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How to Setup an Auto Responder on Your Ponder Consulting Hosted Email

April 22, 2015 by Harmonie

Planning on being out of the office for a period of time and want a way to let those who email you know? You want an auto responder. The auto responder option is one which automatically sends a reply to those emailing you, providing them with a specific message, generally that you will be out of the office and not responding to emails personally until you are back at a specific time, or whatever you would like to say.

cPanel_X

Click on the image to view

If this is something that you find will be useful and are a client of Ponder Consulting, you have this feature available to you from your webmail. Here are the steps to follow to set-up your auto responder from your Ponder Consulting email account.

1.    Begin by logging into your email
Ex – http://www.yourdomainname.com/webmail
2.    From this page you need to click on the “Auto Responder” tab
3.    Here you will be take to another screen where you will need to click “Add New Responder”]
4.    Input your specific information (see screenshot)

Note: Interval should be 24 hours – means how often do you want to send them to people who email you, not more than once in 24 hours
From:  user@yourdomainname.com
Subject: Automatic reply – Out of Office: %subject%
Body:  “I will be out of the office from this date and time through this date and time. I will be periodically checking my email while I’m out. Thank you, Your Name“

5.    Then click the “Create/Modify” button at the bottom and test from a gmail to be sure all forwards correctly and you are ready go.

You should now have your own personalized auto responder and be ready to get out of the office for a couple days without worrying about your email.

Filed Under: Technical Support Tagged With: email, tips

Ponder Consulting Receives 2014 Best of Grayling Award

December 17, 2014 by Harmonie

Ponder Consulting Receives 2014 Best of Grayling Award

Ponder Consulting Receives 2014 Best of Grayling Award

Press Release

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Ponder Consulting Receives 2014 Best of Grayling Award

Grayling Award Program Honors the Achievement

GRAYLING December 10, 2014 — Ponder Consulting has been selected for the 2014 Best of Grayling Award in the Business Consulting Services category by the Grayling Award Program.

Each year, the Grayling Award Program identifies companies that we believe have achieved exceptional marketing success in their local community and business category. These are local companies that enhance the positive image of small business through service to their customers and our community. These exceptional companies help make the Grayling area a great place to live, work and play.

Various sources of information were gathered and analyzed to choose the winners in each category. The 2014 Grayling Award Program focuses on quality, not quantity. Winners are determined based on the information gathered both internally by the Grayling Award Program and data provided by third parties.

About Grayling Award Program

The Grayling Award Program is an annual awards program honoring the achievements and accomplishments of local businesses throughout the Grayling area. Recognition is given to those companies that have shown the ability to use their best practices and implemented programs to generate competitive advantages and long-term value.

The Grayling Award Program was established to recognize the best of local businesses in our community. Our organization works exclusively with local business owners, trade groups, professional associations and other business advertising and marketing groups. Our mission is to recognize the small business community’s contributions to the U.S. economy.

SOURCE: Grayling Award Program

CONTACT:
Grayling Award Program
Email: PublicRelations@awardservice.org
URL: http://www.awardservice.org

Filed Under: Awards

Harmonie Ponder receives Rising Star Award from Outstanding Women Awards

September 17, 2014 by Harmonie

Harmonie Ponder recipient of Rising Star Award from Outstanding Women AwardsOn September 11, 2014,  influential community leaders, business women and entrepreneurs gathered for the first annual Outstanding Women’s Gala Awards Dinner in Berkley, Michigan to honor the winners and learn from their inspiring stories.

One winner of the Outstanding Women’s Gala Awards is chosen for each of the following 10 award categories:

Woman of Achievement is a woman who has attained a high rank and utilized her position, stature and expertise to effect positive change for the LGBT community in Michigan.

Outstanding Entrepreneur is a female business owner who not only strives to build a great company, but also contributes to the success of other women entrepreneurs.

Mentorship Award goes to a woman who serves as an example of hard work and effective management and who demonstrates a powerful commitment to mentoring other women and helping them advance.

Charitable Giving Award goes to a woman who has gone above and beyond through initiatives to provide services that benefit other LGBT community members in need.

Rising Star is an up-and-coming female in our community.

Activist Award goes to a woman who has worked to improve politics, policies or practices effecting change for women at her job or in her community.

Community Leader is a woman who has used her time and talents to bring people together as a leader and role model in the community.

Women in the Arts Award is a woman artist or musician who has shared her talents with the community and followed her talents and passion for the arts.

