It’s difficult to paint a clear and accurate representation of the browsers people currently use. We can’t very well ask every site visitor, “Hey, you there! What browser are you using?” (Not everyone knows the answer to that question.) It’s important for us to know, though, because it shows us what people use to view our sites and how the trend may be changing over time.

Luckily, Google Analytics, a tool we install on many of our sites, provides a fairly good picture of browser usage. For the sake of transparency, I’ve gone through six of our largest sites and looked at browser usage among them. While this information may not be helpful to you personally, it allows developers make key decisions about the sites they build.

The data below is from six Sephone sites in June 2008 and June 2009. These sites appeal to a general population and include real estate, tourism, news, education, and other markets.

We hope to do this periodically to establish a better perspective of browser trending over time. Developers: are you seeing the same trends? Business owners: have you considered a browser switch?

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The site in question, (names have been removed for obvious reasons),  had not been changed in many, many years, thus, the site  was not ranking very well.  We did not go into details regarding how the site if- updated more frequently would assist in results ranking, because he stopped me before I opened my mouth-

“It ain’t gonna happen-  I don’t have the time,  It ain’t gonna happen”

OK-  I am a firm believer that the client is always right-  but our clients expect us to bring our expertise to the table, don’t they?  Sephone is a firm believer to share opinions, not force opinions. Sharing what you know and what we know, makes us succeed and faster. Since we fell on deaf ears, we decided to post this on our blog to get it out there anyway.

We all know the adage “Time waits for no man”-  Right?  This goes even more for the Internet-

Time waits for no website-(neither does Google).  If you do not spend time to manage or promote your site today, then tomorrow there will be more competition and it will be more challenging than ever.  Maybe, depending on your business - too late?

In order to stay relevant, timely and  competitive you need to be seen-  Depending on the type of business you are, or the services you provide to the pool of customers you want to wade in, as this is a dynamic pool, the answer is similar-  You need to be seen and you never know when someone is looking for you.

Simply stated-

• if your entire business is virtual then you need to get it as exposed as much as possible, within reason and within your budget (and time is money too, so social media efforts need to be realistic also).
• if your business is regional or local to any degree, you need to focus on that region or locality.

Exposure in this case is visibility to your target audience, whether through links, banner ads, traditional advertising, or in this case Internet Marketing, Social Marketing Services and SEO.

This includes traditional internet methods as well as socially based methods.  [It can also be extended to traditional 'print' advertising too.]

Your Website is your initial exposure to new clients- Your Online Brochure;  If it is not current, then you could be losing business.  Even if it appears to be dated, but isn’t; the perception is you are still using the 2003 catalog and not today’s calendar.

This goes for layout, info and images.  (info includes, text, press releases, testimonials and references).  If it is not current, you could be losing business, ooops I said that already, but it is worth stating again.

So, if YOU dont have the TIME for your business- why be IN business?   Now perhaps what the client really meant was:

“I don’t have the time to make updates to my web site, or the ability to make the updates or the “Know-How” to make updates;”

The response to that is- then find someone, an individual, a Company or LEARN how to make these changes; and you don’t need to know HTML!

That is where we come in with datAvenger  (see http://www.datAvenger.com ), but more on that later-

In addition to keeping your website current- there are other ways to do that, that can help-  If you BLOG, use FaceBook, Twitter or other social networking tools like YouTube-  these can be referenced on your website that show timeliness!  And these DO NOT HAVE BIG COSTS Associated with them-

This is  where time IS on your side as it is more YOUR time that you are already spending while doing these things that can be merged into (or linked) to your site!

So why not benefit from it and gain some well earned points and “‘cred” on the Internet for your business?

If you don’t Tweet, use FaceBook, etc-  you can still have a ‘presence’ but use someone to help you get started.  That can be a friend or someone like Sephone.  We can help you get started and then when you do feel comfy about it and you will, we can turn it over to you to keep fresh- but we are always here to help.

We don’t usually have “hit you over the head” posts like this with a sales pitch but in this case we (Joe) couldn’t help himself without offering any assistance- so please forgive us (him). And remember- Sephone is a resource for these services and you may have access to your own resources-

Therefore, we encourage our clients to consider timely updates to their sites, Search Engine Marketing and Social Media Services, no matter who does it.

