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Well today is the day. The official Launch of SBS and EBS 2008. This rings in the new era of Microsoft’s bundled OS. It has come a long way since SBS 4.0/4.5, when things really didn’t work very well. SBS 2000 was a big improvement, and SBS 2003 was one of the best product platforms Microsoft has done. Now with SBS 2008 we look forward to seeing if Microsoft has managed to raise the bar again.
With any business the better you know your tools, the better you will be at your business. Lets face it, you get the most out of your tools and you will stretch your profit. We are committed to training and today I’m off to Dallas to get some training and to learn more about one of the tools we use.
The tool I’m learning about this week is our monitoring tool. We also use this tool for our patch management and it has a ton of features that I don’t think we have been making the most of. I hope starting next week we will use the tool even more.
What does this mean to you? Well what tools do you use? Do you get the most out of them? Do you provide any kind of training for your tools? If your tool could save you an extra 15mins a day, would it be worth it?
You should also think about tools you are missing. We have a client that every month had to put together this report for a large contract they had. It took one of the managers 1 week to do this report (mixed in with his other duties). He had to export out of his LOB, cut and paste into Excel add more data until he got it done.
We came in and wrote a small program that does it all for him. Now he takes the same export from his LOB, loads it into our app, and in about 5 secs he has his report. Something that was taking hours to do, and a week to put together, now takes only a few minutes start to finish.
So think about your tools and if you could be using them better or are you missing a tool that could really save you some time and money. Meanwhile, I’ll just enjoy the view.
I know, It’s a little early to be talking about Christmas. Don’t worry, I’m a firm believer that you shouldn’t start doing Christmas stuff until after Halloween. That being said, we couldn’t wait to act on this. Zanacore’s staff stacked up all their old computers and computer parts. This tower of well… Towers, was donated to Barry Whatley.
Each year Barry goes around gathering computers and getting as many as he can up and running to give to children in the foster care system. He turns the computers over to Defacts who in turns gives them to select children each year for Christmas. Seeing how Barry needs time to try and repair these, We couldn’t wait until after Halloween to give them to him.
The great thing was the “Tower of Towers” was only part of what we were able to give him. What you don’t see is the stack of Hard drives, CD Roms, DVD burners, etc that we also gave to him. Barry was taken back by the Great Tower and will have to make a second trip just to get it all.
Barry was able to stay and take part in our Friday’s staff training. This week we had an overview of SBS 2008.
IHS is a computer company located in Columbus GA. Today they came up to our office to take a look at how we do things. They were very interested in how we structure our contracts, what services we include and how we sell it.
You see, there is a big shift going on in the computer service industry. Most people call this “MSP”, Managed Service Provider, but we try and stay away from that term. Basically the shift is from a break-fix business model to a recurring monthly fee.
The problem is everyone is doing it differently. The whole idea of “Monitoring your network” and “Proactive Support” is becoming the key selling points. At Zanacore we have done things a little different. We sell support. The Monitoring and Proactive stuff just helps us to do a better job.
It was great being able to mentor to another computer company. I have been very excited to see how far Zanacore has come in such a little time and the best parts is still to come!
If you are ever in Columbus and need computer service be sure to check them out!
Each year Microsoft host an online summit for small businesses. They go over things like Sales, Marketing, and how to grow your company. This is not an IT conference. It is for any and all small companies. This year Zanacore has partnered with Microsoft to deliver the content straight from our website. The summit will be October 14-16. Each and every day they will have guest speakers and you can even call in or email questions. Also after the event you can watch the speakers on demand from the Summit’s Website.
Zanacore attended the 7th annual “Music on Main”. The highlight of the event had to be the “Heads and Tails” competition. Our own Mike Markos went round and round until there was only two people left. With only one round left, the pressure was building. The winner walks away with a 42” Flat Screen TV.
And the winner was….
Mike!
It was a great event and I think everyone had a great time.
For more info:
Yesterday was the Atlanta SBS Group meeting. It was also the Microsoft SBS 2008 Tour stop in Atlanta. During the event Zanacore staff helped out with serving pizza and making sure there was enough drinks for everyone.
Zanacore was also called out. During the event Rick (Leader of the SBS Group) called out Jack and asked him to host an upcoming ATLSBS meeting. Specify he wanted us to talk about Virtualization and share what we have learned with the rest of the Atlanta SBS community.
When a community leader calls you out, how can you say no? We told him we would be glad to and we are scheduled to give the presentation on November’s Meeting.
It’s an honor to know that you have done something good using Microsoft technology. The fact that others around us see how much we have done with Virtualization, to the point they have asked us to teach our peers is a great honor.
This event will be held at our offices instead of the normally location. Because of that I would like to invite all our customers to attend. If you want to know what all the hype about virtualization is, How to use it in your office, or why you should even care. Feel free to stop by and learn with the rest of us.
The good people over at Dream House put together a great evening each year. The 7th annual “Music on Main” will be held this year on Sept. 12th. Zanacore is proud to be a sponsor and looks forward to a great night of music and fun.
Dream House is a children’s charity teaching families and communities how to help kids with complex health conditions thrive at home instead of being institutionalized for life.
To learn more about Dream House be sure to visit their website:
http://www.dreamhouseforkids.org/
Zanacore has volunteered to help out the Atlanta SBS group. Microsoft wasn’t planning on coming to Atlanta, but after being talked into it, Atlanta has one of the high pre-registered counts of all the stops on the tour!
So what do you do when you are expecting a big turn out to an event? Well you ask for help, and Zanacore responded! Our complete staff has volunteered to help with event and look forward to meeting some of the programmers of the SBS 2008 product.
The SBS 2008 tour will be in Atlanta at the Microsoft office on Sept. 9th.
