Think global

You're probably tired of hearing about Walter Isaacson's Steve Jobs biography from other journalists who, like me, purchased the tome as soon as it became available. I can highly recommend it as one of the best books of its kind I've read, but I won't add any further to the barrage of spoilers and exaltations currently online. What I will lend from the book, however, is a key learning about developing products - because it's something that too many South African businesses overlook.

I got lame excuses and reasons why I was wrong for wanting more than they offered.

Simon Dingle, contributor, ITWeb

You don't have to have read the book to know that Steve Jobs put customer experience ahead of profit. And there's no arguing it either. While Apple does make ridiculously good margins on its products, it does not pivot the development of those products on the margins it can extract, but rather on how to produce something that can reach the widest market.

In so doing, Apple, of course, makes more money doing what it does than anyone else. It isn't a philanthropic undertaking either. While I'd argue the company's products certainly do benefit humanity at large in the market revolutions that they usually herald, Apple is still a money-making machine for its shareholders.

But the point is that the customer is front and centre in the equation. Because you make more money that way, ironically.

It sounds almost stupid to have to make this point in this day and age - but for some reason, customer-centricity, which has become a clich'e in the developed world, is still beyond so many South African companies.

I'll give you an example.

I've been researching online backup services recently. Having a hard drive backup of your computer just isn't enough. You have to keep a backup offsite, and doing so online is the most elegant solution, if you have the Internet connection to support it.

My testing began with the top three online services as recommended by my industry friends and colleagues - BackBlazer, Carbonite and CrashPlan.

The products vary slightly in functionality and compete heavily in terms of customer service. They also compete closely on price - but, generally, you get unlimited backup space for around $5 (R35) per month. I spoke to one Carbonite user who keeps more than 4TB backed up on the service without any complaints from either party.

To make things fair, I also checked out some local offerings from South African companies. There is a fantastic technology called Attix5 that some South African service providers offer for online backup. I know the founder of the company very well and thought I'd check it out.

The technology is impressive, but the first offering I found from a South African service provider had a maximum capacity of 2GB - which is pretty far from unlimited, and nowhere near the 350GB I require. Instead of apologies, I got lame excuses and reasons why I was wrong for wanting more than they offered.

That's right. I, the customer, was told I was wrong.

Another South African company sent me its price list to check out. Its top-of-the-line offering was 50GB of storage for... wait for it... R2 000 per month. So, for 60 times more than its American competitors, I could get a fraction of the capacity and almost none of the additional features. Awesome.

Is it fair to compare little South African companies that pay through their teeth for bandwidth with big American organisations that don't?

Of course it is.

It's 2011 and business happens online. You might think your only competitors are other South African companies, but you're wrong. I can understand if you can't quite match the volumes of our friends in the US, but I won't buy any reason why you have to be 60 times more expensive. And is there really any reason you can't attract an international customer base? What about hosting your own service internationally with Amazon S2 or something like it?

In the case of online backup, I consulted other South African journalists and they all used overseas services. They overcame the bandwidth challenge by seeding international servers with shipped hard drives, or just sweating it out through the initial backup phase.

The same level of global competition is becoming true for physical goods too. I recently bought a Blue Microphone product on a trip to Las Vegas, only to have one of my friends order the same product, shipped by Amazon to South Africa for the same price, including shipping. The closest quote I found from a South African importer was double the price.

Double. The. Price.

Why on earth would I buy it from him when Amazon costs half and can get it here in four days? I don't even care what the excuses are.

The saying used to be: “Think global, act local.” That stopped being true five years ago. Now you just think global.

There are obvious exceptions, of course. In rural areas, for example, you won't find people who can access online shopping very easily. But when we're talking about online services and consumer products, you're fooling yourself if other South African companies are the extent of your view on competition.

The market is smartening up and technology companies are making it easier for anyone to access goods and services from anywhere.

If South African companies are going to compete and make a mark then they need to move beyond the old paradigm of fleecing customers for all they're worth, providing 'kak' service because no one else is doing any better, and making profit the focus instead of their customers.

In short, it's the same endemic problem that describes most of our society: we celebrate mediocrity.

Instead, we need to find the pockets of excellence in South Africa and amplify them.

Until such time, more and more moronic companies will find the modern market a desolate place. And I won't feel very sorry for those who starve.