So earlier yesterday we were going over our launch plans for our PSA integrations and one of the API’s just doesn’t have the same level of functionality to create and manage contracts and companies remotely. And as I mentioned here, if I do something for one group and not the other the holy war ensues.

So here is the problem we are trying to address: Most of OWN’s services are subscription based and the quantity of subscriptions can vary from month to month because the only way you can make money in services is by giving the end user full control to add / remove / modify services when and how they please. This creates an awesome income effect, until the last of the month when you have to reconcile the accounts between us and your PSA.

Now, you could just enter the service changes into your PSA as OWN notifies you of new services and changes. And I’m the bunny Vlad that makes the cookies.

The So-so-solution…

Yesterday we talked this over and we just can’t find a way to make it happen with a 2-way sync as we do in the other PSA integration.

So I coined a new phrase: 1-way automation. It works like this:

Just tell them to create all the contracts manually. When a new contract is created, we’ll just automate our side of notifying them to create a contract so we can update and modify it remotely.

You call it a crappy email alert. I’ll call it 1-way automation

Now obviously that still falls into the category of “your job is so worthless it could be done by a retarded monkey” so it’s a no-go. We also have no proactive way of running a kick-start script as we do with the other PSA.

So the only thing we got left is screen macro playback. This is the software used in software testing where you can record case scenarios and the software moves the mouse, fills in input fields, scrolls down, fills pages, does stuff in sequence. We can automate creation of a macro that would go through your software, locate company, locate appropriate tabs, create products and services and notes – so we can then automatically sync them via API.

If this were the only way to shave off what is at least 2 hours a month in double data entry, would you do it? Got a better idea? Please voice all your comments and ideas to your OWN/ExchangeDefender Partner Account Manager (not me, please don’t bother as I’m not touching the @vladville.com email until next week as previously noted)

We’re still planning as next Monday being the launch day for all our PSA integrations, 1-way or otherwise

Every now and then we come to the difficult decision, or a set of decisions, that might impact the way our partners work. This is my personal attempt, as the guy who is paying to make all this happen, to explain our situation and answer the questions before you’ve had a chance to form your opinion based on the first few keywords that upset you.

Later this month we (Own Web Now Corp) will be announcing our next generation integrations with Autotask, Connectwise and yes, even Shockey Monkey. This is a significant effort, a significant gesture – because it is in no way a part of our products functionality – to help you think about OWN a lot less and make a lot more money. I will go a step ahead and even say that what we are bringing to the integration picture (and beyond, in custom software for the platforms) is unlike anything available on the market… and if you’re an MSP you owe to give us a look.

On to the imaginary questions:

Q: How are we going to implement the integration? Can I have the white paper? Can you walk me through it?

There are two possible ways to get Own Web Now integrated with your PSA deployment:

Supported – Under this scenario we will offer you the whitepapers, create the integration workflows, queues, service boards, dialin numbers, offer best practices and support the integration when it breaks. This service will come at a reasonable one-time cost and will include training and ongoing best practices from others that use it.

Unsupported – Under this scenario we will send you the whitepapers and wish you the best of luck. This will be available free of charge and will include all the features of our integration suite. No support is available. If you choose this route you will not be able to upgrade to the supported product in the future. I know, I know, while it may make sense for you to try it on your own, fail, and then blame my staff into doing it for you for free while also training you to use your PSA, it is really not a fair scenario and not one I expect to see – you know exactly how much time goes into supporting, managing and billing the solution, so if there is even an ounce of question of whether our service is worth $500 then you have more serious questions to address.

The integration is available between us and Connectwise, Autotask and Shockey Monkey.

Q: We use ____ PSA? Will you integrate with that? When will you integrate with it?

No, we only integrate with Connectwise, Autotask and Shockey Monkey. We never (ever, ever) expect to integrate with anything else. If your product doesn’t contain Connectwise, Autotask or Shockey Monkey we will not integrate with it.

Q: Will the integration be different between different platforms?

