Nativeres Econtech talk

Can you place a price on a labor of love?

2009-09-28T08:11:00.000-07:00

Yes I can. What started out as a concept by myself and couple of friends has actually made a difference for an American Indian Compny. We can connect the dots on an actual tangible instance that resulted in dollars exchanging hands using a multiplier effect.

The Smithsonian Institution has selected Sault Printing to be its printer of choice this fall for a variety of printing projects for the National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI). “We were actually contacted by the Smithsonian for a quote and we had been recommended to them by Ryan, who is a well-known designer from the Osage Nation in Oklahoma,” explained Ron Maleport. “We’ve had a great working relationship with Ryan and even recently worked with him printing a program for a golf outing that Tiger Woods played in.” That outing, the Notah Begay III Foundation event, was held in Verona, New York as a fundraiser for the health and well-being of Native American youth.

Ryan in turned sent us an email stating "I located that business off of Americanindiansearch.com True story. Real talk."

We at AIS are tickled red to actually see the fruition of our labors. To connect american indian businesses with people that need their services and products.

We are currently thinking about AIS 2.0 and wondering how we are going to leverage new technologies to assist us and we are looking for more stories like this one. It takes me back to tellings of historic trade routes that we used to purchase products from one another as tribal entities and let's me know we are still doing it today.

Buy Indian it's tradition.

Joseph Brown Thunder

Co-founder, American Indian Search

For link to news story click here

What is this Social Networking thing?

2009-09-11T10:16:00.000-07:00

People want to interact with their media. They want it to know who they are and what they want without telling it. How do we get our products and messages to do this? Some of these questions are simple but the answers are anything but. If it looks easy then it probably took a lot of time to make it appear so. Research, research and more research on your market and customer is the only way you can get this data. Understanding your niche market takes alot of time and effort depending on whether it's local, regional or national.

What do you want to achieve determines how you will present your platform as well as how you choose it.We work to understand what it is that you do. We truly partner with your organization to get your message to those groups and parties that will help your cause and move you forward. Same communication process different technologies.

"We all want to be led to do something just not told" -joseph brown thunder

New CMS in Town

2009-04-15T07:36:00.000-07:00

New Kid on the Block
We don't write about stuff unless we think it has practical implications but we discovered a new open-source CMS (Content Management System) called Mura, f.k.a GoSava. While it’s only been publicly available under a year, it does seem to have the right stuff. Formerly known as Sava, it’s a CMS that’s feature-rich, highly-intuitive, and easy to use. We are impressed by its out-of-the-box web modules. It seems like every need has been anticipated, planned for, and built out.

Here’s a quick breakdown of some of the top features and benefits we uncovered.

Top Features Every Organization Wants that Mura Has:
Multiple sites – manage the content of more than one site from one Mura Administrator Dashboard
Permissions – set access for individuals and groups down to a specific page
Users and Groups – create users and groups
News – create a section for news stories with summaries
Forum – create a sense of community by implementing an interactive forum
Calendar – enter events, meetings, and more and allow visitors to see what’s ahead
Document Management – upload files and track them from the backend, create a permissions-based document library, etc.
Forms – create feedback and contact us forms
Blogs – create a site blog
Image Gallery – add an image gallery and control sizing and display attributes
Video – embed Flash movies

But wait…there’s more:
- Advertising Management – run advertising campaigns right inside Mura
- Email Marketing – send email newsletters for marketing or group communication
- Site Search
- Real-time User and Session Reporting – the dashboard shows basic statistics
- Save Drafts and Version History – you don’t have to publish immediately plus you can go back to an earlier version
- And more…

Fast and simple content editing
Browse to the page you want to update, log in as the administrator, and begin editing either from the front or the backend. With wysiwyg editing features, all you need is the ability to type and click on icons.

Worry-free editing
You won’t accidentally break any pages because content is separated from presentation. You can preview a page before publishing it. Also there is versioning and history that tracks previous file iterations. You can go back and republish older versions of pages in seconds.

Copy and paste entire pages
Instead of reinventing the wheel, you can copy and paste entire pages. This includes the page's template, navigation options, content objects, and more. Save time and prevent repetition.
Scheduled content publishing.

I wish I had this several years ago when I had to publish content for different time zones. With Mura, you have the ability to schedule the date and time you want content to go live. You can also set a date and time for when you want the content to be removed from the site to prevent outdated postings and unnecessary site clutter.

Permissions and workflow
Grant administrative users access to only the sections you want down to the page level. Give certain users only partial rights such as the ability to only post a draft instead of full publishing rights. Give access only to certain users or groups.

Built-in help
Mura has a built-in help system including extensive support content, documentation, FAQs, tutorials and a user support forum.

Rapid site development
WIth Mura's pre-built content objects, starter templates and intuitive interface, you can quickly get your site built. You can create content objects that behave like server-side includes. Edit one file and make it appear on multiple pages across your site.

Pre-built navigation options
There are several built-in navigation options to choose from including top nav, sequential nav, and subnav with nested menu items. There are dynamically-generated sitemaps that automatically update.

