(This post originally appeared on Forbes)
Here are five things in technology that happened this past week and how they affect your business. Did you miss them?
1 – Twitter loses 9 million users
The monthly users on Twitter declined by 9 million last quarter to 326 million from 335 million as the company cracks down on bots and fake accounts. It’s the second quarter of declines in a row. It’s not a surprise. The company also said that it’s prepared to lose an additional “mid-single-digit millions” more in the next few months as it continues its crackdown. (Source: Engadget)
Why this is important for your business:
Although most of my family-owned clients that are in the distribution, manufacturing and construction worlds aren’t big users of the social media service, Twitter is appealing to a certain type of small business: media, advertising, service, some retail as well as personal branding freelancers and experts in particular. Unfortunately, over the past few years, the credibility of the social media giant has been hurt with millions of fake accounts artificially blowing up followers and engagements. If you’re a small business using Twitter, take heart that although this type of purge may take away some of your followers that inadvertently latched themselves onto you, it will also make the service more reliable going forward.
2 — Samsung says it’s working on foldable laptop displays.
Next month, Samsung is expected to introduce a foldable smartphone concept and says it is also working on bigger devices with foldable displays. Industry experts believe foldable displays in laptops could totally change the market for 2-in-1 devices. While existing convertible laptops try to flip and twist into tablet and media modes, a foldable display would help create new designs. Laptops such as HP’s new Spectre Folio and Microsoft’s ‘pocketable’ Surface are seen as ideal candidates for a flexible and foldable display. (Source: The Verge)
Why this is important for your business:
Hear me, fellow business travelers: within a few years your smartphone and tablets will fold into smaller squares that you can tuck away for easier transport. This will enable you to enjoy larger displays and keyboards once you unfold these devices in your hotel room or wherever you’re travelling. It all makes for better convenience and the ability to bring along more powerful technology on the road.
3 — Predictive sales tool People.ai gets $30 million from Andreessen Horowitz
This week, San Francisco-based People.ai—a cloud software company—announced a $30-million Series B round of funding from venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz. People.ai will use the funds to further its mission: to free up employees’ time by building data ‘pipelines’ using machine learning that automates the drudgery of updating contacts in systems such as Salesforce.com. Its cloud-based service automatically extracts information about people and activities from any part of a company’s system—whether it’s email, calendar, phone logs, Slack, DocuSign, or WebEx—and then draws connections between what is found. (Source: Techcrunch)
Why this is important for your business:
Yet another example of how artificial intelligence is invading the Customer Relationship Management space and speeding up data entry and response to customers. The idea is to do away with repetitive data entry tasks and allow users to view, analyze and decide on data which in turn makes much better use of their time. If you’re a business owner looking to get more value from your CRM system then make it a point to embrace the new AI technologies –like People.ai – that are quickly coming to market.
4 — WordPress team working on ‘wiping older versions from existence on the internet’.
Currently installed on 32% of all internet sites, WordPress needs to be very concerned about security. That’s why it’s now working on a way to allow its users to update their program if they have an older, less-secure version and regularly fail to apply updates to the CMS core, plugins, or themes. The WordPress security team used to backport recent security patches for older versions but is now trying to roll those versions forward automatically and then wipe them from the internet completely so as to bring users of the old versions up to date. (Source: ZDNet)
Why this is important for your business:
It’s likely that your website has been built with WordPress and if you haven’t made any changes to its underlying structure in the past few years it would be a good idea to check with your web developer, talk to WordPress, and embark on an upgrade.
5 — PNC to debut entirely digital small-business loans.
In early 2019, PNC Financial Service Group will begin offering small-business customers an entirely digital borrowing experience. The Pittsburgh-based company says that this means business owners who apply for a line of credit online could receive a decision on their application within five minutes. Then, after applicants are approved for a loan, they’ll be able to collect their funds within one to three business days. (Source: American Banker)
Why this is important for your business:
Faster decisions means faster loans for your business. It’s good to see larger financial institutions begin to embrace the kind of technology that smaller, more nimble fintech companies and online lenders have been using over the past few years.
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