Last fall I reviewed Convenos Meeting Center, positioning it as “Your Conference Board Room on the Internet”:

Convenos Meeting Center is a complete conference sharing collaborative environment suitable for both ad hoc and scheduled meetings as well as a virtual meeting room for “persistent”, project-dedicated business activities such as key account sales strategizing or product management support.

I mentioned, however, that one shortcoming was that its Application Sharing was sluggish and found that Convenos only officially supported Internet Explorer as its platform. Last month Convenos released an upgrade that:

• has “lightning-fast” Application Sharing
• supports Firefox as a browser platform
• is Microsoft Vista tolerant (sessions have been known to run successfully on Vista platforms; they just are not sure they have found all the “gotchas”.)
• reduces installation time by about 50%
• provides enhanced Outlook support for scheduling meetings

I did some basic application sharing tests this week and can report that the Application Sharing is very fast — even transmitting some video (but not audio) from the PGA Tour site. Convenos incorporated a “mirror server” into their collaboration architecture to accomplish this.

As a default Firefox browser user, login to, and operation of, my ongoing “Test” Convenos Meeting Room worked just fine. One of the Convenos support staff, who served as another meeting participant during my trial session mentioned above, related a CMC experience where he did not realize two of the participants were on Vista until they mentioned it well into the session. On the other hand they want to do further testing before claiming full Vista compatibility.

If you are currently a Convenos user the upgrade will be offered automatically when you next log into your Convenos subscription. Should you encounter any difficulties with this route, then simply Uninstall your previous installation, reboot your PC and log back, you will have a successful upgrade. The end result performance is definitely worth taking the time to upgrade.

Convenos can be accessed either as an independent browser-based Windows application or as a Skype Extra as a complement to Skype conversations. The Convenos Meeting Center Extra, which recently received Skype certification, provides a complete “instant meeting” Convenos web conferencing mode which incorporates the upgraded Application Sharing . .

And in the same April Convenos newsletter, they remind of the “Green” benefit of collaboration in addition to the well-known cost and productivity benefits:

Did you know that aviation is the world’s fastest growing man-made source of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and is a major contributor to global warming? Per PlanetArk, 16,000 commercial airplanes release 600 million tons of carbon dioxide every year. A recent survey conducted by a leading unified communications consultancy group revealed that 70% of organizations surveyed rated “reducing organizational carbon footprints” as a key driver in their decision to invest in web conferencing and collaboration.

In these times of rapidly rising fuel prices, one more consideration for using collaboration tools.

Testimonials from Convenos customers:

“We were looking for a more affordable way to sell our product that was not only intuitive but also integrated with Salesforce.com and Skype. Convenos Meeting Center met all our requirement expectations. Our sales team launches their meetings with Convenos Meeting Center inside Saleforce.com and are now able to utilize Salesforce.com to its full capacity. Convenos Meeting Center is fun to use and is a win-win solution. I like the tool, and I like the Convenos support team.”

Bertrand de Petigny of Odotech Inc.

“Prior to adopting Convenos Meeting Center, my company was using another web presentation solution that was clumsy, restrictive and quite expensive. We switched to Convenos for its ease of use, unrestricted monthly usage and great customer support. Interactions with the team at Convenos have been timely and pleasurable. Prior to using Convenos, we were accustomed to traveling for in-person meetings. We are now saving over 50% of our normal travel expenses, allowing us to reach more customers. I would highly recommend the Convenos Meeting Center solution.”

Dan Grace, Business Development Manager, Acclaim Telecom Services

“Since adopting Convenos Meeting Center with Skype integration, my company has saved almost 75% in collaboration and conferencing fees. Convenos has allowed us to streamline our communications both internally as well as with our partners by having the ability to work on blue prints and building plans on-the-fly without having to be in the same location. We are very satisfied with the solution and recommend it.”

Brian Anson, Project Manager, McHugh Construction

My first exposure to web collaboration came with my former employer Quarterdeck, who in their mid-90′s days of developing applications for use on the Internet, had acquired a company that provided whiteboarding and application sharing. It was quite a feat in an era of 50 to 100 MHz Pentium-based PC’s and max 33 kbps dailup modems. One morning in early 1996, at 5 a.m,, while at home near Toronto, I came down to participate in a London, UK analyst conference where we demonstrated this collaboration tool between a host in London, a colleague in Paris and myself near Toronto. Since then many collaboration applications have been introduced; they have taken on many flavors, providing different levels of support for activities such as team building, weekly internal sales and support team meetings, customer and employee training and customer relationship management applications. Personally I have had exposure in my consulting work over the intervening years to a few of these tools. Ease-of-use, adaptability into an enterprise’s business’ processes, the session launch process and customer support policies have become key factors in many enterprise decisions on which tools to deploy within an individual customer’s business operations.

