I’ve noticed the term “real-time” getting a lot of action lately, both in tech articles and in the way companies market their products. Digg, Facebook, Twitter, FriendFeed; now even Google is declaring real-time search the “biggest challenge”. You just can’t get away from it.
The phrase is growing in popularity because real-time is growing in popularity; information consumption on the web has slowly morphed into a continuous stream that, with the proper filters, provides a powerful mechanism for keeping current with our social sphere, trending topics and breaking news. Real-time is important because it enables one to capture a snapshot of hyper-current information about a topic, a market, or an event, which can be an extremely helpful tool when used properly for a business.
Real-Time and Business
Most popular real-time stories today relate to social media, but businesses can also leverage real-time information and collaboration to increase efficiency, especially across remote teams.
One thing that many small companies lack is the capacity to utilize real-time information to inform business decisions, manage resources, or communicate effectively with customers and clients. Customer support, sales, and even executives teams could all benefit from real-time collaboration, and real-time information sharing.
For example, real-time data sharing can shorten the turnaround time on a support issue, and reduce wasted customer/support cycles while issues are being resolved; email-based issue tracking systems seem archaic in comparison to a live feed of statuses, customer questions and engaged team members. Sales teams utilizing real-time software can stay in the loop with account managers, resulting in fewer back-and-forth calls and a consistent message to clients. Collaboration in real-time can reduce the overhead of ‘reply-all’ emails and teams can shift gears more rapidly based on immediate feedback.
Real-time collaboration applications will not only help reduce resource waste while information propagates, but will also encourage disparate team members to function as a cohesive unit and be more efficient. Bridging the gaps between various communication mediums and keeping everyone in a team ‘on the same page’ is essential, and the ability to send and receive information in real-time will become crucial to disparate teams that want to keep pace with modern fast-paced markets.
Making Waves
Yesterday, Google released information about it’s new Wave product, to one heck of a lot of acclaim. Being an actual ocean surfer, my initial impression was actually one of slightly arrogant distaste. Did they have to name it “Wave”? First “surfing” the Web, and now this? And what does the name imply, anyways? That Google…is the internet?
Actually, it appears as though the team has done a wonderful job of compartmentalizing real-time functionality, “anchoring” users with the foundation of communication on the web, and cleverly mixing threaded synchronous and asynchronous conversations. I’m definitely interested to check it out. While not specifically targeted at business, this kind of functionality will hopefully gain traction in the modern workplace soon, as teams realize how powerfully these kinds of interactions can positively affect their day-to-day work life.
As it relates to MeetCast, we’re definitely excited about any platform for increased interactivity and collaboration on the web, especially real-time collaboration. If Wave is as interesting as it looks, we’ll examine how MeetCast extensions to Wave could help increase productivity and encourage real-time collaboration for disparate teams. Only time will tell if Google’s Wave will swell with the real-time tide or crash into the sand, but either way we’re excited that people are beginning to realize the true power of real-time.
Leave a reply