Well, our second official contest is over. [The first is still running]

You may remember a couple of weeks ago when we asked for all techs to print out the MinuteFix logo and take a picture of it somewhere unusual. We got some great responses and after much deliberation have chosen MinuteFix Certified Technicians Douglas Wong and James Connors as the winners. What of their images?

Douglas chose to create a desktop for himself as the representative of MinuteFix Montreal:

while James was able to get the seal of approval from author JK Rowlings

Both gentleman will receive a $15 Starbucks gift card in the mail within days. Congratulations guys and keep up the great work! Oh, and stay tuned for further contests….

Certified MinuteFix Technician Doug Wong has a strong idea. He would like to see us, the tech community, build up a bit of a “Best Practices” or small FAQ for our customers that we can either refer them to for downloads and such or that we can allow them to view and then (we hope) decided, “I can’t do that. That is too hard. I should get a tech to do it.”. It really is a good idea and one that we can develop as a community.

Therefore I have started a topic under Tech Conversation on the forum where we can begin that dialogue. The most conversation and input we have, the better. What may be a weakness of one is sure to be a strength of another!

I am so tired of guessing which musical I am or guessing which OC character I am most like or even knowing what my hotness rating is amongst my “friends.” Building a community can be difficult enough of a task. So why do I keep getting all this pressure from the Facebook community? Why do I have to invite 20 friends just to get access to the app. Not my style at all.

Oh, my point….speaking of community, Big B, Certified MinuteFix Technician, took a little time today to introduce us to himself in a pretty extraordinary way. We hope you all enjoy this as much as we did! Thank you so much Big B…..

I have spoken on iChat and email (and even phone) with several of you now. We’ve talked tech and life and Super Bowl and movies and family. Lately I have been having a bit of a Woody Allen conversation with one of our MinuteFix Certified Technicians, Richard Adler. He attached a pic of his fam to an email so I thought I would highlight him and his handsome family. Send me your pics and I’ll give you some link love too! So, community, I introduce you to Richard and his fam.

BTW - Richard is certified in Customer Service, English, Antivirus, Gen Prof, Windows and Vista!

Part of any successful startup is the marketing campaign that takes place very early on. It is what can make or break early rounds of funding. It is the key to having a solid customer base. And ultimately it is what you will rely on to assure consumers and/or customers. It isn’t something to be taken lightly by any means. Drew McLellan knows this. That is why last year he assembled a team of authors to write The Age of Conversation. The book was a great success and the proceeds went to various children’s charities. It was so successful that a second volume is preparing to take off. The exciting thing is that I will be one of the authorial collaborates. I have to admit I am pretty darned excited. Looking at the list of some of the other authors is a bit intimidating but totally cool, nonetheless. So, in an effort to kick off this experience I am asking you to go and vote on the topic of the book. It is a quick survey and will really help with the initial effort.

If you want to know more about the project I encourage you to visit Drew’s blog and the actual book page.

Although it’s tough to believe, the entire MinuteFix staff works from home. Drew works from home. I work from home. Our lead developer Chris works from home. Alin, his right hand works from home. Oscar, our newly-appointed Marketing Manger works from home. We like it like that. Actually, we love it like that. We work best when we don’t have to drive an hour to the office, or have to wait more than five minutes to check our email when we wake up in the morning. You know the feeling.

MinuteFix is designed around working from home. You will most likely be working from home too. If you ever need a reminder of the pleasures of not having to go to the office, here’s a little game to refresh your memory. There are just two rules to surviving ’til vacation. 1) Finish your daily work by collecting the folders and 2) Avoid supervisors.

I am putting out a personal call for anyone that can customize a Myspace page. Yes, MinuteFix is going social, so to speak, and we want to have a totally unique look. If you are someone that either spends way too much time on myspace or just knows how to do a total overlay on a site please send me an email and we can get this party started right! Unfortunately, there are no prizes involved but I will think you are the most amazing person I have interacted with today! Thank you so much.

Well, MinuteFix has joined the social networking system. We are now on Facebook. That’s right! For all you Facebook addicts (of which I, of course, am one), you can become a friend of MinuteFix. What better way to show off and show your love for our team? It’s also a great way for us to score a date with another hott company or send a round of drinks to all the hardworking technicians! Don’t be surprised when you get a slightly pixelated cup of S’bucks from me!

You can find us here.

I’m concerned. Well, let me rephrase that. I am not losing sleep. However, if you are anything like me you may not be so sure that that two week stint back in college working at the GAP was quite enough to prepare you for being a customer service agent. It is only through my role with other companies that I have observed some awesome customer service techniques and added them to my presentation. To that end, I am pleased to say we are welcoming to our team a top notch customer service specialist, Phil Gerbyshak. Because MinuteFix is as much about customer service as it is about fixing computer problems he will be a great tool in helping us all strengthen our customer service skills. We not only want to offer quality customer service but revolutionize it. And with a powerhouse team like we are assembling? Well, I don’t think the goal is far fetched at all.

