business

Product: Build vs Buy?

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Whether you are bootstrapped, just getting started, or established, the decision to decide whether to try to build a feature/function yourself, or integrating something existing can be quite difficult. There are opportunity costs for either direction you take. It’s good to grow your product quickly, but you’re still limited by the resources provided to you.  No doubt, there are great tools out there you can use to quickly enhance your product.  But are they good enough for what you want to accomplish, and will it fit in with exactly what you need?  Here are a few pros and cons I suggest to consider:

Build It Buy It
Slow to deploy Quick to deploy
Flexibility of features Limitations of features
Unproven functionality Proven functionality
More developer hours Less developer hours
Flexibility of design Limited design
Opportunity cost Possible high dollar cost
Ability to iterate Limited ability to iterate
Ease of a MVP Challenging MVP. Sometimes all or nothing
Downtime at helm of developers Downtime at helm of vendor
Ability to enhance features easily Feature enhancements limited by vendor’s development pace
Agile Waterfall

 

Google Glass and My Thoughts

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I admit it, I was skeptical about Google Glass. I didn’t understanding it and but had a hunch of what the goal of the product was. I was immediately reminded of an episode of NOVA or some other science show I saw on PBS as a teenager about some students at MIT developing a wearable computer. The unique part of this wearable computer (which probably was powered by a 75 pound 486 with a turbo button) was that it had a camera you would wear on your head. What it was able to do is capture your day’s activities, point out names of individuals as they walked by so you didn’t forget their name, and several other interesting things. Neat.

Fast forward to present day. Google Glass comes into our lives (beta) and the nerds rushed to it. People paid the $1500 to be one of the first. Apps were developed. People became concerned about privacy. Users became labeled as dorks for wearing them. All the things you would expect to hear from consumers and critics around the globe. I fell in the bucket of those who thought Google Glass was rude to wear around friends and family, and possibly an invasion of privacy. How do I know you are paying attention to me when I talk to you? Are you recording something you shouldn’t?

However, I do believe it has a place in the workplace. Having tried them on once, you can’t help but feel a bit Universal Soldier and Terminator like. In the work place, and I’m not talking about your white collared desk job, I see a lot of benefits for the field workers.

Those men and women who make sure your phone lines don’t go out in a storm. Those folks who come to repair your fridge so that your salted caramel ice cream doesn’t melt. The proud men and women who serve and protect your community. The Google Glass can be for you. When the repairman comes to your house to fix that fridge, he can have all the instructions and data available right in the Glass on how to fix it. Sure, he’s knowledgable, but come across something he’s not familiar with, he/she can be guided step by step with an app, possibly even guided by a human being from the manufacturer in real time. Keep their hands free and keep them connected without looking away.

I for one would like to see this adopted this way. Let’s build some great apps for the Glass and put it in front of the field workers.

Great Customer Service… a Dying Act?

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It’s been a whirlwind the last few months.  New job, new hobbies, less time. I figure I write something about a good experience I recently had. I was in the market for a new pair of gloves for go kart racing.  A comfortable pair is very important to me.  Any pair of any type of gloves just won’t cut it.  Sorry, no garden gloves for me. Having something comfortable that fits my needs and purpose made lessens the distractions while on the track.  Few key things that I look for in its comfort is are:

  • Does it fit well?
  • Do the finger tips dig into your finger nails?
  • Are they too tight? Too loose?
  • Easy to put on and remove?
  • Provide good grip on all steering wheel materials?

After digging through several different brands and styles, I chose a pair of Alpinestars Tech 1-K Race Gloves.  They easily met all my needs and the price point was right. Immediately used them at the next event I was able to attend and couldn’t be happier. Fast forward a few months later, the gloves had only around 40 minutes of total use.  I got a call from some friends to do a indoor go kart race at a local indoor track.  A 3 hour endurance race in teams of 3.  Couldn’t turn it down so I committed and participated.  After a rigorous drive and a good finish, I noticed something dangling on from my gloves.  The tacky material on the palms of my rather new gloves had come off.  I couldn’t believe it since they were still quite new.

I call up Alpinestars customer service the next day.  My expectation was that I would get your typical run around and investigation needed into how I used my gloves before they could do anything about it.  Not so.  4 minutes into the call, I was speaking with a rep and an RMA number + shipping instructions was immediately given to me.  The following day, they were in a bag on its way to Southern California.  Once again, I expected this to take several weeks to process before I hear anything back.  I was wrong.

