So, you’ve heard by now that we’re moving…to the cloud. Throughout this series of blog posts we’ll be explaining and sharing our entire experience with you. This post should really frame everything and give you an overall perspective on why we’ve decided to make this move.

A little background

Our move to the cloud really began in late 2008. During our end of year review and planning one of our biggest topics of discussion was our website and blog. At that time, we were using a very capable WYSIWYG, (What You See is What You Get), Website design software package called Rapid Weaver. We chose Rapid Weaver as our Website design software shortly after we began business. Our primary reasoning for making this choice was the WYSIWYG feature because at that time, we knew just enough HTML and CSS to be dangerous. Rapid Weaver had the ability to create a blog page and we initially used that feature until we quickly realized how inconvenient it was to use. Essentially, every time we wanted to add a new blog post, we had to open up the software, draft the blog, and then re-publish the changes to the website. While this is not a huge deal if you only have one person blogging, it is quite inconvenient when there are multiple authors.

In an attempt to make it easier for both me and Kevin to blog at will, we opened a Typepad account, largely because it was web based and either of us could access it from a web browser (and because Kevin really liked the iPhone interface). Our dilemma with that however was that we had a fairly static website at one web address and our blog located at a completely different web address. So, if we got traffic to our website, people didn’t have access to our blog content, and if we got traffic to our blog, people didn’t get a lot of the important information they were looking for about our company. Plus, we were paying a monthly fee for Typepad as well as paying a monthly hosting fee for our website.

So, to bring this back around to the subject at hand, we discovered and began investigating the WordPress platform late last year. Both Kevin and I had heard about WordPress in the past, but had never really given it much consideration because we thought that it was quite similar to Typepad. What we learned was that WordPress is quite possibly the most innovative Content Management System platform in the world. As we began to investigate and learn more about WordPress, we realized that it was exactly what we had been looking for when we started our business three years ago. We realized that WordPress had become much more than a blogging engine, and could function as our Hub on the web and be a central place where our clients and prospects can connect with us.

In the next post, I’ll be giving you some examples of how we are utilizing WordPress as our Hub.

In case you didn’t hear, you can win one (1) of four (4) Web Presence Development Packages that we are giving away by simply following us on Twitter. If you haven’t done so, go there now and follow us. The drawing for the Web Presence Development Packages takes place on August 1, 2009.

I’m probably not the world’s best marketeer, (pretty sure that title belongs to Seth Godin), but there’s one thing about marketing I believe in 100%. Talk about how your business or organization outshines the competition. In this case, they were probably attempting to be honest. Honesty is important in marketing, but these folks needed to spend just a few more minutes in the tagline brainstorming session. I dare say that, “Closest to the River” or “Friendliest Staff” would have served them better.

What are you thoughts? Leave us some comments.

We’re moving…to the cloud. You’ve probably heard of the cloud, but just in case you haven’t here’s how Wikipedia explains it:

Cloud computing is a style of computing in which dynamically scalable and often virtualized resources are provided as a service over the Internet. Users need not have knowledge of, expertise in, or control over the technology infrastructure in the “cloud” that supports them.

Another term that is often used interchangeably with the cloud is Software as a Service, or SaaS. Essentially, the software lives in the cloud, on someone else’s technology infrastructure, and it is accessed over the internet with a web browser. Simply put, by moving to the cloud, DDS won’t have to continue to invest our hard earned capital in Server ownership and maintenance. Instead, we’ll be paying a monthly subscription fee for the Software as a Service (SaaS) that we utilize.

Since we began business, a little more than 3 years ago, we’ve utilized some very good desktop applications that have helped us run every aspect of our business. Many of these desktop applications connect back to a Server side application running on our Macintosh OS X Server. These applications have included Daylite, Billings, and MYOB Account Edge, to name a few. They are top notch and they have served us very well.

