Control your own backups of Basecamp with LifestreamBackup

At 37signals, security is a top priority. All data is backed up daily, written to multiple disks instantly, and stored in multiple locations. You could say our backups have backups.

But if you want an additional insurance policy, you may want to consider LifestreamBackup. It's a service that can backup online accounts at a variety of services, now including Basecamp.

Backing up your lifesteam is easy. Just enter your login credentials for each service you want to back up, and set your backup preferences. We take it from there. and you will get regular emails confirming your backups are completed.

Learn more.

Web Worker Daily: A daily checklist in Backpack helps with marketing efforts

Tools and Techniques for Better Lead Generation [Web Worker Daily] argues that maintaining a consistent effort is key to marketing. The author says you need a reliable system so you can see exactly what you’ve done and when, as well as what’s left to be done — and Backpack is a great tool for this:

I have a page set up for each day of the workweek, and I evenly distribute the action tasks for all of my marketing tactics throughout the week.

On a given day, I simply click on that day’s page and get to work on the tasks, which are within a handy checklist (see image above along the left).

As I complete the items, I check them off. My goal is to get through the entire list on any given day. If I don’t get through the list for some reason, my rule is to get through all of the week’s tasks before the following Monday. This provides me with a little flexibility without letting me completely off the hook or allowing me to get too lax with my efforts (thus, adding consistency).

Each Monday, I un-check all the lists on every page, which helps me to stay accountable to my plans and goals for my business. I can clearly see what got done and what did not get done over the previous week. After un-checking the items, I’m ready to begin another week.

Campfire and Basecamp make ReadWriteEnterprise's list of "The Four Essential Apps for Distributed Teams"

ReadWriteEnterprise recently published "The Four Essential Apps for Distributed Teams." It's a list of the four types of applications you'll need for groups who work from geographically separate locations — and some examples of the popular places to get them.

One type of tool you'll need according to RWE: IM & Chat. And Campfire "can't be beat."

Group chat is slightly less common a need than IM, and is less useful for informal access in your daily workflows. But for certain use cases, only group chat will do. Skype and Campfire from 37Signals can't be beat from our perspective...

Another recommended type of tool: Task Tracking. Basecamp makes that list.

By task tracking, we mean any tool that exists to keep track of the group's work. These can be issue trackers like JIRA, Trac, or Redmine. For those less-development oriented, it might be something tailored only to project management, like Basecamp, LiquidPlanner, or the offerings from Microsoft and Oracle.

Read the full article.

FormSpring: Capture new contacts & leads in Highrise with a web form on your company site.

Highrise contact management just got easier with FormSpring web forms. Customer information collected with a FormSpring web form moves automatically into your Highrise contact database.

Here’s a quick video demo on how FormSpring works with Highrise:

Reduce the time you spend on online lead generation and contact management. The FormSpring-Highrise Integration allows you to:

• Automatically add a Highrise contact with each form submission
• Attach follow-up tasks to each contact
• Add one or more tags to contacts
• Update existing contacts with new submitted information

Learn more about FormSpring

Logbook: Post Backpack Journal updates in seconds without ever opening your browser

Logbook lets you post your status and log your work on your Backpack Journal right from your Mac.

It’s called Logbook, and it makes updating your Backpack® Journal a breeze. For a while now, we've been using Backpack® Journal to keep our team connected and we absolutely love it. Lately, though, we've been getting sick and tired of having to repeatedly open the browser to post quick status updates or completed tasks (not to mention the fact that we often forget to post anything at all). Logbook is a lightweight menubar app that enables any Backpack® user to post Journal status updates and tasks in seconds without ever opening your browser.

Try Logbook or learn more about the Backpack Journal.

New in Highrise: Improved tags list

We just improved the way tags are listed in Highrise. Tags are a really useful way to organize and group contacts together. In the past, the tags list was a bit hard to read because all the tags were listed one after another in paragraph form. Today we released a redesigned tag list that is much easier to read. Now the tags are grouped alphabetically by the first letter, so you can quickly scan the list and find the tag you want. It's a great improvement.

