Tech Tip: Inbox Zero

By Heath Miller, Google Apps Certified Sales & Deployment Specialist

Communication has always been important in both our personal and professional lives. This is because communication is not just about sending and receiving messages: communication is about building and maintaining relationships.

Many years ago, the cornerstones of communication in the business world was mail and memos. In fact, whole departments were devoted to ensure proper flow and delivery of these messages. Recipients had to have a method of filing for record keeping and of course respond to those messages.
As time has gone on, email has taken over as the primary communication method between co-workers, vendors, and clients, but we haven’t changed our method of managing those communications.



Have you ever looked at your inbox and have been anxious by how many messages needed some sort of action?

Have you ever found yourself looking at your folders that originally worked, but because of changes over time, no longer work perfectly and thought to yourself, “I need to re-organize these,” then just never find the time?

You are not alone. With email being an important part of our daily business, it has become necessary to have an efficient method of managing and processing those messages. Without an effective system, email bankruptcy ( aka email fatigue ) becomes a threat and important messages can be missed.

This is where I personally found Inbox Zero plus the tools of email powered by Google Apps to be extremely useful. Instead of having extensive and unwieldy folder trees that require time to maintain. Inbox Zero only needs a small handful of folders (labels).

Between the few folders (labels in Gmail) needed with Inbox Zero and the powerful search tools of Gmail, my inbox is always manageable and clean. I don’t know about you, but I like having a clean inbox.

I had a client not too long ago give Inbox Zero a try. He ran for about two weeks with inbox zero in one of his Google Accounts using the Gmail interface and used his old method of managing email in Outlook with another account. After the trial he informed me that he can no longer take using his old method. He continued by saying he would physically become ill every time he opened up Outlook and how happy he is now with Inbox Zero with Gmail.

So, I have to ask you, do you want to take the challenge and find a new method of managing your email?

Newmind vs. Google: Where should I purchase my Apps?

What's the Difference?

Clients sometimes ask us why they should buy or renew their licenses with Newmind instead of directly from Google? This table below illustrates the advantages of a relationship with Newmind as your Google Partner. You can think of Newmind as that layer of Customer Service for your Google Apps, so it’s kind of like getting two great companies for the price of one.

Where should I buy my Google Apps licenses?
	Google	Newmind
Google's innovative communication and collaboration tools	✓	✓
Allow Credit Card payments	✓	✓
Allow Check payments		✓
Quick and easy resolution to billing questions	maybe	every time
Email based ticket support*	✓	✓
Immediate human support*		✓
Able to escalate support requests		✓
Complimentary User Training Live Webinars		✓
Complimentary Office Hours Q&A Sessions		✓
App Integration Advice		✓
App Integration deployment, customization, and training		✓
Email Archiving and Security	✓	✓
Total Cost Per User	$50	$50

Billing
Google offers automated credit card payments only, whereas with Newmind you can pay and renew with credit card or check. Pay your bill the way your Accounting Department finds most comfortable.

Support
Answers to your questions can be found in forums from time to time, or you can send Google an email and wait. Working with Newmind as your Google Partner allows you to use our connections at Google and "escalate" support requests on your behalf. Newmind also offers enhanced phone support and end user helpdesk support for an additional fee.

Training
Google Apps is an amazing suite of applications that ease communication and collaboration. We adore it and that's why we became a Google Partner. There are two things that Google doesn't do though: Deployments and Training. Newmind offers a variety of training options, so you can choose what's best for your environment and budget: live webinars, on-site training, or eLearning videos and courseware. Even after the deployment is over and you're on your way to becoming an Apps Wizard in your own right, Newmind offers ongoing education for our customers through our training portal. 

Integration Advice
Wondering what Marketplace add-ons would be a good fit for your businesses' need? Just ask. Newmind is happy to provide advice and guidance regarding which additional applications integrate best with Google Apps. We'll also customize, deploy, and train your staff on these applications for an additional fee. 

Google Security and Archiving
You can go to Google directly for security and archiving, but there's a hearty minimum to that order to the tune of $1500. Newmind can offer that same service for organizations with as few as 5 users. 

Office365: Baby I'm Leaving You

Consider what would happen to your business if your ability to email disappeared for a month.

