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This is our general purpose blog. If you are looking for Mike Landman's blog (he's our Founder), is it here.

Tips for a Bad Economy, Part Two: Print Less

-This is the second in an series of articles to help companies make the most of a bad economy, by Homer Bartlett. Part One is here.

Printing has several associated costs. There's the cost of the consumables (paper and toner), the cost of the printer itself, and the cost of disposing of waste paper, which is even higher if you use a secure shredding service. So reducing your printing can save you money.

• Enable duplex printing as the default setting on all your printers that can print duplex.
• Consider using printers with a high per-page cost for only special projects for which you need the high quality and can justify the high cost. Turn them off otherwise, to prevent people accidentally printing to them.
• View PDFs in Adobe Reader on screen instead of printing them.
• Stop printing those emails. Archive them to CD or DVD instead.
• If you synchronize your calendar with your smartphone, stop printing directions and instead put the directions in a calendar item, which you can then view in your car.
• Replace your fax machine with an eFax number to reduce the waste associated with those spam faxes, from more paper in the recycle bin to a couple extra mouse clicks on the Delete button.
• Instead of arriving to your meeting with a stack of printed agendas, send your meeting agenda to the other participants via email, giving them the option of printing it themselves.

AIM Marketing is a top Woman Owned Business

Our client AIM Marketing Solutions was named to the Top 100 Woman Owned Businesses in Georgia list by DiversityBusiness.com.

http://www.aimmarketingsolutions.com/blog/?p=286

Congratulations Kristi and everyone at AIM!

Tips for a Bad Economy, Part One: Use Systems That Scale

-This is the first in an series of articles to help companies make the most of a bad economy, by Homer Bartlett

For most companies, payroll is the single biggest cost of doing business. If you do find yourself in the unfortunate position of having to reduce payroll, you'll see larger cost savings if the software and services that support those employees also scale. For instance, you can reduce the number of hosted email mailboxes you pay for every month, but if you own an internal email server you have already spent the money on that server and its software licenses and you can't reduce its cost now that you don't need as much of its capacity. When your business grows, if it becomes less costly to internalize these services, they often have no contracts, and therefore no barriers to exit.

Examples of IT systems that scale easily:

• Hosted Microsoft Exchange is typically billed per mailbox per month. Make sure retired employees' mailboxes are archived and deleted to keep monthly costs low.
• Hosted SharePoint is typically billed by storage space. Start small and only spend more if you need the space.
• Hosted chat (GoogleTalk, AIM, etc.) is often free. Don't spend money on an internal chat server unless you need the extra security or customizability.
• Salesforce and other web-delivered software-as-a-service like Google Apps for Business is often billed per user per year. Review your renewal closely and buy the minimum you need, you can add more as you go.
• Adobe PDF Online offers unlimited PDF creation from most major file formats for about $10/user/month.
• If you aren't using all those minutes, see if you can downgrade your mobile phone service plan to one that costs less but still delivers all the minutes and features you need.
• If it's time to renew your ISP contract, do you need as much bandwidth as you did when you signed the contract? Can you switch to another provider, or combine telephone and data bandwidth and save? Most ISPs will happily upgrade you later for free, so start with what you know you need rather than what you think you might need later.
• If you are using our hosted Exchange service and the integrated Blackberry Enterprise Service (BES), switching to an ActiveSync-enabled phone (including the iPhone) will save you $10/month in BES fees (ActiveSync service is free).

Email Marketing

-by Homer Bartlett

If you do (or want to do) email marketing, there is no better service than MailChimp. The system itself is smarter than all the others on the market, and the value you get from reading their blog is ten times what you'll pay for the service.

Why are you still on this page? Go make yourself smarter!

Standardizing on Mac?

-by Homer Bartlett

File this under "just wacky enough to maybe make sense." A client with both Mac and Windows laptops asked if it made sense to standardize on Apple laptops for all roles, including roles that required Windows and Windows applications. Now that the Mac platform is Intel-based one can easily load the Windows OS instead of the OEM Mac OS, and there was a time when an Apple laptop was considered the fastest XP laptop available.

The concept has some obvious appeal. With everyone at the company on the same hardware, swapping laptops around when people leave and new people arrive becomes simpler. Interchanging parts is certainly easier (you're limited to RAM and hard drive unless you're Apple certified). And Apple consistently gets top marks in customer service polls.

Unfortunately this standardization comes at a cost. Well several costs actually.

Apple Laptops are More Expensive

This is a debate that never dies, so let me clarify. I think Mac computers are a better value for home users than Windows computers, primarily because of the top quality OS and applications that are bundled in. iPhoto, iMovie, iTunes, and all the extra user-friendly stuff Apple packs into their computers make them a tremendous value, and you would be hard pressed to find applications of similar quality at any price in the Windows world. Unfortunately the minute you decide to run Windows you now have an Apple laptop running Windows, not a Mac laptop, and you've thrown much of that value away.

