Cisco Buys Meraki For US$1.2bn, Adds WiFi Tech, Mid-Market Reach

It’s going to be a short week with US Thanksgiving, but Cisco has begun on a high note with the announcement that it is buying Meraki for US$ 1.2 billion, only a matter of days after it announced it was buying Cloupia for the relatively paltry sum of US$ 125 million.

Both Cloupia and Meraki look to make up ground in the cloud space for Cisco, with the Meraki buy set to establish the base of Cisco’s Cloud Networking Group.

Why Meraki Went With Cisco

Meraki is based in San Francisco and also has offices in New York, London and Mexico. The company was founded in 2006 by members of MIT's Laboratory for Computer Science.

It is a privately held company that has developed over the past seven years with the backing of Sequoia Capital and Google, and while it had considered launching on the stock exchange, it says that the buy-out by Cisco will push it towards it goal of revenues of US$ 1 billion per year without having to go the IPO route.

Explaining the deal in a letter to employees, which it made public on its website, Sanjit Biswas CEO of Meraki has outlined some of the major points around Meraki this year.

"This year has been particularly amazing for us (sorry to say amazing three times in a row, but it really has been). We successfully shipped another major product family, achieved a $100M bookings run rate, grew from 120 to 330 employees and did it all while achieving positive cash flow."

He also said that for the original founders it made sense on three different levels:

1. Cisco wants to continue its release pattern and to "cloudify" other Cisco products.
2. Business model fits across all teams and departments.
3. Corporate culture facilitates recruitment of suitable candidates in the San Francisco headquarters.

And of course there’s also the US$ 1.25 billion, which must have weighed heavily on the minds of the original founders.

Cisco’s Meraki Plans

But it’s not all about Meraki. For Cisco, it is another step into the cloud market as Meraki provides technology for developing WiFi, security and mobile device management and switching.

More importantly for Cisco, it also has a deep reach into the small and medium-sized market that to date has eluded Cisco providing it with opportunities to bring its other products into that market too.

In a statement issued around the announcement, Rob Soderbery, senior vice president, Cisco Enterprise Networking Group, said:

The acquisition of Meraki enables Cisco to make simple, secure, cloud managed networks available to our global customer base of mid-sized businesses and enterprises. These companies have the same IT needs as larger organizations, but without the resources to integrate complex IT solutions…Meraki’s solution was built from the ground up optimized for cloud, with tremendous scale, and is already in use by thousands of customers to manage hundreds of thousands of devices.”

Cisco, based in San Jose, California, expects the acquisition to close in its second fiscal quarter ending in January. If you are interested in more on Meraki, check out the video below. 

 

 

Source : cmswire[dot]com

Google+ Gets Closer To Enterprise Social Networking With Google Drive Sharing

In a week where we talked a lot about collaboration, it is probably appropriate to wrap up with a small announcement from Google Drive that should make Box or Dropbox pause for thought.

The announcement appeared on the Google Enterprise blog during the week and concerns file share between Google Drive and Google+. In fact, what it says is that from here on it will be incredibly easy to share files from Google Drive into the Google+ social network, taking Google+ another step further towards making it a truly collaborative environment.

Google+, Google Drive

Collaboration, however, only becomes attractive when it is easy to do, and this addition is just that. As of this week users who want to, will able to share everything stored in Google Drive with selected recipients. This includes documents, photos and even videos which can be played directly in Google+.

While at face value this doesn’t look like much of a change as there has always been the possibility of sharing between the two, it’s not just sharing this time; now, users will also be able to access all this content in Google+ itself.

Think of what this will mean. It basically offers collaboration and sharing of all content inside a social application to everyone that has signed up with these Google apps. In some cases, this will undoubtedly make them think twice about signing up to Box or Dropbox for at least some users.

Google + 

And it really is easy to use. To get started, Li-Wei Lee, Software Engineer with Google explains in a blog post that users only have to click the Google+ icon when they are sharing from Drive, or copy-and-paste a link to a file from Google Drive into one of  their Google+ posts.

Google Drive, Google + file sharing
 

Google+ contacts will be able to click on a thumbnail within the Google+interface and open the file in a separate browser window.

If you are using Google Apps for Business, Education or Government, posts can also be restricted to ensure that the conversation only lands where you want it to.

