Its good to be back again…I will start with saying that the apprehensions about the Indian Software Market is slowly disappearing. The positive tone of talks gives us a great feeling. But what urged me to write this post is not that positive tone it’s a negative statement. Day in day out we at iPOTT , get service requests from Software vendors, most of it is catered, some we reject. That is when I hear these negative statements… One software vendor was persistently asking us to generate leads for his software, and our reply was “no, we are not lead generators”. Like he said lead generation and % of sale could be a massive revenue stream. Then he said “you don’t want to lead generate, then it will be difficult ..in the Indian market..” Read the rest of this entry » |
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The SWOT in a nutshell..
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Strengths
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Accounts/Finance, Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Increase Technology Expectations, Purnima Varadrajan, software
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“Threats” that make India Software Inc
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Government Interference: In the past decade, the Government and industry have worked very well together in India for the success of the I.T. software and services industry. Now the Government’s role needs to be increasingly directed towards providing suitable infrastructure and continuing its role in the simplification of policies. Any further plans for Government control, restrictions or undue interference could well pose a threat to the industry. |
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Global Market: The market is large and rapidly changing-from a mix of legacy client server to web / package-based services. Market openings are emerging across I.T. services, software products, I.T. enabled services and E-businesses, and creating a number of new opportunities for Indian companies. Domestic Demand: The corporate, government and consumer sector of the Indian domestic market offers a U.S.$ 18 billion opportunity by 2008 to software and services companies. |
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“Weaknesses” of India Software Inc
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Lack of Package Orientation: Although, a few companies have started making shrink-wrapped software packages, the industry as a whole is still not oriented towards development of world class ’shrink-wrapped’ software packages. Thus, the industry is not able to take advantage of a multiplier effect for growth in revenues. Lack of Domestic Computerization: Lack of adequate computerization has led to a relatively weak domestic software market. Even, the PC penetration rate is very low. |
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Some other important factors which are strengths of the Indian Software Market are as below: High Quality & Price Performance: Quality is the hallmark of Indian I.T. software and, services. ISO 9000 certification and SEI Level 5 are the order of the day. High quality knowledge workers and attractive price performance have been and will continue to be a key component of India’s value proposition. Large Pool of Knowledge Workers: The basic raw material for any software development activity or a dotcom start up is the availability of quality knowledge workers. India’s main competitive advantage is its abundant, high-quality and cost effective human resources. |
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“Strengths” that make India Software Inc
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Some of the strengths that make India Software Inc, such a major force are: India has moved rapidly on the quality front. Indian software organizations adopted the ISO model soon after it came and then when the Capability Maturity Model (CMM) started becoming more important, rapidly transitioned to the CMM. Though no doubt the success of Indian companies with these frameworks is due to the “exam taking” abilities that our people have (exam taking being part of any career), still these models have been by-and-large absorbed quite well. This has given the Indian companies solid project and process management strengths these models are supposed to bring. Read the rest of this entry » |
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Developing Nations in Asia and Latin America trying to emulate India’s Success Story The Indian software exports, as is well known, have grown from less than $100 million before 1990 to over $5 billion in 2000. What is not well known is that revenue per person per year has grown from less than $20,000 to over $50,000 in most large companies in the last five years. This is not simply due to ‘inflation’. Though the industry is still focused on tapping the huge software services market, most of the big players have moved from lower value services to higher value services. |
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Indian Software Product Market is going to get extremely bullish… it’s time for software vendors to understand and prepare their We were trying to identify the parameters which influence the market. The 4C’s (customer, cost, competition & change) are driving themarket. We wanted to drill down to basics. Result was the question on “the top 3 parameters which influences a company’s decision in software vendor selection process”. What influences a company to select a software vendor? |
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Increase Technology Expectations, Purnima Varadrajan, Software Selling Mistake, Software dos & donts, software
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WHERE ARE MY SOFTWARE HITS…? Part 3
4 . Your Software on the siteSince we are talking about visitors to the site and then to the software, the software itself attracts clicks. Check out the examples below: |
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The topmost software selling mistake!
