March 18, 2025

Episode 411: πŸ›οΈ πŸ’³ Work, Life, E-Commerce Evolution and Business Central πŸ’³ πŸ›οΈ

In this episode of Dynamics Corner, hosts Kris and Brad chat with Chris De Visser about the rise of e-commerce innovation. They explore how maintaining work-life balance, structure, and human connection is key in a virtual world, especially for junior employees who benefit from face-to-face learning. Chris introduces Commerce Build, an ERP-first e-commerce platform that integrates with Business Central, offering flexible solutions for B2B and B2C markets. He highlights the importance of understanding client needs, seamless implementation, and adapting to payment and PIM integrations. 
πŸ›’ Commerce Build is an ERP-first platform tailored for diverse e-commerce needs.  
πŸ›’ Client-focused flexibility and innovative implementation drive e-commerce success.  
πŸ›’ Technology shapes user expectations, influencing online transactions and convenience.  
πŸ›’ Conferences remain vital for networking, with content and logistics at their core.

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#MSDyn365BC #BusinessCentral #BC #DynamicsCorner

Follow Kris and Brad for more content:
https://matalino.io/bio
https://bprendergast.bio.link/

Chapters

00:00 - Introduction to E-Commerce in 2025

06:49 - Discussing Remote Work Challenges and Benefits

22:31 - Chris DeVisser's Professional Journey

27:19 - Commerce Build: An ERP-First E-Commerce Platform

37:10 - Product Materials and Payment Processing Integration

01:07:44 - Directions North America Conference Preview

01:23:20 - Las Vegas Experience and Closing Thoughts

Transcript

WEBVTT

00:00:00.521 --> 00:00:03.790
Welcome everyone to another episode of Dynamics Corner.

00:00:03.790 --> 00:00:07.049
Do you need e-commerce in your business?

00:00:07.049 --> 00:00:08.603
I'm your co-host, Chris.

00:00:09.125 --> 00:00:09.769
And this is Brad.

00:00:09.769 --> 00:00:13.330
This episode is recorded on February 24th 2025.

00:00:13.330 --> 00:00:17.103
Chris, chris, chris, with an extra Chris.

00:00:17.103 --> 00:00:30.405
E-commerce In 2025, many businesses, if not all businesses, can benefit from e-commerce 2025, many businesses, if not all businesses, can benefit from e-commerce With us.

00:00:30.405 --> 00:00:48.292
Today, we had the opportunity to speak with Chris DeVisser about Commerce Build and its e-commerce solution.

00:00:50.234 --> 00:00:54.076
Hey, chris, did you know that you can use AI in Business Central to manage your financials?

00:00:54.076 --> 00:00:54.856
Really?

00:00:54.856 --> 00:00:55.377
You can.

00:00:55.377 --> 00:00:56.676
How you can?

00:00:56.676 --> 00:00:58.637
With Data Courage's apps for Business Central.

00:00:58.637 --> 00:01:01.847
Data Courage helps you uncover the why behind your data.

00:01:01.906 --> 00:01:05.064
It's not just about looking at numbers, it's about truly understanding them.

00:01:05.064 --> 00:01:14.001
Their AI-powered apps for Dynamics 365 Business Central go beyond reporting and give you real insights things like recommendations, summaries and suggestions you can act on.

00:01:14.001 --> 00:01:18.519
You can even chat with your data and ask what matters How's my profit and loss looking?

00:01:18.519 --> 00:01:19.402
Where are the risks?

00:01:19.402 --> 00:01:21.245
What's the best decision for tomorrow?

00:01:21.245 --> 00:01:23.028
And you'll get clear, actionable answers.

00:01:23.028 --> 00:01:24.090
How cool is that?

00:01:24.090 --> 00:01:25.112
That's cool.

00:01:25.112 --> 00:01:30.123
Take their apps financial intelligence.

00:01:30.123 --> 00:01:34.361
It creates your profit and loss statement and balance sheets and minutes, gives you an instant pulse check of your financials and frees up your time to focus on decision making.

00:01:34.361 --> 00:01:37.852
And they've also got other apps that give you insights on customers and products.

00:01:37.852 --> 00:01:45.308
Oh, and here's an important part, that ai is built with security as a top priority, so your data stays safe, right where it belongs in your environment.

00:01:45.308 --> 00:01:50.043
Ready to see the why behind your numbers, visit datacardagecom and check out their app and app source.

00:01:59.813 --> 00:02:00.274
Good morning.

00:02:01.155 --> 00:02:01.995
Good morning, hey guys.

00:02:01.995 --> 00:02:02.536
How are you doing?

00:02:02.536 --> 00:02:07.402
How are you Very well, very well, hey guys, how are you doing, how are you Very well, very well.

00:02:07.402 --> 00:02:09.067
That office looks familiar.

00:02:11.192 --> 00:02:14.168
Yeah, it's what can I say?

00:02:14.168 --> 00:02:17.950
It's probably it's a WeWork, right.

00:02:17.950 --> 00:02:21.370
So there's like a couple hundred of these.

00:02:21.370 --> 00:02:23.907
Oh, very cool.

00:02:25.122 --> 00:02:26.447
How long have you been at a we work?

00:02:30.207 --> 00:02:39.713
um, I mean on and off, I would say almost 10 years oh so do you have I'm one of the few people that, because of the pandemic, went into the office.

00:02:39.713 --> 00:02:50.126
Uh, it's because, um, my wife started working home, we had our daughter born and we just had to uh somebody, somebody had to leave the house.

00:02:55.197 --> 00:02:57.902
And that's why you're still married, because you chose to leave the house.

00:02:58.144 --> 00:03:00.770
Yeah, it's um, it's uh.

00:03:00.770 --> 00:03:03.522
I'm sure anybody with young kids recognizes it.

00:03:03.522 --> 00:03:17.306
Of course I love my kids, but we have three of these youngsters right now and when people say happy Friday, I have like a reverse reaction from what it was a couple of years ago and I'm like, oh God, it's the weekend.

00:03:17.306 --> 00:03:23.772
It means hard work, it means like not being able to think for myself and just live by the grace of these minions.

00:03:23.772 --> 00:03:27.741
And then on Mondayay I'm like, hey, I can think again.

00:03:27.741 --> 00:03:29.425
I have like my brain for myself.

00:03:30.467 --> 00:03:55.990
yeah, I get it having the separation between work and home is important and you, you said so much and I have so many things to say and my psychologist tendencies are not really one, I just pretend to be one on tv and you are absolutely correct, small children or children in general are a lot of work I think, yeah, it's just.

00:03:56.510 --> 00:04:08.784
Yeah, I think you go in in parent mode, which automatically means, uh, like I mean, and maybe it's um, it's self-centric or something, but it automatically means I can't really think anymore.

00:04:09.205 --> 00:04:15.002
No, no, and it's also when you want to spend time with your kids and do kids.

00:04:15.002 --> 00:04:16.125
They require attention.

00:04:16.125 --> 00:04:22.124
It's to make sure that they're safe and they're doing things and they're not growing up on television and such.

00:04:22.184 --> 00:04:28.685
Yeah, and sometimes what you do at work is like kind of blends in how you handle your kids and vice versa.

00:04:28.685 --> 00:04:30.732
Yeah, so that's funny.

00:04:32.081 --> 00:04:33.487
No, the separation is good.

00:04:33.487 --> 00:04:36.990
So have you had the same office at the WeWork for that same period of time?

00:04:38.930 --> 00:04:46.213
No, I've been at the same building, but I've been changing units either by choice or by force.

00:04:46.213 --> 00:05:03.223
I the first time I got here was with Sana Commerce, my first employer here in the States, and we grew the team quite big, so we had we needed bigger units each time, which is the big convenience from, like a shared office.

00:05:03.223 --> 00:05:12.362
Set up a little bit, um, and then I left them, and then, I think, a little while after they, they left the building altogether.

00:05:12.362 --> 00:05:19.435
I think they now left New York, um, but, um, uh, then I like what was it then?

00:05:19.435 --> 00:05:22.946
The pandemic was 2020, right, uh, early 2020.

00:05:22.946 --> 00:05:28.595
Um, I had a killer lease, of course, like I could negotiate like crazy.

00:05:28.595 --> 00:05:31.887
They almost gave me money to, to, to show up.

00:05:31.947 --> 00:05:33.250
I was going to say it was a 10.

00:05:33.250 --> 00:05:37.387
They probably gave you 10 a month and a free coffee every day or something.

00:05:37.408 --> 00:05:41.324
Well, the coffee is always free, uh, and in the old days they had unlimited beers.

00:05:41.324 --> 00:05:43.249
It was crazy like, oh, wow, and it's.

00:05:43.249 --> 00:05:57.146
It's a building with 17 floors, um, and each floor had its own um, draft, um, and they would, they would list, uh, like the special, like the beer, the type of beer for each floor.

00:05:57.146 --> 00:06:05.190
And then, uh, we tried once around the holidays to start at the top and drink a beer on every floor.

00:06:05.190 --> 00:06:12.370
Got kind of messy like around, like floor, floor nine or something.

00:06:12.391 --> 00:06:14.374
I mean 17?

00:06:14.374 --> 00:06:15.961
Yeah, I think yeah, by eight.

00:06:15.961 --> 00:06:25.312
Well, it depends how long you're doing it, but if you're doing it after work, for the quick rundown, 17 beers can get a little messy I, so the cost covers that Not anymore.

00:06:26.920 --> 00:06:31.211
I mean, I don't know how many people saw the WeWork kind of collapse.

00:06:31.211 --> 00:06:33.519
Right, they were going to go to the stock market.

00:06:33.519 --> 00:06:42.694
They were worth $60 billion because they were this SaaS startup scale-up solution.

00:06:42.694 --> 00:06:53.293
And then the bubble popped Like they turned out to be a real estate company that had to sign 20-year leases with the building owners.

00:06:53.293 --> 00:07:09.088
Well, their tenants had month to month, so COVID happened at the same time and everybody peaced out and they were stuck with a 20-year lease and everybody else could get out of WeWork, so they had no more money coming in.

00:07:10.403 --> 00:07:31.903
And I think just because, talking about amateur psychology, I remember like the sunken cost trap from from college as one of those traps soft bank, I think at that point poured in like billions and billions and billions that they had to double down on it because they could not walk away from it anymore.

00:07:31.903 --> 00:07:35.389
And they bought off the guy for like $9 billion to go away.

00:07:35.389 --> 00:07:38.144
It's crazy.

00:07:38.706 --> 00:07:40.565
I gotta check out that documentary.

00:07:40.565 --> 00:07:46.237
I know there's a documentary about it and I never quite understood that we work.

00:07:46.237 --> 00:07:50.718
I mean because you know, at least for me, I've been working at home, so I never had the opportunity.

00:07:50.718 --> 00:07:55.488
But there are times when I'm working at home and I want to work somewhere.

00:07:55.488 --> 00:08:00.786
I just wanted to be somewhere else from my home office to to get away.

00:08:00.786 --> 00:08:05.108
Because if you work at home five days a week and then your family's home, then you're home for the weekend.

00:08:05.108 --> 00:08:08.836
This is, yeah, you know, work at home five days a week and then your family's home, then you're home for the weekend this is yeah, you know you're here seven days a week.

00:08:09.036 --> 00:08:09.656
It's third credit.

00:08:09.656 --> 00:08:15.576
It doesn't disconnect, so going to like even a coffee shop was like a big treat for me, right?

00:08:15.576 --> 00:08:18.987
So an office space would be awesome there's more to it.

00:08:19.149 --> 00:08:22.040
It's the separation of from work and home going someplace.

00:08:22.040 --> 00:08:23.302
Working from home is great.

00:08:23.302 --> 00:08:24.305
There's a lot of flexibility.

