Startup Success With Crowd Sourced Software Testing and “99Tests” |  |
- Startup Success With Crowd Sourced Software Testing and “99Tests”
- Yahoo Will Free Up Inactive IDs, Possibly Including Yours
- Mid-Year Business Review: Risk Management Edition
- Scaling for Growth: The Benefits of a Business Phone System in the Cloud
- 12 Business Leadership Lessons From Scout Law
| Startup Success With Crowd Sourced Software Testing and “99Tests” Posted: 13 Jun 2013 04:00 PM PDT
In this world of instant global communication and online forums that allow individuals to contribute to the wealth of knowledge that lies a mere finger tap away, it's no wonder companies have put two and two together and started crowd-sourcing aspects of their business. But could this collaborative business phenomenon evolve into a world where there are no managers, and people could contribute when they wished because they were intrinsically motivated? Software Testing with “99Tests”That is the question Praveen Singh, CEO and Founder of 99tests, asked himself when he leaped into the crowd-sourcing fray in the winter of 2010 by starting a crowd-sourced software testing venture in the form of 99tests. 99tests offers crowd-sourced testing to software product companies around the globe. These companies can hire twenty to sixty on-demand software testing professionals who will test their products in real world conditions over the course of a few days in order to catch critical bugs before customers do. They test for various platforms such as mobile, Web and tablets and support a range of testing types such as functionality, security and performance testing. With a workforce 4250 testers strong and over fifty global customers within two short years, 99tests has hit the software testing market floor running. Many diverse companies from all over the globe have already enjoyed the effects of employing 99tests such as Intuit, Flipkart, and Cleartrip. Whether you're an established firm or a fledgling start up, 99tests accommodates your testing needs through fixed price per unit packages, a pricing standard used among other crowd sourcing companies such as CrowdFlower. Each package varies in size depending on the client's needs and 99tests communicates diligently with the client to make sure these needs are clearly presented and addressed. 99tests even provides a demo package for a steal to win you over. And win you over they will when you consider that in just over two years, the 99tests community has logged 22,304 bugs. Motivation Via Healthy CompetitionKeeping the community dedicated to providing quality service is crucial to the success of crowd-sourcing firms, so what better way to motivate his testers than to turn each project into a healthy competition? 99tests makes each project a client sponsored competition amongst the assigned testers in which the top testers who find the most bugs receive a monetary prize. But 99tests goes a step further and often these top testers will also win testing tools that help nourish and build their skill sets. It is this perk that really sets 99tests apart from other crowd sourcing firms since it is not only their intention to deliver the best possible service to the clients, but also strive to strengthen each tester's abilities. By offering these incentives, 99tests guarantees a network of passionate and exceptionally talented testers. In fact, founder Praveen Singh sees 99tests as a professional networking site for testers that creates a unique image and reputation for excellence. He would like to fortify his 99tests brand by creating a crowd-sourcing platform that testers want to be associated with and feel compelled to be a contributing part. Praveen found a trusted partner in his Co-Founder Naveen Kumar, who expressed interest in 99tests after shutting down his own venture. Naveen plays a crucial role in the operations of 99tests taking care of the technology, development, and marketing aspects of the business. This leaves Praveen free to continue being the software crowd-sourcing evangelist he is. It is equally important to Praveen to give value to the lives of the people in his community, as it is to provide his clients with exceptional service. By outsourcing work to independent freelancers through an internationally accessible platform, he has helped place testers from remote corners of India in established organizations, significantly improving their quality of life. In just over two years 99tests has been able to log over 20,000 bugs from this 4,000+ work force. They have done so with only a fraction of the 37 million dollars in venture capital their American goliath counterpart, uTest, has. Praveen and Naveen's goal for 2013 is to reach 10,000 testers and secure 200 customers by the year's end. They also want to expand into automation services and help companies manage the risk of releasing "buggy" software. Ambitious, of course, but with increasing demand for crowd-sourced services, certainly promising. Testing Tablet Photo via Shutterstock The post Startup Success With Crowd Sourced Software Testing and “99Tests” appeared first on Small Business Trends. |
| Yahoo Will Free Up Inactive IDs, Possibly Including Yours Posted: 13 Jun 2013 01:30 PM PDT
