The Marketing Technology Blog

My team of good friends, Jason, Bill, Carla and I drove to Cincinnati yesterday for our final I-Prize presentation with Cisco. The Carmel facility is a lot closer but Cisco needed to move us to enable their full Innovation team to be present.

The Finals!

With over 1100 international entries to the contest, we were selected and made the 32 semi-finalists. Now we were one of the final 12 ideas presenting in front of the very board who initiated the contest. No pressure, huh?

I couldn’t think of a better mix of team mates to work with on this project. The irony, of course, is when you pick a team of hard workers… all of us have challenging jobs already. The I-Prize really added to our workload and I’m thankful I had friends who would step up when I couldn’t. You could see the strain leave our bodies and the smiles return after we finished the presentation.

The Telepresence Experience

A sample video of Telepresence is on YouTube but it really doesn’t provide the full experience.

The room is a partial oval table that directly faces 3 enormous screens with built-in video cameras. When you plugin your laptop to do your presentation, it’s projected locally under the screens as well as remotely under the screen so all members can see it.

We had parties at 3 physical telepresence locations at our meeting as well as another caller who simply dialed in. The system automatically flips the image based on which location is speaking. But it doesn’t flip all of the screens - it simply flips to the screen that someone is speaking on. Here’s a great pic where a tech was working to the left of the San Jose group - you can see half of her.

Within a few minutes of using the system, you truly forget that you’re actually at opposite ends of the country. it’s an amazingly comfortable experience. We were definitely impressed.

The Cisco Team

With hearts pounding and so many executives from Cisco, I tried to write down everyone’s names but simply lost track. It was a thrill to be face-to-face with Marthin De Beer, though! The Cisco team were casual, gracious, inviting and supportive hosts. Any fears of Randy, Paula and Simon quickly evaporated with the leadership team we had in front of us!

Enough! How did the Presentation go?

Trying to sell a billion dollar idea in 60 minutes is definitely a new experience. Bill was our spokesperson and the guy who kept the tempo of the meeting. I chimed in with as much industry data and experience I could. We knew the toughest hurdle was actually getting the team to recognize the solution and opportunity. Carla illustrated our slide deck to visually capture the mounds of data that we packed into each slide.

POS? Really?

When you say “Point of Sales” system, folks immediately think about a barcode scanner, an inventory database, and the ability to print a receipt and charge a credit card. That’s the paradigm that we had to shift in the first 30 minutes!

We had to get the team to recognize that the POS has much more potential to be the entire hub of the business with an opportunity to integrate into all other business processes - inventory control, food supply, employment, accounting, marketing, rewards, online ordering, kiosk ordering, wireless ordering, reporting, enterprise management, etc.

The reason why people see a POS as a ‘glorified cash register’ is that this is exactly what it’s been the last 50 years with very little change. The core of our idea for the finals is to make the POS the HUB of the restaurant, with a secure and reliable network to support any communications.

Perhaps the best part of the presentation was that, as we spoke, we could physically see the expressions on their faces change and the light bulbs turn on. Questions changed from ‘who, what, how much’ to ‘how about, do you picture, why not’. With a $17B industry, prospects that are disappointed with current offerings, and no vendor stepping to the plate - the restaurant industry is primed for disruption by a company with the resources of Cisco.

What’s Next?

By close of the meeting, we had talk of thin-net clients deployed with ideas of the “Restaurant in a Box” and alliances with vendor agnostic POS hardware clients. Yes!!!! That’s the picture that we wanted to paint all along. We had some very positive responses from the team, some good chemistry throughout, and we closed the meeting. Jason polished off the meeting letting the team know why a system would have been so essential to his success as a restaurateur.

I don’t believe it could have gone better! There is additional cost/benefit analysis that could be accomplished and we identified the resources to obtain that information to refine our business case. A few thousand dollars in industry reports would need to be scoured with a good analyst to come up with an accurate estimate.

