Archive for September, 2009

Made some important programming changes, bug fixes, feature upgrades, etc to our OrderReadyInventory.com web service.

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Looking for Internet statistics? Google, probably as a response to searches for statistics websites, went ahead and created a portal for viewing internet statistics on core subjects like

• Macro-economic trends
• Technology
• Consumer Trends
• Media Consumption
• Media Landscape

We have only begun to see what this can do but the most intriguing opportunity to us is the ability to submit statistics to google.

We are considering utilizing some of our clients extensive industry experience and authoring informational articles on statistics that we can back up and then submitting them.

What statistics would you offer?

Got an email from Verizon about their distribution of my CPNI (Customer Proprietary Network Information) to their “family of companies”, which I can do without at this time. So now that I am notifed what options are usually available?
1) Call someone on an extremely low-priority call center
2) Mail a letter, who can find a stamp?
3) Send an email, not bad, but no confirmation my preference is adhered to

Usually, consumers will end up ignoring these because none of these options is particularly fulfilling. But Wait!

Down at the bottom is a Do Not Share My CPNI link! Clicking it required no login since it was coded with my email address and I get an immediate response saying my preference has been logged.

Fin. I like that!

Next time we need to contact our customers for a quick question, this is a customer-friendly strategy, well-worth noting!

We’ve moved a step closer to realizing our vision for a robust Form Data aggregation and modeling utility service in our FormTracks offering.

FormTracks is exactly what this post title says: a Web Form Conversion Tracking and Analysis Service. Simply put, it offers website owners a means by which to securely stored Web form Data that comes into their domains, analyze conversions, and interpret form fields into cogent data sets to further interpolate and extrapolate what the data means. All of this means better data management for your domains, and a more concise understanding of what all of the data means.

What’s more, it is a developer-centric service. FormTracks Integration is available through the FormTracks Web API platform. It’s early capabilities allow for remote form posting, system querying, report creation, and data exporting. Eventually, through the FormTracks API, we intend on providing white labelling capabilities, so developers can build their apps around the FormTracks Architecture while embedding their own programmatic touch of class! The API system is slow going, so stay tuned for the FormTracks API Documentation.

Take a look at FormTracks for yourselves.

Did you get your check from Department of Revenue Services? If not, that’s probably because you DID NOT overpay your business taxes! Congratulations!

Check from CT DRS

Living in N.E. with the winter not too far away got me thinking about
the ‘awesome’ commutes us New Englanders have to look forward to on
our way to work. Which immediately brought one word to mind:
Telecommuting. Being in the “Web Sphere” as it were, 3Prime has the
luxury of being accessible anywhere - at the office, from home, etc.
b/c we have implemented a telecommuting policy that works for the
company b/c it works for our employees.

But what else dawned on me was how many businesses through New England
(and country wide) DON’T have any intention of implementing a
telecommuting policy anytime in the near future, and how these
businesses are putting themselves at a great disadvantage.

So, I came up with a short list of reasons to implement a
telecommuting policy, and how doing so will put businesses at an
advantage in the short term as well as the long term.

1) Increase Employee Moral
Workers will embrace their employer when telecommuting becomes
available b/c they are being given the opportunity of flexibility,
which is a critical in-road to embracing your staff as a key business
asset. Any attitude an employer takes that conveys the concept that
employees are valuable and not expendable, will generate a reciprocal
feeling of appreciation, which will bolster employee moral, job
satisfaction, and motivation to excel. Which leads to my next point:
Increased Productivity.

2) Increased Productivity
A satisfied worker is a good worker. And a good worker is productive.
Think about that: People LIKE to work. If they didn’t, we’d ALL be
looking for government handouts!! People work to make a living, and
to advance their stance in life. They may not like their JOB, but
they understand the value in working. So make them like their job a
bit more, and they’ll give it back to you. By introducing a means by
which to access their working resources from many locations, you are
increases the means to produce, and that is good in itself for morale,
as well as the employer.

