Unofficial Spiceworks

Spiceworks claims “It’s everything IT” yet they have yet to release a mobile version of  their popular network monitoring software. There are many request but still no official word.  That is until yesterday when I spotted this tweet:

I replied:

Andy was a little confused:

Spicy JS replied:

So I did:

I guess we will have to stay tuned…

Tabrez from Spiceworks announced:

We pushed out an update to the Spiceworks Community last night. While most of the changes were infrastructure oriented some of the changes you’ll notice are:

• New Help Navigation: We’ve added a new help navigation control that should help you find the relevant help documents faster. As always please give us feedback on this so we can continue to improve it.
• Spiceworks Partners in Groups: When you visit a group you’ll see the partners from related vendors listed on the right. So if you’re in the Seagate group you’ll see the folks from Seagate on the right.
• Weekly Update for Group Admins: If you’re a group admin you’ll receive a weekly summary of the activity in your group. This will help you see how active your group has been and how many questions still remain unanswered.
• Sidebar Changes: You’ll notice that the side bar (on the right) has recent community activity and a new tab that shows the popular topics in the community.
• Home Page Changes: We’ve made a few minor changes to the home page of the community so you can see the recent activity in the community. A tip: If you want to filter and see only the activity you’re interested in then you can use this page: http://community.spiceworks.com/activity/recent (You can use the filters at the top to only see discussions or scripts, etc)
• Time Zone support: There is now a new setting under Community Settings in your profile that will allow you to set the timezone. The timestamps on topics will use this to display the time.

Weekly Update for Group Admins

Do you think you have what it takes to be a SpiceCorps Host? Well if you do that is a good thing because it really isn’t that hard.  The fine folks over at Spiceworks give you some great resources, but you have to ask. There are also other ways to promote your event outside of the Spiceworks Community to attract IT Pros that have no idea what Spiceworks is.  Here are seven ways to get you started.

First things First: What is SpiceCorps?

Jen Slaski (Spiceworks marketing maven) has written the following: “SpiceCorps are local Spiceworks user groups aimed at connecting you with your Spiceworks-using IT neighbors! The goal of SpiceCorps is to bring local Spiceworks users together in-person so you can help each other use Spiceworks, swap ideas and resources & expand your local IT network.”

Second: Does your City already has a SpiceCorps group?

Here is a list of the official SpiceCorps Spiceworks User Groups (as of 7-26-09):

USA:

• Boston
• Denver
• Central Florida
• New York
• Upsate NY
• Houston
• Los Angeles

United Kingdom:

• London
• Manchester

Third: Make an official (That is If you don’t see you City):

Generate Local Interest: Get other local users involved by posting in your Location group and asking other members if they’d be interested in a local meet-up.

• Contact Spiceworks: Once at least 5 people have responded to your posting & expressed interest in attending let Myshell know via a PM (Private Message) so they can start the wheels in motion.
• Pick a Date & Time: Post a meeting date, time and location for your first meeting in your new SpiceCorps group. You can choose this on your own or solicit user-feedback.
• Choose a Venue/Location: When choosing a venue/location you’ll want to find a venue that ideally has adequate space for your members, wireless access, is easy to get to, and has sufficient parking. Company meeting rooms are often a good (and free!) location if you or one of your members can get access & permission!
• Let Spiceworks Help You Promote It: Contact Myshell once you’ve posted the date & time and we’ll help you let others in your area know about the event by creating ads and sending emails on your behalf.

Scott Alan Miller asking other members if they'd be interested in a local meet-up.

You may be wondering who is this MyShell?  Michelle (aka MyShell) is the Community Manager at Spiceworks and she will be your new best friend while setting up your first SpiceCorps event.  This is what you need to get from her:

• Spiceworks Swag (Shirts, Cup Holders, Pens, etc.)
• SpiceCorps Kick Off Meeting  90 Minute Agenda Guide (word document)
• Spiceworks Logos (Zip File)
• Feedback on any flyers, ads or icons that you or someone make.

Fourth: Design a flyer & Icon with the theme of your choice.

For our fliers, I choose the Buildings of Downtown LA because locals can identify with that landmark. For example if your from Las Vegas you might want to incorporate the famous vegas sign (picture).  What ever you choose to do keep it consistent so SpiceHeads don’t get confused.  For our icon I choose to modify the “L.A. Dodgers” logo. FYI I used Adobe Photoshop but you can use any image manipulation program like GIMP.

SpiceCorps LA Icon

SpiceCorps LA 300x250 Ad for community.spiceworks.com

Fifth: set up a landing page using some sort of social media platform.

When choosing a landing page for your event make sure it is free of cost, fast and easy to set up and reliable. This will allow you to centralize all of the info for your event and possibly reach people who don’t already know what Spiceworks is all about (we had two guys come out to our event that found about our Event via Twitter!) Here is a list of landing page ideas:

• Netvibes Universe
• Tumblr
• WordPress.com
• Blogger.com
• Facebook Page/Group
• Spiceworks Forums

I chose Netvibes because they offer so many great tools/widgets that let me set up a great landing page in the matter of minutes.  Once you have your landing page go to TinyURL and customize a URL (ie: http://tinyurl.com/spicecorps-la-info) that way you and everyone else doesn’t have to remember something like: http://www.social-media-hosting.com/foo/bar/meh/spice-corps-my-city/pebkac.htm?forward=true&sid=010001111100100010101101010&you-get=the-point?

Sixth: Get Social.

If you have a Twitter account great, pick a #HashTag so you can pin point who is talking about your event. If you don’t have a Twitter account, get one, reach as many IT pros as you can.  Choose a flickr tag so you can find photos of your event. Provide RSS feeds so SpiceHeads can have the content you generate delivered to them. I am sure by doing this you will find a SpiceHead who is heavy into Social Media just like I did. I was fortunate to find Paul Wirtz (aka Paul_Maxim, @mogrith) who helped me test out the Ustream.tv feed, came early to help set up and went over the agenda to see if anything was meeting.

Seventh: Show Time.

The morning of the event you must pray to the ‘IT Gods’ that your Exchange, SQL, DC’s do not fail because you have an event to host! After that you need to get to work. Here is a list of what needs to be done (assuming you’re at the venue):

• Test your Video Stream (ie Test 1, Test 2)
• “Event is Here!” signs. (Add your Phone Number just in SpiceHeads can’t find the Venue.)
• Wi-Fi SSID & Password
• Name Tags (I added Avatars so we could put Faces to the Handles)
• Sign in Sheet for MyShell (So she can give attendees their SpiceCorps Badge)
• Cold Water
• Check  AC/Fans (want to make sure everyone is comfortable)
• Trash Cans
• Digital Camera (for Flickr/TwitPic)

And that is that.  Let me know how your event goes.

Regards,

Justin Dorfman
http://fr.ugal.it | http://blog.justindorfman.com