I can't function without my daily cup of latte. There are a number of StarBucks stores that I go to everyday depending on where I am (Toronto, San Francisco or Boston). I guess that I spend quite a bit of time in Starbucks(I actually think that they should adopt the semi-virtual office business model for their loyal customers but that's another story).
The story is about a young man who is working in one of these locations, actually right on Yonge st. and Finch st. in Toronto. He is quite a guy.
Whenever I see him, he welcomes me and asks how I am. He usually asks general questions about my work and life and tries to communicate. He does it with every single customer in the store. The other day, somebody was paying him a compliment saying that he makes nice comments and shows interests in his clients. Needless to say, he seems very sincere and shows genuine interests.
The result? Well, everybody likes to buy their coffee from him. I have actually seen people in the line that allow other people to move in front of them, just because this guy was busy and could not serve them at that moment. All of the staff give you the exact same coffee so it is not about the coffee. It's about the connection that this guy makes with the customers. This guy created a personal brand on top the Starbucks'. It seems like the coffee that you get from this guy is much better from the regular coffee. It is more valuable! Technically speaking, people are willing to pay more, maybe not money wise but definitely time wise, for his coffee.
We, at TELTUB, are also in the process of building our brand. It is very vital for us, and for every other business out there, to be known as a valued member of the community as oppose to be known as a jerk. The truth is it's not all about what we want to be known as, it's about who we really are. Take this example:
I spend a lot of time every day to go through the tech and business daily news. I read blogs and I comment on them if I can actually add value to the conversation. I also submit what interests me to social networking websites in the hope that somebody, who thinks like us, finds them interesting. True, it's a part of my daily job but would I be able to do it consistently if I didn't like it?
We have been lucky and we have a team of people who share many common values. We like new and interesting technologies and we share the passion of making life more enjoyable for everybody. We want our brand to represent our shared values: innovation, coolness, connecting with like-minded people and making things possible without over complicating them.
Look at some big names like Microsoft, Google, Yahoo, AOL, AT&T, Verizon, IBM and other giants. Each of these names will remind you of something. That's their brand and not necessarily what they claim it to be. They are successful if what they claim their brand to be is what people actually think of them.
We know who we are and what we like to do but the question is "how do we communicate this to other people?" Just saying who we are is not going to work (I know this much) but what will?

How a guy, who is working in Starbucks, created his own brand

I know many people, including myself, that say they just want their phone to be a phone and nothing more. They just want to make and receive phone calls. Wouldn't it be nice though to have this for free?
Let's be clear: To this date, which is Jan 17th 2010, you need to have some technical knowledge and some spare time to be able to have a free phone using the available services from different companies. We, at TELTUB, are sure that this will change either by us or somebody else and we will let you know once this happens. You can register for our free phone alert and we will let you know once a simple and easy-to-use free phone service is out there in the market that can replace your current phone.

Your email address:

Although it might be challenging for normal users to follow some geeky steps, we have a number of solutions for the people who have some technical knowledge and can find their way around complicated settings: (These solutions are intended for US users but you might be able to use them in other countries if you try)

• If you know what Asterisk is and are not scared to work with it, this solution is for you. You also need to have a free Google Voice account. Google Voice is by invitation only for now but if you know somebody who already has an account, you can ask him/her to send you an invitation. Up until a while ago, you could sign up for a SIP account with Gizmo5 and register that as a phone under your Google Voice account. However, Gizmo5 has suspended new user signup and Google Voice does not work with any other SIP providers.
  You should find a free SIP provider that gives you real US phone numbers. These are called DiD numbers and you can use them to receive phone calls. DiD providers forward the incoming calls to a SIP address that you provide which in this case would be your own Asterisk box. IPKall is a company that gives you free US DiDs but you can find other providers if you look for them on your favorite search engine (Aren't we all talking about Google when we say this?)
  I am assuming that you have an Asterisk box setup at home and you know how to handle static/dynamic IP addresses (using DynDNS). Once this is done, you can simply follow this instruction and get your free home phone line setup.
  


• If you don't have an Asterisk box but don't mind working with third party telephony providers with complex scripting capabilities, you could use this tutorial and setup your system. You would still need an IPKall account and a VOIP adapter.


• There are solutions similar to the video that is posted bellow which do not give you free phone but can decrease your costs. The reason is that these solutions actually need you to have a real phone line, like your cell phone, home phone, etc. You'd still need to pay for a phone line (maybe an affordable one) and therefore your phone will NOT be completely free.
  

There are a couple of other solutions which are far more complicated and provide lesser flexibility. Because of this very same reason they are out of the scope for this article.
These solutions are rather complicated and users might have difficulties to follow the required instructions. For those of us who are not tech savvy and looking to have a free phone service right out of the box, I suggest you register your email address and we will let you know once a simple free phone service becomes available. I assure you that this won't take too long ;)

Labels: Asterisk, Google voice, SIP

How can you have a free phone line?