On top of this, each file share in Google+ carries with it the access settings that have been given by the owner on Drive, so the content that is to be shared can be defined and limited by the file owner.

While this is a big plus for Google+ it is still not a fully-fledged enterprise social networking (ESN) app, but it is getting close. It is unlikely that Google will just leave it at this and it's just about certain that Google will continue to add functionality until it has to all intents and purposes become a ESN. More on this as it happens.

 

 

Source : cmswire[dot]com

Box Unveils New Mobile App for Windows 8

Microsoft isn't the only company making an announcement surrounding the newest version their Windows Operating System. Box has also announced that they have designed a new version of their file managing app — specifically for Windows 8.

More Than a File Manager

Earlier this year, Box announced a new app for the Windows Phone, but with the launch of Windows 8 they are expanding on what their product can offer Windows users.

The new Box app was announced in conjunction with the launch of Windows 8 today, while Simon Tan, Box’s Product Manager of Mobile elaborated on the details in a blog post. Tan confirmed that the new Box Windows app would have all the features of its predecessors, such as being able to manage individual files and folders, adding collaborators by email and working with colleagues through document collaboration.

The Windows 8 version of the app will include a variety of features to enhance the user experience. They include:

• A Semantic Zoom feature allows users to avoid using the ‘pitch to zoom’ technique, as they can see all of their files and folders with an easy to read summary, where they can pick a file by letter, date or size.
• Files can be easily managed with either a sibling folder tree tool or hierarchy drop down tool.

• Files and folders as links can be shared via a Windows 8 Share charm.
• Box is part of a cloud file system, which allows users to not only create, upload and download files into other sources, but also is a ‘file source and file target.” As a source and target, information or files from other apps can be stored or opened in Box.
• Not only can files be edited within Box, but any changes made outside of the app to a file will automatically be saved to the Box version when it's opened with the app.
• Box can be linked with Live Tiles,so that any updates to the Box system are seen on the start screen, while individual file and folders can be pinned to tiles.
• Box for Windows 8 is currently available in English, French, Italian, German, Spanish, Dutch, Portuguese, Russian and Chinese. Other languages will follow when the app is updated.

Security Features

The security features available for Windows 8’s version of Box are similar to those available to mobile users; they include SSO login support and a passcode lock.

 

 

Source : cmswire[dot]com

Microsoft Makes a Marketing Automation Play With MarketingPilot Acquisition

Anybody that had doubts about Microsoft’s commitment to service got more proof this week. Only days before its second quarter earnings announcement, the company announced plans to acquire cloud storage vendor StorSimple and that it closed on a deal to buy marketing automation provider MarketingPilot. Should Salesforce be concerned?

Head in the Clouds

Microsoft is using every opportunity it gets to let us know it is no longer just a software company. Microsoft’s most recent annual report, released earlier this month, included a letter from CEO, Steve Ballmer, reiterating to shareholders that it has evolved into a “devices and services company.” This week the software giant has been busy putting its money where its mouth is.

On Tuesday, October 16, Microsoft announced its intent to purchase StorSimple, which provides an appliance for Windows and VMware that integrates cloud and on-premises storage. Microsoft plans to leverage the technology in its hybrid cloud offerings.

The next day, the company announced the closing of a deal to acquire MarketingPilot, a marketing automation software provider.

Microsoft is always buying something, but the latest round of acquisitions signal a significant shift within the company, which has made its fortune selling software. Windows and Office have long been the main contributors to Microsoft’s profitability and growth. These product families aren’t going away any time soon, but Microsoft realizes consumers and companies are increasingly choosing cloud-based solutions instead of locally deployed software. In addition, more businesses are adopting an IT-as-a-service model, which encourages delivering capabilities as discrete units of service that can be aggregated into more sophisticated offerings. This is driving Microsoft to invest heavily in the cloud and service oriented offering.

The terms of the deals have not been disclosed. Microsoft promises to release more details at the Convergence conference in March.

Other Trends

Microsoft’s acquisition of MarketingPilot is also a part of another major trend — customer engagement. Although the cloud technology and marketing automation may seem unrelated from a business perspective, they aren't. Businesses want holistic, highly integrated, flexible solutions that “just work.” They want the same thing in their interactions with customers and leads. 

