13.5.2011 It starts from here.
We are starting to write down our thoughts about what we do and how we see the future.
First a little walk-through of what has happened so far.
The business we are in is about getting customers and keeping them, first happy and then even happier. In the process, we make their life easier as well. We got the first customer after some serious negotiation efforts. That was a good lesson and it was a welcome change to the daily work we had been doing for a long time. The success on the negotiation front gave us an opportunity to work in a big project. To have lots of fun as well as big responsibilities. At the beginning it was rather hard to get out from the old role we had. Some things sit tight in a person. But slowly we realized that we are on our own. We can decide where we put our efforts from now on.
Having said that, we have been doing some heavy thinking around the subject: what to do next?
Thanks for reading. Story will continue.
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26.5.2011 About the market and such.
Our field of expertise is financial software in its many different forms. We are in the business of helping people. And we see two main ways to help the people that form our market. Some might say that our market consists of companies, but we put it differently. We see teams of people that form our target market. We serve the people and sell to the people.
So we help them, in two ways. We increase the level of automation in our customers' processes. Or we decrease the amount of IT skills that are needed to run the daily operation. These are not trivial tasks at all. They are quite challenging actually.
How are we doing with the challenges at hand? So far so good. These writings will tell you about our moves and thoughts from now on. Check our site every now and then. Maybe you find somehing to think about and ideas that actually work also in your own environment.
Thanks for reading. Talk to you soon.
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16.9.2011 Building the product
We think that a good and lasting service business is built on products. Our consulting offer aims at leaving the customer a working product or a well running process. Something more than just a plan on Power Point slides. So, we need a product or two. Good ones. Those that sell, open the doors and help our customers to achieve better results.
Many think that developing products for our target industry is a game for big players. Oh well, if you start building something grand, you'll need time, staff and money. Making a market-ready product is a challenge, and we see an opportunity in that challenge. Start simple, get to the market. That is the key. Make something that does one single thing right.
Our idea is to develop products that work tightly together with the existing ”big” products. Our goal is to improve the performance of other products already used by our customers. We try to identify processes without sufficient tool support, and fill the gaps with our knowledge and tool building. Our target market consists of companies of all shapes and sizes in the financial sector. Luckily enough, we know a few processes in there that do not have simple and easy-to-use tools available.
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31.12.2011 Second year over
Our second financial year comes to an end in a few moments. It is time to check where we stand.
Looking back this year, we had many consulting projects. They were good experiences and offered a lot of learning opportunities for us. Our vision of year 2012 is that there will be somewhat less consulting, but overall our market will be active and interesting.
Our product plan has moved forward quite happily during the last couple of months. We have found a process to follow, and we believe very much in the model we now start to run. Our team will soon grow by one and our goal is to bring the product into market test during the spring of 2012. First installation is agreed and happens in a month according to the current plan.
It will be exciting to get the v1.0 product out and then can start interviews with the following potential customers. That will be so fun. See you then.
This was a good year. To all our customers, we say thank you for your business.
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13.3.2012 Going forward
Sometimes it happens that you start to do a simple thing and it turns out to be really complex.
Product development is an arena where that must happen quite often. When is it good enough? That is a hard question.
Since new year, we have had good progress with the product. Many features that we earlier thought should be in later versions, are now in the product already.
We are working now to get the version 1 tested and deployed to real use in 30 days from this day. It will happen, you'll see.
On the consulting front, year 2012 has started very actively. More than we planned. Currently we need additional resources for consulting work and business development. Our perfect candidate can do both. The search is on.
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