After many painstaking late night hours of coding, the new Stuffr is here.

It’s here! It’s finally here!

The long awaited update is finally finished. It took a bit longer than I expected (about a month longer) because I wanted to add as much to this version as I could before letting it out the door, so to speak. So here it is…

Stuffr, a desktop blogging client for Windows, has a streamlined design that works in conjuction with multiple weblog platforms.

With customizable toolbars, syntax highlighting, and smart prompts, Stuffr offers you all of the tools needed for speedy and convenient posting.

Stuffr allows you to save drafts or publish entries to your blog in real time, but it also offers the choice of saving the post locally for further review and editing.

New in this version of Stuffr are four preset color themes, as well as the choice to customize the interface colors.

Stuffr currently supports blogging on the Movable Type and Wordpress platforms, as well as Tumblr TumbleLogs. Stuffr now also supports posting to Twitter and Pownce.

Stuffr’s features include:

Blogging (Movable Type & WordPress):

• Post drafts and publish posts
• Save drafts locally
• Editing posts and drafts
• Multiple blog accounts
• Multiple categories
• Add Categories (WP 2.2+ Only)
• Trackbacks
• Post date modification
• Add files, images, links and web videos (from YouTube, Vimeo, College Humor, and MetaCafe)
• HTML syntax highlighting
• Technorati tags
• Pinging multiple update services
• Four customizable tag buttons
• It’s 100% free, with no ads or spyware!

TumbleLogs (Tumblr):

• Post Text Entries
• Add Photos
• Cite Quotations
• Link to your favorite sites
• Paste an online chat conversation
• Embed Video

As you use the Stuffr interface to view your Twitter timeline, it will display up to the last 250 tweets you have received since starting the application.

Twitter:

• Posting Tweets
• Sending Direct Messages
• Highlighting Newly Arriving Tweets
• Posting Blog Entries To Your TimeLine
• Sending Tweets To Your Pownce Account
• Following/Leaving Twitter Users
• Viewing User TimeLines/Favorites
• Keyword blocking (filter out tweets using keywords you define)
• “Hushing” users (temporarily filter out tweets from specific people)

Pownce:

• Posting Notes
• Highlighting Newly Arriving Notes
• Posting Blog Entries To Your Pownce Notes
• Sending Notes To Your Twitter Account

Bug Fixes:

• The tab order on the Account Setup Screen is now in the correct order.
• The height and width of the app would “fluctuate” from time to time.
• The Insert Image/Upload File window would hang (not close) when uploading large files or images.
• If you edit a post on one blog and then switch to another blog, it no longer overwrites the post id on the second blog.
• Fixed a small sizing issue when embedding YouTube videos.
• Changed the default position of the cursor on the form when opening some options.

Known Issues:

• If you have chosen to update Twitter while creating a blog entry, you will notice a “delay” as the Twitter display is refreshed.

For more information on changes included in each version of Stuffr, check the history.txt file that accompanies the file.

Stuffr, with it’s intuitive design, does what a blogging client should, and it does it quickly and efficiently.

So when you have a lot on your mind, take your thoughts and Stuff ‘em!

Visit the download page at GetStuffr! to grab your copy.

– Powered By Stuffr! –

The new version of Stuffr is almost complete. I have been busy adding full integration with Twitter, which is going to be awesome.

In this latest version I have cleaned up the icons a bit, fixed a couple small bugs that most people probably didn’t even notice, and of course, added the integration with Twitter.

Stuffr will also allow you to post a message on Twitter when you post a new blog entry, whether you are running WordPress, Movable Type, or if you have a Tumblr log.

I am aiming for a Wednesday release at this point, so it won’t be long now. I’d really like to take a mini-vacation and stay at any number of Las Vegas hotels right now, but I know, you are waiting patiently for this release, so it’s the least I can do.

– Powered By Stuffr! –

EBay announced yesterday that they are cutting the listing fees and making the shopping experience simpler and safer! Awesome huh?

