A Fine Knock

The telecom equipment business grew by 24% and holds promise for similar growth in the current year as well

Come May and we begin our annual analysis of the telecommunications equipment industry. The VOICE&DATA survey is one of the most consolidated surveys, which uses various information sources to work out the performance of the industry. To make the survey stand out and reflect the actual performance, the industry information is collected from companies, third party sources, and the information acquired is analyzed to arrive at the results.

We divide the Indian telecom equipment business in three categories-enterprise equipment, carrier equipment, and phone. The entire telecommunications industry grew by 24% from Rs 76,973 crore in FY 2006-07 to Rs 95,407 crore in FY 2007-08.

The biggest contributor to the growth of the industry was the carrier equipment business, which contributed 60% to the entire telecom equipment business. Wireless infrastructure and telecom software recorded a growth of 43% and 29%, respectively.

Reflecting the growth in the broadband segment, broadband infrastructure grew by 68%. Telecom cables and transmission were other sectors that recorded more than 50% growth. Telecom turnkey was the only segment that recorded a negative growth of 17% in FY 2007-08.

The enterprise equipment business grew by 27%, from Rs 10,381 crore in FY 2006-07 to Rs 13,210 crore in FY 2007-08. Network security recorded a growth of 73% last fiscal and network storage grew by 46%. Voice solution and router recorded a growth of 22% and 26% respectively. The enterprise equipment segment contributed 14% to the entire telecom equipment business in the country. Structured cabling grew from Rs 827 crore in FY 2006-07 to Rs 1,173 crore in FY 2007-08, recording a 42% growth.

In the phone segment, while the handsets continued with the growth trajectory, the fixed phone division recorded a southward trend. This is not surprising since cheaper handsets have been eating into the market share of fixed phones. Broadband, coupled with feature-rich phones, might help the fixed handset players to salvage some market this year. The phone segment contributed 26% to the equipment business.

The mobile handset market grew by 12%, from Rs 21,434 crore in FY 2006-07 to Rs 24,003 crore in FY 2007-08. The fixed phone market recorded a negative growth of 41%, from Rs 2,018 crore in FY 2006-07 to Rs 1,200 crore in FY 2007-08.

Telecom Bellwethers
Nokia retained its top position in the Indian telecom industry clocking a growth rate of 30.6% as revenues reached Rs 15,000 crore. A smart marketing strategy ensured that the company retained its marketing position. Second in rank, Ericsson also managed to retain its position, growing by around 60%. Aggressive marketing strategy and big orders in the wireless segment went a long way in Ericsson's growth story.

Motorola was at the third position in V&D Top 10 in FY 2006-07. A new entrant, Nokia Siemens Networks (NSN) occupies this position in FY 2007-08. Owing to a lackluster performance in both the wireless and handset segments, Motorola was ousted from V&D Top 10. The company lost huge market share in the handset as well as the wireless segment. There were also reports of Motorola equipment being replaced by the equipment of other prominent companies in the segment.

V&D Top 10 saw the entry of new players-Nokia Siemens Networks and Sony Ericsson. In its first year of inception, NSN grabbed major deals in the wireless segment, while Sony thumped its way in V&D Top 10. Sony Ericsson grew from Rs 1,386 crore in FY 2006-07 to Rs 3,083 crore in FY 2007-08, garnering a share of 12.8% of the total handset market.

ZTE, which had entered for the first time in V&D Top 10 last year, found itself at the same rank in FY 2007-08. Smart pricing strategy helped the company retain its position.

Alcatel Lucent, Wipro, TCS, and Infosys moved one step ahead in their rankings. Alcatel Lucent, which grew by 40% last year, moved from the fifth rank to the fourth; Wipro, on the other hand, grew by around 60% and moved from the sixth rank to the fifth. Infosys grew by 34.3% and moved from the ninth position to the eighth in the V&D ranking.

All in all, the Indian telecom industry played a superb knock in the last fiscal. One looks forward to a great innings by the Indian telecom industry in the current year as well.

Courtesy - Voice & Data

Marketing Technology in Recession

As the US economy slows down, Indian companies face diminishing workload and lowering margins. But so far there have been no withdrawal symptoms. If the rupee is fluctuating, it might be time for us to make the most of it by channelizing marketing in the right direction. It’s not a time for worry; it’s a time for some strategizing.

As the US market slackens, Indian outsourcing firms fear a danger. Of suffering lesser work, lesser profits and even having work taken away from them to countries like the Philippines.

“I don’t think it’s a situation of gloom for the industry. I think it’s a situation of cautiousness for the industry,” Azim Premji, chairman of India’s third largest software services exporter Wipro, said recently. It is true. We needn’t panic about the appreciating rupee but should prepare ourselves well for what is to come.

The worst has not hit us yet. And it probably won’t. If there is one thing to learn, and many have learnt it from the 2001 crisis, we need to focus a little harder on the business. Glenn Gow of the Crimson Consulting Group opines in one of his pieces, “This time will be different. Software won’t get hit as hard – but it will suffer along with the rest of the economy. Vendors that shape their marketing strategy for the downturn will emerge stronger when economic growth returns.”

That is the trick. To make the most of what marketing costs offer you in a slump. As the economy slows down, this is the time you can leverage yourself to the utmost by investing in your image. If you present your strengths at the time of a slowdown, it puts you at an edge around your client. If you show results and enthusiasm at a time when all is not well, you are bound to reap benefits in the long run.

Instead of worrying over the US economic slowdown, it is a time of cost saving for most Indian companies. That is the only way you can recover from loosing profit margins. When you concentrate on confidence building with clients at this point, you are bound to make a stronger statement that will stay with them much after the slowdown has recovered. You can focus on some image building, find newer clients during the slump, and who knows, you might win a whole new set of friends. This is the time where we need to dive deeper into our existing clients building stronger and longer ties.

It is up to the Indian software industry to make the most of the situation now. If everyone’s cutting costs in the US, which is where most of India’s business comes from (it is Indian software industry's largest market with a whooping 61 per cent share), there are all the more chances that more varied work will flow into countries like India. It gives us the opportunity to explore opportunities of doing more central software or knowledge development instead of cloning processes that have simply been passed on by our Western counterparts.

So far we are primarily providing back-office services. There are little chances of doing premium work like coding and engineering management. So this might be a good time for Indian techies to learn the intricacies of the technology market as it works across the globe. This again requires us to undertake serious marketing so we are able to garner more work out of currently confused companies abroad that are not sure how they want to go about maneuvering the economic recession.

The flipside, once again to India’s advantage, is that companies don’t cut down on processes that are mandatory to day-to-day processes. They may instead cut down on more nonobligatory jobs like consulting. This gives an advantage to Indian companies that undertake tasks indispensible to routine needs of an organisation. In an interview HCL chairman Shiv Nadar said, “Our work is the core of the client's business processes.” He says the company primarily focuses on technology services, which don’t impact their business in such a slowdown.

Innovation. That is another key to successfully rise out of the slowdown. Invest smart, get business that will impact you lesser and provide unique services at a good cost to new clients and old. This will boost your business now to propel outsourced work later. Indian technology firms can also look at exploring newer markets where they have not reached so far. With low costs, extended services and newer offerings, they can lure clients.

Many tech visionaries are likening India’s IT industry and the slowdown to what happened in Japan with the Auto industry and the appreciating Yen. Technology for India is an area of excellence and it is time for us to invest and use global best practices for India’s benefit. If we provide the right services at agreeable terms, invest into the image building and infrastructure for the industry, we are likely to benefit in the long term.

Another Important aspect of the India IT is to create or develop or acquire the “Intellectual Property”. Any downturn or upturn we need to build and/or revise the IP as per the changing dynamism and a look into the future. According to Dale Wolf (http://www.perfectcem.com/) creating Intellectual property is a universal truth, whether a country is in a recessionary or in a growth mode ... that it is our intellectual property that enables us to better satisfied customers. An “IP” is what a company can differentiate itself from its friends known as Competition. The ability to create uniqueness in one’s process, delivery, implementation, etc. can provide the competitive advantage that is require to tied over any downturn(s). McDonald’s targeted service time for a burger is 7 minutes delivery, no matter which part of the globe you are.

When in peace prepare for war. And that is what we ought to do. Utilize the time to strategize the marketing efforts/resources for reaping benefits in medium to long term.

Strategic Entrepreneurism in the New Economy

Designing a startup for acquisition means software entrepreneurs must follow a new path to success.