Three days later, a kind gentleman rang my phone, notifying me that they have received my damaged gloves.  To make the story short, they did not have any Tech 1-K gloves in stock and apologized for the inconvenience.  To make things right, they decided to send me a brand new pair of a Tech 1-ZX Gloves as a replacement instead so that I do not have to wait for the same model to come in stock.  I couldn’t be happier.  Within 10 days, I had a new pair of gloves sent back to me, minimal questions asked.

So the answer is simply, no.  Good customer service is definitely not going away. We always hear the horror stories from your friends and family about how they were on hold for 30 minutes, got the run around, and nothing was actually solved.  There are companies out there that provide this great service, and it does show that these companies do care about their customers.  Alpinestars gave me that service level I didn’t expect, and only hoped for.  No doubt that this will make me a repeat customer.

B2B Software Companies can Learn from In-N-Out Burger

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Two guys walk into a Cheesecake Factory.  They sit down and are presented with what looks to be an instruction manual for an Ikea entertainment unit.  Pages and pages of choices (and advertisements) from appetizers, pastas, samplers, main courses, steaks, burgers, veggies, fish, wine list, beer list, cocktail list and of course, 2 pages of cheesecake variations.  How do these friends narrow down to what they want?  They want to share an appetizer, so they pick through the 30+ choices.  George likes lettuce wraps, but Peter doesn’t care for the water chestnuts.  Peter recommends the buffalo wings, but George doesn’t do spicy food.  Time to compromise.  The waiter arrives, they order the appetizer, the sampler.  This fits both their taste as it has a little bit of everything they enjoy.

The evening resumes, and they continue to look through the bible of offerings and can’t decide on their main courses.  Club sandwich or big salad?  Steak or Halibut?  Ughhh…  Offering customers literally hundreds of choices to choose from does not mean they will be satisfied with the options.  They will spend more time figuring out what works, and satisfies a craving, where as another choice may satisfy another craving.  Surely, ordering both won’t be an option.

What does all this have to do with B2B software companies?  What happens when George and Peter go to an In-N-Out Burger?  They are presented with a much simpler menu.  Hamburger or Cheeseburger?  (OK, yes, I know there is a Double Double, but that’s just a Cheeseburger with 2 patties).  The answer to ordering French Fries is just ‘yes’ or ‘no’.  There are no sizes.  Order a drink.  Small, Medium, Large or a Shake.  It’s as simple as that.

So, put yourself in the customer’s position.  You are looking for a new enterprise software solution to replace your existing 25 year old DOS based setup.  You have identified your requirements and begin your search for a vendor.  Several options come up and you find one company that might be a good fit.  When looking at their product offerings, you find several different versions.  Small Business, Mid Market, Enterprise, Retail, Mega, Mid Upper Market, Super Enterprise, Medium Business, Express, Lite, Purple, Green, Yellow, Black, Gold…. the list goes for days.  This shouldn’t be that hard, right?  You have your requirements, and you start to compare it with the suite of products this company has.  Nothing seems to fit.  If it has the requirements, it’s too expensive.  If it’s the right price, it doesn’t meet the requirements.  Is your company a Mid Market?  Just because you have 500 employees, doesn’t meet the Mid Market offering will fit the bill.  Do you now look at Enterprise?  Green? Mid-Upper?

Giving the customers fewer options would simplify this process for them.  They are less confused and can select an offering that would just meet their needs at a reasonable price.  The customers may not immediately know exactly what they are looking for, but offering them more options is not the solution.  When they grow and there are more features required, they can upgrade to the next level.  Seat level restrictions need not apply.  Surely, there will be some cases when ordering a simple Cheeseburger may not fit your needs just right.  That’s when you ask about the secret menu and order it Animal Style.  But if no product line is a perfect fit, then maybe they need to look elsewhere.

Bottom line, a B2B Software won’t be able to meet all of a customer’s needs.  The customer will eventually find the right product with the right fit.  The software vendor won’t need to worry about granular customizations to close the deal, and accept the loss.  These aren’t the droids your looking for.  Move along.   Focus on perfecting the product.  You can’t order bacon and avocados at In-N-Out, there’s a reason for that.

