…And the other here when I tell you that while exploring the functionality of Verizon’s newest smartphone, the Blackberry Storm, and the potential impact said phones could have on 360 Professional Services Group, I will not compare it to the iPhone.

Wednesday, December 10, 2008:

New Verizon Blackberry Storms 360 PSG

With the variety of smartphones on the market, 360 PSG took a leap of faith and invested in Verizon’s Blackberry Storm, the first ever touch screen blackberry, just weeks after its initial November 2008 release. But will the newest addition to the Amherst, NY based web design company reign terror on the office or help 360 take the web design world by, well, storm?

By now I’m sure that you’ve heard at least one horror story about the Blackberry Storm. David Pogue, author of the NY Times technology column, lambasted the phone recently concluding, “Maybe Storm isn’t such a bad name for this phone. After all — it’s dark, sodden and unpredictable.”

It doesn’t help that the name lends itself to a virtual gauntlet of negative puns. It’s not all bad though. Get over the fact that this blackberry has a touch screen, so does just about every other phone released in the last 8 months, and you might find something you like. Oh yeah, there’s no stylus either…

360 PSG is a cutting-edge company and using cutting-edge technology in and out of the office is an integral part in remaining a leader in the web design world. Staying connected to clients is key as quality website maintenance and service are high priorities of 360 PSG.

Matthew Whelan, Managing Partner, Operations for 360 PSG, listed a few benefits of having smartphones. “Instant access to email and customer inquiries, mobile address book & calendar synchronization so we always know where we’re supposed to be and how to be in touch with everyone. Google Maps to find where it is we need to go. No internet connection* … no problem!” Whelan said.

Remote email access is a highly desired feature for any business; it is the best way to stay connected with customers. As a 3G** network product, the Storm allows instant access to email all the time. Problems with a site over a long weekend could leave customers in a panic. An email from a 360 PSG employee could lead to a quick fix before the work week begins again on Monday.

Whelan joked, “Now there is nowhere to hide!”

Employees at 360 PSG understand that they will have to take the good with the bad. “Anytime you adopt early release technology (like the Storm within one week of launch)… you run the risk of patches, updates, glitches or bug-fixes that make you have to re-enter, start over, reinstall, or otherwise inconvenience you,” said Joel Colombo, 360 PSG Managing Partner, President.
He added, “So you risk cutting edge adoption for possible intermittent headache. Waiting for 12-14 months after a release of new technology insures most of the critical setbacks have been patched and fixed.”

Daniel Dumas reviewed the Storm for Wired.

“Web surfing on the device is good, not great. The fully realized browser pulls up pages quickly but also suffers from a lack of flash support. Cut-and-paste functionality works almost perfectly, as does text editing. All of RIM’s e-mail goodness and top-shelf messaging are also effortlessly integrated into the device. For better or for worse, you never forget that you are using a BlackBerry.”

Verizon is marketing the phone not just as a blackberry, a device that most business men and women have trusted to scroll through emails and work calendars for over a decade, but as an everyman’s media device (photos, mp3 player, and a 3.2 megapixel camera). Of course the new phones were integrated into 360 PSG to improve reliability and service between clients and coworkers. Although there are some concerns, there have been no major setbacks and the general outlook remains optimistic.

In his initial review for Consumer Reports, Mike Gikas concluded:

“With its simple interface and powerful business and entertainment features, it may be one more good reason for smart-phone seekers to choose Verizon’s top-notch service over less-consistent carriers.”

The Consumer Reports review was released before the Storm’s official launch date. Gikas was able to test the device at a press preview, and he did like some of the features that the Storm boasts like the touch screen, the display resolution of 480 X 360 pixels, and easy navigation.

The Storm has an accelerometer that detects when you’ve rotated the phone into landscape orientation. It can be a little frustrating sometimes as one wrong flick of the wrist throws your accelerometer into overdrive changing views for you even though you really didn’t want it to.

Texting takes some getting used to. When held vertically, blackberry patrons will find a familiar Sure Type keypad. But when turned on its side, the Storm presents a full QWERTY keypad. Transitioning so quickly from Sure Type to QWERTY takes some orientation but once it’s mastered it can provide texters with efficient messaging options.

360 PSG clients should see some of the benefits of the Blackberry Storm too. Colombo said, “They will get even faster than usual responses on critical issues and rapid delegation to people in office that may be able to support or answer questions originally intended for the person that may not be available at that exact moment.”

Jason Ortiz, 360 PSG Director of Programming Services, added, “All client information will be at our finger tips. We can access our email, and communicate instantly whether we are at the office or anywhere else.”

No matter how great a product is, there are always complaints, and complaints are always much funnier than compliments. So after a week of practice with the phones, I asked everyone at 360 to answer the following…

“What do you hate about the phone?

…OR finish the phrase:

“If the Blackberry Storm were a person, I would punch it in the face because…”

…And I almost got five comprehensible responses… almost.

Matt said, “If the Blackberry Storm were a person, I would punch it in the face because the camera keeps coming up for no apparent reason. Though I really like the touch screen, I find that it is inexact to use your finger vs. a stylus.”

Ben Shepard, 360 PSG Director of Graphic Services and Marketing responded, “The speed dial function is useless. You push the 6 key; it asks you to assign someone to the 9 key… You hit the 5 key; it dials whoever is assigned to 6. There is also noticeable lag between applications and functions which gets to be annoying.”

Bryan McConnell, 360 PSG Account Manager said, “I really like the touch screen and knowing that I am not one of the losers that do not have a cell phone anymore. I also love how sexy the phone is – Wow!”

