Another great stop on the tour and while we kept the conversation tailored to Simply Accounting it was hard not to speak about the elephant in the room: the Oilers. What is going on?! I won’t dwell on that though.
Each stop has presented us with new ways to improve our business and Edmonton was no exception. We are also hearing some recurring themes around training and education. Marge suggested that we don’t necessarily need someone from the Simply Accounting offices to provide training, but rather, we need to do a better job of connecting users to Simply Accounting trainers across the country.
There was a generally positive sentiment with Simply Accounting support and service agents. Yah! There were also a number of customers who were very satisfied with our chat support as well as the knowledgebase to help them with their questions rather than phoning in to speak with a live person. Double Yah!
There are many more takeaways from the day, but here are a few that stood out for me:
1) Reporting in Simply Accounting has been an area where we have needed improvement and have been working hard to address this. In Edmonton, Hugo provided the crew with a sneak peak of Simply Accounting Intelligence. Wow! The feedback was very positive. Gordon, who has been a vocal about improving Simply Accounting’s reporting capabilities actually did a little dance in his chair and uttered, “I am soooo happy!!”.
2) Joanna made a comment about a Simply Accounting Mac version. She alluded to our dominance in secondary and post-secondary schools across Canada (Simply Accounting is used in over 3,800 schools across Canada), and asked why we don’t provide a Mac version. Great point. We are going to address this need through an online version. In the meantime, something that is not very well known is that Mac users can run Simply Accounting if they use a product called parallels (www.parallels.com).
We had a solid day in Edmonton and then went to West Edmonton Mall in the evening. This place is HUGE! We had a fun dinner, checked out the rollercoasters, the indoor wave pool, and the hockey rink. We then watched Avatar in 3D! There were mixed reviews on the film, but we all agreed on one thing: Lisa’s incredible ability to imitate the avatar bird call! Ask her to demonstrate it…it’s hilarious!
Looking forward to a great day tomorrow in Calgary. See you there!
Jamie
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Saturday, January 23, 2010
Vancouver – Stop #3 on the Simply Accounting 2010 Listening Tour
Vancouver is buzzing with anticipation of the 2010 Winter Olympic Games. It was also buzzing on Thursday as the host of the 3rd stop on the Simply Accounting 2010 Listening Tour!
As always, it was great to connect with so many small businesses on our home turf. For those that aren’t aware, Simply Accounting is developed in Richmond, British Columbia. Unlike many of our competitors, Simply Accounting is made by Canadians, for Canadian small businesses. We also support our product in Canada.
We hosted the event at the River Rock and had a great turn-out of raving Simply fans! Of course there were a multitude of suggestions for us to improve the product and our company, but I am always invigorated to see so many genuinely happy users. The feedback energizes our team, and we take that passion back to our campus to build bigger and better solutions for our customers new and long-standing.
We jumped in at 9am with the Sage Accountants Network (SAN) members and I couldn’t get the silly slide remote working. User error! But when Amber stepped up to present and couldn’t get it working either, the last laugh was not just on me. Hugo was fine with it, but then again you can’t tell what he is doing anyway because he moves around so quickly.
Key takeaways for this stop (p.s. there were so many good ones, but I have just captured a few here)
1) I think Harold spoke for everyone when he talked about moving to a paperless world. We need to leverage the power of the internet and solve problems for our customers. He likes our direct deposit service (http://www.simplyaccounting.com/productsServices/addOns/direct_deposit) and wants to see more services that facilitate electronic document and money flow—“ cheques are a thing of the past”. We are working to this end and rest assured our goal is to use the Internet to its fullest.
2) William and Marjorie asked a question around why we can’t provide support in Cantonese given we have staff that are fluent in that language. Great point, why don’t we? We have the resources and language capability, so why wouldn’t we provide customer service in the language our customers prefer? More to come on that.
3) Lance talked about connecting Sage Accountant Network (SAN) members to other small businesses (newly formed and existing). Yes, we are doing this, but the point was we need to do a better job of it. I should note that both Pat and Moira, who are certified consultants, feel our partner locator is working. At the end of the day, we want our customers to run their businesses in the best manner possible and having access to resources like our Sage Accountants Network is one way to help. This is part of the reason we designed this Listening Tour the way we did – to connect you all.