While we have tried to bring the identical level of integration to all platforms, there are many factors prohibiting us from offering the same feature set across all platforms. Things contributing to differences between platforms can be attributed to the maturity of the API we are using to integrate with your platform, similarity of data types for services / contracts / products, vendors willingness to assist with problems, vendors restrictions of features across product lines.

Most importantly, our technical inability to create an integration point because of our unwillingness, incompetence and BSTDWOT (better “stuff” to do with our time). It’s not that we are bad people, it’s that your feature request will never generate enough money for us to justify writing the software in the first place.

Q: But..but..but… Vlad! If you can make this work with Autotask, why can’t I have it in Connectwise? Why does it work on the dedicated installation of Connectwise and not hosted? I have this feature in ConnectWise but I’m moving to Autotask Go to save money, I can just assume it will work the same right?

I don’t want to oversimplify this but here it goes: If you see a feature that you don’t have in Connectwise, it’s Arnie Bellini’s fault. If you see a feature you don’t have in Autotask, it’s Bob Godgart’s fault. If it’s a feature that you don’t have in Shockey Monkey then it’s coming in the next release.

Joke aside, see the above answer. The platforms are too different for us to offer the same feature set. If you see a feature in Connectwise that you need in Autotask or your business will implode, please switch to Connectwise. Or vice versa. Again, we are not bad people, we just need to explain that it’s not really apples to apples out there:

All OWN workflow and order management is designed on top of Shockey Monkey. That work is then ported to an extent to two different sync APIs. Some stuff will work with your PSA, some will not. That’s just the reality of software development.

Q: Is this just an elaborate ploy to sell more Shockey Monkey?

No. As a matter of fact, we will not take competitive orders for people looking to switch from Autotask or Connectwise. Truth is, we develop software for our platform and then extend it, within reason, to our partners platforms. We do not have any more advanced access to either platform than any other vendor, we are bound by the same legal and licensing as every other vendor and it’s a leveled playing field.

Q: When will you do ____?

Official answer will always be no. I cannot stress this enough, we are talking about software and features that save you money and make you more productive – I do not want to put more pressure on my staff or shift their focus from our tasks. We don’t write our software in India or China for $2/hr so the feature you are looking for will be available in the next release (maybe not the very next one)

This may sound harsh, and I wanted to give you an idea of the possible conflicts I see in this initiative so you can know where our line is drawn. We will do everything in the power to help out the people that see the value in this.

By all means we’re going to do everything in our power to give our partners an advantage with their PSA choice. All of the above will be made very pretty contract language with blog posts and screenshots to follow.

We’re looking for ConnectWise volunteers / victims to test out our new support system integration. If you use OWN service and ConnectWise, please drop me an email.

We need: 1) Access to your ConnectWise system 2) Your system needs to be SMTP enabled to send out alerts 3) Permission to access your OWN account 4) Permission to setup a new alert and open/update tickets in your ConnectWise system and 5) We need it by tomorrow at the latest.

P.S. This will complete our integration portfolio between Shockey Monkey and Autotask, ConnectWise, Kaseya, LPI, Quickbooks, MYOB, Office (SBA/Excel) as well as our own WMI agent software. We also have the Zenith Infotech code in place but without the ability to test it with them.. well, you know.. it might happen but don’t hold your breath on that one for SM3 release.

We’re ready to start beta testing Shockey Monkey 3, launch of which is anticipated in May. Only a limited number of slots are open and participation is mandatory. If you have a heavilly used Shockey Monkey deployment (as in used every day), or if you are waiting to be turned up but do a lot of business with OWN (and are willing to deploy the Shockey Monkey remote monitoring / management tool at some clients) we want to talk to you.

Expectations are having at least 10-20 minutes a week to spend in one-on-one conversations with me and listen to a 10-20 minute a week presentation on new features/use. All of these would be conducted throughout April.

If this all sounds good, vlad@vladville.com is a place to reach out to me.

If you work with me, you will be getting an email from me over the next 24-48 hours from now. It’s pretty important (to me, to you) so I hope you take a moment to go through it and see if you can benefit from it at all.

