Is it time to differentiate your business from the others? In today’s economic climate, commodities will suffer.

You might not really be selling a commodity. But if your customers — or potential customers — perceive your products and services as commodities, you may suffer anyway.

Tailoring your business systems to the exact business requirements of your company allows you to gain a competitive advantage by differentiating your business from the competition.

An exclusive Manhattan caterer used a Clevertech custom software solution to provide a special experience for their customers. The system took care of all their business needs, and at the same time offered a special interactive menu that reinforced the image of the caterer as a cutting-edge firm.

When you can say, “Our service is faster and better because we have special software that allows us to automate some decision-making according to our special 12-point system,” you show your clients that you’re savvy enough to make use of technology and valuable enough to rate an exclusive custom software system.

At the same time, your custom software is designed for your business, so you can enjoy the smooth functioning of a system designed for the way you work. And when things change (for example, when your business grows as a result of that differentiation), there’s no need to change to a new software package that might be a slightly better fit. Just have Clevertech back in to tailor your business systems to your new business reality.

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These days, businesses are working on running leaner. You may be looking to automate systems and maximize productivity. There are online programs that can help. Here are a few of the ones we like:

• Microsoft Office Live integrates with MSOffice, lets all project participants share workspaces for a given project, and gives you a place to keep all your documents.
• 37 Signals has a whole suite of productivity apps, including TaDaList, Basecamp, Backpack, and several more. They’re versatile, robust, and easy to use.
• Freshbooks is an easy invoicing application. It tracks time and integrates with some accounting programs. Billing Orchard and SmartPay are others.
• Zoho is another productivity powerhouse.
• SugarCRM helps keep customer relations on track, with some sophisticated reporting options.
• Remember the Milk is a to-do list. We find that it works well with GTD. Nozbe is designed for GTD.

All these applications can be useful. If you only need one or two for your business, and then you’re satisfied with your systems, then you’ve got an economical solution.

If you’re tired of cobbling things together and having them not quite work the way you need them to, or you don’t have time to bother with things that aren’t going to work quite the way you want them to, or if you’d need half a dozen of the programs listed above in order to meet your needs, then you’re the kind of business Clevertech is designed for.

We build custom software systems for businesses serious enough to need custom systems. Call us at (516) 869-4970 today.

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Who isn’t getting calls for donations from all kinds of charities these days? In the current economic climate, needs are greater than ever — and you certainly don’t want your money going to unnecessary overhead. How can you be sure you’re doing the most good with your donations?

Technology to the rescue! While you’re still on the line, you can check Charity Navigator’s profile of the organization.
Charity Navigator gives you an overview of a charity’s financial effectiveness. From their revenue growth to their CEO’s salary, all the details for a comprehensive assessment of the organization’s financial management practices are on the screen in front of you.

If you don’t like what you see, let the callers know that they need to clean up their act before you’ll donate.

Once you’re off the phone and have some time to explore further, you’ll find that Charity Navigator has a lot more to offer, from tax tips for giving to historical data on specific organizations.  Register for free and you can save a list of charities you’re interested in, share information with friends, and compare organizatons side by side. When you get that next phone call, you can line up the caller against organizations you’ve given to in the past and see whether you’d want to add or switch.

Do good and be smart.

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We believe in backup. We’ve written before about programs to back up all the files on your copmputer, but sometimes you might want to back up something that’s not exactly on your computer. That’s when Lifestream backup comes into play.

Lifestream backup will automatically back up your stuff in a variety of online programs, including Flickr, Twitter, and Photobucket, with Google docs, Delicious, and WordPress coming soon.

Share your log-in info with Lifestream, and you’ll automatically get multiple backups made and stored in multiple locations, with no further effort on your part.

Where’d the name come from? Many people are now using the term “lifestream” to refer to the bits of information you leave hither and yon — in your Flickr account, on Twitter, at your blog, and so on. It’s ephemeral, really. If your blog platform goes out of business, then your blog is gone. Lifestream backup saves and replicates your lifestream for you for about a dime a day.

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I added a special kind of functionality to a client’s user interface today. The client has forms in the application — those screens where there are boxes into which the client types information.

Now the client can click on a field name in a form and up pops a little modular window where he can enter a note. The note can be a field definition, how he arrived at a number entered, or simply a note to himself for the future.

The pop-up window is really a simulated window that resides inside the current browser, so the client won’t end up with multiple browser windows open. Also, it can be resized or dragged out of  the way — like “post-its” for the screen.

This idea came out of a griping session from a client who couldn’t remember how he came up with some adjustment numbers for an overcollateralization analysis.

It  helps the client, and it helps the developer as well. I can read these notes and get a better understanding of the client’s methods, which allows me to understand and deliver future requests faster.

Not to mention it is also pretty cool functionality.

Coolness counts.

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Every company has at least one: the experienced manager we all like to go to for advice and decisions. He knows it all, because he’s seen it all. He listens, thinks… and gives us the wisest course of action. It looks like magic – or, if not magic, at least an amazing and inexplicable insight into situations and people.

In fact, the wise manager is using rules. From his experience, he has learned that if this happens, that will probably follow. Multiply this simple pattern by dozens or even hundreds of rules in multiple situations, and it all happens so fast in his brain that he isn’t even aware that he those rules operating.

The rules are trapped in his head, as tacit knowledge. He couldn’t explain how he makes those decisions – so he can’t pass on that knowledge to another manager.

And yet, that knowledge is part of the the capital of your company. We recognise that information is an asset. You know that your data, your special processes, your innovative ideas are part of the intellectual capital of your company, creating value that’s potentially negotiable. Read the artilce »

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