Many traditional content management and customer relationship management (CRM) vendors have been adding features that allow business to manage content, marketing campaigns and customer engagement from a single platform. Microsoft may be preparing to follow their lead. The MarketingPilot purchase is being handled through Microsoft’s Dynamics CRM, which could mean customers will soon see marketing automation modules be natively integrated in the platform. There is also an opportunity for marketing automation to come to SharePoint.

Oracle, Microsoft and IBM now own all of the components to create their own Salesforce-like offering. However, none of the companies has put the components together in an easy to use, subscription-based package. If Microsoft decides to move in that direction, they could eventually provide a fair amount of competition to Salesforce in the small and medium business sector because of their will established position in the market.

 

 

Source : cmswire[dot]com

Microsoft Buys StorSimple, Pursues Hybrid Cloud Storage Strategy

Coming just a day before the announcement of its financial results for the first quarter, Microsoft has announced that it has bought cloud-storage provider StorSimple for an undisclosed sum.

Cloud Storage Market

There may not be any significance in the fact that this deal comes so close to the earnings announcement — except that IBM announced its third quarter results last night, and they weren’t good.

In fact, Mark Loughbridge, IBM’s CFO, said in the earnings call after the results were released that IBM would be looking at analytics, its Smarter Planet initiative (which is closely connected to Big Data) and cloud computing to add US$ 20 billion to its books by 2015.

Microsoft has come under some fire in the past about its cloud ambitions and functionality, but it has done a lot of running in the past year. With this buy, the company will be able to increase its ability send data into the Azure cloud, not to mention Google and Amazon Web Services.

Microsoft, StorSimple

And that’s the real functionality value of this deal. StorSimple was created nearly four years ago to provide cloud-integrated storage solutions and has worked with Microsoft in the past. In 2010, it optimized its products to work with Microsoft applications. This made it a sure target for Microsoft as it clawed back ground it lost to other cloud providers because it wasn't quick enough off the mark.

Microsoft is not saying how much it paid for StorSimple, but we have found in the past that this usually means that, relatively speaking, they haven’t paid a whole lot.

But strategically, when StorSimple is added into the Microsoft mix, it should produce a really heady brew — and that’s where Microsoft is going with this. Microsoft says that the addition of cloud-integrated storage systems will “advance Microsoft’s Cloud OS vision."

It may also be important to note here that StorSimple already works with Microsoft SharePoint (cloud storage is a great way to improve the performance of SharePoint).

Microsoft’s Hybrid Cloud Storage Strategy

In practical terms, what this means is that Microsoft is going into the hybrid cloud market in a big way. Combining primary storage, backup, archiving and disaster recovery with cloud integration, this will enable users decide to where their data should be stored.

Customers faced with explosive growth in data are looking to the cloud to help them store, manage and archive that data. But, to be effective, cloud storage needs to integrate with IT's current investments … StorSimple's approach helps customers seamlessly integrate on-premises storage with cloud storage through intelligent automation and management," said Michael Park, Corporate Vice President, Server and Tools Division for Microsoft.

StorSimple solutions combine the data management functions of primary storage, backup, archive and disaster recovery with cloud integration, enabling customers to optimize storage costs, data protection and service agility.

With it, enterprises will be able to protect and restore production data using public clouds. Using encryption, cloud providers will be able to send data over the web securely, using compression technologies and de-duplication technologies to eliminate multiple copies of data.

StorSimple appliances currently have storage capacities ranging from 2TB to 20 TBs with prices starting at around US$ 40,000.

 

 

Source : cmswire[dot]com

Document Mgt Roll-up: Alfresco's Solr Integration, Hyland's Easy Mobile Access

This week in the document management world, Alfresco is back in the news with the announcement of a new integration by Ixxus to add Solr search to Alfresco 4, Hyland is making its OnBase application more readily accessible through mobile devices, Lexmark rebrands Brainware and SealPath secures documents in the cloud.

Alfresco’s Solr Integration

More from Alfresco this week after the release of the Community Edition v4.2 last week. Again, Alfresco is not making a big deal about it, with the only reference to it so far in the Alfresco blog.

If you use Alfresco, this will definitely be worth a look. The announcement comes in the shape of a guest post by Dan Tuffery of Ixxus, which says that systems integrator Ixxus has just released code that will enable users to integrate Solr with Alfresco 4. The result is the application of "Faceted Search" to Alfresco 4, enabling users explore content collections by applying multiple filters to its search results.

