Even those marketers with exceptional social-network-savvy can struggle to keep up with the latest developments in leading social media. Acquisitions, new features and new platforms are a daily occurrence, and it can be easy to get lost in the sea of updates in the social world. Similarly, it can also be easy to lose sight of which are actually of benefit to your business.
I recently posted about ShoreTel’s acquisition of M5 Networks (which is still getting tons of readership!), which may signal the strongest validation yet for cloud-based VoIP as an alternative to premises-based telephony systems.
The deal is good news for both companies, and even better news for the broader cloud communications space.
CANARIE is offering a DAIR to small- and medium-sized Canadian tech companies: the Digital Accelerator for Innovation and Research (DAIR) program aims to speed time to market by offering an advanced R&D environment for product design, prototyping, validation and demonstration.
In our experience, firms often engage in ad-hoc innovation as a result of crisis management, or in reaction to external influences and competition within their marketplace. These efforts tend to focus on implementing something quickly with the expectation that it will help avert disaster, or change the companies’ fortunes somehow. Its no wonder that managers and employees alike, often experience innovation initiatives as frustrating, distracting, and disappointing.
For me, one of the best Chapters in the book... Adam uses many examples of how SJ (Steve Jobs) drilled culture and acceptable behavior through the ranks at Apple and describes his fight against the bureaucracy that tends to cripple and slow organizations as they grow. SJ was fervent in his fight to maintain a start up type environment upon his return to Apple.
Just launched free website that helps small business better measure and manage tactical marketing programs. We are looking for beta testers for our new website called MarketingReportCard.com – a marketing measurement dashboard. Designed for small to mid-size businesses, companies can login to the beta version of the MarketingReportCard.com and document and measure tactical marketing results over time.
Deloitte Canada has been running this event for 11 years, and yesterday's
TMT Predictions 2012 in Toronto is the biggest one yet.
This morning [December 15, 2011] I attended a breakfast session hosted by
IT World Canada, and it was a good update on the state of the channel, especially for serving the SMB market.
Can a business that appears to be healthy acutally be dead? Why do we do the same things and expect different results?
By Christine Sheppard
November 23, 2011 6:15 AM
Categories:
Data centers SMB
Do you keep a close eye on your servers…and is it still necessary to do so? We’ve talked to a few businesses over the course of the summer that have experienced serious downtime, outages, information loss and irreparable damage due to this summer’s significant natural disasters.
If moving your organization's communications to digital seems a daunting task, learn from this case study of a successful migration.
Great start to Cisco's Collaboration Summit today here in Miami Beach. Having been to a few of these, it's really interesting to see how the overall messaging has evolved, along with all the new offerings that keep coming. I don't say that last point lightly, as Cisco is working very hard to address as many touch points as possible around how people get things done in the workplace. Sure, it all drives network usage, and that's good business for Cisco. There's a higher motive at play though, and there's little doubt that Cisco is trying to be a lead author in the next great American novel, Work 2.0.
By Christine Sheppard
November 4, 2011 6:00 AM
Categories:
SMB
Ask yourself this question:
“What can I do today, next month and next year that will change my business?”
If you run a small business, it is increasingly important to stay ‘ahead of the game’ instead of just being a player.
As an entrepreneur, start-up or small business owner, do you have questions that constantly keep you up at night? You know what I mean – issues, stressors, reoccurring business questions you just can’t shake! They sit in the back of your head all day, and then keep you up at night.
