When an entrepreneur starts a new firm, she or he always focuses on the core product. It is nothing wrong. She or he should do that. The same situation with established businesses, they need to keep the core products and services running well. However, not many people pay attention to add-ons. It is a flavor for your delicious dish.
Source: Vietnamese cuisine (Wikipedia 2014)
I have been working in web hosting industry nearly a decade. I have seen more and more innovations here. From the platform such as cloud technology (Wikipedia 2014), to applications such as Ksplice, Kernel Care, and CloudLinux. Without those applications, an admin can still create a complete web hosting service. That is why I call them add-ons. Having those add-ons will make the admin life easier, customers are more happy. It is a win-win situation. The fact is that offering that software beside standard features makes your business better from the customer’s views, when it brings more benefits to users.
Recently, I read an interesting article about How to fix IBM. (Cringely), in that blog post, wrote “There isn’t enough profit in PaaS for IBM to get a good return on its multi-billion dollar investment. IBM needs to provide additional things with its Cloud service — Services and Software as a Service (Wikipedia 2014). To provide Cloud SaaS IBM needs to have software applications that the market needs”. Now, I do not have knowledge enough for judging a big shark likes IBM. However, Bob Cringely is a writer who has covered IBM for years, he should know what he is talking about. I do not want to say it is right or wrong, but I just want to point out again about the additional things. They can be a game changer. Moreover, this time, it seems happen in a well-established giant.
Remember I mentioned to flavor and dish above. I am a big fan of Master Chef series. How many times have you seen Gordon Ramsay shows his disappointment to a dish without seasoning enough? It can be the factor that keeps a good home cook stay with the chefs or go home. Don’t be a person just going home. Keep your business strong with add-ons.
References:
Cringely, R. X. (2014). “How to fix IBM.” Retrieved 10, 2014, from http://www.cringely.com/2014/10/27/fix-ibm/
Wikipedia. (2014). “Vietnamese cuisine.” Retrieved 12, 2014, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnamese_cuisine