In practical terms, this means that users can continue to use simple keyword search, but it also enables users to add filters to the search results as they go through the results and as they require them. This frees them from then trying to second-guess what filters will be needed and applying them at the start of the search.

Alfresco-Solr Integration

All this is the result of enabling users to integrate Solr search to the Alfresco repository. Solr, you might recall, is an open source search server built on top of Apache Lucene that is extremely fast and scalable, and enables faceted navigation, query and browsing.

Hyland’s Mobile OnBase

Also in the document management space this week is news from Hyland Software, which has just announced the release of Mobile Broker for Microsoft’s Windows Azure that will enable Hyland customers to implement mobile solutions easily.

Specifically, it offers Hyland OnBase customers with an alternative implementation option for mobile solutions, without having to make significant investments in hardware.

With it, iPhone/iPad, Android, Blackberry and Windows Phone users can securely connect to OnBase through Azure, which reduces the need for IT departments to manage secure access connections between mobile and enterprise networks.

In reality, what it does is to make OnBase a lot more attractive to enterprises, as users can use it through mobile devices — without the enterprise having to spend a lot securing access and users’ phones.

This release should hardly be a surprise, as OnBase uses numerous Microsoft technologies already including .NET, Windows Azure, SQL Database and BizTalk Server. It also integrates with Office, SharePoint and Outlook.

Lexmark Rebrands Brainware

Meanwhile, Lexmark continues to reshape Perceptive, which it bought last year to help it gain deeper traction in the document management space. This time it has announced that Brainware Distiller, its intelligent data capture product, is to be rebranded.

From now on, it will be known as Perceptive Intelligent Capture, powered by Brainware, but apart from that, it doesn’t appear to have been changed much. It will remain a standalone product for automating the entry of data into the system and will continue to be compatible with all the different applications currently in use in the enterprise.

 

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Source : cmswire[dot]com

Samsung Shrink-Washes the Galaxy S3 To Produce A Mini Smartphone

 To cover all bases, and hand sizes, Samsung is entering the shrinking game with the announcement of a smaller-model Galaxy S3 smartphone. Will all smart devices soon come in a range of glove sizes?

Harry Potter, Where Are You?

With Apple engorging the size of its iPhone screen and shrinking down the iPad to Mini proportions, why can't Samsung get in on the fun? All they, and other, companies need is a handy wizard to do the work, instead of all these process shrinks and redesigns. 

Wizardry aside, Samsung has done it the hard way and will announce tomorrow a European mini version of the top-selling Galaxy S3 super-phone. That will bring it more in line with Apple's iPhone 5 and give choice to those who think the original S3 (and the Samsung Note) are just a touch too big.

Likely to ship with a 4-inch screen, it will match Apple's phone and create a new entry point in Samsung's arsenal. But the phone shouldn't be substantially less-specced, as Samsung is stating that it is only a mini in size, not in specification, while highlighting the demand for smaller-screen devices in Europe. 

The specs have just leaked and we see a dual-core CPU clocked at 1GHz and 1GB RAM with 16Gb storage (plus a microSD slot). It will be running Android 4.1 Jelly Bean and comes with a 5MP main camera and flash, plus a VGA front-camera, The European model will have quad-band 2G and tri-band 3G (No real need for 4G in the old world).

What Size Would You Like?

Samsung won't comment if the smaller device will come to the American market, where presumably those hulk-hands are happier with the current Samsung Galaxy model (pictured below). Either way, you can expect an interesting court date between Apple and Samsung at some point in the future arguing over the "Mini" name, with lawyers going "we shrunk it first!" "No, we did!" etc. 

The official unveiling will take place in Germany tomorrow, and the news is scorching across Twitter right now. But, will a smaller phone be as successful as a larger model… we have Apple going up the scale and Samsung going down it, it will be interesting to see which is the most successful route?

It would be hard to envisage existing Samsung users "downsizing" against the throng of upgrading Apple users. But, if Samsung gets many million new users through this popular-branded product, it should put it in a far better position over time. 

 

 

Source : cmswire[dot]com

Axceler, Webtrends Partner For Better SharePoint Governance, Visibility

There’s just nothing like seeing a couple of old hands get together for a common cause. That’s what’s happened today with the announcement that Webtrends and Axceler are joining forces to help another old pardner — SharePoint.

