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Companies are finding ways to enhance the social media and website experiences of their customers

By Andrew Weeks

When Joe Sandin was in college, he envisioned having a business that helped companies with their branding and creative marketing.

Like any true visionary, Sandin and a business partner at the time set to work on bringing their vision to reality, and in 2002 OnSharp was born.

Today, some 20 years later, Sandin, based in Fargo, N.D., runs the company that specializes in building websites, mobile apps and custom software solutions.

“Ultimately our goal is to help businesses be successful,” he said. “Whether we're doing that through app development or creating some kind of internal efficiency or whether we're helping them with their image and brand and getting their message out there, they all kind of go hand-in-hand.”

Over the past year of the pandemic, he has noticed a shift in trends related to his industry. Whereas companies once obtained a website and social media presence to have a footprint on those platforms, now they are using them a lot more to engage with their customers and clients.

“With COVID I feel like there's been a bigger sense of social media,” he said. His company helps businesses have the means to better use their websites and social media platforms to sell and interact more with their customers. “I feel like all of that stuff has been pushed forward a lot quicker, because they still have to communicate when they're not physically in front of a customer as much as they used to be.”

Until recently companies knew what worked for them using their websites and social accounts, but once the pandemic was declared the rules of the game changed. Those rules, so to speak, seem to always be in flux these days.

As a January article in Forbes noted, “social media trends come and go, social platforms continue to serve as primary marketing channels for growing a business,” and the methods of “increasing visibility, customer reach and engagement via social media are constantly evolving.”

In a different article by the same publication, it mentioned that blogging, case studies, checklists, ebooks, infographics and videos are all things that businesses can do to increase their online presence and viability with their websites.

Sandin echoed agreement.

As more people are connected virtually, they are often accessing services by the same means or at least are online more to connect with potential businesses and services.

Sandin said how companies leverage their social accounts and websites are immediate, evolving trends that will help any business navigate the pandemic storm and allow them to continue their services in a post-pandemic world in which virtual and other technology will remain.

“I just feel like companies are pushing that faster now because of the climate that we're in today,” he said. “It could be a retail business that's been wanting to do e-commerce, whether it's to survive or thrive in the economy, they need to allow their customers to buy stuff online; or maybe it's interacting with dealers if they have a dealer network. There are just so many reasons that are now even more justified for businesses to move certain services through the internet than ever before.”

Giving ‘IT’ a seat at the table

Nexus Innovations, a management and technology consulting company headquartered in Bismarck, N.D., is intensely regional and deliberately so, according to Tony Ambrose, the company’s chief technology and chief strategy officer, who is based in Fargo. About 85% of the business is within the Fargo and Bismarck areas.

“We like to stay close to home,” he said.

He said the company, which specializes in IT consulting, likes to keep its footprint small so it can be the premier go-to company for the services in which it specializes. As such, it also is on top of current industry trends and gets a peek at what might be on the horizon.

Abrose said because of the company’s client base, which ranges from small and large businesses to local and state governments to companies specializing in health care, one specific trend is difficult to pinpoint; however, he said a common thread among most businesses today is that they are trying to leverage their data.

Companies today are more data-driven than they used to be – a necessity of the times. Fifteen to 20 years ago, for instance, many businesses found technology tools as barriers due to lack of access to advanced analytics because the tools to do that were expensive and often out of reach. As such, they couldn't make use of the information they had.

“Now we've got small businesses able to have the same technology stack for email management, for information management, for data management – all of that is scaled down because of cloud delivery,” he said.

A five-person organization can have the same technology stack as a larger corporation or government entity because now “they continued on page 24 continued From page 23 have all the same tools, and it's not cost prohibitive anymore to make that happen.”

A parallel trend is that companies are investing more in technology than they used to and “making sure they have the tools to keep up with the Joneses and to maintain and manage this process of information they are collecting,” Ambrose said. For many companies it is now “almost an afterthought.”

That puts IT at the table.

Previously it was all about IT professionals coming into an office to manage the server room and make sure everything was up to date and running properly. Basically, managing the “technology stack,” Ambrose said. Now it is “applying the technology stack to the business and what the business is trying to do. That requires technology skills but it also requires good analytical skills and good strategies.”

