The St. Joe Valley Metronet is a high speed data network that connects dozens of South Bend businesses, hospitals and colleges.  What makes it unique is that it’s a ringed network made of dark fibers that allows data to keep moving even if there is a break or cut in the cable. 

What can St. Joe Valley Metronet do for my business?

• Help achieve speeds of 10gps or higher
• Provide bandwidth that is almost 6,000 times faster than T-1
• Back up business data in a matter of minutes (versus hours)
• Update information instantly across networks (Connect seamlessly, as if you were in the same building)
• Unlimited local access can be extended to facilities through-out the world via local high speed Internet access points.
• Allow for quality real-time video conferencing
• Website video streaming has never been easier.

In other words?  Crazy fast internet, great return on investment (ROI), and essentially no downtime.

The service area for the Metronet continues to expand as it’s been growing over the last few years.  You can find more information and continued updates on the St. Joe Valley Metronet at http://www.stjoevalleymetronet.org.

Really it’s cliché’ to say “we value our customers” or “we pride ourselves on superior customer service”…  Blah. Blah. Blah.   I’m sure the same information is on your competitor’s web site.  How are you insuring that you’re truly putting your customers first?

What controls can you put in place?  How can technology help raise the bar of the experience your clients have with your organization while saving time, improving security, and monitoring your business processes?

Microsoft 4.0 Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software can help.  What can it do for me?

• No more “information everywhere”.  CRM software can consolidate all your customer information into one shared database.

• Security for your sales leads and contacts.  If you have salespeople on the road with valuable leads only on their laptops, you may be at risk of those leads going with them if they choose to leave the company.  CRM centralizes this information from anywhere in the world.

• No more duplicate entry.  With Pinnacle’s PinConnect tool, we can have your customer data synchronized with your accounting system, push A/R information into CRM, and talk to just about any other system you have to get the information you need where you need it.
• Manage tasks and business processes.  Your business most likely has several processes, how a lead converts into a customer, how warranty or customer service calls are logged, how proposals are created, etc…  CRM has built in “workflow” tools to help you track the progress of critical functions and can send you automated alerts when/if they’re not happening.
• Information accessible 24/7 from anywhere.   You can access your CRM data from anywhere in the world via the web to update meeting notes, add leads, you name it.
• Business Intelligence.  Once your data is consolidated, you can get the information you need to make day to day decisions to help effectively manage your operation and improve service with scores of built in reports.
• And there’s more.  Really, the opportunities to customize CRM to your specific needs are nearly endless.  This is not your old spreadsheet telling you your customer’s birthday… this is a platform that can lead to web portals for your clients, multiple systems working together, an employee management tool, sales funnel reporting, and more…

Want to see it in action? 

On February 25th from 11:00-1:00, we will cover some CRM basics, but more importantly, give you practical examples of how businesses are actually using this software to build sales, improve service, and more…  Better yet?  We’ll feed you lunch…. on us.

Where:     Pinnacle, 4100 Edison Lakes Pkwy Ste320, Mishawaka, IN  46545

When:   February 25th, 11:00-1:00   (Lunch provided)

Cost:   $0

Please RSVP at http://pinnaclecrm.eventbrite.com or call us at (574) 235-8100 to register.

Can I really use Facebook or Twitter for my business?  How do I even get started in the process to learn some basics?  Can social media be an effective tool in achieving successful communications with my target audience?

Join a group of other business leaders for six months to dive in and learn real tools to launch your social media strategy.  (Limited to 12 organizations)

What Can You expect?

• Learn practical ways to leverage Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and other tools to create your social media strategy.
• Review examples of how some companies are using social media well (or, in some cases, not well at all).
• You will learn from each other, as a variety of different local businesses will discuss what’s working for them, what they’re learning, questions they’re asking, and more!
• This experience will be dynamic.  You control the agenda based on feedback from month to month and the specific needs in the group.  We will be customizing the content according to your desires.
• Great food!  Thanks to LaSalle Grill offering to host for these 6 meetings, we will enjoy some really fine dining along the way!

First Social Media Coaching Network Meeting:

Date:  February 18, 2009

Time:  11am – 1pm

Place:  LaSalle Grill– Colfax Suite

Price: (6) Luncheons Only:  $395   (Alternatively, for those organizations already participating in our ongoing, personalized Social Media Coaching services, the cost to attend these luncheons is free).   

Want Personalized Coaching?

We are offering a variety of options for Social Media Coaching specific to your organization’s needs.  Depending on your goals, they range from “just get me started” to a “strategically optimized” social media plan tied to your business initiatives.

