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Better Business Technology

Domain uses hi-tech to boost property services

By Leon Gettler, Talking Business >>

DOMAIN’s head of customer solutions, Angus Ferguson, says his team provides the technology for real estate agents to scale up their businesses without the paperwork and numerous trips to the office.

They also show agents how to get return-on-investment (ROI) out of technology by identifying customers who are more likely to invest in the property.

Mr Ferguson, who started out as a real estate agent, developed the technology years ago to address one of the big issues real estate agents faced: every time after an auction, whether the property was sold or passed in, the agent had to call four data houses – Domain, REA, Property Data and Core Logic. 

“If you had 10 auctions on that Saturday, you’re potentially making 20 phone calls to report your auction results,” Mr Ferguson told Talking Business.

“So what we did was we build a tool that allowed us as agents, in the very beginning, to scribe bids on an iPad. So we built technology to allow us to write down the bids, translate that into a number, store it and then send that sales price to all the different data houses.”

From there, he then transitioned out of his real estate business into a start-up tech business with his business partner.

“Agents started coming to us and saying ‘You guys are good at solving problems and building price out of that. Can you look at other parts of our processes?’ ‘’

The product his company built out of that was a digital compliance tool, allowing the agent to go into the living room of a client with the all compliance documentation on their iPad to sign up a listing. The compliance tool allowed the agent to speed up the efficiency of the compliance, taking up less of their time, making them more productive, and create digital contracts.

The business was then sold to Domain.

He now runs a team of about 100 people offering a range of products for the real estate industry such as Price Finder, which is a data product, and LeadScope to help agents identify their next listing faster.

The technology has allowed Domain to transition from a listings business to a high-tech technology company. A marketplace for the real estate industry.

“The challenge and strategy for us is how do we create a connected suits of solutions that allow our customers to seamlessly transact a lot more efficiently than they did yesterday” Mr Ferguson said.

“Really what that means for us is…what we hope for and strive for, is that we build the best workflow through technology and we have an open ecosystem that allows them to plug in their tools as well. They’ll be able to transact more properties by not necessarily putting more cost in an that allows us to have more listings on site.”

Domain’s customer segments include governments, banks, buyers, vendors, investors and landlords.

Mr Ferguson’s core customers are real estate agents. His aim is to help them scale their businesses with a minimum of paperwork and trips to the office.

www.domain.com.au

www.leongettler.com 

Hear the complete interview and catch up with other topical business news on Leon Gettler’s Talking Business podcast, released every Friday at www.acast.com/talkingbusiness.

https://play.acast.com/s/talkingbusiness/talking-business32-interview-with-angus-ferguson-from-domain

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Throw away the CVs, Barb Hyman says AI ‘recruits best’

By Leon Gettler, Talking Business >>

HOW RELIABLE is artificial intelligence (AI) to recruit talent? According to Barb Hyman, who created Sapia.ai, it’s the only way.

Sapia.ai is the AI-driven recruiting program that is being used by some of Australia’s biggest companies and government departments.

Ms Hyman said candidates were assessed through the AI tool of natural language processing. Job candidates are asked to answer five questions on their mobile phones. It’s all done by text.

“It’s mobile-first because that’s where people live. These days you have to meet people where they are,” Ms Hyman told Talking Business. 

“It’s five questions, questions you would ask in an interview. ‘Tell about a time you delivered amazing customer service. What did you learn from that?’ ‘Tell us about a setback in your life. How did you pick yourself up and move forward from that’.

“It’s a structured interview which is the high water mark of what is regarded as fairness and calibration and we have built and experience around that and that simplicity and ease is what candidates love about it.”

AI interprets what businesses really want and need

Ms Hyman said most business and agencies know what they need for a successful candidate and this is also defined by the data.

“We know through our data there is certain profile of success, a DNA if you like, of someone working in customer service, and that’s different to someone working in sales,” Ms Hyman said.

