Moving up to a Blackberry

Blackberry has done a tremendous job in penetrating the business market with their smartphones but now have shifted gears to also include the commerical market. Thats right people like you and me are now prime targets for RIM to sell their blackberry. The blackberry accessory market has sky rocketed with companies producing skins, chargers, different cases and bluetooth accessories. However also growing the software development market for blackberry including applications, games and productivity tools. Your blackberry is truly a smart phone with the ability to handle much more than a traditional cell phone. You can browse the internet faster and with more ease, manage your schedule, connect to email and overall provides a new way to interact with the internet and others. Bplay is one such company that has created a reputation for a great blackberry experience through their games and applications. Bplay owns nearly 80% of the blackberry gaming, ringtone and theme market. To find out more about them please click here.

Netfirms for Small Business

With the poor economy many businesses and individuals are looking at ways to cut costs whether it be resources, operational expenses while trying to maintain sales. This is the beauty of technology and how it can help you acheive just that. Netfirms, is a web delivery company that provides web hosting solutions at an affordable rate. This service is especially offers the ultimate service for small businesses. They offer 250GB of space, 2 domain names, blogging, CMS technolgy, email and much more. For just under $10/month a business can get up and running with fast and reliable service. To find out more about their service then click here.

Making Voip Affordable

Voice over IP (Voip) is a fast growing and hot business in today's technology market. Many corporations and individuals are making the switch from their traditional telephone systems to a more cost effective system over the internet. In particular there is one organization who is offering the best bang for the buck according to CNET and that is toktumi. Toktumi is a jam packed service that offers several features. The best part is you can try it out for a month, hassle free. Below is a run down of their feature, their promotion and their pricing.

• Auto Attendant - The auto attendant enables you to create an IVR like response so that your customers can be directed to the right person and enables custom messages such as office hours, directions and more. This saves time in the office to find other associates and adds a professional look to your business.

• Virtual Assistant - The virtual assistant will screen callers and ask them to first state who is calling. The system then calls you and tells you who is calling and you have the option to send the message to a voicemail or take the call directly.

• Call Handling - This feature enables you to direct and forward calls to another number anywhere in the United States or Canada. You can forward to a cell phone, landline or whatever you choose. It adds a map to routing calls to different customers.

• Your Number - The system allows you to pick from 1800 numbers or a local business number within the United States. The service would be useful for Canadians and we hope to see this as an added feature in the future.

• Dial In Access - This is an important feature. This feature allows you to not only dial in from to your voicemail and system options but also enables you to place a call from your 1800/local business number which adds a professional outlook to your company.

• Conferencing - You can add a conference call of upto 20 people at any time. Downside is you need a PC to make this call so you need to call out to your customers. However, the temporary workaround is for you to get a fre conference call service which you can find on Google, and have your IVR forward the number to the free conference call service. So your customers will need to enter your 1800 number, then hit a button like 9 which transfers you to the free service. Its seamless integration. However, this is a value add service which toktumi should consider adding in future.

• Unlimited Calling - Call anywhere in Canada and the US from your PC and its free. This service is similar to skype with the difference that skypeout enables you to call from a landline as well. However, for the service offering it does a great deal. You can connect your phone to your computer which will enable you to call from a phone connected to your PC.
  

On the whole we find that the service offering for the price is a steal. At $14.95 US a month you get a virtual telephone system for your business. The best part is the company is offering a free 30 day hassle free trial. Try it out for 30 days and if you like it you can pay month to month. There are no contracts or commitments. To find out more visit Toktumi.

Unlock Freedom from Roaming

Travelers look forward to visiting a new place, meeting new people and seeing new things. However, they need to stay connected with family and friends while out of their country and want the convenience of using their cell phones. Did you know that when you travel out of your country, you not only pay long distance but also have to pay roaming fees. Average roaming fees across carriers is approximately $0.95 per min plus long distance. Let assume your long distance minutes are $0.25 per min if you travel from the US to Canada. Therefore per minute you are paying close to $1.20. To counter these high fees many companies are offering unlocking services for cell phones. What this does is it enables anybody who has a GSM phone to place a pay as you go sim card of another carrier and avoid these roaming fees. For example if a Canadian Rogers customer wants to travel to the United States, they can get their phone unlocked, place a US carrier sim card such as verizon or t-mobile, and pay only $0.10 per min using their phone + long distance. So you are saving on average $0.85 cents per minute.

Now one would ask what is the payback? Well thanks to the increase in unlocking service providers, prices have fallen significantly. We recommend one service in particular that offers inexpensive unlocking and they offer a 100% guarantee on lowest price. Just to show you how inexpensive they are, we took a rogers blackberry curve to several providers and found the average market value to unlock this device was $35. We found a service with cellunlock, that offers remote unlocking and you can get the same unlock code for half the price and if it doesn't work you get your money back.

So lets assume the unlock price is $17. With an average savings of $0.85 per min, you are looking at a payback if you use your phone for 20 min which is highly likely. Unlocking your phone can save you time, money and the frustration behind roaming fees. Check with your destination country to see if they provide a gsm based network. Click here to find out more on this unlocking service.