New SaaS Objections?

I'm always trying to learn about real life, in-the-field objections that sales people are having when it comes to selling SaaS products, especially to enterprise clients. There was an article published today on Silicon.com that features an objection to a SaaS product that I have not yet heard of... limited feature set. Wait, yes I have, and this is not a SaaS problem just because the product in question was a SaaS product.

If you aren't interested in reading the article, or the synopsis of the article, here is my take on it. Basically, the vendor showed the client some pre-release features that they couldn't deliver in a timely manner so the client looked for a product that could deliver. Unfortunately to get the features they needed, the client had to take a best-of-breed (do we still say this?) approach rather than an integrated one. This new approach caused problems since sharing data with the systems chosen proved to be a challenge.

This scenario could have occurred regardless of the software delivery method. First, integrating products that are not built to share data is not easy. Whether deployed or SaaS, products that are built without data sharing in mind often cause problems when forced to integrate. I think the mentality with a deployed solution, where you generally have access to the underlying database, is that if push comes to shove, you can drop down and query the data manually. Queries are one thing, but often people think they can import and export data this way. What they often miss is that business rules are enforced within at the application level and by writing directly to the database they could be causing data integrity problems.

Since SaaS products are hosted, a mechanism to directly work with the underlying database is generally not available, nor should it be. The SaaS vendor should know their market, know where they fit in the market, and know what products they might have to integrate with. They should learn this early in the process and create the tools necessary to allow for integration with those third-party systems. This should not come up as a concern to the client if the SaaS vendor has done their homework.

Second, in the case of the scenario referenced in the Silicon.com article, the vendor made the error of showcasing features they were not ready to deliver. Again, this is not a SaaS problem but an age-old problem in the Software business itself. Selling features that do not exist yet, or even products that don't exist yet, is not new, and not limited to SaaS. Software vendors of every kind must be cognizant that over promising and under delivering is not the way to build a sustainable business.

SaaS in North Texas

At the first Southwest Venture Forum meeting of 2008, the official topic was "Venture Capital Update: 2008", but the unofficial topic, when speaking with those in attendance, was all SaaS. First, I spoke to a banker who said his client is a SaaS vendor (technically an ASP, but I forgive him) and the company handing out a 3-fold pamphlet for their MySpace killer (guerrilla style) have a "SaaS Guru" as their CTO.

Finally, the two companies that presented their investor pitches (Red Oxygen and 2Go Software) made sure to use the SaaS buzzword in their presentations, even though they don't seem to have SaaS products at all. Red Oxygen definitely has a hosted solution and I think 2Go said they do as well. Don't forget, however, that hosted is not the same as SaaS.

This was interesting, especially given the fact that this was a non-tech event. I do think that we need to re-define what SaaS is, but at least its out there, and technology start-ups in North Texas apparently see enough value in the term to use it in their pitches. I'm going to begin work cataloging the true SaaS start-ups in North Texas. If you have a SaaS start-up in this neck of the woods, drop me a line… lincoln [at] lincolnmurphy [dot] com

Acquisitions Happen; Mergers Are What Employees Think Happen

John Taylor, VP Research at the National Venture Capital Association was in Dallas on Tuesday to speak to the Southwest Venture Forum with an update for 2008. It was an interesting speech with some great data about Texas. Hopefully the slides will be posted soon that give the breakdown; in the interim the raw data is available from the PriceWaterhouseCooper Money Tree site.

It wasn't the update on VC activity that was the most interesting to me, however. It was when discussing Mergers and Acquisitions activity for 2007 that Mr. Taylor said something I found to be totally true and yet something no one ever discusses. He asked the audience "when was the last time you heard of a merger?" His point was that it is almost always one company acquiring the other, often it is not "happy" as he said, but forced, and that employees are almost always told it's a "merger." He said, in fact, that he only uses the term "M&A" when he doesn't have enough room on a PowerPoint slide for the word "Acquisitions".

More Mapping Madness

This isn't my first complaint about online mapping services. Also, in this article I ask why Google doesn't have their own URL Shortening Service. It sure would make sending map URLs easier. For instance, if I want to send a map URL to someone, I can hit "Send" and it will bring up a window for me to send an email to someone.

However, it just sends an email with this really long URL in it:

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&
geocode=&time=&date=&ttype=&q=1+post+street,+
san+francisco,+ca&sll=37.0625,-95.677068&sspn=
35.136115,82.265625&ie=UTF8&ll=37.789811,
-122.402029&spn=0.008563,0.020084&z=16&
iwloc=addr&om=1

If I didn't want to send an email from within the Google UI, but instead wanted to include this link in a meeting invitation in Outlook, it would either be cumbersome or I would use a URL shortening service. Why doesn't Google create user-friendly, sharable URLs for their maps and other services? In fact, why don't any of the large mapping companies do this? I just checked Yahoo! and MapQuest and they both do the same thing. MapQuest's URL is just a monstrosity!

Yahoo! (not as bad as Google, but still bad)

http://maps.yahoo.com/#mvt=m&lat=37.789098&
lon=-122.402044&mag=3&q1=1%20post%
20street,%20san%20francisco,%20ca

MapQuest (HORRIBLE! Is this for real?)

http://www.mapquest.com/maps/map.adp?
address=1%20Post%20St&city=San
%20Francisco&state=CA&zipcode=
94104%2d5203&country=US&title=%3cb
%20class%3d%22fn%20org%22%3e1%20
Post%20St%3c%2fb%3e%3cbr%20%2f
%3e%20%3cspan%20style%3d%22display
%3ainline%3bmargin%2dbottom%3a0px
%3b%22%20class%3d%22locality%22
%3eSan%20Francisco%3c%2fspan%3e
%2c%20%3cspan%20style%3d%22
display%3ainline%3bmargin%2dbottom%
3a0px%3b%22%20class%3d%22region%
22%3eCA%3c%2fspan%3e%20%3cspan%
20style%3d%22display%3ainline%3bmargin
%2dbottom%3a0px%3b%22%20class
%3d%22postal%2dcode%22%3e94104
%2d5203%3c%2fspan%3e%2c%20%20%
3cspan%20style%3d%22display%3ainline%
3bmargin%2dbottom%3a0px%3b%22%20
class%3d%22country%2dname%22%3eUS
%3c%2fspan%3e%3c%2fspan%3e&cid=
lfmaplink2&name=&dtype=s

I can't understand why in 2008 this type of thing is still around. With the explosion of Twitter, micro-blogging, text messaging and IM, this just doesn't make any sense. And as I stated in the other post on URL shortening, the metrics Google et al. are missing out on is unbelievable.

Where is Google’s URL Shortening Service?

Why doesn't Google provide its own URL shortening service? Can you imagine the potential for a Google-owned version of this type of product. Think of the intelligence they could gain on the popularity of URLs.

No longer does a link have to be on a published web page to count against their Page Rank, but now the sharing of those URLs could be taken into account. In fact, this seems to me to be a better way (potential system-gaming aside) of determining the popularity of a URL. A big question is, how many people publish links to their favorite content vs. share URLs with friends. I'm guessing the former out-weights the latter by a huge margin.

If Google provided an easy-to-use tool (bookmarklet, addition to its toolbar, integration with gMail and Reader, etc.) and encouraged its use, this could be a serious blow to the 90+ URL Shortening Services out there, and a major gain in actionable intelligence for them.

100% of LinkedIn Users Violate Terms of Service?

LinkedIn can only be used for non-commercial purposes...








Is this the first site where 100% of the users are in violation of the terms of service?