EBay unveiled changes to its online marketplace Tuesday that the company characterizes as sweeping and historic and that are aimed at boosting sales by making the shopping experience simpler and safer.

The changes, which include lowering some fees and raising merchant standards, were announced at the company’s eCommerce Forum by John Donahoe, who will succeed Meg Whitman as president and CEO in March.

The changes, which will be implemented at different points in the coming weeks and months, come at a time when eBay is struggling to boost growth of transaction volume and revenue amidst increased competition from the likes of Amazon.com, which in recent years has attracted many merchants away from eBay.

Too bad their “fee cuts” are anything but that. What? You don’t believe me?

For the sake of argument, let’s pretend we’re listing and selling an item for $25.00. The fee changes are as follows:

The current listing fee is $1.20. The new listing fee will be $1.00.
The current gallery fee is $0.35. The new gallery fee will be $0.00.
The current final value fee is 5.25%. The new final value fee will be 8.75%.

Sounds nice and puffy doesn’t it? Well, let’s take a closer look.

Before the cuts:

Sale Total: $25.00

Listing fee: $1.20
Gallery fee: $0.35
Final Value fee: $1.31

Net Sale Amount: $22.14 (aka your profit)

After the cuts:

Sale Total: $25.00

Listing fee: $1.00
Gallery fee: $0.00
Final Value fee: $2.19

Net Sale Amount: $21.81 (aka your profit)

$22.14 vs. $21.81. Is sure doesn’t sound like much of a cut in fees to me. If it was up to me, I would much rather make $22.14 from my item than $21.81. Imagine if you are a high volume seller and you have to pay 33 cents more for every item you sell. If you sell 100 items you’ve made $33 less than you used too.

All hail the fee cuts!

When I first started doing contract programming jobs, aka working for myself, I did a lot of document preservation jobs. That’s what I called them anyway. Many companies hired me to write customized applications that allowed them to scan a document and store it on a storagre server somewhere in the building.

Since then, many Document Scanning Services have cropped up, and they are basically much easier to work with and much more cost effective for the companies involved. I can say that now, because I haven’t had a document scanning type job in over five years, which is good for me, because they were a pain in the butt, and needed constant maintenance from the programmer (aka me) involved.

A good Document Scanning Service will help set up a good records management program for your company. In today’s day and age, document storage is vital, to ensure you are adhering to any number of laws, as well as for future reference from within the company itself. One of the best parts is they will store your records in a secure location off-site, so if something happens at your location you can rest assured your documents are safe.

I wonder how long it will be before regualr everyday people like you and I will require the services of such a service. Heck, I bet there are some of you who already do.

One of the things I asked for this Christmas was enough Cat5 cable to run our network into each room of the house. I doubt I will get that for Christmas, but it didn’t hurt to ask, right?

Of course, in a perfect world I would be running fiber cable from room to room and surfing the web at breakneck speeds.

Yeah, in a perfect world. I need Extreme Makeover: Computer Network Edition.

Being an application developer and a web designer, I deal with numerous different types of customers on a daily basis. One of the hardest parts of working for yourself, is developing a solid customer base, and remembering each detail when it comes time to communicate with them.

Several years ago, my wife worked in the IT department of a trucking company. She spent numerous hours working on the computer system used by their CRM personnel, and it just about drove her crazy. She suggested time and time again that the company invest in a real customer relationship management software package. They didn’t take her advice, unfortunately, and they went out of business the following year.

AIMpromote offers a customer relationship management solution that removes the confusion and complexity of the whole process. They have just added a new feture set to their software to make things even better. Check out this press release:

Traverse City, MI October 19th 2007 — AIMpromote, provider of lead management and customer relationship management software, has launched a significant upgrade to their CRM offering. The newly added white-label CRM software feature enhances the value that lead aggregators can offer to their lead purchasing customers. The enhanced reselling functionality provides an intuitive interface to completely manage the selling of a privately labeled CRM as their own.