To sum it up: Things are going really well at OWN, we are taking advantage of the economy and we’re about to embark on an insane release schedule to expand our solution portfolio which is why we’ve been relatively silent on a number of fronts since last summer. Generally, there is a lag between us announcing something, partner signing customers up and then realizing there are missing pieces. I’m offering some incentives to be more involved in the OWN design process.

This is the extension of the “V…” newsletter, only applied more closely with what I actually work on. While I gave the open community one a shot, I am tired of trying to figure out where the line between the personal and business stuff happens to be – if it doesn’t apply to sleep, it doesn’t apply to newsletters

One of my greater joys in business over the past two years has been the development of our PSA. In the process of studying just how much we suck (and the extent) I’ve really gathered an alarming amount of data points that explain just where we suck but also the uniform way in which our client base is retarded. Naturally, it’s our fault.

Earlier today one of the kids from the Leesburg office drove down to frigid 60F Orlando and we took him out to lunch. We talked about some of the more advanced topics regarding ExchangeDefender. It’s so nice to see people interested in your work.

It’s also quite a pleasure to explain the actual meaning and implementation of the system and watch their dreams shatter in front of you. “Well, yes, that’s how we explain it. Here is what actually happens on the backend.” What can I say, my job is to deliver a message to destinations that are setup by a combo of a laid off IT helpdesk employee, part time lawyer and his wife, the disaccredited CPA. The miracles we perform to get mail to go from point A to point B deserve some sort of a sainthood.

So today we made some slight changes to the support system.

See if you can tell which one is for real.

This is the official business version:

Better Support Escalation

This dropdown allows you to select the service that you are requesting support for. This helps us route the request to the most qualified individual on the support team that can address your request quickly.

Note that when you select an item you will be presented with a checkbox to tell us if this is a service outage. If the outage affects the entire organization, and you check this box, we will escalate the request for free and bump you to the front of the queue.

Now, since I wrote the whole thing this afternoon, allow me to take you through the development process and the reality behind the sugarcoated marketing speak:

Business Problem Definition:

1. These jackasses aren’t reading the documentation.
2. Support team spends all day copying and pasting KB articles.
3. People shouldn’t pay for urgent support if there is a system down issue. We aren’t going to waive charges for urgent support. Meet me half way!

Business Problem Analysis:

1. Nobody reads our documentation.
2. Nobody bothers to file support requests with enough detail, only bare minimum.
3. Nobody reads anything we write or do.

Solution Matrix:

1. How about we hide a setting for our literate partners that lets them get free support?
2. What about embedding help right when they ask the question, maybe it temporarily distracts them and they forget what they wanted.
3. Maybe we can route these requests better around the clock, skip the middle man.

Voila.

Now, true: I wrote this to help my partners and make my staff a lot more efficient and provide more value along the way.

However: Things would cost so much less and perform so much better if we were not stuck in the baby sitting mode training people how to use the products they should have learned in less than 1 hour of video sessions.

This, IMHO, is what sucks about IT and what makes most people throw their hands up in frustration and they end up compromising for Google Gmail and the iPhone. Neither is a serious business solution, but serious business people are about money and efficiency – not about throwing money down the IT Strategic Initiative toilet, hoping to have something valuable at some upgrade cycle in the future.

Ballmer is under fire for some statements he made today. For what it’s worth, I defend the guy for being up front about the problem and what is going on. We can no longer afford little incremental fill-in-the-gap solutions. It’s all or nothing, black or white, people simply won’t put up with limitations in reliability. If they have to put up with limitations, they will go to the shiny crap or free crap – because let’s face it, if it’s all crap anyhow you may as well not pay for it and at least get some joy out of looking at it.