There’s an old saying that if you don’t know where you’re going, you’ll probably never going to get there. This applies to starting up a company in more ways than you might realize.If you’re going to start a software company, you’re probably going to think big. That’s what I did when I started Bharosa. And when the company was acquired by Oracle last year, it was not by accident.Today’s founders need to think differently when they start a company. I call this new-economy approach “Strategic Entrepreneurism.” Launching a company today is more risky than ever.

Following the new laws of Strategic Entrepreneurism can improve your chances of success.

What is “Strategic Entrepreneurism?”The ultimate dream of every entrepreneur is to create the next big success story. Whether you want to create a company that sells a specific product (such as Apple’s iPhone) or provides a unique service (such as Google’s search engine), the one key to starting up any company is that you must make money so your company can grow, thrive, and ultimately dominate its market. If you try to hit home runs every time you step up to bat, you’re going to strike out nearly as often as you hit a home run. In the world of sports, you can strike out and step up to the plate over and over again. In the world of business, one or two strikeouts can wipe you out financially so you may never get another chance to correct your mistakes and succeed.

By following the old rules of starting up a company, you have to shoot for that one-in-a-million shot if you want to succeed, even though the odds may be stacked heavily against you. If you can free yourself from the blinders of these old rules, you’ll find that you always have other options for starting up a company. This new way of starting up a company, which I call Strategic Entrepreneurism (SE), can maximize your chance of success while minimizing your risks.

How SE WorksThe basic idea behind Strategic Entrepreneurism is to refocus your goal. Instead of trying to become the one dominant company in your market, Strategic Entrepreneurism says that you want to be the one company that a larger, and more dominant company, wants to acquire.From day one, create and design your company to become an attractive acquisition candidate. Identify the companies that you believe would most benefit from acquiring your company. Of course, you can never control what another company does, but by understanding which company may acquire you and what their own needs may be, you can steer your company in their direction as an acquisition target.

Then when your company gets acquired by this larger corporation, everyone will remark on how lucky you are, not knowing that this was your goal from the beginning.When I created Bharosa, I designed the entire company to be acquired for the maximum amount of money in the shortest amount of time. Oracle didn’t suddenly discover Bharosa and decide that my company would be a natural fit. Instead, I designed Bharosa to fit right into a company like Oracle from the beginning. Everything Bharosa did from day one was aimed at making the company an attractive acquisition target.

Practicing strategic entrepreneurism can actually involve more discipline than trying to build a company towards an IPO. First, you must rely on far less investment capital to guard against dilution. The more money you accept to startup your company, the more you’ll have to pay back to these initial investors before you can make any money yourself.Second, you must build your company’s products so that they can seamlessly integrate with a potential acquirer in mind. This can be as simple as making sure your product doesn’t compete directly with a potential acquirer’s product to courting the right analysts to say and print just the right things about your company. If I could make only a single bet on my entire company, I would bet on the right strategic customer (and the right team to serve that customer) of maximum strategic interest to a potential acquirer.

To find a niche for your company, look for a crucial problem that needs solving and then provide that solution for a Fortune 500 customer that a Fortune 100 company would want to do business with or is already doing business with. By solving the problem of a Fortune 500 customer, your company will most likely be profitable as a result of this customer. By developing a solution for a Fortune 500 company, you make your company a desirable acquisition target by a Fortune 100 company.

How SE Differs from the Traditional ModelBy making the correct decisions right from the start, anyone can increase their chances of success for their company. However, to fully understand the advantages of strategic entrepreneurism, you must first understand what being an entrepreneur is all about.While every startup is different, the path for each startup consists of several distinct. Second, the entrepreneur assembles a team to help create and market the product. With a team in place, the entrepreneur may need to raise seed money to get the company started. This money can be the team’s own money, money from friends and relatives, or money from outside investors.

As the company grows, it may go through additional rounds of funding, which provides money necessary for the company to continue growing. Ideally, the profits generated by the company can provide the additional money necessary to continue growing, but if profits are trickling in, you may need this additional funding to move the company forward much faster. For example, you may need additional funding to pay for expanding your sales force or purchasing additional equipment.

Many companies make the mistake of using additional funding to pay their bills and keep the company alive. What inevitably happens is that the company continues losing money and once outside funding dries up, the company is forced to declare bankruptcy. As a general rule, startups should only use each round of additional funding to help it move forward, not to delay bankruptcy.

During this period, a startup remains a private corporation. After several rounds of funding, a startup may decide to offer an IPO, which essentially allows anyone to buy shares in the company and become part owners. This is the time where a company becomes public. A successful IPO is generally considered a major milestone, although it’s really just another form of additional funding. In the traditional model, a startup’s success relies on offering an IPO. However, the long path towards reaching an IPO can take years. During the dot-com bust of the 90’s, many companies issued IPOs prematurely, watched their stock price skyrocket, and then plummet into nothing.In Strategic Entrepreneurism, the goal isn’t to reach an IPO but to sell out to an acquiring company much earlier.

The drawback is that the potential valuation is much less, but the major advantage is that it takes less time, which also increases the chance of success, Strategic Entrepreneurism focuses a startup into being acquired early in its life.

The typical business model for a startup assumes that the longer a company stays in business, the higher its valuation will become - but that’s not always true for two reasons. First, the longer a company stays in business, the greater the chance of failure, either through changing market conditions or growing competition. Second, the more funding your startup receives, the greater the dilution of ownership for the entrepreneur.

The longer you hold on to a company, the greater the risk that your valuation may decrease. Strategic Entrepreneurism helps founders avoid this risk and ensure the financial success of their ventures through an early acquisition by a strategic partner.

By Jon B. Fisher served as Bharosa, Inc.’s CEO, Sandhill

Outsourcing to India: 1998 Vs. 2008

It is a fact that the business strategies change with time. Same is the case with business tools such as offshoring. The reasons that lured the early movers to India has changed drastically. And if you still want to offshore to India for the same reasons why some of your peers did in 1998, do that at your own risk.

Though there is no single event that one can point to which can be called the beginning of BPO offshoring to India, it is in the second half of 1998 that many of the entrepreneurial start-ups in BPO were planned. Many of them actually were incorporated, and became operational in the next year, though. For that reason, many point to 1999 as the year in which India’s offshore BPO industry started. To that extent, we can say that we are entering the 10th year of the BPO revolution in India.

As someone who has followed it keenly for all these years, I thought it would be appropriate for me to look at what has changed in these 10 years. And not surprisingly, most of the factors have changed — some for better, some for worse, some we don’t know at this point of time whether better or worse. Here is a list of five such tangible changes that I believe in.

Cost as the No. 1 reason to people as the main reason: Cost efficiency is a major factor behind any business strategy in a mature market; so is it in outsourcing. However, unlike in 1998, when offshoring was a newly discovered goldmine, is now more mature. While some have discovered that a comparison like that may not be the best way to measure cost saving, after burning their fingers; some successful early movers have realized that they can do in India much more than what they initially thought they could do, thanks to the available talent. So, many of them have grown by not just doing more of the same, but a lot more new things.

The cost equation has changed: In 1998, telecom was a good 20 to 25 percent of total cost. In 2008, telecom tariffs have become less than one-tenth in India, leading to a much smaller amount of operating cost going to telecom. Thanks to the infamous wage inflation, people costs have gone up drastically, with senior managers in Indian offshore BPOs earning almost same as their counterparts in the U.S. and the U.K., though the purchasing power of that money is very different in India.

It has become a sellers’ market: In 1999 to 2000, if someone wanted to outsource some customer-service work for 200 people, almost all Indian BPO firms existing at that time would do anything to get that deal. Today, even the smaller firms will not bother, let alone the large and medium companies. Not just because they have plenty of business coming in, but also because getting people for such jobs with high attrition is not worth the effort for many.

Finding people is not easy: In the good old days of 1998 to 2002, BPO (then call center) jobs were the craze for the youth of India, with even students with best academic records opting for them. Today, it is tough finding people, even if you pay well. The reason: Indian economy is booming with lots of opportunities in the domestic business, that are more challenging and satisfying. In the offshoring area itself, a lot of high-value jobs, often called knowledge-process outsourcing, have been created, attracting better people. So, do not expect to see a long queue if you carry a two column ad in The Times of India.

India is no more Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore: In the early years of offshore BPO, you did not know any location other than Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore. You did not need to know. Today, if you are not evaluating Kochi, Indore or Bhubaneswar — even if you are looking at Hyderabad, Chennai and Pune — it is time to raise serious questions about your offshore consultant.
There is one underlying reason behind all these changes, except possibly better and lower cost telecom. That is: Unlike in 1998, in 2008 India is not just a delivery location. It is where the future of outsourcing gets decided. It is No. 1 for any outsourcing. That sounds arrogant. Truth sometimes is.