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Marketers have always had a tendency to jump on the bandwagon of some latest craze and pound it to death.  I can say that because I am one to the core and with the advent of social media the buzz is louder and the clicking sound is that of a smoking keyboard or cell phone with all of “those people” talking to each other agreeing and singing the praises of the ideas that are exchanged between them.

Sound familiar?  But are the Marketing people the only people “getting it?”  Is this all a fad that will fade away like the Cabbage Patch Doll?

Being from Maine, Maine folks are known for not appreciating a lot of “fluff,” also we adapt to things that most need attending to, like shoveling the driveway, taking a friend to a doctor’s appointment, making sure the bills are being paid.  IMPORTANT stuff.

Right now Social Media, just may not seem that important and it is okay to feel like that, but it is July (almost) and the snow shoveling is a few months away, make part of your summer reading articles in periodicals that can give you the quick info you really need to know!

First take a quick 3 minute look at this video.

Then here are 3 quick things to read that may help you make sense of it:

1. Twitter a 140 character exchange between people from the mundane to the very important.  This article is from the periodical “The Week.”
2. Something  from a “traditional” type media about Twitter is an article in Business Week and its effect on recent events in Iran, certainly one type of media did not change life in Iran, but the fact when used along with “the old fashioned way” of doing things it helps support what was all ready happening.
3. Facebook isn’t necessarily only something your kids use to keep track of their friends whereabouts, it is really creating some unique opportunities for businesses to advertise to “specific” demographics at very reasonable costs.  Business Week has an interesting article here.

We know you don’t have time for this.
We hear this all the time.

If you want to promote your business yourself and not pay for yellow page ads (which are becoming dinosaurs) and daily news papers, (depending on which one you read, readership has declined in some cases nearly 75%).  How do you know someone, the RIGHT someone even sees your ad?  Cash a bit tight these days? Think again about Social Media.

If you have a rainy day (which so far this summer, it seems like all we have had is rainy days), go to YouTube.COM and search for “How To” or use other keywords to learn about things you may have questions about.  YouTube isn’t just a collection of senseless videos, there really are great things there - and if your business wants to produce something that you want the world to know about, here is your free way to promote it.

Also, looking for something to talk about with your nieces and nephews, or grandchildren?  Ask them about their facebook page or about how they text to keep in touch with their friends.  You may be surprised what you can learn and where you can learn it!

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Over the last couple of months, the search landscape has really caught on fire. New services are trying to chip away at Google’s lead by offering a different set of results for search queries. Here’s a brief look at three of these sites that may help you find the information you need more quickly.

Bing

Microsoft recently launched a massive rebranding campaign for its Live Search, renaming the engine to bing.com. Bing follows in the footsteps of other mainstream search engines of Internet past; in addition to general web results, Bing also provides local, image, and refined links based on your search. Microsoft has held one of the top three search spots for quite a while, and Bing is the corporation’s latest attempt to grab a bigger slice of the pie. Here’s a search for Maine on Bing.

Twitter Search

Looking for something a little more recent? Twitter Search may be what you need. A Twitter search will yield results posted by Twitter users over the last month or so. It’s a great way to know what people are saying about something in an up-to-the-minute way. We’ve previously offered some Twitter searching tips if you’d like to try a search or two. Here’s a search for Maine on Twitter search.

Wolfram Alpha

If you’re looking for data, check out Wolfram Alpha. Wolfram Alpha will give very context-sensitive results: everything from statistics to graphs to maps, depending on your query. Here’s a search for Maine on Wolfram Alpha.

What are your favorite ways to search the current landscape of the web?

Technorati Profile

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With some of the latest additions to these products, we’ve realized that the names of these applications don’t reflect the companies aren’t as accurate as they could be. If you’ve visited the admin area for a datAvenger/datAvenger lite site today, you may have noticed that we’ve rolled out a name change to both applications. Here’s what you’ll see:

• If you’ve been working in datAvenger, your content management application is now called datAvenger Pro.
• If you currently use the latest version of datAvenger lite (the one with the blue header bar), your application is now simply called datAvenger.

You’ll see these changes in the text of the application, the logo, and references to the applications on our sites.

There are a few key points to keep in mind for this transition.