Now we wait! Marthin closed the meeting with a statement of how interesting it was to hear others’ perceptions of what Cisco ‘was’ or ‘did’. We hope that they can visualize themselves into this space. This would solidify Cisco as the data backbone of commerce, first in the food service segment, and beyond to the entire retail industry.

The team ended the phone call and did a 30 minute debriefing. We wait until June to hear the results! Tick… tick… tick…

If Cisco does not choose us, we’ve already discussed the idea with some entrepreneurs, angel investors and venture capitalists here regionally. Without Cisco’s network and reach, this may be a tough idea to sell. That is, unless we get the funding and become their customer!

One of the challenges with having an out-sourced or offshore development team is simply trying to track and prioritize your work. I work with no less than three outsourced resources, one of them offshore. It seems when you split the workday between time zones, you naturally introduce a delay to everything you do.

I got some press when I canceled Basecamp a year ago. The irony is that, when I signed on with my new job, I was back working in Basecamp again. I’m not knocking Basecamp, it’s a worthy application. I just need something with more robust task and time management. I did then, and I’m finding I still do now. A discussion board with a simple to do list just doesn’t cut it as a project management application.

I don’t know if Sergei Podbereschi and Greg Roy (founders of 5PM Project Management software) ever used Basecamp, but they definitely experienced some of the same issues I find myself in today with their company, QG Software.

So - they put their heads together and developed 5PM. The application was, ironically, developed on two different continents across 5 different languages spoken by the (now) six employees.

After seeing a preview of 5PM, I contacted Sergei. Here’s how 5PM came about:

It was developed as most of the project management solutions - out of need. It was back in 2003 when we started and it was nothing out there that we liked. So we started on our own and called it Project & Team Manager. In fact, that first version was initially developed by me, then we hired additional coders to extend it. 5pm grew from that initial product. It’s all web20, but, as you can see, it’s based on much older ideas. 5pm in fact was a total redesign. Everything changed - from the development platform and interface to the branding. We launched it in November 2007, as SaaS (previous version was downloadable).

I think it takes one look to see how it is different. We did not cut corners when designing the interface. We wanted everything within a click or two and the possibility to customize the interface. It even comes with a Flash Timeline (I don’t know of any project management software that mixes AJAX and Flash together).

We have a bit different approach to the interface and features - we try to make it simple on the surface while packing a lot of power “under the hood”. Also, 5pm is a result of an interesting mix of visions - Greg is an IT manager with 15 years experience, while I’m a younger web designer and developer. Managers like detailed views and reports. Developers hate project management tools, basically. So we tried to design an interface where it’s easy for team members to add messages or close a task with a single click (even through email), while managers have the power to dig deeper.

I also think that we will differentiate more as we add features, using the feedback from our clients. Expect big changes in our Timeline and Reports section in the next months.

I’ve requested our development partners review 5PM immediately. The team was taking a look at Jira, but the interface is honestly confusing the heck out of me. I’m hoping that I get a shot at using 5PM!

For you Office Space buffs out there, you’ll also appreciate the demo. Enough said.

In the last few months, we’ve had at least a dozen releases of new functionality in our application and our integrations. Unfortunately, we also have a few projects that were started many, many months ago prior to my arrival that still aren’t ready for production. It’s not the team’s fault, but it’s now my responsibility to get to production.

There’s no question that I have the right team and the right technology. But 90% of the work has been done for too long.

Here’s the plan to get us over the last 10%:

1. Have your developers demonstrate the functionality.
2. Document request changes with great detail and gain acceptance from the team on why those changes need to be made.
3. Gain agreement on when the changes will be completed by.
4. Schedule the next demonstration.
5. Go to step 1.

Once a project gets delayed, the risk actually increases that it will get delayed again. In past jobs, I’ve actually heard sighs of relief when a deadline was broken… because it buys more time for completion. Employees always want to do a great job and developers especially love to show off their talent.

We had a demo a week or so ago that didn’t go over too well. The developers showed up late, they initiated a request manually with their application (a bit of a hack), and then the transaction failed. When it failed, there was silence. And more silence. And some more. We talked through some possible solutions and then politely closed the demo.

