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Posts from the ‘Sage ERP’ Category

Jul 29

4 Comments

The Road Ahead for Sage

http://www.flickr.com/photos/qmnonic/266203795/sizes/z/in/photostream/Recently Dennis Howlett, self-proclaimed no-nonsense purveyor of truth in matters pertaining to enterprise IT, penned an article called “Sage on the road to nowhere.” As a long-time observer of Sage UK, Mr. Howlett makes some tough and mostly accurate assessments of the current situation and the challenges faced by Sage as they shift to addressing new customer expectations in the increasingly Cloud-based world of software applications.

Luckily for all involved, Sage leadership has seemingly woken up to these new, and growing, set of expectations and now it’s a matter of proper, disciplined execution on the road ahead. There is no doubt that this journey of transformation will continue to experience bumps in the road with some painful ramifications for many involved.

But it’s completely necessary if Sage wants to survive in the new economy.

If you don’t believe this, consider companies like Blockbuster Video, RIM, Sears, Best Buy and others that – not waking up in time to the transformations in their particular industries – have been either put out of business completely or dramatically crippled.

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Mar 14

1 Comment

Ignore the 5 Ps of marketing at your own peril

Just wipe it off and good as new!

In the various social networking groups that I belong to I often see people talking about “strong” products. The argument goes that success in the marketplace is reliant upon the importance of having software with strong feature sets using current technology.

I always find this to be an interesting point of view.

Interesting, but wrong.

In general, customers don’t purchase products solely based on strong features and current technology. Most companies routinely select products that are not considered the best on features alone because of other considerations in the decision-making process.

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Mar 12

40 Comments

Till death do us part?

I have a friend who’s been married for over 20 years now. His wife is an amazing lady – beautiful, smart, dedicated – and has been a true friend and companion to him.

She has taken excellent care of him and their family.

She took on the responsibilities of being a homemaker – handling the finances, keeping up the house, cooking the meals, taking the kids to school, ensuring the kids grow up healthy and strong.

It’s a lot of work to make those tasks look easy.

If you ask her, she would say that she did it willingly – knowing that she fulfilled an essential role in the partnership. She took on these responsibilities and chores to ensure the overall well-being of the family.

She’s no saint though and wouldn’t suggest that she is. Just as he has benefitted from her taking on these tasks to free him to pursue other responsibilities for the family, she has benefitted as well.

He appreciated her playing this role and I can tell you without revealing any big secret that he wouldn’t be where he is today without her.

And man oh man … let me tell you – he has come a long way from his humble beginnings.

A lot of our mutual friends have commented for years on what a great relationship it is. A true partnership where they have built a wonderful life together.

Sounds perfect, right?

It was.

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Mar 9

1 Comment

I’ve got some bad news for you, sunshine

For those not in the know, the title of this post was taken from “In the Flesh” – a song on Pink Floyd’s The Wall album. The Wall resonates heavily with themes of abandonment and isolation and relates the story of a protagonist who steadily builds up a wall to hide behind in response to the negative pressures in his life.

[Here's a link to the video for those interested: WARNING FOR LANGUAGE AND THEMES THAT MAY BE OFFENSIVE TO SOME. Please don't click if you are one of those folks that get offended at such things. In fact, no one should click on it. I'm asking you not to.]

I think the themes are appropriate as the next few articles are going to focus on the Sage Transformation journey.

What exactly is the “Sage Transformation” journey?

From what I can tell (and please understand that the following is just my opinion and is not endorsed, confirmed, approved or in any other way agreed upon by anyone at Sage), at its core, the Sage Transformation journey is a plan designed to help Sage respond to the rapidly changing landscape of software publishing.

It includes many different elements including re-branding, introduction of subscription pricing, re-organization efforts, direct sales, closer interaction with end user customers, improved cross-selling, connected services and many more. We’ll cover some of these topics in the coming days but for now, let’s keep our focus on the big picture.

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Dec 15

3 Comments

Dr. Sagelove: or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Re-brand

http://www.flickr.com/photos/purplemattfish/3918004964/sizes/z/in/photostream/Ok … maybe “love” is a strong word but bear with me here and then feel free to blast me in the comments if you don’t agree. Or for the more disagreeable among you, feel free to blast me even if you do agree. :)

When the re-branding was first announced, it was short on details, long on speculation, concern and fear.

