iPhone 6 Plus – How Does it Stack Up for Business?

Sholto Macpherson

SME Tech Commentator
Digital First

Sholto Macpherson is a business technology journalist and expert on cloud software and services for SMEs. Since June 2011 he has published http://DigitalFirst.com, which explores how SMEs can use the latest cloud technologies and the impact of digital disruption on the accounting industry.Sholto has 14 years’ experience contributing to magazines and websites, radio and TV segments, webinars and conferences on enterprise and SMB technology and the cloud-led productivity revolution. His stories have appeared in national and regional Australian newspapers and industry websites such as CRN.com.au and iTnews.com.au.Sholto won a national IT Journalism award for Best Columnist in 2012 for his Cloud Channel column in CRN Australia magazine on the transition from server software to cloud software…...

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The iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus are “the biggest advancements in iPhone history”, Apple CEO Tim Cook told Apple fans around the world yesterday. But is a bigger iPhone a good idea for business users?

The answer depends on whether the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus will make it easier to do your work. Let’s take a look at five ways the two phones, with a 4.7 and 5.5 inch screen respectively, can improve your productivity.  

1. Communicate Faster

Smartphones with larger screens (“phablets”) are not only better for watching YouTube videos and photos. Business users can see more information in a single glance.

Apple has redesigned its native applications into two columns to take advantage of the extra screen real estate. The iPhone 6 Plus demonstration showed the Message app displaying the content of a message in the right column and the list of other messages in the left. That means you can jump in and out of text messages and emails without having to open and close each one to view the remaining list.

When you’re rushing between meetings it will make it easier to read the important messages from colleagues and leave the social texts for later. This is especially true of the iPhone’s Message app which lacks a Next button.

The iPhone 6 Plus further reduces the time to reply by squeezing in profile photos of each messager, providing context for the conversation.

It’s also worth pointing out the QuickType keyboard that suggests the next words for faster and more accurate messaging. The ability to see more on a smartphone is driving the boom in phablets, Canalys analyst Tim Coulling told the Guardian in May. "Bigger screens are becoming essential for browsing. Email gets easier on a big screen too."  

2. Work Faster in the Cloud

The screens on the iPhone 6 models are not just bigger – they have more pixels. The iPhone 6 Plus has a whopping 2 million pixels, double the iPhone 6.

Why are pixels so important? Most businesses are not fussed about prettier photos or videos. The real difference is that a higher resolution screen makes it easier to show more of a website without scrolling. This is great news for businesses who use browser-based applications to run their accounting, sales and marketing. Yes, many of them have mobile apps, but these are usually cut-down versions that lack key features.

The ability to fire up Safari and view the full web app will be a key attraction for the iPhone 6 Plus. We will probably see developers shift to responsive designs that make use of the phablet format. 

Just on the applications front – the new A8 processor makes the iPhone 6 25 percent faster than the previous generation. Quicker apps equals greater productivity. Add to that the longer battery life, particularly in the iPhone 6 Plus which has 80 hours of audio playback, 12 hours browsing and 16 days of standby time.  

3. Easier to Call

One neat feature that was kept under wraps until today is Wi-Fi Calling. If you are working in an office with terrible mobile reception, you can make and receive calls over the Wi-Fi network. If you move out of the office while on a call, the iPhone 6 will hand over seamlessly to the telco network. It no longer matters if you’re sitting deep inside a brick building, your phone will still work.

Another neat comms feature is voLTE which lets a user take calls over the high-bandwidth cellular network. Conversations are crisper and easier to understand; and thanks to simultaneous voice and data transmission over LTE, you can also look up something on your phone without losing the call. Wi-Fi connections will also work up to three times faster on an iPhone 6 thanks to a little reengineering.  

4. Single Digit Sign-On

Apple announced today that the fingerprint authentication system on the iPhone 5S, Touch ID, is being used to launch third-party apps (the one in the demo was online accounting program Mint). This is great news for businesses that use a lot of mobile applications on their smartphones. Entering passwords on the iPhone virtual keyboard is always a fiddly affair. It’s even more complex if you have to try to copy your login details from a password manager on the phone itself. If Touch ID becomes a single sign-on platform for iOS apps, happy days.  

