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A word from a Hero

December 5, 2011

Jon Ferrara, the CEO of Nimble, may not know that he is one of my corporate heroes. (Hi, Jon!)

This morning Jon sent out the message that Nimble partners have been waiting to see. Here is what Jon said.
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As we approach the one-year anniversary of releasing our Nimble beta, I would like to take this opportunity to thank you for supporting our company. I am humbled that more than 15,000 users have signed up over the last nine months with thousands spending almost four hours a day managing their social relationships and growing their businesses with Nimble. I knew it was going to be an enormous challenge when we set out to create a new paradigm for CRM in 2010. We wanted to enable businesses to manage Relationships & Social Engagement in a simple and elegant way. I am excited to tell you that we are weeks away from being “core vision complete” and will be releasing a major new version of Nimble in January 2012 that we are testing with select users today.
As you know, Nimble has been free during our testing phase. We wanted to wait until Nimble was something worth paying for…something truely helpful in growing a business. I am proud to say that Nimble is now ready to help you Turn Your Social Communities into Customers for Life. With our upcoming new product launch this January, we will start charging for Nimble. A free single-user version of Nimble for basic Social Relationship Management will still be available. For business users who utilize Nimble as a team and need more professional functionality, we will be charging $15 per user per month. As a special thank you to everyone who has been a Nimble user prior to enacting this change, I would like to extend a 90-day free period on their Business accounts applicable once we intiate charging. More details on pricing here.

It would be wonderful if we could offer Nimble for free for everyone forever; however, I know you can understand that to continue to grow and meet the needs of our users, and to continue providing super cool new technologies, it is necessary to monetize our platform. Speaking of super cool new technology, please join me for a webinar this week to see the new Nimble features planned for our January 2012 release.

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Jon Ferrara

“Bring Your Own Computer to Work” Day

November 23, 2011

Recently Karen Goulart, Features writer for SearchCIO-Midmarket, wrote an interesting article called “Forget flex spending, Millennials want a flexible mobile device policy.” Based in large part on an annual study by Cisco Systems , her article raised some interesting and alarming (to traditional IT managers at least) viewpoints.

Basically, Goulart talked about the Millennial Generation of computer users who bring their own computing devices to work and who are not at all afraid to sidestep a mobile device policy in their quest to use them. First as a helpdesk operator and later as a systems manager, I realized that some years back, such a scenario would have been met with comments like “We did not authorize the use of that device and we do not support it” and “Sorry, it’s not standard within the company…if you have a problem with it, go elsewhere to get technical support.”

That was then. This is now.

Nevertheless, other than IT managers fearing loss of control of hardware they could be expected to support, there are some potential downsides to bringing your own computer to work. Some legacy applications may still be hardware-sensitive and not friendly to your own computing platform. Also, not every application used by companies today are “in The Cloud, ” where many, if not most Millennials have no clue as to exactly where their apps and/or data exist. Apps and data in “the Cloud” may in fact not be on a server in the USA. Does it make a difference? Perhaps and perhaps not. In any case, IT managers who may not be in the Millennial generation do have a lot to think about and communicate with those who bring their own technology to work.

Word for the Day: Fail Whale

While we all know the Fail Whale from Twitter, it appears that there is an interesting history behind the word. Read and enjoy!

We are Moving on…a new Look and Feel

October 3, 2011

Effective now, you will find this blog at http://blog.pequodsystems.com. We believe this change will make us easier to find. We also decided to give ourselves a new look. We also changed so that our friends using mobile devices such as an iPad can read this blog while you are on the road. Over the next month or so, you will also see some changes at our website. Our vision, values and mission will remain the same. Our products and services are evolving. We are still enthusiastic Nimble partners. As always, you will find us on FaceBook, in LinkedIn, Twitter and even in Google+ .