The experience and technology behind that Quarterdeck application eventually, after many twists and turns in the business infrastructure, evolved into one of the first web conferencing services: Webex, which grew to become an industry icon and was recently acquired by Cisco. But many others realized that they too could attempt to develop a suite of collaboration tools. One of the eventual web conferencing players, whom I had encountered as a client’s competitor several years ago, was an offering called Convoq. They had built up a reasonable customer base but their business focus recently took a turn that went away from collaboration tools.. As a result Convoq had decided to close down their web conference service at the end of January.

Last fall I reviewed a web conferencing service, Convenos Meeting Center, which effectively provides a persistent virtual board room with a “slide projector”, “full motion video display”, whiteboard, cobrowsing and application-desktop sharing. With its audio options, including Skype conferencing and HighSpeedConferencing.com incorporating HD Audio, Convenos has built an enterprise customer base around its ease-of-use, range of features (including its ability to work with salesforce.com, amongst others) and customer support activities.

Convoq at least recognized they needed to close down professionally by proactively recommending a preferred provider to whom their customers could transition smoothly and continue their collaborative activities. A month before closing down, Convoq announced they had selected Convenos as that preferred Provider; Convenos has since been working with Convoq personnel and their customer base to ensure a smooth transition prior to Convoq’s shutdown a week ago. From the press release:

“We selected Convenos based on their customer satisfaction ratings, feature set compatibility, and pricing relative to our products. Additionally they are an experienced, dedicated web conferencing provider that has earned an excellent reputation in the marketplace”, said Dermot O’Grady, CFO of Convoq.

The Convoq team needs to be congratulated for developing a transition process and putting their customers’ interests first in executing on their decision to close down. Too many businesses “just don’t show up for business” one day and leave their customers to fend for themselves. And congratulations to Convenos on their selection as the preferred web conferencing service provider; with their overall philosophy of “delighting the user”, the transition process should be a relatively smooth one.

Tags: Skype, Convenos, Convoq, web conferencing, Quarterdeck, Webex

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A major trend in the late 1990′s was the emergence of enterprise grade Customer Relationship Management offerings that not only required IT support but also significant investments in server hardware and business process engineering. However, 1999 saw the launch of a different scenario for CRM, namely a hosted service, Salesforce.com, where even the smallest business could sign up and pay under $100 per user per month with no capital investment required. Today over 35,500 companies have implemented this hosted solution and Salesforce.com is regarded as the pioneer of the “No Software” movement. One could also point out they were the pioneer in the “No Hardware” movement.

Today we are seeing the emergence of several “No Hardware” hosted services including:

• OnState ACD: removing the need for Call Center PBX’s
• Convenos Meeting Center: a virtual boardroom for ongoing enterprise team building
• OnSIP hosted PBX: providing a hosted full service PBX for turning any SIP-based connection into an extension.

Of course common to all these platforms is that the users can also be geographically disbursed worldwide, contributing to the “Green” movement by reducing the need for business travel. And common to all these is that they bring what were previously perceived as large enterprise solutions to the small to medium business market space with a sub-$100 per user monthly subscription cost.

Lost in the buzz of Fall VON two weeks ago was the recent launch of another “No Hardware” service, SightSpeed Business, providing a range of video-based services for the small to medium enterprise. What previously required minimum six figure investments has been replaced by a service that costs under $20 per month per seat with no capital investment beyond user PC’s.

SightSpeed has always had a reputation for high quality video services including video calling, (up to four party) video conferencing and video messaging (or video mail). Building on SightSpeed’s informal adoption by over 30,000 small businesses, Sight Speed Business consolidates its video services for small business by introducing:

• An Administration console for central management of users, including internal directory services as well as coordination of purchasing SightSpeed
• Multi-user licensing
• Full video session recording
• In-call file sharing

The key new software piece here is the Administration Console providing the a business of any size a tool to easily and readily take control of how it deploys, manages and purchases SightSpeed’s video services. All the features of the previously available SightSpeed 6.0, including its Windows/Mac cross platform capability, are included.

