The Three Killer Small Biz Apps Coming in 2012

I'm going to make just a few predictions for the remainder of 2011 and 2012.

Charlie Sheen and the producers of Two And A Half Males, unable to ignore the riches of another season, will in the end reconcile. The most recent Pirates of the Caribbean film will bomb. The Mets is not going to make the playoffs. President Obama will win the Democratic primaries. I'll pay extra in health insurance, not less. Test back and see if I am right on these. I am pretty confident.

However not as assured as I'm about a number of developments that may have an effect on my firm, and other small and medium sized businesses. Within the subsequent two years, I predict that no less than three killer apps will emerge that can have a big affect on us all. Are you prepared for them?

Killer App 1: Mobile payments

I not too long ago found an effective way to avoid wasting money. I do not carry cash. This manner none of my teenage children can dig into my pockets after I'm not around and walk away with ten dollar bills to fund their pizza fix. As an alternative all they find are ineffective credit cards. Properly, in a few years they will not even be capable of find those. That's as a result of I will be doing it all on my phone. As will most of my customers.

First some facts. Data Week says that 38% of small and medium sized businesses already rely on cellular apps. American Specific is working on a brand new e-wallet application. Microsoft, Apple and Google are implementing close to discipline communications (NFC) expertise for mobile payments of their subsequent technology of products. As we speak, Google is testing an Android payment system in New York and San Francisco. PayPal is teaming with modern firms like Blingnation to bring cellular payments to its customers.

Cell payments are the subsequent killer app. How will it all work? It isn't that complex. Your buyer's credit information might be embedded in a safe application on their phone. You should have a wireless terminal related to your cash register, or stand alone, that may communicate with their phone using NFC expertise, or something similar, to transmit data. Utilizing the touch display or digicam on the cellular machine, the technology might incorporate fingerprint, eye scan or some other type of security if necessary. Your customer waves her phone over the terminal. The transaction is recorded. A receipt gets mailed all around. The transaction hits your bank account and accounting software with no more human interaction.

Is what you are promoting ready for this? You actually should be. As a result of quickly, a customer's going to stroll in your door and ask to pay for a product using her smartphone. At first whenever you inform her that you do not settle for payments that approach she'll understand. However after some time, when increasingly of your competitors and different companies are taking smart telephone funds she's going to cease being so affected person with you and take her enterprise elsewhere.

Will this value us more? What do you assume? After all it'll! We'll must pay hundreds for new smartphone scanners and sign up for companies and soak up further charges and charges. You understand this is going to happen. You understand that the people who find themselves really going to get wealthy off this are the companies I mentioned above. However it won't cease us. As a result of we'll want to offer this functionality to our prospects with a purpose to stay competitive. It could even drive extra enterprise our way. And save somewhat time in processing too. We'll see.

Killer App 2: Lockers

Final week Amazon announced that it will be offering as much as 20GB of storage to its prospects for anything they want - music, movies, ebooks, etc. They call it a "cloud locker." One factor's for sure - this locker will odor loads higher than my health club locker. And say what you want about Amazon, but these guys not solely spot trends effectively upfront, additionally they start tendencies of their own. I by no means thought folks would go for ebooks once they were first introduced. Now I see that Amazon's bought round eight million Kindles in 2010. Exhibits how a lot I know.

However I do know this: space for storing is cheap. And finding new prospects is expensive. So we're all the time on the lookout for methods to keep our customers near us. And what better way to maintain them shut than to provide them "lockers" to store their stuff? It makes it easier for them to keep coming back to us to buy new products. That Jeff Bezos is a brilliant dude. And the truth that he is bald makes me like him that a lot more.

Call it no matter you wish to name it, however I believe that many smart enterprise people will start providing some type of "lockers" to their customers within the coming years. Not only for music or ebooks. However to store quotes, estimates, invoices, orders, documentation, images, etc. For example, after I promote a new software utility to a client, I might create for them a personalised "locker" where they can go to download their latest updates, manuals, training guides and all of our paperwork. It retains them tied into my company. And it's a further value-add: purchasers will not have to worry about storing all of this stuff and might simply entry it from our site. And if I wish to offer some further merchandise as incentives I can do that too. Every consumer would have their own area on our servers (or some server that I rent somewhere) with their own access.

Killer App  three: Apps

Another killer app? Apps.

Ask Jonathan Rochelle, a Group Product Supervisor for Google. "Enterprise software is going by a platform shift to the Web." he mentioned in a latest interview. "As that happens, all prior software may be re-questioned. So there are alternatives for the man who writes the appliance that helps a dentist's workplace, the man who writes the applying that lets you run your hardware store, or helps a journalist be more effective. The most important opportunity is in delivering the perfect software program in these area of interest lessons on this new Web platform. Web-primarily based software is far less expensive for consumers than conventional software and programmers will be a lot more modern, that it is worthwhile for an entrepreneur to say, OK, let's start from scratch."

I don't agree with all the things he says. I don't suppose most small enterprise homeowners would trust some man to jot down an app that runs their total business. It's most likely as a result of I promote business software and that thought scares the you-know-what out of me! However I do think that Rochelle hits on the next killer app that may have an effect on lots of us. And that killer app is...apps.

Take a look round and we see most huge companies creating their very own little apps for his or her customers. Airways have apps for us to search for flights, check times and now even use our phones as boarding passes. Restaurants have apps for ordering and checking menu items. Complete Foods, ESPN and Fedex have apps. And did not I simply see a business the place a father in London uses an app to activate the ignition of his Buick so his teenage daughter can take it out for a joyride with her friends? She's taking out a Buick for a joy experience? What a loser!

Over the next couple of years, many good enterprise homeowners may also be creating their own apps for their very own businesses. These apps will enable a buyer to test pricing for the products they buy. Or look up the status of an order. Or open up a hassle ticket. Or request a quote. Or pay their open invoice (apart from my prospects, who do everything of their energy NOT to pay their invoices).

Like Rochelle says, these things is much cheaper than it ever used to be. The instruments are already out there and there are a rising variety of developers out there to jot down apps. In fact there might be challenges: preserving the functions updated, making sure they'll run on a number of units, supporting users when there's an inevitable problem. However right this moment a typical developer can write a cell app for a few thousand bucks and a few cans of Pink Bull. And, if deployed right, an app can allow a buyer to get issues finished sooner and more profitably together with your company. Which suggests they're going to wish to continue to do business with you going forward.

So yes, I predict Charlie shall be back on Two And A Half Man. And I predict that these three killer apps will impression the best way all of us do enterprise within the subsequent few years. And if my predictions come true, we'll all be winning.           

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