IT workers – and other business professionals – have to “think big and be able to apply what technology can do for the business,” he continued. “A good part of what we bring to the table is some of that big-picture thinking and some of that strategy thinking.”

Preparing a technically-advanced workforce

Ambrose and Sandin both have seats on the board of TechND, an organization that represents tech-related developers, companies and institutions across North Dakota.

Their perspectives come not only from what they notice in their own businesses, but from what they are noticing as board members.

“We're a group that represents tech-related organizations across the state of North Dakota – and I use ‘tech-related’ in a very broad sense in that it is not just guys typing curly braces and semicolons in software development,” Ambrose said. “It is also health care tech, it's also ad tech, it's also aviation tech.”

The group serves three core purposes: it champions the technical community, often being a voice for the tech sector in the state; it advocates policy at the state level; and it bridges the gap, as Ambrose calls it, between technology and companies’ workforce needs.

“Our goal with that is that we make sure we're advocating for and supporting programs that can address those workforce needs in North Dakota,” he said. “The reality is we probably have about half of the workforce that we need for all the tech jobs that could be open in the state. At the end of the day, the trends we talked about a little earlier are really starting to play out. It's a major area of growth and North Dakota companies are constrained, not by ideas, not by resources, but they're constrained by workforce.”

He said the group wants to make sure North Dakota has a robust workforce and is graduating people with the right set of skills, or bringing skilled employees to the state, so that businesses can have their technology needs met.

Sandin, who reflects on the past 20 years of his business, said there is much to look forward to in the state with regard to business and technology. He is confident in the rising generation of tech professionals who will one day take the helm. But that means they must have opportunities available to them to explore and achieve.

Internships can help, he said. One program he advocates is the state-run Operation Intern grant program, which works with employers and institutions of higher learning to meet training and workforce needs.

“The best experiences I ever had were my internships,” Sandin said. “I think internships are a really valuable way for students to get realworld experience. What they teach you in school and what you learn out in the workforce are two totally different things. You need both perspectives – you need formal education, but then you need to understand how those things can apply in the real business community.”

FAR LEFT: NEXUS INNOVATIONS, WITH OFFICES IN FARGO AND BISMARCK, N.D., HELPS BUSINESSES WITH MANAGEMENT AND TECHNOLOGY SOLUTIONS.

IMAGE: COURTESY OF TONY AMBROSE/ NEXUS INNOVATIONS

CENTER LEFT: JOE SANDIN, PRESIDENT AND CEO OF ONSHARP, A WEBSITE AND MOBILE APP DEVELOPMENT COMPANY IN FARGO, N.D., SAYS BUSINESSES ARE USING THEIR WEBSITES AND SOCIAL MEDIA ACCOUNTS TO COMMUNICATE AND SELL PRODUCTS TO CUSTOMERS MORE THESE DAYS THAN THEY EVER USED TO, IN LARGE PART DUE TO MORE PEOPLE GOING ONLINE TO ACCESS SERVICES DURING THE PANDEMIC.

IMAGE: COURTESY OF JOE SANDIN/ ONSHARP

TOP LEFT: JOE SANDIN, CENTER, PRESIDENT AND CEO OF ONSHARP, POSES FOR A PHOTO WITH JAKE DAHL, LEFT, DIRECTOR OF BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT, AND JOE HIXSON, DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS.

IMAGE: COURTESY OF JOE SANDIN/ ONSHARP

BOTTOM LEFT: TONY AMBROSE, CHIEF TECHNOLOGY AND CHIEF STRATEGY OFFICER FOR NEXUS INNOVATIONS IN FARGO, N.D., SAYS A TREND HE IS NOTICING IS THAT MORE COMPANIES ARE LEARNING WAYS TO BETTER LEVERAGE THE DATA THEY ARE COLLECTING ONLINE. HERE TEAM MEMBERS ARE SHOWN IN A MEETING.

IMAGE: COURTESY OF TONY AMBROSE/ NEXUS INNOVATIONS

“I learned a ton of things starting my business. Obviously I learned a lot about how to operate, and then I learned a lot from my internships as well. … Operation Intern is a program the state needs to continue putting funds into, as well as any other workforce-related programs. We need to keep pushing on those.”

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