THIS AND THAT

Word for the Day: (An oldie but goodie) Mashup.
Music, Slang . a recording that combines vocal and instrumental tracks from two or more recordings. a piece of recorded or live music in which a producer or DJ blends together two or more tracks, often of contrasting genres .
…a hybrid website that collates and displays information taken from various other online sources …

Not to be confused with enabling Nimble to talk with your Google Apps.
Cheers!

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Squish those BUGS!

September 20, 2011

I hate bugs. I especially despise stink bugs. They stink if you squish them. They fly into my Honda and crawl up the inside of my windshield just as I am sitting in rush hour traffic. They land in my lemonade.There seems to have been very little federal effort to control them or get them out of our lives. Evidently they do not do enough damage to crops and animals to warrant serious investment in their control.
On the other hand, there are software bugs—the kind that show up when you aren’t looking and irritate you just when you are on a deadline and muttering four-letter words under your breath. The team at Nimble has been squishing software bugs, much to my delight.

The bug-squish report in the latest Nimble Partner Newletter was a delight to read. Several Nimble bugs that had crept into the earlier beta versions and evidently not quite put under control have now been squished. All this activity is thanks to an active Nimble communitysubmitting support tickets and some hard-working programmers. The open Nimble community conversation with beta testers, current users and Nimble staff keeps everyone aware of what changes are needed and why. Recent squished bugs related to Twitter, the Auto-Suggestion Box , the Activities Tab and the Deals tab. I am glad to be part of that community.

Good News
You can Add Users to your Nimble account. Here are the Directions.
Better News
Now you can register for Nimble directly at our Nimble partner website.
Best News
The single user version is free and will remain free. The multi-user version is currently free but in the near future, the cost will be about $10/user/month in a team account. Join the community dedicated to and enjoying the benefits of the bug-squishers now bringing more new features and benefits to Nimble.
Got good news? Comment here by replying to this blog.

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We can do It!

September 3, 2011 — 3 Comments

This blog was going to be about teamwork. And it still is. But today’s blog is about something I have never written publicly about and decided to do so anyhow.
It’s about breast cancer. It’s about a growing army of people who, out of the goodness of their spirit, are part of a superb team doing things for me that I never would have imagined friends would do. And yes, I do have a small stage one breast cancer.

On September 8, I will have a small breast cancer removed. A sample of the cancer will be analyzed, using the Oncotype DX Breast Cancer Assay. The outcome of this assay will be a recommendation for a course of action based on my genetic makeup—-not a course of action based on the statistics of thousands of people who are not necessarily like me.

And now for my team. First, there is a higher power to whom I give the worries and cares that may, for the time being, seem bigger than I can handle. Next there is my husband, who has been and will be with me on every step of this journey. There is the woman I met through Toastmasters who will meet me at my door at five in the morning to take me to the hospital. There is yet another friend who will accompany my husband to the hospital when I am done with the outpatient surgery and completely unable to drive. There is my cousin who sent me a pink pen with a personal note I will treasure forever. The team keeps growing, and I am truly blessed by every member’s contribution. With their help, we can beat this cancer. We can do it!

For all the women in your life, encourage self-checks and regular mammograms. Support cancer research. Speak out.

Google’s Rel = Author…where is the Return On Investment?

August 15, 2011

: Susan Ellsworth

For anyone other than a professional webmaster, Google’s current “Rel=Author” implementation in G+ profiles for increasing trustworthy content has a long way to go before those of us in small business will find it easy to implement. And I am wondering exactly where is the return on investment for the time and sweat it now takes to make it work reliably.

Setting up a Google+ account is actually quite straightforward. So is pointing the G+ profile directly to my website and to the URL for this blog. Pointing this blog in the direction of my G+ profile, however, was not so much. The introductory Matt Cutts/Othar Hansson video on authorship did not match my thee-hour effort to discover the appropriate way to point this blog in the direction of my G+ profile. Google’s online helpdesk documentation specific to WordPress, the Content Management System for this blog, told me why the video had tripped ever so lightly over commenting on its implementation by saying that the implementation is still “in the early days.” Make that “still in Beta.”