Courtesy - Shyamanuja Das, Global Services Media

SOA and Web 2.0 'mash-ups' for business enhancement

The current wave of social networking phenomena seems to spawn a new website or next big thing on a weekly basis. Facebook is hot, MySpace is fading, and Friends Reunited is simply dead. However, the social networking trend has already begun to stray beyond the bounds of keeping up with friends - business is starting to take advantage of the technologies spawned by the social networking revolution. Web 2.0 changes the way businesses interact with customers having economic, communal and technological impacts.

Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) is a business-driven IT architectural approach that supports integrating your business as linked, repeatable business tasks, or services. These functions may be provided locally, remotely, or via an external system. SOAs effectively build applications out of existing software services. Using an SOA methodology or mash-ups (the difference being that mash-ups are always web-based whereas SOA is not) to bring in useful communication and information services could see an online convergence of services like email, news aggregation, account management and so on. The standardised technology within most business (XML, HTTP, AJAX, REST, RSS) provides almost boundless possibilities for creating business oriented, efficiency-increasing Web 2.0 applications.

‘Mash-ups' are created by drawing together internal and external information and applications, leveraging them to reach a new level of business competitiveness.

The web provides the central nervous system for this new generation of mashed-up, linked applications. By using a standardised computer code, applications can be made to talk to each other, creating innovative new applications and services. At this early stage for mash-ups they can be used to save many hours in administration. However, with increased security and development, as well as by leveraging the Web 2.0 phenomenon, mash-ups could become central to business development.

One way of utilising Web 2.0 mash-ups is the oft-quoted example of mashing Google Maps with currently existing core systems. The most cited example here is the delivery company mashing up their existing sales tracking system, inventory control system and delivery system with the Google Maps API. Therefore drivers can be given the best routes for delivery, as well as traffic reports, which is bound to boost productivity.

Businesses are using SOA and Web 2.0 to reach new markets and improve efficiency and collaboration. Web 2.0 extends the reach of SOA by making it simple for both business users and less advanced programmers to create or remix their own rich applications and to access services through the web. Enabling this new Web 2.0 functionality requires increased content and infrastructure flexibility - which is where SOA comes into play. When you combine SOA with Web 2.0, you get two related approaches focusing on connecting people and systems together more easily, making software and data available for reuse via services, and building new value upon the foundation of existing information resources and IT assets.

And this comes back to the heart of SOA itself - the development of new value from pre-existing software. The availability of adequate pre-existing resources means that developing entirely new applications is deemed unnecessary when the base resources are already in place - SOA is a common-sense approach to software development. When combined with Web 2.0 mashups, new applications can quickly, easily be written and implemented, at a lower cost. IT is able to reduce cycle time and time to market - more rapidly address application backlog and serve the business with speed and agility.

Yet there are risks associated with SOA and web 2.0 mashups too. These stem from the fact that SOA is a new initiative and merging it with Web 2.0 is even newer. The fact that it is introducing major changes to the way a company develops its applications contains an inherent risk associated with any such new development methodology. It will take time for IT professionals to adapt to the way SOA applications are developed and maintained, which is completely different from developing and maintaining bespoke applications.

Another risk with SOA is the issue of change control and SOA governance. If an SOA service changes, it could have an impact on a number of applications and therefore have a detrimental effect on a company's systems, whereas if you change a module within a single application, the impact is much smaller. The upshot of this is that SOA interfaces have to be well defined, documented and tightly controlled from a change point of view, hence a need for strict SOA governance.

Overall, the potential for creating Web 2.0 mash-ups using SOA far outweighs the risks and potential drawbacks. Both Web 2.0 and SOA are burgeoning industries in themselves and the potential to collaborate between the two could deliver new, high-quality applications in a short space of time. The Google Maps example is only the start - as soon as businesses realise the potential that this field could deliver, the world of application development is their oyster.

Courtesy - Sergey Karas, IT-Director

Transformational outsourcing, intelligent outsourcing

It has its detractors, but in reality there is little evidence to suggest that the outsourcing market is doing anything other than booming. Research firm TPI has found that Europe and Asia-Pacific are both still experiencing strong outsourcing growth. Outsourcing activity in Europe for the first quarter of 2007 was up by two-thirds compared to 2006, with $9.7bn-worth of contracts signed, while Asia-Pacific experienced a 30 per cent rise to $2.1bn. Outsourcing is still, and will continue to be, a boom market. However the nature of the outsourcing deals is changing.

In the past in the financial services sector, reducing overheads to maintain a competitive edge or simply staying afloat was the underlying force behind every outsourcing decision. In some respects outsourcing was seen as a way of passing on a problem that was too expensive and resource-draining for the company. Financial services organisations have been guilty in the past of viewing outsourcing primarily, if not solely, from an operational perspective.

Nowadays, a more mature and wiser outsourcing market has emerged. Companies no longer see cost as the principle driver behind outsourcing deals - more and more companies are viewing outsourcing as a way to add value to their organisation as well as gaining additional domain and technology expertise. By employing a supplier with high-level industry knowledge to develop complex technology that transforms or re-engineers a key business process or function, the end user aims to change the operation so that both the performance improves and the cost decreases.

Outsourcing the development of high-end technology, which will re-engineer the company's key processes - transformational outsourcing - is a new and exciting development in the outsourcing marketplace. Analysts describe transformational outsourcing as "an emerging form of IT outsourcing that combines cost saving with the potential for enhanced IT flexibility".

One example of transformational outsourcing is within banks and financial services organisations, which outsource software aimed to improve or re-engineer their front line operations. By employing a supplier with the domain and technology expertise to deliver mission critical software, the banks accelerate process transformation and build software that is a vital part of their operations.

When outsourcing is approached from a transformational perspective, the economic advantages are a beneficial result rather than an objective. The key aim is to accelerate and finance process transformation. This is geared around key business needs such as strengthening front line operations, accelerating speed to market, closing the skills and knowledge gaps and primary technology demands such as building a strong and flexible infrastructure. A recent IDG study on transformational outsourcing found that firms are increasingly using transformational outsourcing as a way to introduce strategic flexibility into their business models.

The transformational model implies another level of the vendor / end-user relationship. It is more of a partnership in which an outsourcing provider can demonstrate flair in thought leadership, pro-activity, domain expertise and an ability to adapt and respond to the end user's business requirements. This approach can be used in any sort of outsourcing practice, from high-end applications through to complex IT systems and business process outsourcing.

With the rise of transformational outsourcing has come the realisation amongst end users that outsourcing isn't a matter of simply handing over a problem to a supplier. The transformational model is different. As research firm TPI explains, transformational outsourcing is "the process of effecting continuous strategic change and tying the results of the outsourcing initiative to strategic business outcomes. It is a collaborative, risk- and gain-sharing relationship among the organisation and its service providers to drive enterprise transformation and achieve significant business process improvements." By harnessing the outsourcing process, and working in tandem with the supplier towards the same goals, transformational outsourcing can have a strategic effect on achieving company goals.

There are both huge benefits and potential pitfalls when outsourcing such development to a supplier. On the plus side, the promise of rapid, substantial, sustainable improvement in enterprise-level performance, as well as an improvement on the bottom line has tempted end users to consider transformational outsourcing.

However, it is essential to follow best practice guidelines when considering a transformational outsourcing solution. As in any outsourcing deal, finding the right supplier is vital. The difference in transformational outsourcing being that the supplier must be trusted absolutely to know the end user's business, the systems that are used and the operations and processes that are to be transformed. The domain-level expertise has to be one step above traditional outsourcing because of the fact that core processes are actually being transformed, rather than amended or simply being managed.

One other issue that must be thought through within transformational outsourcing is the need for the end user as well as supplier to look at their relationship as a business model, that benefits both partners, and not just a deal. It is very important that the strategic purpose should be kept at the centre at all times.

The advantages of transformational outsourcing come about as a result of intelligent outsourcing processes. When transformational outsourcing is put in place, monetary benefits are an inevitable outcome, but it is the improved value to the end user's organisation and processes that is the most significant benefit to the end user.

Courtesy - IT Director

Customer Trends that Can't Be Ignored

If you are wondering what's happening in the world of your customers, consider these statistics and there implications.

If you are not wondering, start…

• Consumer IP traffic surpassed Business IP traffic in 2008 and the gap is predicted to widen.
• Consumer Information Technology is advancing faster than Enterprise technology.
  Social Networking dominates Global Internet traffic. In 2008, all of the top 10 sites are in some way involved in Social Networking. These six were in the top 10 in 2005 but no longer are: ebay, Amazon, Microsoft, aol, go.com and google.co.uk.
• Fifteen to twenty-four year olds are 2 time more likely to connect via social networks than email. In contrast, adults 44+ years of age are 1.5 time more likely to use email than social networks.

