Just a quick note to say thanks to all our blog readers!

The saasu blog is now in the top 0.32% of all blogs on the planet.

Our site is in the top 1.84% by traffic globally.

We have also popped into the first page on Google globally for some search terms.

In return, please accept our humble ‘video link gift’ below in addition to our earlier free CeBIT tickets.

Google strategy insights

It’s definitely worth watching this little gem. A unique bit of insight about how the gurus at Google are thinking on business strategy, product and customers. It came out some time ago but it’s still completely relevant for nearly all business owners today. It’s not just a tech thing.

It’s a video of Seth Godin speaking to a bunch of Google insiders on some strategic topics close to our heart. Seth is one of our favourite bloggers. We have written about his other important work previously.

Thanks again for your support. You are helping us build a truly global product that makes lives better. We can always do better though, so help us by giving feedback on what you want us to do.

Here is a way you can Catch all those great ideas you have for your business. Saasu helps you apply a system to them, making sure the right ones get used in your business. It’s all too easy to inadvertently add complexity to your business.

Saasu Activities - An IDEAS Framework

In the new release of Saasu (see preview) we have Activities. Activities are all kinds of things; Meetings, Notes, Milestones etc. One Activity types is an Idea. We included this feature for our own use and because we felt other business probably have the same problems as we have in dealing with lots of ideas for improvement, change, new markets and the like.

This feature can help your organisation capture ideas from your employees and advisors who have access to your file. Once your management structure has reviewed the Idea convert it into another Activity type called a Procedure. Your could print or publish your procedures and you have your procedures manual. You can build up your set of business procedures organically over time rather than dedicating fixed resources. Create rigour in your business execution, create some control in the change process. Simply being a little more systematic and could save complexity being added to your business through Ideas which aren’t approved or tested before being actioned.

An Idea in Saasu could be a single sentence or an entire proposal. The key is that you all have access to it in a controlled environment. Someone owns the idea in Saasu and it can be added to todo lists. have date deadlines applied and more.

Saasu IDEAS framework

There are many ways you could use the tool we are providing but here’s one example where we have created.

An idea has a life-cycle just like sales, business models, markets and products -

1. IDEA - it starts as just that ‘an idea’, your thinking around opportunities, efficient process, intellectual property and the like.
2. DOCUMENT - get the idea down. A brief version or the detail as a brief, white papers, business plan or whatever you feel is appropriate for your documentation phase.
3. EVALUATE - all ideas need scrutiny, if you never put them up for scrutiny they don’t exist (except in your head). Allocate your Idea to a new Owner who will make the call or review it for discussion.
4. APPLY - all ideas that pass the tests of evaluation need to be applied to real life situations that they were thought up for. Convert the Activity type from an Idea to a Procedure in Saasu
5. SYSTEMATIC - Ideas can be re-worked moving back and fourth through the cycle.

The evaluation step is key. Ensure the right person is controlling what passes, what goes back on the shelf and what’s removed. This person should have a keep it simple mentality. They should be wise and knowledgeable enough to evaluate the ramifications and the advantages of applying ideas to the business. It could be a committee, a board of directors or a CEO. You will need to work this out for your specific industry and organisational structure.

Engineer your business better by going back and documenting existing processes and put them through Saasu IDEA. Removing any deadwood you find and improving existing ideas to create efficiency and advantages.

In summary, start filtering your ideas with the rigour of a framework and ensure the right ideas are added to your business.

The reality of small business is that despite lots of automation, importing and connecting tools there will be times you need to enter transactions. The world is progressing to the point where a company can share invoice and other information which Peter our CEO recently wrote about. However, there remain companies who use older style accounting software that simply aren’t connected to the Internet.

The Internet is a pre-requisite to extinguishing data entry intelligently.

When designing Saasu we consider keyboard lovers

Keyboard lovers are those people who like to leave the mouse untouched (as much as possible). Those who pride themselves playing the Internet piano with mastery. And of course, short-cut junkies. I have seen many bookkeepers and accountants do their keyboard work and to see those dexterous fingers write up an invoice with speed and mouse independence is very cool.

Enabling enter and spacebar keys to add invoice line items

When you tab across a line in an invoice to the plus icon you can now use the spacebar or enter key to create a new line item. You should never need your mouse to enter an Invoice if you don’t want to.

It might seem like a small change and it is certainly not rocket science but it adds a lot of usability. Mouse independence is often dramatically undervalued in designing online business productivity systems. Overly slick Web2.0 design often denies people the ability to do things in fast, practical and simple way.