“What we are able to do through our algorithms and our innovation is extract, from your 200-300 words, that DNA. We can tell whether you are someone who is a high critical thinker or low critical thinker. Someone who is high on humility or low. And that’s what we’re matching to.

“We can discover that with accuracy of 85 percent-plus and without any bias. We don’t use any CV data, no social media data. There’s no information about you. You could be 50 or 10. It doesn’t make a difference to machine.”

CVs are old, unreliable technology

Ms Hyman said this system worked a lot better than using ‘the old CVs’.

The Sepia-ai recruitment program worked more effectively, she said, because CVs were an “outdated data point”.

“It doesn’t reveal who are, it’s pretty easily gameable these days. It’s more a description of what school you went to, your GPA (Grade Point Average in education), the experience you’ve had which a lot of research shows is not predictive of performance,” Ms Hyman said.

“So if you’re applying for a job to a company like Woolworths which uses predictive hire, you don’t need to submit your CV, it’s irrelevant.”

Ms Hyman said past performance indicated on a CV was no indicator of how someone would perform now.

She also said some clients, such as Energy Australia, use Sapia.ai because they want to bring about a culture change.

“They don’t want the same people who go from one contact centre to another,” Ms Hyman said. “They want the hairdresser who has the ability to stand all day, engage with customers, incredible empathy, great listening skills. Why can’t a hairdresser make a great call centre operator?

“You get to see talent that no one else does and discover undiscovered talent because you’re not relying on the CV.” 

www.sapia.ai

www.leongettler.com

 

Hear the complete interview and catch up with other topical business news on Leon Gettler’s Talking Business podcast, released every Friday at www.acast.com/talkingbusiness.

https://play.acast.com/s/talkingbusiness/talking-business-28-interview-with-barb-hyman-from-sapiaai

Securely app can help solve tradie payment delay problems

By Leon Gettler, Talking Business >>

ONE OF THE BIG ISSUES for tradies and sub-contractors now is they are not being paid. They finish a job and the client is unwilling to pay, or they want to negotiate it down, telling them they don’t have the money and suggesting it be paid off in small instalments.

Andy Squires, CEO of Securely, has developed an app that will address that problem and create a win-win for tradies, sub-contractors and their clients.

Securely records and guides the process. A tradie comes to a client and they agree on a price. The tradie then uploads their photo and a word description of the quote into the app, and for the client.

The client then gets a message on their email asking them if they accept the job and, once the client accepts the job, funds are deposited. The tradie then gets notification that the job has been accepted. Once the job is completed, the tradie puts that information back into the app. When the customer sees that and they’re happy with the job, they release the funds directly to the tradie. 

Useful for building tradies and beyond

Mr Squires said the app had attracted the attention not only of building tradies. Cleaners, landscapers and interior designers are also interested in it because they have got the same process problem.

“We’ve had a few business areas contacting us and saying can we use it for our business.” Mr Squires told Talking Business.

He said the problem had been getting worse since COVID.

“Everybody has been spending more time at home so there’s a lot of DIY stuff going on and we’re hearing a lot more situations where customers are getting ripped off by people posing as tradies, coming around, having a look at a job, being paid a deposit and then vanishing,” Mr Squires said.

This application allows people to see that they could get work done on a safe platform which would make Securely a win-win for tradies and customers.

“The tradie knows the money is there and available once he’s completed the job and the customer knows they don’t have to release the funds until once the work has been completed,” Mr Squires said.

Payment disputes ‘common’

Mr Squires said disputes about payments were now coming through “thick and fast” around Australia.

Securely is Queensland-based but is operating now right around Australia. The app has been developed and tested over several years so that it can be used successfully by tradies and customers.

Mr Squires said the Securely app was also partly created by an international app developer and an ex-IBM project management specialist, with assistance from a banker

He said Securely is now talking to a range of other organisations that are interested in using the app.

These include Mitre10, Queensland Buildign and Construction Commission (QBCC), Carsales, trade organisations and TAFE Colleges.

