5 Digital Info Observations, 5 Predictions

No, what follows is not a poem. It's a list, two lists actually as I turn 70 and having spent 50 years in the digital information business...


Five Observations
1. New technology and new data continue to leap-frog and recycle each other
• 1962 FORTRAN punch cards with data appended at Trinity. 1967-69 timesharing, TDMS, Lexis, Internet, regression analysis at the Pentagon. 1969 timesharing plus economic data at DRI. 1983 Bernoulli cartridges and Compustat at Isys. For Lotus in 1985-88: CD-ROM and Compustat at OneSource, FM sideband and stock prices at Signal. 1989 FM sideband, TSR software and integrated news wires at Desktop Data/NewsEdge. 2002 web analytics and internet access at Compete.
• Timesharing --- PCs --- Phones/tablets/TV --- cloud (timesharing again)

2. It’s not about the technology or the data, it’s about the apps
• Apps provide the value for users. Killer apps are key to sales: Product line forecasting for DRI. Screening company fundamentals for Isys and OneSource. 1-2-3 computing of portfolio values in real time for Signal. Personalized alerts for NewsEdge. Web comparisons versus rivals by Compete.
• Selling capabilities is not like selling apps (timesharing companies vs data publishers in 1977.) Sales and renewal pace of OneSource and Signal didn’t match Lotus’ packaged software cycle. Microsoft failed repeatedly at info. Dow Jones/Reuters failed at delivery (Bloomberg got it right with archaic technology.) There is no new intrinsic magic in SAAS or the Cloud – we’ve seen it all before at DRI

3. Customers learn, markets evolve
• Disruptively innovative apps initially require consultative selling, teaching and support: Enterprise selling at DRI, Desktop Data, Compete. Service consulting at DRI. Quarterly client in-house presentations from Compete. Market was not ready for channel or retail sales of OneSource, Signal in 1985-88.
• As they learn, users want direct interaction, cheaper and more accessible tools, less support. Pricing and packaging must change. The Internet taught multitudes how to “go online” for info.
• Compete’s $100,000/year vertically-focused services in 2002 vs free, funnel-filling Compete.com in 2008.
• Lesson: distinguish data/infrastructure cost from consulting/selling cost right from the beginning, even if selling bundled packages. This will facilitate restructuring as the market matures.

4. Business models must evolve
• Digital information is “competitive destruction” and “destructive innovation” on steroids (Joseph Schumpeter, Clayton Christensen.)
• “Damn the profits, grow the users” Internet stymied NewsEdge.
• Today, enterprise sales giving way to B2C selling to businesspeople.

5. The team matters
• Smart, innovative and effective people who really “get” the new intersections of tech and data are required to create the new killer apps.
• Shared vision, coordinated focus are necessary: “Make revenue grow.”
• Trust, integrity, empathy paramount. Destructive internal competition is cancerous
• Privilege to build repeatedly on trusted colleagues. Privilege to build new company with new colleagues of the same character.
• The old team must keep learning themselves, and hire and listen to young entrepreneurs who “get it” now.
• Family and long-term friends matters. Figure out how to maintain balance, at least over time but don’t wait too long. In the end, entrepreneurial businesses are just very exciting jobs, and family is forever.


Five Predictions
1. It’s not over! Huge amounts of new data becoming available (more consumer tracking, more consumer generated content.) Machine reporting (real time all the time.) Easy new entry (Ruby on rails, cloud computing.) Seed funds/angels increasing. Mobile everywhere. Video everywhere. More people will recognize that privacy is an illusion. Many more ad dollars to move online. Today’s young entrepreneurs grew up digital – admire and support their product innovations.

2. Enterprise selling is dead. It died with the birth of this new generation of digital marketers to whom big brands now give big authority. Welcome B2C selling to business. (Still must teach really new stuff.)

3. Cyberattacks will become warfare, cyber-disclosure too. Iran centrifuges. Drones: videogames with real deaths. US powergrid. Freeway seizure. Digital security will be a growth business. Let’s just hope the smart new kids at MIT work for our side.

4. Someone will solve the online authority issue. “Which of all this stuff should I believe, whom should I follow?” Watch for social-search: “Of all the search responses , what did people I respect find most useful?” - Google+? Facebook? Most likely, some entrepreneur we haven’t heard of.

5. TV plus social is a new, big thing. TV won’t die, it will continue to be a primary stimulus to consumers. Social networks will identify who is engaged, who is influencing, who is listening; online will extend the moment of TV (both before and after the show/ads.) Real time response and brand/opinion shifting over time will need to be measured and analyzed. Nielsen is an easy target with a big price umbrella. Google TV? Apple TV? Bluefin Labs?


Postscript
Yes, the right team makes a difference. My privilege is to have been surrounded by really smart, innovative and effective people. They have been trustworthy, loyal and insightful in good and bad times. They mattered to our companies; They made revenue grow! They matter to me. Thank you, thank you, thank you!