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Business ecommerce internet mobile apps

Old Websites

Considering Internet detritus of the slash-and-burn order, often the walking-dead creations of fly-by-night “web developers” who took the money (and lots of it) and ran.

Websites. For small businesses. Probably built by someone nice met at a local business networking event.

In Drupal? Joomla? TYPO3? For those without a care in the world, those first two aren’t places (except in web developers’ multi-conversant-code-language-script-caffeine-based frontal lobes), not even in the Hindu Kush. No, these are programming languages often used to build websites. Took that certain ‘someone nice’ years to learn that, and it would have taken many hours to build, let alone discuss wireframes etc., with you, their patient ‘How long is a piece of string?’ client.

What did you pay? £500? £1500? £6000? More !?! Wow! How was the ROI? How much is the SEO still costing you?

Hmmmm…. Guessing that if that was a few years ago, you’d currently have more chance of tracking down a yeti in a blizzard than locating the whereabouts of said web developer, who’s possibly off finding self, tracking yetis in the Himalayas etc. (or perhaps even heading up a super secret division looking into ants at Google HQ!)

Having had to track down (hey, thanks #socmed) and drag one web developer back to his Himalayan base camp, to make contact by satellite phone at an allotted time, and say ‘Just give us the bloody admin password’ so very small but critical changes could be made to a client’s site, I feel for SME owners caught in this trap. He of course wanted us to wait until his return in three months. Client wanted to call Nominet and serve a fortnight’s notice. Compromise met, password released. In that particular case, thin ‘partition walls’ existed between all the small sites he had on the server and with the main admin password I could of course see everything: clearly he’d done quite well and was now spending his earnings travelling. I hear new examples of this every week.

I suspect this is just the tip of the iceberg and that there’s a lot of these about, perhaps enough to one day push Nominet into ringing round asking if you were “mis-sold a website”, which you maybe won’t even own the domain registration of, and hence have not a clue what to do.

Nobody can claim WordPress ($free) is the be-all-and-end-all of web design (sorry Editor Kory!) or replace what a great digital agency can do for £50K, but with the availability of plugins such as WooCommerce ($free) and Information Street’s ‘Connector4 WooCommerce’ ($147) integrating the popular SMB commerce tool InfusionSoft ($pick your pain level) and thus taking the financial sting out of DIY self-build SMB websites, just what will all the newbie web developers cut their teeth on in the future?

Mobile apps for these previously desktop-only greats like WordPress (and all its plugins) and InfusionSoft enable, empower and look very shiny (“Give me that power!”), and they just kill that web developer’s rough version of your site (beautifully coded in C++, for less than a fiver an hour most probably, demo’d and discussed frequently in Nero’s).

Seriously, how long before there is nothing you cannot do on your business’s site/blog/e-commerce backend on your tablet sitting on the beach (except actually see it in direct sunlight)?

Ouch. Poor web developer.

However, it’s ‘out of the pan, and into the fire’, dear Reader. Those web developers; I have a sneaky feeling if they’re not working at $P$R$DigitalMegaBucks$$ design agency, many have gone off to design WordPress themes — and now the 2014 equivalent to the above scenario is discovering they haven’t updated that theme you bought two years ago (and they aren’t going to any time soon either, as it’s snowboarding season!). They just haven’t got the time or incentive to continue to support it, just so it will work with the newly-patched WordPress release for your newly-old website. For example, there’s the Jewelry Shop Theme by Sarah Neuber (see also this if you’re affected!) although I have no idea about Sarah Neuber’s reasons for leaving no forwarding address (it’s probably not yeti related) again you can feel the obvious pain of the SMB owners.

Moral of the story? It’s tempting to reiterate that if you want something done properly then do it yourself, but if your business is actually keeping you busy, you probably don’t have that time. However it’s 2014 and you now have no excuse not to have at least some working knowledge of what to do if that nice web developer checks out of town, and to ask that it’s built entirely upon WordPress in the first place?

Categories
Business mobile apps

Apps and SMBs – a Microsoft experiment with Joshfire

A few weeks ago I wrote a slightly disparaging post in response to a mailshot I had received from Microsoft. The tone of the post was why has Microsoft sent me an email that turned out to disappoint. Had they got their marketing totally wrong?  A business that spends a huge amount of money on marketing?

Later that day I got an email from Ally Wickham at Microsoft. She introduced herself as a Senior Audience Marketing Manager at Microsoft and the orchestrator of the email campaign. I called Ally and we had a good chat about what she had been trying to achieve which was to understand where apps are going in business, particularly small business. I felt this to be an interesting enough and valid subject and offered her the opportunity of writing a guest post. Seemed fair.

Here’s the post:

Categories
Business voip

VoIP for small businesses market seems to be on the move

Trefor Davies thumbnail pictureJust been on my periodic stroll round the business. You know how it goes. Checking up on everyone. Making sure backs are bent, brows sweaty and I can hear the scratching of quill pens telling me they are all scribbling away working hard.