Intuitive, easy interface
The best part for users is the easy-to-use interface which allows you to basically see where everything in your site resides. You don’t have to go to three, five, or 10 different folders just to change one little item in your site. It takes two clicks to add a new page, and the new page inherits the correct template and content configurations by default.

Building community
If you’re building a site that requires user interactivity and feedback, Mura has features such as the "accept comments form" with integrated CAPTCHA that can be added to any page or content node, event reminder forms, content ratings (1-5 stars), user favorites, and more. Features like these come in handy when including a blog on your site.

Other Stand-out Features
Mura also offers an image gallery with automatic thumbnail creation and image resizing and ShadowBox display. It also offers an integrated Forms Manager, with form data storage and reporting. And for eCommerce, Mura has a shopping cart with PayPal integration.

Final Thoughts
After years of experience working with other proprietary and open-source CMS software, our group has found that Mura is one of the most user-friendly builds from a development as well as user perspective. From the intuitively designed backend, almost anyone can go in and make immediate changes to a website without fear of breaking the site or overwriting a page. Best of all, there is no question where a page resides in the bigger scheme of things. The Site Manager, for example, shows in a folder-like structure all the pages, subpages, and files of a site and allows easy access for adding, editing, deleting, and publishing. A lot of the in-demand web features are built-in. There is almost no need to ever spend extra time and money customizing and hacking the main build just to implement a single must-have feature. If you would like a demo get in contact and see how this CMS can help your organization.

Keeping Our Bases Covered.

2009-01-22T07:52:00.000-08:00

Because our team juggles so many open projects at any given time, we needed a place and way to track the progress of these various projects. It had to be a centralized area that each team member could access at any time, it had to be a tool that was easy to use, and it had to allow us to share information directly with our clients. We needed the ability to store and share project files, set up and assign tasks, and communicate with each other within the context of each project.

Enter Basecamp, www.basecamphq.com.

Basecamp by 37signals (www.37signals.com) is a fantastic and intuitive web-based project collaboration tool that allows us to do everything we need to do for our internal and client projects, plus more. It resides strictly on the internet hosted by 37signals’ web servers.

Our Basecamp account is safe, private, and secure – it’s password-protected. The beauty of this arrangement is that all we need is an internet connection and a web browser and we can access our projects from virtually anywhere. The same goes for our clients.

It’s easy to add our own team members to various projects or to add client members to various projects. We can restrict access of each individual using a simple permissions system that allows us to specify who can see what.

There is also a handy Messaging system that works very much like email and we can either share a message or make it a private so that internal communication can only be read by our team.

Here is a breakdown of some of the various sections and features our team uses the most:

The Dashboard
The Dashboard serves as our home base. It gives us a bird’s-eye view of our various projects and any new developments.

From here, we can view all our clients and projects on one screen. In the main content area on the left is a Late & Upcoming Milestones box. Any late items show up at the very top of this box. Anything due in the next 14 days shows up directly below this within a snapshot of a calendar in days format. Then right below this, all latest activity across projects is listed. Anything from the newest Milestone to the latest Comment, or from the most recent message to the latest revision of a File, is listed here.

Directly to the right of the main content area is a column that contains our company logo (this was uploaded by us) at the top. Below this is a “Create a new project” button. Then below this is the list of Your Projects.

Create New Project
The Create New Project button is obviously very important and is the starting point for using Basecamp. Once we click the button, we’re able to name the project and choose who can access it. We usually name a project by company name. If the company has us working on more than one project, we’ll create a new Basecamp project for each, while using any client-provided acronyms or subtitles for the new projects’ names. Basecamp then gives us a choice as to who should be able to access the project: “just our company for now” or “a client or another company, too.” We leave the default radio button “just our company for now” checked and click “create this project.”

People & Permissions
Using the People & Permissions tab, we can go into a new project and add access permissions. From here we can add people, remove people, and change permissions. Basecamp has it set up so we can add the client’s company and its team members, as well as our own internal team members. We set up a team member by filling out his/her email address, creating a Basecamp username and password, and sending a Basecamp invitation to that member’s email address. The invitation contains a default welcome message providing a link to the specific Basecamp project page for that company and the member’s username and password. The invitation is sent from Basecamp with a single click. Other member information can also be filled in including title, phone number, fax number, etc.

File Sharing
File sharing for our group is crucial. We share internal documents for the team’s eyes only (files set to private) as well as documents for our clients. Files like sitemaps, powerpoints, meeting notes, and project plans are the kinds of things we post. Basecamp allows us to save new file versions without overwriting the originals. All file versions remain accessible by whoever has permission. We can add, delete, and edit a description line for each file and each file version. We can also delete an entire file or file version. Files can also be attached to messages.

