Tag Archives: iWork

FPPad Bits and Bytes for August 29

Posted on August 29, 2014 by in Bits & Bytes

On today’s broadcast, Google ups the ante among office mobile app providers. Will the enhancements be enough for you to leave Office 365? Dropbox and Amazon want your cloud file storage business. Find out who has the features and pricing that are right for your firm. And, creating time-lapse videos just became a whole lot easier. Learn how you can use a new iPhone app for an interesting twist on your website’s contact page.

So get ready, FPPad Bits and Bytes begins now!

(Watch FPPad Bits and Bytes on YouTube)

Today’s episode is brought to you by the 2014 T3 Enterprise Conference, exclusively designed for the technology needs of broker-dealers and financial enterprises.

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If you’re looking for the best place to monitor trends in broker-dealer technology, you need to come to Atlanta November 11th through 13th. Reserve your spot today by visiting t3enterpriseconference.com

Here are this week’s stories of interest: Google bolsters iOS productivity suite with Slides, updates to Docs and Sheets from Apple Insider

[This week’s top story comes from Google, as the Internet search giant released a new app for iOS devices called Slides. Originally contained inside the Google Drive app, Slides is now the latest stand-alone app from Google to round out its mobile office productivity suite, which includes the previously-released Google Docs and Google Sheets apps.

This now rounds out Google’s mobile office toolkit, matching, at least in basic functionality, the Pages, Numbers, and Keynote apps from Apple, and the Office 365 apps of Word, Excel and PowerPoint most advisors know, and may or may not love.

The apps are free to use if you have a Google account and are included in Google Apps for Business subscriptions, priced at $50 per year per user. So if you don’t need any of the complex features in the Microsoft Office apps, the Google office apps may be everything you need to manage your business on the go at an affordable price.] Google on Monday released presentation app Slides alongside updates to existing iOS apps Docs and Sheets, offering a free Web-connected alternative to similar productivity suites from Microsoft and Apple.

Introducing a more powerful Dropbox Pro from Dropbox, Amazon Opens Up Its Enterprise Cloud Storage Service Zocalo To All from Techcrunch, and Cloud Storage Showdown: Google Drive, Dropbox, iCloud and More Compared from Gizmodo

[Next up is news on two cloud file storage services, Dropbox and Amazon Zocalo. First up is Dropbox, which announced this week that the company is upgrading it’s Pro plan to offer better security controls when sharing files and folders with others. Also new is an improved remote wipe feature. Before this update, any files synchronized to a device that later became unlinked from a Dropbox account would still stay on the device. Now with the updated remote wipe feature, that’s no longer the case.

And the storage space of the Dropbox Pro plan was increased to one terabyte with pricing remaining at $9.99 per month.

But a new service competing directly against Dropbox Pro users is Amazon’s Zocalo, which is now available for the general public after being in a limited preview for a few months. Designed with enterprise users in mind, Zocalo can integrate with Microsoft’s Active Directory services for user permissions and administration. Pricing for Zocalo starts at $5 per month per user for 200 gigabytes of data, and with all these options now for cloud file storage, it’s hard even for me to keep everything straight. But if you head over to fppad.com/138, I’ve linked to a handy chart from Gizmodo with the details of many of the top cloud file storage providers.] We first launched Dropbox to help you simplify your life. Since then, you’ve told us that Dropbox does more than just that — it enables anyone with an idea, project, or passion to create amazing things.

Hyperlapse: Instagram’s First Standalone App You’ll Actually Want to Use from Mashable

Download Hyperlapse from Instagram from iTunes

[And finally, my last story will give you something to do to add some creativity to your weekend. Earlier this week, Instagram released a new app for iOS called Hyperlapse. The Hyperlapse app allows you to record several minutes of video on your iPhone and condense down to a quick time-lapse video with some added video stabilization. So why is this relevant to you as an advisor?

Here’s one idea on how you can use the Hyperlapse app in your business. The next time you drive to your office, mount your phone to your dashboard and record the route you take to get there. The hold your phone while you walk into your building and go to your office, and then create a Hyperlapse video from that footage. Post that Hyperlapse video next to your address on your website’s contact page. That way, anyone who is going to visit your office for the very first time can actually see where they should park and what door to enter, all in cool Hyperlapse video.] Instagram’s latest standalone, Hyperlapse, is simple, elegant and actually really useful. The app, which rolled out Tuesday, allows users to quickly and easily create on-the-go time-lapse videos— something that hasn’t been easily and effectively accomplished on mobile, until now.

Here are stories that didn’t make this week’s broadcast:

The Freewheeling Life of the Virtual Advisor from ThinkAdvisor

Financial planner Alan Moore is at the forefront of a trend that is extending the reach of traditional advisors onto digital platforms.

