Business Email - Step 2: Hosting Email.

We recently published our Business Email series to help you with your business email management strategy. As each post is posted up, we will dive deeper into each chapter to discover a better business management strategy.

So far we have discussed on which email to choose from; in-house or outsourced email. If you have decided to go for the outsourced email route it doesn't stop there, because not all outsourced emails are the same. After deciding to outsource your business email, the next step, is to find out which type of hosting you need. There is consumer and business email. Both determines the requirements or maturity of your business.

A small business might be okay with the limitations and risks of free email, provided by Google or Outlook. Ideally you want a plan that can grow with your business as your needs will change according to the performance of your business. Having to migrate data comes with all the little issues when it comes to migration, and this wastes a lot of time.

Comparing the EVERWORKS Business Email Hosting Package against Google's Email Hosting Package might bring this argument further to light. (Click the image for a larger preview)

Consider hosting your email professionally to save you future hassle, and save you time.

Tell us what you think:

1. Is Business Email Hosting necessary?
2. What is your experience with Google Email Hosting?

Follow us through our feed to follow our future updates through email and more.

Danbo photographed by Jenny - vmabney from Flickr | Resourced from Rackspace

Read More

Business Email - Step 1: Which Email?

Last month we concluded on a series on how to Build Your Startup Internet and Mobile Business to help you with starting up really quick and easy. 

When considering Business Email, the first thing you need to consider is where to run it on-premise or hosted. When making your decision you should consider 3 major, broad factors, as we move through this Business Email Guide.



Here are the 3 things to consider:

Value: Is what you pay for worth every penny you spend?
With non-revenue generating applications like email required by almost all, businesses sink in large amounts of money, while gaining no business advantage on having an email that works. Although, the Business Email, can be used as a channel to stay in touch with leads that could lead to a generation of revenue, and having email that works helps that; email is after all only just a channel for communication. However, businesses risk their reputation with their customers when their email doesn't work. Should you consider to host internally or to whisk off everything to a dedicated email provider, is a tough decision to make.

Most businesses are unaware of the heavy costs of email-specifc IT Assets could incur them. A wrong security patch, could leave them vulnerable and eventually cost thousands to rectify. Everything else that follows owning, and maintaining a server is also put into play; space, cooling, electricity, technicians, software, etc.

Support: Is help readily available when you need them most?
"Oh No! There is an outrage going on, the email server is down! Just what is wrong with it? Can't it just stay up for us to stay in touch. Just when I need to send out that important email."

Do you face this issue often? Can you afford to lose time troubleshooting or have an online response waiting to solve any problem that you may encounter? Of course this assumes that you have picked a package with a responsive support! Determining the level of support you require is how much in-house expertise is available and the amount of control you require for your business email.

Features: What does your email need to do for you?
Consider all the nitty-gritty things that users complain about, against the required heavy capital investment remedy. Should you be investing a large budget and long hours, or offload to an email provider that is already ready to service everything you need at a fraction of what you would have invested into initially?

Business Email, can be complicated; but consider these 3 broad factors and take it into account. Consider every possible scenario before coming to a decision.

For better assistance consider seeking help from our ever ready reliable support. (read more on our "No Fuss. 6 Hour Response.")

Tell us what you think:

1. Are Business Emails a headache?
2. Should Businesses consider emails an asset or a liability?

Follow us through our feed to follow our future updates through email and more.

Servers designed by Ken Hawkins from The Noun Project | Resourced from Rackspace

Read More

Build Your Startup Internet and Mobile Hosting Business: Step 3

Previously I have written on how easy it is to startup your own Internet and mobile hosting business.

Oh, and yes, this is a series on Building Your Startup Internet and Mobile Hosting Business. There are 3 steps to the whole process. Well, 3 steps keeps things nice and compact and easy to follow.

This is the final of the three (3) steps on how to easily startup your own Internet and mobile hosting business.

Yes I have a plan, now I will get to doing it tomorrow.

You know what you need to do. You know why you need to do it. You even know what steps you must take to get it done. But there’s one small problem: you can’t seem to get moving. Big problem, but it actually isn't one.

