Publication Date: December 23rd 2004
ISSN 1445-1360
In this issue you will read:
Editorial: December 23rd 2004
Quotable: Norman Vincent Peale said...
Interview: Jeffrey Citron CEO Vonage
Web Site Review: Swantown Inn: Bed and Breakfast
The Great Australian Joke: Twas the Night Before Christmas (In Australia)
G'Day Blokes and Sheilas!
I have to start this issue with this little tidbit reader Tom Shubnell sent me. I always knew us Aussies had something over Americans!
This issue I have a couple of big things to share. The first is an interview with Jeffrey Citron the CEO Vonage. As you all know I am big fan of this technology and I really think it is now a phone service the average Joe can use as easily as a tech geek.
The second item is something I have already shared in my blog. This is the big news I had been referring to for months. Casey and I bought ourselves a Bed and Breakfast in Olympia, Washington. It is the Swantown Inn and is a Queen Anne/Eastlake Victorian Mansion that was restored and converted in to a Bed and Breakfast in 1997. We have been working on the deal to buy it for around five months, actually we made the offer on it the week we got back from Australia. Of course this is a huge change for me, there will be new challenges, but there is also opportunities to spend more time on NetBloke and Thinkers. I finally have a nice big office again so I can set up all of my equipment. I quickly point out the site in this issues Web site Review.
Once again I would like to wish you all a safe and happy holiday season!
Nathan Allan
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Formulate and stamp indelibly on your mind a mental picture of yourself as succeeding. Hold this picture tenaciously. Never permit it to fade. Your mind will seek to develop the picture. Do not build up obstacles in your imagination.
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Jeffrey Citron is CEO of Vonage. Vonage remains competitive despite big cable and telephone companies entering the market. Vonage has over 300,000 subscribers to date and is growing more rapidly than any other residential VoIP provider.
I was lucky enough to be able to conduct a phone interview with him recently. Here are the results.
With your phenomenal growth how do you intend to continue to supply timely support to your customers?
Vonage is hiring and training 600 new support staff, which are all going to be based in the USA. There average hold time is down to an average of 2 minutes with a goal of 90 seconds not far off.
With technology lay people taking up your service and you effectively having got over the early adopter stage of the business, do you see the need for support staff to be more knowledgeable in related problems? For example should they be able to identify when it is actually a cable outage and nothing to do with Vonages service?
Vonage try to employ people with well rounded skills so they can quickly and efficiently identify customer problems. They also monitor the services of the high speed Internet providers for outages and the like.
Will you continue to integrate the VOIP technology with other hardware manufacturers like you have with Linksys?
On top of the Linksys that already has a number of offerings, there are also VOIP units with Motorola and Netgear in the works.
Will you continue to undercut the likes of AT&T’s callvantage service?
Currently Jeffery feels that there is some degree of price stability entering this new marketplace. At $24.99 for the most popular unlimited package he feels this is just about right for now.
Do you have a forum that allows customers to suggest new features?
Vonage receives many suggestions from customers for product enhancements and ideas every day. There is no formal forum for this however.
Does Vonage have any killer new features coming out that will help make our choice in VOIP companies easier?
Basically by providing a broader range of brands and devices they hope to make it easier for consumers to pick them as their choice VOIP provider.
Do you have plans to expand service in to Australia?
There is a possibility here, normally what happens first is that customers get the opportunity to purchase a Virtual Number in this country first. This has already happen in Canada, Mexico and the United Kingdom.
Jeffrey was very open and willing to answer all questions, and I found this to be a reassuring sign about the customer philosophy that the company has.
Visit: Vonage
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As I mentioned in the editorial Casey and I have made a dream for us come true. We have spent the last five months working on purchasing the Swantown Inn, Bed and Breakfast here in Olympia, Washington. So this is now NetBloke's base of operations!
The Inn is absolutely beautiful, although we do hope to add and enhance some of the features. The underlying architecture and structure is on the state and city historic registers.
We have only been in the Inn for a week, and already Casey's gourmet breakfasts are a hit. I even cooked a large part of one myself. It is a great change for us from the stress of our other work.
The new site is not live at this point but this link will take you to the existing site. This should give you an idea of what is on offer.
I hope to see some if not all of you at some point over the coming years we spend here.
Visit: Swantown Inn: Bed and Breakfast
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Twas the night before Christmas, In Australia you know,
Way down on the beach, without any snow.
Asleep in their beach hut, were Bruce and Sue,
A dreaming of Christmas, like me and like you.
Not stockings but jetskis, at the foot of their beds,
For this was Australia, what more need be said?
When all of a sudden from out the still night,
There came such a ruckus, it gave me a fright!
And I saw 'cross the sand dunes, like the shot from a gun,
A loaded up ute, come on at a run.
The driver was shouting as he left the road,
And the Heelers were sitting on top of the load.
"Come on there Blue, Red, and Dog, hold on tight,
There'll be plenty of travelin' for you-all tonight.
The driver in his bathers, and a towel that was red,
Had a bright red sun hat on the top of his head.
As he stepped from the ute, he was really a sight,
with his oh so long beard so curly and white.
As he burst in the beach hut, the children awoke,
And both so astonished, that neither one spoke.
And he filled up their jet skis with such presents galore,
That neither could think of a single thing more.
When Bruce recovered the use of his jaws,
He asked in a whisper "Are you really Santa Claus?"
"Am I the real Santa? Well, what do you think?
And he smiled as he gave his mysterious wink.
Then he left in his ute, and called back in slang,
G'Day kids of Aussie - Merry Christmas - Cooee!
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