As great as these applications have been, we’ve concluded that moving to the cloud is what will help DDS continue to to bring our Clients the best service and value in the long term. There have been many factors that have impacted our decision and we’ll be sharing those and chronicling our move to the cloud experience here on our blog. It is our hope that by documenting our experience here that we can help you and your company make a determination about whether such a move is right for you and, if so, hopefully you can learn some best practices. You might even learn a few things that you shouldn’t do.

If you have questions, comments, or suggestions for us along the way, please leave us some comments. We’d really like to engage as many of our readers as possible during this process.

We’ve decided to make the DDS birthday celebration a month long event. So, here’s what we have planned…

We’re going to be GIVING AWAY some of our services for FREE. Yes, you read that right, FREE! Here’s how the giveaways will work:

• We’re giving away four (4) free Website setup and design packages. On August 1, 2009 we will select the four (4) lucky winners. They will be drawn at random from our Twitter followers. (Please visit DDS Birthday Celebration Rules for details).

To enter, just click on the Twitter icon in the right hand sidebar and make sure you are following us. Or, click this link: Follow DDS on Twitter

We’re really excited about how our business is growing. Because of our growth, we have embarked on some really big changes at DDS. We’re excited about these changes and know that they will benefit not just us, but you, our clients as well. We’ll be talking about these changes during a series of blog posts that will begin on Wednesday, July 1 ,2009. Be sure to visit our subscribe buttons over on the right hand sidebar and get subscribed in whatever manner you wish so that you can learn about the changes and how they will benefit you and your business.

I’m going to go ahead and let you in on the biggest change that we are making. WE’RE MOVING!!!

I can’t really say any more than that at the moment. You’ll have to subscribe or check back in here to get the details.

Once again, we’d like to say thanks for making the past three years a huge success for DDS!

• New MacBook Pro 15″ – improved display, improved battery life, processor speed increases, SD Card reader now included, entry level price dropped to $1,699.
• Enhancements to MacBook Pro 17″ – entry level product now has 2.8 GHz processor and 500GB Hard drive, entry level price dropped to $2,499.
• MacBook 13″ Aluminum is now MacBook Pro 13″ – tops out at 8GB RAM and 500GB Hard drive just like 15″ big brother, entry level price drops to $1,199.
• MacBook Air – entry level price drops to $1,499, processor clock speeds bumped up to 1.6 GHz, 1.8 GHz, and 2.13 GHz.
• Safari 4 is out of beta. (It is super fast BTW).
• Snow Leopard to ship in September – $29 upgrade for existing Leopard users, $49 family pack available too.
• iPhone 3G S – launches on June 19, 2009 in North America and parts of Europe, the S stands for Speed, will ship with iPhone OS 3.0 (which is available on June 17, 2009), includes Video Recording/Edtiting, Voice Control, 3 megapixel camera with auto-focus. Available in 16GB or 32 GB option at $199 and $299 respectively. iPhone 3G 8GB option continues to be available and price is reduced to $99.
• iPhone OS 3.0 – available on June 17, 2009, free to iPhone owners, $9.99 for iPod touch owners, over 100 new features including cut, copy, paste, and spotlight search.

I didn’t think so.

Please note, this does not change my impression or perspective on Adobe even a little bit. Adobe SUCKS as far as I’m concerned. Always has…always will. Until of course Apple buys them. LOL.

As of June 2, the One to One membership will only be offered to customers who purchase Macs through Apple’s direct channels – our retail stores and the Apple online store. The price for the program will remain $99. Existing customers will be able to renew for one additional year for the same price as well.

What is it that’s driving Apple to tighten these guidelines? Is the program becoming too popular? Is this part of Apple’s strategy to drive more sales through their direct channels?

I’ve heard from various sources within the Apple retail channel that the program’s popularity has begun to grow exponentially. In fact, Apple had to re-word their verbiage about six months ago to reflect and communicate that one-to-one was subject to availability of time slots, according to one source.

What do you think?