Essentials:

• Operating System: Windows 2000/XP/Vista; Mac OS X 10.3.9 or higher
• Video Services: Video Calling (one-to-one), Video Conferencing (up to four participants), Video Messaging (create a video and email it)
• Voice Services: Unlimited (VoIP-based) PC-to-PC calling; Outbound calling to PSTN; Inbound calling via 800 number or local phone number.
• Other features include: In-call file sharing, session recording, unlimited text messaging
• Packages:
  • Single seat: $19.95 per month; $189.95 per year; 5-, 10- and 50-User Packs
  • Free 30 day trial
  • Includes 500 minutes of Outbound U.S. or Canada calling

SightSpeed has developed a customer base associated with their video messaging strengths. Having found a market niche in the SMB space, SightSpeed Business opens up new video communications (and productivity) opportunities for this market segment; it provides the tools for easy implementation across the business’s operating space with no capital expenditure. The challenge for small business is to determine where video communications can be incorporated into their ongoing business processes.

With Skype’s expanding video capabilities and the increasing general awareness of video overall as a real time conversations tool, we should be seeing additional interesting video-based services going into 2008.

More information here.

Tags: SightSpeed, SightSpeed Business, video services, video calling, video messaging, video conferencing

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This is the fourth post in a series summarizing the current state of Skype’s ecosystem and providing a perspective on the assets in place for a new CEO to run with.

Getting to the Present

Alec Saunders’ Voice 2.0 Manifesto talks about Applications as the value creators in a Voice 2.0 world. Once again Skype differentiates itself through a two-year-old Skype Developer Partner program as evidenced by Skype’s Extras Gallery. But getting to this point was not easy; in fact:

• Developer Partners had to be true entrepreneurs who kept their vision of a value-generating application above all the obstacles encountered in not only developing their offering but also in initially marketing it. Close communication with many players at Skype was a key to resolving many issues.
• Skype needed to develop experience with all the subtleties of a developer program from building a roadmap and a viable API set to communicating where Skype would play and where they would let their Partners play in the overall market space.
• Skype’s API set has evolved over time to the point where only over the past summer, as evidenced through the Skype Mashup competition, it provides a more complete set of developer tools, including many, such as Call Transfer, that have been clamored for by developers. (But Skype is by no means finished yet with delivering API’s.)
• Skype has also developed a publishing platform, Publishing Studio, that lets developers focus on their application while providing the infrastructure to bring the application to market and generate transactions associated with the application
• To provide standards for quality assurance, Skype is in the process of certifying its partners’ software applications.

The Voice 2.0 Challenge

The Voice 2.0 Manifesto talks about three flavors of applications:

• Voice applications such as conferencing, enhanced voice mail, audio hosting.
• Voice enabled IT applications: collaboration tools, Salesforce.com, Outlook integration, call centers — all designed to assist the knowledge worker
• The voice web: mashup of voice and the Internet. Here the combination of voice and web services offers the greatest opportunities. From the Voice 2.0 Manifesto: “Examples include: spoken word real estate descriptions from the MLS coupled with mapping, voice enabled matchmaker services, customer service coupled with inventory / ordering / availability. The mix of text, web, voice, and programmatic access to data is a heady brew.”

To date we have seen several offerings in the first two categories with initial steps taken, such as with PamFax, into the last category. However, this category’s true potential will only be realized when web services API’s are incorporated into the Skype API set. (The first one is on their recently released roadmap.) One other challenge for the SDP is to extend this program from Windows to the Mac platform.

Skype Publisher Studio

In the course of judging for the Skype Mashup Competition and checking out some newer Skype Extras, it became apparent why the Skype Publishing Studio is a valuable asset and differentiator, not only for Skype but also for, especially, the Skype Developer Partners:

• provides complete install/uninstall infrastructure
• includes Digital Rights Management that allows the publisher to determine the licensing terms for the software including free trials and offerings; tolled, monthly or annual subscriptions, etc.
• connects to a transaction processor that provides mechanisms for payments via Skype Credtis, which, in turn, can be purchased via PayPal or a credit card.

Basically the Publisher Studio relieves Extras publishers of the need to worry about overhead that would be common to them all and allowing them to focus all their resources on the actual value-creating application. Along with the Publishing Stuido, the Skype Developer program is requiring adherence to standards for usability, robustness and overall quality assurance through the Skype Software Certification program.

PamFax, worldwide winner of the recent Skype Mashup competition, demonstrates the full power of the Publishing Studio through its use of all features, including transaction handling. My quote to the Share Skype blog post about PamFax’s award:

“As I judge I found many excellent entries that demonstrate the value of various aspects of the Skype ecosystem. However, the winners have gone beyond the normal “just add Skype” and taken a broader advantage of the entire Skype ecosystem to turn their Skype Extra into a full business opportunity. For instance, PamFax demonstrates that the Skype Extra program not only provides API’s into Skype but also provides a flexible set of licensing terms and a unique means to quickly collect revenues via the Skype Extras transaction engine.”

