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Month: June 2009

Interview with Amanda Holtstrom from Opentext at the Canada 3.0 Forum

Published June 16, 2009

By David Offierski

The Tie that Binds Great Design: Marketers Must Be Conversation Starters (Part 1)

I interviewed Amanda Holtstrom, Senior Product Designer for Opentext, at the Canada 3.0 Forum. We discussed how user experience has evolved as key area of focus for the development and implementation of enterprise (B2B) software solutions.

If you are in the enterprise software business, presumably your company will create products that will provide a solution and resolve a pain point within an organization (CRM, content management, project management software, supply chain, database management, data mining, data analytics etc.). In Opentext’s case, they are masters of content management and create solutions to deal with the massive amounts of
data being produced by modern corporations. As Amanda points out, often times enterprise software will solve a problem for the IT department, but unless those who are expected to use your solution fully embrace this new piece of software, the relationship and the product are destined for failure.

I would guess that someone who has worked for a number of years in a sales or marketing department of a large company has seen quite a few losers in terms of enterprise solutions. Think for a second about where those that failed went
wrong. Implementing enterprise software across a large organization can be a costly and time-consuming affair, fraught with many challenges for the IT department. An implementation gone wrong can be very wasteful for organization, not just in terms of costs but also productivity, morale and losing valuable data. Check out this ArgoWiki
page on some of the most spectacular enterprise software failures in recent
history.

But this post is on what happens before and after the implementation. It is about
communication driving great design, and great design driving user adoption. This is where marketers can make the difference.

Continue readingInterview with Amanda Holtstrom from Opentext at the Canada 3.0 Forum
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Microsoft's Bing at Search Engine Strategies Toronto 2009

Published June 15, 2009

By Bart Molenda

This year’s Search Engine Strategies conference was a mix of young and old, experienced and novice search marketers that got together to discuss the state of the industry, what’s to come, what’s working, and who to watch for.

Of course, one of the big topics of the conference was the recent introduction of Microsoft’s new Search Engine, Bing. The highly anticipated launch of the site was actually somewhat of a surprise to many, as it wasn’t a typical Microsoft launch. What we saw was a fresher, gentler giant come out and quietly release its new offering that, well … didn’t quite look like Microsoft. It had more resemblance to Google — both aesthetically and how it was introduced.

I had the privilege of spending time with Microsoft’s Search Lead, Stacey Jarvis, whose enthusiasm about Bing actually started to wear off on me.  And, if I’m really honest, Stacey actually surprised me; I had pegged a typical Microsoft speaker as someone in a blue shirt and khakis talking technical but Stacey was anything but. Both as a speaker and a personality she came across differently then most anyone at SES, and broke my mold of how I perceived someone talking about Microsoft Search.

Microsoft created custom ringtones specifically for Bing. Stacey shows off 3 versions she used for the internal launch.

Microsoft’s step to obsolete Microsoft's Live Search and migrate users and advertisers to Bing is no small gesture, but one that seemed to happen quietly. According to Stacey, Microsoft’s development and launch of Bing was so stealth that most employees weren’t aware of the initiative. Even her boss was unaware of exactly what she was working on, what it was called, or when it was launching. (A cue from Apple?)  Several names were considered, different teams were working on the project, all under NDA, extensive research was conducted, and the end user experience was refined to produce something that at first glance, bears resemblance to something we’ve already seen, but upon use has some terrific features.

Continue readingMicrosoft's Bing at Search Engine Strategies Toronto 2009
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Content (Creation) is King at Canada 3.0 Forum

Published June 15, 2009

By David Offierski

Canda30forum At the first ever Canada 3.0 Forum, there was a definite buzz of excitement amongst the over 1000+ attendees who assembled in Stratford, Ontario to participate in a dialogue to define Canada’s future in Digital Media. 

The irony that the event, attracting the best and brightest from the Canadian technology industry, academia and government, is being held a hockey arena, was not lost on David Johnston, President of University of Waterloo during his keynote address.  This is Canadian collaboration at its finest. 

Broadly speaking, digital media is where the creative aspect of content and context meet emerging communication technologies defined here as Web 3.0, or the semantic web.  A web that we can interact with to create and disseminate our own content is rapidly accelerating the rate of new media production, be it social media, rich media or otherwise.

Canada 3.0 Keynote Address Day 1

The Keynotes on Monday morning introduced many of the government organizations responsible for stewarding Canada’s digital economy through policy and government support.  It certainly does seem that all three levels of government understand what is at stake in terms of establishing Canada as a leader in digital media an they have created a number of organizations and committed resources to guide the development of the industry.  The buzzword and theme of the event is already clear.  Collaboration is the name of the game.

So why is OneDegree.ca covering the event and what does the Canada 3.0 mean to you as a digital marketer? 

Continue readingContent (Creation) is King at Canada 3.0 Forum
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