Shockey Monkey certainly brings up a lot of questions. We encourage you to check out the most frequent answers and if you don't find the answer you are looking for, feel free to contact us!
Business
- Is it really free?
- Yes. Absolutely. Completely. Totally.
Now there is no such thing as a free lunch. Just because you are not paying for the service, hosting, power, development and so on doesn't mean that someone else isn't willing to pay to display a message to you. To put it bluntly, Shockey Monkey is advertiser sponsored. We can display banner ads, videos or even survey questions to Shockey Monkey admin/staff users (never to your clients) and still keep the system free for you. We also have a Pro version of Shockey Monkey that is free of ads and supports further development of the platform. - So.. how do you make money?
- The free version is supported by advertisers. The Pro version is financed through Pro subscription fees. Service Manager enables software and hardware vendors to help you offer their solutions to your clients through your portal.
The rest is our gift to the community. - Who owns the data?
- You do. Shockey Monkey software is property of Shockey Monkey, Inc. The data stored in it (support tickets, images, attachments, survey data) is your property and can be exported as an open and documented XML export. You should back up your data often.
- What happens if I want to leave Shockey Monkey?
- Just back up your data and don't login to the portal. The portal will expire automatically when it's not in use (when you don't login to it for a month).
- How do I migrate from Shockey Monkey to my new PSA?
- If you are moving to Autotask (www.autotask.com) we have a simple one-button upgrade process. Just enter your Autotask login, password and server location (USA, Global, etc) and we will upload your client and support data to your Autotask portal. At that point your clients will be automatically redirected to your Autotask login page and only the Service Manager tab will remain available in Shockey Monkey as everything else will be now done in a full featured Autotask portal. All of this is absolutely free, in both free and Pro editions. The service management and reporting is absolutely free with Autotask, so you will not need expensive addons or components to continue managing your MSP services procured through Shockey Monkey.
If you are moving to an unsupported PSA or CRM platform, contact the provider and give them access to your data backup from Shockey Monkey. It is fully documented and the XML data stream is very clear. We suggest you contact them first and find out if this is something they will support and get a clear idea of the fees you will incur. - How long does it take to get started?
- Less than a minute if you type fast. Then about 60 minutes for the onboarding video that will take you through every feature and design idea behind Shockey Monkey.
- Is training required to fully integrate this with my business?
- Not really, anyone can figure out Shockey Monkey. However, we do recommend watching at least the Shockey Monkey onboarding video to get you started.
- Can I upload my current clients into it or do I have to enter them in manually?
- In the free edition, you will have to type it in. In the pro edition, this will be an automated CSV import in September 2010.
Security
- Will you sell my information?
- No. We have a strict privacy policy. Advertising display is completely anonymous and client data is not subject to sale.
- Is it secure?
- Certainly. Shockey Monkey is written on top of the industry standard LAMP which powers nearly all the new Web 2.0 companies like Digg, Facebook, Twitter and so on. The only way to access Shockey Monkey is through the 128bit SSL encrypted connection. From there, each access is audited and logged (there are no "trusted" unauthenticated portions of Shockey Monkey).
- Where is it hosted?
- Shockey Monkey is currently available from Own Web Now Corp's data centers in Dallas, TX. The same network is the home of the Own Web Now Corp NOC and ExchangeDefender.
- What does the infrastructure look like?
- Shockey Monkey is developed on Linux, Apache, PHP and MySQL (LAMP) and hosted on Dell hardware. We use a mixture of Dell PowerEdge and SuperMicro servers, SAS (15K RPM) storage and have a distributed cluster for serving web pages, database queries, database searches and inserts, long term audit log storage, etc.
- What if I uploaded a PHP or ASP script?
- We do not allow uploads of PHP or ASP code to our servers.
- How secure is the authentication process?
- The authentication process is handled over 128bit encrypted SSL connection, which is the same level of security used in ecommerce. The password and username combination is then passed through to the login mechanism which verifies your role, permissions and access levels.
General
- Can I have a free trial of the Pro version?
- Unfortunately, Pro is currently only available as a paid offering. However, you are welcome to try out the free version and see if it fits your needs. We're confident that if you don't like the free version, the Pro will not make much difference.
- Will the free version not be free anymore one day?
- We are committed to the long term viability of the free version. It is a core of our offering and we have no intention of ever charging for Shockey Monkey.
- How does this compare with the Autotask, ConnectWise, etc
- To be honest, it's not even close. Mature PSA solutions are flexible, customizable, offer variety of deployment methods and have a very sophisticated ERP, CRM, billing and sales management process. If your business is at that level, please contact the providers and don't even look at Shockey Monkey - it's not for you.
We designed Shockey Monkey from the ground up to be simple. As veterans of the software business we had to take a hard look at the mirror and see what kind of software we were developing - selling features, selling enterprise quality and support. We simply could not write such a solution and make it available for free. Over the past few years the Web 2.0 has caught a lot of hype and popularity because it focused on the users, not the system and the IT. We wanted to create an environment that was easy to use, easy to configure and start managing right away. We also spent a significant amount of time to make it easy for you to upgrade to the professional services automation platform and currently have Autotask ready to go. We also created an XML export so you can integrate it into any other solution that supports XML import and data mapping.
Questions?
Please contact us and we'll do our best to follow up with a response and answer it on this page as well!