Everybody Helps

New Version with Presence - Get Help On CrossLoop, Now!

After a very exciting launch of the CrossLoop 'Help" Marketplace (which has now already grown to over 8,300 Helpers!), we bring the new version of CrossLoop that enables any Helper to show his/her availability to any customer seeking help and get notified of leads immediately.

CrossLoop Software Application

• The application can track your availability and echo that information in the CrossLoop Help Marketplace.
  • Tracking will only be enabled if you (a) are logged in to the application, (b) have a helper profile, and (c) have not opted out of the Marketplace.
  • Any keyboard or mouse activity will indicate you are available, reflected in the green beacon
  • After 5 minutes of inactivity, the beacon will turn yellow
  • One minute after that, the beacon turns grey indicating that you no longer appear as “Available” on the Marketplace
  •  Keyboard or mouse activity at any time will restore your availability status.

• The Helpers can choose to run CrossLoop on startup so that they are available to any customer who needs a quick response independent of their use of CrossLoop at that moment

• From the menu, you access all you setting, including turning off tracking entirely or setting yourself temporarily as “Unavailable.”

- T

• With this version of the client, future software upgrades will be handled seamlessly so you don’t have to download the latest version by visiting the CrossLoop website
• As a security measure, you can no longer edit the access code
•  If you want a new access code, you can generate a new one by accessing the application menu
• When the applications starts up, in additional to creating an account or loggin in, you can also skip the screen and proceed directly to sharing screens

• Notifications: If you are contacted by a customer and are on-line, you will see the notification appear in the application. Email will the contact information will continue to be sent to you.

CrossLoop Help Marketplace

• Customers can sort Helpers by their availability so I would recommend that you run CrossLoop on startup always
  
• A Helper’s availability status will be shown in search results
• There is a time lag of a couple of minutes between the change of status on the application and the website

Download the new version here 

We have also added a detailed "Getting Started Guide" with a short video on that page that you can share with those you are helping.

As usual, we always listening so feedback and feature requests can be submitted here

Good Afternoon and Good Luck!

CrossLoop "Help Marketplace" is Now Live!

It gives us all humongous pleasure to inform you that we are now live with the CrossLoop Marketplace!

Before I dig into what this means and whats now, some notable things since our last big announcement - our Series A funding from El Dorado Ventures are:

•  

• Recognized as One of The 10 Best Downloads for 2007 from CNet's Download.com
• Recognized as a Top Tech Sites for 2008 (See # 34) from InformationWeek
• BusinessWeek mentioned us in Worthwhile Small Business Technologies
• In depth 3 page walk-through of CrossLoop in UK's very popular PC Advisor magazine
• We have now served over 31M desktop sharing minutes over 1.75M help sessions!! [Check out the new live Odometer on our homepage now that always keep you current with these metrics]
• Our CrossLoop Badges have seen very good adoption. Here are some  great examples:

  • The Computer Community Hospital

  • Biden PC

  • Absolute Business Solutions

We all know that our product CrossLoop is an enabling technology for those who can help one who needs it. We are all about people and empowering them with tools - so we are taking our popular software to the next level by providing a robust platform to find and identify trusted, qualified people with whom you can get personalized and efficient service driven by relationships.

Maybe you are a huge Star Wars fan like me, and wanted to get your family photoshoped in (I like playing Vader on Halloween and thats my daughter). If that is too geeky, how about having someone to do all your design work so that you can fold the laundry or take a nice long bath? If none of that, this should tip you over since bloggers have asked a solution for the huge email problem in the lives of a few of us - A Helper who can help you automate Outlook so that all your emails would be answered and taken care of by themselves - just like that!

Now, you can find them ALL on CrossLoop!!

So What's New.....

For Customers who need Help:

1. New Homepage with Search & Discovery:We have created multiple ways in which you can find      potential Helpers, including
   • Search - from the homepage or any other page
   • Popular Topics
   • Filter Helpers by location and language from the search results
2. Enhanced Profiles of Helpers for you:
   • Contact Helper: There is a more prominent "Contact Me" on the Helpers profile. This enables you to add your contact information and select a service you need
   • Choose a Service: Helpers now have a "Rate Card" through which you can see rates for 3 services with an hourly rate across multiple currencies. Also lookout for the free estimates       indicator on the rate card if they provide one
   • Bookmark and Tell a Friend about a Helper: Each profile has these on the bar above       the Helper's picture. This will enable you to come back to a Helper you like for the continued personalized service and recommend them to your friends
3. Consistent 'Free Download' button: As always, we will continue to provide our popular screen sharing software for free through the consistent 'Free Download' button on the top right of every      page
4. It's a completely FREE service for Customers 

For Helpers

1. Enhanced Profiles with Rate Cards and a prominent "Contact Me" on your profile
2. Leads: When a Customer contacts you, you will receive an email from leads@crossloop.com.
3. Fees: For a limited time, all of the customer leads from CrossLoop are FREE. It is our goal to pair those who want help on their computer with those who can help. 

