Happy Dawg Days of Summer! August has proven to be anything but a slow news month. Volatile markets, numerous industry events and work that needs to be done suggest that our vacation months is really a working vacation month.

In this issue – I share with you the geek content we already have for the SMB Nation Fall conference and then ask for your help in adding more and more content (complete our Geek survey). You’re also invited to a geek webinar (August 11, 2011 at 10AM PST).

Many readers have followed the story of my niece, Christa Brelsford, over the past 18+ months since the Haiti earthquake. You may recall she was impacted by the earthquake while volunteering in Haiti – teaching children to read. I’m thrilled to report that, in late July, Christa was married to Ethan Coon in our own hometown of Bainbridge Island, WA. And their future looks bright – they are booth smarties with Ethan (PhD – math) working at the National Laboratory in Lo Alomos, NM and Christa completing her doctorate.

Christa and Ethan Coon – married July 30, 2011

cheers....harrybbb

Harry Brelsford | CEO | SMB Nation, Inc. |

PS – the “Fall Fun” for our 9^th annual conference all starts at fall.smbnation.com. Save the date for September 30-October 2 in Las Vegas PLUS the pre-days of September 28-29 PLUS the post-day bike ride of October 3^rd

Get your Geek on – SMB Nation Fall 2011

It’s “back to school” time in more ways than one. With autumn approaching – it’s literally time to think about the continuing professional pathway you will pursue in the next few months. And with new volatility in the economy, the time-tested theorem of more education rings true, loud and clear.

So right here, right now I want to list the current GeekSpeak sessions we have PLUS ask you to recommend several additional sessions. We have about five (5) more spots to fill and I want to make sure our content is “spot on.”

Group Policy in SBS 2011(Eriq Oliver Neale - SBS author)

One of the major differences in SBS 2011 Standard and SBS 2011 Essentials is that SBSE does not have any Group Policy elements created as part of the installation process beyond the standard policy objects that get created when a Windows 2008 R2 server is promoted to a domain controller. Those who are used to managing previous SBS installations are going to be surprised to find that a lot of the familiar tools they are used to using are no longer present, and some of the typical features of previous versions of SBS are not present because the Group Policy structure of other SBS versions is missing.

In this session, we will cover the key Group Policy objects present in SBS 2011 Standard to give attendees a foundation to use to build their own GPO scheme in SBS 2011 Essentials. Even those who are not familiar with Group Policy will come away with an understanding of how to implement folder redirection and other common tasks made possible through Group Policy.

Windows MultiPoint Server 2011 - The Perfect Second Server for SBS (Charlie Russel – MVP, Windows Author)

Microsoft's new MultiPoint Server is a perfect fit as a second server in your SBS environment. Why pay for the Premium Add-on if you don't need SQL? Instead, add a MultiPoint Server and get all the benefits of a Remote Desktop Server, but with better management and control and less cost. We'll see how the flexible connections of WMS allow you to quickly add users to your network for less, while the management capabilities give you complete control and visibility over what your users are doing.

GS104 - The Five Technical Things You Need to Know about Developing Successful Windows Phone Solutions including MANGO! Ed Roberts (Windows Phone expert)

This technical session will focus on how partners can extend value to their existing customers by integrating Windows Phone in specific discussions. We'll provide product demos, discuss B2B value props, review integration with Sharepoint 2010, Exchange, and Office. Attendees also gain an understanding of the "consumerization of IT" dilemma that business customers and IT departments face and how Windows Phone can effectively mitigate its effect.

BONUS: Technical review of MANGO – the newest version of Windows Phone! Create Groups and Threads, Local Scout, Live Tiles,

DOUBLE-BONUS: Apps! The app marketplace is more dynamic than ever with very few solutions standing out and delivering strong business benefits. Attend this session and learn about proven strategies and best practices to successfully take your Windows Phone solutions to market.

GS110 - Telepresence Secrets (Harry Brelsford, author and conference founder)

Harry has a new technical niche and it's really cool: Telepresence! The topic will be introduced by learning how SMB Nation switched its business model this spring by dispatching many workers to home office equipped with a business-class telepresence solution. Then the lecture will turn technical, where four competing systems are evaluated: VU Telepresence, Cisco UMI, Skype and ClearOne Collaborate Console. Each solution offers very different functionality. Then learn the common port openings for Telepresence and how to make such entries on a firewall device. Next will be the discussion about bandwidth consumption and network packet loss. The future is now – it's Telepresence in SMB!

See below for voting on the remaining GeekSpeak content!

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HELP NEEDED: Geek Content Survey!

Everybody has an opinion – and I’d like to tap into your sentiments. You know your business best and can tell me what content adds maximum value to your SMB Nation Fall conference experience. Please take two (2) minutes to answer my short content survey. It will drive the selection of speakers and content for the remaining five sessions!