We give some of the staff telephones and computers because some of our customers expect it. These staff are then able to relate to what the customer is talking about and you never know, maybe get the deal. The business needs to move on.

Being serious about it one of the areas that has been a real success and seen real growth of late is in VoIP for small businesses.

Categories
Business internet

BT market research into ICT buying habits of SMBs

I am always happy to hoover up any market research data up for grabs and at yesterday’s ISP Forum  BT analyst John Kiernan presented a summary of a study that BT had conducted into the ICT buying habits of 255 small and medium sized businesses.

The following factors were ranked in order of importance:

  • price is the major factor – no surprise here
  • SMBs then wanted to be able to buy services as part of a bundled package
  • the ICT product or service that they bought needed to last/be future proof but SMBs are prepared to try something new
  • SMBs need strong tech and after sales support
  • being local is not a major consideration – only 22% of those questioned felt this was important

Most SMBs look to the internet and their own existing suppliers to keep up to date with products and services. They have little interest in buying as a result of sales calls.

The last couple of years have been tough for UK SMBs with GDP falling for 6 x quarters in a row. According to JK growth was slow or non existent for most SMBs in 2009 and only slightly better for larger business.

A few other sound bites that were interesting:
Only 60% of SMBs have a website.
Only 14% see competitive advantage from ICT – smaller biz recognises it best

Finally what keeps SMBs awake at night? Finding new customers, leaving the recession behind growing their business, profit and cashflow. I can’t see these factors being specific to SMBs however.

I’ve got the slides if anyone is interested – I’m sure that BT would be happy for me to let you have them.

PS that’s the 20 minute talk distilled into a 20 second read 🙂

Categories
Business internet

Cisco SMB Marketing Day

I went to a Cisco Business Solutions Workshop today. It was aimed at the Small and Medium sized Business market and Cisco were expecting around 400 resellers to be in attendance. Considering the event was held at the Vauxhall Vehicle test track in Millbrook with test drives on offer I think the turnout was quite high.

Cisco certainly know their stuff when it comes to marketing. Much of the event was marketing oriented. The equipment vendor is going after the SMB market in a big way. 2009 is what they call a transition year where they will be getting their product mix right. In 2010 and 2011 they then expect a big push to gain market share.

You have to look at the market numbers to understand why they are doing this. The Cisco share in the Service Provider and Enterprise markets is quite high. However in the SMB space it is a different story

Business size              Global TAM            Cisco Share

<250 pers                   $15.9Bn                 <$300m

<100 pers                   $9.9Bn                   <$100m

The source is Cisco and although the numbers might be broad brush it is easy to see why the company sees the SMB market as a huge opportunity. Next year they are planning to spend $100m on marketing specific to this sector.

This market opportunity also has upsides with sales of additional services such as Webex and video conferencing thrown into the mix.

In fact it seems to me the biggest challenge for many in this industry is how to migrate to a services oriented business model. As a Communications Service Provider Timico is already doing it. However if you earn your living selling and installing hardware your mix is going to have to change.

The cost of hardware solutions is plummeting and it won’t be long before it is thrown in free everytime someone signs up for an installation and ongoing maintenance programme. We were told that the world GDP is in the region of £12Trillion and over the next 5 years 25% of this is going to be based on managed services (Cisco’s numbers not mine).

As the world enters an economic downturn it is worth noting that during past such periods SMBs have been the first to recover and start spending again. I certainly wouldn’t bet against Cisco succeeding in this market.

Categories
Business UC voip

Nortel SMB Certification

I am proud to announce that Timico today gained it’s Nortel SMB certification. Okay okay so what? The point is that Communications Providers and System Integrators selling a manufacturer’s product into traditional Enterprise markets will have a list of certifications as long as your arm. However none of these businesses will particularly be interested in selling into the SMB market (sorry – small and medium sized businesses).

When you have to pay expensive engineering resources to be around to install kit the money in the deal has to be there to make it worth the effort and traditionally this means selling to bigger customers.

The poor old small business, whose market segment incidentally represents the vast majority of the market, has had to exist on an adhoc basis relying on a variety of local small engineering shops to satisfy their miscellaneous technical needs.

It is unusal for a CP to hang its hat on the small business because of the cost of reaching this customer. However the traditional Enterprise equipment vendors are beginning to wake up to the opportunities in this market and I have already commented on the Cisco play via the “Linksys by Cisco” brand.

Clearly Nortel also see the merits of selling to the SMB and this latest award to Timico is a reflection of the understanding that both companies have that a professional approach to these customers is essential. The SMB is now able to source its communications and networking products from a known and trusted entitity that is called Timico.

Categories
Business video voip

Will petrol price itself out of the market?

I had my first £80 tank of petrol today. It seems to me that now is the time to start investing in public transport stocks.

