Simplify or Perish: Technology Is Not Your Business Advantage

Even in the post-ZIRP era, technology innovation is everywhere -- except if you are someone who has committed to build their own stuff. Then all you see are limitations.

* I need custom "do-jobbies."

* I need more attributes.

* I need a custom page with the menu on the right side.

* I need my SEO or tagging a different way.

* I need my page slightly faster.

First of all, do you really?

Second -- the problem isn't that you have unique requirements. The problem is those unique requirements then drive bad decisions you must live with for a decade.

Most people the vision of what they could build custom to what the SaaS vendor has on the shelf now. With no consideration for:

* how much funding all the vendors have

* how many developers all the vendors have compared to you.

* all the conversion rate and QA testing they have done

* the size of their roadmap

* their pace of innovation

But that's not even the most important thing. It's not about the platform anymore folks. It's about the ecosystem. If a platform has hundreds or thousands of apps connected for you, that is a huge enabler for your business that I promise you are underestimating.

Your team cannot maintain these connections. In SaaS software, these integrations are the hardest part. As soon as you have to build ANY INTERNAL ROADMAP for integrating with third-parties post-website launch you are dead.

Remember all those questions I asked about? All these connection points to the software platform you dismissed have their own developers, their own funding, and own roadmap. All of which you dismissed.

You are already falling behind. Do the math, your underestimation of the importance of ecosystem is likely exponentially wrong, not just wrong by a scaling factor. Becasue a strong ecosystem attracts new partners faster.

If you have over 100k SKUs over over $1B in sales, sure let's have a discussion about it. If you have lower than 25% gross margins, fine. You can't afford to operationalize expenses.

But even in those cases, there is still off-the-shelf software for you -- it just probably isn't the most popular brand (Coke/Pepsi) that everyone else is using.

If you are on one of these systems, your platform is burning. Buyers have choices and you are not improving as quickly as your peers. Simplify or perish.