5. Faster and Safer Expenses

The launch of mobile payments platform Apple Pay is great news for businesses. The iPhone 6 can scan your credit cards and then use them to pay for items at participating retailers. Millions of affluent iPhone owners will ensure that retailers roll out compliant point-of-sale systems pronto. The obvious advantage is security – the iPhone 6 doesn’t actually record the credit card number itself (it creates a unique number combined with the phone’s device ID) so if you lose the phone you don’t have to cancel your credit cards. Think of all the sales executives who run a corporate tab by handing their credit cards to the bar staff. With Apple Pay no retailer will ever see your credit card number or even your name. There’s no information for anyone to lose or card to skim. Given that we’re moving away from signatures to PINs, many employees will be happy to pay with Touch ID. After a long customer lunch you may not remember your PIN but you’ll always have your finger. Apple Pay opens the door to automated expense filing for employees. Although the demonstration didn’t show it, Apple Pay will probably send receipts to the email address attached to the iPhone 6. A simple rule in your email application could forward the receipt to an online accounting program or receipt scanning service such as Shoeboxed, Receipt Bank, Expensify or Concur. No more paper receipts stuffed in wallets until the end of the month. And the business owner can see outstanding liabilities from expense reimbursements in real-time.  

Downsides

Apple still needs to address weaknesses in its mobile strategy.

1. No Suites

A big miss for business users is the lack of integration with the two main cloud productivity suites, Microsoft Office 365 and Google Apps. Although they are owned by major competitors, it’s a shame Apple hasn’t done more to integrate its latest handsets with the dominant tools for business users.

2. Awkward Sound 

And as Samsung points out in its attack videos, the speakers are still on the bottom of the iPhone 6 rather on the front screen. This can be a little annoying on speaker mode in a noisy conference call.

3. Big Ain't Always Beautiful

Not everyone will love having a bigger phone. Heavy callers could resent prising a 5.5-inch block of metal and glass from their pants pocket while sitting at a desk. That said, I’ve heard that wide phones are more manageable if they maintain the same width. Remarkably, the profiles of the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 plus are smaller than the iPhone 5C and iPhone 5S.

The iPhone has put up a good fight against Android in the corporate world. The bigger screen and security features make it more useful than earlier versions. Steve Jobs may be gone but it’s safe to say that Apple isn’t going anywhere.

This post first appeared on DigitalFirst.com.

10 Things We Want to Know About IoT - webinar

The Importance of Addressing the Unknown

The Internet of Things is this year’s technology buzz word, but in the excitement over this new technology, we have forgotten to ask some important questions.

How will connectivity work? What about privacy? Can our internet infrastructure handle the demand?

Join R “Ray” Wang as he interviews entrepreneur and technology scholar, Richie Etwaru about this void in our knowledge of internet of things.

You will learn:

• 10 things we want to know about the Internet of Things
• How to avoid the pundit effect (talking a lot, but knowing little) when implementing new technologies 

Webinar Details:

•  September 19, 2014 11:00a.m. PT / 2:00p.m. ET
• Speakers: R "Ray" Wang, Richie Etwaru 

How Will Agencies Get the Attention of the CMO? Publicis Groupe Adobe Multi-firm Announces Always-On Service Delivery Platform /

Vice President and Principal Analyst, Constellation Research
Constellation Research

Role: Vice President and Principal Analyst focusing on the IOT of Customer Experience and how the cloud is driving more flexible, agile, and robust customer service and customer experiences. In-app or in device customer service is the future. Coverage Areas: Next Generation Customer, Digital Marketing Transformation Bio: As a Vice President and Principal Analyst at Constellation Research, Inc, Petouhoff works with Fortune 100 and 500’s Senior Leadership teams to create strategic customer experience (marketing, sales and service) solutions which engage customers, build brands and grow businesses. Combining her experience as a former Forrester software analyst, PWC systems integrator and change management consultant, Petouhoff leads executive workshops to discuss to not only…...

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How will agencies get the attention of CMOs for marketing optimization and big data analytics? Here’s one approach: Publicis Groupe and Adobe announced a strategic partnership to deliver the Publicis Groupe Always-On Platform™, the first end-to-end marketing management platform from Publicis Groupe that automates and connects all components of a client’s marketing efforts.