So for businesses, where most of those iLife applications aren't used, here's a quick comparison:

• Apple MacBook Pro: 2.5GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 4GB RAM, 250GB hard drive, 1-year warranty: ~$2,700
• Dell XPS M1530: 2.5GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 4GB RAM, 250GB hard drive, 3-year warranty: ~$2,000

It costs another $349 to extend the warranty on the Apple to 3 years to ensure it's under warranty for as long as you plan on using it. That means you're looking at a thousand dollar penalty just on the initial cost of the computer.

OEM Costs Less Than Retail

If you want to run Windows on your Apple laptop, you have to buy Windows, since it doesn't come on the computer. Windows XP Pro or Vista Business will set you back about $300 retail. When you buy that Dell laptop you're getting the OS at OEM pricing, which is often less than half the retail price. Apple isn't part of the Windows OEM community, and is unlikely to join it any time soon.

You'll also find OEM deals on Microsoft Office and other productivity applications when you're building a customized Dell laptop, deals you won't get when you have to buy retail licenses for those applications for your Apple Windows laptop.

Value Versus Cost

In the end we didn't talk the client out of the idea. If the benefits of a standardized hardware platform had been sufficient to justify the $1k+ penalty on each laptop they would have done it. But the benefits didn't add up, and they talked themselves out of it. They still buy Mac laptops for roles that work best on Macs, and they buy Windows laptops for other roles, and we had a fun little exercise.

What Does the New iPhone Mean for Small Business?

-by Homer Bartlett

In case you were in a cave for the last week, let me be the first to tell you that the new iPhone has launched. I'm not a gadget fan, nor an early adopter, so why do I care enough to write about it? Sure, it finally runs on the 3G network, and it costs less, but the feature that makes it relevant to small business is ActiveSync. ActiveSync is the Microsoft technology, licensed by Apple, that enables the new iPhone (and old iPhone running the new software) to synchronize your Exchange contacts and calendar in addition to your email.

A very large percentage of small (and not so small) businesses use Microsoft Exchange as their email platform. If you use our hosted Exchange service, you can have ActiveSync for free, Blackberry Enterprise service for $9.95/mailbox/month, and GoodLink for $19.95/mailbox/month. If you have your own internal Exchange server, ActiveSync is free, Blackberry Enterprise is several thousand dollars, and GoodLink is…er…well…nobody can really tell you how much, not even Good (now owned by Motorola), because the licensing is so complicated even the guy who dreamed it up can't decipher it.

How does this all play out? Some folks have suspected all along that the iPhone's superior user interface and Internet integration was the future of smartphones, but resisted taking the plunge because they depend on the functionality they get from their GoodLink phone or Blackberry (or maybe even some other ActiveSync phone). Now they can take the plunge, and maybe even save some money in the process. For companies to whom we might have previously proposed a Blackberry Enterprise Server, we might instead propose Blackberry Professional, because we know that many of their current Blackberry users are going to make the switch to iPhones as soon as we give them the green light.

GREEN LIGHT

Full disclosure: I own some Apple stock. If it triples in value it might be enough for one year of college for one of my kids. However I would not hesitate to tell you that Xserves are expensive compared to an equivalent Dell server, and not right for most of our clients, and an iPhone might not be the right smartphone for you.

Vista Drop Dead Date

-by Homer Bartlett

Most of our clients, at our suggestion, have been avoiding upgrading to Windows Vista. Not because we think it's awful (we don't), but because we were waiting for the first big service pack to reduce the number of bugs they would have to deal with, and to give software vendors time to get their software Vista-compatible. Now that Service Pack 1 has been released, we will suggest that some of them start making the transition. Some, however, will be unable to upgrade to Vista until certain business-critical applications are upgraded for Vista compatibility.

If you run an application that hasn't yet been certified Vista-compatible, you are facing a dilemna: any new or replacement computers you need will have to be purchased by June 30, 2008. After that date you will no longer be able to get computers with XP pre-installed (or even XP CDs in the box so you can downgrade it yourself).

Even some fairly broad-market software companies, like Intuit (makers of QuickBooks), only claim Vista compatibility for some of their products. If you're replacing computers on a regular cycle (you are replacing them every 3-4 years, right?), you'll want to plan your computer replacement timing with how long you expect it will take for your business-critical applications to become Vista compatible. For instance, if you expect an upgrade to your company's CRM software in May 2009, but between now and then 10 computers are due for replacement, you can either postpone their replacement and purchase new computers running Vista after upgrading the CRM software, or replace them early (before June 2008) so you can get XP.

