We’ve got plans to attend a lot of events this year.

• ISPCon (spring and fall)
• HostingCon
• The Microsoft World Wide Partner Conference
• The Hosting Transformation Summit

We’ll also be attending a variety of other shows with Microsoft. We’ll make sure and keep you up to date with our event schedule so if you’re attending a show we will be exhibiting at you’ll be able to stop by and chat.

Today more than 85% of all electronic mail traffic on the Internet is unwanted, malicious or offensive. SMBs are under siege from a variety of increasingly sophisticated attacks from hackers, spammers, and phishers. Being a small business doesn’t afford “security through obscurity.”

groupSPARK’s Postini solution blocks spam, viruses, and email attacks, and provides sophisticated message management and policy enforcement capabilities.

With Outlook 2007, users can view calendars and contact lists stored on SharePoint sites, and create and manage sites for editing documents and organizing meetings. Outlook 2007 and Windows SharePoint 2007 support a new set of significantly enhanced functionality including:

 

• Read/write access to SharePoint items: calendars, tasks, contacts, discussions, and documents
• Synchronization of offline support of document library and lists
• Ability to check out and edit documents when offline
• Roll-up views of calendars and tasks across multiple lists and sites
• Unified view of personal and SharePoint tasks in Outlook 2007

 

Exchange Server 2007 is obviously something that groupSPARK and our partners have been waiting for. There are significant improvements over Exchange Server 2003. Here are just a few of those improvements…

• Advanced Anti-SPAM and Anti-Virus protection
• New data replication capabilities
• Unified messaging with fax and voice mail
• Improved performance and scalability

And this is just the tip of the iceberg.

As with all Microsoft software releases, there are many improvements over the previous release.

Outlook 2007 has a redesigned look and feel of its messaging interface, which makes composing, formatting, and acting on information an easier and more intuitive experience. You now get all the Outlook 2007 rich features and capabilities in an accessible location, which makes it easier to navigate your options.

Users benefit from a new scheduling assistant that automates time-consuming calendaring tasks, the ability to schedule and customize out-of-office communications, and managed folders that facilitate compliance needs.

You can connect Windows SharePoint Services documents, calendars, contacts, tasks, and other information to Office Outlook 2007, giving you a central place to manage your information.

These are but a few of the major process improvements that you will see in Outlook 2007.

With Microsoft releasing their 2007 products, they will be generating a tremendous amount of buzz about products and services that you have in common with them. Monitor their actions and when a press release or new set of marketing collateral is put into the main stream, alert your customers or better yet, forward the information directly to them.

For the month of January we are giving away free mailboxes. All you have to do is sign up at least 10 new mailboxes in the month and we will give you 1 free month for all those mailboxes. But it gets better. the more mailboxes you sign up the more free months you get.

>10 mailboxes - 1 free month
>20 mailboxes - 2 free months
>30 mailboxes - 3 free months

You can take this extra cash and use it to entice more customers to Hosted Exchange or keep it for yourself.

December Promotion Start private labeling your Hosted Exchange offering today! 
The key aspect of a true private labeled solution is that your customers only see your URLs - everywhere. Now, instead of using a generic domain, you can use your own URL for all the Exchange functions that your customers access. We provide a SSL certificate for your custom URL which is then used for SSL-enabled OWA, ActiveSync, OMA, and RPC/HTTPS.

Along with not having any setup or monthly minimums for mailboxes, we’re waiving the SSL setup fees for the month of December. 

Marketing Tip Pre-Launch Marketing 
When you decide the time is right to offer more hosted services, like SharePoint or CRM, be sure to generate some buzz about it with your customers. 1- 3 months Prior to launch, be sure and start getting your marketing collateral in place. Email your customers and begin educating them on your new service so when the time comes for you to begin offering it, your customers will already know the features and benefits the new service can bring them. 

Dynamics CRM  Hosted Customer Relationship Management 
groupSPARK is now offering Hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0. Dynamics CRM is a premiere Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software available in the marketplace today with an easy to use web-based interface and full Outlook integration.Cost and complexity of building and maintaining a Hosted Microsoft CRM solution have prevented deployment by service providers across the world. As the first Private Label Hosted Microsoft CRM solution in the marketplace, groupSPARK empowers you to instantly add Hosted Microsoft CRM to your suite of services. 

New Control Panel Same functionality - New look 
We have been working very hard these last few months to make improvements to our control panel. Based on feedback from you, we have made significant changes that will improve usability and the overall look of the tool. 

As with our previous control panel, this one is fully private labeled, but we’re included much more flexibility in changing the appearance of elements like fonts, colors and styles. 

SharePoint 2007 
groupSPARK will be one of the first private label providers to offer SharePoint 2007. This is a another great opportunity for you to be the first providers in the nation to offer SharePoint 2007.

New functionality in 2007 includes the ability to implement team-based blogs and wikis, enhanced integration with Outlook 2007, and the ability to easily create new application templates (you will find that the 60+ templates we already provide will satisfy even your most demanding customers).

SharePoint is being used by more and more SMBs every day. If you don’t already offer it, now is the time to. You will be able to take advantage of all the additional marketing and PR coming out of Microsoft. 

ISPCon Santa Clara  Good to see everyone 
For those of you that attended this year’s Fall ISPCon in Santa Clara, CA, we wanted to thank you for stopping by our booth. Events like ISPCon are great opportunities for us to not only meet prospective new clients but also speak to existing ones and hear their success stories. 

Dynamics CRM  Hosted Customer Relationship Management 
groupSPARK is now offering Hosted Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0. Dynamics CRM is a premiere Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software available in the marketplace today with an easy to use web-based interface and full Outlook integration.Cost and complexity of building and maintaining a Hosted Microsoft CRM solution have prevented deployment by service providers across the world. As the first Private Label Hosted Microsoft CRM solution in the marketplace, groupSPARK empowers you to instantly add Hosted Microsoft CRM to your suite of services. 

New Control Panel Same functionality - New look 
We have been working very hard these last few months to make improvements to our control panel. Based on feedback from you, we have made significant changes that will improve usability and the overall look of the tool. 

As with our previous control panel, this one is fully private labeled, but we’re included much more flexibility in changing the appearance of elements like fonts, colors and styles. 

SharePoint 2007 
groupSPARK will be one of the first private label providers to offer SharePoint 2007. This is a another great opportunity for you to be the first providers in the nation to offer SharePoint 2007.

New functionality in 2007 includes the ability to implement team-based blogs and wikis, enhanced integration with Outlook 2007, and the ability to easily create new application templates (you will find that the 60+ templates we already provide will satisfy even your most demanding customers).

SharePoint is being used by more and more SMBs every day. If you don’t already offer it, now is the time to. You will be able to take advantage of all the additional marketing and PR coming out of Microsoft. 

ISPCon Santa Clara  Good to see everyone 
For those of you that attended this year’s Fall ISPCon in Santa Clara, CA, we wanted to thank you for stopping by our booth. Events like ISPCon are great opportunities for us to not only meet prospective new clients but also speak to existing ones and hear their success stories. 

When you decide the time is right to offer more hosted services, like SharePoint or CRM, be sure to generate some buzz about it with your customers. 1- 3 months Prior to launch, be sure and start getting your marketing collateral in place. Email your customers and begin educating them on your new service so when the time comes for you to begin offering it, your customers will already know the features and benefits the new service can bring them.