The details made themselves known over the course of time which has helped squash most of the speculation but hardly any of the concern and fear.

For many, the largest concern on the table is that it’s going to create customer confusion. Personally, I don’t think this will happen but I can understand why some feel that way.

As partners, we are always discussing the products – amongst our own teams, with our clients, with other partners, with Sage, with our spouses, etc.

It’s natural that we partners think in terms of the product.

I don’t think the same is true for most customers though – at least my customers. My customers call it “the system”, “Accpac”, “CRM”, “the Sage program”, “Accpac CRM”, etc. Most of my customers don’t really care about the product name.

They just want to do their jobs.

A related concern to the customer confusion is prospect confusion. To me, this is more serious. People know “MAS”, “Accpac”, “Peachtree”, etc. and will be asking for and looking for those products for a long time. Many of these people won’t necessarily know that they are owned by Sage.

Hopefully this will get sorted out by the branding initiatives spread by Sage, the channel, the media, analysts, etc. People will start to become aware of the new names over time.

How much time this will take is open to debate. People still talk about “Great Plains” when Microsoft re-branded that four (five? six?) years ago as “Dynamics GP”.

Adding to prospect confusion though, I contend that the new product names are so generic that – assuming a prospect knows what they are supposed to be looking for (ex. Sage 100 ERP) – it is going to be difficult to find the proper information sources on the Internet.

A search for “Sage 100″ or “Sage 100 ERP” is going to return a lot of junk and we will be asking our prospects to sort through it. Search engine technology is always improving and the Sage brand pages have high authority (used to promote search results) so this might get sorted rather quickly.

So … putting aside those concerns, here are the positive take-aways from the re-branding:

  1. Sage efforts to promote the Sage brand are already working. I’ve had several different sources – prospects, referral partners, clients – mention that they heard the ads and they have had a very positive result. The marketing groups are really producing some high-quality, effective messages. This will ultimately make it easier for partners and Sage to introduce other products in the Sage family – CRM, HRMS, Payment Solutions, etc.
  2. Sage internally is beginning to focus on the Sage brand. Traditionally, as Sage has acquired companies and product lines, each group has had their own mandates, their own missions, their own messaging. I already see a shift in this – in large part because of the new unified brand message. This will make it easier for prospects, customers and partners to work with Sage in the long haul.
  3. Sage is going to be forced to deliver on the brand promises. “Forced” may be a strong word but it works. By putting themselves out there and committing to a brand and trying to drive meaning to that brand, Sage efforts will need to support that meaning or risk losing a lot. My thought is this requirement impacts every last initiative at Sage including a renewed focus on R&D to meet the brand promise. R&D has always been a soft spot in the Sage strategy and, like the other areas I’ve mentioned above, I see evidence that R&D is already turning around.

So, yes, there are still several unknowns coming with the Sage re-branding and I’m guessing that people will still be talking about “Accpac”, “MAS”, “Peachtree”, etc. for the next ten+ years despite Sage efforts.

Overall though, I think it was a bold move and a smart move on the part of the Sage team.

Right now, the software world is going through a huge shift. We need to be bold to take advantage of this shift.

Dec 1

5 Comments

Are internet leads worth a damn?

With that deal, count me down for 10 hours!

If you follow along with the rest of the class at The ERP Lifestyle Consultant, you might get the impression that web leads are less than worthless. MAS guru, social media maven and fellow Summit Diary blogger, Wayne Schulz paints a pretty bleak picture of the whole situation at times.

Wayne convincingly makes the case that web leads are the sorts that do a lot of shopping around, look for some (or all) free advice and won’t be loyal in the long run.

Considering that he has been leading the way with Internet based marketing and social networking long before the term was invented, I would bet he knows what he’s talking about.

So, on the surface, this news can be cosidered rather depressing.

I am personally just starting to dip my toes in the blogging world so it gives me pause as I stop to consider if the required effort is worth the potential payout.

And, for me at least, it is a considerable amount of effort.

[Sidebar: I'm not sure how Wayne makes it look so easy. My theory is that he discovered the secret of cloning back in the 90's and there are actually two or three Waynes running around. Robert Wood suggests that he has a team of social networking agents much like Willy Wonka had his Oompa Loompas. I'm not sure if we will ever know the real truth on this matter.]