• The people who visit your site won’t be affected by this change at all. The only changes you’ll see are in the administration area of your site.
• The administration area will remain the same other than references to your application’s name. This change does not affect any functionality.
• Your invoices from us will reflect the name change, but the amount you are billed will not change. This is only a name change, not a pricing change.

Thank you for your understanding during this transition. Please contact us if you have any questions.

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• wabi.tv in Arts and Entertainment
• dempseychallenge.org in Non-Profit
• themainemarketplace.com in E-Commerce

We wish the best to all of the other finalists.

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We often hear from our clients that these applications save a lot of time in their daily routine, but sometimes there’s a learning curve as the business transitions to a new system. We completely understand this; after all, we’re used to providing businesses and organizations with improved ways to do a core part of their work.

When we develop an application for a company, we’ll often provide a version of the product for the company to use prior to its actual launch. These versions might not have every feature that’s planned for the final release, but they’re usually used by one or two people to help understand how the product works before it’s actually switched on and used by everyone. The product testing periods are a great time for you to give us your feedback about the application. If something doesn’t make sense to you, we can discuss what changes we could make before the product’s final launch.

As we often say here, nobody knows how your business works better than you do. We want to help your business succeed, and your feedback is valuable as you use your application. When the final version of your application launches, we want it to save your company time and money.

Photo by Anne Oeldorf-Hirsch, released under Creative Commons.

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RSS (Really Simple Syndication) is a way for web sites to relay their newly published content to you. It’s often used by blogs or news sites and very widely supported.  Rather than going to a website to view the content, the content is “pushed” to you.

Why would I use RSS

Instead of having to visit several websites to view their content, those same sites can just send their updates to you via RSS. This would enable you to just check one place for new information instead of going to numerous other sites.

It can help cut down on spam as well. With email, the sender decides if the recipient wants the message; with RSS, the recipient decides if they would like the information. Therefore little to no spam comes through RSS feeds.

How do I know if a site has a feed

In most browsers, an orange icon, similar to the one in this post will appear around the address bar.  By clicking on it, you can see the feed.  Sometimes you will see a link on a site called “RSS” or “feeds” as well.

How do I use RSS

You are going to need a feed reader. The feed reader is an application that subscribes you to the updates.  This application wiill pull RSS feed data into one place for you to view.  We can write volumes about the numerous applications, but we are going to stick to the basics.

Web Browser Based

A web browser based feed reader is one that you use with your web browser. Your web browser is what you view the internet with, like internet explorer, firefox or safari.   With your browser you go to the feed reader site, login, and it will show you your feeds’ content.  Here are a list of popular feedreaders.

• Google Reader
• Blog Lines
• My Yahoo!
• News Gator

Most of these are easy to setup and use.  Plus they can be used for any computer that has internet access.  The rest of these need to be linked to a single computer.  If you don’t know which one of the below feed readers to use, try one of these.  I personally use google reader.

Vista Based

Windows Vista has it’s own way of dealing with RSS feeds.  Here are the basic steps.

1. Open Internet Explorer by clicking the Start button and then clicking Internet Explorer.
2. Go to the website that has the feed you want to subscribe to.
3. Click on the feed button
4. Click Subscribe to this Feed.
5. Type a name for the feed and select the folder to create the feed in.
6. Click Subscribe.

Once you are subscribed it will show in your internet explorer.  You can now add the feed to your vista sidebar or to your windows mail program.

Outlook

Inside of Microsoft Office, Outlook provides RSS functionality.  If you have outlook installed, by clicking on the feed icon in the address bar, Outlook will subscribe to automatically.

Thunderbird

If you have Thunderbird installed, it makes a great feed reader.

1. Go to the “File” menu and select “New -> Account”. Alternatively, you can go to the “Tools” menu and select “Account Settings”, and click on the “Add Account” button.
2. In the dialog box that pops up, select “RSS News & Blogs” and press the “Next” button.
3. Enter an account name, press the “Next” button, and finally press the “Finish” button. This new account will now appear in the folders pane in the main Thunderbird window.
4. Right-click on the account name in the folders pane and select “Manage Subscriptions”.
5. Click on the account name in the folders pane, and then click on the “Manage Subscriptions” link in the main Thunderbird window
6. Go to “Tools -> Account Settings”, click on the account name in the left-hand pane, and then click the “Manage Subscriptions” button.
7. click the “Add” button
8. enter the URL for the feed into the box
9. click “OK”