The source: www.morganstanley.com/techresearch

These people are your customers and they are involved in a massive conversation. What are they saying about you, your company and offerings? What if they are not saying anything? What are you saying? Is it visible? Is it credible?

Courtesy - John Todor, Perfect CEM

Software to enable mobile users to get real-time information

A new software system which enables mobile phone users to obtain location-specific, real-time information, either actively or passively, from other users across the world has been developed by a team led by an Indian-American professor at Duke University. The rapid convergence of social networks, mobile phones and global positioning technology has given Duke University engineers the ability to create something they call "virtual sticky notes," site-specific messages that people can leave for others to pick up on their mobile phones.

"Every mobile phone can act as a telescope lens providing real-time information about its environment to any of the 3 billion mobile phones worldwide," said Romit Roy Choudhury, an assistant professor at Duke's Pratt School of Engineering. It will be as if every participating mobile phone works together allowing each individual access to information throughout the virtual network.

Interested in trying that new Indian restaurant? Tap into the virtual sticky notes floating in the ether within the restaurant and find what other network users thought of it. Heading to the airport and need to know where the traffic jams are? Sensors in the phones detect movement and can relay back to the network where traffic is the heaviest. The potential of this new application, which has been dubbed micro-blog, is practically limitless.

"We can now think of mobile phones as a 'virtual lens' capable of focusing on the context surrounding it. By combining the lenses from all the active phones in the world today, it may be feasible to build an internet-based 'virtual information telescope' that enables a high-resolution view of the world in real time," Roy Choudhury said. The application combines the capabilities of distributed networks (like Wikipedia), social networks (Facebook), mobile phones, computer networks and geographic positioning capabilities, such as GPS or WiFi.

Courtesy - Economic Times

Going to Hills

I am of to hills of Kausali for the weekend with my wife and will be back on Monday.

I read somewhere that sometimes you need to pull the plug and hence I am doing so. No laptop, no blackberry....above all no work, just chill. Hence no new post over the weekend.

Articles at current issue of Expert Access is highly recommended reading, especially the Q&A section.

Take Care and Enjoy the Weekend.

Blogging and Social Media

Recently Linas Simonis at PositioningStrategy commented on the post "The 7 Deadly Sins of Blogging".

Comments:
One more sin - not seeing of the difference between a blog and
a business blog.Blogging rules differences between these two are enormous. But
most of business blog authors still use old internet diary rules.What a
mistake!I even wrote an entire e-book on this topic - "The New Rules of Business
Blogs". You are welcome to check it out in my blog at
www.positioningstrategy.com. Please feel free to post it on your blog or pass
the e-book to whomever you believe might benefit from reading it.

I must say he has given me a new thought process and his book is highly recommended. Thanks Linas for the same.

I even noticed that he has referred David Meerman Scott.The New Rules of Marketing and PR on his site, which I am personally a big fan of. This book was gifted by my dear friend and PR Guru Steve Kayser. He is the editor Expert Access and Director PR at Cincom Sytems. Expert Access, is an award-winning e-publication that identifies key strategic trends, innovations, and critical business issues. Expert Access provides relevant, concise, objective information, sometimes in an irreverent, humorous manner, to help readers do their jobs better, become aware of new ideas, products, or services or occasionally have a B2B laugh. With an enormous 1,49,000 subscription base globally, Steve has turned a newsletter to a highly effective and efficient tool of communication. I guess number speaks for themselves.

I highly recommend subscribing to the Expert Access. You will be amazed by what you get or see.

I guess, the social media will turn into the most critical tool for marketers in the coming days. This does not discount in any ways how important it is today. I foresee that it will evolve into a much bigger thing then we know or can anticipate. A recent question on the Expert Access was a pretty good one - Social Media News Releases (SMNR's) Are Absolutely Worthless . The post surely indicates the importance of social media. I am big fan of social media and would not shy in arguing that it will be the next big thing in marketing. With my post Marketers, get ready for the social networks? I have made an attempt to give my view point(s). However with the evolution of social media, my article will keep on evolving and advocating for the same.

HAVE A GOOD WEEKEND !

Mind Our Mindsets

Move the World

The economy. Gas prices. Housing. Credit crisis. Healthcare. Education. War. Terrorism.

Yes. We face significant problems.

Albert Einstein once stated that,

"The significant problems we face cannot be solved by the same level of thinking that created them."

An adaptation of this comment produced as a bumper sticker subtly personalized and criticized some of those in modern society with this question:  "Can the problems we face be solved by the same minds that created them?"  Einstein's comment is the more tactful; the bumper sticker is more pointed.  Both direct the needs for solution to the quality and depth of thinking.

The answers?

Mastering Mindsets

Since almost all thinking is conditioned by various predispositions and diverse subjective factors, it may be useful to also think about "mindsets" rather than just minds, or thinking processes.  While knowledge, skill, intelligence and other mind-oriented attributes are key assets and requirements toward all success, the true "masterminds" may be those who also master their mindsets. 

The positive, optimistic attitudes are key hallmarks of the "can do, will do" mindset that is essential to, and absolutely necessary for, all high achievement in every endeavor or pursuit.  Such mindsets not only help to gain achievement, but they also help to enlarge and imagine new possibilities and opportunities. 

It's a Force—Good and Bad

Mindsets are more than just an attribute—they're also an energizing and directing force.  But, depending on the bent of one's mindset, it can also be a demoralizing and limiting factor.  So powerful is mindset that it might be said that mindsets move minds.  Perhaps without overstating this point, it might even be said that mindsets manage minds.

Carol S. Dweck, Ph.D., is one of the world's leading researchers in the field of motivation and is a Professor of Psychology at Stanford University. In her seminal book, "Mindsets: The New Psychology of Success," she identifies two basic types of mindsets.

Fixed
People with a fixed mindset (those who believe their intelligence is fixed) prefer to do things that will make them look smart and that will shore up their image instead of things that can stretch them and help them increase their skills. This is true even when they might badly need those new skills.

Growth
People with a growth mindset (those who believe their abilities can be cultivated) are highly eager to learn, even if it means that they will make mistakes and expose their deficiencies.

A "Growth Mindset is a critical element of success—in life or business.

"Learning is not compulsory ... neither is survival."

- W. Edwards Deming

Learn. Learn. Learn.

But in your learning, be precise.

Precision Mindsets

As we travel in any modern airliner, we may suspect, but not sensibly realize, that we may be often, if not perhaps always, slightly off course.  But, the navigation systems in calculus-like ways are regularly adjusting the course, in minute steps, as frequently as is needed to have the airplane travel and land almost precisely as intended safely at its destination.  But the aircraft does not land with perfect precision.  Rather, it lands as precisely as is necessary.  This idea that providing solutions, or systems that operate to the degree of perfection that is necessary, is an important one to consider.

But, however difficult it may be to measure and monitor all of these effects, still the requirement for the varying degrees of precision and perfection demanded from the products and services offered can usually be quite accurately determined.  In some cases, with which many of us are very familiar, such as the quality and reliability of the mission-critical software that Cincom offers, we realize that the degree of perfection necessary is very high indeed.

Pursuit of Perfection

This need for virtual perfection in our software development, testing, quality assurance and other software-perfecting processes is all the more challenging when one considers the great variety of usage environments, and the almost unlimited interactions of user transactions and application processes. In many ways, living and life are just like the perfection of software. We can never test, and thus quality assure, for every one of the virtually infinite number of possibilities or variables. One can never be certain, nor in complete control of all that may happen.

Still, no matter how complex the problems our software must solve, and how infinitely variable their needs may be, customers want virtually perfect reliability and accuracy.  Life too is similar. No matter how unpredictable or   challenging the times and the uncertainties may be, we are called upon to cope and respond in the many ways that produce the best possible outcomes for all involved—whether directly or indirectly.

Our Mindset

Whatever job one may have, product one may create or service one may deliver, our mindset should be the "pursuit of perfection—that can lead to a perfect customer experience in business—and in life, lead to a fulfilling and meaningful existence.

"To improve is to change; to be perfect is to change often."

- Winston Churchill

No software system, or any product or service, can ever be considered to be absolutely perfect. So we tend to pursue such perfection in incremental steps that enable us to deliver systems that are as precise as they need to be, remember:

No product is perfect.

No service is perfect.

No business is perfect.

No person is perfect.

But all can pursue, with a determined and focused mindset, perfection, and by doing so, everyone will be the better for it.

One thing is certain. Along the way, mistakes will be made. Yes. Absolutely. But that's ok.

"If I had to live my life again, I'd make the same mistakes,
only sooner."

