The early bird may get the worm, as the old saying goes, but the tardy mouse gets the cheese.  With the enterprise collaboration software market already crowded with attractive contenders like Socialtext, Atlassian, Blogtronix, cyn-in, whatever Goggle does with JotSpot and other alternatives, now might not seem the best time to launch a new wiki company. 

The founders of BrainKeeper, who will launch their Enterprise Wiki on January 15, obviously disagree.  By waiting until the early leaders worked out the technology bugs and discovered exactly which features companies wanted and didn’t want, BrainKeeper believes it can vault to the head of the class by offering features that are more advanced and better suited for the corporate environment than those the other wiki tools provide.

For example,  BrainKeeper will offer an API that can be used to pull page and workspace content into other systems like existing knowledge repositories, backup systems, or corporate portals.  Another new feature will be Workflow, which will allow Workspace Admins to monitor and meter the content that is added, edited, and deleted from the site.

I tried a demo account and found BrainKeeper to be extremely intuitive and easy-to-use.  It may be the most immediately user-friendly interface on the marketplace so far, with clearly marked navigation and help features.   There are other wiki tools that do more but they are often difficult to learn and leave users to fend for themselves. 

Too many of the current market leaders take the here’s-some-great-technology–you-figure-out-what-to-do-with-it approach.  BrainKeeper  provides solid guidance to corporate buyers through example projects and customer success stories that tell their story from the customer’s point of view.  Bottom line:  BrainKeeper is a solid product with great marketing and that should make it a serious contender.