GrandCentral.com is a phone project brought to you by Google… free of charge.

My GrandCentral.com phone number is: 501-859-6035. You can call me now or you can even click the “call me” link on my page.

I’ve recently started using it and I’m really impressed. It make screening phone calls (something I do a lot) easier. Here’s the short version… Once you sign up, GrandCentral.com assigns you a phone number. When someone calls your phone number it immediately asks you who you are and why you’re calling… it then starts ringing… you can play any ring back… it also gives you a list of funny ring back options.

I told GrandCentral.com my “real” number and GrandCentral.com then calls my cell phone when I get a phone call from 501-859-6035… I pick it up and it says “X is calling.” I then have the option to answer it by pressing “1″, ignore it by pressing “4.” If I press “4″ to ignore, I can listen to the message that they leave… if I feel like answering while they’re talking, I can press “*” to pickup immediately… while they’re leaving a message! I can see a list of calls that I recieved on any day… and

It records the conversations and allows online access to voice mail. I can change my “real” cell phone at any time and just redirect where GrandCentral.com calls me from… I can switch phones while I’m on a call… I can immediately block unwanted calls (telemarketers hear a “disconnected” ring)…

Its pretty cool and worth taking a look at… if you’re interested, call me and ask me for a private beta invitation (I have a few left).

PS… I think this will be heavily used with the Google Phone. As a matter of fact, my prediction is that it won’t be network specific (like the iPhone, which only works with AT&T)… it will work across any network because the features are independent of the network you’re on…

      

Okay… here is a free business idea.

I want a recruiting system, that allows potential employees to submit their resume, allows our guys to sort through those resumes, search the resumes and store the resumes. Thats it… really simple… I want it to look good and run fast.

We have a recruiting system now but I’m not really happy with it. Its slow, complicated and not user friendly.

The Free Idea (lets call it XYZ.com)

What would be really nice is if XYZ.com was a job web application like monster.com. But, XYZ.com created an API which my web site could use to allow John Doe to submit a resume for my position. Then, using their API, I could view, search, and store any resume submitted through my web site.

When John Doe submitted his resume, although he sent it to my company, it was actually stored at XYZ.com. XYZ.com, as a service, offers companies the ability to search through the “global resume database” for a small fee.

After John Doe submits his resume to my company, he can now easily submit his resume to other companies that use XYZ.com.

The Revenue Model
XYZ.com is basically a monster.com… it gains revenue by companies paying them money to search through resumes and post jobs.

What Makes XYZ.com Different
What makes XYZ.com different is their ability to obtain a vast number of applicants… its viral marketing… its distributed networking… its pushing “the work” onto other people.

The application is given away but the data is saved. It is inherently integrated into a business with no need to change the way business is done. People and businesses hate change… the requires NO CHANGE.

Conclusion
Do you like the idea? Good… me too… As a business owner, I would use it because it would allow me a cheap way to obtain a recruiting system… I’d be your first customer

If you like it enough, higher iProv to write the software.

Or email me and lets do it together as a joint venture

Call me, we’ll do the development

      

One of my non-techy friends introduced me to something pretty cool a few months ago.

Did you know that you can send a text message to Google at 46645 (which spells “googl”) and it will return to you a list of things….

the main thing I use it for is when I’m looking for a phone number. I can text “Pizza, 72211″ and Google will instantly reply with the phone number and address to pizza places near 72211. Alternatively, I text “Pizza Hut, 72211″ I will receive the phone number and address of the pizza hut.

This is a broader search and returns more information than the traditionall “*411″… and it’s cheaper! It only costs you a text message.

For more information, check out Google’s SMS help page.