If you have an old inactive Yahoo ID you haven’t used in a while, you may loose it…soon. The Internet giant plans to “free up” those IDs for the benefit of new or existing users who want them, if the old users don’t sign in to Yahoo before July 15, 2013. It looks like Yahoo is doing this primarily to make room for potential new users of its services coming over from Tumblr. As we’ve reported, Yahoo announced plans to acquire the popular social blogging network for $1.1 billion last month. The company said on its official Tumblr blog Wednesday that it will allow new users to stake their claims on inactive Yahoo IDs. Here’s what Yahoo Senior Vice President of Platforms Jay Rossiter wrote about the changes in a post called “yourname@yahoo.com Can Be Yours!”:
Here’s how Yahoo plans to give new users a crack at the old inactive IDs. In mid-July, Rossiter said Yahoo will be “resetting” IDs inactive for 12 months or longer. At that time, Rossiter says anyone will have a chance to “score” one of these free IDs. No word yet on exactly how this will work. They can then return to Yahoo in mid August to find out whether they got the ID of their choice. Yahoo IDs are used to access most Yahoo services including Yahoo Mail and Flickr photostreams. If you’re like a lot of early Yahoo users, including online business owners, you probably have a Yahoo ID you haven’t used in a while, perhaps to access an old Yahoo email account or MyYahoo page you used for business purposes. If you’d like to keep that account for future use, no problem. But you’ll need to act soon. Rossiter says existing users need only log onto any Yahoo product prior to July 15, 2013. So, if you want to keep that old Yahoo ID – take note. The post Yahoo Will Free Up Inactive IDs, Possibly Including Yours appeared first on Small Business Trends. |
| Mid-Year Business Review: Risk Management Edition Posted: 13 Jun 2013 11:00 AM PDT
For small-business owners, conducting a mid-year check-in is an essential part of staying on track for meeting annual revenue and growth goals. But a mid-year review can also be an effective risk-management tool to help keep your business safe from the various forces that can throw it off track. Below are key questions to include in your business review to ensure that you're adequately managing the risks that affect your business. Business Review: Risk Management QuestionsAs with any mid-year review, half the battle is setting aside time to analyze your business and develop an action plan for items you need to work on. Get serious about latter portion of 2013 by setting aside a half day in the coming weeks to spend analyzing the current state of your company. When you do, take the time to consider these questions that focus on risk management. Are your taxes on track?In mid June, your second installment of estimated quarterly taxes is due. But if your revenue has increased since your initial projections, your tax liability might have changed, too. To make sure you don't incur underpayment penalties, take time during your mid-year check-in to reexamine your calculations. Dedicating a few minutes to crunching these numbers has the potential to save you time, energy, and unnecessary penalties when you're filing your taxes next year. How safe are your business premises?A quick safety audit of your business premises will alert you to any hazards that could lead to property damage, bodily injury, or lawsuits for the people you serve and employ. Check batteries in smoke and carbon monoxide detectors, verify that furniture and decorative items are secure and unlikely to cause accidents, and make sure that light fixtures provide adequate illumination. A little preventative work now can save you from a customer injury that leads to a costly lawsuit down the road. Are you inviting a data breach?These days, it's almost impossible to run a business without handling client data of some kind. And if you have access to customer information, you're at risk for having it compromised in a data breach. Minimizing your chances of being victimized requires a multi-pronged approach: Encrypt data, use strong passwords, change your passwords regularly, limit employee access to sensitive data, install antivirus software on your machines, and invest in a Cyber Liability Insurance policy that will cover your costs if and when a data breach does happen. Small businesses are big targets and if you've skipped one or more of these steps, there's no better time than the present to put protective measures in place. Do you have policies in place for avoiding client lawsuits?In many cases, client lawsuits are triggered not by sloppy or incomplete work but by clients who feel as if their needs haven't been met or their concerns haven't been addressed. One way to minimize the likelihood of dissatisfied clients is to institute a check-in strategy that includes communication during all phases of a project. Having a standard policy for touching base allows you to identify areas of concern and address problems when they're small. Without such a policy, you'll likely only hear about problems when they've escalated and are harder and more time-consuming to deal with. Your communication system doesn't have to be complicated: Even pre-written emails sent at specific stages in your projects can work by demonstrating to your clients that you're thinking about them and available to address their concerns. Do you know what your competitors are up to?It's never fun to be blindsided by a disruptive innovation from one of your biggest rivals. A new, out-of-the-blue product or service launch by one of your rivals can hurt both your credibility and your revenue. During your mid-year review, set aside some time to research your competition (and develop a schedule for doing this on a regular basis if you aren't already). At worst, you'll find out about an upcoming challenge sooner than you might have; at best, you'll get some great