He said Securely was looking to push out into other areas of business along with their networks. There is also scope for Securely to move into New Zealand.

“We’ve even had inquiries from Singapore as well from someone over there who has seen it and is very interested because they see it’s a massive problem internationally,” Mr Squires said.

While a lot of work needed to be done about the standards and legalities involved, a global expansion of Securely was “definitely on the cards” according to Mr Squires.

www.securely-app.com

www.leongettler.com

 

Hear the complete interview and catch up with other topical business news on Leon Gettler’s Talking Business podcast, released every Friday at www.acast.com/talkingbusiness.

https://play.acast.com/s/talkingbusiness/talking-business6-interview-with-andy-squires-from-securely

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ATO extends cyber security contract with Australian secure internet gateway Macquarie Govt

MACQUARIE Government, part of Macquarie Telecom Group (ASX: MAQ), has renewed and extended its agreement with the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) to provide a range of vital data and cyber security services.

The ATO has opted to continue to leverage services including Macquarie’s Secure Internet Gateway (SIG), 24x7x365 Security Operations Centre (SOC), sovereign data centre, hyper-converged infrastructure, and cloud services.

According to Macquarie Government managing director Aidan Tudehope, these services support the secure management of the connection between the ATO’s IT environment and the internet while protecting the financial, personal and other sensitive data of Australian organisations and citizens. 

Since the initial agreement was signed in 2019, Macquarie has facilitated the migration of SIG services as well as supported the ATO’s IT and security teams in relation to SIG services. This support includes monitoring digital events on the ATO’s SIG and triage of targeted attacks by Macquarie’s SOC. 

For the ATO, Macquarie’s SOC provides a full inspection of internet traffic flows, content, and images to meet ATO policies, the Government’s Protective Security Policy Framework (PSPF) and Information Security Manual (ISM) controls.

In December, Macquarie Government, Australia’s government cyber security specialist, also became the first company in Australia to have both its cloud and data centre services ‘certified strategic’ by the Digital Transformation Agency (DTA).

Macquarie Government provides SIG and other cyber security services to about 42 percent of Federal Government staff, based on headcount.

“We’re proud to play a key role in keeping one of Australia’s most fundamental government agencies secure, at a time when Australians are looking for greater assurance their critical government data and the institutions that store and protect it are fully secure,” Mr Tudehope said.

In growing its government cyber security capabilities, Macquarie Government has continued to invest in its infrastructure and service capabilities, including a significant focus on recruitment, according to Mr Tudehope.

The company now has more than 220 security cleared engineers servicing its clients. TMr Tudehope said they were driving service innovation through the provision of virtual services gateways, enhanced cyber security tools and secure access service edge (SASE) security frameworks.

Macquarie Government has also significantly expanded its sovereign data centre campus in Canberra, opening the $17 million Intellicentre 5 data centre in 2021.

www.macquariegovernment.com

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Cyber security requires ‘eternal vigilance’ says Tudehope

By Leon Gettler, Talking Business >>

BUSINESSES and government agencies are now taking cyber security more seriously. The big change has been since the Federal government brought in minimum standards.

David Tudehope, the founder and CEO of Macquarie Telecom, compared it with fire insurance.

“There was a period when there were no standards on what was acceptable by way of fire prevention and fire response and it was very difficult for businesses to know how to protect their buildings,” Mr Tudehope told Talking Business.

“And 100 years ago, they brought in minimum standards for buildings and I think in terms of fire protection and sprinkler systems and water houses and fire hydrants, and the things we take for granted weren’t part of that,” he said. 

“It’s similar to cyber security. When you have minimum standards, it does prevent and reduce the impact.

“There is a value, in having minimum standards for cyber security in critical industries of course, the ones that are most important to the economy and also in other sectors as well.”

GOVERNMENT MUST HELP

Mr Tudehope said these type of preparations require government involvement.

“It’s not about red tape. It’s about protecting the economy, individuals and businesses’ data,” he said.