This unique platform will standardize on Adobe Marketing Cloud, and for the first time in the industry, all agencies across Publicis Groupe will be able to create engaging content, access marketing intelligence, identify and build audience segments, deliver campaigns, and track and measure marketing performance through a unified technology and data structure.

Available to all agencies in the Publicis Groupe network, the platform will be anchored in VivaKi as an open framework so that every agency can deploy and brand it uniquely for use. Agencies currently slated to access the system include BBH, DigitasLBi, Leo Burnett, MSLGROUP, Publicis Worldwide, Razorfish, Rosetta, Saatchi & Saatchi, Starcom MediaVest Group, VivaKi and ZenithOptimedia.

The collaboration is expected to drive growth across the two companies, and accelerate Publicis Groupe’s goal to make combined digital and emerging market revenue 75 percent of its multi-billion dollar business by 2018.

It is a great partnership. My only concern is that this type of implementation requires organization change management on behalf of each organization and great leadership that understands their current organizations and the vision of the future state and where the agencies are going….. It will require the right leadership in each organization and the skill sets — people who are not only excited about using the technology, but is not so busy that they can learn to use and then optimize it. I believe it’s possible and that these firms can make it happen. They are well positioned to be the leaders.

That’s my take!
@drnatalie

VP and Principle Analyst, Connecting Marketing, Customer Experience and Customer Service

See you at Constellation’s Connected Enterprise, Half Moon Bay, CA Oct 29th-31st, 2014

5 Easy Steps to Solve Your Digital Marketing Challenges Using Big Data Analytics: A Clear Path Forward for the CMO

Vice President and Principal Analyst, Constellation Research
Constellation Research

Role: Vice President and Principal Analyst focusing on the IOT of Customer Experience and how the cloud is driving more flexible, agile, and robust customer service and customer experiences. In-app or in device customer service is the future. Coverage Areas: Next Generation Customer, Digital Marketing Transformation Bio: As a Vice President and Principal Analyst at Constellation Research, Inc, Petouhoff works with Fortune 100 and 500’s Senior Leadership teams to create strategic customer experience (marketing, sales and service) solutions which engage customers, build brands and grow businesses. Combining her experience as a former Forrester software analyst, PWC systems integrator and change management consultant, Petouhoff leads executive workshops to discuss to not only…...

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The world has gone digital, and no one feels the pressure more than the CMO. Customer segmentation presents challenges that are not possible to uncover with traditional methods. According to Forbes, “Gartner analyst Laura McLellan recently predicted that by 2017, CMOs will spend more on IT than their counterpart CIOs.” Those who don’t embrace analytics fully will lose their seat at the C-suite table. 

First Take - SAP’s SuccessConnect - Top 3 Takeaways Day 1 Keynote

Holger Mueller

Vice President and Principal Analyst
Constellation Research

Holger Mueller is VP and Principal Analyst for Constellation Research for the fundamental enablers of the cloud, IaaS, PaaS and next generation Applications, with forays up the tech stack into BigData and Analytics, HR Tech, and sometimes SaaS. Holger provides strategy and counsel to key clients, including Chief Information Officers, Chief Technology Officers, Chief Product Officers, Chief HR Officers, investment analysts, venture capitalists, sell-side firms, and technology buyers.  Coverage Areas: Future of Work Tech Optimization & Innovation  Background: Before joining Constellation Research, Mueller was VP of Products for NorthgateArinso, a KKR company. There, he led the transformation of products to the cloud and laid the foundation for new Business Process as a…...

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Here are my top 3 takeaways of the Day 1 keynote – which is always more about the general business, with the Day 2 keynote more reserved to product as delivered by Dmitri Krakovsky tomorrow.

• Another SuccessConnect – another transition. Last year it was the first time that SuccessConnect happened with a new leader, Lars Dalgaard having left SAP, and Shawn Price did a very good job re-assuring attendees that the new SuccessFactors would only be better than before, to quell any takeover angst. And overall that has panned out very well for SAP with most of the SuccessFactors clients staying loyal, giving both credit to SAP and the product vision. Of course it doesn’t hurt when all customer need a product, that is being promisingly delivered – which is EmployeeCentral.
  