One company who contacted Newmind recently was faced with that exact scenario. Their email was inoperable for an entire month, decimating their main means of communication with their clients and potential clients. We’ve seen companies come to us for different reasons, from a lot of different solutions, but this one really stood out. That solution? Office365.

Stern Estate isn’t a company that exists on computers, it exists in one-on-one relationships with the people they are helping, and their email system is simply a necessary tool they use to get the job done. 



“Stern is a pretty small company.” says Joe Shields. “My mother-in-law, the owner, as well as the four other employees, aren’t particularly tech savvy. Their strengths lie in helping their clients. In fact, they’d probably say they are more comfortable with a pen and paper than a mouse and keyboard. I can get around a computer decently enough so I’ve ended up as the de facto tech go-to guy for the business.”

For a long time, Stern had been using an online Exchange solution (Microsoft Business Productivity Online Standard Suite, or BPOS)  and were pleased with their choice. In fact, the only time they would even think about the system that supported them was when they’d forget their password and need it reset. It worked for them. They were fine with their system, that is, until the service they were using became Office365, and they were forced to migrate. 


“When Microsoft moved us to Office365 the problems started immediately.” Joe explains. “We couldn’t get it to work on our Macs, in particular, and even our PC users had issues accessing their emails.” Like any rational person, Joe’s first step was to call customer service. “Dealing with the Office365 customer service department was, frankly, laughable. Every time we called we were given a different case number, so each phone call required us to explain and re-explain our issue with each case never properly tracked.” says Joe. Microsoft was nice enough to copy Stern Estate on internal emails discussing the case. Nice, right? Sure, except that the emails they were being copied on were private discussions between Microsoft employees, scolding each other on not handling the Stern case properly. They were unwittingly cc’ing Stern, detailing their own errors!




“After a month of back and forth with the Office365 customer service, we were finally able to figure out that the reason we were having trouble accessing our email was because, apparently, while they could confirm payment of the licenses with billing, they were unable to verify those same licenses in our account, ” Joe continues. “I was relieved to have finally found the issue but at the same time I was pretty frustrated because we had lost a month’s worth of email. Sterns’ revenue was heavily impacted simply because Microsoft couldn’t effectively communicate our purchase of Office365 licenses to the necessary people. We weren’t even new customers. We had a history with them of always paying our bills on time before they made us switch from a hosted Exchange to Office365.”

“Well we finally knew what the issue was, but they still couldn’t get their ducks in a row and we still couldn’t get our emails flowing. We were looking at $80,000 in lost business with no resolution in sight. That was it for me. We contacted Newmind Group and one of their engineers, Steve, got us started on the switch to Google Apps for Business.” says Joe. “The first thing Steve and I had to do was to get Stern Estate’s email backlog out of Office365 and migrated into Google Apps, but we even had problems with the Office365 people there. They basically threw up roadblocks and wouldn’t allow us access to our own data while they ‘tried’ to get it working,” Joe explains. 

In desperation, Joe emailed Bill Gates.

Joe acknowledges that his email likely never made it to Bill Gates, so it may just be a coincidence, but after that email, Microsoft seemed to get their act together a bit. “I finally started to see movement. Steve and I stayed persistent and the Office365 people finally allowed us access to our information,” Joe says.

“I’m relieved and happy to say that after all that, Steve and I were able to get all the Stern employees up and running in Google Apps and finally able to access their email again. And since our migration to Apps, the service has been seamless. Furthermore,” Joe concludes, “we are very happy with the technical skill and experience that Steve and Newmind provided us. Steve made coming out of a very difficult situation much less painful. He explained things clearly and concisely, without any talking down to our less technical staff members.”

Stern Estate contacted Microsoft again, after their exit from Office365, to try and negotiate a reimbursement for the month of lost business that they suffered during the time that 365 was inaccessible. Microsoft was kind enough to offer them a little something for their trouble. Apparently that little something would have roughly covered a round of lattes for the staff. 


Emails from Microsoft are still coming to Joe too. They’re very eager to work out the licensing issue and think they’re thiiiiiiiis close to figuring it out.

Smooth Operator

When you’re in the business of helping people, which we are, customer feedback is everything. Sometimes it’s word of mouth, sometimes it’s online reviews, and sometimes, more rarely, it’s directly into our inbox.