 

Loving Music Again

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Actually, I was going to title this post as “I Invented Spotify!” or “Spotify Stalked Me in High School and Stole My Idea!” , but I didn’t. Back in the early 90’s we used to make “mix tapes” with our favorite songs and swap them around.  And when I say mix tapes, I do mean cassette tapes.  For my younger audience, they are these .  Eventually, we morphed into CD’s.  Now, that was nothing new.  People made mix tapes all the time and shared them with friends.  But what I did was something a bit different.

My father taught me a lot when I was growing up, so I was always tinkering with things.  Learning to solder circuit boards was something quite enjoyable.  I remember repairing old 286 and 386 computers with him in the living room using screw drivers and soldering up some boards.  I used this skill to try something.

I realized that there is a wide spectrum of frequencies for FM radio stations, and several of them were unused, notably FM87.5.  I picked up an electronics kit for an FM Transmitter similar to this one.  I built it up, got a little project box for it, tuned the frequency output to FM87.5 and connected my CD player.  It worked!  I threw in a CD and did a low power broadcast of what was playing on the CD player to a radio in the house.  Eventually, I moved this to the car and hid the box under my seat.  During a mini road trip with the family, I was able to do this broadcast of what we were listening to in one car, and shared it with the other family in another car, albeit up to 100ft away.  It was a one-way solution, but it worked.  We shared music.

Fast forward to today, I saw all the hype about Spotify, and wanted to give it a try.  Amazing product.  Don’t think it’s anything ‘new’ (Rhapsody was the first attempt at this from my memory), but it is a fun, easy way to solve this problem of sharing music, legally, with your peers.  A game changer.  I was amazed at the amount of music that is currently available.  Many of which I used to own on CD and Tapes which I have misplaced over time.  Friends and I would build playlists and share them with each other much like we used to do.  As an added bonus, we could collectively share a playlist and both contribute to it.  If opt-in, you could see what your friends are listening to and easily play that song too.  Throw in Pandora like features, mobile app, and also in-app Apps, and you got a great product. I wish Spotify the best, as I see a very bright future for them.

What’s the future for Spotify?  Acquisition?  Sounds like there are some people talking on the web that Netflix would be a good fit to acquire Spotify.  I could agree with it.  Apple apparently has already tried to block Spotify from entering the US, but has since failed.  Cloud products are everywhere now which has morphed from mostly enterprise products into consumer.  Music in the cloud is here.  We used to buy music LP’s and CD’s from music stores.  Gone.  We used to download it from friends via Napster.  Gone.  Buying digital music online? Not yet gone, but it could be if music in the cloud works out.  If I added up the 1,500 songs I have just in playlists on my Spotify, that would be $1,500 worth of MP3’s I would have purchased instead.  But for the price of $0.00, or $10/mo if you want to take it mobile and ad free,  I’m already ahead with access to more music I could ever listen to.

**Update**  Well then… Looks like Spotify has something going on with Y!.  http://techcrunch.com/2012/06/26/a-new-chapter-for-yahoo-music-a-deal-with-spotify-replacing-rhapsody/

Being Green at Work

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It should come as no surprise that we are becoming more and more green in the home.  Recycle.  Turn off the lights.  Unplug unused appliances.  Keep the thermostat off.  There shouldn’t be a reason why this doesn’t apply to an office. Not everyone is as green as they are in the office than if they are at home.  I do catch myself being ‘un-green’ at times both in and out of the office.  We try our best, right?  A few things to consider to try to be more green in the office:  (oh no, not another list….)