  12 months later there is a new leader with Mike Ettling, who performed equally well with his first major keynote in front of the customer, user and partner base. A different style, it was all jeans on stage, a few more jokes and bringing back Lars Dalgaard on stage was a different delivery than last year, which – what matters most – was well received by the audience. 

• Trends, Trends, … No HCM event these days without talk about Millennials. And the keynote even brought them on stage – two new graduates of the SAP sales academy talking about experiences, an then in true – as presumed – Millennial fashion taped Dalgaard’s view on where the industry is – right in to a SAP Jam session. It was all good – but looked a little bit too scripted. And in general we don’t think at Constellation Research that it’s about your date of birth, but your digital proficiency – read my colleague Alan Lepofsky’s report here). The implications for vendors are significant – as e.g. Jam is not only for the Millennials but for all users. If digital proficiency will postulate a different user experience – as it should – remains something to be seen – beyond SAP.

• Major Service Improvements – Unfortunately only at the very end of the keynote – when the audience was as usual a little drained in attention span – Ettling announced a number of key services changes – unfortunately not explicitly mentioned on slides – so I may miss a few – but the key ones were:

• • A rolling roadmap of 12 months, which garnered direct applause. A good move as customers deserve to know and plan what’s ahead.
     
  • A separation of test and production. I think that is already the case – and probably this didn’t come over as clear as supposed to, meaning more that customers will have access to the new version before it goes to production. Certainly something SuccessFactors needed to address.
     
  • A release document 6 weeks before cut over. Not sure how late or early SAP customers learnt what is in a release but this is certainly a welcome change, too.

We need to find out more on these – and see if they are meant for both SAP HCM and SuccessFactors products and more, stay tuned. Ettling has an extensive services background from his time at NorthgateArinso and Unisys – so I am pretty sure he knows what stands behind these announcements, which ultimately should be all for the better for customers and ecosystem overall. Now SAP needs to deliver on them .

MyPOV

A successful start for this SuccessConnect – next executive transition handled well – stay tuned for the event report in the next days. We had asked SAP for roadmaps since the longest time – something that SuccessFactors as a SaaS company claimed it couldn’t (or needn’t) to do – so this is a change for the better.

Where to Start: Lead by Letting Go

Terri Griffith

Professor/Author/Speaker
Simon Fraser University

Terri Griffith holds the Keith Beedie Chair in Innovation and Entrepreneurship at Simon Fraser University’s Beedie School of Business. She spent two decades in the Silicon Valley and, in 2012 was honored as a Woman of Influence by the Silicon Valley Business Journal. Terri helps her students and their organizations accelerate performance and prepare for the futures of work. Through her speaking, writing, teaching, and research, she brings evidence-based leadership and innovation to high-tech, education, and global agribusiness organizations. She inspires and coaches groups on negotiating change and uniquely mixing existing and new capabilities. Her most recent work uses a “bottom-up” approach to automation, including artificial intelligence. Her award-winning book, The Plugged-In Manager:…...

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How To Lead By Letting Go

• Let go of traditional job reviews. Instead of the momentous annual sitdown, provide 24/7 performance feedback as needed. The colorful former Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz once fired a manager with no notice after the manager fought so hard for her idea--ultimately successfully -- that she alienated the colleagues she’d need to enact it.  Salesforce.com’s Work.com makes feedback as easy as checking-in on Facebook. Younger workers want more feedback and transparency in their work -- embrace that, as great ideas can come from unexpected places in the organization. 
• Let go of stay-in-one-place work rules. Marissa Mayer may have had her reasons for cancelling telecommuting at Yahoo, but if you have the right systems, technology, and people in place, flexible workplace strategies are  an important part of most organizations. You get access to a global workforce and the work environment can better match the task.
• Let go of education requirements of old. Google is hiring more people without college degrees -- if they can do the work. Automattic (the company behind WordPress.com) hires into its global workforce by having candidates take on a project as a contractor first.  Coursera, Udacity, Udemy, edX, and many others provide online, often free, ways to keep up the skills needed in the modern workforce. If you do want a degree, realize that you’ll eventually need another one or two to stay on top of the changing needs of the workforce.
• Let go of traditional mentoring roles.  Mentoring is a two-way street where younger workers can share rapid-fire communication strategies and more senior colleagues can share wisdom around how to value the firehose of information. And like jobs, mentoring relationships can be more fluid with online matching services.