Imagine you process 100 sales per month along with corresponding payments and customer data and that you waste 1 second going to and from keyboard and mouse each time two or three times per item. Delaying your customers who may be waiting is not great. Adding to the overall pressure of delivering customer service excellence is worse. Wasting (100×3x3×2=30) up to 30 minutes on something trivial like that is just not on.

This is in our new release along with nearly 200 other improvements.

Typing is faster than mousing. However, data creation via automation and direct connection trumps them both.

Sources of quality ideas and ways to manage them

Are you starved for new ideas or do you find yourself seeing so many ideas out there that sometimes you feel the information floods over you? Either way, there are idea sources and filtering techniques that can help.

Do you find yourself so time poor that you can’t spend 2 hours reading a high quality book on a new concept or global trend? In 20 minutes with the right material (there is some right here) you can get the same outcome.

Any idea or piece of information can be slotted into three clear realms or stages of knowing that a gentleman called Plato did some groundwork on without the benefit of technology to accelerate his learning:

1. What you know you know
2. What you know you don’t know - or know a little about but not enough to be of much use
3. What you don’t know you don’t know - blind spots to which you are completely oblivious

Opportunity exists in that final point, we would like to share some quality sources with you.
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If you have not seen Marc’s excellent recent post on Sustainable Business you should read it.

Today we will build on that article and take a slight tangent to focus on the specific use of SaaS (software-as-a-service) to improve your business and improve (not just simplify) your life with SaaS in three areas. (more…)

The big problem with technology is that it can be so darn good you want to use it all. Making matters worse, it’s cheaper and cheaper so there are less purchase barriers.

Like all consumption, too much technology will give you business lethargy. Wasted time, wasted investment and the scary one - redundant technology (that’s the kind you stopped using almost as soon as you paid for it).

The golden rules of technology investment:

1. Use a few really good technologies to keep it simple.
2. Make sure you make full use of those technologies.
3. Be prepared to change a technology for a better one.

Use A Few Really Good Technologies To Keep It Simple

What is the turning point where buying technology stops generating productivity gains. I’d argue it is a lot sooner than you think. Complexity costs money and distractions cost money. What is a really good technology:

Good Engineering and Design

The automotive industry has proven this time and again. Engineer and design well and the market will be all over your business to buy your goods and services. People will pay disproportionate amounts of money versus the practical gains. Does Hyundai really underperform a BMW when taking you from A to B. No, but the BMW driver is willing to pay for the design and engineering difference that gives them sheer driving pleasure. You can have 3 or 4 Hyundai’s for the same money. The point being it is disproportionate assessment of value by the consumer. People don’t buy on price, it’s a 2nd or 3rd order consideration.

Photo by The Aga

Automation Creates Time Where It Didn’t Exist

I always say to people,

Experiences and time are limited in life, money isn’t.

The number one thing you all want more of in your life and seem powerless to get it is (more…)

Another new Software as a Service (SaaS) idea that might work for some of our business customers is Avatars.

Avatars are a digital representation of people. You find them all over the internet these days, in virtual worlds and increasingly in commercial use for customer support.

A more recent innovation however is the use of these Avatars to sell your products. In pre-sales not post-sales, as it is a very different area because people are less tolerant of poor quality voice or images.

We set one up recently to welcome new visitors to saasu. If you have any feedback let us know. It’s easy to get one for your own site.

The downside of course is (more…)

Another great software as a service area that crosses over into tangible products is the garment printing industry. Particularly for quality branded corporate clothing.

We started looking for a decent virtual store provider last year and were very impressed with cafepress.com, so much so that we set up the Saasu.com Store with them.

Have a look. If you buy something and send us a photo of yourself wearing it we will give you an extra month’s free subscription or an extra user or file on your saasu.com paid subscription.

Seth Goddin has a great quote in the opening page of his new e-book which launched today. It is the simplest way to describe the problem at hand. “The web is a haystack, the biggest haystack the world has ever known. The reason that Yahoo and Google are so important is that they help us find what we want in the stack. And your lens or blog or page or store is just a tiny little needle.”

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A major hardware and software vendor is warning of a data centre power disaster sometime in the future. I feel that there is an ulterior motive.

This vendor loses a lot of revenue when SaaS Utilities are created allowing 1000’s of businesses to share infrastructure.

Data centres do go down every now and then, but it is very rare. Usually they are back up quick smart, so this is not a big prediction in my view, just scaremongering.

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