October 2007 - Posts

• The Open Social Initiative -- Google's Face-Job on FaceBook

  Google announced today it's Open Social Initiative a set of common application programming interfaces (APIs) that will enable developers to create a single application that will work with multiple social networking sites provided that the site accepts the OpenSocial code. Currently, developers have to write new programs for each new site, even if the functionality of the app will be the same on each site.   Google said, “this initiative marks the first time that multiple social networks have been made accessible under a common API," and shows how Google is attempting to do a face-job on facebook by being more open, and inherently more attractive to developers.   The question, of course, is how quickly will the Open Social initiative be adopted and by whom? For starters, participants will include Orkut, LinkedIn, hi5, iLike, Slide, Ning, Friendster, and Plaxo. Not surprisingly, Facebook, which recently reportedly chose Microsoft over Google for an exclusive ad and investment deal, will not accept apps written using the Open Social APIs.   As far as “standards-style” initiatives go -- I think this one is potentially huge – - and it's further proof of two things:   1. the web really is the platform 2. connecting “loosely coupled” dots on the social grid is, and will continue to be, the future of software Finally, with all things software, I think it is critical that we put ourselves in the shoes of the small business customer. In that sense, I would be absolutely thrilled if someone provided me with a "master profile" on the web that could magically syndicate and feed my content out to any number of relevant sites on the social grid. That would be powerful. For that reason alone, I hope Google's Open Social initiative takes off like a rocket – and I hope Facebook will join in. Posted Wednesday, October 31, 2007 8:03 AM from Matt Howard | 0 Comments

• Are you a small business looking to grow faster? Pay close attention to BT Tradespace

  Telecom and Software Consultant Ovum published this research note today regarding the launch of Small Business Week 2007 -- an event promoting the 4 million plus small businesses in the UK that account for 47% of the UK's private sector workforce and contribute £967 billion to the economy.   Not surprisingly, these are big numbers.  But, it’s damn hard running a small business.  Imagine how big these numbers would be if SMBs had access to affordable and easy to use software tools to help them grow?   That’s exactly what Bill Murphy, head of BT Business is thinking about.  Murphy commented, “that while the industrial revolution may have killed the cottage economy, the broadband networking revolution has brought it roaring back.”   Murphy pointed to BT’s recently launched Tradespace service as an example of offerings designed specifically to cultivate small business growth and communities.   The simple and powerful premise for BT Tradespace is that “offline sales are driven by online search”.  Consider the following:   ·  63% of purchases resulting from online searches occur offline (Comscore, March, 2006) ·  The Internet will influence nearly half of all retail sales in 2010 (Jupiter) ·  58% of people said they locate items online before going to store to purchase (K group)   Therefore, if you own a small business – and people can’t find you when searching online, then they will not buy your stuff offline.   Unfortunately, like 15 million other small businesses, you’re not and IT expert and the thought of building and maintaining an online marketing system seems daunting – not to mention expensive.   What you need is a simple and affordable way to promote your business on the web so you can attract more customers, sell more things, and manage important business relationships -- with no IT expertise required.   Bill Murphy and Bt Tradespace are focused on meeting your needs.  See for yourself.  Signup here for your free Tradespace site. Posted Tuesday, October 30, 2007 8:09 AM from Matt Howard | 0 Comments

• What's in the box? Surprise! It's SaaS for Small Business Customers

  Allow me to offer a premise:  The SMB market for software is classically underserved and is absolutely enormous with tens of millions of customers up for grabs.   Allow me to offer another one:  The vast majority of SMBs have limited or non-existent IT resources and are inherently late adopters of innovative software technologies.   If the premises are true, then the question is begged:  How can providers of software-as-a-service (SaaS) dramatically shorten the adoption curve and motivate millions of SMBs to adopt new technologies sooner?   The answer, my friends, is not “blowing in the wind” -- rather it resides with young and nimble SaaS providers capable of engaging and executing innovative channel distribution strategies.   Companies such as EchoSign, which has announced plans to embed their web based contract execution and management service within H&R Block’s 2008 version of Home & Business Attorney.  Now, almost any of the hundreds of business forms can be electronically or fax signed in seconds via EchoSign – with signed copies automatically stored online to find and use later.   Others such as Be Professional in the UK have taken equally innovative steps by partnering with Peter Jones, one of the UK’s leading entrepreneurs and star of the hit BBC television series “Dragons’ Den,” to launch a online suite of SaaS business tools which will be available exclusively in all branches of PC World, the UK’s leading chain of computing retail superstores.   And my company, SMBLive, which has found initial success by partnering with incumbent telecom providers such as British Telecom to distribute innovative SaaS solutions which dramatically increase the value of “broadband lines” and “directory listings” by merging them into a modern marketing platform for SMBs.   It’s still early, and it will definitely take some time – but companies such as EchoSign, Be Professional, and SMBLive are aggressively pushing the edge of the SaaS distribution envelope – which is fundamentally creating new and different ways for SMB to adopt SaaS sooner. Posted Monday, October 29, 2007 5:13 PM from Matt Howard | 0 Comments

