Waving to Myself – Am I Really That Sad

: Image by avlxyz via Flickr

Google Wave Matures, or does it?

Has Google Wave come of age as a business tool? Does it have a role in Customer Service and CRM applications. Will it be a natural component in any company IT architecture? We’ve been trying it out again to find out the answers to these questions.

Google has just announced the general availability of Wave accounts. You can get one here and it’s also announced Wave can now be installed as part of the Google Apps suite.

So now everybody can enjoy the new technology – even Apps accounts who are typically at the back of the queue when it comes to Google innovations. But will it be any good in Customer Service and CRM type jobs

Since last September Google Wave has been in a controlled roll out with Google using the same invitations method which was so successful with Gmail. We received our first invitation in October and dived in full of anticipation.

The lengthy build up, over more than 6 months before release, created a lot of excitement about Wave. It promised to be a combination of Email, Instant Messenger, Docs and Content Sharing for workgroups and even publishing. Fashionistas clamoured for invitations. Wave was going to change the way we work, totally.

Our First Attempts

We set up a number of accounts, for different businesses, and invited colleagues to join in some real time collaboration. Despite being Microsoft Office brainwashed they joined in, but not for long. Wave was a disaster when it came to busy people finding ways to lighten their load. They couldn’t figure out how to use the editor, the gadgets didn’t work, and worse – we had to email participants telling them to check their waves for updates. They didn’t want to use it, under any circumstances. I guess that isn’t going to change anytime soon.

A couple of months ago Google introduced email notifications solving one of these problems, but by this time all the people we new with Wave accounts had given up on it. We (I) could only Wave to Myself.

Customer Service and CRM

We’d had all sorts of ideas on how we could use Wave as a business app – some CRM aspects, on-line, real time Customer Service and publishing to name a few in our Front Office Box business. In fact we still do, so today we had another go – with an on-line training tutorial. The big advantages being

Public Access
Multi Media – combinations of text, images and video
Interactive use for conversations

How did we get on?

As usual with Google software the answer was a OK-ish.

The text editor is still clunky. We used an html gadget to add a YouTube video which works well – once we’d found the gadget and figured out a clumsy UI. We opened it to the public with the easypublic@appspot.com address. But we couldn’t figure out how to tell people where to find it.

We’ve just solved that problem.

Search on Wave “with:public title:Front Office Box Getting Started” and you’ll find the pilot Wave.

I’m sure we will be able to use it for Customer Service and CRM type conversations. But will we ever get anybody to look at it? That’s an entirely different question.

I’ll probably just have to keep Waving with myself.

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