Thank you Vancouver, you are such a great city for so many reasons. Next stop Edmonton!
Jamie
As always, it was great to connect with so many small businesses on our home turf. For those that aren’t aware, Simply Accounting is developed in Richmond, British Columbia. Unlike many of our competitors, Simply Accounting is made by Canadians, for Canadian small businesses. We also support our product in Canada.
We hosted the event at the River Rock and had a great turn-out of raving Simply fans! Of course there were a multitude of suggestions for us to improve the product and our company, but I am always invigorated to see so many genuinely happy users. The feedback energizes our team, and we take that passion back to our campus to build bigger and better solutions for our customers new and long-standing.
We jumped in at 9am with the Sage Accountants Network (SAN) members and I couldn’t get the silly slide remote working. User error! But when Amber stepped up to present and couldn’t get it working either, the last laugh was not just on me. Hugo was fine with it, but then again you can’t tell what he is doing anyway because he moves around so quickly.
Key takeaways for this stop (p.s. there were so many good ones, but I have just captured a few here)
1) I think Harold spoke for everyone when he talked about moving to a paperless world. We need to leverage the power of the internet and solve problems for our customers. He likes our direct deposit service (http://www.simplyaccounting.com/productsServices/addOns/direct_deposit) and wants to see more services that facilitate electronic document and money flow—“ cheques are a thing of the past”. We are working to this end and rest assured our goal is to use the Internet to its fullest.
2) William and Marjorie asked a question around why we can’t provide support in Cantonese given we have staff that are fluent in that language. Great point, why don’t we? We have the resources and language capability, so why wouldn’t we provide customer service in the language our customers prefer? More to come on that.
3) Lance talked about connecting Sage Accountant Network (SAN) members to other small businesses (newly formed and existing). Yes, we are doing this, but the point was we need to do a better job of it. I should note that both Pat and Moira, who are certified consultants, feel our partner locator is working. At the end of the day, we want our customers to run their businesses in the best manner possible and having access to resources like our Sage Accountants Network is one way to help. This is part of the reason we designed this Listening Tour the way we did – to connect you all.
Thank you Vancouver, you are such a great city for so many reasons. Next stop Edmonton!
Jamie
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
Winnipeg – Stop #2 on the Simply Accounting 2010 Listening Tour
Another great day on the Simply Accounting 2010 Listening Tour in Winnipeg. Thank you for attending and thank you Mabel (one of our long-standing Sage Accountant Network members) for scheduling the seasonably warm weather!
We arrived in Winnipeg on Sunday afternoon, checked out the venue, settled in for some comfort food at Dalton’s and had a relatively early night. I got a little caught up watching ManTracker actually. Great show, but it seems to me the cameramen would also leave tracks making this whole show a sham? Ha!
One of the greatest things about our stop in Winnipeg was the diverse group of attendees. New users, veterans with the product from the days of Bedford, CGAs, bookkeepers, IT consultants, coffee roasters, an asbestos removal company, print shops,…the list goes on. This made for a robust discussion and we received tons of great feedback for our company.
A few things stuck out in my mind:
1) Similar to our stop in Saskatoon, many of the small businesses weren’t aware of all the resources available to them, especially our Sage Accountant Network (SAN) members. At the end of the session Dave raised his hand and asked for business cards from our SAN members. How amazing is that?! Simply Accounting has been working hard to develop online tools (www.sagespark.com) to facilitate the connection of small businesses to our business partners but this just shows the power of good old-fashioned networking and face-to-face contact.
2) Crystal talked about converting customers to Simply Accounting Enterprise from Microsoft citing cost and the fact that Simply Accounting Enterprise is now capable of supporting 20 users as major reasons. We are consistently hearing that Simply Accounting Enterprise is meeting the mark for many larger companies. This is great news for us and is precisely where we are taking the product—up market.
3) Lastly, there was a comment from Debbie suggesting we provide evening training classes as it is just not that easy for a busy small business to get to them during the day time. Great observation and something we need to look into.