Essential Reading: Phil’s post yesterday (Russell Shaw also thought so): Why Skype and Vonage Must Live:

Skype is still evolving how to work in the hundreds of network and compute environments in hundreds of millions of situations. Those situations are challenging and evolving on their own. How you cross firewalls, scale p2p, and adapt streams for mobile conditions aren’t ready to be locked down.

Bottom line: Along with Skype’s provision of a complete suite of real time conversation tools, the Skype Developer Partner program is the other big differentiator from other “VoIP” services. This program:

• positions Skype outside the traditional “legacy telephony replacement” space
• opens up significant sustainable revenue generation opportunities for both Skype and its Developer Partners
• brings reduced communications costs and increased productivity to its business users

And somebody must like these Extras: over 21 million downloads. Another success story: WebDialogs (publisher of Unyte) recently became a division of IBM’s Lotus SameTime Group.

Reference posts:

• Unyte’s Tale: Pioneering and Persevering as a Skype SDP
• On Being a Skype Software Business Solution Partner
• A Banner Day for Skype Development Program
• Desktop Collaboration: The Skype Ecosystem Expands
• Skype Partners Answer Jeff’s Challenge for Innovation in Voice Services
• The Dawn of the Mashup World: – Part I: Challenges, Why and Expectations

Business Solutions Extras:

• Voice Recording and Archiving Applications: Pamela, Skylook
• Voice Services: Evoca, HighSpeed Conferencing.com.
• Call Center: OnState ACD for Skype
• Collaboration: Convenos, Unyte Yugma Skype
• Animation: Crazy Talk
• Miscellaneous Utilities: MyToGo, PamFax

For Skype Journal posts on these Partners, enter the Partner’s name into Skype Journal’s Search box and you will get a list of all posts related to that Partner. The complete set of Skype Extras, including games, entertainment and personalization Extras, can be found here or by going to Tools | Do More | Get Extras on the Skype for Windows client.

Other posts in this Skype Primer Series

• A Backgrounder
• Enabling Real Time Communications
• Skype Hardware – If and When Available

Tags: Skype, Voice 2.0 Manifesto, Skype API, Skype Extras, Skype Developer Partner Program, Skype Publishing Studio, Pamela, Skylook, Evoca, HighSpeedConferencing.com, OnState ACD for Skype, Convenos, Unyte, Yugma, Crazy Talk, MyToGo, PamFax, Phil Wolff, Russell Shaw

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When looking at Convenos, think of entering your conference or board room and encountering the audio-visual devices within that room: a slide projector, a whiteboard, a video monitor and probably a display adapter with screen. In essence Convenos Meeting Center moves that board room to the Internet, even to the point where you can enter and leave the board room at will and re-enter to find all your shared content just as you left them previously. Convenos Meeting Center is a complete conference sharing collaborative environment suitable for both ad hoc and scheduled meetings as well as a virtual meeting room for “persistent”, project-dedicated business activities such as key account sales strategizing or product management support. Perhaps the best indicator of its effectiveness is that Convenos Meeting Center is being adopted by enterprises requiring up to three figure numbers of licenses.

Sharing Modes: The essence of Convenos is demonstrated in their tab bar’s titles:

• Slides: A full presentation slide manager (PowerPoint, PDF and MS Office files, etc.)
• Web: Cobrowsing (sharing links) of web pages
• Draw: A virtual whiteboard with the usual annotation capabilities
• Media: embedded Windows Media Player for full motion video sharing
• AppShare: an application sharing environment for either your full desktop or one individual desktop application window

In addition to displaying the five basic services, the Convenos Meeting Center session displays sidebars that facilitate and support management of the meeting:

The left sidebar includes single click access to shared content (such as presentations and documents formatted for sharing in the Slide tab, Bookmarks for display in the Web Tab or videos to show in the Media tab), listing of logged in users and a text chat service. The right hand sidebar includes Meeting Information (Name, Type, Host, etc.), Polls, Attendees (all who are authorized to attend the meeting and their status), a Notepad and a File Share window for files that you wish to allow all meeting participants to download.

