The Blog

AppExchange Ecosystem Changes the World

But this isn’t about me, it’s about the business movement and phenomenon we know as the AppExchange.  As you’ll read from Mr. Fernando Israel of Uruguay, the AppExchange opened up a new way of doing business for him, one that simply didn’t exist before.  The story Israel recounts here is exactly what I was describing in 2004 in “The New Garage” and it’s wonderful to see it in action.

I think Salesforce deserves a lot of credit for what it’s done with the AppExchange.  I has developed a new business paradigm for technology vendors and if you believe what’s being written about the subscription economy, it goes well beyond the tech sector.  Only Amazon and Apple have done more to establish the on-line sales paradigm and I’d say that Salesforce has carried the most water for subscriptions to date.  After you read the letter below, you’ll know more about what I mean.

 Oooo!  Know what?  This could be fun.  If you have an AppExchange story like Mr. Israel’s please send it along.  I can’t promise to post all of them but you never know where this will lead.

Dear Denis,

First of all thank you for your blog post :“The AppExchange Seven Years On”, a very refreshing piece on a subject that is close to my heart.

I am writing to you because you touched on a point that has been crucial for me, and I could not stress it hard enough. On your second bullet point you say: “The AppExchange created the opportunity for a very long tail of credible business solutions”. Here to me lays the magic and the power of what Salesforce is all about, and of course the AppExchange is a vital part of it.

I started a company 8 years ago when I had to come back for personal reasons to my native Uruguay. This is a very small country, with about 3M people, and located in a part of the world normally known as “third world”. When I grew up, it was inconceivable to be able to launch a global business from here. Still today at the fast pace of globalization, it is not easy. And this is where the AppExchange and Salesforce get into the picture.

The AppExchange has completely changed that. It was the last piece (or perhaps the first one, depends on how one sees it) that made it possible to bring down all the barriers so, basically anybody in the world with an internet connection and a computer, can launch a new and successful global business. When I was a kid you had to be called IBM to do that, or you had to be born in the US or Europe. Not anymore.

I have launched Invoices for Salesforce a year ago in the AppExchange, and this has completely changed my life. It has picked up a lot of attention during this last year, we have customers as far as Japan, Iceland, Russia and India (far from us), and the momentum does not seem to stop. Of course I am ecstatic about it, but perhaps more important, I can’t stop thinking at the more fundamental issue here: the world has changed for the better! Today, thanks to the AppExchange, the field has been leveled, and anybody can add value to the enterprise, globally, and create a new business and new opportunities.

I noticed you mentioned some of the outstanding apps this last year in your post, all well deserved, and I wanted to put Invoices for Salesforce in the radar too. I have a story to tell, one that embodies what Salesforce and the AppExchange have done for this world. Here is a link to a blog post that Mr Reid Carlberg wrote just before Christmas about it  bit.ly/Skmmvt.

If you think it is appropriate,  I would love for Invoices for Salesforce to be include in the list of future blogs.

Kind Regards,

—

Fernando Israel
Founder/CEO

Phone:     +598 2900 0159

Cell:         +598 9927 5928

Web:        www.invoicesforsalesforce.com

Twitter:    @invoicesforce

Ok, Fernando, will do!