Part of what our business is about is helping clients maximize the use of the Apple/Macintosh platform. We work with a number of different types of businesses including some Graphic Design firms and Graphic Design departments. So, back on October 3, 2008, we helped a Graphic Design client get a new iMac setup for a new employee. As part of this new setup, the client purchased a copy of Adobe CS3 Design Standard. The client was fully aware that CS4 would be shipping in the very near future but we needed to get the new employee productive as quickly as possible. Once CS4 was released Adobe made an announcement regarding eligibility rules for receiving a free CS4 upgrade. Before you ask, yes, we followed their eligibility rules and request guidelines to the letter of the “law according to Adobe”.

On November 8, 2008, we received a letter confirming eligibility and indicating that we needed to call their customer service telephone number to confirm all the details of delivering the CS4 Upgrade. We placed the call, they took all the pertinent information such as the shipping address and told us to look for the upgrade within the next 7 to 10 business days.

Fast forward 6 months. Today was call number 4 to Adobe’s “lack of” customer service department. I must be honest folks, I said some bad words. I probably made the lady on the other end of the line feel about an inch tall. Here is their excuse for not shipping the upgrade after the previous 3 calls:

I’m sorry sir, but apparently the order was rejected because we do not have a shipping address on file.

No joke! Not only did they ask for it and confirm it during the last 3 telephone conversations, I double checked it online with our customer profile. Could they not at least auto-generate an email indicating that further information was needed to ship the Upgrade? Anyway, once again, I have yet another “order number” and am assured that they will use expedited shipping to get this delivered to our client.

Look for an update on this post sometime Monday because she said that we should receive a confirmation with the shipping information by then.

Nobody cares about your website…

…but your content matters more than ever. I came to that realization a few months ago while I was sifting through our stats on Google Analytics.

via Nobody cares about your website… « MEDIA SALT.

So, this was an article I’d been intending to write but Eric over at Media Salt beat me to it. He covered everything and said it all very well. Rather than try to do it better myself, I’m going to point you to his article at his site. Give it a read. If you’re a church or non-profit you definitely need to take five minutes and peruse the content. If you’re a small or medium business, this applies to you as well.

If you have questions about how to develop and implement a web presence strategy give us a call (see the big button to the right –>) or send us an email. Or, click on the Twitter over there in the sidebar and follow us and tweet us your questions or thoughts.

If you are too busy to check this out right now, this paragraph from the opening section will hopefully motivate you to go check it out later:

Social media didn’t create content marketing, but it’s an unsurpassed tool for getting it distributed. On the flip side, great content gives social media life, by giving people something more interesting to talk about than what they’re ordering right now at Starbucks.

The TED Tribes talk is now live

via Seth’s Blog: The TED Tribes talk is now live.

We’ve been fans of Seth Godin and his books, specifically his book Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us. We are trying to build our Tribe here at Digital Design Solutions by providing expert advice, quality service, and better than expected results. We’ve also been participating in a Tribes group-blogging project initiated by John Saddington over at ChurchCrunch.com. Check out the posts and and join in the conversation.

I decided to take each of the sections (pages 110-117) I was responsible for, use the header and write my thoughts on what I read. I know most folks participating here are doing so from and with a church perspective. I take that angle, too, being very much interested in how this relates to the Church today, but also relate to it from a business perspective as well. We work with small/medium business, churches and non-profits, but we really have a passion for helping churches and non-profits learn the benefits and power of all the amazing tools now at their disposal to connect with members of their tribes.

Thanks for reading and, please, join in the conversation.

Possibility of Risk

One take-away for this section is what many of us already know: the biggest risk is playing it safe, not taking the risk. This idea has been communicated many times, many ways:

“It is better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all.”

“No risk, no reward.”

“No pain, no gain.”

“Every man dies. Not every man really lives.”

The simple truth in all this is that life is risk. There’s equal risk in doing something as there is in doing nothing. Doing nothing allows you to continue dealing with issues and problems that you are comfortable with while doing something different opens you up to new issues and problems. But it also provides opportunity for growth and change. Opportunity for something extraordinary to happen.

What is something you, your church, or your organization is continuing to do the same for fear of the perceived risk of changing it? What are you going to do about it?