- Tallulah Bankhead

Make our mistakes—sooner. Learn from them and improve.

But We Still Face Significant Problems

Yes, we do.

The economy. Gas prices. Housing. Credit crisis. Healthcare. Education. War. Terrorism.

What are we waiting for? Problems can't be fixed by the thinking that created them.
But new thinking, imagination, guts, innovations and bold, brave ideas can.

"Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it. Only engage, and the mind grows heated.

Begin it, and the work will be completed. Begin it now."

- Gothe

Mastery of the world, its problems, its difficulties, begins with mastery of each one's own self.

Mind our Mindsets.

Now let's go forward together to move the world, to become the better place it can and should be for all of us. 

by Tom Nies, Cincom CEO

Why IT Industry should expand its physical base

The government’s reported move to build over 50 IT cities in the country to retain India's top position in this sector may change the entire landscape of the industry which is now concentrated in big cities. It could also pave way for even urbanisation of the country. The move, complementary to the IT investment region scheme cleared by the Cabinet a few weeks ago, does not come as a surprise to companies which are expanding beyond the metros to service their onshore and off-shore clients.

Nasscom, the industry body for IT companies, has been in talks with the centre for developing new IT regions in the country. It has short-listed 50 locations in the country — other than the top seven cities —for companies to set up shop. “With the surge in real estate prices, IT and ITes companies are finding it tough to set up operations in traditional locations including Bangalore, Chennai, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Gurgaon and Noida. We expect small cities to anchor the next growth wave in the IT industry,” says Ganesh Natarajan, chairman of Nasscom.

Nasscom has, perhaps, taken a cue from China, which has developed small growth regions such as Wuxi and Dalian for industrial development. It reckons that Tier II cities will have the potential to account for at least 40% of the total projected IT/BPO jobs by 2018 provided there is a balanced growth. Currently, the top seven cities account for over 85% of IT sector employment “The proposed move will help spread development across the country and ease out pressure from big cities, where infrastructure is crumbling. By encouraging locations outside metros, the government could make way for reverse migration,” he said.

Srinivas Vadlamani, CFO, Satyam Computer Services, said the company has already initiated steps to move out of large cities. “We are planning to move into places like Vizag, Nagpur, Gandhinagar and Madurai and are setting up our own SEZs. This can lower our cost of operations, cut travel time and traffic congestion which our associates face in the Tier I cities,” he said. He says the government should offer incentives such as salary subsidy, free office space and liberal tax breaks spread over 10-15 years to make this move successful. Some of the Asian governments like China and Malaysia already offer such incentives.

“The state governments, for instance, can support the development of these areas by extension of similar tax benefits that are given to the Software Technology Parks of India (STPIs) and the Special Economic Zones ”, said Natarajan. But it is not clear whether the government plans fiscal incentives – similar to those enjoyed by companies set up in software technology parks – in the proposed IT cities. Companies are hoping it would, citing the slow-down in the US economy and its impact on their bottomlines.

According to Sanjay Khendry, vice-president (global business development), Sierra Atlantic, the proposed move to set up new IT cities will also help improve lives of people in small cities. “It will also provide an opportunity for existing employees to move to their native places. It could lead to improved educational opportunities as new institutes could come up in these cities. For smaller firms, it will be an added advantage as they will be able to get access to a larger talent pool,” he said.

The average salary bill for IT companies that have been battling attrition is a whopping 45% of the total cost. This could come down as companies expand their footprint in the hinterland. India’s $64 billion IT-BPO industry employs around 2 million people and accounts for 5.4% of the gross domestic product. It is expected to increase its workforce to 8 million by 2018. Fiscal incentives apart (the lure of these IT townships would not be tax sops only although each township could consist of tax-free SEZs), the overall success of the new proposal would hinge on the speed and commitment with which the government will work towards improving and developing physical infrastructure and urban environment in these locations.

As per the policy cleared by the Cabinet a few weeks ago, the developer of these IT investment regions (ITIRs) could be the government, private entity or a public private partnership. It has been rather difficult to attract private money into Greenfield urban infrastructure at locations far away from big cities despite the reduction in cost of funds due to the government’s viability gap funding mechanism. An assured market for the infrastructure facilities in the proposed IT towns could be an incentive for private funds to flow in. Even if the SEZ tag is not there, section 80 1(A) tax holiday for infrastructure projects is anyway available.

ITIRs would play a major role in urbanisation of the country. These new towns could at least slow the pace of migration to big cities. As to the IT industry, it can cut costs and be less dependent on tax sops. It’s a win-win situation.

Courtesy - Economic Times

Why Lack of Customer Experience Insight Could Spoil Your Business

The focus to improve the experience and interactions with customers is becoming a key investment and priority. Organizations now realize that customer relationship management (CRM) has not met the expectations once set to manage customer relationships effectively. CRM does not help you manage customer relationships but automates internal functions in marketing and sales, customer and field service. Now, the goal to improve the performance or outcomes of customer relationships grows in importance and customer performance management will become just as important as other performance management efforts in finance, HR and operations.

Professionally, I now see many organizations are building customer management teams that can span across the line of business to assess interactions with customers and examine the current experience and satisfaction. Organizational structure and customer related processes are important but unfortunately are not enough to be successful. You will also need information and technology to manage customer performance and measure experience, interactions and satisfaction.

All of this activity points back to good management of customer information and the use of it into new technologies that can facilitate improvements to the customer experience. This is not a simple endeavor, as the integration of data into a clean and consistent set of customer information has to be established to efficiently deliver value to those who need the information including your customers. Evolving is a class of technology providers like Cincom, Ciboodle, ResponseTek and TeaLeaf entering a new segment to advance the art of customer experience management (CEM) with methods to automate and measure customer interactions to a successful outcome.

I hope that those of you who are focused on improving customer relationships take heed to new innovations in information management and applications that can help advance your efforts. Just investing into CRM and the 90’s approaches could inhibit your future. New approaches like customer experience management and customer performance management are now beginning to bring applications and capabilities that positively impact your efforts. If you are not, you could be spoiling your business faster than you are improving it.

Courtesy - Ventana Research

India's IT Market Likely to Grow 18 Percent : Forrester

Signalling its maturity as IT consumer and not just a supplier, the Indian IT market is projected to grow 18 percent in 2008 to touch $38 billion, the second highest growth rate after China, Forrester said on Friday.

According to the latest Forrester study, the Indian IT market’s growth rates would come within a striking distance of China’s growth percentage, although a 20-percent growth would catapult the latter’s domestic market to a whopping $138 billion in size.

Forrester termed the double-digit growth as “welcome news” for technology vendors — who see sluggishness in the US and European markets — and advised them to now recognise India as a consumer of IT than just a supplier.

Commenting on the finding, Forrester’s senior analyst Jonathan Brown pointed out that the IT sector had long looked to India for top-drawer technology talent. “But India is poised to become an increasingly important market for technology vendors as its population comes of age (half of India’s population today is under 20), its rural areas become increasingly developed, and its engagement with the US increases. It is time the tech vendors no longer treat India as merely a skilled talent pool but also as a lucrative market in its own right.”

Forrester felt that Indian firms would make great leaps in application integration, ERP, CRM, unified communications, and security and regulatory compliance.

The report noted that while Asia-Pacific economies are closely connected to each other through trade and cross investment, they differed in their levels of economic development and the state of their IT infrastructure. For instance, while India, Korea and China demonstrated tremendous enthusiasm for the SaaS (software as service) model, Japan and Hong Kong appeared reluctant to abandon traditional development and licensing models in favour of SaaS.

Courtesy - Economic Times

Is the Middle of Your Company Happy?

Happy Employees. Why they so important to the customer experience? That answer is simple if you have caught any of our postings on the role that employees have on customer experience. The rule of thumb: employees that have a great employee experience deliver a great customer experience.

"Caught in the Middle" -- an article published on Knowledge@Wharton confirms that managers are often referred to as the "glue" that holds companies together, bridging the gap between the top management team and lower level workers. They implement strategy and organizational changes, keeping workers engaged during both good times and bad. Yet according to a recent survey of middle managers around the world, 20% report dissatisfaction with their current organization and that same percentage report that they are looking for another job. How do middle managers fare in an uncertain economy, and what should companies be doing to keep them happy? Middle

If middle managers are so valuable, why would they report dissatisfaction and leave their companies? A primary reason is lack of advancement opportunity, says David Sirota, co-author of The Enthusiastic Employee: How Companies Profit by Giving Workers What They Want. "When companies downsize, they will often cut middle management ranks. But even if companies just stagnate, advancement opportunities are limited. This hits people very hard, particularly people in their late 30s and 40s."