SharePoint Governance Is Suddenly a Hot Topic

One of the many interesting things about this partnership is that it comes on the heel of a spate of announcements about new solutions and software for SharePoint governance.

This week alone we had a new records management release from FileTrail that has a strong element of content governance in it, while AvePoint announced the availability of its DocAve 6 Service Pack 1 (SP) that provides governance for SharePoint.

You can go for months without anyone ever talking about data governance in SharePoint and then all of a sudden, we get a run of three different solutions from three different vendors in a matter of days. With two days left to go, could we be looking at a record-breaking week for SharePoint governance?

Joking aside, there is a serious issue here. It may be that the sudden interest in SharePoint governance indicates that the penny has finally dropped — and enterprises are beginning to realize that SharePoint deployment without strict governance can end up being extremely costly.

Of course it's important to remember that it is already the end of September — and by all accounts, there are only about three months left before SharePoint 2013 goes into general release.

Axceler, Webtrends Combine Their Strengths

Enough of that, and back to Axceler and Webtrends. This combined solution looks to manage user access to SharePoint and SharePoint content and to measure user access and engagement in SharePoint environments.

From the Axceler side of the equation, ControlPoint provides the user management element. Webtrends for SharePoint provides in-depth analytics of what users are doing in SharePoint and even who those users are.

Combined, the two companies (both Microsoft Gold Partners) are providing a solution that offers powerful intranet analytics along with enterprise collaboration governance. The companies say that this will ensure enterprise security and compliance.

As companies make greater investments into social enterprise applications with the promise of enhanced internal communications and collaboration, the question hanging over every organization is, 'Is this working? … Organizations using SharePoint effectively need a combination of measurement and governance to drive effective collaboration and provide a 360-degree view of the social enterprise, which is precisely what Webtrends and Axceler have teamed to deliver," said Jeff Seacrist, VP of Partner Solutions, Webtrends.

It remains to be seen whether they have or not — but if the partnership can provide effective SharePoint governance and user analysis, then they are onto a winner. Combined, they say, the new integration provides:

• Simplified adoption: Offers ways for enterprises to measure the level of content collaboration — by user, geography, team, project or site. Also offers insights into trends across the deployment.
• Restricted uncontrolled sprawl: Gives administrators the ability to uncover usage patterns and block unnecessary growth by identifying lesser used sites as well as popular access points.
• Corporate governance: Allows administrators to easily establish rules and protocols to control usage of SharePoint according to corporate guidelines. Also provides insight into how users interact with corporate material.
• Compliance: Offers better visibility across the entire SharePoint platform by automating SharePoint governance with the ability to establish rules and protocol policies; also boosts security to deter information theft.

With this deal, both companies expand an already impressive list of partnerships built around Microsoft and SharePoint.

 

 

Source : cmswire[dot]com

Ensighten Raises US15.5m To Develop Enterprise Tag Management Reach, Expand Market

If any one had any doubt that there is money in tag management, then the announcement today that enterprise tag management vendor Ensighten has managed to raise US$ 15.5 million in Series A financing should knock those doubts right on the head.

Ensighten's Enterprise Tagging

The funding round was led by Volition Capital with a number of other investors including Eastern Advisors and Floodgate Fund to top it up.

We have come across Ensighten in a small way in the past by a way of a free do-not-track tool. It is a company that clearly has ambitions — ambitions that others believe in too — to deliver tags as a service. It has also made that service scalable and lightening quick.

If it can provide effective tag management for enterprises then it is clearly onto a winner. Tagging, while essential, is really slow and infuriating, but if it’s not done correctly, it can have a really negative impact on your webpages and site.

Building Ensighten

Now it seems Ensighten has managed to provide a service that has captured the attention of the venture capitalists. With the money, it says it will accelerate product development and expand sales and marketing operations, as well as expand its workforce as it enters what it describes as its “next phase of growth” without actually describing where it hopes that growth will bring it.

That said, Ensighten has already developed a market for itself. Among its clients it already claims to have 10% of the Internet Retailer 100 companies, including two of the top five, along with global companies like Sony, Microsoft Dell and Thomson-Reuters.

At this point, and across this customer portfolio, Ensighten is being used in websites, but is also getting a lot of attention from vendors that are providing solutions for the integration and optimization of digital marketing services like Web analytics, social sharing and conversion pixels.