Team Leader is a woman who has used her time and talents to create, manage and bring teams together in sporting and other group events.

Harmonie was the recipient of the Rising Star Award, an up-and-coming female in the community.

Filed Under: Awards

Ponder Consulting Chosen To Be Showcased At Beyond The Bar Design Showcase

June 5, 2013 by Harmonie

Beyond the BarPonder Consulting is pleased to announce their inclusion in the 3rd annual Beyond The Bar LGBT Art Showcase.

The top LGBT artists in the Metro Detroit area have been chosen to be showcased at Beyond The Bar, the premier Motor City Pride Kickoff Event sponsored by AIGA Detroit This represents the shows 3rd year which has grown to become the largest LGBT art show in the country and features the most outstanding art from the LGBT community including websites, logos, photography, painting and sculpture.

Ponder Consulting is pleased to announce their inclusion in this. The work was chosen by a committee made up of artists and design professionals and was chosen based on its concepts/subject, impact, process and aesthetics. Ponder Consulting submitted their work and was excited to learn that the website www.barbarapayton.com, designed and built by Harmonie Ponder, was chosen to be showcased this Thursday at the opening gala.

The event, which begins at 7 pm at the Start Gallery in Detroit, offers visitors the opportunity to enjoy the amazing art being offered by the Metro Detroit LGBT community while enjoying delicious appetizers, beer and wine as well as music by DJ Lena and a silent auction to benefit the Ruth Ellis Center. A $5 donation is suggested. Attendees will also have the opportunity to vote for their favorite piece in the show with top vote getters being displayed for the rest of the Motor City Pride Weekend. A link to the event can be found here:

https://www.facebook.com/events/148581218649663/ or http://detroit.aiga.org/event/beyond-the-bar-2013-an-lgbt-art-and-design-showcase-2/

Filed Under: Awards, Reviews

How To Set Up Your Ponder Consulting Hosted Email On Your iPhone

November 2, 2012 by Harmonie

If you are an iPhone owner and would like to stay connected by accessing your email via your iPhone, here is how to do it.

Setting Up Your iPhone

To setup your email use these settings:

Click on Settings
Click on Mail, Contacts and Calendar
Select Other (not iCloud, Exchange, etc.)
Click Add Mail Account

Name: Your Name As You Would have It Appear (in recipients inbox)
Email: user@yourdomainname.com (always enter the full address)
Password: your password (case sensitive)
Description: Your Email Description (example Jane’s Email)

Click Next
On next screen be sure to select the “POP” tab rather than “IMAP”

Name: Your Name
Email: user@yourdomainname.com (always enter the full address)
Description: Your Email Description (example Jane’s Email)

Incoming Mail Server
host name: mail.yourdomainname.com (example mail.ponderconsulting.com)
username: user@yourdomainname.com (always enter the full address)
password: your password (case sensitive)

Outgoing Mail Server (this is not optional as it says)
host name: mail.yourdomainname.com (example mail.ponderconsulting.com)
username: user@yourdomainname.com (always enter the full address)
password: your password (case sensitive)

Click Save

You will see a “Cannot Verify Server Identity” error message but click Continue anyway (may have to select Continue multiple times).

Congratulations! Your email should work!

You can always check your email at www.domainname.com/webmail or pon.ponderconsulting.com:2096.

Filed Under: Technical Support, Technology Tagged With: iphone

Ponder Consulting Adds Toll-Free Number

September 17, 2012 by Harmonie

Ponder Consulting adds toll-free number to better serve our clients. The upgrade in phone systems allows for all staff to be reached by calling 1.800.713.7291 at no long distance cost to callers. We look forward to hearing from you.

Filed Under: Company News

The Importance Of Using the Right Email Address for Your Business

October 17, 2011 by Harmonie

There are many internet server providers (ISP) and websites offering free email accounts today. For some, this seems like a viable option and for the individual, it may be. However, for the business owner, it is a choice that should be reconsidered. Although some ISP’s for free email do their best to promote using them as your primary email account, touting that you can choose your address or that you have more memory, the benefits pointed out will be far outweighed by the credibility you lose as a legitimate business.

Believability Is Key

Look at it as a business owner or decision maker. When we receive an email from gmail, aol, or yahoo, we are generally less apt to take that email as seriously as an email from “admin@yourcompany.com”. If you feel that way about businesses who use free email accounts, then it begs the question why would you use one? In addition to the lack of credibility associated with free accounts, there is another reason that choosing to use your business email account is a wise choice when setting up your email provider, one based purely from a marketing standpoint.