We are looking forward to learning and working with this great group of organizations!  February 18 is coming fast, so if you’re interested in filling one of our remaining spots on our Social Media Coaching network, please call or email our Social Media Consultant, Michelle Hillaert at:

574-235-8100 x327
mhillaert@pinnacleofindiana.com

For the business leader:

 Has your IT department asked for a large storage budget this year leaving you concerned with the rising costs of storage? You can now purchase your IT storage as you need it in small discreet chunks using new storage technologies rather than in large expensive chunks. 

There are currently two companies that stand out in this market.  HP became one of the strongest players with the purchase of Left-Hand Systems.  The second company is a new player in the market originating in Indiana, Scale Computing.  Scale Computing leverages the same technology as HP with a promise of much less expensive price.

What do I need to know about storage and why should I care?

• You can purchase storage in small increments as your business grows rather than large investments based on best guess projections.
• Usable clustered storage runs from $5-10 per GB, while traditional SAN storage runs $12-24 per GB after configuration and software licensing.
• The potential ROI in clustered storage is the amount of dollars/yr investment vs. available storage at year end. Reducing available, but unused storage purchases, eliminating “cage” costs, and eliminating software licensing can dramatically increase storage ROI’s.
• If you currently have a terabyte of storage, are planning a virtualization project, or getting ready to renew maintenance on an existing SAN - you should consider the benefits of clustered storage and discuss with your IT Team or provider.
• If you’ve outgrown your current storage solution and are planning to expand this year, a cheaper alternative may be clustered storage, which can be less than maintenance on existing systems
• Like all technology considerations, your storage solutions should be part of your overall Technology Plan.

For the Technician:

 JBOD to JBODS
SAN technologies first took off when innovative engineers discovered they could leverage the low costs of hard-drives built for Personal Computers to build large virtual storage systems. Enterprising engineers found that redundant arrays of inexpensive drives allowed them to build large pools of storage leveraging consumer focused drive technologies. Engineers soon learned that software could also take advantage of the larger number of read devices to cheaply produce inexpensive, yet fast storage systems. JBOD (for Just a Bunch of Drives) philosophies for building storage solutions eventually became so commonplace they overtook the strategies for building large storage systems. JBOD designs now dominate all multi-drive storage solutions.

Scale Computing and HP’s Left-Hand Systems take advantage of increasingly inexpensive multi-core CPU based server hardware in much the same way engineers first took advantage of drives with increasingly larger number of read/write mechanisms. Both vendors’ architectures replace the concept of “cages of drives” with the concept of storage nodes.   Storage nodes are essentially 1U servers filled to the brim with drives. Each storage node is a 1U server with four internal hard drives configured for redundancy. SANs are built by plugging multiple storage nodes into a common GB Ethernet switch. Think of the new storage approach as JBODS (just a bunch of drives and servers) instead of JBOD.
The advantages of the clustered storage node approach to building SANs over cage architectures are many.

• Eliminating traditional cage frameworks removes cage capacity issues, as both vendor architectures scale to petabytes from even a small 3TB starter SAN.
• Adding storage nodes also increases the number of available read/write mechanisms, and therefore SAN performance; while at the same time increasing storage access bandwidth as single, or sometimes multiple, GB uplinks are added with each new node.
• Storage nodes can be added “as needed”, in small or large increments, with both architectures allowing nodes consisting of different sized drives to be added to the SAN.

Scale Computing and HP’s Left-Hand Systems architectures leverage software to ensure data is replicated across different storage nodes, ensuring entire storage nodes or drives can fail without losing data. While Scale and Left-Hand architectures differ in approach to providing drive-management redundancies, both offer increased redundancies potentially dwarfing the majority of caged SAN solutions. Both vendors promise some version of “all-software, all-the-time” with their SAN purchases; and both vendors indicate their solutions include previously enterprise class storage management solutions at no additional cost.  

Sizing and Buy-in Costs
Both Scale Computing and Left-Hand Systems price storage nodes at usable sizes (size after configuration for redundancy). Today’s nodes start at 1TB each, with three nodes required to start a SAN. Pricing appears to vary broadly depending on vendor, hardware, and options. Pricing starts at under $13K for 3TB of Scale branded blades; Scale also offers IBM branded blades at higher premiums. HP branded Left-Hand pricing starts in the $25 -30K range for a similar amount of storage. High availability options with power and network options are available at higher pricing from both vendors.

Conclusion
Whether an ROI driven business executive, or a technology driven gear-head – both of these technologies are worth watching and perhaps even testing. The cost advantages inherent in JBODS design closely mirrors past JBOD philosophies which have shaped the storage industry for years. Combining IP based architectures with commodity based clustered CPU and drive technologies, at a time when thousands of terabytes are referred to as petabytes, is somewhat akin to launching a big-wave surfer past giant 40-foot breakers with a jet sky; whether they crash and burn, or come out on top of the surf in the end – clustered storage solutions are guaranteed for a very, very wild ride.