My favorite quote of the day was from Len. He said he loved Simply Accounting and would only consider using an alternative small business accounting software application if, and I quote, “you want to live on the edge with your financial data”.
Vancouver, you are next. See you on Thursday!
Jamie
We arrived in Winnipeg on Sunday afternoon, checked out the venue, settled in for some comfort food at Dalton’s and had a relatively early night. I got a little caught up watching ManTracker actually. Great show, but it seems to me the cameramen would also leave tracks making this whole show a sham? Ha!
One of the greatest things about our stop in Winnipeg was the diverse group of attendees. New users, veterans with the product from the days of Bedford, CGAs, bookkeepers, IT consultants, coffee roasters, an asbestos removal company, print shops,…the list goes on. This made for a robust discussion and we received tons of great feedback for our company.
A few things stuck out in my mind:
1) Similar to our stop in Saskatoon, many of the small businesses weren’t aware of all the resources available to them, especially our Sage Accountant Network (SAN) members. At the end of the session Dave raised his hand and asked for business cards from our SAN members. How amazing is that?! Simply Accounting has been working hard to develop online tools (www.sagespark.com) to facilitate the connection of small businesses to our business partners but this just shows the power of good old-fashioned networking and face-to-face contact.
2) Crystal talked about converting customers to Simply Accounting Enterprise from Microsoft citing cost and the fact that Simply Accounting Enterprise is now capable of supporting 20 users as major reasons. We are consistently hearing that Simply Accounting Enterprise is meeting the mark for many larger companies. This is great news for us and is precisely where we are taking the product—up market.
3) Lastly, there was a comment from Debbie suggesting we provide evening training classes as it is just not that easy for a busy small business to get to them during the day time. Great observation and something we need to look into.
My favorite quote of the day was from Len. He said he loved Simply Accounting and would only consider using an alternative small business accounting software application if, and I quote, “you want to live on the edge with your financial data”.
Vancouver, you are next. See you on Thursday!
Jamie
Sunday, January 17, 2010
Saskatoon - First Stop on the 2010 Simply Accounting Listening Tour
What a day! It was the first stop on the 2010 Simply Accounting Tour and it was the best stop yet!
From a Simply perspective, yesterday’s event fully exceeded our expectations. We had a fantastic dialogue and collected some great feedback and suggestions about our business. It was constructive, humbling, and at the end of the day exactly what the Simply team needed. Both customers and Sage Accountant Network members (business partners) provided at ton of useful insight into the product, our business, our marketing, training, and support. Thank you Saskatoon!
One of the greatest things about the day was the knowledge sharing across our small business customers and business partners. We saw business partners reconnect with each other, small business customers connect with new business partners, and we also saw small businesses helping other small businesses. There was a real flare around the dialogue and I think it was because we had a great cross-section of attendees.
Last night the Simply team got together for dinner at Keo’s Kitchen (the new location on 2nd) to talk about the day. We talked about the agenda, tweaked some things, and discussed some of the key learnings. With all the great feedback we decided to create a “Nag List” which we want our customers and partners alike to hold us accountable for. The whole purpose of this tour is to gain feedback and insights and then action on them. We will certainly need to prioritize and focus in on the top concerns/issues/suggestions, but I am already super excited to implement some of them. The power of our customers!
There were two key pieces of feedback that resonated with me:
1) We need to make more business partners aware of all the benefits of the Sage Accountant Network (SAN) program. We could see the energy level in the room rise when we explained everything that is included and particularly what happens at our annual Simply Partnership Conference. It is a blast, don’t miss it this coming October in Vancouver! One of our attendees, Marg, also made a great suggestion about randomizing new customer leads so that preference isn’t always given alphanumerically. Look forward to more information on the SAN program and check out www.simplyaccounting.com/partners/joinSAN/benefits for more information in the meantime.
2) The second takeway was that we need more training in Saskatchewan! Yvonne brought this up in the morning and it was re-confirmed by Doris among others during a deeper discussion in the afternoon. Having Alan Cohen training sessions once a year just isn’t enough to meet the training demand in this province. It was also clear that hands-on training was a clear preference. We will definitely be taking a closer look at this. Simply needs to make it more clear to customers exactly who are business partners are across the province as many of these business partners (we have over 300 business partners in Saskatchewan) provide training to their clients.