Messages
Messages in Basecamp work just like email only they are project-specific. We click to a specific project, write a message in Basecamp, click send, and the message will arrive at whatever email address(es) we have specified in Basecamp for that individual project’s members. We can specify who receives and who doesn’t receive a message by checking or leaving blank a checkbox next to member names. If it is a public message, anyone who has access to a particular project can sign into the Basecamp project page and view the message even if the message wasn’t sent to him/her. However, just like with files, we can set a message to private which means only our internal team can view and respond to it. Any replies, whether sent via email or added as a comment within Basecamp, post directly to the project. It’s a great way to track and record any and all project-related communication without crossing over into non-related projects and causing confusion.

Additional tools on Basecamp (depending on which package you subscribe to) can include To-Do Lists, Milestones, Writeboards, Chat, and Time Tracking. While just as intuitive and feature-rich as the other tools, our team rarely uses these, opting for other applications and custom methods to get the job done.

Pricing
As of this writing, there are three monthly plans to choose from. Taken from the Basecamp website, here are the plan descriptions:

Basic $24/month
Built for smaller businesses.
15 Active Projects
3 GB of space for files
Unlimited Clients/Users

Plus $49/month
Most popular, best value
35 Active Projects
10 GB of space for files
Unlimited Clients/Users
Time tracking
SSL Security

Max $149/month
The best, top of the line
Unlimited Projects
50 GB of space for files
Unlimited Clients/Users
Time tracking
SSL Security
Free Campfire Premium

All plans come with a 30-day free trial. If you’re looking to get your business communications organized, centralized, instantly accessible, and secure, give Basecamp a try. Our team is very happy with it.

SKYPE for 2009

2009-01-02T10:15:00.000-08:00

SKYPE Review by ResTeam

Voice over Internet Protocol, or VoIP, is a general term for delivering voice communications over the Internet. In layperson terms, this means you can talk on the “telephone” via your computer as long as you have access to the Internet.

One of the big-name service providers in the VoIP arena is Skype. Our company has been using Skype for about a couple of years now. While it’s far from perfect, it has come through for us in a positive way about 90% of the time.

I’m going to provide a brief overview of our experience with Skype including helpful tools as well as a list of pros and cons.

Skype offers a myriad of services, some of them bundled and some of them a la carte, with either a pay-as-you-go plan or a subscription plan. While their website is all cheery and nice-looking, it can be a little difficult to navigate, and even harder to determine exactly what services you need.

We’ve kept it simple by subscribing to the service called SkypeIn which enables our team to receive incoming calls from phones and mobiles. Subscriptions are in 3 to 12 month increments. (Skype to Skype calls are always free which saves our company money when we have any internal conference calls or one-on-one calls.)

A very cool feature of Skype that comes in handy in this increasingly mobile world is the forwarding feature. You can have your Skype calls forwarded to your mobile phone/device number after a predetermined number of rings set by you. You can then answer the call from wherever you are.

You can also have your Skype calls go into voicemail after a certain number of rings (again, set by you) and you can retrieve your messages through your Skype interface.

There are some general tools that have been helpful to us when using Skype such as:

A VoIP headset microphone. Many third-party companies make these. We generally go with Logitech. These allow you to hear the party on the other end of the line as well as speak to them through the microphone hands-free. You can get headset microphones that have a cable that splits into two separate plugs, one for the microphone jack and one for the headphone jack on your computer. Other slightly pricier models offer a usb cable which simplifies things. Comfort level, pricing, and to a lesser extent sound quality vary so shop around.
A VoIP handset. If you already have a headset microphone, you don’t need one of these, and vice versa. Again, third parties make these and they operate similar to a standard handset phone except for the fact that they respond and work with Skype. I typically like to go hands-free but if you feel you need a more traditional approach to talking on the phone, go for it. Again, shop around for the features you desire.
A broadband internet connection. Skype can work just fine over 56k dial-up according to what I’ve read, but our experience has been with broadband.

Not everything is peachy keen with Skype. Though rare, sometimes the quality of the calls suffer. We have experienced the following issues when using Skype:

Dropped calls in the middle of a meeting
Echo
Sound going in and out resulting in randomly dropped words
In one-on-one calls, one party cannot hear the other resulting in hanging up and redialing
Also, another thing I found irksome is the business administrator panel user interface. It’s not the best user interface and requires a little digging before you find the areas you need to access. When you finally learn your way around, you can access your entire team’s profiles and Skype information. You can also renew individual subscriptions here with a valid credit card or with Skype credits still remaining on your account.

Finally, the subscription lengths max out at 12 months for a service like SkypeIn. If you forget to renew, you can risk losing your SkypeIn number, the one you might’ve already had printed on all your marketing materials. If you lose your number, it’s released into the open where it may be assigned to any new subscriber or even a consumer purchasing telephone services from another provider. Thankfully, you’re given a grace period before this happens and allows you a chance to renew.

Other than a few gripes here and there, Skype has been a very useful tool for business. It has allowed our team to stay in contact with clients as well as each other, and to remain fast, light, and mobile. If you need a quick, easy, and fairly inexpensive way to outfit your business with VoIP, look into Skype.

