Blog
Live Chat is…Live!
Hot on the heels on the Maclean Customer Portal – the easiest way to see your Service Tickets, Invoices and System Health – Maclean Technology today announced the latest in their Managed Service offering – Maclean Live Chat.
Live Chat is expected to be a welcome addition to the support offering, complementing the ability to raise issues and receive support via the traditional telephone and email mechanisms, and the recently launched Maclean Customer Portal which offers customers a convenient real-time view into their systems health and ticket progress.
“As we develop our Managed IT Service offering, we have two primary goals” says Chris Maclean, CEO of Maclean Technology. “They are to avoid downtime if at all possible, for which we use the award-winning Enfusion remote monitoring and maintenance capabilities; and in the event of unavoidable downtime to get it back up and running as quickly as possible. But if we’re not communicating well, then none of that matters. Giving customers real-time visibility into progress and system health through the Maclean Portal, and real-time access to engineers via a system as convenient as Live Chat is another big step forward.”
Live Chat will enable faster and more effective incident resolution, and is expected to have a direct positive impact on reducing the Time to Respond to requests as well as increase our First Call Resolution rates – all of which adds up to a better customer experience. Customers will be able to access from a Desktop Link or our email signatures and there is nothing to install.
Click here to be directed to Maclean Live Chat. For any enquiries, please contact markb@maclean.co.nz
New Partnership – theCloud
New Partnership – theCloud
In forming our Cloud concept, we embarked on an ambitious mission to find the right hosting partners for applications that are best hosted locally. We are very pleased to have formed a business partnership with a similarly ambitious and capable company, appropriately called theCloud. With data centres in Auckland and Hamilton (and soon to include Wellington and Christchurch), market-leading cloud agility products for fast deployment and adjustment, and an impressive array of existing customers, they have proven a great addition to our eco-system of Cloud partners.
Services jointly provided and supported currently include quick provision of Server 2012 Servers, Back up, Disaster Recovery, Hosted Exchange and a new product that provides Dropbox-like functionality in a secure NZ-based location.
theCloud is providing high-quality hosting up to the Operating System level, with Maclean providing related consulting, design, and implementation services and their award-winning Managed Services over the top, giving customers a best-in-class experience perfect for their target mid-sized Auckland-based customers.
theCloud complements our existing relationships with IBM and HD, giving us the enviable ability to find a perfect fit for your requirements.
Microsoft on Fine Form
It’s shaping up to be a big year for Microsoft, with big launches all taking hold at once. Server 2012 promises to give Citrix and VMware a run for its money in the mid-market, causing customers to question whether the (IMHO) slightly better but more expensive Citrix and VMware offerings are still worth their premiums.
Windows 8 is massive, not because of the new features but because it is the first step towards decent mobility for Microsoft. I went to a Microsoft Conference 3 years ago where I heard about this vision, and fair play to them; they’ve done it. They finally have a Windows phone that won’t get you laughed at in the geek set; in fact it might even get some admiration from those not totally blinded by Apple-love. They appear to have done their normal thing – take the bet and raise it some. There’s no doubt that Apple created this Smartphone revolution; but I think Microsoft is going to give them a good run in the business market. They’ve raised the stakes with consistent experience across all devices (desktop to tablet to smartphone) and have enough unique things to stand out. Furthermore, Exchange will always work best with Outlook – and the Microsoft phone has a fantastic Outlook client. A space to watch with interest.
Also important, is Microsoft Office 2013. I’ve been using it for a couple of months now, and love it. It’s hard to describe what makes it worth the upgrade as to me – I guess it’s quite subjective. Simply put, it’s just ‘cooler’. Everything just feels more intuitive, there’s some great features for power-users (like automatic pivot tables which have a pretty good guess at what you might be looking for) and for novices alike (such as adding a new line to a Word table is a one-click operation of the table itself). Here is a link to Microsoft’s user guides for the new app suite.
And finally, let’s not forget Microsoft’s public cloud offering – Office 365. If you have unique email requirements, by all means an on-premise or partner-hosted Exchange server is still a great option and the Managed Service Provider (MSP) community will be happy to help. But if your email is the same as most others, you don’t mind it being offshore or losing some of the more advanced features then Microsoft’s Office 365 Hosted Exchange becomes pretty compelling. Not that it suits us MSP’s too well – but that’s progress.
Chris Maclean
Mass Deployment of Apps Now Available in NZ
Up until now apps have had to be tediously loaded on to each and every iOS device one at a time. Apple’s Volume Purchase Program (VPP) now makes it easier to find, buy, and then distribute the apps your business needs. Apple’s new VPP isn’t restricted to just Apple Store apps. It’s also a simple way for businesses to get custom B2B apps built and deployed from third party developers.
To enrol and find out more about VPP visit http://www.apple.com/business/vpp/