Shaun Smith, CEM Consultant, author and contributor this blog, considers the employee experience as one of the three main legs in his tripod of Customer Experience Improvement.

Align your people to deliver your experience

The question, Shaun points out, is how do you electrify and energise people in your organisation? How do you align them with your customer-focused strategy? The answer lies in the following four key factors that are critical to successful employee alignment:

1. Recruit people with the right fit
2. Train employees to deliver experiences that uniquely deliver your brand promise
3. Encourage employees to demonstrate the right behaviours
4. Drive and reward the behaviours from the top of the organisation

The big puzzle to those of us who believe that delivering a customer experience that is unique, relevant and valued have such a difficult time retaining middle managers. Here they are, the glue to a business. And yet, they feel caught, under-appreciated and in peril for their jobs.

Like so many aspects of CEM, the employee experience is cultural. Companies seem to have a hard time changing cultures -- even when they know the culture is hurting their performance. Does it really take a whack along side the head with a 2 x 4 to get the CEO's attention?

Courtesy - Dale Wolf, Perfect CEM

The 7 Deadly Sins of Blogging

The flipside of the ten P's of blogging previously covered here are the attributes or characteristics that should be avoided in creating a successful business blog. Like the seven deadly sins in Christianity, these vices can relegate a blogger to the underworld of the blogosphere though the judgment of readers.

Gluttony: Avoid the "it's all about ME!" syndrome in blogging, where every post is about ME, MY company, or MY product or service. It's perfectly acceptable to write a personal post on occasion, or selectively bring up one's product or service in highly pertinent posts. But if one's own company and its offerings are the only topics of coverage, the end result will be a (very boring) piece of extended marketing collateral, rather than an effective blog that enhances organizational recognition and credibility.

Greed: Everyone has to eat, so there's nothing wrong with generating income from a blog—providing it's done ethically. Including sidebar content from ad networks and/or affiliate programs is a common and accepted practice. The sin, however, comes from deception—passing off paid content as an "objective" blog post. If exposed, this practice destroys a blog's credibility.

Sloth: A blog needs fresh content on a reasonably frequent basis to be effective. Writing a couple of posts per month (or less) is not conducive to getting traction with search engines, RSS subscribers or other bloggers.

Wrath: The best review posts have an objective tone, presenting both the strong points and limitations of a product, services, company, individual or idea. But posts that simply trash someone or something seldom do a blogger or his/her audience any good, and certainly don't help the subject of the writing. I've heard the same idea expressed in a number of different ways over the years: "Keep your words short and sweet, in case you have to eat them later" (folk wisdom, almost everyone's grandmother), "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all" (my mother), and "You'll catch more flies with honey than you will with vinegar" (Mary Ann from Gilligan's Island). It rarely pays to make enemies.

Pride: You've seen it—bloggers who write with the tone of "I am the all-knowing fountain of wisdom on (topic), and you mere mortals should count yourselves blessed indeed to feast on the morsels of knowledge that fall from my intellectual table." Oh gag me. Get over yourself. I'd love to name some names here, but don't want to violate the deadly blogging sin of wrath (above).

So, instead, I'll point out some counter examples. Laura Ries is a best-selling author and frequent speaker at industry events, as well as a principal of marketing consulting firm Ries & Ries in Atlanta. Given her stature, she could perhaps be forgiven a bit of arrogance; yet neither her blog nor her approachable and charming personality display a bit of it.
Another example is Guy Kawasaki, a former Apple Fellow, founding partner of Garage Technology Ventures, and author of eight best-selling business books. Despite his fame and pedigree, Guy's blogging is delightfully humble and self-effacing. One of my favorite examples is his closing line of The 120 Day Wonder: How to Evangelize a Blog: "May you use this knowledge to rise in Technorati and make the A List. Just say hello as you pass me by--someday I'll be sucking up to you. :-)"

Seth Godin falls into this camp as well. In fact, it seems that it is rarely the truly famous who display pompous behavior online, but most often the wannabes, like...ooh, can't do it, no wrath.

Okay, this is where my parallel construction with the seven deadly sins of Christianity breaks down. The last two are "lust" and "envy." While someone may be able to come up with a clever way to relate those to blogging sins, I'll focus on two blogging-specific vices here.

Failing to acknowledge the existence of other bloggers: This sin often goes hand-in-hand with Pride above, but is its own worst practice. One of the very cool features of a blog post is, of course, the ability to link to other relevant blog posts as one is writing. For example, pretty much everything I know about podcasting I learned from podcasting guru Albert Maruggi, so I rarely write anything about the topic without linking to him.

Yet some bloggers write as if they are the only experts on a given topic, or at least the only ones with an opinion worth reading. They consistently fail to link to other bloggers who could add additional knowledge, perspective or insight into the topic at hand. Very bad blog etiquette.

And last but not least...

No contact information: The vast majority of blogs enable readers to comment on posts, which is great. But sometimes, a reader will have a question or comment they'd rather share with the author personally rather than through the very public forum of commenting. Giving readers no way to contact you directly is just flat-out rude.

There you have it. Avoid the sins above and your blog may ascend to new heights of readership; engage in these vices and you risk damnation to the depths of unread-blog hell.

Courtesy - Tom Pick

BlogStress.com

Guys we (bloggers) need to chill a bit and not take much tension. The below mentioned article published in Hindustan Times can be scary......hey nothing is larger than life......

HAPPY WEEKEND ! Enjoy with friends and family.....

The Article

"Burning the midnight oil, skipping meals, stressed out 24/7 - we aren't talking about students or BPO workers; we are talking of bloggers. Neck deep in competition to write the best post, get maximum clicks or make the most money, their lives are nothing but grist for their next post. They surf incessantly, are hooked on news updates, and are constantly thinking of opinions they can give. Taking a break is not an option.

In the US, two popular tech bloggers, Russell Shaw and Marc Orchant, died suddenly of heart attacks. Another prolific blogger, Om Malik, 41, also had a heart attack, but survived. Delhi guy Pratyush Ranjan has been blogging for three years. "It's stressful. I need higher levels of concentration. I've to socialise to make my blogs popu-lar, which further saps my energy " Zola Marquis's blog Elitechoice.org started as a passion. But now it is a job in which she invests up to 16 hours a day. "Whether I'm partying or watching a movie, I'm disturbed by the fact that I'm not blogging." Dr Ekta Soni, chief clinical psychologist, Apollo Hospital, feels that blogging is an addiction. "People blog for the sake of attention, and this can become an obsession."

Satisfied Customers Tell Three Friends, Angry Customers Tell 3,000

In today’s internet-driven and instant-communication world, customers have more power than ever, and they’re using it.  Through what interactive marketing expert Pete Blackshaw calls "consumer-generated media"—blogs, social networking pages, message boards, product review sites—even a single disgruntled customer can broadcast his complaints to an audience of millions.

Pete is Executive VP of Strategic Services, Nielsen Online and author of the soon-to-be-released book, “Satisfied Customers Tell Three Friends, Angry Customers Tell 3,000: Running a Business in Today's Consumer-Driven World”

In his book Pete reveals strategies to influence the voice of the customer that will ultimately build your brand or tear it down.  He shows managers, marketers, and business leaders how to establish and maintain credibility for their brand by being authentic, listening and responding to customers, and forming relationships built on openness, transparency, and trust.

Based on his experience working with Fortune 500 brands such as Toyota, Dell, Nike, Sony, General Motors, Hershey, Unilever, Nestlé, Lexus, and Bank of America, Blackshaw offers a clear strategy to sustain a competitive advantage by creating enduring, loyal relationships with today’s consumer.

On June 30th, Pete will deliver a webcast where he will share customer stories and outline his six drivers of brand credibility in today's world.  You can register for this event at www.cincom.com/blackshaw.

Courtesy - Randy Saunder, Perfect CEM

Three Ways Web 2.0 Can Make You a More Successful Businessperson

(www.AddictedCustomers.com)

1. Turning Information Overload into Insights and Opportunities

Today’s fast changing and complex world confronts both businesses and customers with too much information and confusion that comes with change and innovation. The time pressure of a 24/7 world exacerbates the problem.

Web 2.0 tools and filters can harness information overload and turn it into insights and opportunities. These filters can help businesses deal with their own challenges. Most importantly, executives gain insights on ways to help customers make sense out innovation and see how it can help them and therefore creating desire and demand.

2. Building a Networked Brain Trust

Trust in relationships can simplify things in a fast-paced and complex world. While online networks improve the efficiency with which businesspeople can accumulate and manage connections, they don't necessarily foster trusting relationships. The reality is that time-pressures and other societal factors have reduced the number of close relationships for most people.

