Category: Schipul Co Events

Events from our past as Schipul – The Web Marketing Company before renaming the company after our software Tendenci.

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Why I’m Building SpacePoints on the Tendenci CMS for Non-Profit Websites

First, What is SpacePoints?

The general software platform I’ve been leading development on called SpacePoints can best be explained like this:

When you share your excitement and passion for space, you’ll earn a ‘spacepoint’ and the SpacePoints online platform maintains the database of your space activities and spacepoints earned.  

The toughest part with describing SpacePoints is communicating the idea around a platform for space enthusiasts to share their excitement of space-exploration to people outside of the space community and being rewarded for this through a virtual points system.  The goal is to motivate people to become more active in promoting space exploration, whether it be robotic, planetary science, human spaceflight, science fiction turned reality, or other space-topics.

The Background Story of SpacePoints

SpacePoints was an idea that spontaneously came out of a SpaceUp Houston Unconference last February in a session jointly led by Dennis Bonilla and Tim Bailey.  I could write several pages sharing the story of how SpacePoints went from an idea to a crowdsourced workshop and set of requirements to a working software product.

I won’t go into all of that here though – instead I will share a little about the “elephant in the room” and how I came to use Tendenci as the platform for SpacePoints.  In case you missed what the “elephant” is – I work for Tendenci and I’m building SpacePoints (a volunteer project that I’m personally involved in) on Tendenci.   I’m presenting SpacePoints at different events like SpaceUps and SXSW Interactive and as a result, Tendenci is getting PR too.

The decision to build SpacePoints on Tendenci was a tough one – and not remotely because I thought Tendenci wouldn’t be a good platform or don’t enjoy using it.  Quite the contrary – I love Tendenci and use it every day to update both our company’s websites: https://www.tendenci.com and https://www.tendenci.com.

SpacePoints actually started on a custom PHP platform that we weren’t able to complete due to a lack of programmers with enough free time.  Then, I began researching a number of different options including Drupal, PHPBB and Elgg. Each of these were far more technical than I was prepared for with the limited timeline I had before March 12th, 2012 when Spacepoints will be officially launching in beta at SXSW Interactive.

I needed a beta-ready version of a new online community and I had less than 5 months to do that. The irony is it took a Drupal developer (and friend), Kojo Idrissa, to convince me finally to stop resisting and use the tools that I had inside of Tendenci because I knew how and could accomplish it in a way that would really make SpacePoints more than just a “space-twitter” clone.

The SpacePoints Development Site is already being tested by a select number of users and it is far easier to use and integrate social sharing tools and other plugins in a short time frame than other options I looked into.  I am really glad I ultimately chose Tendenci for the platform.

What I Learned From This

I learned a lot of new technical things, including just how complicated setting up and configuring a Drupal platform can be, but I also learned something more valuable that I feel is something most of Tendenci’s clients can relate to.

Nonprofits and cause-related projects are understaffed and underfunded and generally don’t have a lot of technical people to help – yet the website and other online tools for marketing and fundraising and building a community are so critical.  If you can find a tool that you can use and that you can afford (or that someone is going to donate like my company has donated Tendenci software and hosting to the SpacePoints project), then Say Yes and use it!

Even if it isn’t the exact fit you wanted – nonprofits don’t have the luxury of waiting for something perfect if perfect means custom programming, doesn’t exist yet, or costs too much.  Start building your community and generating revenue through donations, memberships, and sponsorships on whatever platform you have access to.  You can always change it later on when you have more support and more money.

I wish I had said yes months before I did instead of worrying about how it would look.  Yes – Tendenci is going to gain a lot of PR from this and that’s not a bad thing because SpacePoints is also going to be able to grow and succeed faster than if I’d tried to go with something else.

SpacePoints Links

I would love for you to go learn more about the longer story of SpacePoints.  Then sign-up for a beta invitation and if you’ll be at SXSW this year, come to the panel!   Here are the links:

Sign-Up for the SpacePoints Beta sign-up

Check Out the Details in the SpacePoints Wiki

Come to the SXSW SpacePoints: Space Outreach at Ludicrous Speed panel!

 

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Your SXSW 2012 Interactive Top 10 Tips for Survival

SXSW Interactive is one of, if not THE biggest, interactive marketing and web conference, and is a valuable resource for our team here at Schipul.  SXSW Interactive offers education and the latest and greatest for all things related to web marketing and digital advertising.

