Microsoft Financing

When I first heard about Microsoft Financing about 6 months ago, I thought it was only for Microsoft Software. But last night at Karl's event, he spent some time discussing this financing and also about how to integrate this in with HaaS (Hardware as a Service) model. You can use this not only for the software, but also for hardware and IT services. I do believe that there is a $3000 minimum.

From what I have been told, there is not much of a credit check and that once submitted, the IT company will have their money within 72 hours. This is something that I am going to pursue heavily with my clients instead of using a third party leasing company.

Microsoft Response Point

I had not seen Microsoft's new product, Response Point, prior to today when Jeff Smith of the Microsoft's Response Point team gave a demo. I was very impressed with how easy it is to setup and administer. This product is intended for small companies (less than 50 users).

Currently, there are only three companies that will be manufacturing equipment that uses Response Point: D-Link, Quanta, and Uniden.

One of the neat little features is that you can integrate the reporting from the Response Point to your SBS Servers Server Performance Report.

SMB Nation - Keynote

Eric Ligman (Senior Manager Community Engagement) and Arnie Mondloch (Director Marketing and Relationship Engines) are giving the Keynote address today.

Microsofts new awareness campaign... http://www.wevegottaguy.com

Useful links from the keynote:

www.dandh.com/sbsc
partner.microsoft.com/us/40026351?msp_id=sbscsecure
www.smbspecialist.com

SMB Nation Pre - Karl's Perfect Project Every Time

I attended Karl's Pre-Conference event yesterday and it was above and beyond what I expected. Karl brings simplicity to project management. He breaks down complex tasks down to their simplest tasks and has created forms to use to track the projects from beginning to end.

The main issue that I have with this is how to track a lot of projects using this system. If you have twenty project binders, how do you know where you are at on each project without having to open up each binder?

I will be spending some time reading his book "The Super-Good Project Planner for Technical Consultants" and incorporating much of what he does into what I do on a daily basis.

AutoTask Pro

Autotask is coming out with an entry level PSA solution for 1-3 users called Autotask Go! their current product has been renamed to Autotask Pro.

Autotask Go is designed for start-up and smaller solution providers and will have the same features of the Pro version but only cost $99/month with no start-up fees.

There will be a number of features that will be added to the next release (due October 9th) but the one that I am most looking forward to is are the new quoting features. I only hope they make it easier for the everyday user to generate quotes. According to the press release the new quoting features include:

Improved Quoting Capabilities for Recurring Services and MSPs. Autotask users can now generate comprehensive quotes for recurring services, managed services, and software as a service (SaaS) offerings. Users can easily quote separate monthly unit prices per device (like price per firewall, server or desktop), quote a price per user or quote a fixed price based on a complex service bundle. In addition, the new quoting update allows electronic quotes to be sent and reviewed online and then updated in real time as changes are made.

One of the features that I would love to have is the ability to save a quote as a template so that I can pull it back up and use that template for another client.

The other feature that is fundamentally necessary is the ability to export quotes so that you can import that information into your billing software. Why you are unable to run reports or export based upon individual quotes is beyond me.

These are two issues that I will be bring up with Autotask here at SMB Nation.

SMB Nation 2207

SMB Nation 2007 is finally here! I flew in yesterday with Rick and Greg and spent some time in downtown Seattle before heading to the hotel. I will be heading to Karl's Pre-Conference event here in a couple of hours.

I will be posting a lot more over the next few days and will also be reviewing Karl's Pre-Conference event later today.