The final step.

Work on your project rather than saying you will. Get down to things, start doing work now; rather than later.

The measure of productivity and good returns is the ability for you to start something and to get it up and running immediately.

Contact EVERWORKS. Ask the support team all the questions you need answers to, and get down to starting your business.

Some tips to help with procrastination:

1. Make sure you really want to do it
2. Keep things simple
3. Make it the first priority of your day
4. Just get started
5. Tell yourself you are just going to work on it for 10 minutes

Ask anything, unsure of how long it will take, how much work is required, how much it costs, what are the plans, who will help when help is needed most?

Asking is important, because if you don't ask no one can answer any of your questions. 

With that, this ends the series on how to startup your own internet and mobile hosting business easily.

Somethings to ponder on:

1. Tell us what you want to read in future?
2. Was this short series helpful?

Subscribe to our feed for future series like this.

Read More

Your Data Is Your Data.

Can Internet Companies be forced by Government to disclose data that is stored by its customers?
Recently there has been a lot of concern on the NSA Prism program where government has been secretly obtaining data from companies; an undisclosed program, now made known to the public. "NSA Prism program taps in to user data of Apple, Google and others" - The Guardian UK

The National Security Agency has obtained direct access to the systems of Google, Facebook, Apple and other US internet giants, according to a top secret document obtained by the Guardian.

The NSA access is part of a previously undisclosed program called Prism, which allows officials to collect material including search history, the content of emails, file transfers and live chats, the document says.

It is EVERWORKS's policy that it will not access, transfer, or deliver EVERWORKS's customers in response to any government authorities other than pursuant to a properly issued, lawful request from appropriate law enforcement officials or other order from a competent body from the country in which the servers are physically located.

EVERWORKS has not participated in any data mining or collection of customer data located within its hosted environments.

Read more on EVERWORKS's Terms & Policies.

What are your thoughts on:

1. How to maintain digital privacy?
2. What other policies should be implemented to keep privacy?

Follow us through our feed for more reads.

 Security photographed by bulldog1 | PRISM Information & Picture: The Guardian UK Online

Read More

Build Your Startup Internet and Mobile Hosting Business: Step 2

Previously I have written on how easy it is to startup your own Internet and mobile hosting business.

Exciting news isn't it? Stopping there wouldn't have done you much justice. In this post I will tell you just how to do it, and what you can possibly achieve with this easy startup option!

Oh, and yes, this is a series on Building Your Startup Internet and Mobile Hosting Business. There are 3 steps to the whole process. Well, 3 steps keeps things nice and compact and easy to follow. So stay tuned for the final chapter of this series, the "third step".

Is the Mobile and Internet Space worth it?

May 2012: Mobile & Social Gaming, Internet Consulting, Internet Publishing and Broadcasting E-Commerce are some of the 11 Best Business Opportunities according to Inc.

Big news surrounds this big boom, but is the mobile industry just another "dot com" bubble or is it going to last a good century? Technology as it seems, is moving towards a more mobile, organic form whereby designers and engineers in the current age are building for the future and going back to the roots of ideology where technology was meant to be an aid to everyday work, rather than an obstruction.

Considering the current trend is really staggering, so why don't we take advantage of the booming trend in technology and immediately assimilate into it with little or no heavy initial commitments.

From the previous understanding of how to startup your own Internet and mobile hosting business easily, there are a few steps that you could perform much in advance to prepare yourself for an immediate performable action. In other words, prepare a simple action-step; simple, quick, and effective.

Start with:

1. Market Identification: All you need to do is identify the market you wish to penetrate, with the wide array of already available infrastructure provided by EVERWORKS. What helps is to; identify the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats that could potentially come against you, and have a good strong core that your customers can relate to. Generally people believe in your beliefs and ideas, because ultimately all products sold are relatively the same. 
2. Also, having a solid plan that covers the action-step for the next 3 years helps to keep the direction clear during times of trouble.

Behind every won war, there is a great tactician. Plotting your action-plan is vital to making sure your business succeeds. Even though the easy solution has been given, but if your idea or inspiration does not take direction, and have a clear path, nothing gets translated properly into effective actions.

