There was a time, not so long ago, that people would have refrained from using Hotmail or Gmail as their email domain for business. Now, according to Gartner, the research company, that's all set to change as the software as a service (SaaS) model for email is leading the way to the large-scale adoption of cloud computing.
According to Gartner analysts, SaaS email is already proving attractive for many companies and will represent 20 per cent of the commercial email market by the end of 2012.
In 2007, the SaaS email market represented only 1 per cent of the commercial email market.
This is probably not the best news for Microsoft whose Outlook email software is the runaway market leader for desktop and enterprise applications; the market for third-party product vendors is predicted to shrink by one-fifth. But while disruptive technologies do force change and impact established business models, they often also create new opportunity.
'The lost opportunity to the traditional third-party market may be more than 20 per cent because the earliest adopters of the email SaaS model are small or midsize businesses,' said Matt Cain, research vice president at Gartner.
'However, SMBs are less likely to buy third-party tools compared to larger organisations.'
According to Gartner, there are four general categories within the third-party community for email services that will be affected to a greater or lesser extent by the move to the SaaS model for email.
>> Applications core to running premises-based email
Examples include disaster recovery, reporting, backup, spam and virus filtering.
>> Applications that extend the core services of the email platform
Examples include mobility, fax, archive and encryption.
>> Client-side applications
Examples include PST management and email efficiency add-ins.
>> Applications needed for SaaS implementations
Examples include premises and SaaS management tools and premises-to-SaaS migration tools.
We'll likely see an increase in acquisitions among SaaS vendors, to fill in missing platform gaps much the same as the Google-Postini and Microsoft-Frontbridge deals have done in the past. Matt Cain said: 'In many ways, email is the "litmus test" for the SaaS model, disrupting a pre-existing set on on-premises-related businesses.
'We can expect similar third-party dynamics to occur in adjacent collaboration spaces, such as instant messaging and virtual workspaces.'
We're already seeing innovation in this space. Earlier this year, Zemanta, a service that makes blogging easier, launched a browser plug in to make webmail a whole lot more social. It works with both Firefox and Internet Explorer applies to Gmail and Yahoo! webmail.
Once installed, the webmail user clicks a button and the Zemanta goes through the email text and identifies related links and other internet content worth adding. It's quick and just about effortless. I tried it out by sending a 500 word article to myself via Gmail. It took seconds to process and Zemanta came up with a raft of suggested links, visuals and follow on content. It then took me less than a minute to tag and send the message.
Users can associate various social networks with Zemanta too so that photographs from Flickr can be added instantly and information from Facebook and Twitter can be included.
Right now, Zemanta is a consumer play, but you can see the value it would add to enterprise webmail. Not only would emails be shorter, (loud cheer!) with links to deeper explanation saving time for both the writer and the readers, email would better enable collaboration and add structure to more data.
Google, too, is working hard to develop add ons to make their webmail service more useful. The company has recently introduced additions that can keep a user from sending an email in error.
One is the Forgotten Attachment Detector which identifies when the sender has forgotten to attach a file. Another, Undo Send, provides a 10-second grace period to cancel a sent email. Both are great ideas from Google to save time and avoid embarrassment.
A third new add on is based on the age-old 'beer goggles' concept. Called Mail Goggles, this feature prevents poorly-conceived late-night emails by requiring the sender to solve a few maths problems before the message sends.
The true value of this add on remains to be seen. I'm not convinced, and frankly, inebriated folks are more likely to use SMS or Twitter to embarrass themselves anyway, don't you think?
>> Sherrilynne Starkie is the managing partner of Strive Public Relations, a strategic communications consultancy serving the Isle of Man. Visit her business blog, www.strivepr.com/notes or follow her on twitter.com/sherrilynne.
