Enhanced Revenue and Growth

• Extensibility
• Enhanced Revenue and Growth
• Widespread User Base
• Familiarity

Situation

BrainStorm, Inc.® was founded in 1995 to provide both hands-on and software-based end-user training. Their client base ranges from individual users to massive enterprises with seat sizes numbering in the hundreds of thousands.

“We are a company that focuses on user productivity,” explains John Wade, Principal, BrainStorm, Inc. “We help train and support users to be productive in the work force, primarily with software applications. We’ve been in business for 15 years and have always focused on helping the information worker use their software as effectively as possible.”

With teams of trainers in constant contact with end users, BrainStorm is able to track precisely what help end users need the most, putting them in the perfect position to provide those solutions. Wade explains: “We have dozens of trainers who are in classrooms in front of hundreds of thousands of users all the time. These trainers know what the most frequently asked questions are.”

However, BrainStorm discovered through its in-person training that once users got back to their desks, they still spent a lot of time searching for new tools to maximize usage of their software tools and boost their own productivity.

Solution

Leveraging Office 2010

Then Office 2010 was launched. BrainStorm spotted an opportunity to build an innovative solution called BrainStorm QuickHelp™ into the ribbon. The toolwould enable end users to view tutorial videos that answer their software queriesand give tips on how to be more work-efficient.

The structure of Microsoft Office makes it extremely easy to deliver that information. “We chose Office 2010 because the platform is so easy to develop for, and it was such a good fit because we could take that solution and make it available to end users right in the product. There was a need, a demand, and it was easy to do because of Microsoft’s development tools,” says Derek Adams, BrainStorm’s VicePresident of Technology. “Office is also the productivity suite—it’s the solution. It creates opportunities to make users more productive than any other piece of software.”

Adams adds that putting the solution in the ribbon was a logical fit. “Endusers are kind of like water,” says Adams. “They’ll take the path of least resistance to find help. So we said ‘Let’s make it as accessible as possible,’ and that meant putting it right in the product. Right in the ribbon andright at the point of need. The ribbon not only brings the power of Office to light, to where the features aren’t buried within the menu system, but it also brings the value that BrainStorm and QuickHelp offers to light as well.”

This is how QuickHelp works: Say a user is working on a presentation in Microsoft PowerPoint, and is looking for tips oninserting a chart. The user can access the QuickHelp tab while they are still within PowerPoint, search for the desired topicand watch a succinct, clear tutorial video. They can follow along and learn without ever having to stop working.

Adams explains: “That means I don’t interrupt my neighbor, I don’t call the help desk, I don’t go out to my Internet search tools, and get lost in video sharing sites or end up updating my social networks. I’m right there in the product, and I can get the answer.”

One Solution Across PC and Cloud

QuickHelp is accessible to the enduser in three different ways.“QuickHelp is not only accessible in the Ribbon, but also through SharePoint and the web,” says Adams. “It offers ubiquitous access to that content,and users have the exact same experience whether they are working on their PCs, through the corporate portal or in the Web browser.”

In fact, offering QuickHelp on the Web not only allows users to access the videos from any computer, it provides an additional way to access content for applications that don’t have a Ribbon such as Windows 7.

“For instance, if I go into Microsoft Word 2010, what I see for QuickHelp is by default filtered, so I see just content for Microsoft Word 2010,” says Adams. “But I can change that filter to see QuickHelp content for any software title. Additionally, for our enterprise clients, we put an icon right on the desktop that links them to a Web player where they can access the full repository.”

From a business perspective, offering the QuickHelp solution through a web player is also attractive to organizations which may already have invested in SharePoint or Learning Management Systems (LMS). “The web player is simplyan html object which can easily be plugged in to any web page or portal they already have,” says Adams. “It’s very flexible.”

BrainStorm’soverall approach to the solution rests on three main principles: Accessibility, consumability, and applicability. Adams says: “We need this to be very accessible to people so it’s very easy to get to. We need it to be very applicable, so when I’ve got a problem I receive a relevant answer to that problem. And lastly it needs to be consumable, so I can digest it very quickly, get the answer I need, and get back to being productive.”

The solution involved a team of developers who usedVisual Studio 2010to hook right into the Ribbon. The video streaming, search results and course listings were all rendered in Microsoft Silverlight.

Benefits

Everyone Is a Potential Customer

One factor that makes QuickHelp so profitable is the ubiquity of Microsoft Office products. Adams says, “Every single person who would buy Microsoft Office is a potential customer of ours. When you look at our customer list you’ll see that there’s no typical profile—from small to large, and all different verticals.”

Hence, the biggest opportunity for BrainStorm is really getting the chance to help Office end users,from consumers to small businesses to huge enterprises, become more productive. “The way Office is set up as a system,the way it integrates with SharePoint, Communicator, Outlook, the user has more to gain by effectively using Office than anything else in their workday. It’s the solution that by far has the biggest impact.”

A Revenue Enhancer

Just three years ago, in 2007, Microsoft Office products accounted for just 10-15 percent of BrainStorm’s revenue. Today, that number is closer to 70 percent. “Our revenue increases have been significant thanks to Microsoft Office,” says Adams. “It’s been a very considerable change, just in the last three to four years. It’s completely changed and re-oriented our business, and created lots of opportunities.”

Office2010 was launched publicly on June 15, 2010, and in just five months has doubled the pace of BrainStorm’s next most successful launch, “which was a pretty good one, by the way,” Wade adds. “The QuickHelp product itself has only been out for about three months, and it’s on pace to grow our business by about a third—just that one single product line. After one quarter of business, it represents a very significant piece of our revenue. We’re running as fast as we can to keep up.”

BrainStorm projects that their business will double in 2011, “and it’ll definitely be driven by Office 2010,” Adams says. “Our QuickHelp product line is going to be asignificant part of that—and that’s going to be all new growth, meaning we don’t have that revenue today.”

New Markets Through Office and Office 365

Microsoft products like Silverlight 4, Office 2010, SharePoint 2010 and Office 365 aren’t just important to the growth of BrainStorm and QuickHelp—they are vital. Wade says, “It’s not a matter of whether the Office 2010 platform made developing our product easier or more efficient—it made it possible. The development of SharePoint, social networking and collaborative Office tools have changed the work paradigm, and we are helping end users make that paradigm shift.”

The extensibility of Microsoft Office, the utility of Silverlight, and the expanding potential of SharePoint—these features are the backbone of BrainStorm’s success.

Adams adds: “All we’re really trying to do is surface all the productivity tools Microsoft has to offer, to raise awareness of what’s in there, and get people to use tools they have at their disposal but maybe didn’t know were there. We’re really about getting people to use their Microsoft products and getting the most out of them.”

Microsoft Office 2010

Microsoft Office 2010 gives your people powerful, timesaving tools to do their best work from more places. With new capabilities and insightful updates to Excel, PowerPoint, Word, and Outlook, Office 2010 offers the complete package with familiar, intuitive tools. Now you can express ideas, solve problems, connect with people, and create amazing results — in the office, at home, or on the go. For more information about Microsoft Office, go to: