s purpose is to develop their entrepreneurial potential, while providing 42 hours of in-depth training from Business Development Specialists who are professionals and/or experienced business owners in their respective fields. I am a part of the Knowledge for Success team.

Objective

The training goal at Knowledge for Success is simply to help people become successful and achieve their dreams. We (perhaps me more so) were getting wrapped around the axle.  We were having difficulty understanding why students weren’t comprehending the concept of blog posting, creation and their value statements.  Then we went to “why”.

Assessment

W. Edwards Demings said that 80% of all problems in the workplace can be attributed to management. As a member of the team, I had to take ownership of my own shortcomings.

It has been said if you ask “why” six times, you’ll come to or get close to the root cause of a problem.  That’s what we did.

While writing down the answers to the “whys”, we had an Ah Ha! moment.  What she and I naturally take for granted, we were not emphasizing.  We found a root cause!

Plan

Deming and Walter Shewhart gave us the Plan, Do, Check, Act cycle.  Plan a change.  Do the change.  Check to ensure the change gave you the predicted outcome.  Act on the results by refining or implementing. Our plan was written down.  We wrote our expected outcomes and in her upcoming February 17, 2010 class we will start to measure those outcomes.

For me, I am excited. Anytime you can improve a process that helps with the customer experience is time well spent.

What have you and/or your team worked on recently where you expect a better 2011 customer experience?

Jon Perry is the CEO of Merchant Services Inc and Managing Partner at Rebel Without Applause LLC. He is a speaker, writer and columnist.  You can connect with Jon on LinkedIn, follow him on Twitter or learn more about him on Facebook Profile or Facebook Business.

This month I am going to an Ozzy concert. I don’t do the mosh pits anymore, but as an avid “people watcher” I love to watch them mosh.  Wikipedia defines moshing as the activity in which audience members at live music performances aggressively push and/or slam into each other.  The mosh pit is right in front of the stage. You are trying to get up close to the artist on stage.

Each day I see people who are moshing on the Internet.  They are trying to get their business, their blog, their product in front of others by aggressively pushing and slamming into each other through tweets, posts and email blasts.  The artist in this case, is the consumer.

A rock band can play above 120 dbA.  The average human can yell at 90 dbA.  Even if you are in the front of the mosh pit, your voice is muted; drowned out. The same holds true on the Internet.  Every day our email, Facebook page, Twitter feed and cell phone lambaste us for attention.  We think, “crank up the volume” and get in the mosh pit to vie for customer attention.

How’s that been working?

Great businesses and bloggers tone down the volume.  They communicate with their fans, they ask their opinion, they offer sage advise or intellectual property . . . for free.  If you are cranking up the volume, here are a few suggestions that will make you be heard without having to lose your voice.

1. Post fresh, relevant content frequently.  At least one time per day, post something on your website, blog, someone’s site or blog that adds value.
2. Spread Karma.  Post on other peoples sites.  Spread the love and love will come back.
3. Foreplay.  Sales is like sex.  When we meet someone, we don’t just get down to business.  We listen, we share.  We make it a point to understand before we are ourselves are understood. Relax, enjoy the process that leads up to the climax.
4. Keep it Simple.  Writing this article is not being graded as an English essay or used as a PhD dissertation.  Consider writing in the first person, with a conversational tone.  Keep your posts short, 350 to 500 words.
5. Ask for Feedback. Get your readers input about the article, what you are writing and what they’d like to hear from you. If you have a thirsty audience, they will be coming back for more.

To paraphrase Ozzy, let’s not get All Aboard the Crazy Train.  You can be heard without moshing on the Internet.

Jon Perry is the CEO of Merchant Services Inc and Managing Partner at Rebel Without Applause LLC. He is a speaker, writer and columnist.  You can connect with Jon on LinkedIn, follow him on Twitter or learn more about him on Facebook Profile or Facebook Business.

Each year resolutions are made only to be forgotten a few weeks later.  A resolution is a formal expression of  intention.  Webster [1913] defined formal as done in due form, or with solemnity; according to regular method; not incidental, sudden or irregular.  So let’s think about that.

Resolution – We intend to do something that is not incidental or sudden and we express that to others.

I personally don’t like New Year resolutions.  I think if you have a resolution, make it anytime during the year. Make it formal, put it in writing, establish measurable outcomes and tell everyone about it.

I started this website at the end of 2010. My resolution is to post an article at least three times per week.  It’s in writing, it’s measurable and by the way, I’m telling you and everyone about it.

Happy 2011.

Jon Perry is the CEO of Merchant Services Inc and Managing Partner at Rebel Without Applause LLC. He is a speaker, writer and columnist. You can connect with Jon on LinkedIn, follow him on Twitter or learn more about him on Facebook Profile or Facebook Business.