The result, is that is has rapidly spread form the US into the EMEA region with the opening of an office in the UK in May of this year. That office is also expected to grow rapidly in the coming months.

Currently, Ensighten's global Tag Delivery Network provides over 750 billion tags annually to more than 25,000 Web domains across 150 countries that cover US$ 25 billion in transactions. At least that’s what Ensighten’s figures say, and there’s no reason to dispute those figures.

 

 

Source : cmswire[dot]com

Microsoft Says Hello to 'Bing Ads'

Bing Ads. That’s the new name for Microsoft’s adCenter, and it will be used to self-manage search ads on the new Yahoo! Bing Network.

In an announcement on Sunday on its Bing Ads blog, Microsoft said that the new name also represented “an improved experience with new features” for managing marketing campaigns. It noted that recent improvements have included a new web interface, improved ad rotation controls and new tools that better enable the management of multiple accounts by agencies.

10-Year Agreement

The Yahoo! Bing Network is the name of the collaborative advertising ecosystem for placing keyword-based ads in search results, combining the resources of Yahoo! Search, Bing search and the two companies’ various partner sites. Partner sites include Facebook, Amazon, Viacom and WebMD, plus such networks as The Wall Street Journal Digital Network.

Microsoft community manager Tina Kelleher wrote on the Bing Ads blog that “the Yahoo Bing Network is comprised of 151 million unique searchers in the US who are likely to spend 24 per cent more than the average searcher, and likely to spend five per cent more than Google searchers in the US." In the U.S., the companies said, the Network reaches 46 million unique searchers who are not using Google.

Worldwide, the Yahoo! Bing Network said that it reaches 489 million unique searchers, 92 million of whom do not use Google. Another competitive advantage: Bing will be the default engine on the recently-announced Amazon Kindle Fire HD tablets.

In July, Microsoft and Yahoo announced a 10-year agreement, under which Bing acts as the technology behind Yahoo! Search, Microsoft integrates Yahoo! search technologies into the combined search platform, Yahoo! serves as the combined sales agent, and AdCenter — now Bing Ads — serves as the self-service ad platform. Display advertising will continue to be handled separately by each company.

30 Percent

The combined effort of these second and third-place search engines will reach about 30 percent of the search market, as the two companies position themselves against the 600-pound gorilla, Google.

Microsoft will deliver eighty-eight percent of search ad revenues generated by Yahoo! sites to Yahoo!, which is expected to result in more than a quarter billion dollars annually to that company.

Last week, Microsoft announced a new ad campaign, called Bing it On, to promote its search engine. As part of that campaign, it commissioned a study of 1000 individuals, with the results showing that users prefer Bing results over Google’s. It is also offering a Bing It On Challenge, which shows search results of five user-generated queries side-by-side, without either the Bing or Google brand, so that users can choose which engine provides the most relevant answers.

 

 

Source : cmswire[dot]com

Weekend Reading: It's Not the Data, It's What You Do With It

While the hot weather is hanging on in NYC, this week marked the end of vacation for many as students went back to school and the mobile device announcement season kicked into high gear.  

Our contributors helped launch the beginning of the school year with some looks at how to put data to work for you, future trends in the digital asset management world and an explanation of just what semantic web technologies are and what they do (and a hint at how they will change the future of enterprise information management). 

If you're like me and you miss the syllabuses from schooldays, consider this yours for the week.

Putting Data to Work

Four Actionable Steps for Google Analytics Users

Bob Clary (@webucator): As an avid Google Analytics user, I sometimes find myself overwhelmed with all of the data! I could spend days and days trying to determine actionable steps to help improve my website and online marketing endeavors, but that's just not realistic. I'm sure it's the same for you. So I want to provide you with four actionable steps you can do right now within your Google Analytics account.

My, That's Big Data (Or Is It Just a Big Pile of Data?)

Virginia Backaitis:There’s a difference between a big pile of data and Big Data.

It’s hard to believe that this needs to be said. But try this. Ask someone what Big Data is and see if you don’t hear words like petabyte, exabyte, zettabyte, yottabyte and the like dominate their answers. Most common definitions of Big Data revolve around quantity and data/information storage. 