When Tribes Replace What You’re Used To

Business as we know it has changed. Church as we know it has changed. They are continually changing and evolving. At least the ones that are thriving are changing and evolving. Those that aren’t are dead or dying. The Internet has played and continues to play perhaps the most significant role in this evolution that we are in. Evolution? Or is it revolution? Thomas Friedman, in his book The World Is Flat 3.0: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century, details the reality of our interconnected world and paints the picture of a world with no boundaries. Real-time collaboration – audio, video, data-sharing – between a team in the US and a team in India, or multiple teams from the UK, Japan, and Russia take place daily because of the Internet. LifeChurch.tv has real-time online worship services with attendees from over 100 countries around the world. These aren’t your Dad’s companies and churches.

When “new tribes” replace what you’re used to, how do you react? What do you think is the key to leading and being a part of the replacement tribe

Initiative

The Barbara Barry anecdote that Seth gives is an awesome example of taking initiative. Her initiative seems to me like a cross between confidence and faith. A belief in her vision and confidence in it’s execution led to an amazing success. Is there a direct application for churches or nonprofits that can model her approach? Why is it that the organizations or churches “that need innovation the most are the ones that do the most to stop if from happening”? Does it take a heretic to lead with a little bit of initiative? Does it take confidence, maybe “healthy” arrogance, and faith to take initiative.

Stuck on Stupid

My wife loves Dr. Phil. I think he’s got a good common sense approach to many things, but one thing I like, that I’ve heard my wife repeat, is the question “How’s that working for you?” It’s usually asked of someone who apparently is “stuck on stupid”. Someone who continues, as Seth says, “playing today’s games by yesterday’s rules”. Doing the same thing over and over expecting different results. Isn’t that a definition for insanity?

Where is your church or organization “stuck on stupid”? How can you move forward?

Mark Rovner, Nonprofit Heritic

Do you have to abandon the old ways today? Of course not. But responsible stewardship requires that you find and empower heretics and give them the flexibility to build something new, instead of trying to force the Internet to act like direct mail with free stamps.

Seth Godin – Tribes: We Need You To Lead Us – page 117

That is in response to the story Seth tells of Mark Rovner and his insight that the Internet, and even technology itself, isn’t the end-all-be-all for connecting with your tribe. It also isn’t just the next method of distribution that allows you to continue doing things in the same way, just modified for the Internet. The real nugget of truth here is this: without empowering your tribe members to become the next tribe leaders the movement will eventually fail. In the church we call that discipleship. In business it’s called selling the corporate culture and training your replacement. Either way, we must engage and encourage our members to lay claim to the vision and take up the cause. Even if that means mutiny at some point. Just this week I listened to an Andy Stanley Leadership podcast that talked about this. Look for the one titled Becoming A Student.

The Posture of a Leader

What’s your posture as a leader? Is it a posture that blames others for not getting the vision? Do you believe that your “followers” aren’t trying as hard at following as you are at trying to lead? These are great questions for us to consider. I like what I remember from Steven Covey in The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. I’m paraphrasing, but the concept is simple. Seek first to understand, then to be understood. I’ve tried to apply that in my life, both personal and professional. Rather than get frustrated or angry with someone to whom I’m trying to communicate something, and it seems they aren’t getting it, I try not to blame them. I try to take a look at how I’m communicating my message. Am I understanding where they are and am I presenting the message to them in the way in which they need to hear it? Maybe an oversimplified analogy, but if I’m talking English and my subject only understands Spanish I’m not going to get my message across clearly, if at all. It’s not their fault I’m delivering my message in a language they don’t understand.

What’s your posture as a leader? What’s the posture of your church or organization when it comes to leadership? How do we change poor posture?

Welcome to Day 9 of ChurchCrunch’s Group Blog Project. I am the lucky recipient to cover pages 40-45 of Seth Godin’s wonderful gem called Tribes. Picking up from where  Dawn Nicole Baldwin’s very excellent post yesterday left off, we get to examine what Seth calls “the F word…. fear.”