This email was received regarding our newest addition to the team, Nicolas. Nick has impressed us since he started here, but it is great to know that he’s impressing the experts as well:

>>> LETTER TO MANAGEMENT - FEEDBACK FROM 1ST-TIME CALLER

To whom it may concern,

I don't do this often, but I feel I should forward a commendation on the performance of one of your front-line customer reps, namely Nicolas Yarosz.

My issue was "passed off" by the Google support team, and I was instructed to call your firm, thus I expected, well, not the best. I was surprised.

Nicolas was courteously proactive, wading through my decades-wandering IT babble, and providing me with sound, balanced advice. I'd made it clear that the services I required were for a start-up company, but Nicolas treated me as if I was calling from a Big Account. That was cool. I'd called 15 minutes to closing time, but Nicolas didn't hurry, offering me concrete solutions and answering my resultant questions. His presentation of your company's services was flawless.

My creds: I've been training phone reps since 1988, then hitting the tech support floors in 1996 at CompuServe, where I co-wrote the book on Quality Customer Service. I've managed at MS, and my UCLA degree is in Psychology, specialization in Human-computer Interaction (Usability). Therefore, I do know what I'm saying, when I say: hold on to Nicolas. I see in him a teacher; a person who can explain important nuances of the trade to his coworkers, despite the fact that his experience at this point is "under construction." (That never stopped me.)

In conclusion, I'm very pleased with the first-line treatment I received from your company, thanks to Nicolas. Even if I decide to go with your solutions only at a later date, I will certainly recommend calling your firm, to any of my clients, immediately.

Kudos to all of you.

Chromebooks :: Gen 2 is Here

Like a little brother taking his driver’s exam, Chromebooks are coming of age. When they made their debut last year, there were some naysayers who questioned the usability of a device that merged the OS and thebrowser, but as more and more people have moved their lives to the cloud, the viability of the Chromebook seemed more inevitable.

Schools in particular have been enamored with the ease of fleet management, quick start up, and long battery life of the Chromebook. Corporations have taken notice too of how Chromebooks can be a remedy for a lot of what ails them and cure some of their hardware headaches.

Early adoption can be hard when the innovation is untested in the real world. If you were waiting for some of the Chromebooks kinks to get worked out before you jumped in, mark... set... go...


Google and Samsung paired up again and just released the second generation of Chromebooks. These new devices bear a striking resemblance to their predecessor, but with a nice processor upgrade and 4GB memory upgrade that for you translates into speed. Faster browsing, faster start up, and faster response times.

What else should you expect?

• better scaling and multi window support
• app launcher bar with ability to pin apps
• support to view more file formats
• Google Drive support
• Google Docs offline support coming soon!
• new media player
• built in photo editor and uploader

In addition to the new Chromebook device, Google and Samsung are also unveiling the Chromebox. The Chromebox is a small and portable pc that can connect to any keyboard, mouse, or monitor. It boasts Bluetooth, 6 USB 2.0 ports, HDMI & DVI output, and 4GB Ram among other goodies.

There are also some changes afoot regarding the pricing structure for the admin panel that will be a nice boon to organizations who manage fleets of Chromebooks.

With all of these announcements and press releases hitting the tech news and blogs, Newmind is ready for your inevitable questions. Click here and let us know what’s on your mind.

Maybe I Drive, Maybe You Walk

I admit since Google announced the Drive I haven’t been able get R.E.M.'s Drive out of my head, but I don’t mind too much because it’s a great song and I haven’t listened to it in far too long.  Feel free to hum as you read on.

Remember diskettes?

They were coaster sized and coaster shaped, and you likely had a special container to hold all of these plastic and metal nuggets of data storage.

They were standard features in office landscapes until they gave way to the Flash Drive. Now there was a slick method of moving your info from point A to point B. If you lost the little guy though, you could always go back to the tried and true method of emailing yourself a file. Oh wait. You still email yourself files?

Enter Google Drive

If you’ve used Google Docs before you’re already halfway there. Essentially, Google Drive is what Google Docs was, but now you can put anything in there. Word documents, pdf, jpg, eps, wav, psd, indd, ttf, csv, you get the idea. You can put anything you want to in your Drive then have it with you wherever you log in to your Gmail account whether you’re at home, the office, the park, or the grocery store. 


Intimidated at the thought of uploading all your info to Drive? Google thought of that too. You download and install the Drive App, and voila! All of your Drive files are located on your local computer. After that, you just move files onto your local Drive, then leave them to sync to the cloud on their own. The cloud Drive and the local Drive are always in sync so all your stuff is just there whenever you need it, wherever you need it.