Thank You

Future of Work - One spreadsheet at a time

Holger Mueller

Vice President and Principal Analyst
Constellation Research

Holger Mueller is VP and Principal Analyst for Constellation Research for the fundamental enablers of the cloud, IaaS, PaaS and next generation Applications, with forays up the tech stack into BigData and Analytics, HR Tech, and sometimes SaaS. Holger provides strategy and counsel to key clients, including Chief Information Officers, Chief Technology Officers, Chief Product Officers, Chief HR Officers, investment analysts, venture capitalists, sell-side firms, and technology buyers.  Coverage Areas: Future of Work Tech Optimization & Innovation  Background: Before joining Constellation Research, Mueller was VP of Products for NorthgateArinso, a KKR company. There, he led the transformation of products to the cloud and laid the foundation for new Business Process as a…...

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Whenever people need to do anything with numbers in a professional environment – Microsoft Excel is the tool at hand. Most enterprise desktops come with a full Microsoft Office suite and with that Excel is there as well. With that enterprise grasp the Office tools have overall gotten such a hold of people, that many buy Office for their home document handling needs, too. High schools, universities and enterprises even offer Excel training courses. So the domination of Excel for number centric work is pretty absolute.

So no question – to unseat Excel is really hard, but then the product has some weaknesses. Even though it offers easy template creation, users have to do things over and over again. How often have you created the infamous pie or bar chart (again and again … and again)? What if a product could ‘sense’ semantics and offer the appropriate tools, processes and visualization, right out of the box?

In my view I thought the Microsoft competitors had largely given up – to my surprise I stumbled over an unlikely entrant – Informatica’s Springbok (a codename that likely will change, currently the product is pilot mode). [Please note that the Excel competitive / replacement position is my interpretation, Informatica is not officially positioning the product as such.]

There are some things Informatica has done remarkably well – and these will create significant value for the average business user:

• Just upload your data – and Springbok will make sense of it. As simple as it sounds – this is really hard. But pretty well solved and addressed.

• Besides the usual functional menu, Springbok offer the user directly value enrichment. If the user clicks e.g. on a column with zip codes, Springbok offers a distribution of them. Click on a column with state data, Springbok offers a map of the USA with states highlighted by frequency in the data set. 

• Complex out of the box functions are just ‘there’ – no need to code, integrate or even procure (though I am sure at some point users will have to pay for enhanced services such as Dun & Bradstreet validation and normalization).

The most important Internet security group you’ve never heard of

Steve Wilson

Former Vice President and Principal Analyst
Constellation Research

Steve Wilson is former VP and Principal Analyst at Constellation Research, leading the business theme Digital Safety and Privacy. His coverage includes digital identity, data protection, data privacy, cryptography, and trust. His advisory services to CIOs, CISOs, CPOs and IT architects include identity product strategy, security practice benchmarking, Privacy by Design (PbD), privacy engineering and Privacy [or Data Protection] Impact Assessments (PIA, DPIA). Coverage Areas: -  Identity management, frameworks & governance-  Digital identity technologies-  Privacy by Design -  Big Data; “Big Privacy”-  Identity & privacy innovation Previous experience: Wilson has worked in ICT innovation, research, development and analysis for over 25 years. With double…...

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You can be forgiven if the FIDO Alliance is not on your radar screen. It was launched barely 18 months ago, to help solve the "password crisis" online, but it's already proven to be one of most influential security bodies yet.

The typical Internet user has dozens of accounts and passwords. Not only are they a pain in the arse, poor password practices are increasingly implicated in fraud and terrible misadventures like the recent "iCloud Hack" which exposed celebrities' personal details.

With so many of our assets, our business and our daily lives happening in cyberspace, we desperately need better ways to prove who we are online - and even more importantly, prove what we entitled to do there.