Diego met Phil last year at SOBCon, a yearly business blogging conference held in Chicago. According to Diego, Phil was the type of person that could really mold the customer service details of MinuteFix with his energetic, sincere, youthful and enthusiastic demeanor.

Known in the blogosphere as the “Relationship Geek,” his mission is simple: To help people unleash the greatness inside them. He connects people to these ideas to take them to the next level. But not only does Phil understand the importance of building relationships in business, but he has a passion and background for the essence of what is MinuteFix.

Phil has been working in the Help Desk and Customer Service arena for quite a few years and has been involved with HDI (Help Desk Institute) for the past few in the local chapter office in Milwaukee. He currently manages an IT Help Desk at a financial services company where his team of 7 technicians support over 2,000 desktop computers around the world. In addition Phil authored the book 10 Ways to Make It Great!, and has been recognized around the country as a professional speaker.

So please help me welcome Phil as consultant and advisor. He is going to help us build our community. In then near future he will be offering training and strategic planning while helping us relate to and service our global presence. Phil brings to the table a wealth of experience, knowledge and connections to the help desk industry, and sees us as an ideal project where he can blend his passion for forming great relationships and delivering what he knows best–delivering great technology support.

As promised earlier we have identified our first technician to become certified. This is quite an occasion considering we have just recently opened our doors to a select group of Beta technicians. So the first Certified MinuteFix Technician to be dubbed so is Jesse Petersen, a Master Microsoft Office Specialist working as a technical editor for a tech contractor as well as student at the University of South Florida. At USF Jesse is well on his way to finishing his 4-year degree in Professional & Technical Writing. He has been working with computers since 1994 and has a wide range of skills with hardware and software, including graphic design and web publishing. In his spare time, he enjoys playing computer games, relaxing with his bride of one year, reading, and cooking. He is on a short hiatus from his professional World of Warcraft blog gitrknowswow until classes start back up in January.

Jesse met MinuteFix CEO Diego Orjuela in Chicago in May at an online publishing conference and have been in touch about tech stuff ever since and looks forward to being a part of the MinuteFix community.

Many of you have more than likely arrived at this post due to a link within an email or by suggestion through newsletter. Whatever the case, we are pleased to have you. You are not alone. This blog is viewed by a lot more like you - including myself (yes, I know, I wrote it so why should I read it? I am conflicted). Since we began our search for qualified, motivated and exciting Certified MinuteFix Technicians we have had more than 65 people answer the call. Taking a break from the sun in Miami, Florida, riding in from the rodeo in Austin, Texas, swimming in from Novia Scotia, thawing out from Montreal, Quebec, piping in from Glasgow, Scotland and dusting the sand off from Virginia Beach, Virginia, MinuteFix candidates have overwhelmed us with good wishes of success and possibilities for immediate success.

Matt Marcoux writes, “…to be offered as awesome an opportunity as yours and be there at ground zero as opposed to the aftermath of being well established and slimmer chances for advancement, you have my full support!” “This job sounds completely awesome. I’ve worked with Sitel under the HP Handhelds contract (laptops and iPaqs and Journadas) for a while then I worked with Dell covering basically everything they do + Windows Vista. This is a great opportunity,” added Ashraf of Montreal.

Boasting experience in everything from LAN, WAN, Linux, DHCP, Windows Servers, Novell Netware, Apache, C++, MySQL to Win95, WinXP, Win2000, Vista and host of other acronyms and abbreviations that have us still reeling with excitement, MinuteFix is pleased to say we anticipate the strongest team of tech support available to the average computer user.

Thank you for joining us and, please, keep those referrals coming.

This week MinuteFix CEO Diego Orjuela is in town to visit and to get some work done with the guys stationed here. He stopped by my place in downtown Savannah to check out the 30″ screen that is anxiously awaiting the launch of MinuteFix. He doesn’t have that big of a smile but I chalk that up to pure jealousy. If you look closely you can see the MinuteFix logo on the splash page on the monitor. Let’s fact it. The guy believes in his product and he is shameless. Anyway. Welcome back to Savannah, Mr. Orjuela. We’ve always got a Minute for you in the South.

This past week I have been visiting Hampton Roads, Virginia on the east coast of the United States for a bit of family holiday. While there I thought it would be a great time to stop by ECPI College of Technology to see what kind of interest the MinuteFix community is piquing. It was a great visit and it was quite encouraging to hang with a few like minded people who were looking for a way to help the computer world. There was great interest and some interesting feedback. The important thing though is I got to meet these technicians face-to-face. They saw I was real and I, them. Perhaps you too have room for me to come visit. I promise. I will only take a Minute.