Consider those two suggestions, with a valid professional business advisor, before making any critical decisions. Don't just take my word for it.

Stay tuned for more. In the mean time let us know what you think:

1. Is the mobile and Internet hosting business something for the future?
2. Are there any other advice you would like to share to better prepare a Startup?

Please subscribe for future posts.

Read More

The New Facebook #hashtag Feature

The Facebook #hashtag, the buzz that is on the Internet, causing excitement in some parts, and drawing a lot of concerns as well. There have been a lot of speculation surrounding this topic, and much of it just speculation. I can't give you a definite answer for most things as well, but here is a little overview on what to potentially expect in future.

"Between 88 and 100 million Americans log into Facebook every night during prime time TV hours, which represents a significant opportunity for broadcasters, advertisers, and our other partners," Justin Osofsky director, platform partnerships and operations at Facebook, said in a blog post on Wednesday. (Follow more of this report here)

Twitter's use of the #hashtag:

The #symbol, called a hashtag, is used to mark keywords or topics in a Tweet. It was created organically by Twitter users as a way to categorize messages

Using hashtags to categorize Tweets by keyword:

1. Twitter users use the hashtag symbol # before a relevant keyword or phrase (with no spaces) in their Tweet to categorize those Tweets and show up more easily in Twitter searches.
2. Hashtagged words that become very popular are often Trending Topics
3. and much more

Example: in a tweet @everworks_my uses the hashtag #iGoSMS. 

Using hashtags correctly on Twitter:

1. Don't #spam #with #hashtags.
2. Use hashtags that are relevant to its topic.

Facebook's use of the #hashtag:

Facebook's use of the #hashtag is similar to Twitter's adaptation of it, where keywords or topics created after the symbol # (with no spaces) will categorize that message.

Privacy: A Facebook spokesperson commented saying that from a privacy perspective, "hashtags will work similarly to graph search," which has left us in the dark, on whether #hashtags will promote a greater sense of openness. Big questions are being drawn on the privacy of the new Facebook #hashtag feature, but a lot has yet to be known, privacy is after all important to everyone.

Let us know what you think:

1. Will you use the new Facebook #hashtag?
2. Is privacy important to you?
3. Are Facebook #hashtags going to affect advertising ability?

Sourced image ViralBlog | Twitter Hashtag Reference

Read More

Maxis Introducing Error Code of 415

Recently, we got an email from Maxis about the introduction of Error Code 415. Maxis is upgrading their API documentation about this new feature, so that we can reconfigure our Premium SMS Gateway accordingly while detected this error code.

Basically, this error code is to inform EVERWORKS SMS Gateway to take the necessary action when receiving this error message while pushing the MT to Maxis SMS Gateway.

Below are the explanation from Maxis about this error code of 415:

Code	Description
415	The subscriber subscription service has been temporarily blocked due to renewal reminder not receive by subscriber (e.g. may due to the subscriber being out of network coverage area, subscriber.s mobile device being switched-off, etc.).

As our platform will trigger periodical renewal reminders to the subscribers, there will be scenario where some subscribers do not receive the renewal reminders at their mobile devices (e.g. may due to the subscriber being out of network coverage area, subscriber.s mobile device being switched-off, etc.). In this scenario, Content Provider will receive Error Code 415 when attempt to trigger renewal/ content charge to this subscriber.

Action Plan by EVERWORKS
In this situation, all Content Provider of EVERWORKS should not do multiple retries of charging MTs to the subscribers, once receiving Error Code 415 from the SMS gateway. In the following renewal cycle, the renewal reminder will trigger accordingly by Maxis and your subscribers will receive the chargeable content upon successful renewal reminder delivery to the subscriber's device.

Maxis has sent us the latest API documentation with this implementation, and EVERWORKS will revise our SMS gateway in order to compliance on this new feature by Maxis, as well as to update our current API documentations. We will keep our Content Provider update once the revised API is ready. For more information  please contact our Messaging Team at sms@everworks.com

Read More