The Business Web - How We Use the Web for Business » Business Software

Watch Business Technology at VendorDemo.com

X-Man — Mon, 28 Jan 2008 23:59:46 +0000

This is a new site my companyÂ recently launched. It’s meant to connect technology buyers with technology vendors. Technology vendors can post their product demos, webinars, brochures, and more for free. Check it out.

Â http://www.vendordemo.com

What we need for our growing business (what you should consider too)

X-Man — Tue, 20 Mar 2007 19:42:08 +0000

I thought this post might be useful to some of the small business owners out there who might not be necessarily be up to date on the latest office automation technology. My goal is to find essential business software/services (whether it’sÂ software or Saas) and try to find the best deals possible without sacrificing too much on feature and functionality. I’ll start with a list of what I feel every small business office needs and feel free to comment on my selections. I will summarize each and then provide a link to a more expanded post. This list, not ordered by importance, is work in progress so I will be expanding this over time.

CRM Software – I think in this day and age having a CRM system is important. This is the system where you will keep track of all your business contacts, deals, activities, sales, and other so called “front office” information.
Project Management – I run a company with a distributed workforce all over the US as well as overseas. Having a project management solution that is easy to use and one that people will actually use is hard to find. I think this is a no brainer as this is the only way to track activities.
Email Marketing – We rely quite heavily on email marketing to our prospects and customers. Not having a good solution here can be deadly to your business.
Online Collaboration / Desktop Sharing – This is the tool that helps you share your desktop with others. For example, this is useful if you are going thru your finances with your accountant and need to quickly share what’s on your screen.
Online Backup – This is a service that backs up all your important files to a server accessible on the Internet. I had a couple of hard drives fail and I think a back up service provide is most likely more reliable than any hard drive (raid or not) can provide.
Office Productivity Suit – This is synonymous to Microsoft Office. However, unless you need the more advanced features that Microsoft Office offers. There certainly are less expensive alternatives.
Anti-Virus Software – It’s critical that you protect your computer systems. Again, free Anti-virus software is available for this job.
PDF Writer/Converter – These days, everyone needs to output their word doc or xls spreadsheet to PDF. Fortunately, there are many free tools out there that will do this.

We will discuss these areas in the weeks as phobulous comes up for air and I have more time to evaluate our options for each.

Not Microsoft Word 2007 compatible?

X-Man — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 00:53:27 +0000

I am sure that some of the companies out there are running the new Windows Vista. Since those computers have changed into the new OS, most likely they’ve upgrade their Microsoft Word from 2003 version to the 2007 version. If you haven’t tried the new version yet, it is pretty much the same thing but more dressed up. They’ve added tabs for different functionality that you might use so they are bundle with different toolbars on the top, other then that, I don’t see a huge difference. One of the things right now also is that a lot of the companies have not upgraded to MS Word 2007. For some companies that needed to communicate with others that are already upgraded can cause a problem.

The new MS Word document is now saved in a different extension then the previous versions; it is now saved as “.docx” instead of “.doc”. The old version has a problem in reading these documents and claim that it cannot be read. I’ve found that after a bit of research that all you need to do is just keep your Micrsoft Office up-to-date. There is a compatibility pack that you have to install from the official Microsoft website in order for you to read the new format. When I was looking all of this up, I’ve realize there are some websites out there that are charging people to change the “.docx” format to “.doc”. If you can update your Office with the compatibility pack, why do you need to use those other websites? I’ll never know for sure why…

Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 Standard Edition – Free from Microsoft

X-Man — Thu, 15 Mar 2007 01:33:07 +0000

I am not sure when this expires but you can receive a FREE copy of Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 Standard Edition just by attending 2 webcasts and submitting an evaluation form. Here is the link at Microsoft.com.

Do you reallly need Microsoft Office?

X-Man — Fri, 09 Mar 2007 23:08:26 +0000

Microsoft Office is probably the most widely used business productivity software. However, it’s relatively expensive and for most people they use probably less than 10% of the feature. Here are a few alternatives for those looking for a cheaper solution.

OpenOffice.orgÂ (FREE)
Google AppsÂ (FREE)

I recommend any small business take a look at these as alternatives to purchase Microsoft Office. In our office, we did purchase a couple copies of Microsoft Office but we also use both OpenOffice.org and Google apps.

