by jbreazeale on January 27, 2009
I’ve worked for companies with various ranges of accessibility to “The Internet”, but my recent tenure in the uber-locked-down-enterprise-financial-services realm has been a real eye-opener. And if you’re working with people (customers, clients, or even friends/family) who are in the enterprise realm, here are a few things to consider:
1. Not everyone has webmail.
If you’re working with your client on a project for their organization, then by all means, use their business email. These centralized systems are often setup and maintained for a variety of regulatory purposes, so use them. For side projects or personal communication, stick to personal email addresses just realize that it may take longer to get a response.
One more thought on this… For all of you with a “contact us” form that generates an email from the user (as opposed to a fill-in form), not everyone can or is able to use work email systems for non-work purposes. So, when that blank email pops up, you may have just lost that customer. Better to give multiple options for contact, even if they eventually lead to the same place (contact form goes to jane@janedoe.com, or email to jane@janedoe.com).
2. Not everyone has Google.
<gasp>
Ok, I don’t actually know anyone who doesn’t have access to Google’s search functionality, but many people may not have access to Google’s services such as Gmail (see webmail note above), Gcal, Reader, etc. Keep this in mind when creating “shared” calendars or project files that involve enterprise workers. You may have the best “Church picnic planning list” in history, but if you’re sharing it on Google Docs, not everyone will be able to see it as quickly as they might have if you used a different service.
3. Not everyone has an RSS feed reader.
I know, there are lots of enterprise services out there – some you might even be able to install without going through tech support hell – but who wants to maintain two (or more) sets of readers? Google Reader for home, Attensa for work? Nah, too confusing and too time consuming to keep them in sync. This means that, for those of you who blog, add an email subscription option for your feed! It’s free and easy.
4. Not everyone has an easy way to share non-work info.
As far as I can tell, delicious.com still works behind the firewall and it’s a great option for maintaining your own bookmarks or sharing with other users who are actually using delicious.com. Twitter’s another great option for sharing with users who are actually using Twitter. Same with Digg, FriendFeed, Tumblr, etc. How are you enabling users to share your content? Can they email as well as using the common social services to share info?
Coming soon: Enterprise-friendly applications for those in lock-down
by jbreazeale on January 20, 2009
With the economy limping along and no bright shiny future right around the corner, more and more friends are starting to seriously look at starting their own business or at least add some gloss to their resume / portfolio. Since time and funds are tight and most of these friends have limited technical skills, I’ve put together a short overview of how to get a professional looking website up and running for very little time or money.
Get a domain
Ok, maybe I should have said “Get a memorable, meaningful name that is reasonably short and easy to spell. Oh, and .com is best unless you’re really are a .org.” If you really want or need help with a business name, try one of the professional naming services out there but be warned, quality and price vary widely so you might want to give it a try yourself first.
Once you have a few name ideas, Domize provides a great search tool to see if your requested name is available. Once you’ve found one that is available, then register it. I’ve had good experiences with 1and1.com (Disclosure: They’re my current registrar.), but GoDaddy.com is another popular choice.
Depending on your site, you may also want to setup subdomains (portfolio.janedoe.com, blog.janedoe.com, etc.) which can typically be done at no extra charge.
Cost: $7-10/yr. for domain registration
Setup Email
Once you’ve registered your domain, your host will have some sort of email option available for you. For domain packages only, you can typically set up multiple email addresses that you then forward to your “real” address (e.g. someone sending mail to jane@janedoe.com will be forwarded to your janedoe@gmail.com account.)
FYI, you can setup your Gmail account to reply from your business account which allows you to manage all of your email in one place — this is a good thing. Check out this article for more info on setting this up.
Cost: $0 for webmail
Setup your site
If you’re just getting started, I recommend using Wordpress.com for your site. (Yes, I know this is a Wordpress.com site. No, I have no other involvement with Wordpress.) It’s super simple to use, allows your visitors to subscribe to your updates (via RSS, but you can also add email subscriptions using Feedburner), is pretty easy to customize, and is free. You can also upload and display various media (photos, videos, etc.) with just a couple of clicks.
Cost: $0 for Wordpress.com
Redirect your Domain
Now that you have a domain and a website, you need to connect the dots so that your janedoe.com name actually points to your janedoe.com site. You can do this for free from your domain host by using a frame redirect which means that the address bar on the website will show your janedoe.com address and not the janedoe.wordpress.com address.
Provide Subscription Options
If you’re using a blog platform, your site will automatically generate an RSS feed. Using this standard feed is fine, but if you have a few extra minutes I’d recommend creating a Feedburner account. With Feedburner you can customize your RSS feed and create an email subscription option. Even if you’re not planning to run the site as a blog, per se, it’s nice to provide a regular push of information out to your subscribers instead of forcing them to come back to your site.
Cost: $0 for Feedburner.com
