HTG Summit, the first annual gathering of thought leaders from across the small business technology community recently wrapped up and Small Business IT Radio has the inside scoop on what happened in Dallas. Join Stuart Crawford from Bulletproof InfoTech along side the leadership of Heartland Tech Group with members and other thought leaders as we review the week in Dallas.

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/smb/2009/05/01/Thought-Leaders-Converged-On-Dallas

Last week, 20th April 2009, saw the launch of the first annual, HTG Summit in Dallas, TX.

So what exactly is HTG Peer Groups
HTG Peer groups are a group of IT professionals who get together and discuss best practices with peers in a non-competitive environment. We Discuss best practices around subjects such as Marketing and financials. The groups are divided up into 12 companies who meet on a quarterly basis on a 2 day session, and monthly meetings via the phone. There are currently around 19 groups worldwide, with our group, HTG11 based in the UK .

As a small but growing business, I learn a lot from the other members of the group, who have been where I am and have gone past a lot of the hurdles I am just crossing now. For ages I have been running as a “Life Style” business. Since joining HTG I have been taking my business much more seriously, thanks to the advice of my peers, I have already started to see the benefits by executing what I have learnt.

Whilst we were at the Summit, Aaron Booker, from Varvid.com produced a video about our group and has graciously given us permission to use it. To see more videos from other members at the HTG summit, as well as other events check out http://www.varvid.com/

HTG have adopted the Famous Thomas Edison saying of “Vision without Execution, is Hallucination“.

To find out more about HTG Peer groups, please go to http://www.htgmembers.com/ or alternatively contact me at chris@tcgcomputerservices.com

So today I had the great privilege of meeting up with Harry Brelsford of SMB Nation, while he was in London on the way to South Africa. Being a South African my self I was particularly interested in his trip to Cape Town where he will ride the Argus Cycle Tour . Good Luck Harry..

Whilst I was with Harry this afternoon, we discussed the UK SMB market and what a great opportunity there is for small businesses to thrive by providing SBS2008 to their customers, even during this down turned economy. We also discussed how groups like HTG can really help small businesses grow in this economy by leveraging the skills of their peers and learning best practises from each other. For more information on HTG, why not visit www.htgmembers.com or contact me and I will make sure that you get in touch with the right person.

The main reason for my meeting with Harry was to pick up my personally signed copy of his new book, Small Business Server 2008, Blueprint which has now finally been released. This book is available at http://smbnation.com/Publications/Books/SBS2008Blueprint/tabid/88/Default.aspx. Having just read the first few pages of this book, I can see that it will be another brilliant book to add to my ever expanding collection of SMBNation Press Books.

Last week I had the great pleasure of spending some time with the folks from ConnectWise at the HTG 11 Meeting in Birmingham, England. Arnie Bellini (CEO) and Jeannine Edwards came over from the US to do a tour of some of the user groups in the UK as well as talk at our HTG11 Meeting.

I have been using the ConnectWise PSA software in my organization for a few months now and it has really changed the way I do business. I am no longer leaking time, by forgetting how much time to invoice customers because ConnectWise keeps track of it all . The Customer Satisfaction levels have increased, because now they are able to send us an email with their problems, which get tracked in the ConnectWise Ticketing system so they know exactly what is happening with the call every step of the way.

One of the greatest things about ConnectWise which differs dramatically from their competitors is that ConnectWise is and IT company in their own right. They have designed the product around their own IT business, and so they understand our business and know the pains that we go through.

Before deciding on ConnectWise, I looked at competitive products, but did not find them to be a good fit for my business for a number of reasons, but mainly because they did not have the option to host the software in-house and not as feature rich as ConnectWise.
If you are looking at PSA applications in your own business I would wholeheartedly recommend ConnectWise, after all when last did you see the CEO of the competitors being interested in what is happening with their partners businesses, no matter how small they are. We are not a large company with a large number of licences but Arnie, was interested in how I am using the product and how it is helping my business. Their visit to the UK, really shows that they are committed to this UK market.
For more information about ConnectWise why not visit www.connectwise.com and have a look a demo..

If you decide on the product, remember to tell them Chris sent you.