Two weeks have passed since the Oct. 22 retail release of Microsoft Windows 7, and we’re wondering how installation efforts are going out there. In particular, we’re curious if any of you have used GoToAssist or GoToAssist Express to migrate your company – or even your family and friends – to the new operating system. Or perhaps you’ve used GoToAssist following a recent installation to provide remote support. If so, we’d like to hear all about it. And we might even share your story with the world.

 Here are a few questions to get you started:

• What Windows 7 challenges were you facing that led you to consider and use GoToAssist?
• What happened? How did it go?
• What is the name of your company, how big is it, and what industry is it in?
• What is your job title, and what are your responsibilities?

We’ll post some of the responses here on the blog, and may even contact you about sharing your story with the media.

 Thanks!

One of the concerns I’ve heard from the consultants I’ve met is they don’t always want to solve problems more quickly. Consultants often bill by the hour so the longer it takes to solve a problem, the more billable hours they can add to their invoice. I get it. Everyone needs to protect their income.

I’ve also heard from consultants that they can actually make more money if they solve problems faster. Their productivity skyrockets (literally) and they are able to take on more business, manage different types of projects, and charge more for their services. They can remotely serve multiple customers off hours simultaneously for monthly maintenance or updates, increasing their billable hours. They can improve their customer’s satisfaction.

I’ll never forget the conversation I had with a customer (we’ll call her Lori) at a conference who told me this story: Lori was in her car and received a call from a customer. She was about 45 minutes away from her office so she thought she would try to trouble-shoot the problem over the phone. Lori could use the software in her sleep so she thought she would easily be able visualize what her customer was seeing and explaining. She spent the entire 45 minutes on the phone with her customer and never solved the problem. Once at her desk, she booted up her computer, launched a session and solved the problem in 5 minutes. 45 minutes vs 5 minutes.

No doubt, seeing the problem and remotely supporting customers will lead to faster problem resolution. But that is a GOOD thing not a bad one. Consultants can improve customer satisfaction which leads to making more money and they can simply fit more into their days – which, depending on the type of person you are, could also general much more money for you. I’d love to hear your concerns or stories about using remote support in your business.

Photo Credit: Darrren Hester

 Recently, Frost & Sullivan published a new report called: World Web-based Clientless Remote Support Software Market. In this report, they identify market challenges, drivers and growth opportunities.

There are 3 major points from this report that I will share with you in this post.

1. The need for remote support is growing because “Businesses are being compelled to ‘do more with less’ and improve service and support internally for employees and for customer.” says Frost & Sullivan.
2. Internal IT and support departments are growing at a faster clip than external support departments. Why? In the past, internal support has made things work with free or  legacy tools. IT is a cost center and they haven’t always had the budget for more sophisticated tools that required a fee. Now, “as businesses grow remote employees and mobile users, free tools are not powerful enough to meet the needs of the tech support proffessionals.” says Frost & Sullivan.
3. GoToAssist Corporate is noted by Frost & Sullivan as “the worldwide market leader.” Yay!

You can read more about our leadership in this press release.

Join us for a live Webinar to hear John Ragsdale, VP at The SSPA, share strategies for using surveys to radically improve the customer experience, accurately measure session performance and fortify one of your most important revenue streams.

 Attend this interactive Webinar to learn:

• Best practices for developing an effective survey strategy
• How to use survey results to improve first-call resolution and customer satisfaction and loyalty
• How to leverage customizable surveys to identify new revenue streams
• And more…

Date: Thursday, October 8
Time: 11AM Pacific, 12pm Mountain, 1pm Central, 2pm Eastern

If you miss this webinar, you can see the recording on-demand by click the register link above.

A colleague recently asked me what my plans are if our kids school closes this winter due to HINI penetrating our community. I looked at him blankly and sighed. In spite of all the hype around the upcoming flu season, I hadn’t really thought of it actually. Being a working mom, I sometimes filter all the data (meaning I don’t have time to watch the news) or I just stay in denial and hope my carefully crafted balancing act won’t be disrupted by things outside of my control (yeah right.)

Well, Eric, you brought up a really good point, and it got me thinking. Fortunately, I work at Citrix Online and we have lots of tools that enable me to work remotely from home, using GoToMyPC I can log into my work PC, I can collaborate online with my colleagues using GoToMeeting, and get support remotely from my IT HelpDesk with GoToAssist. Heck, I can even present in a webinar from home (assuming I’m well enough and don’t have screaming children in the background) using GoToWebinar. I know this seems like a shameless plug for all Citrix Online products but these products have enabled me to have flexiblity in my crazy-busy life.

