Saving Companies Thousands. Be One!

I am always looking for ways to help increase my productivity, or just generally looking for cool new ways to do things on the computer or my phone. With that said one of my most commonly visited websites is LifeHacker. Most articles related to Lifehacker have to deal with PC shortcuts and cool web applications to make life easier. I read about a very helpful mobile tool that should help many people.

The tool they wrote about was BitPim. BitPim is basically an application that allows you to backup your data on many regular phones. If you have a Blackberry, Treo, or Windows Mobile Device, backing up data usually means connecting to your computer with USB or the device does it by itself wirelessly. With regular phones these tasks are not so simple. Thankfully there are backup tools like “Wireless Backup” that Sprint is offering that helps back up contacts, but what if you need a little more?

With BitPim it can back up most of your data, help synchronize your calendars, and even help you put ringtones on your phone. As far as I know there are not many other products out there that do this. Make sure you read the article, because there are very detailed instructions of what you need to do. So try it out and see if it works for you. There are some phones that need a special cable and if you need to order one contact us.  Or if you are ready for a Smartphone let us know and we will help you out!

What a great weekend for football fans ( Me especially), preseason is starting, my wife bought me the DeMarcus Ware jersey I have been wanting, and super awesome Viigo now provides NFL scores in their application. The only really bad thing is the Dallas Cowboys lost, but its okay its preseason.

Anyways back to Viigo, I have had my first impressions of Project Tango some time back and I love it more now than I did then. Of course the NFL is a big deal for me. Usually when I am at a computer I am working, or at least trying to, so I do not always have a chance to check NFL scores. With Viigo on my Blackberry, I can keep up to date on the scores whenever I am away. Actually, I think it would be easier to check on Viigo then it would going to Yahoo Sports, or NFL.com.

Either way, Viigo is doing most things right. I am super excited that Podcasts will be available at some point in the near future. And with all the other things implemented like weather,tracking packages, and the ginormous amount of feeds you can get on there, Viigo is really turning out to be a killer app for Blackberry and Windows Mobile.

I was reading my Viigo feeds at red lights on the way home. I wanted to catch up a little on what I had missed today. I noticed a post about Gypsii which I had to look into because the name just sounded really funny. To ensure everybody’s safety while driving I decided to do further research at home instead of in the car.

When I looked at Gypsii.com it seemed pretty cool. It is yet another Social Networking site, but it definitely caught my attention. Here is the rundown with Gypsii I can geotag pictures, video, and audio. I could geoblog. So say I go to a restaurant and I have great service or horrible food, I could blog about my experience and exactly where it happened. It is really awesome. I would recommend going to the website and checking it out. If you are asking, the answer is yes it works on Blackberrys, but it also works on Windows,Symbian, and even the iPhone.

For business owners, this type of social networking could be used for professional reasons. If you need to make sure somebody is where they say they are you can make them place themselves on Gypsii. It is a great tool for many people, real estate comes to mind. The agent can take a picture of the house and geotag it. Now there is a picture on their Gypsii profile with the home and the exact location, which may also show other listings in close proximity. The real estate agent just showed 5 listings using Gypsii as a business tool.

I just finished reading an article from our good friends over at Blackberry Cool and they say that almost 400,000 small businesses (defined as a business with less than 99 employees) are either using a Smartphone or are planning on purchasing one in the very near future.

Now why would a small business do this, why would a small business customer invest the money into a more expensive device? Once you have seen what Smartphones can do the answer to that question is easy; a Smartphone will allow you to compete with your larger competition. One of the biggest problems small businesses face is real-time communication. A Blackberry, Palm, or Windows Smartphone allow you to e-mail, talk, and use the Internet in a nice little package. We feel Blackberrys are the best for e-mail integration. I almost always receive my e-mail on my Blackberry before it hits my Microsoft Outlook. Think about it,  your most important client sends you a time sensitive e-mail at 2:45 and you are out of the office. You do not get back until 4:30, you walk to your computer and you missed the deadline your client gave you. That is a lost client opportunity and your client has a little less faith in you. With your Smartphone you get the e-mail at 2:45, respond instantly, and you become your client’s hero.

Let me tell you, as I have said before my Blackberry has really made my life easier. It is a little easier, but the more important thing is that my customers are more satisfied. That is so important for a small to medium business, give your customers a reason to do business with your for life and that little extra cost for a Smartphone will be a no-brainer. Still not convinced click here.

Great news, Blackberry has just updated their already great Desktop Manager. It is mostly a cosmetic update of the previous Desktop Manager. If you have not used your Desktop Manager before, use it. Install the disc your phone came with or click here. An awesome feature of the Desktop Manager is the Backup and Restore tool. With this you can back up all of your information from your Blackberry and save it in case you need to load it onto a new device. 

A great addition to the current update is the ability to support Lotus Notes and Windows Mobile. There are several other small updates, and you could see a full list here. Desktop Manager does other things like helps load applications (for those that are not available OTA). It also has a Media Manager and you can change the options to Synchronize your data with your computer.

Bottom line is if you have a Blackberry and you have not used it try it. Blackberrys are so easy to use and the new Desktop Manager makes it a little easier. If you have any questions e-mail me alex@thephonestoreinc.com. You could also contact us here.