00:08:24.305 --> 00:08:26.672
There's a lot of advantages.

00:08:26.672 --> 00:08:52.167
Some of the disadvantages are the inability to sometimes focus, I think, because you have a tendency to oh, I can just go throw in a load of laundry, which is it's a blessing and a curse in a sense, but also to have the distractions home, whereas if you go to office, you go to the office, you get to prepare for your day on your commute in, you work all day, you unwind on your way home, you go home and you just do home life, whereas if you're working from home.

00:08:52.226 --> 00:08:56.711
Sometimes, if you don't have a defined workspace that you only use for work, you have that difficulty with the transition.

00:08:56.711 --> 00:09:00.702
But, chris, also they have different plans you can do.

00:09:00.702 --> 00:09:03.827
Yeah, you can rent an office that's yours all the time.

00:09:03.847 --> 00:09:06.111
Yeah, that's what I have, so I leave my stuff here.

00:09:06.111 --> 00:09:07.533
I got the screen.

00:09:07.533 --> 00:09:08.534
I got everything here.

00:09:09.041 --> 00:09:10.046
I got a bookshelf.

00:09:10.046 --> 00:09:12.019
You can lock your office and everything, yeah.

00:09:12.740 --> 00:09:25.533
And there's even like a spare desk here, like occasionally my wife works from here or something, if she can get to the office, or one of us needs to stay home to pick up the kids or anything like that.

00:09:25.533 --> 00:09:29.811
So, or my daughter sits here and just kind of like callers a little bit.

00:09:29.811 --> 00:09:33.446
So, no, yeah, I can close it.

00:09:33.446 --> 00:09:41.240
But you have like what is nice too, and that is the big benefit of WeWork over some of the other providers they have a global network.

00:09:41.240 --> 00:09:43.408
So I had meetings in Vancouver.

00:09:43.408 --> 00:09:53.013
I can just like in an app, book a room and like a second later my key pass works and I can just bust myself in and walk in.

00:09:53.013 --> 00:09:59.990
And it's kind of like what hotels try to do too right, where you get a level of familiarity.

00:09:59.990 --> 00:10:02.648
So you get like the same coffee.

00:10:02.648 --> 00:10:04.264
You get like the design is like the same coffee.

00:10:04.264 --> 00:10:11.046
You get like the the, the design is is all the same, so it feels familiar even though you're in a complete different location.

00:10:11.086 --> 00:10:15.265
So, yeah, we had a meeting in vancouver for a couple of hours and I just booked it on the spot.

00:10:16.047 --> 00:10:39.172
Um, if I go to amsterdam, I can, I can walk into an office there and, um, have a meeting there, or book a book, a workspace for the day, um, and I think they are now experimenting that you can also like book, um, like a screen right, so you're not just on your laptop, you actually have like a second screen and you can really sit down behind the desk.

00:10:39.172 --> 00:10:44.346
Um, but I think they're still recovering a little bit on the money front.

00:10:44.346 --> 00:10:53.951
So in a city like New York City it works right, Because I agree with the commute element.

00:10:53.951 --> 00:11:03.972
I mean, I worked from home, home for four years or something and you need to be really disciplined and body check yourself to get the stuff done.

00:11:03.972 --> 00:11:09.993
You need to have a very measurable job to also show to your colleagues that you are working.

00:11:09.993 --> 00:11:25.972
And for some reason still, I think instinctively people trust people who go to an office more than people working from home, although I think all stats show that people can be very effective working from home.

00:11:26.139 --> 00:11:28.186
so that's anybody would experience.

00:11:29.128 --> 00:11:35.022
I'm not too shy, but what I'm, what I'm sad for is juniors, right, like, where do you learn?

00:11:35.022 --> 00:11:36.686
Uh?

00:11:36.686 --> 00:11:38.349
We were talking about this the other day.

00:11:38.349 --> 00:11:46.038
I try to think about the context, but, like you're not learning by osmosis anymore, no, um, uh like you're.

00:11:46.038 --> 00:12:01.259
But just by sitting next to someone and hear them talk without, uh like listening in on their conversation, you just learn stuff, right, um, and and you see how people uh handle bad, uh news conversations.

00:12:01.259 --> 00:12:09.970
Like just seeing someone else work makes you better, whether it's good or bad what you see, yeah.

00:12:10.760 --> 00:12:12.567
Well, you feel better too with that.

00:12:12.567 --> 00:12:13.370
Well, I want to go back to the other.

00:12:13.370 --> 00:12:19.884
Chris, they have the ones that you get to your office, but you can also go and just use the space, so you should get one in your area.

00:12:19.884 --> 00:12:23.767
And then during the summer, take your bike over there or something.

00:12:23.767 --> 00:12:29.840
It would be good for you to have something like that, because you could get out, take your bike, go do some work.

00:12:31.183 --> 00:12:39.711
Some locations have recording studios, like, depending on the building, they have like podcasting studios and stuff like that as well.

00:12:39.711 --> 00:12:42.061
That's pretty cool, see.

00:12:42.162 --> 00:12:56.692
I think that, like you said, said, it's a balance of what fits your personal lifestyle, or even professional lifestyle, because I, you know, I'm far from the city and it makes sense, for you know, major cities, you're, maybe you, you're within five, ten minutes away.

00:12:57.360 --> 00:13:06.679
Yeah, and you can take public transportation oh yeah, five minute walk, but like if I have to and that's the thing too like if I had to deal with like a hour drive.

00:13:06.679 --> 00:13:13.485
Now, if they have one nearby, I would totally look into it they have different types of ones and they are in different locations.

00:13:13.525 --> 00:13:15.312
They're not all in metropolitan areas.

00:13:15.413 --> 00:13:18.363
There are some right, I gotta find something close there.

00:13:18.423 --> 00:13:30.567
There are some that are outside of the areas, but even just to get that, chris say, chris and ch Chris had some good points with even the discipline and the trust of somebody at work.

00:13:30.567 --> 00:13:31.350
I agree with you.

00:13:31.350 --> 00:13:38.186
Somebody sitting at work for 16 hours isn't more productive than someone sitting at work for eight hours, nor are they more productive than someone working at home for four hours.

00:13:38.186 --> 00:13:40.360
It's a matter of the individual and what they produce.

00:13:40.360 --> 00:13:46.094
But there is also a point to being in that office setting because humans are communal.

00:13:46.379 --> 00:14:14.994
So if you have the ability to talk to somebody and your point about the juniors is so true because in a remote work environment I find that someone that's starting out or maybe new is less likely to ask questions or ask for assistance than if they were in the office with somebody, where somebody could either check in on them and they say, oh yeah, by the way, I have a question, or it becomes more of an effort to talk to other co-workers or to get to know them.

00:14:14.994 --> 00:14:17.303
So there are some challenges there.

00:14:17.303 --> 00:14:38.544
So if somebody is working remotely or there is a work, a remote work organization which is not what we wanted to talk about anyway today, but we just kind of went there that you need to do something to encourage communication, encourage the knowledge sharing, encourage the asking for help.

00:14:38.544 --> 00:14:47.389
I've had some individuals that I said let's just get on a Teams call and I'll work and you work and we'll just act like we're in the office it works.

00:14:47.931 --> 00:14:48.331
It works.

00:14:48.331 --> 00:14:52.846
You can sit and work and talk and say oh, by the way, you just get some of that small chat.

00:14:52.846 --> 00:14:54.865
Hey, I'm working on this and my head's stuck.

00:14:54.865 --> 00:14:56.630
You know what do you think?

00:14:57.500 --> 00:15:01.865
Yeah, I've seen too, like with cameras on, with remote teams.

00:15:01.865 --> 00:15:06.341
So even you may have like 20 people in one location, there's another team somewhere else.

00:15:06.341 --> 00:15:08.807
Just put a camera on and you see people wandering.

00:15:08.807 --> 00:15:16.360
Like you're wondering, like, oh, is so-and-so in today, and you can just glance over on the big screen and you see somebody moving around.

00:15:16.360 --> 00:15:18.025
You're like, oh, yeah, I guess he's he has.

00:15:18.025 --> 00:15:23.044
I can interrupt him now when if you see somebody super concentrated, you're not going to bother them, right?

00:15:23.044 --> 00:15:25.908
I mean that that is the other downside I find of remote work.

00:15:25.908 --> 00:15:37.351
You miss kind of the non-verbal cues of if somebody is like super deep into like complex stuff or it's kind of like checking his instagram.

00:15:37.351 --> 00:15:47.573
Um, uh, right, uh, you don't know, when you disturb somebody, um, and yeah, it's water coolers fun too.

00:15:47.779 --> 00:16:00.139
I mean it's been a while since been in office space, but you know that that's always fun, where you just coming in and you're getting, you know, putting your stuff away, getting some coffee or whatever that may be, and then you're like stop, say what you do this weekend.

00:16:00.139 --> 00:16:03.962
You know it's like a really quick, you know have a conversation like that.

00:16:04.123 --> 00:16:24.166
It's nice maybe, maybe, maybe that's the pivot to to talking about uh uh, work, work, um like I I joined commerce build in august and and it's hard to meet, if even virtually all all my colleagues, because they're all over the world, everybody's remote.

00:16:24.847 --> 00:16:28.023
Uh like, we have one office and that's in new zealand where the developers are.

00:16:28.023 --> 00:16:29.365
Everybody else is remote.

00:16:29.365 --> 00:16:36.482
Um and um like there's not a real occasion to talk to everybody on a regular basis.

00:16:36.482 --> 00:17:00.600
So, um, uh like it and and I talk to some people several times a day and to some people I never talk, right, um, I don't have a direct reason to talk to the developers, which is a shame, because if we're all in the office, I would bump into these, these guys and girls at the coffee machine, at the water cooler exactly, and chat.

00:17:00.600 --> 00:17:17.175
So we got to come come up with like a format for that, and I think there's like tools like through Slack and Teams, where you kind of get randomly assigned to somebody for a week and you kind of get forced to take a virtual coffee break or something.

00:17:17.175 --> 00:17:19.277
That's what they had.

00:17:21.280 --> 00:17:22.885
Chris, I had talked about this before.

00:17:22.885 --> 00:17:23.709
I remember the conversation.

00:17:23.709 --> 00:17:49.276
You have meeting rooms where you have some companies try to schedule company meetings or company events virtually, which are beneficial, but sometimes, if you do it in a wide scale, you have one or two people that may spend most of the time talking so you can force random breakout rooms that you would have people talk, but I like your idea of having everybody connect virtually.

00:17:49.339 --> 00:17:54.904
Again, time zone related, it's a little more challenging in a situation where you have AI can figure that out for us?

00:17:55.140 --> 00:17:56.486
Yeah, but we've done, you've done.

00:17:56.526 --> 00:18:01.587
You could do, for example, like a lunch teams right when you just show up in that lunch.

00:18:01.587 --> 00:18:08.202
You can turn on the meeting of that team's channel and just sit there and have a lunch or whatever.

00:18:08.202 --> 00:18:10.488
Have it, take a break, I think you need to do more.

00:18:10.567 --> 00:18:13.561
I think you just eat that.

00:18:13.803 --> 00:18:24.963
Yeah, you want a ceo in vancouver to be connected to a developer in in new zealand, and if it's a one-on-one, there's always a window that you can meet for 15 minutes.

00:18:28.366 --> 00:18:32.369
I toyed with this idea and I spoke to somebody who says, oh, it already exists, so I dropped it.

00:18:32.369 --> 00:18:41.936
But this kind of randomizer that throw all people in and every week you get connected to another colleague at random.

00:18:41.936 --> 00:18:56.377
Or you can even say do not connect to these people because I talk to them on a daily basis anyway and the system will find a slot in both your calendars that you can talk to each other and you're forced to like chat with somebody.