Based on our team’s subscription plan and our experiences, here’s Skype at a glance. Be sure to check their website for specific details, pricing, and the features you desire.

Pros
Offers free services
Skype-to-Skype calls
Transfer calls to people on Skype
Video calls
Instant messaging and group chats
Conference calls with up to 25 people
Forward calls to people on Skype
Offers independence and mobility
Easy to use
Can view online status of fellow Skype contacts
Forward your Skype calls to your mobile phone/device
Voicemail
Requires only a VoIP headset microphone or handset to start using it
Fairly inexpensive plans
Ala carte services
Pay-as-you-go or subscription-based (subscribers save more)

Cons
Sound quality can sometimes be subpar
Dropped calls happen (but are rare)
One side cannot hear the other (again, rare)

More Pros then Cons and we recommend this product as a needed services for your business in the new year.

Choosing a technology partner for IT support and web development firm

2008-09-19T20:33:00.000-07:00

Choosing a technology partner is like finding a good car repair shop. Once you find one you probably will stay with them for as long as they are in business. I had an import car and I used to take it to the dealership because I had heard that a local shop doesn’t understand the make and model like the dealership does; but then my uncle was a mechanic who worked under the assumption that if it has wheels and a motor, he could fix it. So I found a local shop. I may pay more, but I know the mechanic and the shop is local which stands by its reputation. This is the same for most tech shops. The first thing is to collect a list of local shops in your area or even national, depending on if they can work remotely and you’re comfortable with that. Ask people you trust who their firm is. Remember this is a partnership. Assess the long term stability of the firm. As with any relationship value will build over time.

Good communication. Make sure the firm has a good process in place, and takes the time to understand your organization and listens to your goals and objectives. Development and support could take several months, and will involve numerous phone calls, emails and possibly face-to-face meetings. It's important the firm communicates effectively and is available to offer support.

I almost always choose my vendors through word of mouth or viral marketing because I trust the people I know and trust the people they give their money and time to.

Price structure. A development firm can either charge you by the hour, or quote a fixed cost per project, depending on the pricing structure of the firm. If you are being charged by the hour, the company can charge you for any extra unexpected developments the project takes. With a fixed quote, you will be charged the quoted price even if the project takes the developers twice the estimated time.If you can't afford everything your website requires, then opt to build your site in phases. Avoid cheap package deals and claims of $300 websites: you get what you pay for. Don't take the risk of driving away traffic and working against your image with a cheap site.

Initially I didn’t understand the old adage, “You can have fast, cheap or good. You choose two but you can’t have all three.” Once I started running a business I ended up living by it. The best firms will almost never be the cheapest because they usually have a waiting list or you need to schedule your work months in advance. If you want your project ramped up quick your going to have to pay. And ultimately you get what you pay for. The first place people go for more information is online. Be sure to create a great site, packed with valuable up to date information for all your potential clients.

It's August .... Again

2008-08-14T08:45:00.001-07:00

I haven't posted the last couple weeks cause it's August. I'm sure their are groups out their that have certain months that are tougher than others for us this month has always been August. Whether this is because most of us are on vacation or clients are on vacation or the stars have lined up in a certain pattern it always seems that the tough scenerios of running a business always come to a head here. So I'm always extra busy with putting fires out or getting projects back on track or dealing with client issues. Some years it's been business was down or clients were not getting back on revisions or change requests. This year is no different except for the fact that I'm in my new house in St. Paul and located in the midwest and I'm running another business besides my apps dev company. I always try to take the third week off because I have three kids and it's the end of the summer and we like getting crazy together but as with any business owner "Can you ever really turn off the business side?" I sleep, dream, eat and breath my businesses 24/7 and 365 days a year. I don't consider my self a workaholic although my family may disagree but I work all the time. Most people envy me cause I work from home but if they only knew how I can't separate the two I don't think they would be as envious. I've tried to back away for instance I gave up my blackberry last year and switch to pull email so I'm not always checking my phone everytime it vibrates (the phantom vibrate was the first sign I needed to stop). I now try to check email every hour except for when I'm at my desk. I try to adhere to a routine of what I do every day with taking time in the afternoon but this is often interupted because of conference calls or pressing needs. But time management is key to my sanity. Often times I'll let friends take me out for a movie or round of golf but even then I'm feeling guilty cause I should be in front of my computer solving technical issues or planning our next month or handling some sort of request from someone and of course if I geta call forwarded to me I take it and then get antsy about getting back to the office which makes me a bad friends cause I probaly act like I don't want to be there. I think just cause I don't work a traditional 8 hour days dosen't mean I don't work a non traditional 12 hour one. I've been lying to myself but I wonder how many other business owners do the same thing? I try to establish boundaries but I still work on the weekends just ask my wife. She's implemented a new rule that I can't take my cell phone with me when we go to dinner on the weekends. She says that if someone needs to call they can call hers. I agree but man that's a tough couple hours worrying that maybe something is happening. Ultimately I know it boils down to having good staff and trusting them and we do have excellent staff which I fully accredit to our success. But I wonder am I the only business owner who experiences this?