Complete the survey HERE.

A Balanced Approach to Backup & Disaster Recovery

Perhaps the most overlooked business practice by small business is disaster recovery planning. While disasters occur every year and in every region of our country—from hurricanes in the South/Southeast, debilitating snowstorms in the Northeast/Great Lakes regions, to tornadoes in the Midwest and earthquakes in the West—many businesses ignore nature, thinking that it could never happen to them. Maybe these businesses believe that they cannot afford a backup server or that backing up is too complex to understand and implement. However, there are valuable lessons to be learned about backup and disaster planning from the businesses that survived or failed during a recent disaster. The most important takeaway is the need for a balanced backup and disaster recovery plan.

A balanced Backup & Disaster Recovery plan takes into consideration several factors. Factors like, how important is your data, how many copies should you make and keep, and how much can you afford to for a backup solution. Another question a small business should ask itself is how much revenue will you lose for every hour, day or week without your data? From these questions come the basis of a plan that considers a business’s needs, budget, and the amount of downtime they can tolerate.

Local, Remote, and Cloud backup as the three components that make up a balanced Backup and Disaster Recovery plan for businesses of all sizes. Smaller businesses from small amounts or less valuable data will benefit from a simple and local backup. Small businesses with larger amounts of more critical data will find comfort in more redundancy or a combination of local and remote backup devices. Finally, there is a combination of local, remote and cloud based backup for a business that cannot risk losing their data for even the smallest amount of time.

MSPs, VARS, and System Integrators are in a unique position of being able to help their customers achieve any and all levels of the balanced Backup & Disaster Recovery plan. Through creative offerings that consider a customer’s needs, budget, and tolerance for downtime, service providers have an opportunity to become a trusted advisor before, during, and after a disaster. In fact, you can be a real HERO. Give HEROware a call today to find out about our Partner Program and demo our “all-in one” Backup & Disaster Recovery appliance, The HERO-Defender™ and the HERO-Cloud™ Suite (FILE, SERVER, and MAIL). Find out why customers are calling this, “The Fastest, Most Cost-Effective, and Easiest backup solution in the known universe.”

More Input Needed! GeekSpeak Webinar August 11, 2011, 10AM PST

Hurry up and don’t delay – please attend my “Top Reasons” Webinar [https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/820573648 ]for the SMB Nation Fall conference tomorrow. You will assist me in selecting the final GeekSpeak content for the event.

August 11th @ 10am to 11am PST

Are You Disturbed? Top Reasons to Attend SMB Nation Fall 2011 (Sept 30-Oct 2)

Now more than ever, you need to be especially smart in your small and medium business consulting/reseller practice. Changing times create unique opportunities for YOU to capitalize on. Attend this webinar to learn more about the new and improved SMB Nation Fall conference. Top reasons to attend, to be revealed in this webinar, include new business models, lines of work, the convergence of complementary technologies and much more!

If you are disturbed by the changes in technology and how it impacts YOU - then you must attend this one hour webinar.

August 11, 2011

10:00AM PST (GMT-8)

Learn more about the 9^th Annual SMB Nation Fall conference at fall.smbnation.com

Register HERE for the webinar:

https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/820573648

Engineering your marketing

In todays era of marketing it bodes well for those who understand the technical sides of things. This is not to say that aesthetics and design are not important, however understand how computers process and packets are routed give you a leg up. At Cisco we have found that marketing is much like designing a network, where have an access and core layers.

The core of your marketing like the network is where all prospects traverse through on their way to becoming a lead. In the case of marketing it is a centralized landing page or microsite. Landing pages are similar to a page on your website, but focus on the solution you are marketing and calls to actions (request a quote or consultation) are clear. Your main website is designed to cover all that you do and can distract a prospect causing a loss of leads (like dropping a packet due to poor network design.)

The access layer of your marketing are all the individual marketing tactics that you do to drive prospects to your landing page, such as a banner ad, SEM, email, or handing out flyers. All these tactics help funnel prospects and the more you can funnel to the landing page the more likely you are to produce a lead. While I know that is a fairly simplistic view of marketing, the reality is marketing is fairly simple it just takes commitment and consistency.

Here is a base line marketing activity that you can do for a minimal budget.

• Acquire a list of 500 contacts with emails from a company like Jigsaw.
• Email the list with a different message every two to four weeks
• Set up a landing page that emails will drive to
• Call all prospects in the following order
  • That fill out the lead form
  • Clicked on the embedded link in the email
  • Those that opened the email

This will make calling prospects more strategic and less daunting.

Cisco also has several guides that help you create a marketing plan and execute on individual marketing tactics on Cisco Partner Central.

If you are not a registered Cisco partner and want access to this please visit www.cisco.com/go/smbnation to found out how to be come a Cisco partner.