I love being introduced to new companies, especially innovative ones with good and original ideas. There’s  something about start-ups and newer companies that are gaining momentum that makes me really excited. Just recently I posted about Lendingclub.com who may be the closest thing we’ve seen to a profit generating social media business model. I also looked at another company called InTouch, who are revolutionizing the fitness industry through a cloud based sales and marketing platform that supplements and supports human capital with digital sales and marketing activities that engages clients while  keeping management well appraised of all sales and marketing activities, in real time.  It’s been a good month, because on top of those first two impressive companies I was just made aware of another company with an innovative online service that I think might completely change e-commerce.

GoEyeball is an online shopping service that saves shoppers time and money by searching for any item as specified by the user based on a price threshold and other particulars. Shoppers make their own eyeballs on the site to find the products they want to keep an eye on, name the price they want to find it at (or a close approximation) and then the eyeball does the rest. Currently the technology is used most on major shopping sites that are compatible with the software but it is being further developed so that the scope and range of the eyeball will increase to include the entire internet; finding you the best price on earth for the product you want.  And you don’t have to do a thing, GoEyeball will e-mail you and alert you instantly when your eye has found the product you want for the price you want. Just in time for the festive season and right in the middle of swine flu season your customized eyeball can do your Christmas shopping for you, everything from kids toys to real estate listings.

I’m pretty stoked that I don’t have to risk  swine flu or debit card fraud on Robson Street now.

The Software as a Service industry is in the midst of an astounding 5 year 43 per cent average annual compound growth, and is expected to own a 23 per cent share of the $120 billion U.S. software market by 2010 according to the recent Royal Bank of Canada report “SaaS Primer – An Emerging Asset Class.”

Virtualization and Software as a Service have been slowly transforming the business landscape by offering effective ways to consolidate and manage massive amounts of data without having to buy your own football field to house servers. They’re also more cost-effective options because companies no longer have to buy physical product and install software,  it’s as simple as buying the service and logging in. Virtualization and SaaS don’t just save space they also save time. SaaS providers have begun to get more creative though as the industry moves from primarily IT data management into new realms. An earlier post examined LendingClub.com a company that launched via Facebook and quickly outgrew the platform. Though the company is viewed as a social media lending portal I feel compelled to include it in the new virtual business model- where the software coding is less of a product and more of a construct in which a service is experienced. They are the newest kind of business models in an exciting field of entrepreneurship. Another great example of innovative SaaS  comes from InTouch, a Vancouver business that creates comprehensive marketing and sales solutions for fitness companies world-wide. The software engages both staff, management, potential clients and existing clients through multiple digital mediums. For management and staff it organizes and clearly lays out all sales data including reminders of appointments and upcoming meetings, instantly informs the company of business leads from activity on their website, tracks sales and shows all leads and what kind of follow-ups have been done. For potential fitness clients it keeps the company in touch with them through reminders and info about the services that the company offers; “Touches” being a key concept in sales and marketing and something that many companies under perform in. According to a PR Wire release the InTouch SalesTracker Software (their virtualized sales tracker):

“helps clients sell more memberships and increases their revenue by an average of $25,000 to $35,000/month/location by ensuring that all leads are contacted automatically, frequently and consistently.”

InTouch clients take “luck” out of the sales process. The average health club only contacts a lead 3 times, while our clients realize that most people need to be contacted 7 to 11 times before they will become a member. Clubs that do not follow-up frequently and consistently, suffer from follow-up failure. SalesTracker stops follow-up failure by guaranteeing that clubs communicate with all of their leads frequently and consistently through multiple communication channels including the phone, email and SMS text” messages.

I met InTouch CEO Scott Johnston at an event recently and we discussed in depth just how profoundly SaaS and virtualization are affecting business. InTouch continues to  explore ways to enrich the service experience for users as the company grows, further developing this robust platform for business to client interaction. I believe they’re another excellent example of the kinds of new business models that we are going to see as engines of growth in the software industry.

Gimme that SaaS!