Mumboe has been listed as an approved vendor with the Texas Department of Information Resources. DIR provides statewide leadership and oversight for management of government information and communications technology. The mission of the DIR is to transform the delivery of technology to state agencies so they can better serve the citizens of Texas. Now state of Texas agencies can acquire Mumboe through an approved contract with a 15% discount. So it’s easier than ever for state and local governments and K-12 public and higher education systems to take control of their document repositories.
We’re excited to announce our latest release and feature upgrades designed to save you time and simplify the user experience. The full list of changes can be viewed on our Support site in the Customer Forums. One of the biggest changes is the display and interaction with the Parties field.
The display takes up less space on the Summary page and there is now an optional Note box where you can label the parties.You can see more contact information by simply hovering your cursor over the name of the Party. This improvement is the result of customer feedback. Previously you could not see all of the contact information, only the address.
Also, you will notice when adding a new Party rather than a drop-down of all contacts we give you a text box. You can simply start typing and we’ll attempt to match with an existing contact. If the contact you are entering doesn’t exist yet you’ll have the option to add the contact plus information.
On the Auto Extraction Results page you will find these changes have been made as well. Please let us know what you think.
Common knowledge around the office is that Bill K. (our CEO) is a huge University of Alabama fan that grew up in Cullman, Alabama. This weekend his Crimson Tide are headed over to be taken behind the woodshed while visiting my beloved Mississippi State Bulldogs. To get the rivalry started off right this week, I sent Bill some smack talk including a local commercial from his home town. Go ahead and watch it. It’s definitely worth the time.
Now that our sales and marketing folks have seen the video, we’ve been talking about how funny it would be to have a commercial like this for Mumboe. I can picture it now…Bill telling his sea stories and ending the commercial with, “…so go ahead and sign up for a free Mumboe account. Or don’t. I don’t care.”
CIO had a great article last week that is a must-read for anyone thinking about or in the process of buying software. I’m sure for people in the software industry this article will come as no surprise, but for those purchasing software, spending 5 minutes reading this article could save you a lot of pain.
The Magic Demo: Canned demos seem to work flawlessly and you’ll hear the word “absolutely” as an answer for every question and feature request. And there’s always a great slide presentation extolling the virtues of this perfect solution to all your problems.
Underbid, then Overcharge: Total cost of ownership and return on investment is almost impossible to calculate when speaking to some vendors. At first, the prospects look great, then you get hit with implementation fees, service contracts, and system integrator costs. They blow your budget out of the water, as well as diminishing the chance for a positive ROI.
The Customer Headlock: Vendor lock-in can happen in two very different ways. Hopefully the application exceeds your expectations, the value and benefits are obvious, and the customer service is fantastic. You want to stay by choice. You are extremely satisfied. The second scenario is more common: trap the clients’ data, make switching costs impossibly high, and make the pain of moving your data too great. The author gives some examples of embedded contractors within the client organization which can lead to relying on them too much or having them sabotage any efforts to change vendors. You need to know the exit strategy before ever entering the contract.
The Billing Mistake: Aberdeen Research reported that 7% to 12% of all charges in the telecom industry are mistakes. This article lists some horrifying examples of what appear to be systematic, intentional overcharges by vendors. After reading this part, I’m guessing you’ll be calling your accountant or comptroller.
The Forced Upgrade: You buy version X today and then next week the vendor calls and says “hey, I know you just bought version X, but we released version Y today and I can cut you a great upgrade deal.” Isn’t this something he could have told you last week?
The Clueless Customer: Bottom line here is do the proper diligence. Make sure the vendor understands your requirements and is selling you what you need. If not, you’ll end up with extra costs for change orders and additional features to get the system you originally thought you were buying.
Fortunately this article ends on a positive note: with SaaS, customers can see how applications really work, and they can back out of a bad fit without sacrificing a huge investment. I whole heartedly agree. Try the real product on-line at some point without a sales person. Make sure the cost is obvious, simple, and transparent with no surprises. Reduce your risk, try it before you buy it and make sure there’s a simple, painless exit strategy.