Just a courtesy update on what’s going on at the House of Monkey: This weekend we are rolling out an upgrade version 2.1 which has some significant changes in it that you might want to be aware of:

• Import/Export functionality for the entire database. We are exporting data in an XML-based format and allowing direct import. So if something in the database isn’t quite up to your liking and you wish to adjust it you’ll be able to with any XML editor available.
• Reporting. The new reporting engine is online and provides Executive Report, Open Support Request Summary, Support Request Detail Summary, Billable Time Summary and Employee Timesheet Summary. These are designed with business in mind, not a braindead paper killer in mind. Each is intended for a specific purpose and specific personnel – some are for clients, some are for you, some are for your workers and some are for the accountant. These templates are granular and FAST so you can opt to select anything you want included in the report at the time it is rendered – and the speed at which it renders them is pretty phenomenal too.
• Accounting. Revised accounting to allow for granular ticket billing. This way if a ticket is spread over multiple billing periods it’s updates can be billed over multiple invoices. Good for projects or people that want to get paid NOW. Accounting also brings the timesheet summary (so you know how much to pay your staff and your contractors)
• Upgraded E-mail Connector. Email connector now allows for the full communication through email only without logging into the portal at all. You’d have to be suicidal to enable this but it was demanded a lot so here it is.

Bug fixes: rounding functions now work properly, email notifications have been fixed as well as the time zone mess. Issues with the disable user functions have been fixed as well as a service creation system.

Next on the schedule is the web service API and enhancements to calendars and tasks in the portal. We are still looking for the invoice syntax for Office Accounting to enable direct imports of accounting data into Office Accounting. If anyone has that available please let me know.

P.S. We are down to the last 200 portals to activate, so if you aren’t in this you will be in over the weekend.

Just a heads up, we’ve put Google’s new Chrome Browser through it’s paces and according to everyone that has checked so far, all Shockey Monkey functions work and render properly. The RMM component was not tested as it requires ActiveX but that’s not generally available to the public either. Ditto for OWN as well as ExchangeDefender.

Our official policy at Own Web Now Corp is that we do not, under any circumstances, support any beta software. So this one is very much YMMV case, if you like it use it – as far as we can tell it works.

Gotta hand it to Google, it’s fast. Almost feels faster than Safari.

Now, back to uninstall it…

I feel like Bart Simpson trying to lie about why his homework isn’t ready to turn in.

I have been working pretty hard on the reports tab of Shockey Monkey and bug fixes all day. The good news is that all the outstanding bugs have been fixed, including the unreported ones I found while fixing other bugs. So great news there.

On the other hand, reports didn’t play out as well. I got them done, but I’ve been told by everyone that has looked at them so far that they are “weak” at best and “totally unpresentable to any client, even pro-bono” at worst. This came from the people that actually like me and are using the product for free so it’s hard to discount that kind of comment. Bah. I’m redoing the style sheets and formatting a little to make it seem like less of a pile of junk, I will update you on the progress tomorrow night.

P.S. The email connector bugs have been shaken out, you can now do 100% of your support via email if you choose to without ever logging into the portal. The billing exports have also been fractionalized allowing you to bill the support request granularly per-request, so if a ticket is split between multiple billing periods it can be broken up over multiple invoices. The executive report and other metric-bearing reports are also getting printable charts, the implementation of which I am not 100% certain off but will be after the morning meeting.

Monday is Labor Day, but it’s also the first of the month.

And first of the month brings the new upgrade to Shockey Monkey as I’ve pretty much committed the team to doing monthly updates to all the bugs and new features. As we’re actually about to allow people to give us money and sponsor the project we also need to kick up the production quality a bit. So starting this Monday, big new feature is reports:

Just a teaser post of course, I’ll show some more in depth stuff on Monday/Tuesday.

Funny thing about Shockey Monkey reporting, I have received a ton of kicks in the balls and bitching over the “missing” reports but only one person (and I’ll name her: Amy Babinchak) has stepped up with the mockups and drawings and sample data to stick into the said reports. If you want to see things in the software folks you’ve got to draw them up and recommend them in. Just saying “I want reports” doesn’t cut it, you have to contribute something meaningful for the entire community to benefit.

Monday 1st, see ya. Have a wonderful weekend.