The FIDO Alliance is a new consortium of identity management vendors, product companies and service providers working on strong authentication standards. FIDO's vision is to tap the powers of smart devices - smart phones today and wearables tomorrow - to log users on to online services more securely and more conveniently.

FIDO was founded by Lenovo, PayPal, and security technology companies AGNITiO, Nok Nok Labs and Validity Sensors, and launched in February 2013. Since then the Alliance has grown to over 130 members. Two new authentication standards have been published for peer review, half a dozen companies showcased FIDO-Ready solutions at the 2014 Consumer Electronic Show (CES) in Las Vegas, and PayPal has released its ground-breaking pay-by-fingerprint app for the Samsung Galaxy S5.

The FIDO Alliance includes technology heavyweights like Google, Lenovo, Microsoft and Samsung; payments giants Discover, MasterCard, PayPal and Visa; financial services companies such as Aetna, Bank of America and Goldman Sachs; and e-commerce players like Netflix and Salesforce.com. There are also a couple of dozen biometrics vendors, many leading Identity and Access Management (IDAM) solutions and services, and almost every cell phone SIM and smartcard supplier in the world.

I have been watching FIDO since its inception and reporting on it for Constellation Research. The third update in my series of research reports on FIDO is now available and can be downloaded here. The report looks in depth at what the Alliance has to offer vendors and end user communities, its critical success factors, and how and why this body is poised to shake up authentication like never before.

Update on the FIDO Alliance: IDAM Implications for a World of Digital Business

My Involuntary Medical Tourism - and a bad Pattern for the U.S.

Chris Meyer

Chris Meyer is a thought leader focusing on the information economy, globalization and business innovation. His latest book is "Standing on the Sun".
Got Nerve

Chris's mission is to anticipate and shape the future of business. He has pursued this goal as an entrepreneur, executive, consultant, author, and the leader of a think tank.

 Based on the ideas in his 2002 book Future Wealth, Chris developed a plan for a business based on a network of thought leaders. He joined The Monitor Group in 2006 to develop this idea as Monitor Networks, where he was Chief Executive from 2004 to 2009. In 2006, he co-founded Monitor Talent, to take these ideas forward operationally. Prior to joining Monitor Group, he was the Director of the Center for Business Innovation at Cap Gemini Ernst & Young, from 1995 until its closing in December 2002. The Center fostered the conversation of leading issues among the business community, developed public conferences,…...

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I was in Singapore a few weeks ago for a mixture of work (digital innovation) and play (attend a wedding). Good times.

Until the night before the wedding, when with our Australian friends who’d kindly flown up to meet us, we went out to the deservedly famed Indian restaurant in the PanPacific hotel.

You’ll note that the entrance is pretty dark, to prepare you for the quite dramatic lighting inside.  My friend and I, strolling in, approached the image of Ganesha you see in the picture. Unfortunately I overlooked the 5” high platform on which the Remover of Obstacles was displayed, and tripped — as I fell, I caught a finger on the crossbar on the wall resulting in the all but complete evulsion of the nail (you don’t want me to explain.)

I mentioned the hotel by name above because the staff could not have been more solicitous and competent, and after providing me a napkin full of ice suggested I visit Raffles Hospital, a mile away.

Here begins the voyage of discovery. 

My wife and I appeared at the emergency room check-in desk, and before any administrative questions were asked I was seated in an examination room. The doctor appeared within two minutes to take a look.  He offered me two options.  They could remove the nail, basically hanging by a thread, and I would just wait to see if a new one would grow back; or they could remove it, wash it, reinsert it where it belonged, and stitch it onto the finger.  He told me the latter would improve the chance of a normal nail growing in, so that’s what I chose.

Half an hour later we were done, including a precautionary X-ray I requested. I went back to my hotel with a kit of dressing supplies and medications.

The total bill was 465 Singapore Dollars, or $372. (That X-ray I asked for was taken and read for $80.)

When I got back to the US I went to see my doctor, who said that she’d never heard of reinserting a nail back into a finger, and admired how well it was healing.  She also said that at Mass General Hospital the cost would have been in the thousands.

Let's review: Instant service; a treatment with a great outcome that likely wouldn’t have been tried in the U.S.; and a cost an order of magnitude less than the U.S. equivalent.

Travel indeed broadens the mind.