Running 2 ways at once

2008-07-23T09:08:00.000-07:00

I read an article in the technology review magazine that spoke about various entrepeneurs and their ideas of what they thought while starting their companies and the last couple of days this article has really stuck in my head. I have this blog as a way to journal my adventures cause even now I'm having problems recalling certain events and how they happened pertaining to my firm and business dealings. I currently have two businesses that take the majority of my time the first being NATIVERES which is an application development firm that specializes in Opensource Health Apps and CMS's but also still doing alot of Microsoft Sharepoint work for federal entities. I also provide technical advise to different groups. Under this banner I have a personal project called "American Indian Search" which is a directory that will allow SMB's the ability to market themselves to indian country. This is truly a labor of love and takes more time and money then I will probaly see back but it's such a needed channel that I will keep it ongoing for as long as possible. And finally I have a year and half company that I've partnered with another entrepenuer called "Buffalo Nickel LLC" which is a screenprinting and distribution business. This last endevor I call selling widgets. I sometimes tell people "I make widgets, I ship widgets and make the software that does the entire process." I plan on writing about each of these projects. Which brings me to my title. As a business person we are required to wear many hats and often time are juggling different priorities. I use various software packages to keep me on track. One is called Basecamp from the group signal 37 this helps with keeping my team as well as clients all on the same page when it's dealing with projects and deadlines. We also use a custom bug tracker internally to help my webteam keep track of the software details when dealing with specific issues. We also use timetracker widgets to keep track of everyday work due to our multiple clientele. and lastly we use outlook exchange to keep our calendars and email and contract lists in place. I've found that these tools are invaluable to me cause often times I am running in two different directions at once. Comment on the tools you use to keep your day straight.

Empowerment

2008-07-15T08:56:00.000-07:00

A little something offtrack. I was reading a blog this morning from South Dakota concerning language and racism. I'm native american. Hocak from wisconsin and lakota oglala from pine ridge. I grew up with racism and have had it point blank in my face with people actually telling me they don't like indians or hate indians. These kinds of experiences give one a perspective of distrust when it comes to dealing with people but I've also had wonderful experiences with people who let me know not every person is out to hate you either.

In the past 15 years of being activily involved in the tech community one thing has always given me a sense of calm is that I have never been judged by the color of skin but by my technical merit. I don't feel like I've ever been singled out in this field because of my heritage if anything I have found a sense of belonging because most people I get to work with are more concerned with what I know than how I am defined.

I know racism exists and my daughters will have to confront this but it feels good to tell them that some areas "they will be accepted based on their knowledge and not the color of their skin because I experience this everyday."

Very Exciting Site - GETGO MN

2008-07-10T14:15:00.000-07:00

I think every entrepreneur can agree that sometimes we spend so much time in the future trying to figure out where our business is going we forget the present is just as important and our past is even more so. But one of the joys in running your own business is you sometimes run into other ideas or projects that really get you excited. I ran into this when my neighbor who works for a hightech association passed a link along to me called GETGO.

Here's the gist:

First off, GetGo (www.getgomn.org) is a, social network that's been developed to support the Minnesota entrepreneurial community.

GetGo is a very deep system and here are just a few of it's features :
-- GetGo, along with Wells Fargo, provides a Resource Center to support our members with guides, advice, tools and more. These resources are provided by many of our partners as well as organizations throughout the state that support entrepreneurs.
-- GetGo provides a directory of local service providers in a variety of fields who focus on servicing small business & entrepreneurs. This can be found on the Professional Services tab above.
-- GetGo provides event calendars and highlights major upcoming events to support entrepreneurs.
-- GetGo provides blogs & forums, which allow members of the GetGo community to communicate with the rest of the community. Read about what others are up to, share your story and get to know others in the entrepreneurial community. More information on Blogs & Forums can be found on the How to Use Blogs & Forums page.

It's basically a hub for people to find one another but it does it through internal marketing from the site itself. I find this idea very englighting because its dedicated to a niche group but narrows that focus through it's profiles and search functions. Very Web 2.0. I will keep you posted on this because it parallels AmericanIndianSearch.com but revs my idea engine about possibilities.

B's 4th of July

2008-07-07T09:23:00.000-07:00

Open Source is it for you?

2008-07-07T09:13:00.000-07:00

I get asked alot about opensource because I think because alot of groups we deal with don't have alot of money but want alot of function in web operations. Open Source has been developing at a rapid pace and is now at the same level as propriety software in most basic functions. We are going to write a little bit about a CMS we've been installing alot this year.

How Open Source Software (OSS) and Drupal can Benefit Non-profit Organizations?

What is OSS?
Open source software is software that is non-proprietary in that it is made available under an open source license which allows users to use, modify, improve, and freely redistribute the software. This arrangement fosters a collaborative environment where developers who favor a particular kind of software form a community and work to improve code, add new features, and generally extend the software’s capabilities for the betterment of all who use it. In many cases, OSS is distributed and redistributed free of charge.