Lead aggregators operate in the highly competitive B2B space, and need ways to add value to their offerings. Michael Myles, President and CEO of AIMpromote said “The significant added value provided by the AIMpromote white-label customer relationship software gives lead aggregators a way to differentiate themselves in what has become a highly commoditized market.” He went on to say that “this product also provides an easy way to leverage existing client bases to more rapidly increase sales.”

The close tie-in between the selling of leads and the powerful sales management functionality of the AIMpromote customer relationship software enables the end-users of the system to easily purchase leads that are then available to be worked directly in the system. There is no importing necessary. Billing is also consolidated, providing an easy way for the end-user to manage their funds and billing profile. The system has been designed from the ground-up to offer high levels of customizability and advanced functionality for everyone involved, while requiring little investment in time.

The CRM reselling and lead sales functions functionality includes the ability for lead aggregators and CRM software resellers to completely customize pricing, including setup fees, discounts, and free trials. This flexibility empowers the resellers of the system to enhance their profit margins as they see fit. The CRM reselling system allows lead aggregators and consultants the ability to brand their system with their own logo and contact information. Integrated Authorize.Net payment processing gives an interface to take credit cards automatically, and have the funds deposited directly into their bank accounts. The advanced accounting and reporting pages in the AIMpromote system give a top-down view of the business as a whole, as well as for each individual account.

The tiered approach that AIMpromote has taken to the reselling of their powerful customer relationship management software gives even the end-user clients the ability to also resell the system. The billing and accounting system automatically takes care of everything for them, even automatically setting up accounts. “The ease of use and flexibility of the AIMpromote CRM for those providing business-to-business consultation services and those selling leads has created an opportunity to significantly improve the bottom line, with very little time or expense,” said Matt Wolfe, Vice President of Operations for AIMpromote. Wolfe added, “The service and functionality of the system is unique in that customers are supported through an integrated support ticket system by their parent account. The end-users of the system will never know that the service they are using is being resold, or that the company from which they are licensing the software are not the actual manufacturers of the software. To them, it won’t be AIMpromote at all, it will be ‘ABC Software Company CRM’, or whatever name the company reselling the software chooses.”

About AIMpromote

AIMpromote leads the market in growth and technology for on-demand lead management and CRM reselling solutions. AIMpromotes enterprise lead management software empowers companies in any industry to more effectively generate, delegate, and report on leads and the teams that manage them. AIMpromote is the only solution that integrates detailed web analytics with sales and marketing analytics to provide a complete closed-loop view of the sales process. The AIMpromote lead management software offers a completely customized solution that can be tailored to fit any organization’s customer acquisition workflow. The unique combination of having the most functionality, and the lowest total cost of ownership, AIMpromote is the most cost effective solution for improving close rates and marketing efficiency.

My wife runs her own business, and her biggest weakness, like mine, is marketing. She comes up with some of the coolest ideas and the hottest merchandise, but getting the word out to people has always been a challenge.

Up until now, she has been relying solely on her catalog mailings to generate additional business, but she’s been thinking of starting an online newsletter for her existing customers as well as those who are interested in the products she sells.

She’s been looking for a solution that allows her to send the newsletters, conduct surveys of her existing customers, and easily communicate with those whose radar she would otherwise never appear on.

iContact seems to have the best email marketing solution out there. With a free 15 day trial, easy to use interface, and choice of over 300 pre-designed templates, we couldn’t help but check them out. I found it interesting that iContact has blogging capability built in as well, from the same application, which is a huge plus as far as I’m concerned.

Once we get done testing iContact, we can keep using it for just $9.95 per month, which isn’t too bad. If her business grows, which we hope it does, iContact will grow with her. They primarily serve small businesses, but some larger companies like Ford and AT&T, as well as political campaigns also use their service.

With iContact’s interface she will be able to track the opens and clickthroughs on her emails, segment her list and perform all of the management functions. The software takes care of handling any bounced email and all of the subscription details, so she’ll have plenty of free time to design new schtuff.