The essentials:

• Convenos runs inside an Microsoft Internet Explorer browser ((IE 6 or later). However, although not supported by Convenos, I was also able to operate the Convenos Meeting Center environment in a Firefox browser tab when using the Firefox IE Tab extension. And, since it uses Internet Explorer and associated technologies, it requires Windows 2000/XP/Vista platforms. Update May 2008: April 2008 upgrade now includes Firefox 2.0 support.
• Meeting Types: Scheduled, Recurring (say, weekly), Ongoing (persistent) and Instant
• Packages: Standard (up to 20 participants, 25GB storage, $30/license/month); Professional (up to 99 participants, 100GB storage, $100/license/month)
• Voice services: Skype (up to 10 participants); HighSpeedConferencing (up to 99 participants) or a host-defined option
• Private and Open (Public) Meetings
• Capacity: 99 participants except when doing Application Sharing – 25 participants
• Access: via Skype Extras: Tools | Do More | Get Extras | Business or download from Convenos website.

Setup and Operation

There are three options for setting up a Convenos Meeting: Web-based, Outlook or as a Skype Extra. While the first two are more appropriate for Scheduled, Recurring and Ongoing meetings; the latter is more appropriate for, and limited to, Instant Meetings. All three options have a one-time free 14-day trial period after which subscription charges apply.

Outlook: This is probably the most general approach with easiest setup of scheduled, recurring and ongoing meetings since it links into your Outlook Contacts and Calendar. Install the Convenos Outlook plug-in, click on the Schedule Meeting or Instant Meeting button, fill in the meeting information, select participants from your Outlook Contacts and send the email invitations. Click on the link to enter the meeting; as the email is received it automatically gets added to Outlook Calendars of all the participants. Any meeting scheduled from the Outlook plug-in will default to using Skype for the voice service; this can be changed by going to My Convenos described below.

Web-based: Convenos is managed through a My Convenos host management session in IE. The three primary categories are Meetings (Enter/Create/Start Instant Meeting), Setup (My Profile, Preferences, Edit Instant Meeting, Purchase and Downloads) and Assistance (Help, Support). Creation of a meeting involves multiple steps including:

• Meeting information: Title, Description, Type, Schedule Information (for Scheduled and Recurring Meetings)
• Meeting Options: Open or Private, Hide Attendees Information, Server Location
• Audio Options: Skype only, Mixed VoIP, landline and mobile (HighSpeedConferencing) or host-defined audio
• Invite Attendees: via email address or from Convenos Contact list, set Attendees’ privileges: (Guest, Participant, Speaker, Recorder)

Skype integration via this option largely consists of automatically bringing Skype users into the voice conversation when they enter the meeting. During any registration session you are asked to enter your Skype Name (but not password) such that when Convenos detects you are entering a meeting it also brings you into the Skype conference call session.

One shortcoming here is the lack of integration with Skype Contacts where one could select a Skype Contact for an invitation and send the invitation via Skype IM (in a manner similar to how the Convenos Skype Extra works).

Actual operation involves the Host entering the meeting from his/her My Convenos while participants can enter from a link in the email (or if they are already a Convenos Contact, from their “My Convenos”). An initial ActiveX client download (~1.5 MB) is required; for Private meetings, non-registered contacts are required to fill in some contact information to register with Convenos. However, given this is an enterprise tool, these operations, once completed, are not repeated, yet they maintain an appropriate element of privacy and security for Convenos sessions. (For Open meetings a one-time participant ID and Skype Name, if appropriate, are all that are requested.)

The Instant Meeting set up via MyConvenos jumps to the Attendee screen from which you can invite contacts. Not quite as spontaneous as inviting contacts via the Convenos Outlook plug-in or directly out of a Skype user’s Contact List, such as with the Convenos Skype Extra, unless the invitee has previously registered with Convenos.

One key area for consideration is how a sharing environment displays across disparate screen sizes of the various participants. Convenos handles this by placing their session in an Internet Explorer window which can be resized in the normal Windows manner. Optionally the sidebars can be hidden to create an even larger display space.

Content for the Slide Tab is generated by a Convenos print driver that converts (“prints”) any file format to a jpg file which can then be viewed in the Slide Tab. As a result slide shows can comprise PowerPoint, PDF, Word, Excel, MS Project or any other printable document; however, they cannot be edited within the Slide tab.

Cobrowsing essentially consists of sharing URL’s to be viewing the same page and, while it will track mouse and keyboard activity, it does not allow any interactivity such as sharing entry of form data (such as Comments to Skype Journal). In practice this is a security feature to prevent unauthorized purchases and access to other personal/confidential activity. When watching a YouTube video each participant must actually start the video and the audio stream comes from each individual’s web browser. (The WEB tab essentially embeds an IE session into the Convenos session.) To share interactivity such as form entry, you must share an IE session under the Application Sharing tab.