ideas you can adapt for your own business. When did you last update your emergency or disaster plan?Hurricane Sandy served as an unpleasant reminder about how serious weather events can affect small businesses. But now that the "Super Storm" has faded from headlines, the urgency behind disaster management plans has also sputtered. If you don't have a plan in place for what you'll do in the event of a tornado, hurricane, flood, earthquake, fire or power outage, take some time to sketch out the details. Remember to include plans for contacting your employees, saving or preserving your inventory, and financing your ongoing business expenses if your revenue is disrupted. (Business Interruption Insurance might be able to help with the latter.) Do your insurance policies protect you against the risks you currently face?Finally, take a look at the limits and exclusions on your Business Liability Insurance policies. If you haven't updated them in six months or more and have experienced any business changes in that time (e.g., moving to a new building, increasing revenue, offering new services or products, hiring new employees, etc.), there's a good chance that your policies don't fully cover you. A brief phone call to your insurance agent should clarify whether you need an update to your insurance policies. Risk Management as Part of Revenue GrowthIt's all too easy to treat risk management as an afterthought while focusing primarily on more traditional revenue-boosting measures. In reality, though, a robust risk management plan is essential to maintaining steady revenue increases. After all, nothing drains a business's assets faster than an unexpected catastrophe or disaster that demands large-scale repairs or a lawsuit that requires extensive time and money to defend. If you're having trouble finding time to update your risk management plan, think of it as one of the safeguards you put in place to shield the revenue you've worked so hard to earn. Take some advice from Ben Franklin, the owner of several small businesses:
Management Photo via Shutterstock The post Mid-Year Business Review: Risk Management Edition appeared first on Small Business Trends. |
| Scaling for Growth: The Benefits of a Business Phone System in the Cloud Posted: 13 Jun 2013 08:33 AM PDT Sponsored Post
Growing businesses have at least one thing in common. They all need the ability to "scale", i.e., be able to grow without infrastructure and systems holding them back. Or as I often say, you have to be able to get out of your own way as you grow. If you are held back from opportunities because your existing systems aren't flexible enough or it cost too much to expand, or you feel locked in to outdated technology that's cumbersome to manage – then your business will suffer. The good news in one area, telecommunications, is that there are many more choices for small businesses today than even 5 years ago. One of those choices is a cloud phone system. A cloud phone system is where you use the power and benefits of the cloud for telecommunications. Cloud phone systems offer a number of advantages: Avoid costly equipment With a cloud-based business phone system, there's typically little hardware involved (other than the phones themselves). So you don't need to worry about buying, maintaining and upgrading equipment or even the software, such as for a PBX switchboard. It saves on capital expenditures and also cuts down your internal maintenance costs. Convenient management A cloud phone system gives you a Web-based management console to configure features and users. Look for a system whose dashboard is easy to understand and use — by a non-telecommunications professional. Fast to set up Some phone systems require a lot of lead time to set up. For example, a dedicated VOIP system on your premises may require multiple visits by an installation crew, and training sessions to learn a complex system. A cloud system is much closer to "plug and play." Get more leverage with more features For small and midsize businesses, you're able to get the kind of features that large enterprise phone systems take for granted, but without the enterprise cost. You can easily get features such as call logs, conference calling, and auto attendants to direct incoming calls. And while you could piece together such features from a variety of providers, there’s less complexity when you get them through a single provider, management them with a single interface, and get a single consolidated billing. Easy to understand, predictable billing Back in my corporate days I remember meetings where we talked about nothing but our high telephone costs. Those costs were mainly driven by expensive hardware we had on site, such a bulky PBX switchboard box, and complex added charges and complicated discount formulas. On more than one occasion we hired a consultant to come in and audit our phone bills, and help us to reduce them. That's when I learned the value of an easy to understand billing system. A system built on a flat monthly rate, with any add-on charges clearly identified, saves a lot of management time. It also helps control costs because it’s more predictable and you can budget more accurately. 