Is Microsoft Office still the standard?

James L — Fri, 09 Mar 2007 21:57:36 +0000

So you all know that we got new computers last month from the last post.Â So I did not know this the week prior and when I got into the office, I find that the new computers did not have Microsoft Office on it, but everything I do is on Excel spreadsheet.Â The problem here was that for some reason, I cannot locate the Microsoft Office key.Â So since everything I do is on spreadsheet, I tried out the Google Docs & SpreadsheetsÂ (FREE of course from Google).Â The first reaction to it was that it seem very simple.Â There isn’t 500 buttons on the top, or the paperclip that pops up to remind you of certain things.Â It was just clean and simple.Â Â Since I don’t haveÂ MS Office at the time,Â I had to make due with what I had.Â To my surprised, it was actually really easy to use for all of my basic needs.Â I think this is a great tool to have while your on the go or you don’t have access to a spreadsheet reader.Â The best thing of all is that all you need is a google account and it all comes free.Â What don’t they make?

Free Anti-Virus Software? It’s Great.

James L — Fri, 09 Mar 2007 21:57:15 +0000

There are a lot of emails and websites out there that is just waiting for people to click on them so they can get their virus out to infect either business or personal computer.Â In these days, a retail version of a virus protector are pretty expensive and the thing with them is that they don’t actually protect you from new viruses, they just prevent what has already been out.Â So what I don’t get is that why pay such a high price for such virus protector/scanner when you can get one for free.Â If you actually look around on google for free virus protector, you’ll eventually come across a program call AVG.Â

AVG has almost everything you need from a regular virus protector for your everyday need.Â It has an email scanner that you can set up, it automatically updates on a regular basis, and of course, you can set a regular schedule to scan your computer for viruses.Â I too went into the phase when I thought, that maybe Norton and McAfee would do a better job.Â I tried Norton awhile back and it ate all my system resources like crazy.Â Everytime I tried to run some applications, everything would slow down by like 3 folds.Â Not everybody has a great computer and while you are working especially, they don’t see a reason why you need to have something top of the line since you are only running MS Office all day doing word processing.Â But since I’ve had AVG, I’ve set the timer to scan in the morning around midnight so it can run however long it does and by the time I get to work, everything is all done.Â AVG doesn’t take a lot of resources and really, do I need the other extra features that the expensive software gives you vs something that you can get for free.Â Yeah, I thought not.

Â Free AVG Anti-virus Software

Need Create PDF Documents? Download the Free Tool from CutePDF.

X-Man — Fri, 09 Mar 2007 20:14:17 +0000

Download the Free PDF Writer from CutePDF. You can create PDF documents from most applications.

Unless you need the features to directly edit PDF files, this is a great tool that you gotta have for your business.

Remote access to your computer… for FREE!

James L — Wed, 07 Mar 2007 19:04:16 +0000

So last month, my boss got a few new computers at work and decided that we should use one as a back-up server.Â There was a problem though because he goes on business trips often and find himself unable to access some of his files at work.Â So he found this online solution call LogMeInÂ which lets you remotely access your computers.Â People would think that it would be hard to configure your computer to do such a thing but LogMeIn is really easy to use.Â You simply sign up, installed their software on your computer and thats all there is to it.Â There isn’t really any configuration that you need to go through, only just signing into your computer.Â You can also add multiple computers onto one account.Â I find myself adding this sort of thing onto my personal PC since it is free and I can log myself on from any computer.Â The only bad thing about this program is that it requires you to have your computer on(of course) and lag issues if you’re not running on a DSL/Cable line.

Free Credit Card Processing? Is this true?

X-Man — Wed, 07 Mar 2007 18:58:11 +0000

Are you tired of pay 2 to 3% to your credit card processing company or even Paypal? Try Google Checkout. During 2007, you can process all your credit card transactions for free. I am sure there is some limit as to the amount so people can’t go crazy on it. After 2007, you can still process credit card transactions for free if you advertise on Google. The way it works is if you spend $1 on Google Advertising, you get to process $10 for free. Paying a fee to process credit card transactions is now officially in the history book!!! Well, only if Google doesn’t change this in the future.