Today I am happy to announce the release of another app on the App Store, GST & VAT Calculator. GST & VAT Calculator is a simple to use application that allows you to add or remove percentage-based goods and services or value-added tax.
While there are plenty of competing apps that have similar functionality on the App Store, I found overwhelmingly that they were packed full of ads, resulting in a poor experience for the user and an unsustainable unmaintained application.
Back in 2013, I was in a car driving back from a function with my brother dreaming about releasing an app to the App Store. On that day we spoke about an app that would be useful for him as a carpenter. An app that would fill a gap in the market. After many years of thinking about it today, I can say the app has been released to the App Store!
While I don’t know how many copies it will sell this was not the end goal for me, rather this is one of a few long term goals that I have now achieved. More to come on those long term goals soon…
Working in media over the past 5 and a half years I have seen many company’s investing in marketing technology. Indeed investment in marketing technology is significant.
Martech is a $122 billion industry that’s growing by 22% year over year; 70% of CMOs are increasing their investments in it.
Carl F. Mela & Brian Cooper, HBR
The investment I have seen has often existed in silos from the rest of the business or based on the tools that were available at the time, not necessarily the businesses objectives or a long term approach. Attracted by the shiny object I have seen marketers fail to define and evaluate the success of the marketing technology, which is characteristic of a bottom-up approach.
Bottom-up approaches often result in tools and data that are misaligned with the business objective or unable to provide relevant insights.
Carl F. Mela & Brian Cooper, HBR
In a recent Harvard Business Review article they explore the importance of aligning marking technology investment to business strategy and moving from a bottom-up to a top-down approach. While there will always be new shiny tools available, it is clear that fewer well-coordinated systems have a greater potential to drive sales up and costs down.
All too often we find ourselves in a familiar conversation that starts with, “so what do you do?” The question is inherently asking about work one of the defining details that most people use to define themselves. This question is not new, though it is now no longer as easy to answer as it once was when our names defined what we did.
...it feels natural to see a person’s profession as a defining detail of who they are. It can be a clue into their values, interests or background (or simply help two strangers pass time at an awkward cocktail party). But many of us have come to actually define ourselves by our occupations – which often comes at our own expense.
Kate Morgan, BBC
Though there is far more to our lives than just work, that I would suggest is a far more important part of our lives. After all, we need to ask how will we measure our life in our final days? Will it be by the profession that we had or family, experiences and friends?
Through COVID we were reminded of the importance of real human connection, the importance of friends and just how fragile we are. I consider myself lucky to have had the time to been forced to reflect on my purpose and the impacts of COVID on my mental health last year, through my studies.
Simon Sinek raises the very real point that, to varying degrees, we all suffered trauma, some of us have dealt with it and others are still dealing with it.
While we might be starting to move forward, don’t forget to check on your friends as they could still be dealing with this trauma.