Online social networking sites and tools can be used proactively to build a robust base of people who can provide the knowledge, know-how and advocacy to thrive in a changing business climate—a Networked Brain Trust. The key is turning online connections into trusting relationships with real-world consequences.

3. Regaining the Ability to Influence Customers

Customers in just about every marketplace are online and they are vetting products, companies and people before they do business with them. All three must have a visible and credible social media presence. If they don't, they lose out. A Web 1.0 website is not enough. Today customers not only want to know about products and where to buy them, they want to know about the experience they can expect when they consume them. And, they want to know if the people and companies behind the products will help them get the greatest possible experiential value with the least possible frustration.

The rules and tools of a Web 2.0 world are dramatically different from traditional marketing, advertising and brand building. To be successful efforts to build a credible social media presence requires an understanding of how today's customers make decisions and what they value. It requires an understanding of the principles underlying the viral network effect of social media as well as how Web 2.0 tools can be systematically used to make it happen.

The new rules and tools of Web 2.0 are a source of disruptive change to the business world. Therefore, it is essential that any businessperson who wants to adapt and thrive must know how to play the game. You can outsource the tasks but you can't outsource how your business knowledge and know-how addresses the challenges your customers face.

For the past year I have been helping clients deal with these issues. The insight, strategies and tactics are now available in two forms. One, an interactive eBook, Get with it! The Hands-on Guide to Using Web 2.0 in Your Business. The second is a series of 12 short and digestible, online seminars. To learn more, I invite you to go to the Get with it! Site.

Courtesy - John I. Todor, Perfect CEM

Outsourcing to India, China not Reversible : Obama

The presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama says he would make the US economy strong and competitive again by expanding opportunity outward rather than clamping down on outsourcing to countries like India and China.

"Revolutions in communication and technology have sent jobs wherever there's an internet connection; that have forced children in Raleigh and Boston to compete for those jobs with children in Bangalore and Beijing," he said outlining his vision of the economy in a speech on Monday.

"We live in a more competitive world, and that is a fact that cannot be reversed," Obama acknowledged as he kicked off his presidential election campaign in Raleigh, North Carolina by accusing his Republican rival John McCain of essentially endorsing President George Bush's flawed policies.

The US has faced such fundamental change before, and "each time we've kept our economy strong and competitive by making the decision to expand opportunity outward; to grow our middle-class; to invest in innovation, and most importantly, to invest in the education and well-being of our workers."

"We've done this because in America, our prosperity has always risen from the bottom-up," he said outlining his vision to build a "21st century economy that works for working Americans."

Obama said he too believed in the cause of free trade, as professed by Bush but with a difference. "There is nothing protectionist about demanding that trade spreads the benefits of globalisation as broadly as possible."

"Because we know that we can't or shouldn't put up walls around our economy, a long-term agenda will also find a way to make trade work for American workers."

"We do the cause of free-trade - a cause I believe in - no good when we pass trade agreements that hand out favours to special interests and do little to help workers who have to watch their factories close down," Obama said.

Courtesy - The Economic Times

IT/ITeS, electronics sectors show sluggish growth in 2007-08

Strong rupee attributed as primary cause

The Indian electronics and information technology and IT-enabled services industry grew 19.3 per cent in 2007-08 — the slowest in six years — to touch a value of Rs 2,91,000 crore.

The sluggishness in growth has been attributed mainly to appreciation of the rupee against the dollar.

Incidentally, only in the previous year did the industry enjoy its highest-ever growth rate of 28.3 per cent, according to the annual report published by the Union Ministry of Communications and Information Technology for 2007-08.

Strong revenue, jobs

The performance of the electronics and IT industry in 2007-08 in rupee terms had a deceleration.

This, however, does not reflect on the fundamental of the IT-ITeS sectors, which continued to be strong both in revenue terms and generating employment.

In 2007-08, the total value of software and services export was estimated at Rs 1,63,000 crore ($40.3 billion), an increase of 15.6 per cent in rupee terms and 28.3 per cent in dollar terms.

A year ago, the sector’s export reached Rs 1,41,000 crore ($31 billion), an increase of 34.8 per cent in rupee terms and 33 per cent in dollar terms, says the report.

BPO growth

Growing annually at over 35 per cent over the last four years, the business process outsourcing segment was the fastest-growing in the Indian IT sector.

BPO exports grew at 21 per cent to Rs 44,600 crore and this sector employs 2.16 lakh, the annual report says.

The IT-BPO sector ended 2007-08 with a direct employment of two million people compared with 1.63 million a year ago.

Every one job directly created by the sector generates four additional indirect jobs related to it.

Another eight million are estimated to have been indirectly employed by this sector last year, the report says.

Courtesy - T.E. Raja Simhan , Business Line

IT research: Is it time to analyze the analysts?

On the Web site of mega research firm Gartner Inc. lives a section entitled IT Budget Optimization, which, among other things, offers for sale 20 research papers on strategies for cutting IT expenses.

The papers cover everything from deferring PC purchases to cheap options for IP videoconferencing. But nowhere is there any advice on how buyers might cut costs on another IT expense that can easily run into six or even seven figures, a product that's Gartner's bread and butter: IT research.

There are more than 400 firms selling technology-related research, data and advice, sales of which topped $3 billion worldwide in 2007, according to Knowledge Capital Group (KCG), an analyst relations strategy firm in Austin.

IT departments across the country spend tens of thousands of dollars every year on IT research sold by Gartner, Forrester Research, IDC, AMR Research, Burton Group, and hundreds of other companies, raising the question of how, or whether, IT buyers can cut back or at least optimize their spending on research and advisory services.

Big money for big research

By now it's clear that the U.S. economic malaise is hitting IT spending. In February, for the second time in four months, Forrester Research revised its 2008 growth projections for IT spending downward to 2.8%, citing recession risks.

However, there is nothing to suggest -- yet -- that sales of IT research will be affected by the economic slowdown, says Louise Garnett, vice president and lead analyst with Outsell Inc., a Burlingame, Calif. firm that tracks the research market.

Indeed, both Gartner and Forrester (the only publicly traded U.S. IT research firms) forecast double-digit growth for 2008. Both companies announced healthy first-quarter earnings, and neither has changed its earlier estimates for growth in 2008.

At Gartner, research revenue grew 18% in 2007 to $673 million, and in May of 2008 the company reported first-quarter research revenue growth of 19%, or $189.5 million. Forrester recently reported first-quarter research and advisory services growth of 16% to $55 million.

If there is no money in the IT budget to do something new, then you don't need the research."

Paul Massie, senior director of IT

Just who are the clients behind that type of growth? Most IT research firms cater to two separate groups of clients with two different research business models: technology vendors, who buy "sell side" research to help them position and differentiate their products in the marketplace, and the companies who eventually buy those products, logically known as the "buy side" of the market. (See Market research: who buys it and why.)

Research as a resource

Technology buyers use research firms as an insurance policy against wasting resources. "CIOs use them to validate their direction, approve their choice of vendors and products and in general, rely on them to keep from making mistakes that are costly in terms of time, money and manpower," William Hopkins, CEO of KCG, explained in a report. "They gather, filter and synthesize information based on case histories, and they talk to a lot more people than you could ever talk to yourself."

Although it's relatively rare, IT buyers also can "rent" an analyst for an entire day of strategic advisory services, for between $15,000 and $20,000. Services like this are more prevalent on the sell side, observers report, where vendors are more likely to have a consultative relationship with an analyst.

Pick a pundit's brain

Many market research subscriptions include some degree of "analyst engagement" that allows subscribers to schedule appointments to speak to an analyst any time they like.

Although subscribers cannot monopolize an analyst's time, there often is no limit on the number of times a client can call with inquiries. A call typically lasts 30-60 minutes and, executives say, there is no sliding scale with respect to more in-demand analysts.

To be sure, some IT departments consider research expendable, especially when cash is tight. "IT research is based around the idea that IT departments are doing something new," says Paul Massie, senior director of IT for a California-based semiconductor company, who dropped his Gartner subscription when his company's sales hit the skids. "But if there is no money in the IT budget to do something new, then you don't need the research."

The research firms, of course, beg to differ. "We would argue that we've done a great deal of work to write research relevant to clients during good times and bad," says Charles Rutstein, chief operating officer at Forrester, noting the rationale of spending tens of thousands on a research subscription to save potentially hundreds of thousands in IT costs.

Either way, there are strategies that IT buyers can and should use for making better use of the dollars their research expenditures. "In general, people spend as much or more [on IT research] in a tough economy," says KCG president Steven England. "But you want to make the right decisions."