This is for all the Apple fan boys at Mumboe who are charter members in the iCult. I’ve seen this list published a few times and I find it both interesting and useful. Not sure which book it’s from but I believe it’s one by Jeffrey Young.
Do what you love to do. Find your true passion. Make a difference. The only way to do great work is to love what you do.
Be different. Think different. Better to be a pirate than to join the navy.
Do your best at every job. Don’t sleep! Success generates more success so be hungry for it. Hire good people with a passion for excellence.
Perform SWOT analysis. As soon as you join/start a company, make a list of strengths and weaknesses of yourself and your company on a piece of paper. Don’t hesitate to throw bad apples out of the company.
Be entrepreneurial. Look for the next big thing. Find a set of ideas that need to be acted upon quickly and decisively and jump through that window. Sometimes the first step is the hardest one. Just take it. Have the courage to follow your heart and intuition.
Start small, think big. Don’t worry about too many things at once. Take a handful of simple things to begin with, and then progress to more complex ones. Think about not just tomorrow, but the future. Put a ding in the universe.
Strive to become a market leader. Own and control the primary technology in everything you do. If there’s a better technology available, use it regardless of whether or not anyone else is using it. Be the first, and make it an industry standard.
People judge you by your performance, so focus on the outcome. Be a yardstick of quality. Some people are not used to an environment where excellence is expected. Advertise. If they don’t know about it, they won’t buy your product. Pay attention to design. We made buttons on the screen look so good you’ll want to lick them. Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works.
Ask for feedback from people with diverse backgrounds. Each one will tell you one useful thing. If you’re at the top of the chain, sometimes people won’t give you honest feedback because they’re afraid. In this case, disguise yourself, or get feedback from other sources. Focus on those who will use your product-listen to your customers first.
Innovate. Innovation distinguishes a leader from a follower. Delegate. Let other top executives do 50% of your routine work to be able to spend 50% of your time on the new stuff. Say no to 1,000 things to make sure you don’t get on the wrong track or try to do too much. Concentrate on really important creations and radical innovation. Hire people who want to make the best things in the world. You need a very product-oriented culture, even in a technology company. Lots of companies have tons of great engineers and smart people. But ultimately, there needs to be some gravitational force that pulls it all together.
Learn from failures. Sometimes when you innovate, you make mistakes. It is best to admit them quickly, and get on with improving your other innovations.
Learn continually. There’s always “one more thing” to learn. Cross-pollinate ideas with others both within and outside your company. Learn from customers, competitors and partners. If you partner with someone whom you don’t like, learn to like them-praise them and benefit from them. Learn to criticize your enemies openly, but honestly.
My favorite is “better to be a pirate than to join the navy.” I know what he means, literally. Our developers will say “wait, you flew in the navy” but something they may not know is that my old squadron was the Jolly Rogers.
Nobody knows the benefits of Mumboe better than our users and your stories about saving time, improving visibility, increasing control and catching costly oversights are really resonating with potential users. We recently introduced the Mumboe Referral Program to encourage our users to share the value and benefits of Mumboe. All you have to do is refer a prospective client to us, and if they upgrade to Mumboe Pro, you will receive a $25 gift card of your choice. You can refer as many people as you’d like; there are no limits on what you can earn.
Get started by filling out this simple form. If you have questions, please contact us. We know that you’re busy and we truly appreciate your help.
A recent survey by BTI Consulting Group finds that corporate legal spending is set to increase nearly 5% during the second half of 2009, after a 7% decline last year. The firm, which provides strategic research to law firms and general counsel clients, is basing its conclusion on more than 1,200 interviews with corporate counsels at the world’s largest companies.
According to the report, the spending will be focused on regulatory compliance, employment, securities and bankruptcy/corporate restructuring law.
Corporate legal spending priorities for 2009.
While the survey did not include an outlook for technology spending, the overall trend is a positive sign that organizations are renewing their commitment to tackling the challenges of business accountability.
For clients interested in the full details of the report, BTI will discuss its findings in a webinar on May 28th at 12:00 EST. Cost is $300 per connection, sign up here.
More proof this week that ignoring those pesky details buried in contracts can get you into trouble. A recent Wall Street Journal editorial about New Mexico Attorney General Gary King is investigating a story about the ties between the AG’s office, a law firm, campaign contributions and a lapsed contract.
