Some constructive criticism. The video does a really poor job selling this. Here are a few things I've learned from building software over the years.
No matter what the end user says, they do not care about fine-grained permissions. Not that they don't care about your system having them, they just have no interest setting them up or ever changing them. The way us software engineers think about things and the way management thinks about things are just too different. "I just want Mary to be able to see the f*$%ing orders!" It's really too much to go, "Ok, well Mary is part of the Server's group, so you go into Servers Group Permissions, then look at this list of vaguely worded categories and find the one you want, then click into that and get half a million switches, then find the action verb that we've assigned to viewing orders then click it on. Oh yea, this also gave Carlos and Mike the ability to see orders because they are in the Server's Group. Oh you didn't want that? Ok, well make a new group called Super Servers and then put Mary in that gr....."
At this point management has slipped quietly into a coma.
Split this video into a, "Here is what your servers will see, look how easy it will be to get those minimum-wage monkeys to use this" and a "Here is what you will see, look at how much more money this will put in your pocket as you are able to manage more effectively, you king of food you!"
And then make a third video about the nitty-gritty technical details of Role-Permission systems and launch that into the sun, no one wants to see that ;)
I think it could be a really compelling product but right now the video doesn't seem to be addressing any audience (other than maybe other developers writing POS software).
Personal Note: For some reason the line, "Refulgent is very proud that Ambur saves all the information pertaining to all closed orders, just as if they were open." irks me to the very core of my being. Whoa, you did the most logical thing to do by keeping historical records, this is nothing to be proud of. Be proud of the truly innovative parts of this product, not the silly things that are obvious for your software to do.
I wish you the best of luck, just throwing in my $0.02 and trying to share some wisdom I've learned the hard way.
>Split this video into a, "Here is what your servers will see, look how easy it will be to get those minimum-wage monkeys to use this" and a "Here is what you will see, look at how much more money this will put in your pocket as you are able to manage more effectively, you king of food you!"
Yes.
I'd really want to see it in action at a table to see that the drill-down method of entering orders is going to work fast enough - there's a reason that current systems have the "million buttons" interface and I don't think it is solely that POS designers can't make good interfaces.
As an improvement I'd add in something like a margin/upsell reminder system. The server would have someone to know high-margin items from the menu list and have key upsells highlight when a dish is chosen ... "do you want fries with that!".
You're right, we probably need to reshoot the video (it was made under rushed conditions with a version that didn't end up being our final apps, thanks to the vagaries of the App Review process), and I also want to shoot ones that delve into specifics.
I'm scared to shoot one showing "action", considering how hard it was just to get the first one done, but we'll have to see what we can do efficiently that looks nice. It's key, I think, because really by far the magical part of the product is how easily devices running Ambur can link together and share data easily.
Thanks a lot for your feedback, it's truly appreciated and taken under careful consideration.
No matter what the end user says, they do not care about fine-grained permissions. Not that they don't care about your system having them, they just have no interest setting them up or ever changing them. The way us software engineers think about things and the way management thinks about things are just too different. "I just want Mary to be able to see the f*$%ing orders!" It's really too much to go, "Ok, well Mary is part of the Server's group, so you go into Servers Group Permissions, then look at this list of vaguely worded categories and find the one you want, then click into that and get half a million switches, then find the action verb that we've assigned to viewing orders then click it on. Oh yea, this also gave Carlos and Mike the ability to see orders because they are in the Server's Group. Oh you didn't want that? Ok, well make a new group called Super Servers and then put Mary in that gr....."
At this point management has slipped quietly into a coma.
Split this video into a, "Here is what your servers will see, look how easy it will be to get those minimum-wage monkeys to use this" and a "Here is what you will see, look at how much more money this will put in your pocket as you are able to manage more effectively, you king of food you!"
And then make a third video about the nitty-gritty technical details of Role-Permission systems and launch that into the sun, no one wants to see that ;)
I think it could be a really compelling product but right now the video doesn't seem to be addressing any audience (other than maybe other developers writing POS software).
Personal Note: For some reason the line, "Refulgent is very proud that Ambur saves all the information pertaining to all closed orders, just as if they were open." irks me to the very core of my being. Whoa, you did the most logical thing to do by keeping historical records, this is nothing to be proud of. Be proud of the truly innovative parts of this product, not the silly things that are obvious for your software to do.
I wish you the best of luck, just throwing in my $0.02 and trying to share some wisdom I've learned the hard way.