Mr Tudehope said compromised information can be restored by storing the information and data in a separate place from the primary, in a cloud that’s separate from the primacy cloud, and in a separate location.

He said combatting cyber threats requires good preparation, talented people and eternal vigilance.

He compared it with the way some people treat “a mousetrap to get rid of mice, instead of being vigilant”.

“The issue is, you need to constantly tune your placement of the mouse-traps, the cheese you use, you have to take away the dead mice,” Mr Tudehope said. “No healthy mouse is going to walk into the same trap with dead mice sitting in it.

“That eternal vigilance, as the Americans would say, the block and tackling, is key to success, rather than the initial purchase and initial deployment which is where the money and the energy goes,”

“It means constantly doing the things you did initially over and over again. Putting in fresh cheese, taking out the old cheese, moving the mouse-trap to a different location. These are the things that are key and what that translates to, back in the world of cyber security, is the criticality of security operations.

“Assuming you buy a quality industrial strength firewall and other kinds of cyber security software, and you install it correctly, the action is at the ongoing management of the security operations.”

NEED CYBER SECURITY ON STAFF

Mr Tudehope said this kind of cyber vigilance required having cyber security on staff.

“The problem now is that there is a shortage of this sort of expertise as these experts were always looking out for career paths and challenges,” Mr Tudehope said. “It is very difficult to retain this sort of expertise on staff. With more companies investing in cyber security teams, only a modest number of people are entering the industry.”

Training people into doing this sort of work takes time, he said.

“The key in the absence of that is for people to work out for their business what their priorities are, whether they can do it themselves, or whether they should use a managed security provider,” Mr Tudehope said.

“It is also very important to vet the people you have working for your business to make sure they are who you think they are.”

www.maxquarietelecom.com

www.leongettler.com

 

Hear the complete interview and catch up with other topical business news on Leon Gettler’s Talking Business podcast, released every Friday at www.acast.com/talkingbusiness.

https://play.acast.com/s/talkingbusiness/talking-business39-interview-with-david-tudehope-from-macqua

 

 

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Profectus counts all the sneaky extra charges that ruin your EBIT

By Leon Gettler, Talking Business >>

FINANCIAL EROSION is the EBIT killer – that is, a business’s earnings before interest and taxes. It occurs when businesses such as retailers get overcharged, even slightly, by suppliers along the supply and value chain.

While small, these minor overcharges snowball and can become a huge issue. Financial erosion can also come in the form of rebates not claimed by retailers or small oversights with compliance of contracts.

Enter the Profectus Group, which helps companies with compliance and recovery issues. To wit, in 2021 Profectus helped recover nearly $29 million in unclaimed revenue or supplier overcharges for its clients across nearly 6,500 claims. 

Focus on the ‘true’ earnings

According to Profectus CEO Chris Hutchins, that is just the tip of the iceberg. 

He said financial erosion occurs when companies, like retailers and manufacturers, do great procurement deals and lose the value of those deals through inadequate compliance and controls.

“So you can imagine a small amount of a price being wrong over a lot of invoices. It adds up to a lot, or perhaps the client is being charged for too many units of something, or a surcharge,” Mr Hutchins told Talking Business.

“So the value being designed is not the value being realised.”

He said inflation, an issue facing businesses all over the world, was making it worse. While businesses can’t control inflation, he said they can control deals and make sure they are not leaking EBIT.

Profectus, which has been in business for 21 years, helps clients automate compliance and recovery in the financial control space. It does this with a combination of software: audit software, contract compliance software, and rebate deal management software.

“Through these technologies, we are able to help clients really get to the devil of the detail,” Mr Hutchins said. “If you think about really big end businesses, even small businesses for that matter, it’s just not possible to be across every single transaction in your company, so that’s what we do. We come in and help automate that.”

He said businesses try to keep track of these transactions using Microsoft Excel. However, he said the problem was that Excel is completely manual and relies on humans to update the data and put in the calculations.