It seems a law firm was hired by the state to sue a pharmaceutical company. Of course, King denies any suggestion that the $50,000 in campaign contributions his office received from a lawyer at the firm had anything to do with that decision.
What is interesting is that the contract with the hired firm, Bailey Perrin, had actually expired on June 30, 2008 and wasn’t renewed until November 24, 2008. However, the lawsuit against the pharmaceutical company was initiated in July 2008. According to the WSJ:
“So we asked Mr. King about this five-month gap in which a private law firm was apparently representing the state without any legal authority to do so. “This is what I believe happened,” said Mr. King. “My contracts people didn’t notice that that contract had expired.” He added: “I have to talk to my lawyers about what happens when a contract expires in the middle of a lawsuit and somebody continues on [litigating]. But I think our laws probably cover that.”
The WSJ points out that the pharmaceutical company’s lawyers might see it differently. It will be interesting to see how the threads of this one get untangled. And whether a little lapse in a contract could be the thing that upsets the apple cart in the state’s case.
In a move designed to give companies even better visibility into their business agreements, Mumboe released an update to our on-demand contract management application today. The latest release, available today, includes a news feed, similar to those found in social media applications such as Facebook and Twitter, as well as new agreement tracking features. Together, these new capabilities give users the ability to see at a glance any activity related to specific business agreements, tasks, milestones and other items stored in the Mumboe system.
Specifically, the new features include:
Activity news feed - allows users to view a stream of recent activity on their Mumboe dashboard, or home screen. The news feed can include any activity in the system, such as changes to an agreements status, new milestones created, tasks completed and more. The feature gives our customers the ability to stay informed of updates and changes to their business relationships, much as you keep up with friends on Facebook. You can configure the news feed to show only the information you want to see, such as new documents uploaded or tasks completed. The news feed can also be delivered in an email digest.
The new Mumboe dashboard features a Facebook-like news feed.
Agreement Tracking - With a single click, you can choose to track a specific agreement, ensuring that any activity related to that agreement is included in your news feed. This eliminates the often time-consuming process of manually tracking changes, revisions, updates and status changes to an agreement.
You can choose to track an agreement with a single click.
Agreement State – a new menu lets you see at a glance what stage of the contract lifecycle an agreement is currently in, such as “preparing”, “active” or “concluded”. The change came as a result of your requests for better visibility into each stage of the contract lifecycle, and makes it even easier for you to proactively manage your business agreements.
“SEO should be the foundation for which the website is structured, so search engines can find it in the first place.”
I recently read this comment on a LinkedIn marketing discussion group about search engine optimization. From Mumboe’s point of view, we couldn’t disagree more. Too many sites get so carried away with SEO that they become virtually unusable. They dump lots and lots of keyword-rich content on their pages, and repeat those keywords often to improve their search engine rankings. And in many cases, it works. The web sites show up in the top listings on major search engines.
There’s just one problem with this approach: Search engines don’t buy products and services, people do. And people want web sites that make it easy to quickly find what they need, understand what you offer, and buy your product or service.
When we launched Mumboe, we had a good discussion about designing the web site for usability versus SEO. It was a pretty short discussion: usability won hands down. Fortunately we’ve got a couple of terrific UI professionals on staff here that keep pushing both the Mumboe application and the web site in the direction of better usability. If you were one of the early Mumboe users, you’ve seen the changes as they’ve evolved over the past year.
Our focus on usability is why you won’t find the long pages of text on the Mumboe web site that you do on so many sites today. We keep things fairly streamlined on purpose to make it easy for people to do what we want them to do: sign up for the free version of our product. We figure that making it easy for people to see the product for themselves, free, with no strings attached, is the best way to figure out whether or not they want to use it. Pages of features and benefits text can’t replace the actual experience of using the application.
Does that make it more challenging to drive traffic to the site? Certainly. But we don’t think that’s an excuse to abandon usability in favor of high traffic numbers. For a good perspective on the topic, check out this article titled “When is Usability More Important than SEO?”, written by a search engine marketing firm, no less.