Finally, as usual, we are all about listening and learning from you so if you have any feedback, please email them to us at cutomersupport@crossloop.com

Thank you for coming along with us on this journey and we look forward to achieving more with your help!

Good Morning and Good Luck!

CrossLoop 2.10 and 2.11

Some of you might not have noticed it so here is a little post on the quick release of our 2 new versions.

CrossLoop 2.10

1. We added a new account login and creation page on the client for users. There were multiple reasons for this:

a) We saw a lot of people requesting the need to track their sessions. This enables them to build a reputation with each minute they engaged with CrossLoop to leverage their expertise (not very different from an airline pilot who logs every minute of his flight to enhance his credentials).

Furthermore, users who were being helped, wanted to support their vendors with ratings and customer testimonials. which without an account were not considered towards the overall reputation of the person helping them. Customer testimonials are a huge asset for any business - we show  off ours here and so we wanted to make sure you could easily capture and market it even more easily.

Very very importantly, there is study that strongly recommends collection of ratings and reviews. Mediapost reports here about a study that
(i) 68% of online shoppers read reviews before buying
(ii) 64% of consumers surveyed by Forrester said that user ratings and reviews were the kinds of features that they wanted to see on Web sites

CrossLoop is enabling that for all ....so bringing ratings and reviews done by your customers to potentially news ones, makes it extremely powerful! So make sure you capture them (on your profile) and use your Public URL in your signature, for example, to market those.

b) The two editable fields of our UI - Computer Name and Access Code - confused people and created a bigger learning curve. Now with a quick one-time only account creation, we only have the Access Code that can still be edited.
Many have asked for a regular password that comes along with an account to connect easily with their trusted contacts for example, instead of an editable Access Code field

Make sure to confirm your account (an email is sent to confirm the validity of the email submitted while creating the account) since the ratings are 'escrowed' until you do.

c) Furthermore, we are working on some more exciting stuff coming soon that will make it a more seamless and compelling experience. Stay close to this blog!

2. Optimization of our software to avoid the many frequent false-positives caused by anti-virus softwares. This will always continue to be a work-in-progress for a small company like ours. Thank you for all the feedback on this.

3. A two step download since the pop-up blockers were confusing users when they couldn't see the instruction box to click through and install the software

The details of V2.10 are here

CrossLoop 2.11

1) This was a biggie - Many Vista users wrote in with the issues they faced while connecting due to UAC that is built into Vista. We have significantly made it a better experience. The step by step explanation is here   

Again - as I said before - I genuinely believe I am a marketer first for you!

Finally, let me end this post and head home with this neat mention here in PC Magazine that recognizes our product as one of "91 Utilities to Supercharge Windows"

Download v2.11 here

Good Afternoon, Good Luck and have a great weekend!

CrossLoop 1.20 and Partner Link

Here is more information on the new version, especially for those using versions prior to v1.14 and a small link that we added on our homepage:

• Faster Sessions with control of color quality: This started with 1.14 but many users were not aware of it since we did not automatically inform them of the new version. Initially we did not want to be intrusive with the notification but based on the awesome feedback of the new feature, continuous requests for that feature (by those not using the upgraded version) and by those who did not want to manually check for updates, we decided to make it 1.2. This allows us to automatically notify its availability. The details of this feature are here.

• We also added a small link here to our homepage for people and organizations in the business of technical computer support, software application support or training to submit their information and work more closely with us.