The Saskatoon attendees were a fun bunch and one other suggestion for us to improve the session for our next stop that resonated with me was “more dancing”! Get ready Winnipeg, because Hugo is going to put together a routine that is going to blow your socks off!
Thanks again for a great day Saskatoon!
Jamie
From a Simply perspective, yesterday’s event fully exceeded our expectations. We had a fantastic dialogue and collected some great feedback and suggestions about our business. It was constructive, humbling, and at the end of the day exactly what the Simply team needed. Both customers and Sage Accountant Network members (business partners) provided at ton of useful insight into the product, our business, our marketing, training, and support. Thank you Saskatoon!
One of the greatest things about the day was the knowledge sharing across our small business customers and business partners. We saw business partners reconnect with each other, small business customers connect with new business partners, and we also saw small businesses helping other small businesses. There was a real flare around the dialogue and I think it was because we had a great cross-section of attendees.
Last night the Simply team got together for dinner at Keo’s Kitchen (the new location on 2nd) to talk about the day. We talked about the agenda, tweaked some things, and discussed some of the key learnings. With all the great feedback we decided to create a “Nag List” which we want our customers and partners alike to hold us accountable for. The whole purpose of this tour is to gain feedback and insights and then action on them. We will certainly need to prioritize and focus in on the top concerns/issues/suggestions, but I am already super excited to implement some of them. The power of our customers!
There were two key pieces of feedback that resonated with me:
1) We need to make more business partners aware of all the benefits of the Sage Accountant Network (SAN) program. We could see the energy level in the room rise when we explained everything that is included and particularly what happens at our annual Simply Partnership Conference. It is a blast, don’t miss it this coming October in Vancouver! One of our attendees, Marg, also made a great suggestion about randomizing new customer leads so that preference isn’t always given alphanumerically. Look forward to more information on the SAN program and check out www.simplyaccounting.com/partners/joinSAN/benefits for more information in the meantime.
2) The second takeway was that we need more training in Saskatchewan! Yvonne brought this up in the morning and it was re-confirmed by Doris among others during a deeper discussion in the afternoon. Having Alan Cohen training sessions once a year just isn’t enough to meet the training demand in this province. It was also clear that hands-on training was a clear preference. We will definitely be taking a closer look at this. Simply needs to make it more clear to customers exactly who are business partners are across the province as many of these business partners (we have over 300 business partners in Saskatchewan) provide training to their clients.
The Saskatoon attendees were a fun bunch and one other suggestion for us to improve the session for our next stop that resonated with me was “more dancing”! Get ready Winnipeg, because Hugo is going to put together a routine that is going to blow your socks off!
Thanks again for a great day Saskatoon!
Jamie
Friday, January 15, 2010
The Simply Accounting 2010 Listening Tour is one day away from its debut and the team is incredibly excited to get on the road and meet some customers and partners!
We named it the Simply Accounting 2010 Listening Tour because that's what we're going to do - Listen! In each city we have a jam-packed day planned - full of dialogue with our Sage Accountants Network members and customers alike. Our objective is to hear face-to-face what our partners and customers want, what we can do to help them be more successful, and to identify opportunities for 2010 and beyond.
We had our last planning meeting yesterday afternoon and put some finishing touches on the tour. First stop, Saskatoon! And with a forecast of only -2 Celsius, it sounds like we only need to pack one turtleneck! Who organized this tour mid-winter anyway?
Jamie
We named it the Simply Accounting 2010 Listening Tour because that's what we're going to do - Listen! In each city we have a jam-packed day planned - full of dialogue with our Sage Accountants Network members and customers alike. Our objective is to hear face-to-face what our partners and customers want, what we can do to help them be more successful, and to identify opportunities for 2010 and beyond.
We had our last planning meeting yesterday afternoon and put some finishing touches on the tour. First stop, Saskatoon! And with a forecast of only -2 Celsius, it sounds like we only need to pack one turtleneck! Who organized this tour mid-winter anyway?
Jamie
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