I’m excited to be able to give back to my profession this year as a presenter on a panel: Spacepoints’ Space Outreach at Ludicrous Speed! If you’re going to be in Austin in March for SXSW 2012, come check out my panel or just hang out with the team from Schipul attending.  {shameless plug!}

SXSW has a Guide for First Timers that can give you some tips on navigating the conference.  Their guide can get you to the sessions, but when I attend SXSW, I am also looking to connect with other Interactive Agencies to build relationships and identify the latest technology innovations and software tools to help our clients improve their online marketing results.  This results in a 24/7 week-long agenda of AM networking breakfast, blogger’s lounge, panels, afternoon networking, party, party, party, 4 hours of sleep, repeat.  Over the past few years, I’ve developed my own tips for surviving the extended-version of SXSW Interactive.

Here are my Top 10 Tips for Doing SXSW Interactive Hardcore:

1) Say Yes to the Free Caffeine; Say No to the Free Booze.

You’ll find that every party will have plenty of free sugar free red bull, monster energy drinks, vodka or some other kind of alcohol to mix.  Then my Caffeine Hero: Starbucks always comes to the rescue the next morning with plenty of free coffee.  Skip the booze if you want to make it through the entire week, and stock your hotel with fresh fruit and healthy snacks because you’ll be hard pressed to find any food, let alone free food at SXSW.

2) Keep Your Smartphone Charger on You at All Times.

You will be on the go running from panel to panel during the day, and then party to party each night. Carry your phone charger with you, take a spare that you keep in your hotel room (in case you lose your first one), and if you have the option’ get a spare battery too. If you see an outlet near you’ don’t be ashamed to plugin and juice up your phone. Tweeting, foursquaring, and texting is power-intensive and you don’t want to have a dead battery at 2am when you are trying to find directions back to your hotel.

3) Bookmark http://austin2012.sched.org/ and use it to create your personalized SXSW schedule before you get to Austin.

SXSW’s event schedule on their website is pretty good’ however I’ve been using sched.org’s unofficial SXSW guide to find EVERY party, panel, and must attend event possible.  The best places to connect with people at SXSW aren’t always “official” parties.

Sched also offers a new feature this year that enables you to sync your Eventbrite RSVPs and the platform is available for all the major mobile platforms: iphone, Droid and Blackberry. When you get to Austin, you’ll love how easy sched makes it to find your next session on the go.

4) Pack a Swimsuit.

Austin weather is fickle, and it may be 60 degrees in early March or 90. Regardless’ all the hotels have swimming pools and hot tubs and if you are doing it right, you’ll be invited to at least one pool party.  I don’t recommend skinny dipping at SXSW’ everyone has a camera in their smartphone and you what happens at SXSW definitely does NOT stay at SXSW.  So take your favorite swim trunks or bikini when you pack for Austin.

5) Pack a Cowboy Hat and Cowboy Boots.

There will be at least 2 parties with a Texas country theme. If you don’t have western attire’ no worries, Austin has some great shops where you can purchase what you need.  I’ve gotten great Cowgirl boots at  Allen’s Boots and the HatBox has Cowboy hats in every style plus tons of other fun and funky headwear.

6) Pack a Backpack and Leave Your Briefcase at Home.

Have I already mentioned you’ll be on the move for a week? Take a compact backpack with a laptop-padded section for your trip and spare your back and shoulders the strain of running around all day carrying your briefcase. You don’t have to take your laptop or tablet PC’ but you’ll definitely want to have something with you for taking notes in the sessions, even if you prefer traditional pen and paper.  If you are going to any of the developer or design sessions then your laptop will be heavily used. Bloggers will find the Bloggers lounge a great resource for power and snacks while updating your audience with all the latest happenings online too.

7) Talk to Strangers.

The panels are great for professional development but it’s the people at the conference that are the core of the experience so don’t be shy’ say Hi to everyone you meet. SXSW Interactive hosts the largest single gathering of ‘Connectors” you’ll ever find so strike up a conversation and get connected with new people who will help you grow your business, launch your start-up, or make an introduction to that big prospect or thought leader.

8) Take More Business Cards Than You Think You’ll Need’ and Stickers Too!

I probably go through 200-300 mini-moos each SXSW. I order cards JUST for SXSW that have my contact information while at the conference. I include a headshot so people recognize me throughout the week, my mobile so people can text me about any “pop-up” parties, my email address for following up later, and this year my panel information so people will know when and where I’ll be presenting. I recommend moo.com’s mini-moos if you are going to order cards just for the event. Here’s my cards for this year:

9)  Make Time to Visit the Exhibitions, Showcases, and Lounges.