A unique feature of the cobrowser, whiteboard (DRAW) and Media Player is the content in these tabs can be captured and transferred to the Slide Tab’s documents for viewing as a slide.

The Media Tab, which supports any video format supported by Windows Media Player including MPEG 4, has seen increased use with the evolution of user generated video content, especially for training and customer support videos.

The one weak area is desktop sharing on two counts:

1. There are only options to share either the full Desktop or one individual application (window) but not multiple selected application windows.
2. In several sessions we found the refresh/update rate to be sluggish. Fast enough to be usable; however, not “snappy”. Update May, 2008; this issue has been addressed.

One major strength of Convenos is the “persistence” of Ongoing Meetings: you can leave the meeting and come back several days later and find the “state” of the meeting has not changed (unless others with appropriate privileges have entered and made some changes). All your documents are there; you are back at the last slide viewed in the Slides tab, the last web page viewed in the cobrowser and the most recent markup of the whiteboard.

Convenos Skype Extra (Instant Meeting): The Convenos Skype Extra is installed via the Tools | Do More | Get Extras | Business path from the Skype for Windows client. Upon installing you are asked to enter your Convenos registration information (email, password) and a Skype Contact window will appear from which you can select names for an Instant Meeting session. Click on Start and meeting information, including a link URL, will go out via Skype Chat windows to each participant.

Subsequently, right click on a Skype Contact’s Name, select DoMore and Convenos Meeting Center. The Skype Contact Window mentioned above appears again with the Contact’s name as the first person to be included in a Convenos session. Click on Start and meeting information, including a link URL, will go out via Chat windows to the designated Contact(s). Basically, four clicks and you are launching a Convenos Instant Meeting session.

Positioning: Ideally suited as an enterprise team building and bonding tool, especially when team members are geographically disbursed. A complete suite of hosted tools for customer presentations, sales and support training, project management infrastructure, recurring team meetings and document sharing.

Strengths:

• A complete conference room environment suitable for enterprise team collaboration and external presentations
• Rapidly switch amongst the various sharing modes
• Persistence: ongoing meetings to support enterprise or special interest community projects
• Voice options: while Skype is there, can be expanded to allow other options for >10 participant sessions; infrastructure inherently provides backup in the case of a specific service’s outage or capacity limitations
• Display versatility: total scaling within the limitations of a participant’s screen size and resolution.
• Skype and Outlook integration
• Full motion video sharing
• Much more user friendly, intuitive user interface and less costly than Webex
• A feature compatible, Skype-enabled alternative to GoToMeeting
• On-the-fly polling to spontaneously develop consensus amongst participants
• Could use a designated coordinator but requires no assigned IT support
• Includes hosted storage of commonly shared and accessed content

Weaknesses:

• Limitations on application sharing (sluggish, options for sharing applications)
• Mildly cumbersome for setting up Instant Meetings from My Convenos manager.
• Flash or QuickTime support comes only via the “Web” mode using the relevant inherent IE plug-ins

May 2008 Update: April 2008 upgrade provides “lightning-fast” application sharing, Firefox 2.0 support and works with many Microsoft Vista installations.

A few days ago I provided an introductory post to the forthcoming series on desktop collaboration offerings that are available as Skype Extras. In this post I simply want to mention the three offerings that will be reviewed along with some additional criteria for the evaluation.

Skype Extras for PC Desktop Collaboration:

Convenos Meeting Center: emulating your conference board room with a slide projector, video monitor and display adapter with screen. A key feature is Convenos’ “persistence” capability that allows you to enter and leave the “board room” or conference at will without losing any of the information left in the room. (Update: January 2009: Convenos ceased operations.)

Unyte: bringing desktop sharing as complementary real time conversation mode to Skype’s traditional voice, IM and video modes via a single click. Includes a “Remote Asssist” feature that allows the user to view a remote Windows platform for providing customer presentations and support to, or reviewing documents with, both Skype-enabled and non-Skype-enabled contacts.

And announced today (drum roll for Mac and Linux users): Yugma Skype: full cross platform desktop sharing (Windows, Mac and Linux). Simple swapping of shared desktops and a free offering for up to ten-participant sessions are two key features.

