John McArthur’s New Venture Blog

Many startups are using free, online survey tools. Today I helped StorageVirtualAppliance develop a survey targeted at users of VMware and other virtual-server solutions. The survey was developed using FreeOnlineSurveys, similar to Survey Monkey, with which I was more familiar.

As I was working with StorageVirtualAppliance, I was reminded of some rules in survey design.

1) Know the purpose of the survey: Lead Generation, Evangelization and Market Awareness, Actionable Information for Product Marketing, Actionable Information for Product Management

2) Think about how you will categorize and summarize the data. Open-ended questions may provide great color commentary or quotable statements, but in large volume are difficult to categorize and summarize.

3) Have an incentive for those that take the time to complete the survey. The incentive could be as simple and inexpensive as a summary of the results, it could be an opportunity to be entered into a prize drawing, or it could be a small cash award.

In addition to helping with the survey, I also offered to help get the survey out to a broader set of participants. So, if you know any IT professionals, please send them to this blog and have them click on this survey link.

Thanks in advance. Participants could win a copy of Eco-Tech Warrior, Greg Schultz’, new book, The Green and Virtual Data Center.

One of the sessions I attended at the New England Area VMware User Group meeting in Newport, Rhode Island last week included a discussion on how to take the internal storage of a VMware ESX host and turn it into a virtualized iSCSI storage appliance.  I happen to believe that the approach has great merit for many smaller IT shops and for remote office environments.  The internal storage of an ESX server, if totally useable and accessible to the ESX host and other ESX servers on the network, is probably the cheapest storage you will ever buy.  What I found particularly interesting about this session, however, was the fact that the presenter downplayed the approach as good enough to experiment with the storage virtualization software, but not good enough to run production applications.  In order to encourage companies to try the software, the developer offers a free 30-day trial, the expiration of which then renders the server unuseable, unless you purchase a permanent license.  While I believe the company has good software, I don’t understand the approach to the market. (more…)

Most people I work with now know that I am a relatively active user of social media and business networking tools, including Facebook, Twitter, Delicious, LinkedIn and Plaxo.  In fact, over the past six months, my blogging dropped off significantly, but my use of social media and business networking tools accelerated.

One of my clients was asking about the size of the installed base of Geographically Dispersed Parallel Sysplex (GDPS), wondering if it was a market large enough to justify the investment needed to integrate with  their own solution.  They also wondered about the penetration rate for GDPS within the installed base of z/OS licenses.  That’s rather esoteric stuff, unless you cut your teeth on IBM mainframes, as I did. (more…)

About 20 years ago, I had a small consulting practice, helping very-small businesses migrate from typewriters and manual accounting systems, to automated ordering, billing, and accounting systems.  Within a year or so, I turned my few customers over to my brother, Ken, who was much better equipped to service them.  Ken was also substantially more knowledgeable in the area.  To Ken’s credit, he continued to service these accounts for years, even though he was geographically challenged with a separation of about 350 miles.

My first client has offices little more than a block from where my sons now attend summer camp.  So this morning, after dropping them off, I stopped by to see my former client.  He’s no longer using the systems we developed for him.  But they were good for more than 10 years.  So that’s not bad.  I met his in-house IT guy, the guy that replaced my brother and our systems.  The new guy says he also takes out the garbage and cleans the offices on Fridays, something we never did.  (more…)

I was describing to my rather-precocious, thirteen-year-old son the problem that companies have of getting the word out.  As part of “Career Week” at his school (five different jobs for five days at the end of the school year), my son decided he would make a stop-motion Lego video for Tek-Tools, one of my clients, to promote the company.   I told him that, if it was good enough, I would show it to the CEO, and maybe he would use it.  Little did I know that my son was going to, upon completion, post the video on YouTube.  But he did.  Without permission.  And my wife asked me, once again, “Why don’t we have more controls on his computer?” 

Ken Barth, the CEO of Tek-Tools,  was our first client at Walden Technology Partners.  A lot of people in the computer storage industry know him, and beyond the fact that he has been successful in everything that he has done, everyone who meets him says the same thing: “He’s a great guy.”  Ken’s company provides a superb solution for reporting, monitoring, forecasting, and profiling IT infrastructure.  It’s easy to install, easy to use, and provides immediate value.  What could be better?   (more…)

I had a conversation with Megan at BzzAgent this week.  My interest was peaked, when a former IDC colleague, who now works at Iron Mountain Digital, mentioned BzzAgent. 

BzzAgent claims to have 400,000 “buzz agents,” who have agreed to review products and services and to share with their friends and colleagues their honest opinion.  BzzAgents get the products for free.  They test them.  And they create buzz.  The buzz could be good, or it could be bad, but it’s buzz.  I don’t know if Iron Mountain Digital uses BzzAgent, but I can see the fit, since, Iron Mountain offers desktop and server backup services to homes and businesses. 