If you’re interested in email marketing you can check out their video, or sign up for their free 15-day trial at www.icontact.com.

WordPress 2.3 has been released and this one is a biggie! So what’s new?

1. Native tagging support allows you to use tags in addition to categories on your post, if you so choose. We’ve included importers for the Ultimate Tag Warrior, Jerome’s Keywords, Simple Tags, and Bunny’s Technorati Tag plugins so if you’ve already been using a tagging plugin you can bring your data into the new system. The tagging system is also wicked-fast, so your host won’t mind.
2. Our new update notification lets you know when there is a new release of WordPress or when any of the plugins you use has an update available. It works by sending your blog URL, plugins, and version information to our new api.wordpress.org service which then compares it to the plugin database and tells you what the latest and greatest is you can use.
3. We’ve cleaned up URLs a bunch in a feature we call canonical URLs which does things like enforce your no-www preference, redirect posts with changed slugs so a link never goes bad, redirect URLs that get cut off in emails on similar to the correct post, and much more. This helps your users, and it also helps your search engine optimization, as search engines like for each page to be available in one canonical location.
4. Our new pending review feature will be great for multi-author blogs. It allows authors to submit a post for review by an editor or administrator, where before they would just have to save a draft and hope someone noticed it.
5. There is new advanced WYSIWYG functionality (we call it the kitchen sink button) that allows you to access some features of TinyMCE that were previously hidden.

Oh yeah, and there are 351fixes. Wow. I’ll be busy upgrading over the next couple days…

Find out more at the WordPress Development Blog.

It took a bit longer than planned, but the latest version of Stuffr has been released. No new features, or fun toys in this one, just an important bug fix.

Stuffr, a desktop blogging client for Windows, has a streamlined design that works in conjuction with multiple weblog platforms.

With customizable toolbars, syntax highlighting, and smart prompts, Stuffr offers you all of the tools needed for speedy and convenient posting.

Stuffr allows you to save drafts or publish entries to your blog in real time, but it also offers the choice of saving the post locally for further review and editing.

Stuffr currently supports Movable Type and Wordpress blogs, as well as Tumblr TumbleLogs.

Stuffr’s features include:

Blogging (Movable Type & WordPress):

• Post drafts and publish posts
• Save drafts locally
• Editing posts and drafts
• Multiple blog accounts
• Multiple categories
• Add Categories (WP 2.2+ Only)
• Trackbacks
• Post date modification
• Add files, images, links and web videos (from YouTube, Vimeo, College Humor, and MetaCafe)
• HTML syntax highlighting
• Technorati tags
• Pinging multiple update services
• Four customizable tag buttons
• It’s 100% free, with no ads or spyware!

TumbleLogs (Tumblr):

• Post Text Entries
• Add Photos
• Cite Quotations
• Link to your favorite sites
• Paste an online chat conversation
• Embed Video

Version 0.9.3 includes the following bug fix:

• Uploading files was not using the file upload path correctly and Stuffr was not saving the file upload location.

For more information on changes included in each version of Stuffr, check the history.txt file that accompanies the file.

Stuffr, with it’s intuitive design, does what a blogging client should, and it does it quickly and efficiently.

So when you have a lot on your mind, take your thoughts and Stuff ‘em!

Being an application developer and a web designer, I deal with numerous different types of customers on a daily basis. One of the hardest parts of working for yourself, is developing a solid customer base, and remembering each detail when it comes time to communicate with them.

Several years ago, my wife worked in the IT department of a trucking company. She spent numerous hours working on the computer system used by their crm personnel, and it just about drove her crazy. She suggested time and time again that the company invest in a real customer relationship management software package. They didn’t take her advice, unfortunately, and they went out of business the following year.

AIMpromote offers a customer relationship management solution that removes the confusion and complexity of the whole process. Their Lead Management CRM Software offers a one-piece software solution to managing all of your lead aggregation needs.

If that trucking company my wifre worked for had used something like the AIMpromote solution, they would probably still be in business today.