At the end of the day, I found myself ponding on two questions. First, where is the return on investment for small business website owners to spend time and effort in this way? If I don’t go through all this effort, will searches on terms on my website suddenly go into the toilet insofar as Google is concerned?

Second, I thought about the matter of trustworthiness as a whole. Frankly, in business dealings, I trust people more than I worry about website rankings. I thought about Jon Ferrera, the Nimble CEO. I have not met him in person, and yet I trust him as a person. Why is that? I have spent time on the phone with him and with his staff. What they say is what they do. My business partner knew him in his early GoldMine days, and I have watched as GoldMine partner after partner has come on board—including some who originally had hooted down the idea of integrating GoldMine with social networking, let alone turning it into a Social Business Platform. Jon has over 20 years of experience in Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and Sales Force Automation (SFA). An entrepreneur at heart, Jon founded GoldMine CRM in 1989 with a college friend and turned it into a very successful venture that he eventually sold to FrontRange. In 2009, Jon founded Nimble LLC, and by February 2010, we were on board. We’re not looking back any time soon. See us at our Nimble site.

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“What can I Contribute” beats “What’s In It for Me” Every Day

July 29, 2011 — 2 Comments

I belong to an organization of about 260,000 members called Toastmasters International. Its core values include “integrity, dedication to excellence, service to the member, and respect for the individual. ” One demonstration of service to members—the High Performance Leadership project—gives experienced members an opportunity to identify an opportunity to serve any community, and to choose and lead a team to carry out the service leadership mission.

Enter Attila Nemes, a member of the Beltsville Agricultural Research Center Toastmasters club. Because the club attracts a high number of members whose native language is not English, many discover they are not even able to pronounce each other’s names correctly. Some, out of frustration, change the name they were born with to an American-looking and American-sounding name. Hungarian-born Ph.D. Nemes has assembled a team with a daunting task: to help members of the club learn to say each other’s names in a comfortable, no-akward-moments way. In a group that includes members from the Indian subcontinent, from Europe and from the Far East, it will be a challenge. As a professional, he will receive no compensation for leading the project team. He could have chosen a project far more related to his field of expertise. He chose to contribute to a cause far different. One that has potential not only for about 35 people, but also for a far wider group. The project is on its way.

What will be your contribution to make the world around you just a little bit better?

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To Skype and FaceBook Together…or Not

July 8, 2011

Recently I discovered a solid business reason for using Skype. A company from BanglaDesh and my company are collaborating on a project together, and Skype is a convenient, economical way we can stay in touch. As a FaceBook user, I was fascinated to see on my Skype page an option to “Connect your Facebook account to message your friends from Skype and see their News Feed.” And of course, the “Learn More” link only said “Enjoy the magic of video calls when you and your friends are logged in to Facebook. “

As a partner in a systems integration company, I love it when apps come together and play nicely with each other. However, just yesterday I had extolled the benefits of LinkNotify. I had proclaimed that LinkNotify is a fast read, that it sends me an eMail three times a week with current links posted by friends and/or organizations I had “LIKED.” As an example, I pointed out that Nimble had posted a FaceBook link to the the July 6 LA Times piece “Facebook details Skype-powered video calling, group chats” and how I had received a report on July 7 from LinkNotify. I had immediately returned to FaceBook to see a comment about starting a group to enable chatting. Earlier in the day, a friend from the Philippines had posted a link to the FaceBook announcement, so that made me twice as interested. A 10-second scan of the LinkNotify report had just saved me a 30-minute check of links posted by all my FaceBook friends. It all looked like so much FUN!