Let’s start first with one of the sweetest quotes (found on p.42) about heretics:

In a battle between two ideas, the best one doesn’t necessarily win. No, the idea that wins is the one with the most fearless heretic behind it.

via Heretics and Fear:Tribes Group Blog Project « Chronicles of Dawnia.

Dawn Carter leads the conversation on Tribes today over at Chronicles of Dawnia as part of the group-blogging project we’re participating in. Head over and check out her post and join the conversation.

We’ll be leading the conversation here at The DDS Blog on May 8. We’ll also post each day with a link to where the conversation is happening that day. Hope you’ll join in.

Forging A Successful Blog

An Interview with Phil Cooke

Phil Cooke has been involved in advocating house of worship blogging and online networking for many years. He has developed incredibly effective blogs of his own and has been a valued consultant for many individuals and facilities who wish to reach out with this potentially potent communication method. We asked him a few questions about what the best ways are to build and promote a worship blog.

via Technologies For Worship Magazine- Church Technology Resources.

Jarrod and I, both, are fans and admirers of Phil Cooke. He has wisdom and insight from years of valuable experience that he freely shares on his blog and in his podcast. This is a great interview with him published over at Technologies for Worship Magazine. Check it out. Especially if you’re interested in blogging or improving your existing blog.

What I love about innovation–the power of an idea–is it can come from anywhere. It’s not dependent on what you’ve done before, your talents or bank account size. In fact, too much of any of these things can actually inhibit the process. That’s why I’m a huge cheerleader for the little guys.

via Let’s Hear it for the Little Guy :: #Tribes

Dawn Nicole Baldwin leads the conversation on Tribes today over at Connect as part of the group-blogging project we’re participating in. Head over and check out her post and join the conversation.

We’ll be leading the conversation here at The DDS Blog on May 8. We’ll also post each day with a link to where the conversation is happening that day. Hope you’ll join in.

Some of you may think I’m crazy, but I can honestly say that I slept “light” last night because I knew that today was the official release of Tweetie for Mac. The user interface is very attractive and pleasing to the eye. As well, it’s quite intuitive. At present, it seems to me the primary missing element would be an audible notification for new Tweets. As well, I don’t see a way to enter my bit.ly credentials. Even without these features present, this app is amazing.

Tweetie for Mac is available as a free, (aka, ad supported), download and you can use it for free as long as you like. To eliminate the ads you can register Tweetie for Mac for a miniscule fee of $14.95. 

Follow @atebits and @tweetie on Twitter. Happy Twittering to you all.

Twitter in Plain English by Common Craft

Communication is multi-faceted

I think for me it is fairly simple to understand the importance of good communication to the tribe, but what makes these pages a little more challenging is to understand the significance of communication within the tribe (or feedback loops from the tribe to the leader) that can take your tribe to a whole other level.

via #Tribes – Day 5 – Is this thing on?!?* « Metanoia.

Norm Tumlinson leads the conversation on Tribes today over at Metanoia as part of the group-blogging project we’re participating in. Head over and check out his post and join the conversation.

We’ll be leading the conversation here at The DDS Blog on May 8. We’ll also post each day with a link to where the conversation is happening that day. Hope you’ll join in.

With the Daylite touch application you can manage your business on the go without the bulk of carrying a notebook computer. Some of the features of Daylite touch include:

• Multi-user Calendar management
• Contact management
• Opportunity management
• Project management
• Task management and delegation

We hope you’ll come out and join us as we demonstrate how Daylite 3.9 and Daylite touch compliment one another.

Leaders need to be unstable in their thinking patterns and in the way they do things today may not be the same way things NEED to be done 5 years from now.

via givelovecoffee: Daily Mug Shot.

Shannon leads the conversation on Tribes today over at Give Love Coffee as part of the group-blogging project we’re participating in. Head over and check out his post and join the conversation.

We’ll be leading the conversation here at The DDS Blog on May 8. We’ll also post each day with a link to where the conversation is happening that day. Hope you’ll join in.