00:18:56.377 --> 00:19:16.849
I like that, that you have no work relation with per se or work reason to talk to, but, but you get forced to just chat and you talk about, like maybe you, you spend a little more time on monday morning or friday afternoon about the weekend, um, and like what, uh, what are you gonna do or what did you do?

00:19:16.849 --> 00:19:28.755
And like you, it becomes a little bit more personal because, as efficient as as remote work, work and online meetings are, it does take away a little bit of the human-to-human contact.

00:19:29.984 --> 00:19:50.152
People want to feel included and I think if you had those meeting rooms where a few people maybe two or three because that way you can have the icebreakers and you still can go for that random rotation but people will feel included within an organization, they'll get to know, feel included within an organization, they'll get to know other people within the organization and I think they would become more productive as well.

00:19:50.152 --> 00:19:51.463
Because now I know people.

00:19:51.463 --> 00:19:55.342
I know there are real people there, I know other people that have their interests.

00:19:55.342 --> 00:20:07.594
It goes with the whole like we'll move on to the topic in a moment but it goes with the whole situation of working with somebody back when we used to consult and travel before video camera or even video camera.

00:20:07.634 --> 00:20:37.807
Now, having met somebody, if you only worked with them remotely before, without video camera, ever meeting them only electronically or on the telephone after you met them, the relationship was so much different Because now you have that personal connection, that personal interaction and I like the cameras because you get that personal interaction, as Chris had mentioned, that you can see someone's face if they're busy, if they're in thought or they are not doing well, if they understand in a conversation.

00:20:37.807 --> 00:20:56.814
So I do think in the remote workforce more should be done for companies and I think that it would be beneficial to have a way for the employees to meet with each other in a sense, but it's not a forced way.

00:20:56.814 --> 00:21:04.182
It has to be in a setting where they're naturally going to feel like they want to talk, because everybody has different personalities.

00:21:04.782 --> 00:21:09.854
I believe in like the clubhouse for an office, right Without making it overly casual.

00:21:09.854 --> 00:21:16.692
It should feel nice to get there and to hang out and stay a little longer and spend time.

00:21:16.692 --> 00:21:25.384
And then it's less about like being in the office or remote, and if people like to go there, they'll be there more often.

00:21:25.384 --> 00:21:31.611
And sure there's a component of cost, especially if you factor in like domestic or even international travel.

00:21:31.611 --> 00:21:43.211
And working remote is not always cheaper, of course, because people need like another set of hardware and the logistics around that too, security of that.

00:21:43.211 --> 00:21:50.010
People just kind of like hacking on their own systems and having stuff flying around.

00:21:54.673 --> 00:22:01.648
But yeah, if you can get to a format where people enjoy coming in and hanging with their colleagues, I mean that's the secret formula, I think.

00:22:01.648 --> 00:22:13.111
And again, it's a little bit easier in urban areas where there's public transport or walking or um, but um at the same time.

00:22:13.111 --> 00:22:24.451
Uh, if I see here in new york city there's a lot of people that are forced to come to the office every day and they walk in to close the door and they're basically remote, they, they just work from a central location.

00:22:33.585 --> 00:22:36.779
So, yeah, as always, the truth is somewhere in the middle, probably.

00:22:36.779 --> 00:22:40.618
So, with that, let's tell everybody a little bit about yourself, and then we'll get into the topic that we intended to talk about.

00:22:40.618 --> 00:22:42.980
Yeah, not that we ever intend to talk about anything.

00:22:42.980 --> 00:22:44.522
I was going to say like we're going to talk about anything.

00:22:44.542 --> 00:22:49.534
We just I was gonna say like we're gonna like free roll anyway, um, but um, yeah, um, I'm chris.

00:22:49.534 --> 00:22:56.748
Um, I am originally from the netherlands but been in the states now for almost 12 years, based out of new york city.

00:22:56.748 --> 00:23:03.971
I got here for a dutch isv initially that I worked for already out of the n to develop the market here.

00:23:03.971 --> 00:23:16.492
So it was kind of like the first hire and built the team, built the market, done that for five years, felt like ready for a new mission, building something new.

00:23:16.492 --> 00:23:19.967
Through some consulting I did.

00:23:19.967 --> 00:23:24.309
I got in touch with Continia and basically the same thing.

00:23:24.480 --> 00:23:38.594
I built it out in a five-year time span to a local team with local partners and doing business here and again kind of reached like a limit of like okay, I think I've brought it to where I can bring it right.

00:23:38.594 --> 00:23:40.924
I mean, the company can grow much further.

00:23:40.924 --> 00:24:10.461
But I was not getting the energy out anymore that I was putting in and I was already on the board of Commerce Build and they were looking to hire a next generation of management, given where the current management is in their life plan sort of life plan sort of.

00:24:10.461 --> 00:24:22.333
And we started talking kind of casually about it and and it is an industry that I was familiar with because of my previous employments and, of course, in an ecosystem, a channel that I love and where I have a lot of friends.

00:24:22.333 --> 00:24:34.228
It became very interesting to make the jump and for the first time, I'm not working for Europeans anymore, but I'm working for North Americans.

00:24:34.228 --> 00:24:37.289
They're still Canadians, so semi-European.

00:24:38.960 --> 00:24:40.286
You had to go there.

00:24:40.286 --> 00:24:41.836
You couldn't just leave that out.

00:24:43.102 --> 00:24:46.832
Yeah, I'm just leaving it as like culturally right.

00:24:46.832 --> 00:24:47.232
I'm not.

00:24:47.232 --> 00:25:06.133
I'm not making it, tying it to any political events oh no, I am, that's okay, not okay, yeah, yeah and um, um, yeah, no, and and so since august, basically, and um, super interesting, um, uh like.

00:25:06.133 --> 00:25:13.150
Less about like starting from scratch, because there is an existing market, there is existing customers in north america.

00:25:13.150 --> 00:25:15.121
The effective far majority is here.

00:25:15.121 --> 00:25:24.585
Um and um yeah, all new challenges and opportunities and uh, um, yeah you've been doing some great things.

00:25:24.986 --> 00:25:33.233
I've seen your journey through there and you know I'll ask you some questions when we talk about some events that are coming up soon.

00:25:33.233 --> 00:25:33.960
But what is Commerce Build?

00:25:33.960 --> 00:25:42.028
Tell us a little bit about Commerce Build, what it is, what they do, what types of problems they solve and I can just not have to talk for a few minutes, to just throw all that on you.

00:25:42.240 --> 00:25:45.534
Yeah, well, it, it, I, I not have to talk for a few minutes to just throw all that on you.

00:25:45.554 --> 00:26:06.996
yeah, yeah well it, it um, uh, I I there's a um, a group of people that pitches like it's the uber off or it's the right um, trying to like, make similarities to like a widely successful platform, um, so, uh, so think of a Shopify for ERP, despite the fact that Shopify claims that they can integrate with ERP.

00:26:06.996 --> 00:26:28.217
So it is a web platform either just a simple customer portal where somebody can look up historical orders, pay an open invoice, to like a really big, enterprise grade web store where companies can sell products, spare parts, what have you?

00:26:28.217 --> 00:26:31.386
But all relying on the ERP.

00:26:31.386 --> 00:26:36.941
So how I'd like to phrase it is like we are an ERP-first e-commerce platform.

00:26:36.941 --> 00:26:42.353
So from the very first line of code we've been built to integrate within the ERP.

00:26:42.353 --> 00:26:52.693
We know what data is in the ERP, what is crucial to do business online inventory, customer-specific pricing in general, any customer-specific logic.

00:26:53.701 --> 00:27:33.019
Because we're ERP first build, we can easily replicate that online where, if you are e-commerce first build, your database structure is kind of set right, like you expect X amount of products, x amount of customers, but they all have more or less the same price and they all get delivered from the same warehouse and kind of like the cool things you can do in an ERP are not automatically assumed in an e-commerce first platform are not automatically assumed in an e-commerce first platform, so you end up having to really modify the database structure from an e-commerce platform.

00:27:33.019 --> 00:27:37.090
There's connectors out there, but who's going to manage it?

00:27:37.090 --> 00:27:37.432
Right?

00:27:37.432 --> 00:27:46.491
In the old days, I think even we had hoped that the ERP partner could own e-commerce as well.

00:27:46.491 --> 00:28:07.403
But I think, talking to a lot of ERP partners over the years, it is a different beast and they'd rather not be the primary responsible for a website where millions of revenue goes through it's a different technology stack.

00:28:07.845 --> 00:28:09.087
Yeah, it's important.

00:28:09.628 --> 00:28:11.333
It's adjacent, yeah, yeah.

00:28:12.182 --> 00:28:13.066
It's that way.

00:28:13.066 --> 00:28:14.744
Everyone thinks like oh, I work in IT.

00:28:14.744 --> 00:28:16.823
Yeah, I hear that I tell everyone.

00:28:16.823 --> 00:28:22.262
If I ever hear them say I work in IT, I just stop talking to them because that just tells me something Because it's so broad.

00:28:22.262 --> 00:28:29.378
So even having ERP and being an ERP expert doesn't mean you can be an e-commerce expert, exactly exactly.

00:28:30.502 --> 00:28:40.880
And requiring someone to pick up a new skill is also a barrier for you, because now, like you had mentioned, it's do I really need to pick up e-commerce or do I want to pick up e-commerce?

00:28:40.880 --> 00:28:41.442
I'm already?

00:28:41.663 --> 00:28:45.641
struggling and you deal with like google stuff right, like how am I ranking?

00:28:45.641 --> 00:28:48.836
And and if people search for my product, where does it show up?

00:28:48.836 --> 00:28:54.784
And and it's so far away from the day-to-day, complex enough erp business.

00:28:54.784 --> 00:29:10.983
Um, so we want to kind of fill that void in the small to mid market, like both our pricing and just our platform as is has been designed for the small to mid market.

00:29:10.983 --> 00:29:16.626
There are some gigantic enterprise solutions out there that serve their purpose.

00:29:16.626 --> 00:29:22.468
So, like I often get asked also like how do you compare to that player?

00:29:22.468 --> 00:29:23.901
How do you compare to that player?

00:29:23.901 --> 00:29:41.159
And I think the market is so huge and each client has their own unique needs that there is enough space for all these different players, as long as they transparently and honestly communicate what they can and cannot do.

00:29:41.159 --> 00:29:50.444
Um, I think everybody would be helped by by that um there's just a lot of noise in the market.

00:29:51.026 --> 00:30:02.497
Uh, because of everybody, everybody wants shopify, right, but that works great for for a lot scenarios, but it also does not work at all for other scenarios.

00:30:02.497 --> 00:30:14.500
You almost need independent advisors to kind of steer you away from some of that stuff, because obviously when I say it I'm biased because I have skin in the game.

00:30:14.500 --> 00:30:39.945
But there is a lot of noise around e-commerce, generic players, very small kind of like connectors, where, again, how I'd like to position us almost as an insurance to both the VAR and the customer, like, oh, you hear e-commerce, just just call us, email us.

00:30:39.945 --> 00:30:49.236
Like we, we know erp and we know e-commerce, and and and we can, we can fill the needs there um is there a?

00:30:49.276 --> 00:30:52.800
specific erp that you guys are focused on is it?

00:30:53.461 --> 00:30:56.747
yeah, so we originate from the Sage space.

00:30:56.747 --> 00:31:04.515
Three different variants there, but since a year, like, we really productized our BC connector as well.

00:31:04.515 --> 00:31:07.863
So we have a good amount of BC customers.

00:31:07.863 --> 00:31:09.507
Now all BC cloud.

00:31:09.507 --> 00:31:21.862
But we've been eyeing like the on-prem stuff as well, although that gets less and less attention, obviously by also the way Microsoft likes to see things go.

00:31:21.862 --> 00:31:27.426
So in our world it's all BC Cloud.