Apple Mail

1. Choose File > Add RSS Feeds or click the Add (+) button at the bottom of the sidebar, and then choose Add RSS Feeds.
2. Browse and select a feed you’ve bookmarked in Safari, or enter or paste the URL of a new feed. To search feeds you’ve bookmarked in Safari, start typing in the search field. To select from a list of bookmarked feeds, Shift-click to select feeds that are next to each other in the list; Command-click to select feeds that are not next to one another.
3. If you want RSS feeds to be included in your Inbox, click “Show in Inbox.”
4. Click Add

What are some feeds I can start with

• Sephone Blog
• Maine.gov has dozens of feeds
• WABI TV-5 Central Maine news

Nearly all blogs and news organizations have RSS feeds as well.

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IMG and Sephone have not merged Companies; We are still two separate Companies operating independently, but because of the common desire to offer the best services we  can to our customers- we have come together to extend each others services to Our now combined customers.

IMG is still the local leader in Portal sites such as

http://www.MaineAutoMall.com, http://www.MaineGuide, http://www.JobsInMaine.com

Sephone is still the leader in website design, application development, content management, e-commerce and  hosting solutions

When you call IMG for updates to your website, Sephone provides that service to you- but you are still an IMG client because of your long-term relationship AND the fact that you have a presence in MaineAutoMall or  MaineGuide and have all of the others services like JobsinMaine too;  PLUS  WE HAVE WENDY!!

Sephone offers its Maine clients the opportunity to include themselves in one of the States top Portal sites to promote their business, with MaineGuide.  MaineGuide.com is a TOP referrer to Travel & Tourism related businesses in the State for the last 12 + Years!

In addition, Sephone & IMG have http://www.maineevents.com  a FREE Calendar Service for Maine businesses, organizations, and individuals.   In October ‘08, we launched http://www.NJhappenings.com and in February ‘09 http://www.FLhappenings.com

So- Happy Anniversary To John, Wendy, Scott, Kelly, Joe and the rest-  BUT also- to our collective clients too!

Sephone is credited for  online products such as,  datAvenger, the new datAvenger Lite, hulaCart, BroadcasterNow and other applications as well as Custom Development for clients across the U.S..

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Have you ever wondered if people are talking about you on twitter.  There is a relatively simple way to tell.  Search.twitter.com is the place to go.

To put it very simply, search.twitter.com is like google for twitter and works much the same.

One of the very covenant features of this search is that the results can be tracked via a feed.   Once I have this twitter search in my feed reader, any time somebody mentions me on twitter, I see it.  This feed is available near the top right hand side of the search results.  It’s the RSS icon, that says “Feed for this query” right next to it.  For those of you who don’t know much about feeds, go back and read our feed reader article.

To really get the most of the this functional I recommend you use the plus and minus signs.  Plus means that the search must contain that word and minus means that the search results must not contain that word.  For example say I wanted to search for tweets that had  ‘cream’ but not ‘ice’, then I would search from “-ice +cream“.

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At the end of the day, though, nobody knows your business or organization better than you do. While we’re discussing your site - whether it’s a brand new project or changes to your existing presence online - we’ll do all we can to understand what’s important to your business and what you want to achieve online. While we’re talking, don’t ever be afraid to bring your experience and vision for your business to the table. We’ve always found that we do our best work when we have a really good grasp of the business behind a site.

Here are a few ways you can help us understand your business better.

• If you have a mission or vision statement, let us take a look at it.
• Bring in some sales flyers, reports, or press releases so that we can have a better idea about how you communicate with your customers.
• If you’ve seen features on other sites you’d like to incorporate into yours, bring Web addresses or screenshots so that we can see them.
• Let us know about the goals of your project. This goes deeper than “I want the business to make money” or “we should attract more customers.” How will your site compliment what you’re doing with the other parts of your business?

For more ideas on how to optimize your communication with us, be sure to read Alan’s previous post, “How to get the most from your web development company.”

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All ye be warned - it be April Fools’ Day!

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Remember the horror of 911 and then shear joy of watching the firefighter that sang the Star Spangled Banner? It was covered on all networks - we heard it over and over.  It gave us hope. People still traveled to New York City for visits, people dealt with inconvenience related to air travel, we picked ourselves up by the bootstraps and moved on, though we never forgot.

