Well,  it looks like our built in spell checker (which we picked up open source) went kaput.  So, with some quick searching across the web, we found a great pay for spell checker app, spent a little money, downloaded the source code and a few hours later we had it all hooked up into our code base for all of you! Of course we could have built a spell checker ourselves, (Andrew wanted to) but this was a great case of need & speed made much more dollars and sense to buy it vs. build it from scratch.

So the turtle keys are gone.   You don’t have to do anything on your end,  just login into myVBO as normal and we automatically take out the old and put in the new and you’re off and running.  I think you’ll find this spell checker much more robust, and certainty faster then what we had in before.  Enjoy! —rfw

Well, it has been quite some time since our last post.  That doesn’t mean we haven’t been very, very, busy here at myVBO – it means we have been TOO busy to update the blog!  So here goes….

Since our last post we have had 5 new releases to the site, with many new upgrades, feature enhancements and minor bug fixes.  So here are the major changes in detail.

Connecting Module with Twitter

• More tweets per request come into your twitter time-line — over 200+.  Ever notice how some apps limit your twitter timeline to 20 or less?  Not in myVBO — the first time you log in, we go out and get the latest 200 tweets from your main timeline. With each timeline and smart box capable of showing more than 300+ tweets, and new tweets coming in once per minute, you’ll have plenty of chirps to keep you up to date with the latest happenings!
• Twitter now has its own sub menu.

• Forums have been broken out under “Messages”.  Look for a major new update to the forums area in the near future.

• Improved URL shortening for tweets.  We also added the back end stats package, so in the near future you’ll be able to see how well your tweets or links got clicked on or re-tweeted.

• Fixed some scheduling issues with tweets.
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• Clicking on a user name in a tweet now opens up a user profile, along with a list of the their last few tweets.
  

You can also follow or unfollow people from their twitter profile view inside of myVBO.

• UI changes to the way you work with smartboxes.  Now you can add a person to a smartbox by clicking the smartbox icon in your twitter timeline.  Smartboxes are a lot like twitter lists, except they can do more, and remain private.
• You can create smartboxes that are based on a group of people, or  you can create a smartbox that is based on a search term.  Creating smartboxes based on search terms is a great way to find people with similar interest to your own, or clients that are looking for help on something your company has to offer.

General features

• Faster and smoother scrolling speeds.  We heard you!!  Depending on your browser,  scrolling speed in some areas of the app  were different.  So we made some changes to correct this; the speeds should now be consistent and smooth.  If you still don’t like the speed, you can always change scroll speed in your system preferences area.
• Site layout was tightened up to make myVBO easier to use on smaller screens, like 13″ notebooks.  However, myVBO is a app with lots of information, and is best viewed on a min. screen size of 1024W x 768L.  Check your resolution in the display section of your system preferences area, and adjust if needed.

Business Module

• We added a new QuickBooks connector that will auto-detect if there is a new version of the QuickBooks connector available for download.  This new connector is also required to sync the new QuickBooks summary data for the QuickBooks dashboard pod.
• You can now look up stock symbols and add multiple stock symbols at once to your watch list.
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Products Module

• Added the ability to click on any reseller and go directly to their site to view/purchase product(s).
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• Fixed issues with the product counts in the product list area.
• Re-worked the UI around manage products list, so it works better on smaller screens.
• Added the ability to search for products from the dashboard pod.
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• Cleaned up display issues with purchase history.

Dashboard

• Added two new help videos to the video pod on the dashboard.

• The Web links tour will walk you through setting up the weblinks tool bar as part of your web browser.  Using myVBO weblinks allows you to bookmark any site you go to and access to those links on the dashboard.

• The Web links pod lets you organize your links, so you can categorize them, and track the last time you visited the site.
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• Added a new QuickBooks dashboard pod that displays quick information and graphs on bank balances, accounts receivables and accounts payable data.
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News Module

• Fixed issues with the way news was scrolling.

Features coming soon…

The team is working on another major update to the site, due out the last week of this month.  This will include our first iphone app, a whole new Forums area designed for business,  a  new SalesForce pod for the dashboard and a few very cool surprises!

Summary

In addition to all the new features listed above, there are hundreds of other little things we did behind the scenes to continue to enhance the myVBO experience.  As always, we appreciate all the feedback and  suggestions on how to make myVBO better.  Please keep them coming in by either posting your comments here or in the forum area of myVBO.

We hope that, by bringing your data all together in one place, we’ve helped you save time, money and allowed you to make better business decisions.

Note: Depending on your browser settings, you might have to clear your web browsers cache and reload the page to see the new features.

Products Area.

• Added call-out to show lowest price and vendor for any product selected in the Manage Product list section.
• Added Average price and highest price graphs to the Market history area.

Connecting Area

• Added the ability to follow and unfollow people from the Twitter timeline.
• When creating a Twitter group you can now filter people by showing only the people you follow.
• User name in tweets can now be clicked.
• You can now retweet a tweet that was made with another account youre managing from within MyVBO.
• Fixed a few bugs with display issues in the twitter timeline.

Business Data

• New QuickBooks connector added to the MyVBO tools dashboard pod.
• If you have been using the old connector to sync your QuickBooks data please download the new connector. It will automatically update your current connector tool.

Video Player

• The dashboard pod now has the MyVBO help videos.

Web Links

• The MyVBO dashboard tools pod, now has a new web links tool that is easy to install and use with Windows Explorer.

Stocks

• Added the ability to create groups for stock portfolios.

Account Info

• Added the ability to create a company and or group profile that is related to Civic Clubs.