Every Time You Buy Something, This App Invests a Few Pennies on Wall Street from WIRED

Now, a startup called Acorns wants to solve these problems with a new smartphone app, hoping it can help millennials outgrow the piggy bank. 

 

Watch FPPad Bits and Bytes for August 29, 2014

Watch FPPad Bits and Bytes for August 29, 2014

FPPad Bits and Bytes for October 25

Posted on October 25, 2013 by in Bits & Bytes

(Watch FPPad Bits and Bytes on YouTube)

On this week’s broadcast, get the rundown of all the announcements from Apple this week, the trend of quick financial planning expands to a new software provider, and how you can impress clients with a survey. Yes, I said survey!

So get ready, a special Halloween edition of Bits and Bytes begins now.

This week’s episode is brought to you by Wealth Management Marketing, providers of complete outsourced marketing services for Registered Investment Advisers.

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Learn how outsourcing your marketing can result in successful custom marketing campaigns that grow your business by visiting fppad.com/wmm.

From iPad Air to Mac Pro: everything you need to know about Apple’s fall event from TheVerge.com

[By now, you’ve probably heard that Apple has further disrupted the hardware and software market as we know it. The company introduced a more powerful line of MacBook laptops, updated the release date of the Mac Pro uber-computer to December starting at just under $3,000, and revealed the both the iPad Air, with its ultra-thin 9.7-inch Retina display weighing in at just one pound, and a new iPad mini, upgraded with its own 7.9 inch Retina display and now priced at $399.

Apple also accelerated the race to zero on software pricing, announcing that Mavericks, the latest operating system for Mac, is now free for all users, and the iWork and iLife suites are free for anyone who purchases a new Mac or iOS device.

So what does all this mean to advisors?

Most of you run your business on Windows computers, with many of you still using Windows 7 and older versions of Microsoft Office.

The cost of upgrading your software is often a deterrent, especially if you need to buy one or two dozen licenses for everyone in your organization. That’s especially true now that Office 365 requires an annual subscription of $99 per person; that adds up quickly!

So with free versions of the latest software from Apple, you need to consider what your businesses technology will look like in the near future. Will you get more value from low-cost PCs that come with non-trivial software costs, or from higher-priced Apple hardware that includes core software for free?

And for those programs that don’t run on Macs: there’s always Parallels or VMWare Fusion if you absolutely must have access to your legacy Windows-only applications.] After a year in which Apple’s product announcements have largely leaked out ahead of time, today the company delivered something of a surprise: a redesigned tablet, the iPad Air, that is the lightest full-size iPad to date at just 1 pound.

SunGard Launches a Financial Planning Solution that Helps Advisors Quickly Create Holistic, Client-Friendly Plans from Sungard

[If you watched FPPad Bits and Bytes for October 11, you learned that Advisor Software published goalgamiPro, the company’s quick financial plan illustration tool, on the Salesforce AppExchange market.

Now the latest company capitalizing on the popularity of quick financial planning tools is Sungard, who announced this week the introduction of a new product called WealthStation CompAct.

The new tool is a single, stand-alone application advisors can use on their own or in collaboration with clients to highlight planning opportunities across eight areas, including cash management, asset allocation, and retirement planning.

WealthStation CompAct allows advisors to create basic plans simply and efficiently to help clients prioritize their financial goals. Should more detailed planning be needed, data from CompAct can be fed into the more robust WealthStation Financial Planning module.] SunGard has launched WealthStation CompAct, a new financial planning solution that gives advisors the ability to produce results-based, holistic financial plans quickly, simply and interactively.

Use Surveys to Impress Clients. Yes, Surveys! from Morningstar Advisor

[And finally, you’ve no doubt read countless articles why it’s important to send surveys to your clients. Client surveys provide valuable insight on what your clients are thinking, but the last thing you want to do is fill up your client’s inbox with another dull, plain-vanilla survey.

Enter a survey tool called Typeform. In four easy steps, you can use Typeform to create fun, yes I said fun, surveys that stand out among the rest. Instead of the standard radio bubbles and check boxes, Typeform gives you lots of options to add color, style, and bold icons to your survey. And since Typeform uses responsive design, your surveys look great no matter what device clients use to offer feedback.] The last thing you want is a client to see your survey request and think, “Hooray–another boring survey from my financial advisor.”

Watch FPPad Bits and Bytes for October 25, 2013, "Halloween Edition!"

Watch FPPad Bits and Bytes for October 25, 2013, “Halloween Edition!”

FPPad Bits and Bytes for September 13

Posted on September 13, 2013 by in Bits & Bytes

On this week’s broadcast, what the new iPhone means to the future of your business, mobile check deposit comes to one of the top custodians, another document collaboration and e-signature partnership, and more. So get ready, Bits and Bytes begins now.