Research spending optimized

When working with analysts, IT buyers should follow these guidelines to ensure they're getting the most value for their analyst dollar.

Target accurately: Organize your technology initiatives and figure out which analysts and which research firms cover those area with the greatest depth. KCG's England recommends that buyers assess an analyst's value based on the quality of his or her insight. Talk to peers or execute a simple Web search to look at that analyst's published papers, speeches, moderated panels and quotes in the press. Even non-subscribers can often read short, bylined research abstracts on the firms' sites.

Remember, the top analyst in a given specialty may not work for one of the top firms, which means companies should . . .

Shop around: Gartner and Forrester have the brand recognition, but smaller boutique firms also offer solid research and analysis, often for less. Duncan Chapple, managing director of the consultancy Lighthouse Analyst Relations, which coaches tech companies on how to manage their advisory services, offers Burton Group as an example. "They have five or six specialties. A company could give up just one Gartner seat, buy one whole technology practice from Burton" and share that data across the entire company, he suggests.

Consider research-only deals: Outsell's Garnett says that IT buyers get the most value out of contracts that include analyst engagement (see Pick a pundit's brain), but if you really just need the data and don't require a deeper dive with an analyst, you can save thousands by buying research only.

Become a case study: If you offer to give an analyst case-history evidence of a particular technology deployment within your company, you can usually bank that in goodwill. It helps in building a long-term relationship in which the analyst may offer you a disproportionate amount of her time, or offer to let you call him directly with inquiries rather than go through the firm's inquiry service and wait a week or more for an appointment.

If clients don't engage with us, they won't get a lot of value and they won't renew."

Charles Rutstein, Forrester Research

Truly engage with your analyst: IT research buyers are responsible for understanding the roles and responsibilities of all those involved in the contract. You cannot monopolize an analyst's time, but you have the right to pick his or her brain, so make the most of your subscription and use all the resources you're paying for. "It's a shared responsibility," says Forrester's Rutstein. "If clients don't engage with us, two things will happen: they won't get a lot of value and they won't renew." Engagement, he says, should include inquiry, events, teleconferences and consulting.

Use data wisely: Gartner and Forrester's subscriptions are priced per-seat, which makes sharing information throughout an organization expensive. Other firms have enterprise-wide contracts where clients are free to distribute research in-house.

In each case, savvy research buyers should have a firm understanding of the roles within their IT organization to ensure that the right people have access to the right information.

For example, someone tasked with tracking business intelligence won't likely have much use for down-and-dirty data on virtualization. Similarly, top-level research on broad technological trends should be channeled to executives in the corner office rather than specialists in the field.

Don't be afraid to cut: Research buyers should take a pragmatic rather than emotional approach to their research spending and their analyst relationships. "Analysts can be very useful and valuable," says Massie, the IT director who dropped his Gartner subscription, "but they're not sancrosanct when it comes to budgeting."

By Lisa DiCarlo is a freelance writer in Newton, Mass.

Courtesy - Computer World

The End of Advertising as We Know It

The next 5 years will hold more change for the advertising industry than the previous 50 did. Increasingly empowered consumers, more self-reliant advertisers and ever-evolving technologies are redefining how advertising is sold, created, consumed and tracked. Our research points to four evolving future scenarios – and the catalysts that will be driving them.

Traditional advertising players – broadcasters, distributors and advertising agencies – may get squeezed unless they can successfully implement consumer, business model and business design innovation.

Read the entire report IBM Institute of Business Value Study, by IBM Institute of Business

Six Ways to Build Sustained Growth

Learning the Lingo of Success

The Choice: Sell Stuff or Add Value

If you have not yet figured it out, all of us as customers of various companies have had it with vendors who want to sell stuff to us without a wit’s care about our needs, our interests, or our situation. These companies have a thing or two to learn about us, and until they do, they will continue to struggle with declining sales and profits.

Do you think I exaggerate? Think again.

How many of our Fortune 50 companies would you guess have been able to sustain even a modest increase in sustained growth? The answer is an appalling and surprising 5%. The flip of that is 95% of large US companies are stalled. This alarming stat is from the prestigious Corporate Strategy Board in their now-famous Stall Points research report.

But other research shows a similar pattern:

1. Chris Zook and James Allen reported in their book, "Profit from the Core," that only 13% of 1,854 companies they analyzed had achieved sustained growth.
2. Richard Foster and James Allen reported in their book, "Creative Destruction," that only 16% of 1,008 companies achieved sustained growth.
3. Jim Collins reported in his book, "Good to Great," that only 9% of 1,435 companies achieved sustained success.

What Should We Have Learned? What Did We Miss?

Customers, including ourselves, are no longer passive targets. The Internet has destroyed the old way of selling. But while this is pretty obvious to all of us, too many of us have continued running our businesses as if this was just a bad dream. One part of our brains tells us things have changed, but another part of our brains clings madly to traditional business as usual. The numbers above tell us to wake up.

Where’s the Love?

For most companies, customer loyalty is just a marketing campaign, and the customers see right through it. Now they collaborate with one another in a myriad of online communities. These social media are where the customers live. They can search to learn about their problems, compare one solution against another, check with peers about their experiences, use online alerts and syndication readers to pull information to their computers, and watch videos of customer testimonials and customer anger. They can go deep into their buying processes without us even knowing they are looking at us. Or worse yet, they can make a purchase and never even put us on their list for consideration. We didn’t show them love for the past few decades, so they figure why should they bother with us?

Customers Now Buy Based on Trust; Not on Features

We have a choice. We can be part of their solution, or we can continue trying to pry ourselves into their buying cycles using interruptive, impersonal, out-of-sync practices. What prospects want now is knowledge and guidance on how to get to their goals, accomplish their needs, alleviate their pains, and achieve their goals.

If we can shift our mindset to believe that our product features are all that really matter, and if we can alter our actions to address this new world, we can yet again find a path to sustained growth. A quick example? Amazon doesn’t sell books. They help customers make informed purchase decisions. That is how the customer conversation has changed … and we need to learn a new language, a new lingo, if we are to get in this ballgame again.

This approach shifts the customer experience from an interruptive, pushy experience to one that gives customers valued resources that address their needs and interests. By changing the customer conversation from product-centric to customer-centric, we can create a relationship where you are seen as a thought-leader that is sincere in your desire to make them more successful. You move up the ladder compared to your competitors as the most trusted resource. When it comes time to buy, they will be more inclined to buy from someone they trust.

This relational experience changes the marketing dynamics.

We show customers how to be more successful.

We help them buy smarter … sometimes from our competition.

We built trust between our clients and their customers.

Learning the New Lingo for Building Business

For simplicity and to keep this article less than book length, I suggest there are six strategies we now must practice to create sustained business growth.

1. Demand Generation. We need to build demand for what we are selling. We do this by delivering targeted, outbound actions with customer-centric content and offers. Multi-stage campaigns that track prospect behaviors and use these to further learn about what our customers find to be valuable to them. Use this knowledge to further segment customers into slivers that are fine-grained enough that they know you are talking to them and not to the masses.
2. Syndication. Create customer-centric content that prospects and customers pull to them through RSS feeds (really simple syndication). Put another way, businesses are now in the business of producing and publishing content as much as they are in the business of producing products or delivering services.
3. Thought Leadership. Remember what I said about customers buying from companies they trust? Establish your management team as the trusted experts about issues that are of most importance to your customers. Managers now need to be speakers and authors who talk and write about solutions to customer issues … a lot different than writing a product brochure.
4. Social Networks. You have to be where your customers are. Join into interactive conversations with customers, using online media where they hang out and where they go to find trusted referrals for products and services. Do you have a FaceBook account? Are you enrolled in LinkedIn? Do you Twitter? Are you on You Tube or Veoh?
5. Search Engine Optimization. Buying cycles increasingly begin on keyword-driven search tools. The requirement is for you to get your company on Page One of Google, et al. You have to learn to write for humans and spiders (the electronic robots that weave their way through the Internet and locate and rank content).
6. Website. This tool has to change perhaps more than anything else you are doing. Most websites are designed from a company perspective, delivering little more than fancy electronic brochures about our wonderful products. That day is over. Caput. The website is now where you must deliver services and capture prospect and customer data so you can continually refine and improve the customer experience.

Of course, there are a lot of other things you need to change to get back into a place where you can create sustained growth. Your customer service must be exemplary. Your sales force must be taught how to sell with this new mindset. Your products must deliver an experience that thrills your customers. Your terms and policies must make it easy for customers to deal with you.

There’s a long list of things to do.

But mastering the six changes above will go a long way to rebuilding your relationship with customers and enabling you to deliver a consistently perfect customer experience.

By Dale Wolf