August, 2009

This kinda snuck up on me. A while back, @DellOutlet quietly surpassed the 1 million follower mark on Twitter. Right now, it’s in the Global Top 100 ranking in at #83 . It’s good to be in the company of other brands like @Google , @WholeFoods , @Zappos , @JetBlue and more. Regular Direct2Dell readers know that we’ve blogged a lot about @DellOutlet and the $3M in related sales its earned since 2007. Most folks also know that I attribute much of its success to @StefanieatDell and...

Dell recently announced our Q2 earnings results for FY 2010. Over on the DellShares blog, our CFO Brian Gladden discusses the results .

I have the privilege of chairing the Global Giving Council, the newly-formed executive team here at Dell charged with governing our giving practices. 2008 brought significant changes to Dell giving, as highlighted in our recently released corporate responsibility report . We established an aggressive giving goal, adopted a new strategy focused on making a global impact, and launched an innovative signature program that is already making a real difference in countries around the world. Actively...

Twitter's rightfully buzzing with the news today that Jeremiah Owyang will be joining Charlene Li along with ex-Forrester analyst Ray Wang and Deb Schultz at Altimeter Group . Wow. I agree with Todd Defren on this: Dream Team. In my view, Jeremiah has consistently produced some of the best commentary on the social web and where this stuff is going. If you have an interest in the evolution of the web, you need to read his blog, Web Strategy by Jeremiah . He continues to shape much of the thinking...

If you're not at the show, be sure to follow us @DellatVmworld on Twitter The VMworld show is next week at the Moscone Center in San Francisco and we've got quite a show planned this year. We'll be there showing how our virtualization optimized solutions can help customers ‘Get More Virtual,’ meaning faster speed time to deployment for new projects and more value out of existing virtualization investments. Inside the booth, Dell will be demonstrating solutions for IT...

What an exciting and energy-charged year on the diversity front! Diversity and inclusion are business imperatives that not only make us a better company but also deliver significant business advantages. There is no better way to showcase this than in the diversity section of our FY09 Corporate Responsibility Report , that we launched earlier this week. Here are some highlights. The Global Diversity Council chaired by our CEO Michael Dell, underscores our commitment to diversity at the highest...

By Tod Arbogast, Director of Sustainable Business, Dell Judy Glazer, Director of Global Social and Environmental Responsibility Operations, HP Gary Niekerk, Director of Global Citizenship, Intel Mike Loch, Director of Supplier Corporate Responsibility, Motorola You may have recently read about the atrocities occurring in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). The DRC holds vast sources of minerals; unfortunately, some of the profits derived from extracting these minerals are...

Today, about two years after Michael declared Dell's aspiration to be the greenest IT company on the planet, our employees are living our commitment to corporate responsibility every day, and in many different forms. You can get an update on what we've been up to with regard to environmental sustainability, social responsibility and corporate accountability in our 2008 corporate responsibility report , which we just launched today. In my role, I'm closest to our environmental...

Earlier today, RichardatDell and I made it to Birmingham Alabama today to take part in Social South . It’s a two-day social media event that kicks off tomorrow and looks to have a pretty exciting agenda . Over the next two days, there are lots of sessions dedicated to four different areas of social media: tools, communication tactics, strategy and case studies. I’m also pumped about being able to share a keynote with @RichardatDell . Our purpose is to talk about Dell’s social...

I hope you have been following the posts about the 10 finalists of the Dell/NFIB Small Business Excellence Award . There are some really interesting stories of small businesses using technology to their advantage, which I think you will enjoy. The next finalist we’d like to introduce is Appleton Learning from Madison, Alabama. This company calls itself the “e-harmony of tutoring” and that’s a great description of how they make technology work for them. They specialize in...

You may have seen some posts on the Inspiron 11z from sites like Gizmodo and Crave . Today, we're making it official. The Inspiron 11z blends netbook-like portability with laptop-like capability. It weighs about 3 lbs. and is about an inch thin so it's easy to carry and stay connected, yet has the capability to deliver smooth HD video playback, and battery life of more than three hours. The bigger difference is inside, or under the hood if you will. Whereas netbooks are based on...

Last month, we introduced a new ordering option for U.S.-based small and medium business customers called Fast Track for Business. It’s clear that many of our customers (not just small and medium business ones) need systems need them right away. That’s why we’ve expanded the Fast Track option for some consumer systems for customers in the United States. Fast Track is a way for Dell to offer great deals on some of our most popular configurations. The Fast Track program also means...