“Which means there is a risk of human error.”

Big names save big money

Prospectus has prominent clients across Australia and New Zealand including household names such as OfficeWorks, David Jones, Chemist Warehouse, BHP, Fonterra, Super Cheap Auto and it also works with some of the big banks. 

While Profectus has a business focusing on Australia and New Zealand, it plans to take its offering globally and help businesses around the world.

Mr Hutchins said there was a lot of potential demand for Profectus’s services from the mining sector with commodity prices being so volatile and the shift towards electrification.

Another sector is manufacturing, with its cost inputs rising.

Then there is retail, which is ideally placed, because of the high frequency of transactions, and the construction industry, with complex rules around labour costs.

www.profectusgroup.com

www.leongettler.com   

Hear the complete interview and catch up with other topical business news on Leon Gettler’s Talking Business podcast, released every Friday at www.acast.com/talkingbusiness.

https://play.acast.com/s/talkingbusiness/talking-business43-interview-with-chris-hutchins-from-profec

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Smart Communications to keep focus on people

By Leon Gettler, Talking Business

A NEW PLATFORM aims to give super funds, banks and insurance companies the kind of customer engagement people expect from Amazon.

James Brown, CEO of Smart Communications – a leading technology company that helps businesses engage in more meaningful customer conversations and which works with top Australian government agencies and highly regulated companies like banks, insurance companies and super funds – said this was now the big trend. Smart Communications works with the nine largest banks in Australia, four top insurers and 50 government agencies.

“If you look at all these regulated industries, they need be operating from a customer experience point of view at the same level as the very best digital brands that are out there,” Mr Brown told Talking Business. 

“Their competition is not the next bank or the next insurer. Their competition is Amazon, Dominos, Deliveroo, whatever it is that provides a great customer experience. That is the benchmark now.

“Many citizens and consumers don’t compare their bank or government agency to another bank or government agency. They compare it with Amazon or whatever the best digital experience they’re getting across the spectrum of engagement that they have.”

COLLECTING DATA AND CONVERSATIONS

To achieve this Smart Communications has developed a platform which collects data and conversations. It creates highly personalised two way conversations. It is on a massive scale.

Mr Brown cites one case of an Australian insurer. The firm has provided more than 400 million communications for them.

Smart Communications works with major regulated companies across Australia and around the world, and government agencies, to transform the customer experience with more analysis and control of conversations. The company works with superannuation providers, insurance companies and banks

“Where we work really effectively is that really deep intersection of customer and citizen engagement and regulatory complexity,” Mr Brown said.

“We manage to create great customer experience for complex, highly regulated environments.

“And one of the things we’re seeing with banks and insurance companies is that the legacy landscape in those industries is often very complex.”

The system also uses a lot of artificial intelligence (AI) to ensure the communications are appropriate and in context. The customers will also use artificial intelligence for their analytics.

SHIFT TOWARDS CUSTOMER EXPERIENCES

Mr Brown said companies in regulated industries since COVID have been looking to create deep and meaningful customer experiences, turning them from one way interactions to two way conversations.

He said in Australia in recent years, there had also been a rapid adoption of cloud technology in these sectors which had facilitated the adoption of the company’s platform.

The company is about turning one way communication into “genuine two way conversations,” he said.

“The richer and more detailed they get, the better.

“We are very focused on building out this conversation cloud that allows organisations to really look at the conversation as an enterprise-wide challenge and deal with it with enterprise wide solutions,” Mr Brown said.

“If you look across all the major industries and government bodies that we work with, it’s a complete transformation of that forms process, with really rich omni-channel two-way communications.

“We believe the conversation is the best way to deliver customer experience.”

www.smartcommunications.com

www.leongettler.com 

Hear the complete interview and catch up with other topical business news on Leon Gettler’s Talking Business podcast, released every Friday at www.acast.com/talkingbusiness.

https://play.acast.com/s/talkingbusiness/talking-business27-interview-with-james-brown-from-smart-com

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