So now we are in an economic slump. This is no 911, for sure. But searching for some GOOD news out there, some hope, some light at the end of the tunnel is human nature in any crisis.

Considering there are so many news stories about Social Media today you gotta wonder, “Is this my silver bullet?”  “Will this solve my business downturn?”  Everybody is jumping on the band wagon. Media professionals are pretending to be experts, when truthfully learning about this is ongoing for everyone.  Even the “experts.” The reason you are hearing about it, is because it is a “Marketing thing” and Marketers talk, and talk and talk - sometimes until it comes true.

Here is a post from Mark Collier that I found after I had written this blog post. He figured this out last August and I am just daring to write about it now!  I am no expert, I like to call myself a “student” as situations and options evolve I am always striving to learn about them.

Social Media and all the “faces” it takes, Facebook, MySpace, Stumble, Digg, Twitter (the list goes on and on), can really feel overwhelming to any business owner.  In addition to the fact that JUST when you think you have it figured out, Google shows up and we need to change something again.

Remember, YOU know YOUR business.  YOU know YOUR business better than ANYONE.  What you need is a solution that works for YOU and YOUR business.

If you feel you need more traffic to your website and that will grow sales, great.  If you need more people to come to your retail store and that will grow sales, great. If your website is getting traffic but people are ditching it on the first page, not so  great. Each business has a unique set of criteria of how they succeed.

What the “experts” need to do for you is “LISTEN.”  LISTEN to what your goals are, LISTEN to your challenges, come up with measurable tasks and help you decide what your strategy is to accomplish these goals. WHICH tools should you use?

Social Media is not a “silver bullet,” nor does it have to feel like “mumbo-jumbo” and just like anything it is a means to an end. While some words spread quickly, other words more slowly, the important thing is to get started and you don’t have to do it alone. Spreading the word is great, but getting people to act, to buy, is most important.

Social Media does not change the fact that you still are the expert about your goals and when we listen we can help you get there.

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Through a relationship with Central Maine Medical Center, we have a client,  Patrick Dempsey. Yes THE Patrick Dempsey.  Dr. Mc Dreamy. He has a new ‘Event’ he is promoting in October-  see  the Dempsey Challenge website for details.

While looking on Twitter to see if there has been any tweets related to Patrick Dempsey- I ran across a reporter in Florida  (Christi  Knight at WPFB  @Twochix1) who was going to interview Patrick regarding his  Car Race in Florida.

She tweeted “Does anyone have a question that they would like to ask Patrick?”

Jumping on an opportunity and a little experiment- I suggested she ask about his “Other Race”, the Dempsey Challenge!

, and Mc Dreamy

And what do you think happened?
She asked the question - and here is the TV Clip so you can see it for yourself!

Now, that in itself is NO BIG DEAL- considering anyone can do it- the DEAL is that there wouldn’t have been the opportunity to get the Dempsey Challenge mentioned in this interview as well as Patrick to have a chance to plug it in the clip if it had not been for Twitter!

Thanks Christi!

Thank you, Patrick!

Twitter and Social Networking WORKS-  Real World Example!

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What is social media?

It has because such a buzz word that gets injected into conversation, it is even a somewhat elusive term to define.  We are going to stick to the most simple definition we can.  Social media is the use of technology (mostly internet technology) to allow folks to publish content (text, images, or video mostly) that encourages interaction with others.

How is it different than traditional media?

In comparison to traditional media outlets (such as television, radio and print) there are numerous differences.

• Speed: traditional media can take hours, days, even months to republish, social media is near instant
• Permanence: once created traditional media can not change, social media can change at will
• Threshold to publish: it takes training and money to publish via traditional mediums, social media is usually free and simple
• Credibility: traditional media has much more credibility and accountability

In some respects they are similar, a blog post may not be read by anybody, it may be read by millions.  A TV show may never be watched by anybody, or by the millions.

What are some examples?

I think examples are some of the best ways to learn

• wordpress: a blogging platform
• flickr: a photo sharing site
• twitter: a micro blogging platform
• facebook: site to share content with your friends
• youtube: a video sharing site
• wikipedia: a community driven encyclopedia
• digg: voting for popular news
• delicious: link sharing and bookmarking

But how can I use it?

