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TD Bank Tops Small Business Satisfaction

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TD Bank Tops Small Business Satisfaction

According to a summer study done by J.D. Power and Associates, TD Bank ranks as the top national bank for small business satisfaction. Of over 7,200 nationwide small businesses with an income of $100,000 – $10 million, TD Bank scored highest on a 1,000 point scale. TD Bank scored a 740. This is the third consecutive year the bank has ranked at Number One. The businesses surveyed indicated that they are more satisfied with a bank when a manager is dedicated to their account, understands their business, and is a thorough communicator with the business owner.

“The highest-ranking banks perform well in customer service and relationship management with their small business customers, particularly the in-branch experience,” said director of banking services at J.D. Power and Associates, Michael Beird. The average score for other banks was about 696. BB&T and Huntington National Bank tied for the number two spot with 725 points.

TD Bank is based out of Portland, Maine and Cherry Hill, New Jersey, and offers banking, insurance, brokerage and investment banking in Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Vermont, Virginia and Washington D.C.

Huntsville, Alabama Named Top City To Launch SMBs

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Huntsville, Alabama Named Top City For SMBs

Huntsville, Alabama has been named the top medium-sized city in which to start a small business by Fortune Small Business Magazine. The magazine’s November 2009 issue contains a “Best Places to Launch” feature and rounding out the top ten cities are Lafayette, Louisiana; Omaha, Nebraska; Clarksville, Tennessee; Peoria, Illinois; Lexington, Kentucky; Killeen, Texas; Des Moines, Iowa; Baton Rouge, Louisiana; and Lincoln, Nebraska.

According to the magazine, Huntsville’s beautiful surroundings and low cost of living are just a few of the benefits the city has to offer, as well as less competition (the city is dominated by government contractors instead of venture capitalists). Huntsville is located in northern Alabama and its metro area has a population of 395,645. The city was once known for its cotton and railroad industries but in the mid-1900’s, it became known as “Rocket City” as it became an important city for developing space technology. Home to NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center, the U.S. Army’s Aviation and Missile Command, and Cummings Research Park, it remains a huge influence on the country’s aerospace and military technology with a thriving engineering community. The magazine calls it a “breeding ground for tech entrepreneurs.”

Jerry Gabig, the CEO of Q-Track Corporation, said of his own experience starting a business in the city, “The cost of living and running a business is also relatively cheap here. My property tax is about a third of what I used to pay in Massachusetts. State gas taxes are relatively low, and the cost of electricity is below the national average. Land is also cheap, which makes it easy to expand.”

Huntsville Chamber of Commerce CEO and president, Brian Hilson, told the Huntsville Times that a number of national publications have had their eye on the city for years. He says it’s the result of the city’s successful image marketing. “Our story is more credible when someone else says it.”

The rankings were based on a study done by Fortune Small Business along with the Kauffman Foundation (the world’s largest foundation devoted to entrepreneurship). The study showed which cities scored highest based on per capita income, hourly wages, work force quality, crime rates, taxes, and foreclosures. The entire article can be found at Money.CNN.com.

Dell Lowers SMB Registration Threshold Deal

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Dell Lowers SMB Registration Threshold Deal

Computer manufacturer Dell has announced that it will be lowering the threshold for its SMB partner deal registration from $50,000 to $15,000, effective immediately. Dell says it wants to better protect those solution providers and expand the number of products and services that can now be registered. In the past, only EqualLogic products and opportunities could be registered below $50,000, but the changes are no open to all Dell products and services.

Paul Shaffer, director of U.S. marketing and operations for Dell’s global commercial channels, said in a statement, “We see this as a great opportunity in the SMB space. We heard from our partners that doing $50,000 in sales was a lot for customers to be buying. We hope that lowering the threshold to $15,000 will create more opportunities for channel partners.”

Many Dell resellers are already excited about the change, claiming it will make the company easier to work with. As a matter of fact, the changes come from feedback given to Dell from many solution providers, along with watching the positive response to Dell’s European channel program’s dropping its own threshold from $50,000 to $25,000.

Dell is also seeing a high number of registration approvals – 85% – and has already started adding more staff to help deal with what they hope will be a much higher demand in the future.

Before announcing the decision, Dell tested the program with a small number of pre-certified partners and say they were pleased with the results of the soft launch.

This is just the latest of several moves made by Dell in an effort to improve both locally and abroad. “We are committed to continuing to respond to the needs of our partners globally, as our decision to lower deal registration for our partners who serve SMBs in the U.S. and EMEA proves,” Vice President and General Manager of Dell Global Commercial Channels Greg Davis said in a statement.

New Q3 SMB Survey Findings

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New Q3 SMB Survey Findings

Even though small and medium businesses (SMBs) are trying to save every penny in the current economic climate, a new survey from Spiceworks, Inc. – a developer of network and systems management software and market research company located in Austin, Texas – shows that a majority of businesses intend to purchase hardware and software within the next six months. The Q3 survey was designed to look at technology purchasing and staffing trends among SMBs all over the world. The survey took place over the months of July and August by Spiceworks’ Voice of ITTM market research program. Of the 1,130, the majority were IT professionals that support companies with fewer than 500 employees and with annual technology budgets of about $108,000.