We are seeing a huge spike in businesses adopting CrossLoop to support their customers (Yes - you can do that for free) and reaching out to us with a lot of feature requests that would add value to their business - we love that. For example, here are just a few businesses that are using CrossLoop to support their customers:

• GeeK Tech Support
• Computer Courage
• APTtek

So if you are in the business of helping people, I would definitely urge you to submit your information there so that we can be in touch with developments relevant to your business. We are working on some very exciting stuff for you - sssshhhh :)

If you are using CrossLoop to support customers and have added our link and logo on your site, I would love to hear from you too so that I can share your stories down the road on this blog. You can reach me at mrinal [at] crossloop dot com

Good Afternoon and Good Luck

CrossLoop Troubleshooting Guide

Based on our tech support expert, Joe Stark's, interaction with some of our users, here is his compiled list of solutions to questions he encounters:

1. Firewall/Security software could block CrossLoop or VNC files from running or accessing the internet which can cause many problems including the following symptoms;

a. Failure to launch the VNCViewer on the computer accessing the contact’s desktop to display after the user ‘sharing’ their computer clicks on the Allow button on their end. 

b. Error message "Failed to Execute the Command Line: winvnc.exe" This message could appear on the computer that is ‘sharing’ and indicates that something is blocking TightVNC files from running. This might also happen if the user does not have Admin rights on the computer in the ‘share’ mode.

c. Error message "Failed to connect to web service." This message indicates that something is blocking the file CrossLoopConnect.exe from accessing the internet or on very rare occasions the CrossLoop server could be experiencing a problem. 

To prevent or remedy the above problems please configure your Security software to “Allow” CrossLoopConnect.exe, WinVnc.exe and VncViewer.exe to run and access the internet. Some security software might list groups of programs to allow or block. The CrossLoop, TightVnc, Remote Control and VIPTunnel groups should be allowed.

2. If either or both of the computers have a VNC program already installed it could conflict with CrossLoop.

CrossLoop installs and uses TightVNC which will conflict with any other VNC software if installed on the same computer. All VNC programs use the same registry keys and could overwrite each other’s settings. If you are being asked for a password from a VNC dialog box when trying to run CrossLoop, it is not a CrossLoop message. The best thing to do is to uninstall CrossLoop and the other VNC program on your computers and start fresh with CrossLoop.

3. You must be logged in as a user with Admin rights.

CrossLoop installs and uses TightVNC which must be able to write to the Windows Registry and to a configuration file. You must be logged on as a user with Admin rights to install and to use CrossLoop. If you do not have admin rights you will receive the error message “Failed to write to config file”.

4. CrossLoop disconnects and closes the VNC Viewer.

Crossloop does not have a time out period.

These are the known reasons CrossLoop would disconnect in the middle of a session;

a. The helper, "Access" end minimizing the VNC Viewer for more than 1 minute. This is a characteristic of Tight VNC that we can't do anything about.b. One of the computers going into Hibernate or sleep mode after being idle for the set amount of time.c. Some screen savers might cause CrossLoop to disconnect when they come on. Windows screen saver will cause it to disconnect if you have it set to "Display welcome screen on resume"d. A prolonged interruption in internet connectivity on either end of the session.

5. Computers that use a Proxy server to access the internet present a problem for Crossloop performance.

An optimal, and normal, connection for CrossLoop is a Peer to Peer connection in which data is transmitted directly between the two computers having a session. If you use a proxy server a Peer to Peer connection is not possible so obviously, CrossLoop performance will not be as robust as with a Peer to Peer connection. When possible, you should have a direct connection to the internet when using Crossloop. 

6. UAC on Windows Vista   

According to Vista's Help file: "User Account Control (UAC) is a feature in Windows that can help prevent unauthorized changes to your computer. UAC does this by asking you for permission or an administrator password before performing actions that could potentially affect your computer's operation or that change settings that affect other users. When you see a UAC message, read it carefully, and then make sure the name of the action or program that's about to start is one that you intended to start."

Unfortunately, this message and request for approval displays even if you are logged in as a user with Admin rights. When this message is displayed CrossLoop is immediately disconnected. 

A workaround for this problem is to turn off User Account Control when using CrossLoop. To do this go to; Start button/Settings/Control Panel/User Accounts and Family Safety/User Accounts/Turn User Account Control on or off. You will need to restart the computer for the change to take effect.

Good Afternoon and Good Luck!

CrossLoop 1.14

A feedback that we heard from our users, who were helping others, was that CrossLoop at times was slow. Many did not care about the default high picture quality (32 bit) we provided when all they wanted to do was help someone and get their work done. They asked for an ability to change the picture quality - so here we are with v1.14 that allows one to do exactly that.