00:31:28.757 --> 00:31:29.780
That's what I was going to ask.

00:31:29.780 --> 00:31:31.602
So you hit some key points there.

00:31:31.602 --> 00:31:42.801
There's many products on the market, if anything, and it comes down to choosing the right tool to satisfy your needs, and that's, I think, what many forget.

00:31:42.801 --> 00:31:46.316
They may hear the Shopify's, which you summed it up well.

00:31:46.316 --> 00:31:55.787
Shopify does great for certain scenarios, and there's other certain scenarios where Shopify needs to even itself have customizations or use some of the other extensions.

00:31:55.787 --> 00:32:06.623
I've gone through some implementations where Shopify didn't do what somebody needed, but they wanted to use Shopify, so they had to spend additional costs to get it to work with the way that they wanted to do business.

00:32:07.218 --> 00:32:08.473
And which can be worth it, right.

00:32:08.473 --> 00:32:12.345
But you need to all know it up front, and that's tough.

00:32:13.275 --> 00:32:18.115
Well, it's just to know exactly, like you had mentioned, which tool is the best for your scenario.

00:32:18.115 --> 00:32:21.085
It doesn't mean that one is better than the other.

00:32:21.085 --> 00:32:30.297
It may be better for a particular implementation because of the scenario, and that's what I think gets lost with a lot of products you had mentioned.

00:32:30.297 --> 00:32:31.580
Commerce build works.

00:32:31.580 --> 00:32:33.145
Primarily, that's what I was going to have.

00:32:33.145 --> 00:32:37.666
One of the questions that I like to have is which versions of Business Central does it work with?

00:32:37.666 --> 00:32:42.186
So right now, you're focused on Business Central Cloud as a product.

00:32:42.186 --> 00:32:44.575
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly.

00:32:44.575 --> 00:32:51.189
And to use Commerce Build, what does the customer need?

00:32:51.189 --> 00:32:52.457
Is Commerce Build?

00:32:52.457 --> 00:32:56.627
Does the web store sit within the customer's environment?

00:32:56.627 --> 00:32:58.603
Is it something that you manage and host?

00:32:58.603 --> 00:33:04.423
Or, if somebody goes to start using Commerce Build, what do they need on their end?

00:33:05.836 --> 00:33:07.824
Well, again, it depends a little bit on their needs.

00:33:07.824 --> 00:33:14.954
It's all hosted, we provide it as a service and it has all the security.

00:33:14.954 --> 00:33:23.469
We have all kinds of tools that can also avoid DDoS attacks and what you can expect from.

00:33:23.469 --> 00:33:38.221
We've been around since almost 20 years, so we've been in this business for a while, but basically we offer two flavors of our product.

00:33:38.301 --> 00:33:55.868
We have our, our own interface where people put stuff in their shopping cart, very easy to manage, to use, but maybe not all the bells and whistles that you, that you see in the major platforms out there.

00:33:55.868 --> 00:34:04.884
And we've seen a development in the market where clients do ask sometimes for the more cool things, the shiny things.

00:34:04.884 --> 00:34:27.626
Some are very transactional and want a simple environment, no distractions, directly integrated, and others are looking at Magento, shopify, bigcommerce, like all the generic big players out there, and are like, oh, in this platform I can do so and so Can I do that in yours, and we don't have the development dollars that these parties have, right?

00:34:27.626 --> 00:34:30.864
So we've been trying to find a solution for that.

00:34:30.864 --> 00:34:40.889
So we've been starting to offer a WooCommerce front end in parallel to what we do with our own platform.

00:34:41.637 --> 00:34:42.903
Similar to WooCommerce.

00:34:44.199 --> 00:34:46.057
It is WooCommerce, oh it is.

00:34:46.097 --> 00:34:47.503
WooCommerce, yeah, yeah.

00:34:47.503 --> 00:34:50.563
So we integrate that to PC.

00:34:50.563 --> 00:35:04.503
We have the technology to still be as integrated as possible without like really losing some of that real-timeness that a lot of the B2B clients require.

00:35:04.503 --> 00:35:19.043
Multiple warehouses, like all the things that ERP-first companies need, are often not possible in the WooCommerce's of this world because they're not designed for that right.

00:35:19.043 --> 00:35:31.862
So we found a happy medium where we think that our integration offsets some of those downsides and for clients that want to go that path, we have a solution and we have clients that run in parallel.

00:35:31.862 --> 00:35:38.483
They have their B2B on their own application and they have their B2C on Woo.

00:35:39.697 --> 00:35:49.635
And I think I saw a stat somewhere like over 40% of the websites in the world runs on WordPress and WooCommerce is the e-commerce engine from WordPress.

00:35:49.635 --> 00:35:52.777
So we, I would say, at least once a month, get somebody like.

00:35:52.777 --> 00:36:16.121
I would say, at least once a month, get somebody like oh, I have Woo already, but I'm struggling with getting pricing and inventory to Woo and orders back into my ERP Right, and again, there are connectors out there, but who's going to pick up the phone?

00:36:16.121 --> 00:36:19.132
Who's going to like, apart from making it work once like, what's the ongoing service model?

00:36:19.132 --> 00:36:22.264
What, if you want to do something different.

00:36:22.264 --> 00:36:27.126
You want some additional changes.

00:36:27.126 --> 00:36:32.423
Microsoft Business Central is not going to answer the phone.

00:36:32.423 --> 00:36:36.945
Woocommerce or Shopify or Magento is not going to answer the phone.

00:36:36.945 --> 00:36:47.688
Your ERP partner, as we concluded earlier, is probably want to stay out of that, so that's how we really want to position ourselves.

00:36:49.416 --> 00:36:51.681
You had mentioned both B2B and B2C.

00:36:51.681 --> 00:36:55.208
Is this targeting someone who has both B2B?

00:36:55.208 --> 00:36:59.735
Excuse me, is it targeting someone who is a B2B, a B2C, or do you support both?

00:37:00.818 --> 00:37:04.065
We support both and again, it depends a little bit on the needs.

00:37:04.065 --> 00:37:11.010
If somebody is super easy B2C, they don't need that hardcore ERP integration.

00:37:11.010 --> 00:37:22.056
Right, Then a connector is typically just fine Because, again, the complexity of the ERP is not making the front-end changes necessary.

00:37:22.056 --> 00:37:30.981
If you're b2b, having more than one warehouse is super challenging for some of these more generic platforms.

00:37:30.981 --> 00:37:35.318
What inventory numbers should they look at in the ERP?

00:37:35.318 --> 00:37:39.166
They don't't know because their integration only connects to one field.

00:37:39.166 --> 00:37:48.730
Right, and as basic as that becomes really complex to build and maintain in a system that's not designed for that.

00:37:49.735 --> 00:38:02.146
So then that's when you bring in WooCommerce to do that, to handle all the crazy complex because I've been in an e-commerce project and sometimes the things they ask is like it's wild.

00:38:02.146 --> 00:38:08.507
So that's the solution that you're providing to your clients.

00:38:08.507 --> 00:38:10.282
They say, hey, we can't handle that.

00:38:10.282 --> 00:38:22.679
We maintain the connector so that you don't have to worry about the data coming out of ERP or, in this case, business Central Online, so that you can have this complex requirements on WooCommerce.

00:38:22.679 --> 00:38:24.746
Exactly, yeah.

00:38:25.836 --> 00:38:35.068
It's those clients that have the need for heavy marketing, b2c-like experiences.

00:38:38.780 --> 00:38:54.951
Woo is a perfect option and we have a technical solution to integrate that with the ERP so that the downside of these traditional B2C platforms don't come into the ERP with all kinds of like missing of data.

00:38:58.398 --> 00:39:08.594
And if that's what they need and this is back to your original question, brad if that's what they need, it does put a little bit more onus on the customer.

00:39:08.594 --> 00:39:14.942
To have a team that runs the web store on a day-to-day basis right, but then it's part of their business model.

00:39:14.942 --> 00:39:23.144
Then they probably make enough revenue that they have at least one, but typically a few people in-house working with it.

00:39:23.144 --> 00:39:35.804
Or and it's the beauty of a platform like WooCommerce there's tons of e-commerce specialists out there that know Woo but then don't know how to integrate that with the ERP.

00:39:35.804 --> 00:39:49.902
Right, so a customer could get WooCommerce integrated with Business Central from us and the crucial support that they need to keep that alive and running and developing over time.

00:39:49.902 --> 00:39:59.164
But they can also hire somebody around the corner that does everything else WooCommerce for them, so it gives them a certain freedom there as well.

00:40:00.815 --> 00:40:01.818
So with the.

00:40:01.818 --> 00:40:15.425
It's a great product, it sounds, because you have a lot of flexibility for your implementation, where you can do B2B, b2c or, if you have an existing B2C, that's something that's in place.

00:40:15.425 --> 00:40:22.242
You can also augment it with additional staff of your own as part of the implementation process.

00:40:22.242 --> 00:40:30.525
Is it something that you, as Commerce Build, sets up and works with them for, or would it be the partner?

00:40:31.115 --> 00:40:36.947
No, we own it and the partner can be as involved as they or the customer wants.

00:40:36.947 --> 00:40:48.885
But we do the kickoff, we run the entire project until you're live and then you roll over to our account management team and then any ongoing needs you have, apart from support, of course.

00:40:48.885 --> 00:40:59.190
I mean if there's a situation where I don't know you're down because of some kind of DDoS attack or whatever, then we jump on that through the support team.

00:40:59.190 --> 00:41:13.146
But as you use it, you want changes, right, like a house you buy, like as you live there, you start to see things that you would like to modify and then you just bring us in and we do it for you.

00:41:13.146 --> 00:41:28.626
Or if it's really just strictly related to the woo element of it, you can go anywhere with that because we already have the house built so you can go to any other contractor to make the changes.

00:41:29.835 --> 00:41:32.085
What do you think would be the typical implementation?

00:41:32.085 --> 00:41:36.302
It's a blanket question because it's how big, how long is a piece of string is what I like to say.

00:41:36.302 --> 00:41:45.335
What would somebody expect to be an average implementation time from the time that they choose to go through and set this up Again?

00:41:45.335 --> 00:41:52.981
Complexity, I understand, and anyone listening, complexity and scenarios are going to dictate if it's something can be shorter or longer.

00:41:52.981 --> 00:42:00.342
But for the ease of implementation, is it something that they, if they have like basic products, basic pricing?

00:42:01.076 --> 00:42:07.081
I get the question a lot and I understand, of course, why I would ask the same question.

00:42:07.081 --> 00:42:14.025
I think there's a couple key things that determine the timeline.

00:42:14.025 --> 00:42:17.445
One is is it a net new ERP customer right?

00:42:17.445 --> 00:42:19.262
Are they on Business Central Online?

00:42:19.262 --> 00:42:22.746
Do they have their pricing, their products and everything set up there?

00:42:22.746 --> 00:42:30.403
It is much easier because we're not building the train as it's leaving the station.

00:42:30.403 --> 00:42:41.949
If it's net new, it always takes a little bit of time before the ERP is ready with the data that we need to populate the website.

00:42:41.949 --> 00:42:46.666
So that's an important one that can cause delays.

00:42:46.666 --> 00:42:57.630
And then the other one is how much experience does the customer have and how much do they want to do themselves to build the website out?

00:42:57.630 --> 00:43:10.963
Of course you have item descriptions and things like that, but sometimes in the ERP those are still very internal, written right, just like black box, 20 pieces, 10 pounds.

00:43:10.963 --> 00:43:17.402
Yeah, that's not a description you can put on the website.

00:43:17.402 --> 00:43:21.041
Somebody needs to write that up and there's all these cool AI tools.

00:43:21.161 --> 00:43:23.300
Yeah, I was just going to say we had to throw it in there.

