“Everything went great on the call and they wanted a proposal. So, once we hung up we put together an agreement and emailed it over. The client had to head out that day and we haven’t been able to track them down since. That was two weeks ago and this happens all the time.”

Life today is filled with interruptions and many get in the way of completing even what we are committed to and enthusiastic about.

One might consider overcoming these interruptions the duty of all professionals but assisting your clients in overcoming them with you will delivery higher revenues and satisfaction from your clients.

The key window I am focusing on here is the time between the verbal commitment and then actual project agreement that leads to a check.

In the above scenario, the addition of an Electronic Signature or eSignature application would likely avoid ending the conversation before the deal is signed. For example, while still on the phone my client could spend 2 minutes customizing a document and have it sent to the client via email. Whether in the office or on their iPhone or Blackberry, they could review it with the benefit of the sales rep on the phone and eSign it while still on the phone.

Now you just need the check but that’s a separate issue – you got the deal signed by providing a convenient and accommodating method of turning verbal commitment into a written confirmation.

Also, you can add eSignature capabilities to any workflow or document using MS Word, PDF, or any image. You don’t need CRM or any sophisticated system.

My readers can try it for free with the service I use: www.EchoSign.com.

I provide 15 minutes of free advice for first time callers to prove my value. Schedule it here.

To your success.

jc

The issue relates to disclosures. In a real estate transaction you have lots of disclosures but they are written and reviewed prior to or during the visit to the Escrow office.

What happens when many of these need to be conveyed over the phone and then archived for future reference? What if they also need to include order specific information such as pricing or quantity information? Additionally, how do you insure that updating the compliance script in the future won’t overwrite previously saved versions that are only valid if kept as they were read originally?

The last requirement is the most important and challenging one to implement, especially in light of custom information to be included within the text to be read to the client.

The first option many would choose here is to use text formulas which work great for simple statements that will have minimal or insignificant changes in the future. However, since changes to formulas are global, they must be changed with care as they will automatically update previous records and leave no trace since formula fields currently can’t be included in Field History. This will work for some but certainly not all as legal language will have to change over time without overwriting data on previous records.

The best option is to separate all the necessary information into simple descriptions that have custom, order specific data that use formulas such as:

 "Your order today, December 12, 2010, will be for $58,434.92."

and more detailed disclaimers and proscriptions that use field default values such as:

"You understand that the purchase of physical precious metals does 
not pay dividends, interest, or earned income and may lose value."

Salesforce.com Field Default Value

By using field default values for the key aspects that are read to the client, you avoid the issue of overwriting by field updating as changing the field default value only affects future records, not previous ones. The formula values will update previous records but since they are simple and descriptive when done correctly, it will be insignificant.

I provide 15 minutes of free advice for first time callers to prove my value. Schedule it here.

Happy new year.

Live blogging of CloudCamp LA 2009

The Organizers

5:15pm – About 10 people so far…

5:30pm – The amazing Persian food arrives thanks to CKK. The lamb is amazing – and the hummus!

6:30pm – Thanks to our sponsors: RIGHT SCALE, Microsoft Azure, alestic, Cisco, Axis Technical Group, & 3 tera. They funded the food, the beer, the venue, and facilitate our gathering to connect, learn, and move cloud computing forward.

6:45pm – Lightning Talk 1: David w/ Microsoft Azure Cloud

This is a cross between Google App engine & Amazon EC2. Nov 17 is go live date.

Cloud models have implications:

• Private – you own it but must manage it. (own the car)
• Infrastructure – (rent the car)
• Private – (public transportation)

100 Globally distributed data centers. Moving the data closer to the customer.

SQLAzure seeks to be relational DB in the cloud. Microsoft is looking to do a hybrid model

7:00pm – Lightning Talk 2: Uri w/ RIGHT SCALE

What are customers doing with the Cloud?

A single admin managing 100 to 1000 servers.
Auto scaling of instances based on load.
Animoto started with 40 servers and move to 4700 in 3 days. Signing up 25,000 people per day.

[Shows many charts showing amazing load variance, ability to peak to extremely high points]

7:15pm – UnPanel (all those who claimed to be “experts” in Cloud Computing)

7 Questions get answered

1. Q: 20 servers paid for + 2 good employees + no power problems. why should I use the cloud?
   A: The hype always precedes the deep usefulness and need of a product. If it doesn’t make sense now, don’t use it. Just evaluate some of the solutions before you invest in your next 10 servers.
2. Q: Ho do I move my ASP.net app to the cloud?
3. Q: When should I stop using Amazon SimpleDB?
4. Q: Large infrastructure, consistent utilization, why should I use the cloud?
5. Q: How do I avoid lock-in?
   A: Carlos: Use systems that have lots of users and developers, use systems that use standards that are interoperable and portable.
6. Q: How do I keep my data secure?
   A: We can’t because someone else owns the disks and could steal them. Although homomorphic encoding is providing some hope of interacting with data without having it leave its encrypted form.
7. Q: How can I put client server apps in the cloud?
   A: Look at each app and analyze it individually. Web apps move the easiest.
8. Q: What is the operational definition of a cloud computing service?
   A: It’s what you use a computer for but with a metered pay schedule that’s scalable, and delivered over the Internet
9. Q: What is one positive nontechnical motivation for the cloud?
   A: Cost reduction, eliminating the complexity of IT, dynamic scalability with no punishment for scaling down, lower risk with little long term consequences
10. Q: How do you build a CAP app? (Consistency, Availabily, Partitioning)
    A: Very carefully as certain architectures do not support it.

7:45pm – Breakout Session Proposals (15+ proposed)