Microsoft Is Your Competition
December 15, 2006
Support for the position that Microsoft Office will remain strong continues to grow. There are two interesting articles on PC World Canada.
The first a two-parter called Office Doomsday? (part two: Office Doomsday: Backsliding to the desktop) is another interesting real life experience with trying to use online products. Similar to the link in our previous post Microsoft is Worth It (probably better titled, now that I think of it, Office is Worth It).
The other is titled Online Takes on Office and is along the same vein as our prior post Microsoft Will Survive (also probably better titled, Office Will Survive). THis article highlights that Redmond is taking notice of online competitors by noting; “in its August 10-K filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Microsoft specifically listed ThinkFree as an Office rival.”
So how are online document companies going to position their products against office? What is the value proposition, key features and tag line that are going to resonate with people and get them to leave MS Office? Put on your marketing hats an throw out some tag lines…..
Adding another one to the competitors list…..
November 17, 2006
Well for the second day in a row I’ve come across something from Web Worder Daily that is great to see. They have a quick bit of information about Todoz, which appears to be another entry into the already very crowded space. Although I think they do differentiate themselves a little; they include project management- which some competitors have but not a lot - and interestingly they include web content management - which is not very common and may provide them a niche. Also noteworthy, since Zimbra announced they are adding and was highlighted yesterday, is that they include IM which is also already available within the Pro version of BlueTie.
The only other thing I’d note is the continued ’stingy-ness’ on space. Todoz offers 1 and 2 GB storage options, where BlueTie offers 5GB for free and 10GB for a dollar less per user.