I also has to be time to look at ways that a business can cut down on its travel spending and Unified Communications and online collaboration is the way forward. We recently had an architect approach us for a video conferencing solution so that his business could conduct video conferences with their London office. Historically they took the train and spent the day in the office. Travel time was 2 1/2 hours each way for the two Lincoln based partners. That’s ten man hours (at whatever the going rate is for an architect) plus over two hundred pounds for the trainfare.

The video conferencing solution used was Timico VoIP for Business which cost them £10 a month per site plus a few hundred pounds for high spec telephone handsets. The broadband connectivity was already in place at each end. The service will have paid for itself on it’s first day of use. That’s a serious rate of return. 

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Business UC voip

SMB drivers

I gave a talk at the Linksys by Cisco reseller day yesterday. There was a good turnout despite the torrential rain and the venue, the Williams Formula1 Conference Centre was a top notch attraction. The day went well with ISP KeConnect demonstrating SIP trunks into a Linksys SPA9000.

 

The content of some of the presentations was also very interesting and I wrote down some salient facts.

 

The top three priorities for Small and Medium Sized businesses in the next 12 months are enhancing IT security and privacy 47%, deploying DR solution 40%, enhancing internet access speeds  35%.

 

Laptops represented 47% of all PCs shipped in 2006, up from 35% in 2004 and there is a 14-15% annual growth in handheld/PDA shipments. 14% of Small Businesses offer telecommuting and over 50% SMBs have mobile staff

 

Group calendaring the norm in MB, growing in SB. Web conferencing, Intranets the norm, IP voice and applications connect growing in MB with growth in business utility of IM and soft phones.

 

SBs are rapidly transitioning to broadband (60%) and the desire to upgrade bandwidth is universally strong. Strong growth in WiFi, acute sensitivity to security and data protection, a strong desire to connect multiple sites and SaaS, virtualization adoption were also key forces.

 

Finally all this indicates that on-premises IT complexity is increasing and managed/hosted services are becoming more viable. There is also an increasing preference for “better” channel partners and SMBs are reassessing their choice of “trusted partner”.

 

This world is full of opportunity…

me holding the constructors\' trophy next to a Williams F1 carMe with constructors’ trophy next to Williams F1 car

Categories
Business UC voip

Cisco SMB day, generation Y and Unified Communications

Very interesting time at the Cisco SMB day held at the Mercedes Motor Museum in Brooklands.

Bernadette Wightman, SMB Operations Director said Cisco are expecting SMBs to be worth $1Bn to them in 2009 and today’s channel event is their first big push towards getting there. The gradual migration of the Linksys brand to Cisco is also an indicator. Cisco have traditionally been too expensive a solution for the SME market and it will be interesting to see how this changes.

Unified Communications and Web2.0 was a big part of their messaging with a big focus on the change in demographics about to hit business.

The biggest users of Web2.0 are those consumers of social networking sites belonging to generation Y. In other words those born after 1980. Currently the decision makers belong to generation X, those fortunate enough to have been born on or after 1964. As someone who came into this world in 1961 I must therefore fall into “generation W” which is somewhat disconcerting.

The point it that the biggest users of Web2.0 will within 4 years represent 20 million of the workforce in the UK. As the SMB sector (under 250 employees) represents 62% of the UK workforce Web2.0 technology will have to be to be an important part of the product offering of vendors in the communications space.

The second keynote was by Anthony Hilton, Financial journalist and former Managing Director of the London Evening Standard. He suggested that whilst some market sectors such as banking and house building were being hit hard during the current financial uncertainties, other parts of the financial services sectors such as insurance and savings were doing well as consumers stopped borrowing and started saving their money.

I asked him how he saw the technology markets being affected compared with the last post 9/11 and dot com bubble bursting recession. He expects that the current financial crisis will drive business towards adopting Unified Communications products that will save them money and improve productivity. However the likelihood is that these products will be based on fairly mature technology that has been around and in use for the last five years.

Much of what is being discussed as being targeted for business is still some way off being a production item. This is despite the fact that Web2.0 in theory allows for rapid introduction of new features and products. Witness the statement that 5,000 Facebook applications were built by 90,000 developers in 7 weeks.

On display was a mockup of Webex Connect, the next gen Web2.0 offering from the hosted provider. Webex’ biggest take up has been in the SMB space but what we saw, which was a convergence of much of what is Web2.0 was not slated for production until 2010. Look out for “dusting” which is where content on the screen of your mobile device is waved or “brushed” onto your desktop when you arrive at the office.

I can’t help but think that one day these elongated product development cycles will be a thing of the past. In fact I can see the day where companies are unable to come up with product roadmaps beyond 6 months because the pace of development will be so fast that no-one will be able so see further out than that.

That being said Cisco is making all the right noise in this space and is clearly putting its money where its mouth is. One of its biggest challenges will be to recruit a channel that faces SMB customers where traditionally its big partners have gone after big Enterprise money. This fact will potentially easy open the door for new entrants into the Cisco reseller space as there is less likely to be competition from the incumbents.