At the $80,000 entry price that Megan mentioned, you’ll want to get a lot of buzz for the investment, and you’ll want to have enough confidence in your product to expect that most of the buzz will be good.   In the consumer products and services area, I see a great opportunity to leverage BzzAgent.  It’s hard to see the fit for the kinds of enterprise IT infrastructure providers with whom we are working. But, Megan suggested I check out their Frogpond offering, which I will do when I get a chance. 

In the meantime, after listening to the pitch from Megan, I decided to sign up myself.  I am now officially a BzzAgent.  I’ll let you know how it goes.  For now, I’ve just filled out a bunch of surveys about my drinking habits (softdrink and otherwise).  Fortunately, the fortunes of Coke and Pepsi don’t depend much on my soft-drink habits. If they did, the companies would be broke.

I did a couple of customer-satisfaction interviews today.  I won’t tell you the company or describe the product.  It’s not important to the discussion, but in case you are wondering, it’s not one of the companies or products I represent.  It is important to note that both individuals that I interviewed want the product and the company to succeed.

In the first survey, I got a lot of feedback.  Almost an hour’s worth.  There was some very positive feedback about certain components of the offering, but I heard many more negative comments, such as:

• They are barely keeping up with free alternatives.
• The leadership was great for a startup, but needs to step aside if they are to get to the next level.
• They are not listening to their customers.
• They treat everyone the same, and don’t listen to the different needs of different customers.
• No one thinks their product or their service is adequate.
• I have to go to a third party to fix the problems they aren’t addressing, and I know other customers who are doing the same thing.
• I shouldn’t have to pay someone else to do the job that they should be doing. (more…)

RyanAir is in a lot of businesses, but they are definitely not in the airline business.  The airplanes they fly are simply the delivery mechanism for a lot of other services.  And since the airplane is the method of delivery, RyanAir has done everything they can possible do to reduce their per-plane cost. For example, they have

• Maximized seat density, making it impossible for anyone with an inseam greater than 32″ to slouch in the seat.
• Eliminated the removable safety-instructions card and replaced them with laminated labels on each seatback.
• Eliminated the seat-back pockets so passengers won’t put trash in them, thus reducing the time to clean a plane.
• Boarded and deplaned from both the front and the rear of the plane, thus reducing the airport turnaround time to about 25 minutes.
• Standardized on a single style plane, the Boeing 737-800, to reduce pilot and crew costs.
• Arranged for landing rights and terminal gates in the lowest-cost locations in Europe.

You may be asking, “If RyanAir’s not in the airline business, then what business are they in?”  Well, here’s a hint… (more…)

Shortly after I started working with StorMagic, I suggested they create a Facebook group.  One of the initial target markets for StorMagic is the education market, and given the number of college students on Facebook, it seemed like a logical fit. We’re only a few weeks into this, but I’m pleased to see that the number of members is up to 46 and includes some pretty well-known, well-connected analysts, venture capitalists, and potential partners and customers.  Facebook groups are a great way to notify interested people about changes, enhancements, new materials and upcoming events. 

That brings me to the Web 2.0 double-dip comment.  Facebook is one tool that can be leveraged for marketing and community-building.  Another is YouTube.  StorMagic just completed their first video and uploaded it to YouTube.  You can see it here.  But they also notified the 46 members of the StorMagic Facebook group about the video, by posting a notice on the group’s posted-items board.  We’ll see what kind of traffic it generates, but having created the video, YouTube is a low-cost way of beginning to circulate it.  I just watched it, and it does a pretty good job of demonstrating the simplicity of implementing a StorMagic iSCSI storage area network.

I’d really like to hear your opinion on two things:

1. Using Facebook as a community building and marketing tool
2. Using YouTube to cost-effectively demonstrate key features of a solution

I’d also like your suggestions for other Web 2.0 tools that are effective in raising awareness and building communities for a supplier’s customers, partners, and prospects.

One last thing.  Can you give us some feedback on the video?

When I was growing up, my family would occasionally take what we called “Penny Walks.”  We lived in western Colorado, where the towns were mostly laid out on a North-South, East-West grid.  A penny walk involved taking a walk, penny in hand, and every time you got to a corner, you flipped the coin. Heads you go right. Tails you go left.  You never knew where you were going to go, but you knew you weren’t going to get caught in a familiar routine.  With penny walks, you ran into different people or different things. You had variety. Penny walks don’t work as well in Massachusetts, where I live now, because the streets are laid out in the rough equivalent of a meandering cow.

My random walks these days are as likely to occur on the World Wide Web, as they are to occur in my town.  Did I mention we have almost no sidewalks? So here on the internet, thanks to a link from Jason Rakowski, I was lead on a random walk through his blog, to another blog by someone named Dejra to a service called Pingomatic.  The service helps writers/bloggers raise the visibility of their sites by updating search engines.  I’m trying it out today.  I’ll let you know how it goes. 

Given Dejra’s focus on affiliate marketing, I’m wondering if she knows my brother, Ken?

Dejra? Ken?