On the flip side, two of my largest Sage CRM accounts found me on the web via a Google search. Prior to reaching out to Azamba, both of these companies had been using their Accpac partner to (unsatisfactorily) help them get up and running with Sage CRM.

Yes – they ran me through the hoops to make sure that my team had the proper skills. Frankly I don’t blame them on that front. When you are going to the trouble of switching, you want to make sure it sticks – particularly if you feel you made a bad choice with your first partner.

My other experiences with web leads hasn’t been so bad either. We’ve had a few other, smaller accounts join the Azamba family and a handful of companies ask for quotes that didn’t lead anywhere.

So … what’s the difference? Why has Schulz Consulting had one set of experiences and Azamba a different set?

I’m not 100% sure. Here’s a few guesses though:

  • Higher volume. As previously stated, Wayne has been on the internet for a lot longer than most of us and has cast a wide and deep net. I’m guessing that he gets more web leads in a week than I see in a month (probably even a quarter).
  • Larger install base size. There are a lot more companies using MAS than Sage CRM in North America. This leads to a larger bell curve with more price sensitive shoppers on the far edge and they are all out there trying to find the best deal.
  • More mature product. Accounting systems like MAS (and Accpac) are more mature than CRM products and feature sets are fairly well known and established. Combine this with an industry of profesionals who routinely price by the hour and customers have a hard time differentiating so they tend to look for the “best deal”.

Where does that leave us? And more importantly … where does that leave *me*? :)

Well – despite the challenges of dealing with unqualified – and sometimes unwanted – leads, Wayne has created a system in which he has built a regular lead flow. Because he has made his presence known and provided valuable content demonstrating his expertise, people are seeking him out.

To compensate for this volume, you will see (if you follow his shared experiences at The ERP Lifestyle Consultant) that Wayne has created mechanisms – forms, protocols, procedures, etc. – to help him effectively and efficiently separate the best-fit prospects from the rest.

So, overall, I would say: don’t lose faith.

Social networking works – particularly when combined with a great qualification process. I plan to take what I’ve learned from Wayne and my own experiences and build a stronger future for my team.

I welcome your thoughts on the matter.

Nov 16

1 Comment

I’m an experienced professional – why should I attend Sage Consulting Academy?

http://www.flickr.com/photos/mindaugasdanys/3404247622/sizes/z/in/photostream/

Kicking myself for not attending the Jamaica Academy!

The new certification process required by Sage to ensure consistent, high-quality customer experiences across the channel requires partners to attend the mandatory Sage Consulting Academy. Now this may initially be seen as an unnecessary burden to many firms that have been in the channel satisfactorily serving clients for ten, twenty even thirty plus years.

Yeah … I feel your pain. We can sit around and gripe all day long about the injustices in the world and the foolishness of such a session for individuals as well-established and seasoned as you and I, dear reader.

Or … maybe we can look at this as an opportunity?

An opportunity to revisit our practices, routines, methodologies that we have built over the years (either explicitly or by default) to serve clients. After all, the reseller and professional service firm industry is undergoing huge transformations right now alongside the software publishers (and, frankly, almost every other industry out there as well).

Isn’t now a great time to review these things? Before it’s too late and you find yourself in an untenable position?

It’s good to keep this thought in mind:

“If you don’t like change, you’re going to like irrelevance even less.”  General Eric Shinseki, Chief of Staff, U. S. Army

You can read about one partner’s experiences here and how she (Susan Cardoza at Sysera) changed her mind after attending. I’m sure others have similar experiences to share.

One apparent hit with the Sage Consulting Academy was recently written up by Wayne Schulz on his channel-focused site, www.erplife.com. Read about here.

In the meantime, feel free to share your experiences in the comments below.

Nov 11

1 Comment

Behind the scenes with Doug Ash and the Accpac TPAC

I am pleased to be joined today by Doug Ash of Smart Hotel Software. Doug has a rich history within the Sage Accpac family and currently runs the successful Third Party Access Conference (TPAC) – now in its tenth year.

Join us as we discuss the conference, its history and the benefits of attending.

Peter:  Hi Doug. Thanks for joining us, today. Can you please introduce yourself and let the readers know a little about your background?

Doug:  I worked for Accpac years ago and “wrote” Order Entry for Accpac Plus (DOS). I have been in the Accpac community over 25 years.  At my company UniDevCo, we developed a set of add-on products – Item Inquiry, Customer Inquiry, Sales Analysis – products that have become part of the standard [Sage] Accpac product.  