00:43:23.300 --> 00:43:29.702
Yeah, that's the whole reason for the marketing copilot, the marketing description feature within business central.

00:43:29.882 --> 00:43:34.777
Exactly and by saying this, this podcast will rank higher now, of course, because we did some product placement.

00:43:34.777 --> 00:43:37.101
Of course, because we did some product placement, I don't know.

00:43:37.161 --> 00:43:42.188
I think now we're starting to see where there's a trend to not talk about AI.

00:43:47.393 --> 00:43:51.175
Yeah, somebody told me that they counted the amount of times AI or co-pilot was mentioned in a keynote at Summit.

00:43:51.175 --> 00:43:52.880
I think it was over 100 times.

00:43:52.880 --> 00:43:53.583
It's kind of funny.

00:43:53.583 --> 00:43:57.068
I try to do my sessions.

00:43:57.068 --> 00:43:58.905
I try to do my sessions.

00:43:59.005 --> 00:44:01.338
I even said it at a session I did recently.

00:44:01.338 --> 00:44:10.938
I went almost the whole entire session without mentioning ai, because I mentioned it, because I wanted to make a point that I didn't mention it, because we hear it all the time and it's nice to go an hour without hearing it.

00:44:10.938 --> 00:44:15.487
Yeah, yeah, but I ruined it anyway, uh, sidetrack.

00:44:15.507 --> 00:44:27.844
But if they have a lot of experience and and assets, they understand, because there's always homework involved in getting a website live, like there is homework involved in getting an ERP live.

00:44:27.844 --> 00:44:31.362
Yes, we've done it hundreds of times.

00:44:31.362 --> 00:44:37.681
You guys bought on the ERP side, I did on the e-commerce side, but yet it's their business.

00:44:37.681 --> 00:44:43.726
They need to tell us how they want to run their business, either in the ERP or in the web store.

00:44:43.726 --> 00:44:54.601
So we're going to need their input and the better they are at articulating it, the better they are at having the assets ready, the quicker the project goes.

00:44:54.601 --> 00:45:14.603
There's also clients that refuse to go live before they're 100% satisfied and there's clients that say let's just do this strictly necessary, let's go live, let's get some learnings in, let's get the feedback from our customers.

00:45:14.603 --> 00:45:19.916
Same, absolutely, because it's focused on the result, it's focused on progress.

00:45:19.916 --> 00:45:22.804
And what do they say?

00:45:22.804 --> 00:45:30.742
Never let perfection be in the way of good, or something like that.

00:45:30.742 --> 00:45:35.878
Right, I read a study where procrastinators and perfectionists are very often the same type of people.

00:45:36.398 --> 00:45:39.588
Exactly Because they wait and wait and wait.

00:45:40.896 --> 00:45:41.740
Because it's not perfect.

00:45:41.740 --> 00:45:49.545
They don't even start because they don't have a path to success and like to throw in another one-liner that I actually often use internally.

00:45:49.545 --> 00:45:52.400
It's like how do you eat an elephant One bite at the time?

00:45:52.400 --> 00:45:55.284
It's just, you got to start somewhere.

00:45:55.775 --> 00:45:56.719
It's so true.

00:45:56.719 --> 00:45:58.777
It's so true, it's so true.

00:45:58.777 --> 00:46:02.940
Well, we talked about it recently on an episode that hasn't been released yet.

00:46:02.940 --> 00:46:03.822
It should be released soon.

00:46:03.822 --> 00:46:06.423
It's progress over perfection is what we spoke about.

00:46:07.025 --> 00:46:38.148
And it's so true because if you want something to be 100% perfect, I don't think it's ever achievable, because every time you look at it you'll see something different that you want to change, and sometimes those changes you make aren't going to make an impact, whereas what you had mentioned get it to a point where it's secure, you can process the orders in a manner maybe not a hundred percent the way you're thinking, but at least you can get out and get the customer feedback to see how they're using it, to see how it's used, to see how it flows.

00:46:38.617 --> 00:46:46.646
Then you can build upon that instead of waiting and waiting, and waiting, and waiting and waiting, and those end up, from my experience, costing a lot more.

00:46:46.646 --> 00:46:59.101
It costs a lot more because you're always trying to make changes, you have scope creep, you have a lot of things that are moving and sometimes you're undoing some things you've done, but also it takes you longer to get to market.

00:46:59.101 --> 00:47:02.686
So if your business does, in this case, rely on the e-commerce sales.

00:47:02.686 --> 00:47:06.210
You run the risk of not maybe getting as many sales because you're waiting.

00:47:13.775 --> 00:47:16.860
Yeah, exactly, and I think you look for like a partnership with the people, right?

00:47:16.860 --> 00:47:21.528
Like both on the client side, on the ERP side, and and for us as an ISV, without making it super soft.

00:47:21.528 --> 00:47:33.204
But I think if you dare align and have super transparent communication, you can overcome hurdles and you can call each other out on nonsense.

00:47:33.204 --> 00:47:36.996
I mean I sometimes have to body check myself a little bit.

00:47:36.996 --> 00:47:44.965
If we talk to a customer, it says, well, I want it in so-and-so way, and then I'm like asking them could you explain a little further?

00:47:44.965 --> 00:47:47.063
Like what's the benefit for you there?

00:47:47.063 --> 00:47:54.101
And then I get a vague answer or like and it probably comes down to because that's their comfort zone, that's what they've always done.

00:47:54.101 --> 00:48:02.983
And they probably done it that way because the previous time they implemented the system it couldn't do half of what the systems can do today.

00:48:02.983 --> 00:48:10.239
This is the time to reinvent your processes, not to make your software do the same thing it did 10 years ago.

00:48:11.342 --> 00:48:16.626
Thank you, and it's so much cheaper to change a process than your software.

00:48:16.934 --> 00:48:23.322
I'm holding back on that, I'm being more reserved, but that's one of the things I see all of the time.

00:48:23.322 --> 00:48:33.637
If you're going to move to a new platform or move to a new system, it could be upgrading, migrating, however you want to phrase it moving a pile of, I have to be nice.

00:48:33.637 --> 00:48:38.117
So, chris, we don't have to market moving a pile of poop from one system to the other system.

00:48:38.117 --> 00:48:41.070
Still a pile of poop, and you you mentioned the most.

00:48:41.170 --> 00:48:50.695
A lot of times, I find requirements are based on a limitation that don't exist, because they existed 20 years ago, the old.

00:48:50.695 --> 00:48:52.880
Well, we've always done it that way, or we.

00:48:52.880 --> 00:48:55.505
This becomes the requirement because our process has always been this way, because we had to done it that way.

00:48:55.505 --> 00:49:08.659
Or this becomes the requirement because our process has always been this way, because we had to do it that way, versus oh, now we can do this in the newer system because that feature may already be in there, we may have slight changes and we can gain some efficiencies.

00:49:08.659 --> 00:49:19.811
It drives me crazy every time when people think that, okay, I'm just going to move to a new system, I click a button and it's done, and they want to do things the same exact way and I always have to ask them then why are you upgrading?

00:49:19.891 --> 00:49:20.373
why are you?

00:49:20.393 --> 00:49:23.442
migrating why are you moving like if you want the same thing?

00:49:24.652 --> 00:49:25.476
why are you moving?

00:49:25.476 --> 00:49:28.143
Just ask yourself that, why are you really moving?

00:49:28.143 --> 00:49:30.530
Yeah, yeah, and then work around that.

00:49:30.530 --> 00:49:33.697
I'm sorry I keep interrupting no, no, it's's good.

00:49:33.777 --> 00:49:36.322
I mean, it's a dialogue, right?

00:49:36.322 --> 00:49:39.092
Or what do you call dialogue between three people?

00:49:39.092 --> 00:49:40.773
Is that still a dialogue?

00:49:40.813 --> 00:49:41.353
Trilogue.

00:49:46.358 --> 00:49:49.521
Trilogue.

00:49:49.521 --> 00:49:55.047
Yeah, this reminds me of a case that I had.

00:49:55.047 --> 00:50:09.679
I'll try to frame it to reveal not too much about the organization or the people that were involved.

00:50:09.679 --> 00:50:19.981
But we had an old license model that was like your on-prem situation kind of, where you pay annual enhancement, and we changed that to a more usage-based pricing.

00:50:19.981 --> 00:50:36.123
But we understood customers don't always like change of pricing, so we need to be super transparent about this and we need to give them an option for at least a few years to stay on the old pricing.

00:50:36.123 --> 00:50:45.105
So we had like a way to calculate, to display like this is what you're paying now in annual enhancement.

00:50:45.105 --> 00:50:49.960
This, which your current usage, is what you would pay in the new model.

00:50:49.960 --> 00:51:05.112
You choose right, choose right and, interestingly enough, for the far majority the new model was cheaper because it would be a more fair system, because if they didn't use it that much they wouldn't pay that much, right.

00:51:05.112 --> 00:51:09.262
So I call a client and I say listen, exactly that.

00:51:09.262 --> 00:51:10.612
This is where you are now.

00:51:10.612 --> 00:51:13.237
This is where you would be in the new model.

00:51:13.237 --> 00:51:15.601
You choose, like I'm.

00:51:15.601 --> 00:51:17.585
I I'm really independent in this.

00:51:17.585 --> 00:51:23.862
You, you choose, but obviously you would pick the lower one, even with a doubling of usage.

00:51:23.922 --> 00:51:30.262
In his case he would still be off cheaper on a month-to-month basis than than with the old model.

00:51:30.262 --> 00:51:39.125
And he got mad at me because he he thought I trying to finagle him into a scam or something.

00:51:39.125 --> 00:51:41.237
I'm like dude, I really don't care.

00:51:41.237 --> 00:51:42.018
You tell me.

00:51:42.018 --> 00:51:44.778
And if you want to tell me next week, that's fine as well.

00:51:44.778 --> 00:51:46.572
This is the data I have for you.

00:51:46.572 --> 00:51:58.159
You tell me, you choose, you let me know, I'll tell finance and that's how the billing will work for the next few years, and if you don't like it, you can also just pull the kill switch.

00:51:58.159 --> 00:52:06.822
In fact, with the month to month, you can do it anytime by stop using it, um, where now, with your annual enhancement, you can only do that once a year.

00:52:06.822 --> 00:52:08.791
So so you buy yourself more freedom.

00:52:08.791 --> 00:52:19.166
But he was so suspicious of me offering him something at a lower price that there had to be something to it.

00:52:19.409 --> 00:52:20.655
You're asking for logic.

00:52:20.655 --> 00:52:23.155
It's hard to grasp.

00:52:24.371 --> 00:52:33.119
And he was furious and to the point that I was like, okay, he started kind of swearing and like this is how all those software guys work.

00:52:33.119 --> 00:52:34.235
And like I was some cheap car sales guy or something.

00:52:34.235 --> 00:52:35.302
So I was like it's okay, all those software guys work.

00:52:35.302 --> 00:52:36.590
And like like I was some like cheap car sales guy or something.

00:52:36.590 --> 00:52:40.277
So I was like it's okay, like uh, let's hang up.

00:52:40.277 --> 00:52:42.197
And I I called the bar that was on the call.

00:52:42.197 --> 00:52:48.329
I was like I don't know, like you ask him what he wants, because I don't even want to talk to this guy anymore.

00:52:48.329 --> 00:53:03.730
He was so uh, rude, um, and I'm not a very sensitive person, but it just hit me in my core also because I like to think I'm very ethical in the way I do business.

00:53:03.730 --> 00:53:14.592
But yeah, it's like what is the most logical thing is not always perceived as such and yeah, it's interesting Old habits die hard.

00:53:14.731 --> 00:53:21.414
It made me realize about talking about some logic that goes through when implementing e-commerce.