And, though it's rarely possible to predict with any level of confidence, you may want to consider company growth too. Think you could add 3 employees in the second half of this year? You might want to go ahead and replace 3 existing computers early, and save them for potential new employees later in the year.

If you're a Ripple client, talk to your PCIO (that's me (homer@rippleit.com), or Brian Poust (brian@rippleit.com) or Steve Du (steve@rippleit.com)) about your options. Don't let Vista's drop dead date sneak up on you!

Update June 13, 2008: Microsoft has relented, a little. They are allowing OEMs to continue shipping computers with certain flavors of XP preinstalled. For Dell that means XP Home will no longer be an option, but there are Vista Business and Vista Ultimate BONUS options. The BONUS means XP Pro is preinstalled and a Vista license is included for a future upgrade (if you wish). If your business relies on software that isn't Vista compatible, you can take down the metal umbrellas now, the sky isn't falling after all.

Discounting Computers

-by Homer Bartlett

"Can you find us something cheaper?" I hear that a lot from clients when I send them a quote for a  workstation or laptop for one of their employees.

Well sure. Of course we can. But is that really the place to focus efforts on cost saving? I don't think so, and here's why.

Amortization
We recommend folks replace their workstations and servers every 3 years, and I have never once had a client tell me they like to replace them more often than that. So over the course of this computer's life, the "extra" $120 for the faster processor and more RAM is going to cost a little over $3/month, call it four bucks if you are paying interest on a lease. Four bucks a month for things to run faster, smoother, more reliable. Four bucks a month to reduce the "I hate this computer, it sucks" emails from your employees.

Perspective
For most folks, their computer is their single most important tool for conducting their business. A decent  desktop computer for a small business costs about $1,250, not including software. That's about $35/month. If the office cleaning service (hundreds of dollars per month) doesn't show up one week, your clients will probably never know. If your coffee service's trucks all broke down and you didn't get coffee for two weeks, your employees would be a little sleepy but the job would still get done. Heck, some companies could lose multiple employees (thousands of dollars per month in salaries) and they would actually get more work done.

But if your computer is slow, or unreliable, or breaks on day 366 to remind you that you chose to save $100 by going with the one-year warranty, nothing else matters, because you can't work. If you can't work, you can't get paid. Why would you want anything other than the very best computer money can buy?

Peace of Mind and Happiness
It's not a perfect correlation, but for most things in life, if you're willing to pay extra you generally get better stuff. Better design, better reliability, better performance, all of those things come at a price. Computers are no different. If you're willing to spend the money for faster processors, more RAM, better graphics cards, and a good warranty, your employees are going to have a better computing experience, which is to say a better working experience.

Instead of telling you how much their computer sucks, as an excuse for not getting things done, or snapping at you when you ask if they can take on another task, they'll be more productive, and with a smile on their face (no guarantee expressed or implied, your mileage may vary, happiness in theoretical scenarios may not match real world happiness, etc.).

Final Thoughts
You know those ads you see for $500 computers that are perfect for your small business? They aren't. They have processors that are about to be discontinued, as little RAM as possible, small hard drives, an operating system designed for home use, and one year warranties. Even if they work decently out of the box, they will fall down as soon as you start loading software on them, or after a couple of months of software updates. In a year, long before your accountant would like to replace it, you will be looking for a replacement again because it's so slow, or it's crashing every 3 hours.

Take the time to analyze the options, and spend the money necessary to get good tools. Your business depends on it!

Taxes: Section 179 Changes

-by Mike Landman

Congress has just passed The Economic Stimulus Act of 2008, which includes some significant tax breaks. Highlights of the legislation include:

• Increased section 179 expense amount – Under current law, most small businesses can elect to immediately expense up to $128,000 each year of the cost of furniture and equipment purchased for use in the business. This amount is phased out if the amount of furniture and equipment purchased during the year exceeds $510,000. The Economic Stimulus Act increases the amount that can be expensed in 2008 to $250,000, and increases the phase-out threshold to $800,000 of purchases.

• Bonus first-year depreciation – For most new depreciable assets (other than buildings) placed in service during 2008, the Economic Stimulus Act will permit 50% of the cost to be expensed immediately, with the balance recovered under the regular depreciation rules. This special first-year deduction applies both for regular tax and alternative minimum tax. For autos and light trucks, for which first-year depreciation would otherwise be limited under the so-called “luxury automobile rules”, a deduction of $8,000 may be taken.

What does this mean for you as a small business person? Most of you will get more benefit from the bonus first year depreciation than from the Section 179 limit expansion. Most small businesses were already spending well with the Section 179 limits every year anyway. But any reduction in taxes is worth celebrating, right?

More information here: http://taxes.about.com/b/2008/01/25/details-of-bushs-economic-stimulus-and-tax-rebate-plan.htm

Hello World

Inaugural post of the Ripple blog.