An SOA, BPM, Decision Management and Cloud Computing Guide for t How To Set Up A Google Store In Minutes Last week, Google released yet another gadget that may win them friends with small business owners. It’s called the Google Checkout store gadget and it essentially allows you to use Google Checkout and Google Docs to to easily create your own online store in a matter of minutes. What makes the gadget especially interesting is that because it’s tied to a Google Docs spreadsheet, small business owners can keep product inventory without having to use another third-party program like Quickbooks. Something many of us can probably appreciate. To install the gadget on your site or blog, Google outlines three simple steps. 1. And that’s it. This is really a great new gadget from Google, especially if you’re one of the many aspiring merchants or SMB owners who were intimidated by the thought of creating your own e-commerce store. What I really like is how much this lowers the bar to entry for merchants to start up. Do practice some caution, though. What do you think? More in: Google
The Paradox of the Information Age Business Models | IT THOUGHT Today, I came across a fascinating discussion about Information Age business models at the Harvard Business School Publishing website. It encapsulates the entire paradox of doing business in the Information Age – do you use the wonderful processing power today to turn old ideas out quicker at low cost or do your innovate and produce new ones even though they may not be price competitive. Both can be profitable uses of today’s technology and approaches to doing business, but one is obviously easier than the other, and unfortunately stifles and threatens the other economically. Harvard Business Publishing: The Best Business Model in the World by Umair Haque Everybody’s searching desperately for business model innovation: Detroit, newspapers, record labels, banks. In summary, the author is shocked by his fascination with a new online presentation tool into remembering that paying for quality makes sense. There are a lot of examples in our world of these two approaches being used.