Tonight will be the night that a majority of the SMC sites will be upgraded to version 3.31 of the software.  While we do not anticipate any problems, you should be aware that a new version is going out.  We will post details of the upgrade once we know everything is stable, but the biggest feature enhancement in this version is the addition of Captcha to prevent spamming of web forms.

More to come…

There is no such thing as a perfect content management solution for everyone, but there’s probably a near perfect CM solution out there for you.  What does this mean?  That doesn’t make sense!  How does this change the way we think about software?

When I think about software the first thing that comes to my mind is Microsoft and the success they have seen with their Office suite.  MS Office is a “one-size-fits-all” software suite, and might be the one of the most flexible collections of software applications ever written.  With that said, it will never accomplish all needs for all people.  So what do we do?  We accommodate and make it work the best we can.  Why?  Because the price is right and Microsoft isn’t likely putting our request on their ToDo list for the next version.  Well, times are changing my friend!

Accommodation versus Customization.  As thousands of software applications are developed each year, our chance of finding a solution that fits our exact needs is more and more realistic.  Businesses are no longer settling for the one size fits all solution, or trying to fit the proverbial round peg in the square hole.  Profitable business relies on efficiency, and efficiency is not realized with accommodation.

Custom applications have long been the norm for the Fortune 500, but are only now starting to gain traction with the Small to Medium Size Businesses (SMBs).  This trend has a simple explanation.  Big business has the money to customize and the resources to support and maintain those customizations.  The SMBs that are able to customize, however, are experiencing tremendous efficiencies in their day-to-day activities.  Solutions that can be customized for any business process are the future, and the software application that can accomplish this at a low price point will be way ahead of the curve.

The latest version of the SMC’s plug-in builder was designed with this one notion in mind.  Every client has a unique way of doing business, and their content management solution needs to be easily and cost effectively customized for these differences.  Printers do not do E-commerce the same way a book store does.  Ranch and farm real estate is quite different than online marketing of single family homes or condominiums.  Is there any reason to think you can use a cookie-cutter piece of software for each of these instances and optimize success?  No way!

Your SMC provider will not try to change your business processes to accommodate the SMC, but will customize the SMC to adhere to your business processes.  Now that’s not the message we aren’t accustomed to hearing from a software provider!  But how can we be profitable when we have thousands of versions of each plug-in out there?  The answer is simple.  The core technology stays the same, but your instance of the plug-in is unique to your SMC.

For more information on how the SMC can be tailored to fit your unique business requirements, please contact one of our SMC providers.

The testing has finally commenced and SMC sites are being upgraded to the latest version of the SMC.  Contact us today to see what awaits in this much anticipated release.

For the past couple of years we have been trying to obtain a trademark for the Site Management Console name.  Unfortunately, our application for the trademark on Site Management Console was rejected, so we will be changing the name.

For obvious reasons, we will not be posting the candidate names here, but I can tell you that we have reduced the list of candidates from 150 to 5.  All five candidates would make great names for the SMC content management system, but we hope to settle on one after we’ve done a little research on each.

The process to rename the Site Management Console has proven to be a daunting task.  It’s hard enough to find a name you can market, can remember, and somewhat describes your product, but the importance of the web forces you to also obtain the domain to go with it.  For those of you that have experience with the domain name search, you can attest to the difficulty of finding the one you want.

Although we are down to 5 candidates, please feel free to post any name ideas you have that also have an available domain to go with it.  We will keep you posted as news on this topic surfaces.

It’s not enough to simply put a web site out there that provides visitors with information about your business, products and services.  The web is a powerful medium that provides the means for businesses of all sizes to incorporate business functions into their website.

Aaron Weiche at Prime Advertising has written a well thought out article in regards to this issue and how it relates to the news industry and USA Today.  This is a great example of the direction the news industry might be going, but where is your business sector headed?  Are there efficiencies the web can provide your business?

Whether it’s e-commerce, project management, or simple accounting tasks such as invoicing, your customers will soon demand that you build a business function or two into your web solution.