Marketing And Branding As A Rationale For Your Business Email

Businesses pay money to make themselves more visible on the internet everyday. Although some marketing is best left up to the experts, many businesses are simply losing out on free marketing opportunities such as an email address. Look at it from the perspective of your clients and prospective clients. You have already lost believability by using a free account and now you have also lost an opportunity to promote your website. Every chance you have to offer up your URL is one more valid promotion of your company name and website.

Your Reputation Is In Your Hands

As a businessperson, your reputation is everything. How others perceive you is as important for business as your product or service. If perspective clients shy away from you before they even try your product or service, then any amount of promoting will do no good. You must represent yourself in the most positive light possible. In short, it is in your best interest to use only official email addresses for your business. Leave the free email accounts for individuals and make yourself stand out from the crowd.

Filed Under: Good Business Tagged With: email

Why You Shouldn’t Trust Emails Selling SEO Services

September 20, 2011 by Harmonie

I’m a little perturbed at the increase in frequency of emails to my clients that look similar to the one found here:

We offer quality Search Engine Optimization / SEO Services and Internet Marketing Solutions. Our dedicated team of SEO Professionals ensures Top 10 search engine rankings. Our SEO Processes are designed in view of the SEO guidelines, and white hat SEO techniques are strictly followed to ensure that our clients from world over get the best SEO services. Please reply to this email so we can send you more details.

from: cecilia (at) gmail.com

Right off the bat, the gmail email address offers no credibility behind the email – one is still left to wonder who this person is and what company they work for (if they are even a real person). But the real clincher behind this email is – if this supposed person who works for a mysterious company is so good at SEO, then why are they emailing YOU? Is it because they don’t have enough clients because not enough people have found them through their own internet marketing efforts?

My best recommendation is if you are looking for an SEO or internet marketing firm, Google “SEO” and the city and/or state your business is in, talk to your friends/colleagues who have worked with a firm or contact us for a no obligation proposal.

Filed Under: Bad Business, Google SEO

Clients: It’s Not Their Fault

November 2, 2010 by Harmonie

I’m lucky to have connected with Clare Ultimo of Clare Ultimo Inc. back in August 2008. We worked on a project together for a mutual client and have remained in contact ever since. I consider her a mentor, and a great one at that!

We speak multiple times per week bouncing ideas, new concepts and trends as well as the occasional personal story off each other. We often laugh and sometimes cry but more importantly we learn from each other. Just last week, Clare brilliantly pointed out that everyone’s in business these days and she’s right. I had never compared the modern era of entrepreneurism to the corporate era when Clare opened her studio in 1987 but it’s different. It’s this very point, that makes me value her insight – as without her the thought would have never crossed my mind.

Let’s hear what Clare has to say about “Clients: It’s Not Their Fault”:

Only a few years ago, clients that bought communication design services were well educated in the design process. Many of them went to design school, later deciding they would be happier buying the work than making it. They were vested in the marketing power of branding and spent years developing their own skill in a marketplace that looked, at that time, “stable” to them. They followed standards that would seem rigid to us nowadays; standards that nonetheless made the work easier and profitable for everyone to do.

These clients won design awards and actually cared what other corporations thought of their visual branding. They understood stuff like corporate color palettes and spoke all the technical lingo of their time. You knew in advance that these clients would be clear about what a “kill fee” was, they understood usage (and planned to pay for it in advance) and they knew that what they paid for did not include endless rounds of revision unless you were billing them. In short, you as designer or developer did not spend ANY time educating clients about your work. They came to you already understanding the business of communication, of design, of branding and marketing…and all you had to do was what you did best: invent, design and produce a fabulous “thing” that made them look good to their higher-ups. They actually paid you for this (very well, in many cases), and you didn’t spend a minute explaining what “comp” was to them. Ah, The Good Old Days…it all changed so quickly, we didn’t know what we had.

The New Client

Corporate meltdowns eliminated a lot of jobs and created a new breed of client: the entrepreneur. These are brave folks with their back against the wall and new dreams to realize. The only problem is that most of these folks had little if any contact with the visual purveyors of their previous corporate entities. They never had to deal with the blurry edges of the creative process, or for that matter, the hard structures of deadlines, clear communication, design briefs, budgets, and all the rest that makes great communication design projects. So while the potential and the need for design is greater than ever today, the folks buying it are less informed about it too.