Here are some of the findings from the survey:

  • SMBs are letting their desktops, laptops, and servers last them ten more months than normal before purchasing new ones
  • 68% of SMBs plan to add new hardware to their networks in the next six months; this includes 56% buying desktops, 55% buying laptops, 45% buying new servers, 31% buying new printers, 27% buying new network devices, and 13% buying notebooks
  • The average new order consists of 13 desktops, 10 laptops and two servers
  • At 37%, new hardware makes up the largest part of SMB IT budgets
  • 51% of businesses are planning to buy new software. 32% of that will go to security and anti-spam solutions software. Of those, about one third plan to buy cloud-based security and anti-spam offerings.
  • 44% of SMBs are using virtualization solutions. 21% of SMBs’ total server capacity is currently virtuatlized, but over the next six months, 30% plan to expand virtualization in their networks.
  • 25% plan to purchase backup and recovery items within the next six months. Of those, 75% plan to store date on-site and the remaining 25% plan to utilize cloud-based storage. 42% of date will be stored on network-attached storage or storage area network devices; 38% will be stored in local and direct-attached storage; 7% will be hosted off-site; and 13% on tape or other media.
  • 57% of SMBs currently use a cloud computing service. The three most popular include anti-spam, hosted email, and online back-up.
  • As expected, budgets shrank in 2009. 39% cut their budgets (averaging cuts of 22%), 31 kept their budgets the same, and 30% grew their budgets (averaging growths of 27%).
  • 60% of SMBs had to cancel at least one planned 2009 project due to the economy
  • As far as hiring goes, 22% of SMBs plan to hire additional full and part-time staff. Only 3% plan to reduce their staff size.

In a statement, Jay Hallberg, co-founder and vice president of Marketing for Spiceworks, said it’s good to see SMBs showing signs of growth and spending, “Most are clearly ready to buy and it will be interesting to watch how these plans play out among different geographies, industries and company sizes. We will track these and other technology trends of interest in future studies.”

New Cisco Products for SMB

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New Cisco Products for SMB

Cisco Systems recently launched a line of new products and services for small businesses. The company says these new products and services will help Sisco fit the needs of smaller companies and increase profitability. This comes after the networking company put $100 million into SMB initiatives, rebranded its Linksys products as “Cisco Small Business,” and wrapped its Linksys small business partners into the Cisco channel.

According to Andrew Sage, vice president of worldwide small business sales for Cisco, “Fiscal Year 2010 is the year of execution for sales and the channel, the product suite and services for the SMB. Last year we were as committed, but now it’s more concrete.”

At the Cisco Partner Summit, the company unveiled several new services for the SMB market, including ESW 500 Series Switches, switches that integrate with other Small Business Pro portfolio products to build solutions for small businesses. The product comes in 24 and 48 port models, has optional PoE, and a five year warranty and is available starting at $659 to $3,299. For transitioning SMB clients to VoIP, Cisco has launched the SPA8800 IP Telephony Gateway. The box allows small businesses to connect their open-source IP PBX to their current analog phones and fax machines. This product will cost around $600.

Cisco also launched the PVC300 IP Camera, an IP surveillance video camera that captures live video that can viewed anywhere, including on mobile phones. The camera includes software with the ability to manage up to sixteen cameras at once, has pan, tilt, and zoom capabilities, and sends alerts when any motion is detected, integrating with alarms, doors sensors, and security systems. The camera is available for $794.

Version 1.5 of the Cisco Smart Business Communications System was also debuted at the summit. The new version has WebEx Phone Connect for getting to an online meetings in one click, Cisco TimeCard View, and single-number reach and third party networking monitoring and management applications. This system starts at about $450 per user.

In addition to the products, Cisco added several new services as well, including the Small Business Pro Service – a three year technical support coverage plan with next-day hardware replacement and extended support center access. The company also offers community-based support via a virtual community. Rebates for Select certified partners that participate in the global Partner Development Funds program will offer up to $15,000 until July 25. Partners can also leverage extended channel financing for 90 days or six months. Cisco will also be adding a “Buy Now” button on their website for certain SMB products, new smart designs for small business. They are also offering more customer incentives including migration strategies from Linksys gear, discounts of five to seven percent and price reductions of up to 25 percent on the SBCS system.

Partners are encouraged about Cisco’s focus on SMB. “It’s going to make it easier for us to sell products,” Robert Betzel, president and CEO of Infinity Network Solutions told CRN.

CodeRED Emergency Communication Service

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The CodeRED emergency system is keeping the country safe, one phone number at a time, through its high-speed notification process. CodeRED utilizes unique internet mapping together with a rapid telephone system capable of delivering millions of phone calls per day. The system calls businesses and residents in the effected geographical areas, leaving recorded emergency messages with either the person who answers the phone or an answering machine or voicemail. If there is no answer, the service will attempt to call the number up to three times.

CodeRED subscribers can broadcast emergency messages from anywhere in the world via a secure website. The website allows users to monitor progress of their placed calls in real time, noting the disposition of each call and allowing users to initiate another round of calls to those that were not answered, either by a live human or an answering service. Also, once a calling job is complete, the user who initiated the call may received a summary at any email account, cell phone, or blackberry. If for some reason, the user cannot access a computer or internet service, calls may be executed from any phone with proper access codes. There is also 24/7 emergency technical support available to all CodeRED clients.

CodeRED offers their service with the highest levels of security, robustness, performance, and makes it easy to use for government agencies, communities and businesses who need to deliver emergency messages to large numbers of residents in record time. Unlike other telephone notification services, messages do not have to be truncated or looped, allowing full messages with complete instructions to be delivered to their recipients and subscribers do not need to purchase any type of equipment.

CodeRED is a part of Emergency Communications Network Inc. (ECN) based out of Florida. Originating in 1998, ECN specializes in high-speed communication services to government agencies, businesses, and the private sector.