August 2006 - David Overton's Blog

You are all hopefully aware of the need to update your profile information and the web site url in it so that when one of the small businesses follows up on one of our campaigns and clicks on the find a partner link (UK) they can find information about you that makes them want to buy from you. Well, we are now talking about solutions to our customers and this is where you can now create and update your solution profile so that you can have several solutions profiled on the site. Each solution can have a completely separate description and URL, so no longer does everything have to be generic. This means that if a customer is looking for a sharing solution, they find out about by searching the solution finder tool, click on it, read more, then click the url that is not generic, so they actually call you and buy something from you. How do you do all this, here is the profile that took me a good 5-10 minutes to put together - I suggest you spend a bit more time on yours, but it will be worth it as we move to the new...

I have just posted a blog item about the latest SB Ignite tour event - hurray I hear you all say, but the thing that got my attention was I went to local.live.com to get a map and it offered me 3 views - road, aerial view (using satellite imagery) and then Birds' eye view. This is just an awesome, awesome, way to see where you are going - have a look at the blog entry - Nottingham, England, 7th September - be there to learn so much more - Small Business Partner Ign and click on picture then play around or click the concord map above - get your personal driving instructions, look at the hotel that is the destination for 8 different angles - makes it so, so, so much easier. I was just blown away by this. Not every location has a birds eye view yet, but the aerial images, routing and the occasional birds eye views are amazing. For more information on Birds' eye images, go to http://www.birdseyetourist.com or to see the local.live.com blog have a look at http://virtualearth.spaces.live.com/PersonalSpace.... ttfn David

I was reading the MSDN Flash and came across this article " Link to Customizing the Ribbon in Outlook 2007 " and thought a few of you who wanted to customise the Office 2007 Ribbon bar can see how to change it and add new icons. ttfn David

Once again the Small Business Ignite Tour is coming out and this time it is Exeter. You need to sign-up quickly, so go to http://www.microsoft.com/uk/partner/training/ignite/default.aspx?id=Exeter and sign up for the Small Business Tour (as opposed to the tour with a date in the past). If you do not know about the Small Business Ignite Tour, then this is the rough agenda: Introduce just how big the business opportunity is in the land of small business Introduce the topics of Flexible Working and Collaborative Business as these will be the basis of marketing campaigns this year from Microsoft into small business customers Demonstrate technologies that you can deliver to give your customers the benefits they demand - such as : working from home or on the road, using the tools in SBS, Windows XP or Windows Mobile Sharing files between workers, customers and suppliers in a natural and secure way using WSS and Office When to consider a hosted solution and when to consider SBS How to stop searching and start finding...

Click the map above to see the Local.Live.Com technology at work - you can get driving instructions to the venue, see the area by birds' eye view, map view etc. We will be there (I will be for sure) explaining, showing via live demos, talk about how to sell and make money while enabling your customers to get more from their systems, get truly mobile (using XP, Office, SBS, Windows SharePoint Services (WSS) and Windows mobile solutions), more productive and easier to manage. If you want more details, go to http://www.microsoft.com/uk/partner/training/ignite/default.aspx?id=Nottingham ttfn David - see you there

I have often debated the quality of IE over firefox and I'm not about to stop now, however this is just a simple note (as I am still a 4 fingered typist at the moment) to say that the latest build of IE is out there. To get more info on what this build has, go have a look at " What's new in RC1 " however they key paragraph for those not after the toolkit etc is: improvements in performance, stability, security, and application compatibility. With this build, Microsoft has also made enhancements to the fit and finish of the user interface, completed CSS platform changes, added language support, and included an auto-uninstall feature in Setup, which automatically uninstalls prior betas of Internet Explorer 7, making installing the new build even easier ttfn David

I was looking for a trickle of information that includes videos and podcasts on the technologies around Office 2007 and the Office System. The IW Center is just the right place to get this info - worh a look. ttfn David

I was reading this blog from the Live Writer site and came across this link - it is just one of the funniest things I have seen in a long time. Link to ...the musings of a psycho...: This is broken! enjoy David

Wow, what a questioning title. I am not a "business online" expert, but I did find this article rather interesting and worth a read. It has some nice reminders about the importance of doing the basics right, such as customer service, shipping and core "business" such as invoicing, accounts etc. just a quick one :-) ttfn David P.S. I could suggest that Office Live might be the answer, but for true transactional stuff you need a transactional hosting partner that provides a "basket" function for you - of course, there is Commerce Server 2007....

Think of this as a 1st mover notification. I am always in awe of those who can motivate themselves to do physical exercise and even more so if it is also raising money for charity. Well Robbie and Susanne have decided to take up the challenge. They have a joint site that will feature blogs, training details, events and other useful information as well as guest speakers/ bloggers. The site is just beginning, but pop along to Robbie and Susanne's Marathon and support a good cause and then sponsor them both - I have - by clicking the two charity logos at the top. ttfn David

Microsoft often pokes fun at itself, but due to one of our competitors taking it a little too seriously some years back, these rarely come out to play in public. Well, have a look at this one . It was posted by Jules in the UKSBSG forum and I also got private messages from a few people saying that we should use this in the UK. ttfn David

For those who need more info on Vista, want to see it, and will be managing it, come along to: • 11 September 2006, London: Windows Vista System Integrity Technologies Windows Vista will ship with several new system integrity technologies, including code integrity, secure startup, service hardening, mandatory integrity control and Internet Explorer protected mode. In this session, Steve Lamb explores how these technologies work to thwart malware's attempts to take over your computer. • 14 September 2006, Reading: What's New in Administering Vista In this session, we will examine group policy functionality improvements that have been made with Windows Vista. We will describe the new and updated features and how these help to alleviate the problems that were present with previous versions of Windows. ttfn David