Criteria for evaluation include:

• User interface
  • Remote viewing: browser-based or independent window
  • Session setup and scheduling
• Operating System, Web Browser flexibility
• Extent of Skype integration
• Sharing Modes
• Refresh/update speeds at remote participants’ desktops
• Session/conference persistence
• Approach to handling different screen sizes

Let the reviews begin.

Over the past three weeks I have had the opportunity to attend the Skype sessions at the eBay-Skype Developers Conference, to meet with and/or interview several Skype Software Business Solution Partners (product reviews forthcoming), and to spend a day at eBay Live – especially in the exhibit area.

Out in the blogosphere, especially via posts from the mesh 2007 and Enterprise 2.0 conferences, we have also seen a few observations about how social networking tools and, in particular, Skype, are penetrating the small enterprise market. The combination of these activities has helped bring into clearer focus what it takes to be a successful Skype Business Solution Partner, not from a technology perspective, but rather an approach to building a sustainable business.

First and foremost – bring along some experience in a vertical market or solution:

• Unyte has been providing desktop sharing services for several years;
• Real Allusion brings expertise in graphic enhancement and animation to Crazy Talk
• The OnState team brings over twenty years’ experience in developing successful Call Center solutions to its OnState ACD product,
• VAPPS brings carrier grade conferencing technology and experience to HighSpeedConferencing.com
• The Convenos team brings several years’ experience in building virtual meeting solutions
• Evoca had been developing a call recording, messaging and transcription web service business around any telephony service for academics, media companies and political campaigns

Second: Be prepared to be a persistent, patient pioneer.

• The Unyte story, initially presented here in an interview with Unyte’s CTO, Gershon Goren , but also articulated so well by Unyte’s CEO Lou Guercia at the Skype “Concepts to Cash” presentation, describes how the Unyte developer team had to work with Skype personnel as both the API set and the developer program evolved over the past two plus years.
• But I also heard about how incorporating Skype into Evoca’s product offering required supportive assistance from Skype personnel to bring on board the first web service involving Skype.
• The OnState ACD solution required patience until Skype could offer full call transfer capability; in the interim they built a Skype chat solution accessible from any website.

The evolution to the current Skype Software Developer Program removes some of the obstacles encountered by these pioneers; on the other hand they have been trail blazers contributing towards what is offered today.

• But the most important advice comes from Dick Schiferli at Pamela: “Nurture your Skype relationship and maintain an appropriate level of engagement by building good lines of two-way communication with Skype”.
• And don’t forget about Skype Software certification whose goal is to provide standards for quality assuance. As of July 2, Skype Software Certification will be required to become a Skype Partner.

Third: Ensure you have a value add product or service, not simply a feature

As an example consider Call Recording: Three partner products involve Call Recording: Pamela, Skylook and Evoca. In addition, Skype offers its own voice mail service but it’s simply that – voice mail with no PC access via MP3 files or other enhancements.

However, when you dig deeper you will find that call recording is a feature within each of these products/services. It is the value add proposition incorporating the call recording feature that differentiates each of the offerings. For instance:

• Pamela offers (MP3) call recording/voice mail as one feature of a set of personal assistant utilities that enhance your overall Skype experience;
• Skylook logs call recordings/voice mails into Outlook for individual PC archival purposes, integrated along with archiving of chat messages and call history within Outlook. In fact, with Skylook, you can manage all your Skype real time communications activity from Outlook and leave the Skype client in the System Tray
• Evoca offers online archiving with web access and RSS feeds for website, weblog and podcast reference along with transcription and translation services but no voice mail service.

And if you investigate the respective pricing models for each, you will find they represent various approaches to providing business-driven value-add.

Fourth: follow Lou’s Rules. From Lou Guercia’s presentation at the “Concepts to Cash” seminar:

• Rule #1: Develop a product that you’d like to use with Skype .. Something that enhances the user experience.
• Rule #2: Don’t forget Rule #1 (when you get into the actual development cycle)
• Rule #3: Keep It Simple Stupid (make implementation and operation intuitive)
• Rule #4: Offer free and paid solutions
• Rule #5: (not stated but implicit in his presentation) Bring your solution to Skype’s global user base in a way that requires no (or minimal) real-time tech support

Fifth: Use Web 2.0 tools and social networking to build your customer base:

While traditional SMB marketing programs will certainly bring results, a profitable business model for selling Skype Partner software involves leveraging Web 2.0 tools wherever feasible. Social networking has become a key business tool:

• From Alec Saunders’ Enterprise 2.0 Reflections: We’re onto something BIG!:

… the business of being an enterprise solution provider just got a lot harder. Over and over we heard repeated that the young bring their own networks and applications to business. And because these are mostly web based applications, not much can be done to contain them. Within a short period of time, we should expect millions upon millions of GMail, Facebook, and Skype users within every enterprise globally.