So like last year, I know that I will work from home when my kids are sick or if their school closes – but I hope they dont’ get too sick (fingers crossed really tightly) and I certainly hope the school doesn’t close. But if it does, there will be lots of families looking for ways to stay connected to their work and some of those people will even be in IT.

The beauty of using GoToAssist is that you can use it from anywhere. You can remotely support your employees from home just as easily as if you are in the office or on the road. Everyone in IT and business should be thinking about business continuity for their companies, see this article from Business Week: Small Business Urged to Prepare for Swine Flu. But have you also thought about business continuity for yourself? How will you support all those employees who have to stay home due to school closures? What will you do if your school closes?

Photo: Collin Anderson

Many of you already know Chris Pirillo, for those of you who don’t, he is a very funny geek, technology enthusiast, and host of both internet and tv technolgoy shows – among many other things (click on his name to learn more).

Yesterday, Chris wrote a blog called Grow Your Business Using GoToAssist Express. It is a great introduction to why companies need GoToAssist Express for their remote support solution. “Save yourself a whole lot of time, headaches and money by using a piece of software that will pay for itself in a matter of days. It’s simple to use, and a very powerful tool to have.” says Chris Pirillo.

Thanks Chris!

This Tuesday, September 15 at 10am Pacific time, we are hosting a webinar with the SSPA on using collaboration as part of your remote support environment. Here are the details for from the webinar invite. If you aren’t able to join live, you can still register (before or after the webinar) and an archived webinar link will be sent to you.

Register Here

Web collaboration has emerged from the economic ashes of 2009 as a high-impact support technology with a compelling ROI. And it’s no surprise — the benefits of Web collaboration for technical support include improved service levels, reduced operational costs, effective team communication and enhanced customer experience.

Join us for a live Webinar with John Ragsdale, VP of the Service and Support Professionals Association (SSPA). Ragsdale will discuss the business and customer value of Web-collaboration tools and share case studies of organizations that are leveraging this technology to thrive in a tough economy.

During this 1-hour interactive Webinar, you’ll learn:

• The 9 functional modules of Web collaboration
• How business can use Web collaboration to deliver better customer support
• Which Web-collaboration modules deliver the fastest ROI
• And more…

Strategies for Developing a Hightly Collaborative Support Environment

Date: Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Time: 10am Pacific, 11am Mountain, 12pm Central, 1pm Eastern 
Speakers: John Ragsdale, VP of Research, The SSPA and Brenda Dentinger, Product Marketing Manager, Citrix Online

If you aren’t able to catch the live webinar, you can click the registration link above and view the archived webinar on-demand.

“Beware of freeway” writes John Ragsdale, VP of Technology Research a the SSPA in his recent report called Market Overview: Web Collaboration. Ten Distint Modules Comprise this Popular Support Technology.

The following is a quote from John’s report, which defines how collaboration works in remote support tools:

Beware of freeware. Basic Web chat and desktop sharing can be had for free and is often bundled into e-commerce servers and other IT and support tools. But keep in mind, you get what you pay for. Lower-end and freeware products offer less security, little or no audit trail, and integration to an incident management or knowledgebase system may be nearly impossible.

You can read more from John in his blog: http://jragsdale.wordpress.com/

If you are member of the SSPA you can access the report as a part of your membership. Otherwise, you can contact them to purchase it.

Thanks to you all, we have won the Stevie Award for New Product of the Year by The American Business Awards.

This is a prestigious award coveted by many software companies. Our win is a direct result of votes by consumers of software products and clearly shows our leadership in the remote support market. For more information, you can read our press release.

Thanks again to everyone who voted!

…GoToAssist Express radio interview that is And it was great, thanks for taking the time and for sharing your love of our remote support product.

If you would like to hear Dave’s Aug 14, 2009 show called “Into Tomorrow”, you can listen by clicking here: Into Tomorrow with Dave Graveline. (I recommend it, he is wonderfully entertaining.) I’m in hour 2, about twenty minutes into the segment.

You can sign-up for Dave’s FREE once-a-week TechNewsLetter and keep an eye on what else “Into Tomorrow” is doing!  Just type your Email address in the red box on the right at http://www.graveline.com/.