Events

Hello FastServers.net Community,

We have just received notice that our billing software provider will be performing maintenance and updates on one of their servers tomorrow morning. This will not affect the servers/services you lease through FastServers, however it could potentially affect you ability to log into or perform tasks in your Pentagon account while the maintenance is being performed.

The maintenance is scheduled for tomorrow - Tuesday, April 1st, 2008 - from 8:00 AM EDT (12:00 UTC) to 9:00 AM EDT (13:00 UTC). Efforts will be made to minimize downtime during this maintenance window.

If you have an emergency based support request and are unable to log into your Pentagon account to submit a support ticket during the scheduled maintenance time please call our support team at 1-866-753-3278. If you have non-emergency questions/issues during the scheduled maintenance time and cannot log into your Pentagon account please try logging in again after 9:00 AM EDT.

Thank you for your time.

At HostingCon 2007, FastServers.Net had the opportunity to connect with current managed hosting customers, partners and potential clients. Face-to-face meetings live on the show floor allowed our team to gather solution details, provide live quotes, and win new business with customers from around the world. Relationship building is one of the key points for the team at FastServers.Net so meeting everyone in person allowed our clients to view an accelerated and in-depth look at our operations and the people that make things happen everyday.

One of the greatest satisfactions of the event was the number of people we were
able to meet. We found it very enjoyable to finally meet some long time
customers visiting us from locations around the world including Australia, UK,
China and the US. In fact, this year we had the distinct pleasure of putting
together and hosting the first ever Business Networking Cruise for 360 guests of HostingCon 2007. The cruise provided the perfect time and place for people in general, and the FastServers.Net team to continue talks, answer more questions, and socialize with everyone on board. After several months of planning, we couldn't have predicted that the removal of activity based events from our booth portfolio would be so well received.

Mark and Steven - FastServers.Net   

Monday was filled with final preparations as the booth was setup and finalized.
Very little stress took place that day as our efforts were spent on last minute
decisions such as the color of lighting and location of power outlets for the
FastServers.Net booth. And we spent some time internally discussing the exhibit
floor and what was to come the following day.

After a previously “stressful” day of deciding what shades of green or blue
would be applied to the lighting on the booth, I attended a power-packed dinner,
compliments of Tech Pad Agency. This exceptional event brought together
evangelists from various companies including APLUS.NET, HostMySite, SWSOFT,
SUPERB Hosting, LunarPages, HostNine, and of course, FastServers.Net. Derek Vaughan and Ben Fisher from TechPad Agency/TheHostingNews.com
deserve a big congratulations on a well executed event. This year is the first
time they opened the event to non-customers, and in my opinion, they really
brought together a nice selection of movers and shakers in the industry!

The exhibit floor opened on Tuesday and throughout the day various members of
our management and sales engineering teams had several sit down meetings with
both current and potential clients and partners. A full day of back-to-back meetings was followed by the three hour Business Networking Cruise sponsored by FastServers.Net and TopHosts.Com. Many of us shared several more hours of "socializing" upon our return. Both the cruise and the aftermath resulted in the meeting of new friends with the comfort of having "The Usual Suspects" at arms length.

TopHosts.Com



As things wrapped up on Wednesday evening, we finalized our exhibit hall meetings ending the night with food, drinks, and fireworks to celebrate another successful HostingCon! And when the fireworks exploded I jokingly stated to the crowd that the finale will include our logo to seal the show with some additional branding and to celebrate the new FastServers.Net logo.


As we all return to our regular schedules and routines, the FastServers.Net team would like to thank the many customers, partners, and friends who took time out of their busy lives to visit with us, talk about the industry, and provide us the distinct pleasure of offering the most reliable managed hosting services in the industry! As the weeks and months progress we
will keep you updated on some of the successful relationships we have developed and we may even post a few new profiles on the FastServers.Net blog!

