The MICRO Wave

Entrepreneur, April, 1999 by Ilan Greenberg

As a baseline technology-buying strategy, Ray recommends business owners ignore sales pitches and visiting reps, and instead take the time to write down a list of desired attributes. They should then pay a visit to a retail store--or send employees for whom the technology is intended off to a store to access the technology for themselves. While this hands-on approach isn't advisable for products that demand a more rigorous technical assessment or for products that should be selected solely according to price, for products like personal organizers or even digital telephones, preference for one product over another can be highly subjective.

"I just bought a Sharp Wizard. Instead of ordering it [over the Web or by telephone], I took the trouble to go to the store and see what fit best for me," says Ray. "It took some time, but I ended up with a different brand than I thought I would." For Ray, the question wasn't the size of the screen, as he first anticipated, but the input device--the Wizard has a keypad, while the Palm-Pilot, the other model he considered, uses an electronic pen.

RESISTING THE HYPE

Of course, trudging off to your local office supply store has a downside, as anyone who's walked into an Office Depot looking for a roll of fax paper and walked out with a new fax machine can attest. As office technology becomes sleeker and better designed, acquiring miniaturized technology can become almost a fetish. Buying technology just because it's smaller than previously available should never become an end in itself. Entrepreneurs need to cast a cold eye on technology, especially because miniaturization often carries a premium cost. Printers are a good example.

Companies such as Hewlett-Packard, Xerox and Brother make excellent printers in both the large and small categories. In terms of functionality, there may be little difference between a 20-pound laser printer and one that's a tenth that weight. But the lighter printer could be almost 10 times the larger one's price. Sure, some businesses with little room to spare will consider the extra cost worth it. But for most small businesses, the fact that there's little compromise, either positive or negative, between large and small printers in terms of functionality will tip the scales toward the bulky but cheap.

The same logic should especially be applied to technology categories that are improved upon frequently. For example, laptops get smaller and faster each year. Depending on the particular needs of your business, buying a slightly older model, even at the expense of both size and functionality, can make sense because the latest model laptop will likely become obsolete in little more than a year anyway. Or take the ubiquitous PalmPilot. The next generation of this personal digital assistant, which is expected to ship later this spring, will be thinner and lighter than the current model. But for most people, the current size is plenty small enough. It already fits snugly inside a breast pocket.

POWER POINTS