• The Micirosoft Identity: Unified Communications

  In what may be the world's worst kept secret Microsoft announced today they would like to own the emerging market for Unified Communciations. According to this article in the Wall Street Journal the evolution of Internet technologies is opening an opportunity for companies such as Microsoft to create a variety of server and desktop software products that are capable of handling voice calls via the internet. In classic Microsoft-form, they are planning to leverage their massive balance sheet to fund an all out attack to eliminate PBX's from the face of the planet -- but before they strike -- they have been kind enough to offer a partnering program (terms of surrender) to legacy equipment providers such as Ericsson, Mitel, and Nortel. Now I don't think that PBXs will disappear over night -- but the impact will be felt very quickly.  According to Jeff Raikes a corporate customer with an Enterprise Agrement (EA) will pay approximately $55 per PC to add voice capabilities.  It's likely that many large enterprises with will test V1 of OCS and then deploy fully at V2 or V3 once reliability and scalability have been proven.  I think the combination of Microsoft and Cisco together waging an onslaught means that PBXs will become PBX-tinct in just a few short years. So here is the multi-billion dollar question... "How does all of this fit together with Microsoft's bigger SaaS strategy of Software + Services?" I am not entirely sure -- but I can easily imagine that Microsoft will soon be in the business of reselling carrier bandwidth services into large corporate accounts.  Do you want fench fries with that??? Note to Verizon and AT&T -- be careful when competing to win the inevitable wholesale contract from Microsoft -- you might just get it.   Posted Tuesday, October 16, 2007 9:18 PM from Matt Howard | 1 Comments

• Microsoft OfficeLive Workspace -- Time is on Their Side (at least for now)

  This past Monday Microsoft announced a free service offering called Office Live Workspaces.  The product allows you to access and share documents online and is quite similar to existing offerings such as BT Workspace and Basecamp. It's interesting, but not surprising, that the free service is being billed as "the online companion" to the $500 Microsoft Office suite.  Ever since Microsoft first announced the OfficeLive brand they have struggled a bit to explain the subtleties and clarify how it all relates to the $14 billion desktop productivity franchise (.doc .ppt. xls.) From my perspective, the top level SaaS message is now much tighter.  Specifically, I think Microsoft has done a great job of hammering home the "software-plus-services" message as the official "call to arms" for a slow, careful, transition from a legacy business based on "one time licensing revenues" to a future business based on "recurring subscription revenues". Undoubtedly, this is a huge "innovators dilemma" for the folks in Redmond -- the hardest part of which is figuring out what pieces of the legacy business are expendable first -- and what pieces of the legacy business must be protected for as long as possible. It 's interesting to read between the lines of the OfficeLive Workspace announcement because I think there are some clues which suggest that Outlook is more expendable than the rest of the Office suite.  Consider this,  Eric Gilmore, a Microsoft senior product manager for Microsoft Office said "People are e-mailing documents all the time which is an inefficient way to do things when you want to work together."  I personally believe that Eric is 100% correct.  Email is simply not an effective place for small group collaboration. Therefore, the question is how should people work together?  The answer, of course, depends on who you ask.  Google, IBM, ZoHo and others have their opinion.  But, at least according to Microsoft, people should author documents in Word, Powerpoint, and Excel (and pay $500 for the privilege) -- and then share documents via "free web services" with teams of people. It all makes perfect sense and is well aligned with Microsoft's long, slow, careful transition from  "licensing revenue" to "services revenue".  I think time is on their side -- at least for now. Posted Friday, October 05, 2007 2:59 PM from Matt Howard | 0 Comments