To Meet the Needs of the Customer 

Holiday Promotion Checklist: Seven Factors Your Deal Needs to Have

Diane Buzzeo: Last year, customers turned to e-Commerce retailers in record numbers for their holiday shopping — outpacing forecasts with a 25 percent increase in online sales. According to eMarketer, 2011’s e-Commerce boost warranted a 2012 online shopping prediction of US$ 224 billion, up more than 15 percent from 2011. With the gifting season creeping closer, it’s time for e-Commerce retailers to get their holiday promotion strategies into shape. 

Customer Experience: A Cost Benefit Analysis of Simplicity

Gerry McGovern (@gerrymcgovern): 

Simplicity for the customer causes complexity for the organization.

When Manish Chandra was launching Poshmark, a shopping party app, one of the design decisions he faced related to the payment system. It was relatively easy to plug PayPal in. However, Chandra was focused on making everything really easy for the customer. So, instead of using PayPal, his developers spent two months developing a system where payments could be made in two clicks.

The result of Chandra's relentless pursuit of simplicity for the customer was a mobile app that has been a big hit.

 

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Source : cmswire[dot]com

Why SharePoint 2013 Isn't for You

There’s a lot of noise on the street since the announcement of SharePoint 2013. We’re headed towards the largest SharePoint conference of the year in Las Vegas this November and it’s only going to get louder. Where does that leave you, the end user of SharePoint? About where you were before the announcement came out, I would think. It should not affect you at all.

Where Is All the Noise Coming From?

If you listen closely to the groundswell, what you hear is a bunch of developer geek speak about SharePoint 2013. There is the marketing coming out of Microsoft, but the Man-on-the-Street conversation is mainly from developers and IT Pros who are talking to each other about how to set it up, how to optimize it, how it is different from 2010. This has absolutely nothing of relevance for people using SharePoint on a day to day basis.

The day to day talk is a distraction to SharePoint end users. In general, the users are not interested in the technology, they are interested in the solutions the technology can provide. This is nothing new. We had the same type of situation after the release of SharePoint 2010. At that time, I took the same position: It’s going to take two to three years for SharePoint 2013 to become relevant to the daily user.

The Current Situation

SharePoint is not an app that gets upgraded every month as part of an update cycle. It is a development platform for providing business solutions. Large clients who rolled out SharePoint 2010 in the past two years are going to find it hard to justify moving on to 2013 in the near future, unless they can find a business justification for spending the time and money it will take to make the transition.

At conferences where I speak, I ask people what SharePoint version they are currently using. Over the past year it has been mostly 2007, with half of those using a hybrid solution that combines with 2010. Those clients who are implementing SharePoint for the first time will start with 2010, but those with existing infrastructure are going to stay with that until there is a real business reason, real financial justification, to run an upgrade.

So Who is 2013 For?

With that said, who should be interested in SharePoint 2013? Why, developers of course! 2013 is still in beta. Enough said. Stop reading and get back to work. Unless you are a developer, an author or a training company, why are you concerned about SharePoint 2013?

I’m not being facetious. I think it is a real distraction for day to day users to be concerned about the “new” functionality of SharePoint 2013: Social, My Sites enhancements, Managed Navigation, the App Store. To upgrade to 2013 is a business decision that will have to be justified at a much higher level than the end user. Will the business gain enough impact to make that upgrade worthwhile?

Final Words

What’s my advice to people actually using SharePoint to get their work done? Keep your head down and out of the line of fire. SharePoint 2013 isn’t for you. For now, let the developers and IT Pros work through the bits and see what’s there. When your company is ready for it, they will let you know.

Editors Note: If you're intersted in another view on SharePoint 2013:

— SharePoint 2013: 7 Features Users are Going to Love by @andrewbish
 

About the Author

Mark Miller is recognized internationally as a Senior Storyteller, weaving engaging tales to simplify the explanation of complex, technological solutions. His current mission is to save the planet from the default SharePoint 2010 interface at NothingButBranding.com. He is the founder of two of the largest, online SharePoint communities in the world: href=”www.nothingbutsharepoint.com”>NothingButSharePoint.com and href=”https://www.nothingbutsharepoint.com/sites/eusp/Pages/default.aspx”>EndUserSharePoint.com.Mark is a founding member of href=”http://sharingthepoint.org/Africa/Home.aspx”>Sharing the Point, a group of SharePoint evangelists who travel the world bringing support and encouragement to underserved SharePoint communities.

 

 

Source : cmswire[dot]com