00:53:21.414 --> 00:53:36.003
Chris, like, how do you handle challenges when it comes to when you especially that new, when you know where e-commerce is brand new to the organization, never done it before, you know clearly you can help them with the marketing materials?

00:53:36.003 --> 00:53:40.079
Like, how do you handle with the rest of the product materials?

00:53:40.079 --> 00:53:50.920
I think what we call them in the past PIM solutions, where you may have some images and then they may not have some, so they take like random photos or maybe start with one photo, things like that.

00:53:50.920 --> 00:53:54.601
Like, how do you handle that with Commerce Build?

00:53:56.853 --> 00:53:57.175
Yeah.

00:53:57.175 --> 00:54:00.356
So the nice thing is that we can be a bit agnostic there.

00:54:00.356 --> 00:54:06.153
Um, in the end it's just a bunch of files or a bunch of text fields and we can run an import right.

00:54:06.153 --> 00:54:11.251
Um, if there's a professional pimp setup, we can integrate with that.

00:54:11.251 --> 00:54:21.057
I mean, most pimp systems are built for that purpose right, where they can also have outside access to assets in there.

00:54:23.240 --> 00:54:26.846
We run into like less and less of the net new ones.

00:54:26.846 --> 00:54:36.282
I mean, my e-commerce experience goes back 15 years or so and those days it was a lot of net new.

00:54:36.282 --> 00:54:48.242
It was people like oh yeah, I heard about this thing, the internet where I can sell my products, and I guess again because of like developments in the B2C world, like we all buy on Amazon.

00:54:48.242 --> 00:54:55.713
So we understand the benefits of an online platform where you can buy stuff, the benefits of an online platform where you can buy stuff.

00:54:55.713 --> 00:55:17.719
What I at this point consider net new in our world is people coming off of the B2B side of Amazon right, where they just upload a bunch of basic stuff and they sell through Amazon and then they slowly but surely figure out their business is growing but they lose a hell of a lot of money on every transaction because somebody else is getting the money first before it comes to their bank account.

00:55:17.719 --> 00:55:30.811
Um, so I think those are kind of like today's net new e-commerce clients, um, that use an outside platform to to sell and want to own that a little bit more.

00:55:32.034 --> 00:55:33.916
Um, yeah, but yeah, then we integrate with.

00:55:33.916 --> 00:55:41.358
Like, the question is the one-time import or is it an ongoing kind of um, uh, sync?

00:55:41.358 --> 00:55:46.670
You need to, uh, need to handle um, but there's, there's plenty of solutions out there to do that.

00:55:46.670 --> 00:56:20.186
Um, ideally it's again single source of truth, right, um, so, um, we, we assume that the ERP is a single source of truth, but sometimes there is a one point five source of truth and with a with a, with a with a PIM that handles some of those product assets because the ERP can't do it Right, like it's not that long ago that we had to concatenate descriptions to just say anything meaningful about a product, because the ERP couldn't handle it.

00:56:21.170 --> 00:56:24.157
Yeah, like brochures, right, like if they want to add a brochure.

00:56:24.458 --> 00:56:26.896
Oh yeah, Especially assets and stuff like that.

00:56:26.896 --> 00:56:27.197
Yeah.

00:56:30.092 --> 00:56:39.164
So with this solution, another big portion of e-commerce and erp is finance e-commerce.

00:56:39.164 --> 00:56:41.331
Customers can pay many ways.

00:56:41.331 --> 00:56:46.440
I've seen you can use credit card, you can use on account payments.

00:56:46.440 --> 00:56:53.757
If you have terms in such a b2b, how does commerce build work with credit card payments or the payment options?00:56:55.159 --> 00:57:02.961


Yeah, so, um, and this is going back to like what's the business model of, of the e-commerce platform?00:57:02.961 --> 00:57:10.402


Um, and our business model is just month to month, uh, based on the type of package you buy from us, that's your price.00:57:10.402 --> 00:57:25.782


But there's e-commerce platforms that have a GMV model where they take a cut of your revenue or a cut of your credit card transactions or they force you to use a certain credit card provider because they have a better deal with them.00:57:25.782 --> 00:57:34.324


So it's a tough question to answer because everybody kind of handles it differently.00:57:34.324 --> 00:57:43.177


But we want to be agnostic on the payment side, again, because there are some historic relationships in place that cannot be changed.00:57:43.257 --> 00:57:44.000


For a lot of people.00:57:44.000 --> 00:57:51.121


They have their own payment gateway or they have their own way of tracking that in the ERP.00:57:51.121 --> 00:57:55.541


Right Again, this is one of those things often overlooked when people pick an e-commerce platform.00:57:55.541 --> 00:58:13.115


How does the ERP right Again, this is one of those things often overlooked when people pick an e-commerce platform how does the ERP ultimately know that when they hit ship, the payment needs to be captured on a credit card, because you do an authorization when it gets bought, but there needs to be a trigger when it gets shipped that they actually collect the money.00:58:14.878 --> 00:58:17.784


How to do refunds, partial refunds, right.00:58:17.784 --> 00:58:29.873


You want an as integrated solution as you can, especially with high volume, like if this happens once a month, it's fine to do it manually, but if it happens a hundred times a day, you want to automate it.00:58:29.873 --> 00:58:35.257


Because you can do it manually, and so we're agnostic.00:58:35.257 --> 00:58:44.663


We integrate with the common players in our channel and even in some cases, with the more generic players out there for payment.00:58:44.663 --> 00:58:51.320


We want to stay out of it a little bit too when it comes to like hardcore PCI compliancy.00:58:51.320 --> 00:58:53.510


That's a whole different ballgame.00:58:53.811 --> 00:59:05.958


So for payment processing, if a customer that wants to switch to use commerce build or start using commerce build, they can keep their existing payment processor if they choose, so they can find a dish one.00:59:05.958 --> 00:59:14.119


Do you help them find a new one or is that something that you have partners that you work with to help them determine the best?00:59:14.699 --> 00:59:23.121


Yeah, we defer to the VAR if they have a go-to party, especially for the in-channel, in-ecosystem kind of players.00:59:23.121 --> 00:59:35.061


Yeah, we obviously on the back end know which ones work better in some cases than others, but again, we try to stay agnostic.00:59:35.061 --> 00:59:51.289


I mean, if somebody asks a question, we'll give them an honest answer, but in the end it's the VAR that, I think, has to have a say in that as well, because there's a lot more to payment than just collect the credit card information.00:59:51.289 --> 00:59:55.376


When somebody places an order, do you want to keep it on file?00:59:55.376 --> 00:59:56.460


Is it compliant?00:59:56.460 --> 00:59:59.617


Again, what do you do with refunds?00:59:59.617 --> 01:00:06.882


That touches more on the ERP than the e-commerce, interestingly enough.01:00:07.809 --> 01:00:20.974


Yeah, like Apple Pay, Google Pay, you know like they sometimes they want those functionalities available and sometimes, like you know, is there a reason if you're doing B2B versus B2C, Like, why would you want that?01:00:20.974 --> 01:00:25.702


Are your other businesses paying in Apple pay?01:00:27.711 --> 01:00:29.820


Well, yeah, like again, you try to.01:00:29.820 --> 01:00:34.240


So everybody is kind of speculating how someone else is going to use the platform, right?01:00:34.240 --> 01:00:41.115


So, yes, from my point, I'm speculating how our clients are going to use the platform, but they do the same thing.01:00:41.115 --> 01:00:59.153


They have hundreds of B2B customers and, depending on the nature of the business and we've seen this completely different amongst our customers and their customers some only get orders at the end of the day because they sell to mom and pops.01:00:59.153 --> 01:01:09.043


They're busy during the day with their own stuff, so the day is closed, they close the door and they place the order for the new stuff for next week or something like that.01:01:09.043 --> 01:01:20.630


And we have clients who have clients that sell or purchase like the whole day long because they have full time people managing that, right?01:01:20.650 --> 01:01:28.264


So it is difficult to like look so many layers deep and understand how people use it.01:01:28.264 --> 01:01:39.913


I mean, if I think about it myself, there are things that I buy on my computer behind the big screen because I just like I feel like I need to see it on the big screen.01:01:39.913 --> 01:01:42.177


I have that with flights, for example.01:01:42.177 --> 01:01:49.119


I like as easy as it is to buy it in the app of the airline, I do it on the big screen, but that's my personal preference.01:01:49.119 --> 01:01:54.119


And then other stuff I just do on my phone with, like, just my thumb right.01:01:54.119 --> 01:01:55.762


I don't use anything else.01:01:55.762 --> 01:02:02.259


I double click Apple Pay, boom, everything is pre-populated and it's in front of my door the next day.01:02:02.259 --> 01:02:27.943


So it is the type of transaction, the type of consumer, how often it happens, and in the end I think you need to tailor to every buyer you want to reach um and um where you have success is where you're going to put more of your money and and double down on yeah, no, no.01:02:27.983 --> 01:02:34.099


The options are important with that, and I'm thinking of all these e-commerce things.01:02:34.099 --> 01:02:34.940


And you mentioned the flights.01:02:34.940 --> 01:02:35.983


I'm the same way with flights.01:02:35.983 --> 01:02:37.875


To be honest with you, I have no idea why.01:02:39.753 --> 01:02:41.157


Yeah, I can't explain it either.01:02:42.393 --> 01:02:45.378


It's rare, I mean I will do it from time to time if I'm in a pinch.01:02:45.378 --> 01:02:50.416


Sometimes I need to do it from my phone, but a lot of times I prefer to go back to my computer Again.01:02:50.416 --> 01:02:51.007


Another digression.01:02:51.250 --> 01:02:51.811


That's interesting.01:02:51.811 --> 01:02:57.391


So it's a matter of real estate, because I I don't mind, you know, booking a flight through my phone.01:02:57.391 --> 01:03:11.592


To me it's convenient, um, but there's some things that I shop for, like I need to see on a browser so that I can maybe read more about it or see more content regarding this, this product.01:03:12.594 --> 01:03:16.682


So, yeah, I think I think for the flights it does come to real estate for me.01:03:16.682 --> 01:03:17.251


Like I want to.01:03:17.251 --> 01:03:19.255


I want to see things side by side.01:03:19.255 --> 01:03:26.282


I want to do a quick like validation of, like price or something like that, and just the the multi-browser thing on my phone.01:03:26.282 --> 01:03:29.833


Um, I consider myself pretty tech savvy.01:03:29.833 --> 01:03:43.382


I mean, I'm the ones getting all the phone calls in the family when something breaks down, um uh, but but still, like, handling multiple tabs on the phone is just not as convenient as it is on the computer no.01:03:43.463 --> 01:03:44.731


And then some websites.01:03:44.731 --> 01:03:46.315


If you switch tabs, you go back.01:03:46.436 --> 01:03:50.030


It's the page has to refresh and the little pop-up box comes up.01:03:50.112 --> 01:03:50.773


We have to enter.01:03:50.833 --> 01:03:54.324


Oh, I can't or the worst is the windows in window right on your phone.01:03:54.324 --> 01:03:57.376


Like you, you see some stupid ad on instagram or something.01:03:57.376 --> 01:04:14.661


You click on it and then it opens the the in instagram browser and and then the navigation is completely different the checkout process and you you do something wrong or it loads wrong and and, like the whole thing, you're gone and you're like screw that, I'm out right and it's.01:04:14.661 --> 01:04:20.402


It's meant to be convenient so that mark zuckerberg collects your dollars and not the web store.01:04:21.105 --> 01:04:33.512


Um but I do say that sometimes I think things are purposefully inconvenient because they either are meant to frustrate you and you just say, ah, forget it, I'm just going to do it like buying a car from a car salesman, your car salesman reference.01:04:33.512 --> 01:04:48.152