Last Saturday, a group from FastServers had the opportunity to team up with the Chicago Cares organization and be part of their Annual Serve-a-thon, the single largest day of service in the city. Geared toward companies in the area, we made up only a small percentage of the nearly 8,000 volunteers that gathered in Grant Park before being dispersed to schools and parks across Chicago.

I'll be the 1st to admit, anywhere outside of my bed is typically the last place you'll find me on Saturday morning. However, this wasn’t a typical Saturday and, as I fortunately discovered, Caribou Coffee is open at the crack 'o dawn even on weekends. With the help of the volunteers, over 50 schools and parks received a much needed face-lift. Our group helped make-over the classrooms and hallways of Edward Coles Elementary School and for the better part of a week had the purple, oil-based paint splattered arms to show for it.

A few personal highlights of the day...

• The look of approval on the barista’s face as I downed my 3 shots of espresso & a large iced coffee. OKAYEVERYONEWHO’SREADYTO GO?!

• The realization that painting the bottom trim of lockers for 4 hours straight is the equivalent of 1000 squats. (At least that’s what I told myself when I skipped the gym after.)

• Accidentally splattering paint on the girls who came in heels, 3” hoop earrings & Gucci purses to VOLUNTEER. Okay, I didn’t, but I really wanted to.

• Watching grown adults teeter-totter.

• Meeting the some of the youngsters whose school we were painting & explaining to them why there were 40 year olds on their teeter-totter.

We wrapped up the day together back @ Grant Park where an outdoor celebration was held. The overall consensus is that it was an extremely rewarding day for the schools and volunteers alike. Getting the chance to spend time with co-workers and their families outside the office, along with seeing thousands of others pitch in to accomplish so much in a single day was very cool thing.

On a related note: During our adventure, we saw some extremely dated machines in the classrooms. Keep your local schools in mind when phasing out 'old' computers. Non-obsolete equipment (typically less than 5 years old) can be donated to nonprofit and school-based recyclers who can redistribute the machines and monitors to organizations in need. Check out TechSoup.org to locate a nonprofit recycler in your area!

As I wind up my travels I wanted to get a blog post out about my trip to ISPCON and Southern Florida.

Monday morning I flew into Chicago and met up with Ian (CEO of FastServers.Net). We proceeded to to Orlando, Florida to visit with current customers, partners, and check out ISPCON!

One of the first stops (after Starbucks) was in Jupiter, Florida to meet with HostNine LLC (www.hostnine.com) a good friend and client. We had the opportunity to tour their office complex and facilities to see what it takes to run a successful web hosting company. After the visit, tour, and lunch we departed with plans to meet up later in Orlando!

As our travels ended for the day we heard the TouchSupport.com execs made a surprise visit and wanted to spend an evening with us. The night ended up being a FastServers, HostNine, TouchSupport, and Register.com evening of insightful conversation on the industry as a whole. Jack Brandt was slated to speak the next day and he talked briefly about his session "The 50-minute MBA: 50 Ideas in 50 Minutes". We heard the next day it went well and people enjoyed the session. After a long day of driving and even a longer night of enjoyment with our industry friends we ended the night prior to sunrise.

This was my first visit to ISPCON and after walking the exhibit floor we ran into a few familiar faces including The WHIR, SWSOFT, TouchSupport (again), Register.Com, and Isabel Wang! The exhibit floor had less vendors then I expected but we heard that the traffic was very focused and pretty good in regards to past ISPCON events.

During the event we also had the great opportunity to meet TOAST.net. We have worked with them in the past, but never had the chance to meet face to face. It's exciting to finally meet business partners, industry experts, and competition at these events and is one of my favorite reasons to attend!

The night ended with a supper including myself, Ian (CEO of Fastservers.Net), David Snead, Isabel Wang, and Jack Brandt eating Italian food and discussing a wide range of industry related topics, technology, and "war stories".

The visit, show, and dinner has resulted in 5 Thoughts, in 5 Minutes! (A mini-version of Jack's session)

1.) Customers read our paper newsletter! It was the first thing our friends from TOAST.net mentioned! You can subscribe via http://www.fastservers.net/newsletter/signup.html, and receive it each month via postal mail!