So it was with a changed point of view that I read of the difficulties of the U.S. blood industry, facing sharply declining demand. The trend is “wreaking havoc in the blood bank business, forcing a wave of mergers and job cutbacks unlike anything the industry…has ever seen.” Transfusions are down from 15 million to 11 million units over the last five years, it turns out, despite the aging of the population, costing the industry $1.5 billion in revenue.

Granted, this was in the business section.  But I couldn’t help wondering why the medical advances at the root of this development weren’t the headline — e.g. total hip replacement formerly required 750ml (1.5 pints) of blood and now uses only 200ml.

To return to the difference in cost between Raffles and Mass General – perhaps this has something to do with it: “Nonprofit organizations collect whole blood from unpaid donors, but hospitals may pay $225 to $240 a unit, according to executives in the business, which covers a variety of costs, including testing. If the unit is billed to the patient, the price can be $1,000 or more.” – CAM

Bye, Bye Buyosphere – A journey of disruption, disrupted

Gavin Heaton

Founder
Disruptors Co

Gavin is the Founder of Disruptors Co, one of Australia’s leading independent strategy and innovation companies. Gavin advises firms on strategy, marketing, product development and innovation. He is also a member of the Orbits program, the influencer network of award winning analyst and advisory firm, Constellation Research. Gavin advises boards and leadership on innovation strategy, marketing, data-driven product development and corporate venturing. Gavin is on the board of Vibewire, a youth-led social enterprise based in Sydney, Australia and on the Technology Advisory Group for Good2Give – the workplace giving platform. ...

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Focusing on the customer journey is never easy. After all, customers are fickle, transitory, loyal and contradictory. I am somebody’s customer. You are. We are all somebody’s customer. And being a customer is an emotional experience. We buy on whim, impulse or trigger. We may plan, research and save as long as we like, but decisions can be swayed by friends, connections, a good salesperson. Or even a lingering smell.

But knowing this doesn’t make easy for businesses – even marketers don’t make it easy for marketers. With every click, interaction and purchase, with every review, tweet, blog post or call, connected consumers like us are shaving away the stubble of established brands. We are eroding the protective layers that brands have built up over time to insulate themselves from us.

We know this has been happening for some time. It is a shift of power in the buying process away from brands to consumers. It is digital disruption in its purest form – connected consumers tapping into the opportunities and power of the internet to out flank the efforts of brands. And helping us to chart this disruption – indeed helping us to move from idea to practice, has been Tara Hunt, author of (amongst other things) The Whuffie Factor, coworking pioneer and theorist (in a very accessible way). In many ways, Tara has been a harmonising voice in a technology dominated world – reminding us that its the people that matter most.

Tara’s 2009 presentation on vendor relationship management has influenced the thinking of many (or even found its way into the thinking of many surreptitiously), including myself. But never content to let ideas percolate in isolation, Tara  went beyond the theory into practice, bootstrapping and launching Buyosphere, a fashion suggestion and style matching website. I can remember signing up myself, wondering how it may work out here in Australia. It was an idea ahead of its time.

In late 2012, after growing and struggling to scale, Tara stepped out of Buyosphere, taking a role with Toronto based communications and engagement company, MSLGROUP. As she explained at the time, “If we were going down, let’s go down in a blaze of glory. Or at least with a product we could be proud of.”

Yesterday, in classic style, Tara shared the next stage of the journey – saying goodbye to Buyosphere:

Once upon a time there were three startup founders who had a dream. They were going to build something that solved fashion search. And they spent 3 years of their lives, their entire savings and pretty much all of their energy on it. Fortunately, they built something great and learned a whole bunch. Unfortunately, they ran out of money, time and energy and had to go back to work and once they abandoned the site, it never took off. xoxo Buyosphere. We love you.

Watch this video and you will hear the very personal, emotional and exciting journey that Tara and the team went through. It’s the journey that so many of us take – or wish we had taken. And while I too, feel sad, to see from a distance, that Buyosphere has ended, I also feel great hope. There have been lessons learned and friendships forged. This is a story of disruption, disrupted, not destroyed. And I for one can’t wait to know what’s next – not just from Tara but from all who build on her experiences.