(Watch on YouTube)

This week’s episode of Bits and Bytes is brought to you by Total Rebalance Expert, the industry’s largest, privately owned portfolio rebalancing software provider.

Total Rebalance Expert

Designed by well-known CPA Sheryl Rowling, TRX features tax-efficient rebalancing, an easy to use interface, and more, all at an affordable price. To learn how you can gain a half a million dollar return on your technology investment, download the latest white paper by visiting fppad.com/trx

Apple Unveils iPhone 5C and iPhone 5S from the Wall Street Journal

[No technology broadcast would be complete without mentioning this week’s announcements from Apple on the new iPhone 5S and 5C. Nearly one out of every two advisors already use the iPhone for personal and business activity, and few will argue that the capabilities of all smart phones, even Android, Windows Phone, and Blackberry, can really boost an advisor’s efficiency.
So if you’re considering an upgrade to your iPhone, or even a switch from the other manufacturers, here are the three most important updates you need to know.

First, the iPhone 5S features a new Touch ID sensor to unlock your phone using only your fingerprint, further enhancing the device’s security to prevent unauthorized access.

Second, the iPhone 5S comes with iOS 7, the latest version of Apple’s mobile operating system with hundreds of new features. Of most relevance to you is the new AirDrop feature, allowing you to share photos, contacts, and most importantly documents, directly over WiFi using a secure connection. Now AirDrop only works with iPhone 5, and the latest versions of the iPad and iPod Touch, so you may need a backup plan when you want to share documents with clients who have older Apple devices.

And third, any new purchase of an iOS device comes with the iWork apps for free, including Pages, Numbers, Keynote, and iMovie, saving you roughly $40, but also giving you native apps to edit the office documents that you use every day.

But no matter what phone you currently use today, manufactures keep trying to one-up each other with new software and hardware features, and Apple is no different than the rest of the competition. One downside to all this innovation: it does put pressure on your technology budget when trying to keep up with all the new options out there.] Apple Inc. introduced a pair of new iPhones Tuesday with upgraded features, but didn’t stray far from its usual playbook to address concerns about intensifying competition from rivals such as Samsung Electronics Co.

Fidelity adds remote check deposit feature to the WealthCentral Mobile app from FPPad.com

[And in other mobile device news, mobile check deposit is now coming to one of the top institutional custodians to independent advisers. In Bits and Bytes for August 30th, you learned that LPL Financial rolled out remote check deposit to their iOS and Android apps. Not to be outdone, Fidelity announced this week that it, too, will allow advisers to deposit client checks into their accounts using the company’s WealthCentral Mobile app.

Now advisors can’t just download the latest version of the app and start deposits right away, as there is an enrollment process that Fidelity requires. Read the related story to get all the details of the process.] Weeks after LPL introduced remote check deposit in its app, Fidelity becomes the first custodian to offer the functionality to its advisers.

ShareFile + RightSignature: Empowering professionals with e-signatures from ShareFile from ShareFile.com

[Next up is news on a new partnership between leading providers of document collaboration and e-signature software. This week, ShareFile, part of the Citrix family of collaboration tools, announced that it completed an integration with RightSignature, another contender in the e-signature space. I bet you were expecting DocuSign, weren’t you, since I’ve mentioned them in almost every Bits and Bytes episode to date!

But advisors using ShareFile now have the ability to route documents stored in ShareFile directly to RightSignature to obtain client signatures. But not all financial institutions accept e-signatures from RightSignature, so if you’re a ShareFile user, you might need to challenge your custodian to pursue a relationship with RightSignature so you have options when it comes to obtaining electronic signatures from your clients.

There’s a video walkthrough available of the ShareFile/RightSignature integration, so to watch it, just visit the story linked above.] We’re excited to announce our new partnership with RightSignature, a leading provider of secure electronic signature services, to bring you a fast, easy and secure way to obtain electronic signatures on important documents, right from your Citrix ShareFile account.

Fate or Destiny? from TheReformedBroker.com

[Finally, you should know what Josh Brown is up to. Josh who, you might ask? He’s the former broker turned fee-only advisor and author of Backstage Wall Street, which Brown says is “the book [air quote]they[air quote] don’t want you to read.”

So what does Josh Brown have to do with technology?

He’s a prime example of how social media and transparency through technology can literally throw gasoline on a smoldering fire and ultimately transform your business into a enviable growth engine.

On his website this week, Josh announced that he has to go away for a while to work on a handful of major projects, but with his social media presence and visibility as a fee-only advisor, it’s worth your time to put Josh on your radar if you haven’t done so already.] I suppose I don’t believe in fate but I do believe in destiny.

 

Watch Bits and Bytes for September 13, 2013