But uh, yeah, you know, sometimes it may not always be so purposeful, but maybe it's just that I'm old too now at this point, uh, yeah, we're guilty as charged on on like the things that we blame our clients for.01:04:48.291 --> 01:04:53.284


Right like, uh, we don't want to change just uh I just wanted the same as 10 years ago.01:04:53.711 --> 01:04:55.257


I just wanted the same as 10 years ago.01:04:55.257 --> 01:04:58.692


Well, sometimes it was easier.01:04:58.692 --> 01:04:59.773


You don't have to do as much.01:04:59.773 --> 01:05:09.224


Technology simplified a lot of things, many things, most things, but in some cases it did not add another level of complexity in other areas, in my opinion.01:05:09.224 --> 01:05:12.572


So we've had a lot of benefits, but in other areas it's like, wasn't it just?01:05:12.572 --> 01:05:25.931


I used to remember that with video games Like, Pac-Man was the greatest because you had the little stick and the button that was it and then as you grew up, and now you have these controllers with like oh, more than the amount of fingers.01:05:26.170 --> 01:05:26.773


You, you have.01:05:27.213 --> 01:05:30.900


Yeah, exactly, you have like I stopped playing at fifa 99.01:05:30.900 --> 01:05:35.038


So I, I loved fifa, the soccer game being european, um.01:05:35.038 --> 01:05:42.478


And then I think it was around the fifa 99 that they changed it and like it became so insane.01:05:42.478 --> 01:06:02.652


Well, it was less on the pc and more on the on the consoles, um, but it was like, okay, I'm, I can't do this anymore, I'm not a full-time player, I'm not investing in the learning curve here, um, and and I I need more than two hands like I'm out it's crazy because you have all those buttons and this and you gotta like do these combinations?01:06:02.711 --> 01:06:08.476


push the stick in, go up on this pad, press the thumb button, like you have like a trigger, a bumper and this.01:06:08.476 --> 01:06:10.043


I look at an xbox control and it's.01:06:10.043 --> 01:06:13.675


It's like I just want to sit down and blow off some steam like and just play a quick game.01:06:13.675 --> 01:06:17.182


I can pick up like Pac-Man and just done with the joystick.01:06:17.309 --> 01:06:18.596


I freaking love Duck Hunt man.01:06:18.809 --> 01:06:23.072


That was the game for me, oh that was the best with the little gun that was the best See back.01:06:23.072 --> 01:06:25.721


Then it was much simpler.01:06:25.721 --> 01:06:27.556


But even the technology behind it.01:06:27.617 --> 01:06:28.231


Right, like it.01:06:28.231 --> 01:06:44.032


Just, I'm mesmerized by some of that, like, mesmerized by some of that like it.01:06:44.032 --> 01:06:44.393


Have you?01:06:44.393 --> 01:06:47.378


Have you ever read into how it works?01:06:47.378 --> 01:06:51.346


No, so, when you, uh, when you pull the trigger, like the human eye cannot see it, but it changes the, the screen completely.01:06:51.346 --> 01:06:53.731


The contrast, um, uh, so um uh, like it's in in a flash, uh, the human eye cannot see it.01:06:54.333 --> 01:06:57.521


uh, but the laser oh, that's from the tube TV.01:06:57.521 --> 01:07:01.409


Not by pixel, right, it's by the reflection or whatever.01:07:01.632 --> 01:07:15.197


Yeah, yeah, yeah this is like CRT, kind of like don't hold a magnet too close to your TV, otherwise it will explode, kind of this was the first thing I know when I was a boy, so I don't even think you were alive then.01:07:16.373 --> 01:07:17.054


Duck.01:07:17.155 --> 01:07:17.235


Hunt.01:07:17.255 --> 01:07:18.378


No, I've been playing duck hunt.01:07:18.398 --> 01:07:21.949


That was a fun game yeah, yeah, I played it at my cousin.01:07:21.949 --> 01:07:28.692


He probably, like, was like a couple generations further with his, with his uh consoles, but I, I just loved the old stuff wow, that's.01:07:28.771 --> 01:07:29.072


I didn't.01:07:29.072 --> 01:07:30.114


I have to read how that worked.01:07:30.114 --> 01:07:30.835


That's interesting yeah.01:07:30.835 --> 01:07:37.525


Are you heading to Directions North America in April?01:07:37.525 --> 01:07:37.885


Jesus?01:07:39.851 --> 01:07:40.233


Next month.01:07:40.233 --> 01:07:42.920


Basically Low sugar, chris, low sugar, low sugar.01:07:44.891 --> 01:07:46.836


Do you have a booth there or are you just…?01:07:47.739 --> 01:07:48.440


Yes, we do.01:07:48.440 --> 01:07:55.023


Actually, it's my first time wearing two hats as a board member of Directions and a sponsor.01:07:55.023 --> 01:07:56.996


I've always gone as a sponsor.01:07:56.996 --> 01:08:00.619


I've not missed a conference since 2011.01:08:00.619 --> 01:08:04.838


And I joined the board last year.01:08:04.838 --> 01:08:18.061


So it will be interesting to see how how it is to be there in two roles, but I prep my team that I might not always be in the booth.01:08:19.113 --> 01:08:21.090


Well, I know understandably if you're on the board.01:08:21.791 --> 01:08:22.631


Yeah, no, it's.01:08:22.631 --> 01:08:24.095


Um, it will be nice.01:08:24.095 --> 01:08:27.791


No, it's, and it's promising, uh, to be a really cool conference.01:08:27.791 --> 01:08:30.315


Um, the venue is is really amazing.01:08:30.315 --> 01:08:37.029


Um, I'm not the biggest Vegasgas fan, but but, um, it's, it's a pretty cool setup it makes sense.01:08:38.212 --> 01:08:38.712


It makes sense.01:08:38.733 --> 01:09:03.203


I mean yeah like what I love about directions north america, and I've been to others but, like of conferences in general, I like that kind of resort vibe, right, where you, um, at the end of the day, still get, get to hang with your friends in the channel and your competitors and like your enemies and like everything in the middle.01:09:04.730 --> 01:09:17.710


But that's what I like, right, you just stroll back to your room or you go to the bar, you go to the restaurant and especially in recent years, it was pretty much a buyout of the venue.01:09:17.710 --> 01:09:26.949


Everybody there is is is there for business central, um, as of our, as an isv, it's partners only.01:09:26.949 --> 01:09:28.252


So it's a little more casual.01:09:28.252 --> 01:09:42.798


Nobody's hunting for like that one deal that's going to make or break their year and, yeah, the size we're getting to is making less and less venues available.01:09:42.798 --> 01:10:00.462


Unfortunately, even in the States where everything's bigger, to find a place where you can book up to 1,500 rooms for like a week exclusively, it's tough.01:10:00.462 --> 01:10:25.234


Like you got the mega resorts and then there's like 20 other conferences going on, or you have the little ones where you have to make sacrifices in the experience with like different places where breakfast is versus where the expo is, and Vegas is one of those places where we don't have to make too many sacrifices as an organization, on behalf of the sponsors and the visitors of the conference.01:10:25.676 --> 01:10:28.329


It is a challenge with the number of people, at least in Vegas.01:10:28.329 --> 01:10:29.957


I'm not a Vegas person myself.01:10:29.957 --> 01:10:31.063


I've been there plenty of times.01:10:31.182 --> 01:10:31.283


And.01:10:31.564 --> 01:10:32.550


Vegas, to me, is one of those.01:10:32.550 --> 01:10:37.860


You show up on Friday afternoon, you leave Sunday morning and you've had your fill, that's with just las vegas.01:10:37.860 --> 01:10:40.192


I'm not talking of some of the other surrounding attractions.01:10:40.192 --> 01:10:47.845


There's many things to do hoover dam, grand canyon, a lot of other things you can do outside of vegas but at least with vegas you hit the point.01:10:47.845 --> 01:10:54.801


With some of these conferences, I think the proximity of where people are staying to the venue is important if you can't stay in the hotel.01:10:55.483 --> 01:10:59.037


To have like a two-second walk is advantageous.01:10:59.037 --> 01:11:02.948


We we did summit in san antonio.01:11:02.948 --> 01:11:13.951


At least they were fortunate that they had the convention center and then they had a a few hotels, so if not everybody could stay in the same hotel, but at least a few were across the street from each other, a little bit up the road, so it made it nice.01:11:13.970 --> 01:11:24.976


So fortunately vegas doesn't have a shortage of hotels yeah, no, exactly, and and um, uh, I mean I remember the last directions in vegas, which is great too.01:11:24.976 --> 01:11:29.154


It was off strip right and it and it again kind of red rock.01:11:29.154 --> 01:11:31.297


They gave that intimacy.01:11:31.297 --> 01:11:35.364


Yeah, the red rock, yeah, the intimacy of, was it like?01:11:37.890 --> 01:11:38.391


that intimacy at red rock.01:11:38.391 --> 01:11:39.978


Yeah, the intimacy of was it like 50 bowling lanes or something in there?01:11:39.978 --> 01:11:40.520


That's right, that's right.01:11:40.520 --> 01:11:48.886


There was like a 4d theater at red rock, but then you were so off the strip so a lot of people left to to go to the strip, you know and it was kind of a drive.01:11:50.050 --> 01:11:52.055


Yeah, I mean, that's the dilemma, right.01:11:52.055 --> 01:11:58.139


Like you want people to feel like they're not just there for the conference but at the same time, you want to keep them at the conference, because that's the dilemma, right.01:11:58.139 --> 01:12:02.289


Like you want people to feel like they're not just there for the conference but at the same time, you want to keep them at the conference because that's like it's the people that make the magic happen.01:12:02.289 --> 01:12:06.662


So it's finding that balance.01:12:06.662 --> 01:12:10.280


It's the same always with, like what do we do for the partner celebration?01:12:10.280 --> 01:12:20.612


Like there's people that love the amusement parks orlando and there's other people are like really, do I have to sit in the bus for that for an hour or uh so you're going to tell us about the partner celebration?01:12:21.654 --> 01:12:23.479


oh yeah, I know I can't.01:12:23.479 --> 01:12:28.251


I think, um, I would have to look at the website if it's already published there.01:12:28.270 --> 01:12:32.315


That's that's my single source I'm trying to get something out of you, uh, but, uh, but it will be good.01:12:32.315 --> 01:12:41.525


No, it will be a lot of fun, we'll be logistically easy and something for everybody.01:12:41.525 --> 01:12:44.097


I think there.01:12:44.097 --> 01:12:53.500


I mean, if you look at like the population that we aim to serve, like the, the needs and the wishes are like extreme right.01:12:53.500 --> 01:13:02.673


There's people that want to be able to sit down and have a five-course meal and there's people that just want to dance and and have a drink in hand and and don't care about anything else.01:13:02.673 --> 01:13:11.815


Um, uh, and then all the shades of gray in the middle there and then there's me, who wants to be in bed by nine yeah, which is six.01:13:11.895 --> 01:13:21.686


That'll be 6 pm for you yeah, no, no, well, yes yes, 6 pm 1800 will be my bedtime, so we'll see.01:13:22.471 --> 01:13:24.938


Let's see how I do, I'm afraid everyone's just waking up.01:13:24.978 --> 01:13:32.192


At that time, man, come on, it's big, that's that's that's why we honor the conference right a couple days early, so you can come in and acclimate and, uh, you'll be good.01:13:32.192 --> 01:13:32.654


No, I will, I'll come in.01:13:32.654 --> 01:13:33.899


I think I come in and acclimate and you'll be good.01:13:34.301 --> 01:13:34.963


No, I will.01:13:34.963 --> 01:13:35.485


I'll come in.01:13:35.485 --> 01:13:39.774


I think I come in a day or two early and I get in in the morning.01:13:39.774 --> 01:13:41.440


This time I never can.01:13:41.440 --> 01:13:46.997


Sometimes you can get in at midnight the night before then the conference starts at eight, but with the time difference.01:13:47.891 --> 01:13:48.796