Software sellingThe other day I was in conversation with a CEO of a product company. We were talking about listing the particular product on iPOTT. The normal questions and answers transpired and then came up the crucial question, I asked, “ what do you claim as benefits of your software”. There was a sequence of points which he mentioned. At the end of it I had to say, “…but these are the features of your software what do you claim as the benefits of your software…” The curt answer was “ I am defining the benefits and let the user decide on how he wants to use it and benefit from it”. |
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The topmost software selling mistake! Even today software selling happens in limited territories. I can confirm this since I have the opportunity to talk / connect / contact minimum 1 software vendor each day. This limitation is valid for companies with or without branches. Most companies who are in the business of selling know ‘what is the size of the market you are selling to’. Do you know ‘what is the size of the market you are not selling to’? |
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Software Selling Mistakes : Ignoring long end of the tail The other day I was in a discussion with one software company on specific exposure mechanism for the HRMS product vertical. He had a concern, his product was too good to resist, he is sure of converting every lead which comes by, but how to get the attention of buyers. With the market flooded with similar products, what will make his product stand out of the crowd in the first instance? On iPOTT itself we have around 30 HRMS products.. |
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Software Pricing Part 1
Its been a long time… there has been a break to the updates to this blog. Though all intension’s were “to write”, it didn’t happen. Now I am back.. lets see what we will talk about for next few posts? We will talk about software price. I am sure many of you out there would agree that their is a lot of ambiguity with regards to pricing of software. We will not discuss how much should a software cost…we will just get into understanding what all goes into cost of a software. I hope it will answer some queries for the Promoters of iPOTT. Let us begin with saying software pricing cannot be done as it is for a consumer durable. I hear some say that software pricing is an art. Basically the first factor a software pricing should consider is the frequency at which you charge the buyer. Eg: If it is SaaS there may be a monthly pricing. For the purpose of our discussion I am talking about the application software pricing. Read the rest of this entry » |
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Software Pricing Part 2
Software Pricing Part 1 cont.. Shall we continue? If you have missed the earlier write-up on Cost of software, you can read it now and then proceed. We will begin with the facts about users and licenses.
As mentioned earlier, the users and licenses are more relevant to client -server applications. Licenses restrict the number of user who can log on to the application. software are sold with single user or multi user licenses. Single user license will mean only one person can use the application. Multi-user is more than one user, so if we say 5 users it literally means 5 users can log on to the application and use the application. Doesn’t it sound simple, but it has more to it. |
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Software Pricing Part 3
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Let us understand customization. Have you read the earlier write up “first time software purchase ?” Customization is just modifying the software to meet your business process and needs. Now why customization should be so complicating? Why is customization referred to as ‘necessary evil?’ Actually, not all ‘customizations’ fall into the ‘evil’ category. Some customizations are very simple and they come to you with the software. To name a few, |
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Its about Web Site Visibility..
I have spoken about websites before, in my post ‘not to be a part of the crowd’. We have discussed the importance of logos, names and websites… Of course we are still in a scenario where there are a number of businesses who have not leveraged the power of the world wide web. But this post is for the web site owners who wish to increase visibility online… Generally there is a mis-conception that web sites will just get visitors if they are designed well and built well. It won’t take long time to learn that the slogan “If you build it, they will come“ is just not true. You have to build it well, thoughtfully and ambitiously and innovatively, inventively and then you have to keep rethinking it and rebuilding it, if you have any hope of attracting a crowd. There are numerous web site designers and developers building just websites. What about the bigger role the websites can play? What about using them as a marketing tool? Are they helping you drive visitors? Who cares….web site development is a one time job ha? If you want to disagree read on…Your web site is should not be just a piece of html code sitting on the world wide web. It does not solve any purpose. |
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Is it yours? TM it now!!
I got a question in mail yesterday mocking over why iPOTT have ‘TM’ all over? What big deal? What did you get putting TM for every name? Guess what, I love such questions, honestly. It gives me a topic new.. Before I talk about TM lets talk about names. While selecting a name for the product or company it is worth putting in some thought , because it shows and its worth it.. the name can either be unique or descriptive. Unique like Google or iPOTT or descriptive like download.com or jobstreet.com. Whatever be the case give some thoughts before naming….one software company was taking my advice on the name they have selected for their software. |
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WHERE ARE MY SOFTWARE HITS…? Part 1
The website www.ipott.com lists software from across the globe. There are close to 5500 software as of date, in 130 odd categories. We get queries on various topics. There are quite a few innovative services. But every time when a user queries on the listing, we seem to be having the same debate. “How many visitors can you assure?” , “how may confirmed clicks will I receive”, “how many lead will you provide?”, “what are my guaranteed numbers”. My answer remains the same, “I can’t give you a numbers or assurance, all I can give you is an exposure guarantee”. I know for sure, my answer is not appreciated. But that’s the whole truth. |
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WHERE ARE MY SOFTWARE HITS…? Part 2
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Now keeping the universal online trend in mind I would like to bring out an analysis on visitor tend on iPOTT. I surely see an emerging pattern in this. Here are some facts born from the trend observed on iPOTT. 1. MAINSTREAM VS NICHE PRODUCTSThe search or hits for a product depends on; if it is mainstream or niche product, this is the global trend irrespective of the mode of exposure. The same is true with iPOTT. The mainstream software will get visitors from wider demographics hence more hits. The Niche Products have a narrow demographics so lesser hits. So a HR product Read the rest of this entry » |
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