As you can see in the image above, our engineers actually took a step further and added an auto selection based on the speed of the session.

If you desire so, you could choose a low (8 bit) or high quality image (32 bit) before or during a session . On the 'JOIN' tab, click on the gear icon on the User Interface which drops a menu as shown above - then click on 'Change Image Quality' to choose the quality you want. this should significantly make a difference and get your work done faster.

If you have any feedback on it, please leave it in the comments below.

You can download and overinstall the new version at our site here.

The gear icon has a lot of somethings that you might want to check out - there is a 'check for an update', 'Change Language', a 'Help' link that drops down further to 'report a problem' or to read the latest developments on our blog here.

Good Afternoon, Good Luck and stay dry - its pouring cats and dogs here in California.

CrossLoop Screencast - How it Works Video

One of the things being requested from our users is an easy way to understand how to use CrossLoop and interact with it and its features. For example, there is NO limit on the number of files and folders that can be shared between two users and you can do so with drag-and-drop - many do not know about it.

I have created a small screencast that walks one through all of it in detail. It begins with how to download and install the application to sharing files with it.

This should be an excellent tool for all of you who help your family or clients frequently - share this video with them and get on the phone only to help and that should save you a few more minutes since you will not have to walk them through the installation.

If you think there is anything missing, or if you are still facing difficulties, please do let me know

It is hosted on our "Everything CrossLoop" channel so sharing should be a breeze.

Good afternoon, Good Luck and have a fun weekend everyone!

1,2,3 Million Minutes

It does not feel long ago that I blogged about CrossLoop having served a million minutes of screen/desktop sharing here between our users and here we are already with 3 Million minutes!

To give you a snapshot of the usage of CrossLoop by our users which is an excellent testament of our product, here is the growth pattern for CrossLoop's usage:

1 Million Minutes: 132 days
1M - 2M Minutes: 53 days
2M - 3M Minutes: 40 days

3 million minutes is approximately 5.7 years!

We are loving every minute (no pun intended) of our time bringing CrossLoop and enhancing it for you. We genuinely appreciate everyone of you for your use of CrossLoop, for your excellent feedback and support. Please do stay in touch.

Good Afternoon and Good Luck!

CrossLoop Security Details

As we moved on with the launch of our product and continue working on it, a core value of this company is to listen and learn. We work hard to do so all the time.

We had a few people write in to us to learn more about different aspects of CrossLoop's security. These were very good questions so we put all these together and some more on one comprehensive page. Since our business is based on that security and trust, not to mention the significance we give to it between us and you, we thought we should describe it in detail for everyone.

Click here to to get to that page and if you have questions that are not addressed on it - email security@crossloop.com. You will also notice a link to it on the footer of our website.

Do not email me this time since I promise you my little knowledge will not put you at ease.

Thanks to all the users who wrote in to us about it.

Good Evening and Good Luck.

Would you Use CrossLoop Again?

Many of you by now have experienced this simple question we ask at the end of a session with CrossLoop.

If you submit an email with it, you hear from me. Here are some of my observations on those responses and my tips:

• The most frequent is a Yes, Oui, Ja etc. I can now actually say 'Yes' in 4-5 different languages !

• Very often you have left responses with a lot of energy - "Hell Yeah", "Absolutely", "Definitely" or “You Bet”
• Some have been more detailed like
  • "HELL YESSSSS... totally what i was looking for... the future is here... thank you so much for making it accessible free."
  • "Yes. It´s a great product! Thanks a lot! I´ll tell all my friends about it!!"
  • "This was great! I use it to help my mother-in-law format simple word documents. I love it and look forward to using it again. YOU GUYS ARE GREAT!"

• If some of you had difficulties, you let us know
• Very occasionally, if you did not have the optimal experience for some unknown reasons - you have given us a chance to understand and resolve your problem and we really appreciate that and
  
• Some of you have used it effectively to suggest features
  

Please do not hesitate to use it to contact us. If you need help, have suggestions or want to just say Hello to me - please do enter your email so that I can get back to you. I actually actually read and respond to all of them!

Alternatively, if you want to contact us, click on the ‘gear’ on the CrossLoop UI (applicable to the latest version - 1.02) - then click on ‘Help’ and select what you want to do.

You might have in the past or will definitely hear from me right away if you enter your email address - we are very proud of our relationship with all our users.

Good Afternoon and Good Luck!