The official weblog of ClickBook.net. ClickBook streamlines the process of appointment scheduling for small business, schools and other organisations. For technical updates please visit the Technical Blog.

Online Scheduling - the ’sleeping giant for SMEs’

Mark Demicoli  16 February 2010 05:17:00 AM
In his article "Online booking systems the sleeping giant for SMEs" Craig Reardon admits that his 6-year-old prediction of an Online Scheduling boom was 'wrong'.  With contemporary focus largely on the darlings of IT that seem to sprout overnight like rare mushrooms, we think his prediction was a little premature, but hardly wrong.

Since ClickBook's inception, quite a number of new startups have smelt the distant aroma of high-tech coffee and jumped on the bandwagon.  To date, the fungi don't seem to have really sprouted.  Many funded startups have been left scratching their heads and dusting off their business plans.

As many of you reading this now probably realise, there is indeed a revolutionary change to day-to-day business for those who embrace the technology fully, but to date, the revolution itself has been rather subdued.

Why hasn't online scheduling really hit the streets?  We think there are number of key factors which will drive more of an evolutionary shift rather than one of a revolutionary nature.  Key to this shift is the change in mentality that is to a great extent the domain of the always-online, privacy-shirking Gen-Y youngsters who are just now starting to become professionals.  This generation and their progeny do and will demand absolute convenience in the years to come.  Just like booking flights and internet banking, a human interaction is generally unnecessary and time consuming for many appointment-based services.  A key factor in this mentality is the 'cloud' of information they now maintain and rely upon which is accessible all the time and from anywhere.  Since email's heyday, there has been a progressive shift into 'the cloud' as people throw away physical records such as the appointment diary.

We have no doubt that this trend will become permanent and accelerate in the next few years.

So where is ClickBook now?  The last 6 months have seen the first confirmed trend toward the real grass-roots takeup that we've been working toward.  A real traction that is driven entirely by word-of-mouth, that Holy Grail of product marketing.

According to Alexa.com, the important "Reach" measurement for ClickBook.net shows a beautiful trend developing:

Image:Online Scheduling - the ’sleeping giant for SMEs’

Evolution or Revolution?  In Hindsight, that good old reliable foe of great visions, we see a revolution evolving.  It won't happen overnight, but it will happen!