If you are thinking, this is cute and all, but my time is precious, how do I use this to benefit myself, then this section is for you.

Social media can save you time.  When you need to get the word out about something, a new product, service, or sale, it can be much faster to publish your information in one place and let everybody read that, instead of having to tell a bunch of people.  Imagine if you are having a sale, you could via word of month, tell 200 people about your sale.  That will take you a few hours and may span several days.  If you have 200 people following you on twitter, it takes about 1 minute and it’s instant.

Social media can help you educate your customers.  Lets say you offer three services, snow removal, landscaping, and trash removal.  Lets say that 1/3 of your business comes from each service and you don’t have very many overlapping customers that use more than one service.  By publishing various social media items, you can showcase your work to your customers that may only use one aspect of your business or didn’t even know you did more than one thing.

Social media can help you to find new business.  By publishing your insights, views and work examples for the world to see, potential customers will see your abilities and you can increase they likely hood to use you in the future.

Where can I read more?

• In tough times, businesses use social networking via wabi.tv
• Social Media on Wikipedia

This is the first in a many part series about social media.  Stay tuned for more.

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They call it Micro-payments cuz they will be real small and hopefully we won’t notice the hit in our wallets sin e it will be billed to a credit card like iTunes.  Infact, iTunes was the inspiration!

The author cited that the high costs of production including the journalists,and photogs costs are increasing so some one has to foot the bill.

Don’t TV stations have the same dilemma? Do we pay for the news in that format?

Micro-payments shmicro-babble. That’s what that is. Don’t fall for it and more importantly don’t pay for it!

Like Agent Mulder used to say “the truth is out there”. Well so is the news and you shouldn’t have to pay to get it. It is the Free press anyway. Right?

Now Paying for something that you want or need is still reality-

Ya can’t get somethin’ for nuttin’, as they say

and in this world of ‘economization’ and down-sizing, what is wrong with smaller payments-  As far as paying for what you use or as you go- then a Micro-Payment for a different kind of subscription or service may not be a bad idea-

I guess my only beef is paying for hearing or reading about something that is public knowledge and is readily available from other outlets.

Hey-  what about micro-payments at restaurants-  A Micro-Payment based on the size of the serving you get-  If wallets ruled the waist line- maybe our bottom lines would be fatter at the end of the month.

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Sephone is proud to work with WABI TV-5 on their new site. Some of the improvements on the new site are increased usability, RSS feeds, and faster page loads.

See the new site for yourself at www.wabi.tv.

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Apparently, our customers told us that they had all ready made calls to the Fairpoint Customer Service number and got lost in a voice mail tree that eventually “the voice” told them that due to high call volumes they were unable to help them at that time.                    

Our small business customers they need their email.

Click here for the news story if you haven’t heard it reported yet.  Fairpoint has updated their website with some of the CORRECT information, but it you are a small business and you have email or contact forms you may still be having trouble.  We have identified our list and made changes, but if you have a different web developer or we may have missed your site in the process please go to this link and we will get on it right away.

The FAQ page for Fairpoint is right here. The reason I said “SOME” of the correct information, because our small businesses accounts have mail that come through their website server (where the site is hosted,) and go to their Fairpoint email account.  The information for the setting for the incoming mail server is not correct.

Your incoming mail server should read as follows:   mail.mywebsitedomainname.com.
The mywebsitedomainname.com is whatever your  .com website address is.

Fairpoint also didn’t use any screen shots on their sites for Outlook or Outlook Express.

Often I think a “picture is worth a thousand words.”

This is how your setting should look:

Outlook email users:

Here is a screen shot for Outlook Express:

Also don’t forget wherever it says “mydomain” or “domain”  that means your website address!

Please know that you can always call us and we are glad that you do - even when we are just bystanders like you, we are in this together!  Thanks  for thinking of us!

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But I use Internet Explorer 6

If you happen to be a user of ie6, you are not alone.  As of today, Sephone sees slightly less than 20% of web surfers using ie6.  We do recommend that you upgrade your browser to more modern one.  There are several good ones to download, install and use.  This is relatively easy to do and they are all free.