We know there a lot of features to MyVBO (thats what make it so cool!). If you’re wondering where to start, here are the top 5 things to do first:

1. Watch the quick tour video on the front door, or in the video player on the dashboard.
2. Add some products into your list, so we can start do the price shopping for you. If you need some help here check out the product tour video.
3. Link or create a Twitter account under the Connecting/Messages/Setting area. This is a really good way to get involved in your business area to find new contacts and customers.
4. Download the WebLink/ Rating tool from the Dashboard tools pod. Use it to bookmark all of your web sites. All of you web links will show up in your web links dashboard pod for easy access from any browser or computer.
5. In the business section under Web Stats/ Settings, link you Google analytics account to MyVBO. From then on youll have up-to-date information on how your web site is doing.

This quarter is a very exciting one for us. The Development team is working hard on integration of new partners and services into the MyVBO platform. Site traffic and usage continue to rise, even though we have not released a press release, or started our ad campaign program. Thanks to everyone for spreading the good word!

Thanks again for all of the support and please those suggestions coming!

A quick tour on how to use the MyVBO shopping engine. In this video you’ll learn how to add products to your customized list, create lists, display price trend graphs, set price alerts on products, purchase from multiple vendors with one shopping cart, and work with the product purchase history area.

More help videos will be available from within MyVBO in our code release due next week.

Try it out, let MyVBO start working for you today!

Moved the market history graphs higher up on the Product List page.

• Explanation of market history for products on your list: MyVBO starts to record price history for products once they are added to a list. If you don’t see any history on a product when you first add it to your list, that just means nobody else has added that product to a list yet. Once a product is on somebody’s list, we start tracking its price, and that price history will be available to anybody else that adds that product to their list in the future.

• Question: Why doesnt MyVBO start market history tracking for all products now?
• Answer: We have access to hundreds of thousand of products, so we think the best way to scale computing power is to only track what people are asking for. On that note, MyVBO is hosted in one of the largest cloud centers in the world. Cloud computing (unlike hosted computing) gives us the ability to use only the amount of computer and bandwidth power we need to manage our user base. It also gives us the incredible ability to scale up to user demand within minutes of large traffic hits. That way you know the site is always available to you when you need it. This has the added benefit of also being greenest solution in the market.

A new QuickBooks Connector, which can be downloaded from the tools pod on the Dashboard. The connector has some minor bug fixes, and adds the ability to update itself when new versions of QuickBooks come out.

Updates and minor bug fixes to the product module.

Formatting updates for the BLOG area.

Added a button to see your blog page in the Account Info area.

Fixed some drag and drop issues of pods on the dashboard.

Added Smart Boxes to the Twitter area.

With Smart Boxes you can now create Twitter searches with key words. You can also create groups of Twitter user you want to follow.

Added a quick MyVBO tour to the home page of the VBO web site. More instructional videos on how to use each MyVBO module will be coming in the weeks ahead.

If you have any questions or would like to see some new features added, please post your comments in the “feedback” forum under Directory/Messages/Community.

Thanks to all of our new users. It’s amazing how many people and companies have started to use MyVBO already, considering that we havent pushed out an ad, or press release yet…

On August 14th @ 2:30am., After 2+ years of hard work, MyVBO Launches!

The quick history of developments is as follows:

• 2007 was all about the business plan. Drafting out the vision for MyVBO, running business models on startup costs and potential revenue streams, talking to advisors about the idea, more re-drafting. All in all the idea took about 6-8 months to take shape into the site you see today.

• Q4 2007 – Q1 of 2008 was early code development. After 15+ years of being out of code I was right back into it again. Brought on Matt and Jason part-time to do the heavy code lifting, while I focused on the UI layout in Flash/Flex. The ability Flex gave me to create working models without having to go through a layer of developers was absolutely critical in cost savings and time to market.

• April 08: we took in our first round of capital (all I can say is that it was in the 7+ figure range). It took 8 phone calls, and the capital was closed within 4 months. I know a lot of you are asking how could I raise the capital so quick, with so few phone calls.

1. I put my own capital in and spent over a year getting the site developed before I went out.
2. Everybody on the list had been on the advisor group. They knew what I was up to, and had been asking to invest halfway through the project.
3. The lead investor had run a VC fund before. I can’t emphasize enough that having experienced investors around that you can trust is key in the early development of ANY company.

• May 08: off to the races! Brought on Matt full time, and used outside developers and graphics people on a part time basis. A big decision early on was going with Amazon Cloud computing (AWS). We had budgeted over $50K in equipment to get us through development and into production. The money that was not used by going with AWS, put us in an advantageous cash position versus budget. The other beauty of going with AWS is that we only pay for what we use and we can spin up servers to match traffic demand in a matter of minutes. Think of all the capital cost we saved in not having to buy equipment for anticipated demand. Big win here.

• October 08 saw the private beta launch. Friends, family, and people we didn’t know then signed up to give us an early whirl. To all of you who have been willing to put in at least 2-3 hours a week testing, we all say thank you, thank you, thank you…

• We finished 08 ahead of plan and under budget by over 26%. Not bad for an early stage startup.

• Q1 09 saw continued modules put into place and changes made to existing areas based on user feedback.

• Q2: Brought Andrew into the full mix of development, and added more time from other outside resources.

• Q3 has been all about getting ready for launch. Added enhancements based on user feedback, including full Twitter integration. Final UI design going into place, and all those last little minute details that have to be nailed down like friendly messages to users, instead of the code messages that developers get.

While that’s it for now…more posts will be coming as we continue to add functionality and enhancements to the site. We all look forward to adding your feature requests, so please stop by the Customer feedback forum in the connecting section and let us know what you think!