In 2010, design clients are ubiquitous. Your Aunt Tildie is a client because she wants to sell her cookies on the internet. The guy who walks your dog needs a website. An economy who can no longer take care of it’s corporate shareholders opened the floodgates, and now clients are everywhere and everyone, whether they know what a kill fee is or not, needs a logo. Designers and communication experts need to be smarter than ever before, and much more saintly too, if they want to keep their sense of humor about all of this.

I once knew a design firm that fired Prince. When I asked the principal of the firm about it, he said “well, not every client is right for us and you have to maintain your standards”. (Boy, would I love to have been a fly on the wall during that termination meeting!) That firm has long since broken into smaller pieces, unable to carry a huge overhead and forty employees through dwindling corporate design budgets, the meat of their income. And while we all need to be picky and careful who we give our talent and time to, corporate America, traditionally the fountain of great design, ain’t what it used to be. This new breed of client is a victim of a system that isn’t working so well for anyone anymore.

So it’s not their fault if clients don’t know what they’re doing, or we have to explain the process over and over to them, right? Right! Annoyingly, we’re all in this together. But in the end, I think we’ll be in a better position, no matter what it looks like now. We all may have to do more than what’s expected of us for a while, (and that means clients too!) but when we begin to surprise each other with the integrity we always knew we had – business will be better than ever.

Great point Clare! Thank you for your insight. I would like to hear what you think about this article! Feel free to share your thoughts below.

Clients: It’s Not Their Fault Article Courtesy of:

Clare Ultimo Inc.

 

 

Since 1987, Clare Ultimo Inc. has been on the forefront of graphic design, corporate communication, and branding, as an award winning Graphic Design Studio located in New York City.

Filed Under: Inspiration

Connecting YouTube to A Facebook Fan Page

October 11, 2010 by Harmonie

As with all applications on Facebook, it is good to note that fan pages are much different than personal profiles. It is also important to also be aware that you need to have a profile as an administrator on a fan page to add most applications as well.

Adding YouTube to your fan page is easy to do as long as you are an administrator of your fan page with your attached profile.

Update – July 2012

As with all social media, updates and changes are constantly being made to either fix bugs and/or to create a more user friendly environment. For this reason, it is important that you stay current on what does and does not still work when dealing with apps and tabs on Facebook.

In March, we were all happy or dismayed with the changes implemented by Facebook in regards to the new timeline feature. Other aspects of Facebook changed as well and many otherwise useful apps became outdated. From landing pages to YouTube, things are and continue to change.

Since we first made reference to YouTube connecting with Facebook, many new options for connecting have been developed, though the Involver Tab is still considered one of the best and is free. To use this tab, simply login into Facebook and choose the YouTubeApp from Involve, you can find it here: http://apps.facebook.com/involver_appjgeph/ and choose to install it. If you have never used the app before, you will be asked to enter your company name and phone number and accept the terms of service. If you manage more than one fanpage, all you have to do after this first time is to add it to a new page from your already added apps and edit the user/channel name to fit your current fanpage you are editing.

YouTube for Pages

Click on Image to see Larger Version

You will be asked to continue as yourself as a page administrator and will be given the option to add the tab to the fanpage you manage. You can personalize all options including whether to post directly to your wall. All you have to do is fill in the channel name and other options and click ok. As with all Facebook apps, this one will be listed with all other apps on your page once it is installed. You can click on the YouTube for pages icon to edit all the features as you can see in the image below.

 

YouTube for Pages

Click on Image to see Larger Version

 

Other YouTube tabs that others are using include the following:

  • YouTube Tab by Tabfusion
  • YouTube Video Box
  • Youtube Video Gallery by Appaddictive
  • tabappforyoutube

Many of the new YouTube options come at a cost and have different options and features. Have you tried any of these other apps or have one that is not listed that you have found works well? We welcome your feedback as always.

Filed Under: Social Media Tagged With: facebook, YouTube

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Recent Posts

  • How to Setup an Auto Responder on Your Ponder Consulting Hosted Email
  • Ponder Consulting Receives 2014 Best of Grayling Award
  • Harmonie Ponder receives Rising Star Award from Outstanding Women Awards
  • Ponder Consulting Chosen To Be Showcased At Beyond The Bar Design Showcase
  • How To Set Up Your Ponder Consulting Hosted Email On Your iPhone

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