Welcome to day 3 of the Tribes Group Blogging Project that began Monday at ChurchCrunch. As I humbly pick up the torch, lets dive a little deeper into a discussion about true leadership (pages 12-16).

“Leadership is Not Management”

via #Tribes – Day 3 – True Leadership « MEDIA SALT.

Eric Murell leads the conversation on Tribes today over at Media Salt as part of the group-blogging project we’re participating in. Head over and check out his post and join the conversation.

We’ll be leading the conversation here at The DDS Blog on May 8. We’ll also post each day with a link to where the conversation is happening that day. Hope you’ll join in.

We encourage everyone to point your favorite RSS reader directly to Church Crunch and make sure you follow them on Twitter. We are looking forward to learning from the insights of the other folks involved in this as well as any comments that you guys contribute. Happy reading/listening.

Daylite Touch Submitted to the AppStore

March 7, 2009 on 1:14 pm | In Apple, Business, Daylite, General

Exactly one year after Apple released the iPhone SDK and exactly one year after we began development, we submitted Daylite Touch to the AppStore yesterday.

Daylite Touch is major milestone for us as a company. Not only is it our first mobile app, it is also a milestone for small businesses. You’ll get functionality that even large scale enterprise systems don’t have, such as scheduling meetings with colleagues right from the phone you can also view their calendars. You’ll get power features such as open projects with linked tasks, appointments and notes from all users. You’ll get really useful “on the go” features such as the home screen with everything you have to do today and tomorrow. And more…

via Marketcircle Blog.

Whether it’s Twitter, Pownce, or any other of the status-update/micro-blogging services, the whole concept is highly relevant as it relates to the benefits technology brings to relationships. Let me share two quick examples:

I recently began to embrace this idea of status updates. At first, I have to say, I honestly hadn’t even thought of it as “micro-blogging”. To me it was just a way for folks who were “following” me to keep up with what I was doing throughout the day/week/month. (I know, that is the whole premise behind blogging but give me a break, I’m dense sometimes). Then something interesting happened one afternoon. I had returned to the office after a couple of appointments and logged into FaceBook. I noticed that I had a few notifications, one of which was from my 17 year old nephew, whom I rarely visit with face-to-face. He had sent me a message saying, “It sounds like Stephen [my son] is having a great baseball season. Tell him to keep up the good work.” At first glance, I thought to myself, “how did he know this?” I quickly realized that he knew this because he was following my status updates. The bottom line is this: you never know how you might connect with others. When you keep your status updated regularly, it gives people an opportunity to peek into your life. This is a great way for people to connect with you. As I have learned, this is really “micro-blogging”.

Along these same lines, my eight year-old daughter is preparing to begin her first blog. I’m so proud of her as she is volunteering at a Horse Rescue organization north of Atlanta. The organization is a non-profit and takes in horses and other animals that may have been mistreated or whose owners can no longer care for them. She’s been doing this for a while now and she has volunteered to be the President of the fan clubs for two of the horses there. One of the requirements is that she regularly writes a blog entry about her experiences with these horses. So when she approached me about helping her with this I took the opportunity to ask her and her brother if they knew what a blog was. My son quickly answered, “Yeah, it is that thing you do with your status updates and stuff. You know, telling people what you’ve been up to.” To be honest, I was quite impressed. I had no idea that either of my kids might know what a blog was, nevermind that they would liken blogging to status updates. My kids don’t have cell phones (yet) and their internet leash is very short. (We’re an all Mac household and with the built-in Parental Controls they can’t view a site unless I, or my wife, approve it.) Even so, they understand this concept in a way that seems amazingly second nature.

Whether you’re a Salesperson, a Product Manager, or just an average guy like myself, status updates can help you connect with prospects and customers. Studies show that people who develop an emotional connection to a particular product, service, or company tend to spend more and are extremely loyal.

If you aren’t on Twitter yet, get with the program! Join up. Search for some customers and prospects and start following them. Encourage them to follow you. Believe me, your relationships with those people will grow as a result and so will your sales.