At my latest venture, Smart Hotel Software, our focus is solely on hospitality – hotels, motels, retreats etc. I have always been involved with operational software (like Order Entry) and continue to be so in the hotel business by building the software that a company runs its business on.

Peter:  Thank you. Can you tell us more about the Third Party Access Conference and how it came about?

Doug:  The [Sage] Accpac conferences focus primarily on [Sage] Accpac. Third-party developers, like me, needed a forum to promote their own products as part of a larger solution. David Hood [former CEO of Accpac prior to the Sage acquisition] coined the phrase “End-to-End Solution”. The third party products are a BIG part of the end-to-end solution.  Some are add-ons like Norming’s Security Suite or Orchid’s Information Manager Suite and some are full modules like MISys or Service Manager or, my own product, Smart Hotel Software’s Reservation System. 

At TPAC, we showcase products and services that connect with Sage Accpac ERP and Sage CRM. That’s it. Every exhibitor has something that the delegates might be able to use. 

The business partner channel needs to be kept aware of what is available. There is no substitute for face-to-face meetings.  The business partners get a chance to meet the actual developers of the products their customers are either using or need. They get a direct chance for feedback or training or support or deal making. It is the BEST way to assess who they will deal with in the future – what products they will carry forth to their customers.

TPAC 2012 is the tenth TPAC.  It is the largest Sage Accpac-only conference in the world. 

Peter:  So, what’s the ultimate reason behind the conference? 

Doug:  To showcase third-party products, how they connect to [Sage] Accpac and how they provide a fuller and better solution to the end users – often via the business partners.

Peter:  Do you coordinate and organize it yourself or is it a joint effort?

Doug:  We do 100% of the organization and a lot of the promotion. Sage helps with the promotion to both the exhibitor and delegate channels. Each exhibitor promotes their own product to the business partner channel.

Peter:  That seems like a big project. How much work goes into planning and running the conference?  

Doug:  It is a BIG project to host a large conference like this. It has become a bit easier with time, but we still have to organize the venue, the conference format, key notes, detailed agenda, exhibit center layout, food and beverage and the event night. In the past, I seconded some of my regular staff to organize and run TPAC. I now have a dedicated resource – Jordan, to run TPAC.

We added a “shoot out” session last year and it was very popular. We will do these again where all the exhibitors for a certain segment – like Business Intelligence last year – get together and compare and contrast their solutions.

Peter:  In your eyes, is it worth the effort you expend?  

Doug:  Oh Yes. We are very self-serving. TPAC gives Smart Hotel Software a great chance to promote its products to the channel. It’s also a great party!!

Peter:  Who can attend the conference? Is it open to customers or prospects?

Doug:  TPAC is open to Sage Accpac and Sage CRM business partners.  It is intended for the business partners and not for prospects or customers.

Peter:  What is the average attendance count? How many exhibitors do you gather each year? 

Doug:  The attendance varies from year to year depending on the economy, the mood of the [Sage] Accpac community and when the conference is. We had to move from the summer back to the spring in 2011 because Sage once again moved their conference and we have to stay 4 months away from theirs. We expect 40-50 exhibitors this year and 150-200 delegates. With the consolidation of the business partner channel, we have a challenge to keep up our numbers. But those that come, now represent larger companies.

Peter:  For people that are considering attending, what are the top three reasons to sign up for the conference? 

Doug: Attendees have the opportunity to:

  • Find new products or services that your clients need or strengthen existing relationships with developers. Increasing the happiness of your clients is paramount – TPAC helps make this happen.
  • Network with your peers and Investing in yourself as a professional – learn new things
  • Meet with senior [Sage] Accpac management.

And a few days out of the office to reflect on life and business never hurts.

Peter:  Agreed! When and where is the next conference? And how much is it to attend?   

Doug:  TPAC 2012 is in Vancouver (actually Richmond which is a suburb) on March 11-13. The price is $500 early bird, $600 regular and $700 for late registrants. Check the web site for details.

NOTE – we have changed the format this year – we are starting earlier on Sunday so the conference is bigger.

Peter:  Finally, where can people get more information? 

Doug:  www.TPAC.biz

Peter:  Great – thanks for your time, Doug. Keep up the great work and happy 10 year anniversary!