After the demo, I spoke to the development director and he assured me that the project is 90% complete.

I explained to him that 90% means 0% in sales. 90% means that the goals were not met. 90% means that the expectations set with prospects and customers have not been met. While I agree that 90% is the majority of the work, it’s not a success until that last 10% is completed. That adds up to 100% by the way ;).

This week, we saw the demo again and it was a thing of beauty. We’re now tweaking the final product and I’m confident we’ll release in upcoming weeks when we’ve committed to our clients. I let the teams know how great a job they did and how much we appreciated the work. It’s not a homerun… that will be when we’re production ready but the bases are definitely loaded.

Some additional advice:

• Always have agreed upon deadlines.
• After every change in requirements, re-assess the timeline and come to agreement again.
• Schedule the demonstration with lots of time for the team to prepare.
• Set the expectations for the demonstration. Let the team know that you’re excited!
• Put the team at ease that you know that problems may arise, you simply hope they won’t.
• Be supportive, don’t wait for failure then attack.
• Praise in public, be critical in private.
• Do not, under any circumstances, use the demonstration as an opportunity to motivate with embarrassment. You’ll only motivate your programmers to look for a job!
• Celebrate success.

Remember that the last 10% is the toughest. It’s the last 10% that makes and breaks business. Planning, preparation and execution on the last 10% will make all the difference.

Digg It!

This was an exciting year in online technology. If you look at it from a 10,000 foot view, humans are really still blazing a trail on how to utilize this relatively new medium, the Internet. Perhaps it’s obvious but I believe 2008 is really the year that applications and strategies go Micro.

The evolution of the social web (Web 2.0) is now moving rapidly into new, targeted territory. The massive, one-fits-all solution will be evolving to provide you with the right connections to the right people and the right content… at the right time.

1. Email has transcended the typical use for eNewsletters and is gaining momentum in the transactional world. Rather than providing it’s own ‘event’ the email send is now triggered as part of an overall marketing strategy to retain users and keep them connected to their retail outlet, their social network, the blogs they read, etc.

   Email is also evolving, despite the limitations of mainstream email clients. Email is going micro… more timely messaging, more control, and more event driven.

2. Blogging has gone Micro with Twitter, Jaiku and Pownce. Quick snippets that create virtual conversations from one to many.

   Companies are already starting to employ Microblogging, but we’ll see the retail use of Microblogging in 2008. We’ll also see groups better leveraged in Micro-blogging… much like chat rooms evolved in public chat applications a decade ago.

3. Social Networks are moving away from the monolithic strategies of Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn and Plaxo… and move to the micro social networks of Ning (note: SmallerIndiana, NavyVets, Sports Marketing 2.0, IndyLance are a few I’ve started or am involved in!).
4. Bookmarking sites such as Digg are being abandoned for sites like Mixx - where you can set up Micro Groups to join. I’d encourage everyone who reads my blog to contact me for an invite to Online Marketing Group so we can share links. Other applications like Truemors will continue to pop up with refined targeting capabilities rather than preselected categories.
5. Geographic Information Systems online are being leveraged more and more to go micro. Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft continue to enhance regional data for improved Geographic searches. Google is even supporting KML in sitemaps, to geographically identify and index your websites!
6. Video is going Micro (post updated with recommendation from Nil’s comment at Scobleizer). Utterz, Seesmic and QIK. Video and mobile phone technologies are converging, enabling people to record and upload video much easier with better quality!
7. Software as a Service Applications will continue to be pressured to be flexible enough for branding and integration into other applications or other brands. No more is the ‘canned’ application good enough for us to buy and put up, we must leverage CSS technologies to transform our applications to any environment. We must build applications that are capable of being modified to the smallest (micro) detail.

There you have it, my prediction for 2008 - the year of the micro strategy and micro business application. The ability to create like groups, geographically centric applications, micro-branded SaaS, or simple social groupings will be fully leveraged in 2008. Those who won’t adapt will be forgotten.