Technology for Business Sake

Here is a great new Radio Show that is hosted by my good friends Brent Leary and Michael Thomas. You can listen to them weekly on Business Radio 1160 WCFO in Atlanta GA. They are looking to help small businesses take advantage of all the great things that technology has to offer. They will be talking about everything from how to choose the best CRM software/service to how to use the email on your Blackberry device more effectively. Take a listen to their first shows below.

You've Got High Tech Mail

You've Got High Tech Email to be more precise. This was the starting sentence of a Wall Street Journal article I read today saying that email marketing is getting another look from the heavy hitting marketers like IBM and Cisco Systems. These are the two of the many companies who shyed away from email marketing after the spamming wars of the late nineties. Their is a new company that is giving these fortune five hundred marketers a reason to send email again. Eyetools, a San Francisco software company has developed a technology called "heatmapping." This technology can tell marketers what parts of the their emails get the most attention. Heatmapping uses cameras attached to a computer that track a person's eye movements to figure out what part of the screen is being viewed. The results are displayed in vivid colors on what is called a "heatmap" that makes clear where on the screen people's eyes focus.

Eyetools has two email services. The first one discovers whether your key message is getting through and is tested in an email client. The second one is for email campaign optimization of landing pages. That way you can see how your offer performs from email open to landing page. Their pricing ranges by a per person cost to a ten person group study cost. Most of their clients want data collected as a group of people open their email and see what they click on as well as see what they are drawn to once the do reach their landing page. What say you. Would you use or encourage your company to use such a services before you sent out your next email marketing campaign? Let me know your thoughts.

Google Checkout "Gbuy" Has renewed my faith in them

I finally got the word from the Google Checkout here is the email that was sent to me today.

Hello Jeff,

Congratulations! Your request to remove your monthly payout limit has been approved. Effective immediately, your payouts will no longer be limited to $500 per month. We hope you enjoy the greater flexibility of your new payout schedule.

In accordance with our Terms of Service, your payouts may still be limited under certain circumstances. We may also request additional information from you in the future if your account status changes.

If you have questions please contact us by replying directly to this email.

Sincerely,
The Google Checkout Team


I was a little ... no a lot ticked off at them for putting me through this but I guess they had their reasons. I still would like to know how they made their decision. If anyone has any insights or have the same thing happen to them plase feel free to leave your comments.

Google Checkout "Gbuy" has me on Lock Down

I was so excited when the announcement first came out that Google.com was going to have its own version of a payment service. As soon as I was able I then applied and was amazed at the ease of signing up for the service. Then came my disappointment. After giving Google all the necessary information they needed to get an account I was put off by one major aspect of the payment process, GETTING PAID!

Turns out I currently have what Google Checkout calls a "Payout Limit" on my account.

Here are the findings when I click on the Payouts tab in my account

Your payout amounts are currently limited to $500.00 a month. To increase your monthly payout limit, upgrade your account.

We when I got to the upgrade your account link it just brings me back to my settings tab and does not give me any instructions on how to upgrade my account.

I have since emailed the Google Checkout team via their email form and I am still waiting for an answer. I did get a standard reply email that said that they currently have my account under review and will get back to me on their findings.

It has only been a few days since that email but I am still not happy with such a process.

Here are the official words from Google on why I have a payout limit from their own FAQ's

What's a monthly payout limit? How do I remove this limit?

A monthly payout limit is a restriction on the total amount of earnings you can receive at one time.

When you process transactions through Google Checkout, your payouts are sent to you according to the standard payout schedule. With a monthly payout limit, however, your earnings will be paid to you over a longer period. For example, say you have a monthly payout limit of $500. If your total sales in July equal $600, only $500 will be paid to you in July; the remaining $100 will be carried over to your August payouts.

Not all sellers have monthly payout limits. If you have a payout limit, the limit amount will appear on your Payout Summary page, Payout Summary Details page, and payment settings page. On these pages, you may also see a notification message asking if you'd like to remove your monthly payout limit. By clicking the link in the message, you can request that Google perform a simple review and remove your monthly payout limit so you can receive your payouts more quickly. (If you don't see these notification messages, you aren't currently eligible to have your monthly payout limit removed.)

To my understanding this is clearly a bad feature if it comes down to my account being limited this way. Let's look at their own scenario in a very possible sales transaction.
I have charged one of my customers say $2500.00 to create a website for them. They then goto my website and use a Google Checkout "Buy Now" button to complete the purchase.

According to Google Checkout they will only allow me to have $500.00 of that money this month and keep the other $2000.00 until the following month and only give me another $500.00 NOT the balance of my original transaction.

So I ask you does this seem fair.

Why can't I get all of the money that was due me from the beginning?

I hope Google Checkout has a good explanation for this, cause right now I won't be using this account anytime soon.

If you would like to get another oppinion on what Google Checkout is doing against the likes of Ebay/Paypal.com please check out Brent Leary's Blog.

Related Blog Entries
Google Checkout "Gbuy" Has renewed my faith in them
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Blackberry Email in Jeopardy

I have a client of mine that is very concerned that his Blackberry phone will not have the feature that he purchase the phone for in the first place. This whole patent infringement with the company NTP, Inc.

According to Gartner Dataquest's Todd Kort and various documents associated with the Research In Motion Ltd. case, the patent in question relates to work that NTP Inc.'s founder, Thomas Campana, did in the late 1980s as a subcontractor for AT&T Corp. AT&T wanted to add wireless e-mail features to its new Safari laptop computer, which it had acquired as a part of its purchase of computer maker NCR.

Campana had developed and patented a method of sending e-mail messages to wireless pagers, and it was a natural fit for AT&T. However, at the last minute, Kort said, AT&T decided not to use Campana's technology, and he lost a considerable amount of money as a result.

"So Campana and his guys sat on the [patents] for years," said Kort, until his holding company, NTP, contacted RIM in January 2000 regarding the patents. However, RIM claims that NTP "did not readily demonstrate any support for potential patent infringement." NTP filed suit against RIM in 2001.

"It's a little bit distasteful," Kort said of NTP's patent crusade, which he said is likely to extend beyond RIM to other companies with similar technology.

"What's happening is NTP is going back in time, asking people who have theoretically been violating their patents to pay up."

Even though my client does not have backup plan just yet I am going ask all who read this to make comments and suggestions on what the current blackberry users should do just in case this battle with NTP does not go their way.

Check out this article by Eric B. Parizo the editor of searchmobilecomputing.com to get additional information on this topic.