911 emergency capabilities One of the knocks against VOIP systems or a system like Skype, is that some don't offer emergency calling. You need this. Better cloud systems today recognize that businesses need emergency (as well as 411 directory assistance) capabilities, and offer them as standard features. Unified communications Unified communications is often an extra feature, and for organizations that do heavy phone work, it can lend considerable efficiency. Unified communications means that you can seamlessly use other devices such as computers for placing and taking calls, getting voicemails sent to email, and other integrated features. It saves users time, and lets them be more productive. For instance, if you're working on your computer and need to make a call, you can do so right then and there from your computer. If you need to check voicemails, you can go to your email inbox along with other messages. Bottom line is this: consider these kinds of benefits when reviewing your phone system needs. And if you haven’t reviewed your phone bills or business phone system in a while, do it soon. A lot has changed in the last five years. It pays to see what’s out there, and see how the right phone system can help your business scale, instead of getting in your way. Cloud Systems Photo via Shutterstock The post Scaling for Growth: The Benefits of a Business Phone System in the Cloud appeared first on Small Business Trends. |
| 12 Business Leadership Lessons From Scout Law Posted: 13 Jun 2013 05:00 AM PDT
Every week, you can find thousands of boys and young men across the nation attending their local Boy Scout meeting, learning the values and skills every good American man should know. With former Boy Scouts everywhere in today's business world, it's no wonder that their twelve pillars of Scout Law (pictured above) are incorporated into the way they practice business. Surveys show that over 70 percent of consumers in America and Europe distrust businesses as a whole. But for the brands that they do trust, consumer loyalty is fierce. I've personally found that one of the easiest ways to instill trust is to mirror the 12 values found in the Scout Law:
Whether you incorporate these values into the way you personally conduct business or into the way your brand operates as a whole, I think you'll find that consumers will be excited to work with you time and time again. So let's get down to business and analyze the Scout's Law. Scout Law Business Leadership LessonsCreate a Trustworthy ProfileDid you know that consumers consider transparency more important that brand appeal? A lack of transparency directly correlates to a distinct lack of trust and consumer enthusiasm. Whether it's being forthright with your stakeholders or honest about the sourcing of materials, there are many areas in which businesses can be transparent. An excellent example of this is The Honest Company, which is transparent about materials used in their products for babies. Loyalty Works Both WaysWhen you truly focus on building a great customer experience, you'll find that brands have the responsibility to increase loyalty to their consumers. In my own business experiences, the more I've loyally focused on fulfilling consumer needs and making them happy, no matter what, the better business becomes. If you take a look at the world's top companies, like Amazon and Apple, I think you'll find that they have a fierce loyalty to their consumers. Forget Fluff and Get HelpfulWhen most brands think about content marketing, their focus is on SEO – and rightly so. However, keywords and content strategy will only get you so far. Your content has to offer value and insight to consumers or there is no point to reading it. Without helpful content, you'll establish a reputation as a fluff-maker that consumers will avoid like the plague. Instead, show that you're willing to help even if there's no direct benefit for you. Friendly, Courteous, and Kind Brands are Likeable BrandsAs a southerner, Southern hospitality is basically my middle name. It's molded the way I've conducted business and established a trusted reputation. No one wants to do business with "mean" folks. Obey the Market RulesThe premise that the "customer is always right" isn't necessarily true. However, you must always behave as though it is. Remember, without their business, you wouldn't have a paycheck. Businessmen and brands alike need to remember how to obey their customers and be subservient to market demands. Brands such as Whole Foods have even incorporated this into their Core Values and mission statement. Spread the CheerEmotions drive the business world as much as anything else. Think about the major brands that you use on a daily basis, such as Google and Facebook, and you'll find that they're all generally "happy" brands. Get Thrifty like MackelmoreBecoming more efficient with your resources and time not only benefits your bottom line, but also makes the consumer happier when the savings are passed onto them. Bravery Gets You AttentionSodaStream recently had their commercials banned across the UK. Why? Because supermarket retailers were afraid that people would no longer purchase sodas if they could make them at home. Despite the controversy, SodaStream is fighting back – and hard. This has only resulted in more coverage and higher sales. Clean is Always Better Than DirtyJust like you would never want to walk into a dirty store, people don't like shopping on unorganized and messy websites. Keep your Web presence clean by focusing on simplicity and content organization. Reverent Brands are Supported BrandsReverent brands give back to their communities whenever possible. You are doing good and building consumer goodwill when you take advantage of opportunities to give back. Twelve Pillars of Scout Law Photo via Shutterstock The post 12 Business Leadership Lessons From Scout Law appeared first on Small Business Trends. |
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