Why Use OSS?
As a non-profit, you need to wisely use a tight budget. While OSS might or might not free you from development costs, it does free you from licensing costs. You also have the freedom of choosing who will provide your technical support. It can come from your in-house developers, an outside consultant, the open source development community, or a commercial entity.

Because OSS can be customized and redistributed, you have the freedom to make modifications to suit your organization’s needs and goals. You still maintain overall control of your project and your data.

What is Drupal?
Drupal is an open source content management system (CMS) that is particularly good at building user-driven, community web sites or information hubs. Drupal is:
- a content management system that makes it easy to create and edit web sites. A web site built in a content management system enables you to add new pages or edit existing pages at any time regardless of HTML or programming skill level.
- user-driven which means the content comes not only from your organization, but from anyone visiting the site. Think of MySpace, YouTube, Wikipedia, and Flickr. These are all user-driven, social networking, community sites where everyone is a content contributor.
- open source software which means its code is shared, so anyone can use, modify, or improve it. Essentially, this means it's free and comes with a large community of developers from all over the world who are constantly expanding its features and making the platform better. With this Drupal knowledge base in place, you have access to several professionals who can help you build or improve your Drupal site.

Why Use Drupal?
It offers friendly URLs, web-based management, modular design, and has good documentation and a strong, knowledgeable developer community. You can use existing modules as well as custom-built modules. The open source nature of Drupal makes this level of customization possible. Code is reusable and shareable by the community.

Additional strengths of and reasons for using Drupal
It's easy to set up sites fairly quickly
It’s a powerful platform where advanced functionality can simply be added by dropping in free modules that manage such features as images, audio, video, etc.
Modules can be custom-built
It’s fairly easy to modify its theme
Search-engine friendly
Scalable for small to large sites
You aren’t locked into a proprietary system
It’s flexible in that it permits integration with other software and web services
It has an extensive user permission system that allows users to set up public and private groups, make certain areas of the site accessible to only a few members or to the whole community, etc.

Web 101 pt.2

2008-07-02T07:56:00.000-07:00

We left off with hosting so we pick up with Content. If you think of your site as a human body this would be your heart. Without it you don't live.

Content is King
To ensure that construction of your site can begin promptly, have your content prepared.
Have all your facts and figures ready; anything that is important and relevant to the company that you want to share with your visitors. This includes relevant text, images, and other assets such as video, audio, etc.

Remember that content is king. It doesn’t matter if your site is fancy and looks appealing if it doesn’t provide the content your visitors are seeking. And your content must be fresh. It’s a good idea to have someone on your team who can dedicate time to periodically create new content, and update your site’s information as necessary.

At the very least, your site should have the following sections:

About Us: Describe your business, the people in charge of the company and their roles, and the history of the company.
Contact Us: Include your company’s physical address and/or P.O. box, a contact name(s), email address(es), and telephone number(s).
Privacy Policy: State that you will not share nor sell your customers’ personal information with any other firms and make sure that you follow through.
Subscribe Here: To stay in the minds of your customer, you should be sending out a monthly newsletter keeping customers informed of your company’s latest news, latest products and services, and ways your company can assist them. You can also offer valuable discounts and coupons on your company’s products and services via your newsletter.
Disclaimer: Limit your liability with customers and have your lawyer look over this statement. This can appear with the Privacy Policy or on a page of its own.

Additional sections you might consider that can potentially increase traffic to your site are:

Links: Provide additional resources and information to your visitors by using reciprocal links to other sites related to your industry (but not direct competitors’ sites).
Articles: Write articles about your industry and about your company that not only educate your customers but also give them a reason to consider using your products and services. Make sure these articles are informative and helpful and provide value to your visitors.
Blog: A blog, or web log, can be a great place to publish your industry-related articles. It can also be a place for case studies or how a particular member of your team is handling a latest project. Again, be sure to make it informative, relevant, and compelling.
Press Releases: Make it easy for the press to obtain information about your company, your company’s people, and the latest and greatest product and service offerings. Publish your latest press release. Include a press kit with high-quality photos, company history, and other information the media could use to put together a compelling story about you and your company.
Testimonials: Consider including testimonials from satisfied customers on your site. While tooting your own horn can go a long way in getting you noticed, you will never find a better way of building credibility and a great reputation than having someone else provide glowing praise of your company and its accomplishments.

Building Your Site
You have a lot of options available to you when it comes to building your site. You can try to save a buck or two by building it yourself. But this depends greatly on your skill set and your availability.

While sticking to a budget is likely a concern, shopping on price alone is not the best answer. If you don’t have the necessary skills, equipment, nor the internal team members, it’s best to hire someone to build your site for you. You can go to an outside firm and have them handle much of the design and construction of your site, with your input. This will free up your time to continue running your business. No matter who builds your site, just be sure to provide them with the content and assets they’ll need. Be sure the content is edited and organized. Have all photos, artwork, and other visual assets ready.

