As time goes on, technology inevitably improves. Business should move with the times and, therefore, move with technology. This seems like quite a simple formula when you think about it and you would assume that this just happens naturally.
Funnily enough, there is no such thing as natural change in most businesses. Why? Well, as a rule of thumb, people are naturally adverse to change. For instance, before I read Spencer Johnson’s Who Moved My Cheese! I found even I was adverse to change. I was doing something that I didn’t enjoy five days a week because to change what I was doing was a scary thought. This would involve changing careers, leaving my old career behind and starting anew.
A change in business is fundamentally no different. Why? Because people run businesses, businesses don’t run businesses. Human behaviour is judged ultimately by the interface by which we interact. Changing that interface is changing behaviour. This is sometimes scary.
Since the conception of the internet and cloud infrastructure there has been a fundamental change in business opportunity. While I could rattle off 10 reasons why running your system either on an internet platform or through cloud infrastructure would be far better than having everything stored underneath your desk in an office, most people would still be naturally adverse to this idea. Quite simply, it means change. They believe what they can see and what they have on their desktop is safe. Safe until it crashes and then what happens?
I wrote an article recently about cloud accounting and how Xero, Saasu and now MYOB Live Accounts are making huge changes to the way businesses can operate.
Well, the exact same thing is happening in cloud marketing. Have you heard of that term before? Maybe not. But I am betting that you have seen its incredible power without even knowing about it (Commonwealth Bank of Australia is currently using it).
Technology like Salesforce.com, Oncontact, Sage, Prophet are all fantastic examples of CRM software. The add-ons like Marketo (Datarati does implementation for this Australia-wide), Hubspot (Bluewire Media is an Australian partner for this software) and Salesforce Marketing Cloud are simply incredible.
Talking to Paul Holstein from Brandrally recently it was really interesting to discuss the difference between marketing teams and C-Level executives.
The disparity between the two is incredibly fascinating. That is that one looks traditionally at the tangible and the other at the intangible.
The great thing about the before-mentioned software is that it allows these teams to now play in the same sphere. C-Levels can effectively measure the success of creativity, while at the same time marketing teams can express creative ideas with real insights that were never previously available. These two species can now speak the same language.
These tools will no doubt change the landscape of the marketing industry and how business has traditionally operated. It has been estimated that by 2017 CMOs will spend more money on IT than CIOs.
Again, another funny concept.
However, when you drill down into the CIOs role – being across absolutely every piece of software relevant to an industry – it is revealed as an almost impossible task.
This is why I believe ‘cloudware’ will slowly but surely change business forever: It will create a system (using technology) which makes everyone in a business accountable to each other, rather than the traditional structure of the manager above being responsible for the employee below.
So, there is this awesome technology everyone now wants to get their hands on. What’s the cost? Will it work for my company? Which one should I use? All these questions will be solved with time (apart from the cost part – just go to their websites and check).
Remember the quote from Steve Jobs from my last article – “It’s so much easier to connect the dots looking back.” Just as social media has taken a while to find its feet; these powerful technologies will take time too.
Personally, I’m excited to be working with this technology to help the greater good. Being a cancer survivor, I’m excited to be helping the Leukaemia Foundation of Queensland with their web strategy and utilising technology (like marketing in the cloud) to help them achieve their goals and reach for the stars – helping cancer sufferers around Queensland and Australia.
If you require any help setting up on either tool or have a chat about the best platform for your business, please do not hesitate to contact me on john@cloudbasemedia.com.au or give me a call on (07) 3040 8083.