Erik mentioned in his post the other week , we’ll be sharing details on the 10 finalists of the Dell/NFIB Small Business Excellence Award over the next few weeks. I think you’ll enjoy learning about some of the interesting and innovative things these companies are creating with technology. The next finalist we’d like to introduce to you is Vitals , from Lyndhurst, New Jersey. Vitals The business of this company couldn’t be more topical. Vitals is an online...

Since we introduced the Mini 10 back in February, the most common question on my blog post about it was when we would offer the 2GB configuration. Back in May, IdeaStorm user Birdman8232 submitted 2GB on the Mini 10 as an idea on IdeaStorm . It’s also been one of the most common questions we continue to get via @Dell_Mini on Twitter. I knew this was coming, but didn’t realize it was already live until I saw Matrix-2002’s comment on the blog post and @Stevehoward999 tweet to ...

The first thing I want to share in this update is we have some planned downtime for maintenance scheduled this weekend. IdeaStorm will be unavailable from 9:00 pm CST Saturday, August 15th until 5:00 am CST Sunday, August 16th. We appreciate your understanding with this and have done everything we can to reduce any inconvenience this may cause. The other highlight to note is the recently announce partnership with Nickelodeon. As you can see from Lionel's blog post , much of the customer feedback...

This year's QuakeCon is being hosted at the beautiful Gaylord Texan in Grapevine, Texas. It was originally supposed to be at the Hilton Anatole in Dallas, but was bumped for another convention at the last minute. Though the change caused a bit of confusion for those planning to attend, id Software stepped up to the plate to get the convention rolling, and there have been surprisingly few problems. The BYOC (bring your own computer) waiting area was probably the most notable hiccup. Folks who...

Back in June, Dell was part of an announcement from Xsigo Systems on how Pixorial leveraged Dell PowerEdge servers and Xsigo virtual I/O in support of their ground-breaking online video service. As both a Dell customer and innovative business, Pixorial is an ideal customer to illustrate how innovative technology and a partnership with Dell helps grow their business. Today, Pixorial announced the launch of its collaborative video platform with features and capabilities that promise to change the...

Who lives in a pineapple under the sea? If you've got young kids at home like I do, you know the answer to that question is the one and only SpongeBob SquarePants . I'm betting you can probably sing the rest of the theme song as well. Why am I talking about this? Because we're partnering with Nickelodeon , Whyville.net , Walmart and others to introduce a netbook for kids. It's or first product that focused on kids. Since it's a netbook that weighs less than three pounds...

Over the past couple months we've introduced several new products to the Vostro line of products that offer the right features, services, durability, and resources to serve the distinctive needs of small business. From the ultraportable Vostro 1220 to the Vostro All In One (the first all in one exclusively for small business), these systems are preconfigured with tools like free videoconferencing and are designed to be "easy to buy, easy to own." Dell listens to small businesses...

You may have seen some recent reports from places like Engadget , liliputing and Electronista that the Inspiron Mini 12 was going away. It’s true. Dell recently decided that it’s time for the Mini 12 to ride off into the sunset. Here’s a nice Mini 12 photo comparing it to an Inspiron 1420 (thanks Watchcaddy from Flickr !) So, should you read anything into this as far as Dell’s commitment to the netbook space? Nope. It really boils down to this: for a lot of customers...

Last month Dell announced the Vostro All in One to help entrepreneurs "Reclaim Their Desks." As part of the announcement, we kicked off a contest for readers to share photos of their messy desk and enter in for a chance to win a new Vostro All in One to help organize their desk space. You still have one week to submit your photo on Flickr with the tag " reclaimyourdesk " for a chance to win. For all the contest details, read the official rules here .

We had a great opportunity to listen to the needs of our SMB customers recently when we organised a roundtable discussion in London with the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC), three of our customers (including two UK Finalists from the Dell Small Business Excellence Award 2009 ) and four journalists who cover the SMB market. The topic was around how technology can help SMBs survive and thrive in a recession. As you can imagine in this current environment, there was lots of lively debate. On technology...

Last week, I participated in the judging panel for the annual Dell/NFIB Small Business Excellence Award , where we reviewed all of our U.S. award finalists. The experience reminded me why I love working with the small and medium business sector so much – these entrepreneurs have some amazing stories. And learning about such a wide variety of industries is fascinating. Especially when they are demonstrating just how much technology can revolutionize how they run their businesses. For background...

We've blogged quite a bit about how Dell technology can help your business run more efficiently and save a bundle on energy costs, but our words pale in comparison to the real life examples our customers provide. Data centers can be notorious energy hogs , but a transition to greener IT can cut down on energy-related costs significantly while reducing your data center's impact on the planet. This is perhaps best illustrated by Earth Rangers , a Canadian nonprofit organization that rescues...