The exciting part about Drive too is that Google doesn’t want you to just be able to store your files on the cloud, they want you to be able to edit your files on the cloud! How cool is it to be able to walk into a coffee shop, order up a large salted caramel mocha (yum!), then fire up your massive AutoCAD file and start editing it on the cloud. The same goes for image editing. With a single (free!) Chrome Web Store add on, you can clone, heal, blur, and adjust the levels of your psd files. I’m not even kidding.

What does this mean if you’re on Google Apps?

Drive can be the glue that ties Google Apps together. Yes, GMail is great, and what would you do without Calendar? Even Sites and Blogger are powerful tools, but Drive creates a foundation that gives those other tools a whole new level of functionality. Collaborate on and share any of your files, not just Docs files. Even search through your files using Google’s powerful search algorithms and Drive’s character recognition.

Apps users will love the way Drive integrates with their workflow. I know I do. I can attach photos and images from Drive to posts in Google+ and into Docs that I’m creating. They’re saying that soon we’ll be able to attach directly into Gmail from Drive too.

Drive has the same infrastructure as the other Google Apps services you already use, meaning it has the same management tools, security, uptime guarantee, data replication, and 24/7 support. 

How do you get more storage?

The short answer here is to contact Newmind Group. Drive is still very new, and depending on your organization’s new feature roll out preferences it might be hard to find all of the settings on your own. Directions for doing this yourself are out there, but with redesigns of the control panel underway right now, you might be setting yourself up for a little frustration.

Google starts each Apps user off with 5GB of storage for free and administrators can purchase and manage more storage for the team (Google Docs don’t count against the storage quota). That would be enough for 1000 songs, some hi-res scans of your baby pictures, your resume and work samples, and your archive of college term papers. If you want to upgrade for some more room to breathe, you can add 20GB for $4/per month up to the monster storage solution 16TB.

If your Apps account uses online monthly billing, you can activate Google Drive storage licenses on a flexible plan, meaning that you only get charged for the licenses that are actively assigned to users. 

If your account uses the annual billing, you buy a set number of Drive storage licences for the year and assign or reassign that storage as you like throughout the year. The rub with the annual plan is that all of the storage licenses you purchase, even one purchased months after the initial purchase, will expire on the same date as the original subscription, and all purchases are non-refundable, so it's important to know your users and their habits before you buy storage for them. 

There will undoubtedly be things coming down the pipe fast and furious from the Drive Team (and I suggest download links a la Dropbox), but fresh out of the gate it's a pretty big game changer when used in conjunction with Apps for Business. 

What about the diskettes? I think I saw on Instructables on how to make a tote out of them. Emailing yourself files? Get the Drive. 

Newmind Named Among Top 100 Cloud Service Providers

Newmind Group now ranks among the world’s top 100 cloud service providers (CSPs), according to Nine Lives Media’s second-annual Talkin’ Cloud 100 report. The companies featured in the top 100 CSPs generated more than $2.3 billion in combined cloud services revenues in 2011. This number is up nearly 46 percent from 2010 according to the Talkin’ Cloud report.

The Talkin’ Cloud 100 report recognizes top cloud service providers based on such metrics as annual cloud services revenue growth (both in actual dollars and in percentage growth rates).

Companies reflected in the Talkin’ Cloud 100 report include:

• Cloud service providers -- companies that offer IaaS, PaaS and/or SaaS
• Cloud aggregators -- companies that offer online marketplaces for sourcing cloud applications, platforms and/or infrastructure
• Cloud brokers -- companies that recommend a range of cloud applications for customers
• Cloud integrators -- companies that link multiple cloud services into a customer solution
• VARs (value-added resellers) with cloud services expertise
• MSPs (managed service providers) with cloud services expertise

“Newmind Group is passionate about cloud computing, and using cloud services to make life easier for our customers,” said Sara Brylowski, Marketing Manager for Newmind Group. “What really gets us going is looking at all of the great successes our customers have had with Google Apps and seeing how the tools that we’ve been able help them find and use have improved their businesses. To get recognized for doing this by Talkin’ Cloud is icing on the cake.”

The Talkin’ Cloud 100 report is based on data from Talkin’ Cloud’s online survey, conducted January through April 2012.