Benefits Of Windows 8 For Small Businesses

Benefits Of Windows 8 For Small Businesses

By   21:49   No comments:

The official date for the launch of Windows 8 is still awaited. However, the latest operating system from Microsoft has set the rumor mills churning ever since the news about its forthcoming release was made public.

This is post is all about how we can say that Windows 8 has quite a lot for Small Businesses. But, before we talk on that, lets just get a glance on how to Download and Install Windows 8.

If you want to test Windows 8 on a Virtual machine, you need to have the latest Virtual machine software, say for example, VMWare 8, VirtualBox, etc. This means, if you are using VMware 7 or earlier version, its time to upgrade your Software's.

We suggest you to install Windows 8 on VMware 8 Workstation. Read my recent article explaining the Step by Step Instructions To Install Windows 8 on VMWare Workstation 8.

I have already said in my earlier post, about where to Download Windows 8 Developer Edition.

Ok, that’s just the basic. Coming to this post, according to the grapevine, Windows 8 has several features that are likely to benefit small enterprises. Here’s a brief description about some of its USPs:

More user-friendly – Windows 8 comes with a flexible interface. You don’t need a particular device to avail yourself of all its useful features. Small organizations can easily incorporate Windows 8 into their PCs without shelling out any extra money on new devices. The existing hardware will be suffice and they need not be updated.

Lesser boot up time – This bit of information will surely bring a smile on your face, no matter whether you are a simple PC user or an industrious entrepreneur. It is being said that the Windows 8 interface will take only 8 seconds to load itself once the PC is turned on. You would surely not mind if your PC is off for just 8 seconds when a software is updated. The advantages are easy to ascertain and they are inter-related. Windows 8 will help save time, which in turn will help save energy. So, the end result will be a sizeable reduction in expenditures.

App Store – Another interesting feature that is bound to catch the fancy of PC users. Have a look at the entire gamut of applications and select the ones that you like.

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Business Needs Secure Solutions, Not Just Solutions

Business Needs Secure Solutions, Not Just Solutions

By   14:10   No comments:

The reason of having IT department is to provide IT-based solutions to the business. And in turn, Information Technology groups follow a project-based methodology to bring these IT solutions to the business.

The theoretical approach consists of linking the risk management methodology in place in the organisation with the project management methodology used in-house. This recommendation sounds logical and appropriate. However, it is not sufficient: Reality tells that nowadays the provision of IT solutions needs to be agile and to accommodate customers’ business needs in a fast and changing manner.

Realistically, the triadic mantra for an IT project is to provide the IT delivery on time, on budget and with a required quality. IT security can only slightly change the direction of a project and improve a little bit this project triad. The earlier IT security works with the project team, the greater its influence will be. Its not just that, IT Provides Solutions to the Business. But, these days IT need to provide Secure Solutions to the Business.

Business is in business is not just to do business, but to do it in a secured way.

In most organisations, IT and IT security are only support areas, not core business areas. Management boards tend to consider IT and IT security as any other support function: An important function, certainly, maybe essential, but not the core of the business.

Making business is taking risks: IT security needs to provide business makers with a clear risk description so that they can make informed risk-related decisions.

More often than desired, security acts as the obstacle for the business to run risks, some of them even unknown to the decision-makers. The ultimate role of IT security is to inform the owner of the business of IT risks run by the organisation.

IT security professionals should forget the sentence “you cannot do it, it is very insecure” and change it for “we will do it in a more secure way”.

The 100% secure IT system is the one that is off and buried in a block of concrete. However, that system is of no use to the business. The IT security team provide advice on how to deliver the functionality demanded by the business, and not on how to prevent the business from getting their idea materialised.

The business will implement their idea anyway. Therefore, it is better for the organisation (and for the team) that they do it with the IT security team, rather than in a totally uncontrolled manner.

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Excel 2010 - Premier Tool For Business Intelligence

Excel 2010 - Premier Tool For Business Intelligence

By   13:19   No comments:

Every new Office version has a set of themes, and the new features are grouped around those  themes. For Excel 2010, the themes were to improve Excel’s reputation in the scientific community and to make Excel the premier tool for Business Intelligence.

As I have done lots of data analysis in the past and continuing to do that, I love the new features for analyzing data. I also remember that while I loved wrangling large data sets into meaningful analyses, I never wanted to spend the time to make those meaningful analyses look “pretty.” Excel 2010 offers new graphics improvements that make it easy to add some visual interest to your numbers. Follow this link to know more about the new features of Excel 2010.

Here lets see what makes Excel 2010, a better tool for Business Intelligence:

PowerPivot Add-In: You can now sort, filter, and pivot data sets that are beyond 1 million rows. The PowerPivot tool allows you to mash up 100 million rows of data from Excel, text files, RSS Feeds, SQL Server, Oracle, and more. A new DAX expression language offers time intelligence functions that enable you to compare fiscal year-to-date sales with the parallel period from a year ago.

Pivot Table Slicers: Filtering data in pivot tables becomes visual with graphical filters known as Slicers. In previous versions of Excel, the filter drop-downs offered the capability to choose Multiple Items, but no one reading the report could tell what was included or not included. These new graphical filters show what is in the summary report and invite people to do ad-hoc analyses by choosing new options from the slicers.

Asymmetric Pivot Tables: Do you need to show last year’s actuals versus this year’s budget? That was hard to do in previous versions of Excel, but the Named Sets command for pivot tables created from OLAP data make it easy in Excel 2010. Don’t have OLAP? Run your Excel data through PowerPivot to enable Named Sets.

Percentage of Parent Item in Pivot Tables: New calculations in the Show Values As drop-down allow for calculations such as Percentage of Parent row, Rank, and more.