However, I had also said that I had killed off all my time-wasting FaceBook games and apps. Considering that LinkNotify is a business-oriented app that allows me to skim through the links my FaceBook friends have posted without my being slowed down by the posts about what they’re eating or watching on TV, I asked myself the obvious question: Would SKYPE also do that for me? Not that I could see. So for now, unless my Nimble buddies can show me a good reason to the contrary, I think I’ll pass on the Skype-FaceBook integration opportunity.

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The Second Most-feared Experience (after Giving a Speech in Public)

June 16, 2011

As many of our readers know, I belong to a world-wide organization which appeals to those who would prefer having a root canal to giving a speech in public. Recent dialog with a fellow Toastmaster in technical support from New Zealand—and personal experience— leads me to believe that even today there are those who would rather have a root canal than try out a new computer application.

Why is that true?

Many people who entered the workforce in the 1960′s and 1970′s and were forced to use computers they did not understand. Not only did they not receive one on one training but they self-taught themselves the bare minimum keystrokes needed to perform only the functions required to do the job they were hired to do. Supervisors punished employees for exploring alternative ways to learn how to use computers. Technical support staff who were far more interested in shiny new toys than they were in answering the same technical question several times over contributed to growing computer-fearing and computer-hating employees.

There is a fix for this problem—and it has to come from an enlightened technical support community that receives as much praise for learning end-user mentoring as a tool as it does for passing technical exams. Stop reinforcing the geek stereotype that regards users as “stupid people.” They are simply people who don’t push the buttons in just the right order, even though they haven’t been told what that order is. They are afraid of having to admit they don’t instantly know the answer.

Interestingly enough, the Toastmasters International organization is full of people who enjoy mentoring others. I myself benefitted greatly by being mentored in technical services by a Toastmaster who happened to be in technical services. And as my friend from New Zealand said recently, “Simply show they can do it, that they can enjoy doing it – and that if they break it they can get help without judgement. The last is crucial and often needs the personal touch (which way too many in IT are AFRAID to give) – but it is the key to building their confidence. Often you are dealing with adults who are “technical children” – and mentoring is NEVER doing your children’s homework for them, right? But you DO celebrate their successes.”

Watching 24 x 7 x 365

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Who are your FaceBook Friends?

June 1, 2011

Writing in All Things D on May 31, Liz Gannes wondered about friending in FaceBook. Among her worries were that

“One of Facebook’s most fundamental flaws is its notion of friending. Relationships on Facebook don’t naturally expire as they do in the real world. To unfriend is drastic, used only in the direst of circumstances–like a bad breakup.

And the fact that people from so many parts of our lives are on Facebook elicits bland communication. You often don’t really know who you’re talking to, so you stop talking.”

That may be over-stating the case for “”while Facebook might be the hottest game in town, it’s still a pretty warped and inaccurate picture of what it means to have friends. “

Consider in-person contacts you make, whether pursuing business contacts or building relationships in small groups of large International organizations. Or even connecting in interfaith activities. Now consider what attending a large family picnic such as a reunion is like. In each instance, there will be people you meet and greet as people you have known for a very long time. In each instance, you will have a different relationship with each person you talk with—or avoid. In each instance, there will be people to whom you say “We have simply got to stop not meeting like this.” And then you keep on not meeting them in person, for one reason or another. Or there will be people you actually do connect with for a while—and then perhaps ignore until, for one reason or another, they come to your attention again.

It’s not that we deliberately deceive anyone. It’s that life happens, and without mechanical prompting (such as with a scheduler) we all pay attention to different acquaintances at different times and for different reasons. With schedulers, we remind ourselves to contact the people who we need to contact.

Her comment that “Relationships on Facebook don’t naturally expire as they do in the real world. To unfriend is drastic, used only in the direst of circumstances–like a bad breakup” misses a reality. It is not necessary to unfriend anyone you discover is not really all that interesting for any reason—business or personal. Simply not connecting with them right now gives one the option of re-connecting later on in a friendly way.

Liz, it’s all about our own goals and needs in the big city. The environment is different but the human behaviors are pretty much the same.

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