3) Maximize Resource Allocation
Telecommuting policies provide an opportunity to down-scope resources
through data centralization, hardware consolidation, and
virtualization. This in turns drives deployment opportunities for
said-resources regionally, nationally, and globally, and in a global
economy, this is a must. What’s more, the overall overhead of
managing hardware resources is reduced dramatically, so along with
allocation improvement you affect a lower cost of operation. And
through advancements in Cloud Computing, implementing complete
web-based solutions are now possible, which further reduce operating
costs further.

Many businesses that offer a service (b/c, as we know, America is
becoming more and more a Service Economy), have the potential for
having an “always open” persona that makes their services more
accessible, more effective, and ultimately, more marketable if they
would but embrace too philosophies: View your employees as your
greatest assets, and provide them the means to telecommute.

Telecommuting in this day in age, IMHO, represents a major departure
from traditional Business management policies - and also the most
important thing for ownership to implement.

Offering health insurance coverage to our Connecticut-based employees is one of our goals for 2009, at the close of the 3rd quarter, we find ourselves in an unexpected position where due to a lack of certainty about what legislation federal government may churn out in the next 6 months, we are hesitant to make a move only to find that it doesn’t meet requirements or fails to take advantage of greater choice or competition in the healthcare insurance marketplace.

What has been your experience?

We have been warned, this flu season could well be more active than in recent years. As a business owner, I thought it would be helpful to create a single source for “best practices” as far as advising our employees and informing ourselves on the topic.

Most of what I have read seems simplistic, but here’s what 3PRIME will be doing next week and we recommend the same to you!

Fact 1)
Typical Incubation period (time between infection and full-on symptoms) is one to three days.

Fact 2)
Hand washing with anti-bacterial soap will reduce exposure to the flu virus in general, including the H1N1 virus.

What to tell your employees
1) If you feel the notable symptoms of flu, please stay home for 48 hours. We will provide you with work to perform at home to limit any lost time in hourly wages. If you treat yourself with anti-viral drugs within the first 2 days of symptoms, you will feel better quicker.

2) We have provided alcohol based hand sanitizer and paper towels, please use as often as you like, particularly before and after meals and after using the bathroom.

3) Seasonal flu shots are often available at Walgreens for $25. If you get one we will reimburse you for 50% of the cost.

4) Cover your mouth and nose with a tissue when you sneeze and use your sleeve when you cough. This prevents the airborne spread of bacteria.

5) Avoid touching your eyes, nose and mouth to reduce the spread of germs

Things you can do at your office
1) Clean doorknobs and other common surfaces
2) Provide plenty of disposable tissues, paper towels and alcohol-based hand sanitizer

List of Notable H1N1 Symptoms
  • fever
  • chills and fatigue
  • cough, sore throat, runny or stuffy nose
  • body aches, headache
  • diarrhea and vomiting has also been reported as an H1N1 symptom

Many more resources
If you want lots of resources, there are links below, but above I have tried to summarize the most critical aspects of preparing your office and employees

pandemicflu.gov/professional/business/
www.cdc.gov/h1n1flu/flyers.htm

How would a sales tax decrease affect your business?

For 3PRIME, not much! We haven’t yet started selling flooring in CT or designer handbags, so this shouldn’t have an immediate affect on us.

But the proposed budget seeks to decrease the retail sales tax from 6 percent to 5.5 percent. Some of our local CT clients could experience an uptick in sales at a much needed time.

For example, RhinoShelters.com, the new brand for MDM Shelters portable garage products, will find that their customers save a bit on their sales taxes. this improves their ability to compete with other online sellers selling in CT, where MDM would have to charge sales tax.

Another local company, Universal Hotel Liquidators, a CT furniture store, will definitely benefit since most of their sales are to local New Haven residents. Of course, people come from all over CT, MA, and even NY because of their great deals, but all of these are taxable sales, so each of those customers stands to save a few dollars.