The old design ran all the tags together in one block. It was a bit hard to read:

The new design groups your tags by letter of the alphabet. The list is broken into groups so you can scan it more easily and find the tag you need more quickly. Here is a look at the redesigned tags list:

Click the "Contacts" or "Tags" tab to see the new tags list. We think this improvement makes tags an even better way to organize your contacts in Highrise and we hope you enjoy it. Thanks for using Highrise!

Get real-time Basecamp project reporting from the iPhone

Rasmus Aaen Madsen of youcalc, provider of on-demand analytics, writes:

We took a couple of our most popular reporting apps for Basecamp and created new editions that run smoothly in the iPhone Safari browser.

This means that Basecamp users can run live project reports from their iPhone – nice if you’re on the road and need to check up on your projects.

Activity report
Generates a list of the latest activities on your projects. Lets you filter the list by activity type (todo completed, todo added, milestone completed, milestone added) to easily track the most important activities. Hit this URL from your iPhone Safari browser.

Milestones Overview
Visualizes milestones progress for each of your projects. Progress is measured as number of to-dos open vs. done on each milestone. Lets you compare progress on different milestones. Hit this URL from your iPhone Safari browser.

We also launched some iPhone optimized reports for Highrise – hit these URLs from your iPhone Safari browser and you have real-time mobile reporting on Highrise data:
- Sales and Pipeline Overview
- Deals value per person
- Deals Distribution Analyzer
- Cases analyzer

We expect to create more iPhone optimized apps soon.

New in Basecamp: Enhanced private messages, to-do lists, and files

We're excited to announce a batch of improvements to private messages, to-do lists, and files in Basecamp. Now it is more clear when you've made an item private and easier than ever to see who can view it. We know private items are important so it's vital that you get clear visual feedback when you mark something "private". When creating a message, a to-do list, or uploading a file, clicking the private checkbox will turn the entire message form light red.

Here is a message that has been marked private. The message box has turned light red and the only parties who will be able to view it are listed:

Once saved, the private flag that appears next to private messages, to-do lists, and files now shows you exactly who can view the item when you place your mouse over it.

Pro tip: You may have noticed that more than one company can view the private message in the example above. The default is to share private items only with your company but did you know that you can choose additional companies to see your private messages? This is great for collaborating with a sub-contractor or partner company on a client project. To allow another company to see private messages, visit the "All people" tab from Basecamp's dashboard and edit the company. Click the checkbox shown below to let that company see your private messages.

We hope you like the ways we've improved handing of private messages, to-do lists and files. Thanks for using Basecamp!

Steve Rubel discusses workstreaming with the Backpack Journal

Steve Rubel is SVP, Director of Insights for Edelman Digital, a division of Edelman - the world's largest independent PR firm. He recently posted: "Workstreaming in 140 Characters with Backpack."

Nowadays, status update boxes are everywhere: LinkedIn, Twitter, Friendfeed, Yammer, AIM, GTalk, Facebook and more. The stream is becoming a de facto way that we communicate with others. However, thinking in 140 characters is also changing how I work. I am now using status updates to workstream.

I have dusted off using Backpack as a tool for managing my life. It's improved a lot since I last used it a few years ago. One of their recent additions is the Backpack Journal, which I love. I can update it throughout the day to capture a running log of what I worked on, when. Right now this is just for my own use but Backpack works great in teams as well. Above is a screenshot from my Journal this am. I also update it from my iPhone using an app called Satchel and on the desktop use text expansion software to enter items more quickly. I use codes and phrases to track my time which I refer to when I enter my time reports.

Learn more about workstreaming (i.e. the publishing of work-related activities and events to your remote colleagues, usually via RSS but sometimes in other formats and ways).

"Backpack is a great way to keep all your wedding planning in one place"

69 Amazing Resources to Help You Plan Your Dream Wedding includes a link to Backpack:

Backpack — While it’s not limited just to weddings, 37signals’ Backpack is a great way to keep all your wedding planning in one place, accessible from anywhere there’s an Internet connection.

Related Product Blog posts:
Two examples of using Backpack to plan a wedding
"Backpack is awesome for wedding planning"
Using Backpack to plan a wedding