That is good to know.01:13:48.796 --> 01:13:51.538


The schedule is slightly different from previous years, right?01:13:51.538 --> 01:13:55.858


So people that have gone to Directions EMEA are maybe more familiar with the flow.01:13:55.858 --> 01:14:00.966


But there's a bit of a change for logistical reasons.01:14:00.966 --> 01:14:07.519


So the keynote is actually on Monday in the morning and not on Sunday in the afternoon.01:14:07.519 --> 01:14:11.470


So there's a slight change in the schedule there.01:14:11.470 --> 01:14:22.181


For those people where they just blindly go and book the same thing every year, just different location, they got to keep an eye on the actual schedule.01:14:22.850 --> 01:14:24.614


And the partner celebration is the last day.01:14:24.614 --> 01:14:34.358


Typically the partner celebration is the day before the last day, which the last day is the half a day, so there isn't a half a day at the beginning and a half a day at the end, it's all full days.01:14:34.869 --> 01:14:35.572


Yeah, yeah.01:14:35.572 --> 01:14:41.135


So we have more space for more content, which is ultimately what people are there for At least it's what they claim.01:14:41.135 --> 01:14:47.945


And so now we and that's again because of the venue we have the space to do more sessions.01:14:47.945 --> 01:14:50.436


Right, because even there we hit bottlenecks.01:14:50.436 --> 01:14:58.869


As a conference to just find meeting rooms where people can do presentations, a conference to just find meeting rooms where people can do presentations.01:14:58.869 --> 01:15:06.149


There's only so many places where you can put I don't know, 10 parallel sessions with at least 30 people in a room.01:15:06.149 --> 01:15:13.560


So that's great about this venue there will be a lot of super cool content.01:15:14.270 --> 01:15:17.439


I think the final decisions are about to be out any moment.01:15:17.439 --> 01:15:24.350


I don't know when you guys publish this, but check the website directions and a dot com for all the session information.01:15:24.350 --> 01:15:26.157


There's a lot more than ever.01:15:26.157 --> 01:15:31.100


And, yeah, we have three full days now.01:15:31.100 --> 01:15:34.158


We do a little bit of a welcome reception on Sunday night.01:15:34.158 --> 01:15:35.322


People can get their badge.01:15:35.322 --> 01:15:37.475


They can slowly kind of hang there.01:15:37.475 --> 01:15:39.922


They can already socialize a little bit of a welcome reception on Sunday night.01:15:39.922 --> 01:15:40.503


People can get their badge.01:15:40.503 --> 01:15:42.009


They can slowly kind of hang there, they can already socialize a little bit.01:15:42.029 --> 01:15:43.592


And then we start sharp Monday morning.01:15:43.592 --> 01:15:52.913


Three full days of conference and then, yeah, the party at the end and then, depending on when people want to fly back again.01:15:52.913 --> 01:16:12.658


This is this is also a little bit East Coast, west Coast dependent Vegas being pretty well connected, I think people have options, but of course we hope that everybody kind of stays through the Wednesday night and leaves on Thursday whenever the flight schedules allow or even connect a couple days.01:16:12.658 --> 01:16:15.439


I think I'm actually going to stay a couple days longer.01:16:15.439 --> 01:16:17.417


Yeah, I was considering the same.01:16:17.417 --> 01:16:21.099


I want to check out the Grand Canyon again.01:16:22.012 --> 01:16:28.600


It's been 20 years I've never been, and that's what I'm still trying to narrow down the logistics.01:16:28.600 --> 01:16:29.563


I go to all these places.01:16:29.563 --> 01:16:31.438


I tell everybody I've been everywhere but I've been nowhere.01:16:31.909 --> 01:16:40.520


Yeah, it's bad, I go to so many places I fly in, do what I need to do and leave, whereas this is one case where I want to leave Vegas.01:16:40.520 --> 01:16:41.842


I don't want to stay in Vegas.01:16:41.842 --> 01:16:48.096


I may stay a night to do a show because you know I'm expecting with the conference in the evenings.01:16:48.096 --> 01:17:11.453


I like to talk with everybody, see everybody, but I'm hoping that Thursday I'll get the opportunity to do a show and then maybe leave early friday morning to head south and go see the grand canyon, hoover dam and those types of things I'm thinking doing the very snobby new yorker thing and just take a helicopter um to the grand canyon yeah still talk to me that's.01:17:11.474 --> 01:17:23.789


That's possible too, because it's well worth it to see it it's it's a mind-boggling I've done it from from grand canyon with a helicopter and it's the most incredible experience.01:17:23.789 --> 01:17:35.622


So if you're gonna go in a helicopter anyway, you may as well just take it straight from vegas, um uh, to say you're yourself logistical on a helicopter to go take you directly to.01:17:35.622 --> 01:17:41.414


I have to look into a recent pricing because the last time I checked it out is about 10, 15 years ago.01:17:41.414 --> 01:17:53.212


My wallet might not allow me to be so snobby, but hey, maybe if we share a helicopter ride we book it as a group.01:17:53.876 --> 01:17:54.792


Maybe We'll see.01:17:54.792 --> 01:18:04.770


I'll try to narrow down my logistics this weekend so I'll definitely catch up with you what's today monday this week, I'll know.01:18:04.770 --> 01:18:13.822


In the next couple days, I'll know what I'm doing, because I still have to book my transportation back and I was holding off determining if I was going to spend a couple extra days there.01:18:13.822 --> 01:18:23.341


But if there's a helicopter from vegas and we can get Vegas and we can get a few of us to go, then the economics may be a little bit better for you snobby New Yorkers.01:18:23.689 --> 01:18:29.015


The sphere seems to be amazing From here people who went there.01:18:29.015 --> 01:18:32.369


It's like crazy, like if you catch a good show there, it's incredible.01:18:32.369 --> 01:18:43.757


And what I've done when it was at the Red Rock there is a I don't know if it's a reserve or like Red Rock Canyon or something I went on an early morning hike there.01:18:43.757 --> 01:19:05.182


It was fantastic and I could just take an Uber from the hotel and it was a little bit like climbing on rocks, so you should be ready for a bit of a workout, but you have an amazing view from the mountains onto Las Vegas.01:19:07.073 --> 01:19:11.555


It is a really cool kind of like cheap, right, especially if you have a rental car.01:19:11.555 --> 01:19:30.798


But even Uber wasn't that crazy expensive and while you're there, it free, um, uh, and it was cool, like, and it's uh, it's uh, um, there's signage on on the hike, um, so, um, I recommend that one for people that like to be outdoors and are early risers.01:19:30.798 --> 01:19:37.936


Uh, just beware of the rattlesnakes because they warm up on the rocks that stay warm.01:19:37.936 --> 01:19:44.689


So I saw one there when we went well, yeah, I mean April.01:19:44.912 --> 01:19:54.257


You're still nice and cool, but you're right, as you progress, throughout the day, it gets warmer and they come out, and that's when you see them and the rocks hold the heat longer too.01:19:56.036 --> 01:20:01.217


A lot to do Well, Mr Chris, thank you for taking the time to speak with us again.01:20:01.217 --> 01:20:02.496


It was a pleasure having you back on.01:20:02.496 --> 01:20:11.779


I look forward to talking with you more after this to see about the Vegas trips and also I look forward to seeing you in Vegas for that beer that you always provide.01:20:13.871 --> 01:20:15.237


Lots of office, not just beer.01:20:17.511 --> 01:20:19.155


He can get you a cocktail.01:20:19.155 --> 01:20:22.765


Yeah, I'm on a lot of mocktails these days, so it might be a little bit easier.01:20:22.824 --> 01:20:26.800


Top shelf right they make, they make top shelf.01:20:26.899 --> 01:20:33.256


Is that guy in denver ever bother you after that one night anymore, or, uh, or was it was a gal right, was she?01:20:33.256 --> 01:20:34.618


Was she unhappy about you?01:20:35.541 --> 01:20:48.952


which one saying you had to buy me a beer, but uh no, like the the bartender in uh in denver oh, that's right that's right, she got angry that's right.01:20:49.091 --> 01:20:50.094


I forgot about that.01:20:50.314 --> 01:20:59.140


I forgot escalated out of nowhere nowhere she, just she gave you a hard time she didn't want to look at you dude like I don't even know what was said.01:20:59.140 --> 01:21:10.136


It was like because we were all sitting there and there was just normal conversation and she all of a sudden, I think she ended up, I think actually caught up with her afterwards.01:21:10.136 --> 01:21:12.425


I think she was just having a bad day time.01:21:12.484 --> 01:21:15.194


Yeah, I think she apologized, didn't she apologize?01:21:15.234 --> 01:21:15.817


yeah she did.01:21:15.817 --> 01:21:23.435


Now that it's coming back to me they were short-staffed and that the it wasn't coming in, the conference wasn't supposed to have so many people.01:21:23.435 --> 01:21:27.452


Yeah, so that's right, me just asking her a couple additional questions.01:21:27.452 --> 01:21:29.076


I think she finally just said screw it.01:21:29.076 --> 01:21:34.533


And just got pissed off, I thought because she's like I thought she was like this guy's from Boston.01:21:34.673 --> 01:21:38.238


I could tell these guys are rude.01:21:38.279 --> 01:21:39.260


No, she did.01:21:39.300 --> 01:21:41.882


I remember when we came back, she was actually very nice.01:21:42.304 --> 01:21:44.025


Yeah, I think she just caught a bad day.01:21:44.025 --> 01:21:49.225


So, yes, I think that was all smoothed over, but that went from for no reason.01:21:49.750 --> 01:21:52.355


It was zero to 100, man Like what's going on.01:21:56.109 --> 01:22:02.395


And again I just had, I think, one drink, or I wasn't even drinking because I know I had a lot of you know, mostly mocktails when we were in denver, so it was crazy, but uh, thank you for taking the time to speak with us again.01:22:02.395 --> 01:22:11.471


How can someone get in contact with you to learn more great things about commerce, build and the solutions and the problems that can help an organization solve?01:22:12.715 --> 01:22:14.439


yeah, easiest is an email.01:22:14.439 --> 01:22:22.819


Uh, chriscommercebuildercom, linkedin is always easy to connect as well, or in Vegas at Directions, of course.01:22:23.270 --> 01:22:23.554


Excellent.01:22:23.554 --> 01:22:25.029


I definitely see that I look forward to seeing you there.01:22:25.270 --> 01:22:26.395


Looking forward to talking with you soon.01:22:26.395 --> 01:22:28.976


Thanks, guys, and thanks for all the stuff you guys do.01:22:29.492 --> 01:22:36.614


Thank you, chris, for your time for another episode of In the Dynamics Corner Chair, and thank you to our guests for participating.01:22:36.875 --> 01:22:38.417


Thank you, brad, for your time.01:22:38.417 --> 01:22:41.921


It is a wonderful episode of Dynamics Corner Chair.01:22:41.921 --> 01:22:45.386


I would also like to thank our guests for joining us.01:22:45.386 --> 01:22:51.121


Thank you for all of our listeners tuning in as well.01:22:51.121 --> 01:23:02.993


You can find Brad at developerlifecom, that is D-V-L-P-R-L-I-F-Ecom, and you can interact with them via Twitter D-V-L-P-R-L-I-F-E.01:23:02.993 --> 01:23:16.337


You can also find me at matalinoio, m-a-t-a-l-i-n-oi-o, and my Twitter handle is matalino16.01:23:16.337 --> 01:23:19.971


And see, you can see those links down below in their show notes.01:23:19.971 --> 01:23:21.336


Again, thank you everyone.01:23:21.336 --> 01:23:22.900


Thank you and take care.

Chris de Visser Profile Photo

Chris de Visser

COO at commercebuild