It helps to be very clear on what you want the site to do from a marketing perspective as well as a technological perspective. Again, this all goes back to knowing the purpose of your site and knowing what features and functionality you require. Find someone or some firm to whom you can communicate your vision and make sure they have the necessary skills to help you express that vision.

When going to an outside firm, ask yourself these questions:
Do they have the skills to make my site do what I need it to do?
Do we communicate on the same level? Do we understand each other?
Do they have experience creating sites that are similar to what I’m proposing?
Do I like their previous work?
Do they stay on time and within budget?

I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For
So now you have a fully functional, live web site. People are visiting your site in droves, right? It doesn’t quite work that way. People have to find your site before they can fully take advantage of what your site offers. If you take steps to improve your rankings with search engines, you just might get several new visitors per day. This is known as search engine optimization, or SEO. Let’s face it, there’s too much information vying for everyone’s attention – on and offline.
Your site needs to be at the top or at least near the top of the list of search results to get on people’s radars.

Every search engine varies in its ever-changing criteria for how it ranks web pages. It helps to visit several search engine sites and find out what latest tips they offer on optimizing your site. Title, keywords, and content are the basic areas you want to consider when optimizing your site for the search engines.

Each page of your site should have a title. This title will show up at the top of a visitor’s browser when they land on a page of your site. In a search result, a site description also shows up. Make sure you include a brief description of your web page so that it shows up in search results. Don’t miss this opportunity to briefly clarify for searchers what your company does.

Keywords, or tags, describe the content on a web page. They should match the actual content on your web page. When you’re writing targeted marketing copy, it’s best to repeat important keywords and phrases throughout your page. Ideally, these are keywords that you’ve researched and know are commonly searched by people who seeks out products and services that your company provides. While this sounds like an easy system to manipulate in your favor, do be aware that excessively repeating keywords and phrases can get your site banned from a search engine or can at the very least bump down your ranking. Be sure to include as many keywords as possible in your web page descriptions, as well. Descriptions have length limits to about 150 words, so make those words count.

Final Thoughts
There are several factors to consider and many basic steps to take when designing and building your first business website. It’s important to know what your company stands for and what core message you want to put out on the web. A focused, concise, and consistent vision and message will help you optimize your online brand. Whether you simply want a brochure site or a full-featured, complex social networking content management system, planning ahead and being prepared will save you time, headaches, and frustration and will help you come out ahead when you’re finally online.

This is the basic premise for developing a site. We will have more instances and give specific experience of our work concerning the various areas of development. Thank you for taking time to read this.

Joseph

A New Day in St. Paul, MN for the RES

2008-06-30T08:58:00.000-07:00

Our daily activities here at the RES usually consist of me emailing in the morning scheduling conference calls talking part in team meetings and planning out our week and month. Sometimes I find myself doing this consistantly like a robot stuck in a loop pattern and don't get brought out of it till something drastic happens.

We'll moving from the west coast back to the midwest in Aug of 07 was something drastic. I moved closer to my family and friends while bringing my family who had only known California. From the home front it's been a great change from a work standpoint it's been even greater. Most of my team still resides on the west coast but I look to establishing the rest of my team here in the St. Paul/Minneapolis area. We've been approached by the local chamber to give an advice column to assist small businesses with their information development. So look forward to everything from tech, econ dev to cultural insights. I will give insight from my team who have a combined experience of over 50 years between us which in internet time makes us dinosaurs.

We will start with web basics 101:

Web 101 – Your First Website

Introduction
In this day and age, if your business doesn’t have a website, your business doesn’t exist. Even having a very basic brochure site can be better than nothing. A website adds credibility to your business and allows you to reach not only your existing customers, but also potential new customers. A website allows you to spread your marketing message far and wide, create awareness of your product or service, and do so just the way you want.

What Is My Purpose?
If you don’t already have a website for your business and you’re thinking it’s about time to build one, you should first ask yourself a very important question:

What is the purpose of my website?

By answering this question as specifically as possible, you will make your life easier in the long run. Your answer will help narrow your focus, keep you on task, and allow you to better communicate your company’s message to whoever’s browsing. It will also help you to better communicate your wants and needs to your web designer.

Think about what you want your site to do for you. Think about what you want to offer your customers and visitors. Think about what you want your visitors to see, learn, feel, do, and experience when browsing and interacting with your site. You’ll need to determine what features will truly add value for your visitors versus what will merely bog your site, and marketing message, down with unnecessary fluff.

So what is the purpose of your website? Is it simply to provide general information about your company in a brochure format? Is it to sell products using e-commerce? Is it to foster a social network of like-minded customers with member log-ins, passwords, special access rights and posting permissions? Determine what kind of information and features your visitors need and make them available on your site.

Hello, My Name Is…
If you’re going to have a website, you’re going to need a domain name. The obvious choice for a domain name is your company’s name. If your company’s name is long, then go with a shorter version that still captures the essence of your name or is descriptive of what your company provides. It’s best to choose a domain name that’s easy to spell, easy to remember, easy to type, and is as short as possible.