• Firefox
• Safari
• Internet Explorer 7

How do I know if I have ie6

Most operating systems and browsers have a menu item that tells you, try clicking Help than About.  On the right, you can see a screen shot of a help menu from Internet Explorer 6.  You can clearly see that it is Microsoft Internet Explorer and then the next line it says version 6.0.2800.1106.  You don’t have to worry about the .0.2800.1106 part, if it says 6. anything, you have ie6.

Why are people not supporting ie6

This version was released in 2001.  That is a long long time ago in web years, it’s very old.  As a web development shop, ie6 has been a source of numerous headaches and frustrations.  Web developers need to do extra work to make sure to works with these older browsers.  Internet Explorer 6 also lacks some of the features that are needed by the modern web developer such as PNG alpha channel, box model, standards compliance and XMLHttpRequest (XHR).

Does sephone support ie6

While we do recommend that you upgrade your browser, Sephone does offer limited ie6 support on some of our products and services.  We are slowly phasing out support though.  As we do more and more development we are supporting ie6 less and less.  The browsers we do support are firefox version 2 and up, Safari version 2 and up, Internet Explorer 7 and 8, and Google’s Chrome.

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More and more when you call companies you get hung up in voice mail someplace only to find if you DO get to a HUMAN, often it is not the HUMAN you were looking for.  When you send an email to a company you get an “auto response”  that reads “Thank you for…” again no HUMAN.

How does that make you feel?  Does it make you feel like anyone cares if you spend your hard earned money to do business with that particular company?

Or if you ARE getting a HUMAN, are THEY telling YOU what the rules are in order to do business with them?

Especially when I am “out of my element” and not in my area of expertise, I feel very uneasy without SOME sort of personal contact.  I like to know I can trust the person and the company I am dealing with. I also like to know that this HUMAN listens to what I need and I am not getting talked down to, because they are smarter than me.  They may be smarter than me, but I have the money, right?

With Sephone being located in Bangor, Maine, we have a clientele of what is categorized as small business.  Even though our market reaches nationally we still work with primarily small to medium-sized businesses. Many of our customers don’t have dedicated IT personnel and even those that do, these folks are stretched thin.  Our customers come to us for our expertise in web design, hosting questions or online applications that allow them to work more efficiently as well as to save money.

This is not a process that can be handled by a website with an “auto-responder”, a voice mail tree, or a form that you fill out that has fields determined by a faceless company that never has actually listened to learn which problems you are trying to solve and what priority they may be in.

We are just like you. HUMANS. And we don’t tell you how it is, we ask you what your goals are and together we work through a process to get there.  Sometimes being a bit on the “geeky” side we don’t always understand things the way you say them. Sometimes we have to ask questions again, we want to make sure we are all on the same page.

That is not to say we don’t use automation, obviously we are in the web business and we use the tools that we build as well as reach out to those services that we don’t build when that makes sense.

Blogging is a way that we try to leverage “community intelligence” to solve a problem, get answers or just plain learn.  And this is a way that the world is going when it comes to Customer Service.  The Sephone Blog (where you are now reading this), is to share information with you, when it is convenient for you to view it.  Have a question about an application, datAvenger or SPAM, you may find it here in the blog.  If you DON’T see it here, please let us know as we are always working to give you the tools you need, when you need them.  (For me I need them at 3am and I am trying to update something!)  Email me personally at kelly.cotaux@sephone.com

Blogging maybe something that may make sense for your company, Blogs are FREE to set up and are very easy to use, let us know if we can help you with one that can help you give more accessible customer service to your customers.  I have a couple I read often that talk about customer service and how to effectively use the tools that are being used.  I liked this one at first because it is called The Church of the Customer!  The amusing title grabbed my attention and the content of the blog keeps me coming back.  Another blogger I like is Guy Kawasaki, his blog title, “How to Change the World” also has some good reading. Here is a post on his views on blogging and Customer Service. I also have a blog called Techno-Trapped In My 40’s that focuses on dealing with today’s technology with a 46 year old brain!

Please never think for one minute that any of the tools that we use are instead of great HUMAN TO HUMAN customer service, or that we think we are smarter than you.  We are in this together.  Thank you for trusting  us, because this IS what we do to support you so you can concentrate on your core competency and together we can help you meet your goals.

If any of these online solutions frustrate you, pick up the phone and we will answer it.

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