• Unyte grew its registered user base from 250,000 to 500,000 in six months simply through the visibility provided by Skype Extras
• “Staff increasingly dictating the corporate IT agenda”. This forum entry is consistent with a story I heard while having lunch at eBay Live about a Fortune 500 company that blocked Skype internally but all their field agents use Skype to communicate externally.
• Obtain third party reviews, especially in the blogosphere.

And from several comments heard at the developer conference:

• Employees start using Skype and bring it into the business
• Skype becomes a key communications tool for building business presence worldwide for small to medium businesses
• Business investigates Skype Business Partner Solution and adopts one or more solutions
• According to Unyte, each license drives four more Skype user registrations as the product infiltrates the business’s best practices

Skype’s introduction into (initially small-medium) businesses via products such as Convenos, Unyte and OnState is demonstrating that Skype Partner Solutions will be a primary driver for building the Skype user base going forward. When you hear of 100 license sales for Unyte and 200 to 400 license deals for Convenos, and leverage those into additional Skype user registrations, you start to recognize that business solutions incorporating Skype will become a key differentiator for Skype from other VoIP players and a key driver of new user adoption in what is becoming an otherwise very competitive market space.

Tags: Skype, Skype Software Developer Program, Pamela, Skylook, Unyte, Convenos, OnState, HighSpeedConferencing.com, VAPPS, Skype Extras, Evoca, Real Allusion, Crazy Talk, mesh07, Enterprise 2.0, SaundersLog, Alec Saunders

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Webware is a c|net website that talks about “cool web apps for everyone”. Recent posts include review of Netscape’s Social Browser, an Adobie Acrobat update for Vista compatibility as well as a remote printing feature and Sclipo, another potential player in the Skype Prime space. Industry veteran journalist Rafe Needleman is the Chief Blogger. “In the three years of writing the [Catch of the Day] column [for the original Red Herring magazine] he interviewed more than 1,000 startup CEOs. Most are now out of business. Make of that what you will.”

At this time Webware is selecting its first “Webware 100″ Awards winners. It’s down to the finalists and, in the Communications category Skype is a finalist. From a Skype press release today:

Skype was chosen as a finalist for the “Webware 100” Awards from more than 4,000 user-submitted nominations. Winners will be announced on Monday, June 18 and posted on Webware.com, a CNET site.

The “Webware 100” Awards recognizes the best Web 2.0 sites, services, and applications that are leading the next wave of innovation. Voting is open to the public from May 23 through June 11, where the top 25 finalists in each category will be listed.

Candidates in the Communications (email, chat, VoIP) category include: GMail, Google Talk, Grand Central, Twitter, Windows Live’s Hotmail and Messenger and 18 others.

Here’s why I will be voting for Skype:

• Most contacts. With over 9.5 million users and a nine figure number of registered accounts, it is one of the most pervasive in terms of finding your own network of friends and business colleagues. Personally I have over 200 contacts; only MSN Windows Live Messenger comes close and even they mostly overlap with my Skype contacts. As Michael Arrington stated at mesh 2007, networking has value.
• Most complete set of real time conversation services: voice, IM/presence/chat, conference calling (up to 10 participants), video, file transfer, SMS, voice mail, SkypeIn/Out (with North American unlimited calling)
• Most cross platform: Windows (of any ilk), Mac, Linux, PC-Free phones, (remember the Sony Mylo that had such great voice quality!)
• Most embedded: Skype for Email Toolbars, Skype for Web Toolbars, etc.
• Most Voice 2.0 applications: Unyte Application Sharing, Skylook – Outlook integration with archiving of conversation activity, Pamela – a personal communications assistant, High Speed Conferencing for larger conference calls, Crazy Talk for Skype (review coming) for avatar creation and animation, OnState ACD for Call Center, Convenos Meeting Center and all the other Skype Extras.
• Bottom line: Most land-based conversations for my activities

And, I guess, having performed a Twitterectomy, Ken Camp won’t be voting for Twitter unless he suffers severe Twitter withdrawal symptoms.

You can vote here; voting closes June 11. Vote early, vote as you like, but, based on an actual test, I don’t think you can vote often.

Tags: Skype, Webware 100, Twitter, Unyte, Skylook, Pamela, High Speed Conferencing, OnState ACD, Convenos, Crazy Talk