One of the best places to find out about innovations in online technology is SXSW’s Interactive.  The only place I personally can imagine being cooler for a tech-geek like me is the Consumer Electronics Show in Vegas.  SXSW has several different Trade Shows and Showcase Lounges featuring an array of products and services that your business may want to utilize for growing online and offline next year.  You definitely want to make your rounds to the SXSW Start-up Village Showcase featuring new technology start-ups, plus you can snag some really fun Swag!

10) Don’t Try to Do Everything.

You can’t.  I tried one year and came back with no voice left and a dazed and confused fog that took 2 more weeks to dissipate.  Until cloning techniques advance, I’ll have to settle with missing about 2/3rds of everything because so much is going on all at once.

Schedule at least 4 to 6 hours of sleep each night.  Make time in your schedule to get away from the convention center to walk around the lake one morning or take a couple of hours one afternoon and take a nap in your hotel.  SXSW, when done right, is both grueling and an amazing experience.  Definitely dive right into the throng of digital tech madness, but be sure to turn off your phone every so often…

And remember: Don’t Drink the Free Booze!

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Tendenci Includes a Little Love Note Just for You with this Week’s Software Updates

Be My Valentine, Love Tendenci!

We are updating your Tendenci websites with new features and improved functionality this morning.  We also wanted to show you how much we love our clients and you’ll notice a new pink link on your admin bar.  Click on the link and receive Valentine’s Sweets for being such a Sweetheart!

Featured Updates

Tendenci’s Custom Forms now include the option for your visitors to set their own price or donation amount.

When you create a custom payment form, you’ll simply leave the Price field blank to allow your site visitors to input their own price.  You can add multiple payment amounts and add this custom price option to the mix.

Here’s an example from Avant Garden using 2 fixed prices plus an any amount option:

Here’s more great updates to Love about your Tendenci software for nonprofit and association website management:

Global Settings and Content Management

  • Help files now have an RSS feed
  • Current Story images and Directory logos can be removed
  • Stories now link to their detail view if a full-story-link is not set
  • Custom forms label size increased to 2k characters long
  • Visitors can set their own price on custom forms
  • Added the ability to remove uploaded images in directories, stories, and events

Membership Module Updates

  • Improved Subscriber import feature that does simple name detection for first, last, and full name
  • You can now customize the “From” address on membership notifications by filling in the sender display and sender fields

Tendenci Online Payments

  • Payment method on custom forms uses currency setting for international payment options

Tendenci Events Management Module

  • Removed initial Google Maps info-bubble on the Event page for a better user view of the map
  • The current featured image for an event can be removed

Tendenci Rich Media Photos and Online Video

  • Added Open Graph meta tags to photo albums to help Facebook detect images and descriptions when sharing the photo album

 

Not using Tendenci for your website CMS?

Find out all the awesome things Tendenci can do for your Non-Profit or Association with our 30-Day FREE Trial.  Then – show us what you can do with your Tendenci website!

Questions about these Updates? 

Hit us up in the comments or over on Get Satisfaction and try out our newest self sign-up version of the Tendenci Software FREE for 30 days! 

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Schipul is Proud to Sponsor the Space City Classic!

This weekend is the Space City Classic Gymnastic Invitational, held February 3rd-5th at the Legends Sports Complex in Spring. The Classic is hosted by Team Cypress of Cypress Academy of Gymnastics in Houston, TX and a portion of all of the proceeds from the event will go to The Greater Houston Gymnastics Foundation, a 501(c)(3) organization. Schipul is proud to sponsor this great event!

The Space City Classic website is built with Tendenci Content Management System Community Edition. The site features include a large homepage rotator, News feed, Event Calendar, and Membership Login Area.

“The Greater Houston Gymnastics Foundation is extremely thankful for the support of Schipul and the Tendenci website platform in helping us revolutionize our presence on the web.  Not only does the quality of product improve the reputation of our meets and organization, but the simplicity and intuitive design constructs of Tendenci make web development, enhancement and daily use extremely attractive.  The fact that I didn’t have to train users on how to interface with our operations through the website says enough!”

– David Duren, The Space City Classic

TheSpaceCityClassic.com hosted on Tendenci. Learn more and sign up for a free trial at Tendenci.com

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Tendenci Software Updates and New Features | January 26th, 2012

Coming Soon to a Tendenci Website Near You…

…Anyone Can Register Anyone with Tendenci’s Event Registration Upgrade!

We’ve updated the event registration system with new features that will go live in all Tendenci websites later this week.

