Forbes Magazine recently wrote an article called The Promise of E-commerce reflecting on how online sales have steadily grown, eight consecutive months in double digits in fact, while physical storefronts have suffered by comparison. This isn’t true for all storefronts in all cities around the world, Vancouver has one of the healthiest and vibrant foot traffic streets in North America, Robson Street. But by and large streets like Robson, one of the busiest foot traffic shopping street in Canada by volume, are Anomalies. And unless you’re a major chain, chances are you can’t afford the rent for these high foot traffic storefront spaces. But you can afford an eCommerce platform, trust me. For a fraction of a month’s rent on Robson, or Yonge, or Rodeo, you can tap into this double digit growth retail sector, and use the rest of your money to grow your business rather than sit and wait for window shoppers to gravitate through the door.

The misconception that custom software and eCommerce platforms are something only large companies can afforded is slowly evaporating as software as a service solutions for small and mid sized companies become more widely used. Though proprietary software from major corporations still makes up a huge territory in this ocean of software development, many innovative new companies have caught the wave of agile development over the past several years, and have utilized this new philosophy and approach with much success. Agile development is collaborative, employing ideas or problem solving from cross-functional teams who are able to create a more well rounded and intuitive perspective on the product they’re creating.  As opposed to the kind of programming that happened in silos, one big chunk at a time, it’s a far more flexible and quick approach to developing software. Thirdi has been on the crest of that wave since our inception, it’s a fun wave to ride.

As eCommerce continues to grow, in double digits, small businesses and medium sized businesses can’t afford to ignore its market potential. It’s important to remember that there is an eCommerce platform for every budget.

For questions on how to grow your business online contact the team at Thirdi.

As business has rapidly adapted to capitalize on the infinite potential of the global marketplace, software as a service has grown from a luxury to a necessity. These aren’t platitudes, these are entrepreneurial truisms. Running a small or medium sized business today is more competitive than ever, and to maximize their market potential companies have to overcome time and geography. Online components of storefronts can often times comprise as much of a company’s cash flow as their physical space itself. And the potential they offer far surpasses the physical storefront.

Take John for example. John runs a second hand store specializing in , instruments, sporting goods, game consoles, cameras etc. He has a lot of stock so he starts posting these items on EBay. Increasingly, he finds that people are contacting him to ship some of these things across Canada or abroad through that platform. The market potential of 30,000,000 other Canadian or 300,000,000 American consumers means his potential for sales has gone from the local maximum of say 2,000,000 to an astounding 330,000,000. Of course, his market share of that potential will only be fractions but a fraction of two million is far less than a fraction of three-hundred and thirty million. Let’s say 1% of people potentially want something John is selling. And John, wanting as much control over his business as possible, starts maximizing the ecommerce potential of this own website- EBay doesn’t take a cut anymore, the middleman is eliminated. He is selling direct to a vastly larger market now.

1% of his immediate geographical market (a city or region of about 2 million residents) is 20,000 people  1% of his national market (Canada) is 300,000 people, and 1% of John’s U.S. and Canadian Market (which thanks to progressive trade laws is relatively harmonized) stands at 3,300,000 people. That’s just 1% of the population looking for the products he offers. If we consider the online component of his business could reach a global population then his potential 1% market is 60 million customers. Even a fraction of that, let’s say .5% of the population equals his potential market size (1 out of every 200 people), this means 30 million customers could potentially want one of the items he is selling. John has gone from 1% of his local market population = 20,000 potential sales to .5% of a global population = 30,000,000 potential sales.

The importance of having an online component to your company, no matter what it might be, CAN’T be under-emphasized.  John’s example might be elementary, very simplified and idealized, but it demonstrates how anyone not engaging potential customers online  denies themselves the opportunity to reach exponentially more consumers and thus increase their income dramatically. It doesn’t take vast amounts of capital and labor, it doesn’t take years and years of strategy and patience. It takes a relationship with a service provider who understands the online marketplace, and who can help you create the ecommerce solutions that you need to reach your potential.

There is value in every corner and crack of your company. Products, services, information, even opinion, are commodities with value. Look at your business, look at what you offer and what you can offer online. If you aren’t offering something online, you should be.

For more information about ecommerce and how it can help your company reach its potential contact Thirdi.

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!

Recent studies by Forrester Research and Akamai Technologies found that 40% of eCommerce shoppers will abandon a transaction if a page does not load within 3 seconds. So by this rationale, eCommerce sites can increase their sales potentially by 40% just by increasing the speed of their booking engine, server or shopping cart software to this margin. Ensuring that your server never goes down and always doing maintenance to your server drives BEFORE a problem occurs is also key. Another survey by Iperceptions for the Hotel and Hospitality industry shows that a similar trend exists in their eCommerce platforms. If a booking engine takes 3 seconds or longer 40% of potential guests will abandon their transaction.

Some larger companies like Wal-Mart have turned to 3rd party cloud based “Software as a Service” platforms to ensure the fastest loading times and most flexible and robust experience for shoppers. Wal-Mart’s recent eCommerce strategy has been commended by many in the industry as nothing mind blowing but definitely a smart and necessary repositioning of the retailer online. It still doesn’t challenge Amazon and eBay for traffic but by adding 1 million new items for sale on its new platform it should gain some ground or strengthen its position.

So long as each item’s page loads in under 3 seconds.