  • Bring your own cup.  Can’t be that hard right?  Need coffee?  Bring your own cup.  I’ve always made sure to bring my own personal cup/mug to the office, especially when I start a new job.  I’m not sure what excuses could come out of those who don’t.  If you need separate ones for coffee and one for water, bring 2!  Not only does it create excess waste, it can get pretty expensive.  The Office Depot brand disposable coffee cups are $6.29 for 50.  That’s $0.125 per cup used.  Figure some use 2 a day, that’s a quarter a day for cups.  At 260 work days a year, you’re looking at $65 per employee savings if it was eliminated.  Now I’m not saying that you are completely banned of using disposable coffee cups, but limiting your use could help your company out.  Besides, you don’t use disposable cups at home, do you?
  • Recycle.  This is an easy one.  But split up the bins so people know where to put items. If you have a compost pick up at your office, have a bin designated for biodegradable items such as food scraps.
  • Turn the lights off.  Also an easy one.  Conference rooms not in use, bathrooms unoccupied, lots of natural lighting… These are all reasons why you don’t need the lights on.  If you have an office that has lots of natural lighting, use it!  It’s probably more pleasant to the eyes than the artificial lights from above.  Overhead fluorescent lamps are efficient, but why use energy when you don’t need to?
  • Unplug when not in use.  From what I hear, even if an appliance is not ‘on’, it’s still using some kW when it’s still plugged in.  This applies to your phone chargers too.  If you’re not charging anything, they are pretty pointless to have plugged in.  Now, I do know that it can be quite the hassle and unrealistic to unplug everything including monitors, printers, and desk lamps.  I wouldn’t expect people to do this.
  • Sleep your computer.  Lunch time is sleepy time for your computer.  Stepping out for lunch?  Going to a meeting that doesn’t require your laptop to be present?  Put it to sleep.  It will save some energy when it’s idling and not sitting there trying to process information.  Not being an expert on this, but I would assume a computer that’s sitting there processing information such as when emails are coming in, and Facebook updating on you browser, is using a bit more energy than if it were to be put to sleep.
  • Climate control —> Off.  This one doesn’t apply to every office.  If your office has the luxury of windows that actually open, open them.  Too cold?  Close them.  This one is a compromise.  Two real life cases come to mind that may affect the decision for this.  1.   I worked on the 4th floor of an office building that had their climate control break in the middle of winter (Bay Area winter).  Outside temp:  50’s.  Inside temp: 85.  It was not pleasant.  2.  Another company I was at had a climate controlled warehouse.  I was told by finance during a random conversation that we would save $10,000/mo by turning off the climate control just in the warehouse.  zOMG!  Apparently, it runs 24/7.  So yes, this doesn’t apply to all offices.  Another money saver.
  • Stop Printing!  There are reasons whey we need to print, and in those cases it’s ok.  I have seen people print emails.  I just don’t get this.  the ‘e’ in email means ‘electronic’.  It should stay that way.  Email already saves paper by design, so why counter that by printing it?  This leads to a product idea:  Printing credits.  Each employee should have printing credits that is allotted to them each month with no roll over.  Every time you print, you use X number of credits.  Use them up for the month?  Sorry, you need to wait until next month.  Yet another money saver.

There are many other things you can do to be more green.  These were just a few.  Just don’t mix it up with being this kind of green.  Although, sometimes you may feel that way at times.

 

Power Pointless

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Like many working people who have desk jobs, we’ve all been in countless meetings with long, and sometimes boring slides.  Slide after slide, graph after graph, bullet points after bullet points.  They can just drag on like there’s no end in sight.  A person’s attention span can only last so long, and it’s important to capture the audience’s attention quickly to keep them engaged.  As someone who has presented countless times, I’m guilty as charged.  Charged with disorderly slide creations, confusing context and flat out being boring.  But don’t get me wrong, I’ve attended some very good meetings with great slide management and presentation skills.

I think I learned a few things for the next PPT I create:

  1. Context:  Set the context of the presentation first.  Communicate to the audience what the goal of the presentation is.  What should they get out of it?  Keep it simple.  Your audience wants to know why they need to be there.
  2. Less Animation:  Animation is something for Pixar to handle.  It may add some flare to your presentation, but don’t overdo it.  Using Fly-ins, Spinners and Dissolve for everything isn’t going to win over your audience.  I generally like to use “appear” when I need to show each item in a list one at at time.
  3. Less Text, more Talking:  One of my pet peeves about presentations is writing exactly what you want to say right on the slide itself.  My personal thought on this is that the presenter loses a little credibility when you read what’s right on the slide.  That tells me that they don’t know the content as well as they should.  Take away the sentences, keep the bullets short.
  4. Fewer Slides:  I wouldn’t put a number on this.  Your presentation should be long enough to convey the message.  Period.  I worked for a company that had a presentation slide deck that had 135 slides.  No, that’s not a typo.  135!  What kind of person would want to flip through all of those slides and memorize each one?  Let alone, an audience who wants to sit through that torture!
  5. Smooth Operator:  Keep talking.  Transition from one slide to another smoothly by making sure the following slide has the correct content that was based on the prior slide.  That is, make sure you don’t make it seem like the presentation jumps around back and forth.

I think this about sums it up.  I may not be the best at this, and everyone has their own style.  This is mine and what I like to see and practice.  Or at least I try to.