Once the new system is implemented, Tendenci site admins will be able to enable event registration for anyone by anyone else when registering for one of your events.  This includes registering someone who qualifies for a discount.

You and your members will be able to use this new feature to register your friends and professional associates for events for them and pay the correct discounted price they are eligible for.  You won’t have to share login information and passwords or miss out on event registrations because someone wanted to register but didn’t have time or forgot.

How it will work:

As an attendee who is not logged in: you click the register button, select one of the available prices and submit your registration.  You can repeat the second step as many times as permitted [by the event] to include more people.

In order to qualify for discounted pricing, you’ll be asked to submit your email address or member number.  You can register using a discounted price if the email address or member number submitted is eligible.  You can also repeat this step as many times as permitted.

If an email address is associated with a discounted price, that email address can only be used once to register.  If the email address is not associated with a discounted price, the email address can be used repeatedly.  This will prevent someone from using the same email address for a member to register their non-member friends just to get the discounted price.

Enjoy!

Here is the full list of updates we will be unleashing this week on your Tendenci software for association website management:

Global Settings and Content Management

  • Updated several status message styles across modules, making alerts and status notices easier to see and understand.  Some of the places you’ll notice these changes on your website include:
    • Tendenci impersonation status
    • When you add, edit or delete Pages, Articles, and News
    • When you add, edit or delete Events
    • Membership Applications and Member profiles
  • Improved the foreign language translation capabilities of Tendenci Stories Module and User Profiles
  • Added new tracking features to give you better information on your site users’ activities on the website, including:
    • New tracking of how many times .PDFs and other non-image files are downloaded or viewed
    • New tracking of how site visitors are using the different modules on your website and where they are visiting the most
    • You can now view a registered user’s site activity individually from each user’s profile
    • *Reports for this newly tracked data are coming soon
  • Added a “Print Page” option to the stories module

Membership Module Updates

  • When a Member renews and changes their Membership type, Tendenci will automatically stop sending Membership Notices meant exclusively for their previous Membership Type
  • Expanded Membership Search functionality and now you can search any entry field to find search results
  • Membership status messages have been expanded to display expired members and if the expired membership has passed renewal or is still inside the renewal period in addition to displaying active membership status.  You can easily view these on each member profile page

Tendenci Template and Design Updates

  • Newly created sites now have a “click-and-edit” feature for changing your logo
  • Improved the modal boxes styles to increase user accessibility when adding or changing Template content with Tendenci Spaces
  • Improved navigation style updates in the module pages
  • Updating how new style changes are implemented to reduce the need for registered site users to refresh and clear their web browsers cache

Tendenci Events Management Module

  • New Event Type Color!  We have added a new light blue color to the Events Module
  • Added “Email Address” or “Member ID” validation functionality to the Event Registration

Tendenci Directory Module

  • Updated the Directory Price page to make it easier to use
  • Updated the directory pricing page to feature “add/edit” options when appropriate.

Tendenci Plugins

  • Updated Drag and Drop menu for managing online video galleries and videos

Not using Tendenci for your website CMS? 

Find out all the awesome things Tendenci can do for your Association with our 30-Day FREE Trial.  Then – show us what you can do with your Tendenci website!

Questions about these Updates? 

Hit us up in the comments or over on Get Satisfaction and try out our newest self sign-up version of the Tendenci Software FREE for 30 days! 

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Tendenci Updates December 29th, 2011

We added new features to Tendenci for you to enjoy in the New Year.   Check out this week’s Tendenci updates:

Global Settings and Content Management

  • Custom Forms now have editable URL slugs
  • Custom Forms no longer require intro and response text
  • Updated how templates use Nav tags to avoid naming conflicts
  • The category template tag now skips objects that don’t have a category or subcategory
  • Reconfigured index servers to dramatically decrease the time for page saves and edits

Membership Module Updates

  • Removed the “admin only” option for membership type and payment method field on membership applications
  • Membership entries can now be deleted by administrators
  • Subscribers can now be batch imported into a User Group using a spreadsheet template

Career Module Updates

  • The Jobs Search page offers additional ways to customize your job search queries
  • Added Agency Information on the Job details page

Events Module

  • You can now filter by event types when an adding content to a new email newsletter campaign

Questions about these updates? Hit us up in the comments or over on Get Satisfaction and help us name our newest self sign-up version of the Tendenci Software by voting for your top 3 favorites: https://www.tendenci.com/vote-to-name-the-new-templateversion-of-tendenci/!