AGGREGATE function: Whereas Excel 2007 added the plural SUMIFS function, the killer function in Excel 2010 is AGGREGATE. This function is like the SUBTOTAL function on steroids. You have 19 calculation options instead of the 11 in SUBTOTAL, plus the capability to ignore hidden rows, filtered rows, or error cells.

And the above discussed 5 points also seems to be an improvement over Excel 2007 and which in turn makes Excel 2010 a better tool for Business Intelligence. Follow this link to know more about the new features of Excel 2010.

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Points To Consider Before Buying A PC

Points To Consider Before Buying A PC

By   11:41   No comments:

With so many desktop computers to choose from, how do you know which is the best choice for your business? In this guide, we’ll cover many of the basics so that you can make an informed decision.

Buying a good desktop primarily depends on what you will be using it for. Are you looking for a computer to perform basic tasks or to meet special requirements? Do you need to stay within a specific budget? Once you answer these questions, you’ll get the best value for your money and, more importantly, a computer you’re happy with. Now, lets see what you should do when choosing a model that is right for you.

Decide on a CPU (Central Processing Unit) - The CPU is essentially the brain of the computer, and thus, a great place to start when choosing a computer. The faster the processor’s clock speed, which is measured in megahertz (MHz) or gigahertz (GHz), the faster it can execute instructions.

As a result, CPUs are divided into three groups: traditional single-core processors; dual-core processors, which boost performance for demanding applications; and quad-core processors, which provide unmatched performance for power-hungry multimedia and software applications. These days all branded Personal Computer manufacturer like HP, DELL etc has a nice selection of Intel Core 2 Duo desktops at affordable prices.

Make sure you have enough memory (RAM) - Random Access Memory (RAM) is temporary storage that provides the working space for your computer to operate. Adding more RAM can result in an immediate and dramatic improvement in performance. Essentially, the greater the RAM, the more applications you can run at one time. RAM is relatively inexpensive, easy to install, and requires no configuration.

Select your hard drive capacity - Your desktop’s hard drive is where all data is stored, so when it comes to storage capacity, too much is never enough. And since enormous hard drives are very affordable (for most users, a 250GB drive is a good starting point), this means more for you and greater functionality for your computer. By the time i write this article, the minimum Hard disk capacity in a system is 500 GB.

CD/DVD Drives - CD and DVD drives read data on discs in a variety of formats. Some drives can also record data, images, music, or video to CD and/or DVDs. But beware: many of these drives create DVDs in formats that other drives and DVD players cannot read.

Consider security - Security might not be in the forefront of your mind when you’re shopping for a computer, but it should play a part in your decision. For example, virus and spyware are far more likely to target Windows computers than MACs. Regardless of which one you choose, you should always use antivirus, firewall, and antispyware programs.

Choose by Brand - Surveys consistently show notable differences in technical support among computer brands. Since some brands are generally more expensive than others, those factors could help you decide which of two similarly equipped computers is the better buy.

These are just some of the many factors that can help your machine run more smoothly and efficiently.

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Be Successfull In Selling A Product Or A Busines

Be Successfull In Selling A Product Or A Busines

By   22:21   No comments:

Setting up and maintaining a successful business is not all about being able to make a sale. In order to ensure one's success in this endeavor, it is also important to be able to keep tab of all the aspects of the process of selling - from the time it takes to get a lead to analyzing the data in order to set future targets that are realistic. These are all  the 5 important aspects to ensure one's success.

The title of a great book by Roy M Spence says it all: it’s not just what you sell, it’s what you stand for. Substitute ‘sell’ for do/have/own/drive/wear and you get how this translates on a personal level too.

Dealing With Leads Or Potential Customers

The first step involves dealing with leads or potential customers. Things will be a lot easier if we keep a list of leads that we can get in touch with to offer our product or service. If our list is systematic, we will be able to save time and effort in looking for pertinent information such as the lead's contact number and e-mail address. It is also important to search for leads and setup a sales call in order to close potential deals. 

System To Create And List Accounts

Once we have made a successful contact and convinced some of our prospects to become our clients, we should also be able to monitor and track them on a separate list. A system that will help us create and list accounts will greatly help in dealing with them in the future. Of course, the deal will not be complete without a quote. A quote is basically a proposal of how much we would be charging for the product or service that is being offered, and if the client approves the quote, then that means we have successfully closed the deal.

Creating Sales Order And Invoice

For documentation purposes, the next step that we need to do is to create a sales order and an invoice. This is the final document that we will need to send to the client so that they can pay for the service. But the work does not stop there. We also need to make sure that we are able to collect money from the invoice. We can track it by entering the name of the person who collected the payment as well as the date the payment was collected.

List Of Upcoming Events

For a more systematic approach, we will also need a system where we can setup an event and pull out a list of upcoming events. We can also use a virtual calendar which we can view anytime to check for any upcoming schedules. This is to ensure there will not be any conflicts between our potential clients and we are able to schedule all the tasks and responsibilities without conflicting with other deliverables.

System To Generate Reports

There are times when certain documents may need to be attached to corresponding transactions. Having a system that will help in creating and listing available documents will help a lot in this process. Once this is done, we will also need a system that can help us set forecasts or future targets and generate reports that will help us analyze if the business is doing good or if more work needs to be done.

Each of the steps discussed above are essential in becoming successful in selling a product or a business. Keeping a record of prospects, of existing clients and accounts is important in making sure that we stay connected with them for future transactions. In addition, adhering to a system that will help us keep track of transactions will not only help in not missing an important event or occurrence. It will also help in setting future goals and being able to reach them.

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