Check availability of your chosen domain name and its top-level domain (TLD), aka extension (e.g. .com, .org, .gov, etc.). http://www.internic.net/whois.html
If it’s not available, check some of your alternate choices.
Once you find that your chosen domain name is available, you will need to register it.

You will need to register your domain name at a domain name registrar. Or you can choose a web hosting company that allows you to purchase a hosting account and domain name in one transaction. Here you can find a list of accredited domain name registars: http://www.internic.net/regist.html.

Domain names can run as low as $7 per year.

A word about TLDs. There are several out there nowadays but .com is the most recognized and popular if only because it was one of the first top-level domains to be established. Unless your company is a nonprofit, in which case you’d likely want to use .org for your TLD, it’s probably best to stick with .com if at all possible. It sticks in people’s minds. It’s familiar and easy to remember.

The Host with the Most
Now that you’ve decided on your domain name, you’re going to need a place to host your website files. In other words, your site files need to reside on a server.

There are several hosting companies available. You’ll want to choose one that has features you want or need. Going back to knowing the purpose of your site, it’s good to plan ahead and get features you anticipate you might use right now as well as in the near future. For example, if you need e-commerce capability, be sure the hosting company offers this feature and find out whether or not it costs an additional fee. Extra features such as this usually do.

Thoroughly review the offerings of any hosting provider that you consider. Make sure you find a host that can guarantee 99.9% uptime, great customer support, backup storage and protection of your data, some form of site statistics tracking, and security.

Business site hosting can run anywhere from $5 to $1200 per month depending on what hosting company you choose, what features you want, how much storage space you require, etc.

..part 1

RES2007 - American Indian Search

2007-03-21T08:25:00.000-07:00

We have had a very exciting month here at the RES. We just came back from the RES2007 conference where we were sponsored by DRS technologies. We would like to give a shout out to them and Shannon Whiteman at the National Center for allowing us this opportunity. This conference is an important conference for any business that wants to do business on and in Indian Country. * pulls out soapbox* which leads me to my topic "keeping tribal dollars in tribal communitities." One of the resounding themes at the conference was capacity building on indian country through economic development. It occured to me that the majority of businesses were not holding to a corporate mentality but to a social entrepenurship vien. They were more concerned with the effect they had on the surrounding community than they we're with the absolute bottom line. I'm not saying they were not interested in making money but that wasn't the primary motivator. It was making a difference which lead me to believe that this is a different mechanism at work here. This was our third year and we saw alot of old friends and made alot of new ones but ultimately each group had a genuine interest in their community. We've seen a shift and as time goes on I'm sure this shift will be more evident by the business on or servicing indian country. *puts soapbox away*

For us at RES 2007 we were in full effect pushing our clients and AIS to the fullest. We also were interviewed on Native America Calling. We are going to be sending out a Press Release letting people, companies and customers know about AIS and our clients. Since our launch 4 weeks ago we are averaging over 100 businesses sign ups a week with over 1000 hits a day. We have had people from all over the US as well as the world looking at AIS. We have had inquiries from corporations such as PG&E, Macy's and Target Corporations concerning their use of AIS and finding American Indian Vendors to work with. We are in the process of getting reciprocal sponsorships in place with leading publications, media outlets and Corporate Branding Partners to provide our clients with the best exposure in Indian Country and Mainstream America.

We are very excited about this venture and the feedback and response we have received from clients and the general public have been overwhelming and humbling. We have been validated over and over again about our services filling a much needed venue and we will continue to strive to meet these expectations.

Our next event will be at National Congress of American Indians in July in Alaska and we will be letting our clients know of each and every step we take to assist them in their success. Your success in our success. Much like our elders have taught us we are all intertwined and in many we are returning to those old ways by trading and supporting one another.

I look forward to working with your company in the year to come.

Launched New Portal for Indian Country

2007-03-04T11:37:00.000-08:00

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
American Indian Search Launches
Internet Tribe and Business Directory

Date: October 16, 2006 Contact: info@a-isearch.com

West Sacramento, CA [October 16, 2006] –

American Indian Search (www.A-ISearch.com) launched the internet’s premier tribe and business directory today. American Indian Search is a directory that brings businesses and organizations together at a centralized location.

Primary founder, Joseph Brown Thunder, designed the site to enhance business opportunities for both small and large businesses.

“The mission of AIS is ‘Keeping tribal dollars in tribal communities’. AIS provides an opportunity for Indian businesses and organizations to network and meet each other,” said Brown Thunder.

Groups and organizations may list their mission, contact information and web link free of charge, or explore tiered memberships for enhanced marketing.

For more information or to list your business visit www.A-ISearch.com.

About American Indian Search: American Indian Search (A-ISearch.com) is am internet directory that brings businesses and organizations together. The mission of AIS is "Keeping tribal dollars in tribal communities."

For more information contact American Indian Search at
www.A-ISearch.com