2.) There is a web hosting provider that utilizes Twitter, check it out - http://twitter.com/memory . I asked the question to Isabel, if any web hosting company utilized Twitter and she immediately shared me with someone that uses it.

3.) We discuss analytics and some of our favorite tools with include www.crazyegg.com, www.robotplay.com, www.clicktale.com, and www.getclicky.com. Stay tuned for a special interview on the “Future of URCHIN ANALYTICS” coming next week.

4.) I shared an interesting white paper from Enquiro, they have just release a great study on B2B buying habits on the web - http://www.enquiro.com/research/whitepapers.asp. It provides a lot of information on B2B search engine use, buying patterns, and is part of a 3 part series that investigates the B2B sector and search engine usage.

5.) Calamari seems to be an accepted appetizer in a survey conducted with 5 web hosting industry leaders.

In just a few short days in Florida I had the chance to experience ISPCON, meet with current clients, and socialize the industry experts making the trip a huge success. Thanks to all I had contact with and I look forward to seeing in July at HostingCon 2007.

FastServers was recently given the opportunity to exhibit our company's capabilities at the grand opening of the Illinois Technology Association's (ITA) new "TechNexus" Facility in Chicago. During this event, over 375 people came to see the new facility and learn more about Illinois based tech firms.

What is the ITA, you ask? Well, the ITA serves members in Chicagoland and throughout the State and exists to help grow the number of successful businesses that create, deploy and utilize information technology as a core part of their organization.

What is the TechNexus, you ask? Another superb question. TechNexus a multipurpose “clubhouse” for the Illinois technology community that includes:

- A Technology Conference Center providing round tables and events from 2-120 people
- Meeting Space and video conferencing for use by technology companies
- Space for 10 “Companies-in-Residence”
- “Hoteling space” for ITA Members who don’t have downtown office space but need the flexibility of an organized downtown presence
- An “ITA Clubhouse” where the community can come together to collaborate and build businesses

FastServers was one of over 10 companies that were able to showcase their business models and got to meet association members in an informal setting. It was a great chance for our team to learn more about what clients are doing with the technology we support.

We also will be making events like these more of the norm in the coming year. Our hope is to not only support these ventures though our participation, but to also "meet and greet" as many of our local clients as we can. So next tech event your at in Chicago, do stop by and say hello.

Greetings, FastServers.Net Customers and Friends! Happy Labor Day weekend!

I thought I'd post something today to inform of a change that many of you may have already noticed. When calling the Sales Department hotline here at FastServers.Net (866-753-3278 ext. 1), you'll get to hear my chipper and helpful voice from noon to 8 p.m. Monday through Thursday and 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturdays. You'll also notice that quite a few of the quotes and sales ticket responses will also contain my moniker.

This change was done to continue providing advanced technical pre-Sales information to potential new customers and to keep the customer service at the highest level possible. I'll be present to help out with any Sales information or provide you with new server configurations for any of your Dedicated Server needs. Jeff Link has taken over the responsibilities of the Abuse Desk Coordinator, so please be sure to help that gentleman out with responses to his communications.

On a side note... some random things that are making me rather enthused as of late:

* FastServers.Net just celebrated its 10-year anniversary

* Expect some brand new hardware offerings from Dell (Coming Soon!)

* Summer is coming to a close, which means college football season's gearing up (Go Hawks!)

* Oakland Athletics are currently 7.5 games up on the Angels in the AL West (they're really good at baseball)

* My friends and I have been exposed to great music over the course of the summer (Lollapalooza, Intonation Fest)

* Chicago continues to be a great city to base our operations and further our staffing requirements

Other than that, I hope that everyone else has had a glorious summer! As always, we're here to help, so be sure to get in touch with us via the phone number above, via ticket or email submission, or the Live Chat link on the FastServers.Net web site if you have any requests.

Have a great week!

Drew Hulburt