Jason said, “I hate that everyone wants to put their greasy hands on it. I would also punch it in the face if it were a person because that’s what I do. I would also do the same if it were a cyborg*** from the future sent back in time to drive me nuts by showing the camera in the email view and refusing to allow me to turn it off.”

*One of the features that the Storm does not come equipped with, curiously, is Wi-Fi capability.

**3G (third generation) is a wireless network that provides cell phone subscribers with remote broadband wireless data.

***There is no such thing as cyborgs. Even if there were, it is highly unlikely that they would possess the technology to travel back to our time or the know-how to properly utilize the Blackberry Storm camera function.

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New Social Networking Platforms and What They Mean to Your SEO

Are you social enough on the web?

You might already have a Facebook page so you’re not totally in the dark when it comes to online social networks. But what are you supposed to be Digging? What’s a Twitter? And isn’t Orkut that magic alien from Masters of the Universe?

Of course you know having strong website content and good search engine optimization (SEO) are keys to getting your site ranked highly on search engines like Google, so the more you spread the word about your product or service and the more linkbacks you have to your site the better.

Keeping up with social media can be somewhat of a daunting task though. There seems to be a new site launched every week. Depending on how many sites you belong to, or want to belong to, your list of usernames and passwords can build up to overwhelming lengths.

If you happen to use more than one social network though, which is likely seeing how “49 million people visited both MySpace and Facebook in October 2008” (Comscore, worldwide), then there is some good news.

Four new social networking platforms, Facebook Connect, MyspaceID, Google Friend Connect, and Power.com, are trying to make it easier for you to manage all of your accounts. The goal: expand your social network with half the effort. After all, more manageable networking means more potential SEO for your site, right?

So now all you have to do is decide which platform to use…

Tech Crunch broke it down like this:

“All three services are platforms for third party sites (Digg, Twitter, Citisearch, CBS, whatever) to let users sign in via their favorite social network instead of the normal approach. Some profile information flows with the sign in, which the sites can keep for a period of time. And activity that occurs on the site – Twitters written, Digg stories voted on, restaurant reviews on Citysearch, etc. – can optionally flow back to the user’s activity stream.”

Facebook Connect:

Facebook Connect takes your Facebook profile information, your picture, and your friends and expands upon them by looking for others with common interests. It basically does the legwork for you, taking your login information and applying it to your Twitter, Digg, Citysearch, etc. accounts to make it easier to sign in and manage content and profile information or create new accounts.

Your other social networks link back to your Facebook profile, where your network is allowing you to advertise your product or services.

Myspace ID:

MyspaceID works on the same basic principles as Facebook Connect, however functionality is still being flushed out. Myspace looks to be a step behind Facebook when it comes to sending data back to your Myspace feed. However, Myspace supports Open ID, which Facebook does not, and that could mean more potential third party partners.

Social Networks that support OpenID could be hesitant to partner with Facebook who has basically shunned tools like OpenID and OAuth in favor of their own login ID which they will own.

Power.com

In May, when Facebook Connect was announced on the heels of the news of MyspaceID and Google Friend Connect, the first in the trend of all-encompassing social networking platforms to actually launch was the Brazilian-based platform Power.com.

Unlike its competitors who enable social access through a universal ID, Power delivers a dashboard to users and branded their service “social inter-networking.” Currently offering sign-in ability to Facebook, Myspace, Orkut, and Hi5 accounts, Power.com has its sights set on centralizing social networks rather than owning your online ID.

Power has created a single site interface where you can view and jump to all of your social network pages. Users can navigate seamlessly from Facebook to Myspace to Orkut in a matter of seconds without having to logout and log back in.

When you sign into Power.com using your Facebook, Myspace, Orkut, Hi5, or MSN account ID and password, it scrapes that site for you and immediately creates a profile page where you can manage your account.

Google Friend Connect:

Google Friend Connect adds applications to your website, so your friends can interact right on your site. It’s goal is simple: make the web more social. Like Power.com, Google Friends Connect is not in the game to promote itself.

There is a little more leg work involved too. Users interested in Google Friend Connect can get started by copying a few lines of Java Script from the Google site and pasting them onto their page.

Google Friend Connect has partnered with Facebook’s competitor becoming a component of MyspaceID.

How Do You Benefit?

Since all four platforms were announced around the same time (May), the new race, for now anyway, seems to be for the right to become the proprietary online ID.

When users are logging into their favorite sites with their Myspace or Facebook IDs, it presents even more incentive for them to keep up those profiles. If the two major social networks are your home, then you want to pack it full of as much information as you can to lead your Digg, Twitter, or Orkut followers back there. Once you have them on your Facebook page, you can lead them to your website.

The verdict is still out on which platform the major third-party sites will choose to partner with. Twitter has been mentioned by both MyspaceID and Facebook Connect. Power.com already acts as home base for both Myspace and Facebook sites, plus Orkut and Hi5 are on board.

According to Venture Beat:

“Facebook gained nearly two million new US users from May to June of this year, while MySpace lost about a million, according to the latest data from comScore. MySpace is still nearly twice the size, though, at 72.8 million national users versus Facebook’s 37.4 million. Facebook has, meanwhile, grown 34 percent since June 2007, while MySpace has grown only two percent” (comScore Media Metrix).

If you truly want to reap the SEO benefits of these social network platforms, signing up for a plethora of third-party sites is only the first step. Making the effort to update content, and more importantly make sure that content is relevant to your product or service on these sites, is key. Remember, every blog you produce, Twitter, or Digg you make could potentially drive more traffic to your site.

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