Nov 2

15 Comments

What do the new Sage pricing options mean for you?

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose

First off, let’s get this out in the open: any pricing options discussed in this post are purely speculative at this point. Sage has announced that there will be new options introduced over the next 12 – 18 months but the details have not been released yet.

So as long as we know we are playing the speculation game, let’s begin…

The prevailing speculation is that pricing will be aligned with subscription models and represent a monthly or annual fee model that allows the user to have access to their desired Sage software solution as long as the fees are kept up. This pricing model is in line with the majority of (maybe that should read “all”?) new internet-based software publishers these days – you pay an “as you go” price.

As a software publisher, this makes a ton of sense as it provides an even, smooth, predictable revenue stream that allows the organization to maintain consistent operations and budget activities such as marketing, sales, research and development, operations, capital expenditures, etc. This model is far preferred to the current model of a large initial expenditure by a customer and then they may or may not stay current on the annual support (which entitles customers to current software versions and some level of support).

From the customer perspective, this makes a ton of sense too and it’s one of the reasons that SaaS (Software as a Service) is becoming more popular. Just as this model provides the predictable financial model for the software publishers, the customers also has the same benefit of smooth expenditures vs a large initial implementation cost of services and software.

Ultimately, customers will typically pay more for the software with this model over their total usage as it works much like renting vs owning property.

The interesting thing is that this model works whether the software is in “the cloud” or installed at the customer’s website. Sage is making a push to providing off premise options (I’m not getting into the “what is the cloud” debate here) to give customers the freedom of choice and the theoretical pricing model will work for all options with, of course, some variation in pricing depending on the selection.

For Sage and their customers and prospective customers, the new model is a very good thing. Sage wants to provide options that customers are asking for these days and give the customers the flexibility to do business the way they want. It makes a lot of sense from this angle.

Customers are spending a lot more time on their own these days researching options and making their choices without the assistance of VARs (Value Added Resellers / Sage partners). When they are ready to buy, should Sage say “Whoa … hold up there, chief. You need to talk to one of our partners.” before committing the sale?

For their sake, I hope they wouldn’t do that. Customers have choices and are going to want to do business with vendors that make it easy to do business. Every last one of us follows this rule in life.

So for Sage resellers … what does that mean? Well – Sage historically has a great track record as a partner-centric organization. This might change but I don’t think it will in the near-term.

On the Accpac side of the business, there is a good track record of customers signing up with Accpac Online, the Sage-hosted version of Accpac and being assigned to local resellers to assist them with configuration, training and ongoing assistance. With the current launch of the MAS Online, from what I’ve heard the same model is being used. It’s a rare customer that can configure and setup their accounting or CRM system without some expert guidance.

For the short-term anyway, it seems that margins and end-user relationships are still safe with the channel.

That being said … I think if resellers keep doing business as usual they are going to find themselves in the soup in the coming decade. I encourage every partner in the channel to sharpen their saws and shake things up. Attend the Firm of the Future sessions. Think through how to take your services to the next level. Figure out a niche. Do something – anything – because the status quo is gone for good.

I occasionally hear partners speak as if Sage is somehow unique in facing these dilemmas and decisions and maybe the grass is greener with other publishers. This is not the case at all.

It’s every last publisher. Think about it: all new software companies are starting off going direct as internet based, cloud, subscription models. Sage, Microsoft, SAP are actually operating at a disadvantage with decades of inertia keeping them from changing course overnight. But it’s coming.

Again – the above is 100% speculation but if I look into my crystal ball, it sure seems like a winning play for Sage and Sage customers.

Nov 1

8 Comments

Interested in getting more from your Sage MAS installation?

It's actually this easy to use!

This morning I had a semi-regular breakfast meeting with fellow Chicagoan and business maven, Paul Ziliak at xkzero. We spoke about a myriad of topics including Steve Jobs, software marketing and development, reselling challenges and opportunities, Sage future direction and Halloween fun (we both have kids in the right age group).

One topic that I think will be of particular interest to any MAS resellers or customers reading this column is GetX, a home-made product that xkzero has developed. I’m not a MAS reseller or customer but to me it sounds like it’s worth a look for those of you out there that are. Read on and see if you agree.

GetX essentially gives MAS customers the power to search for data across companies, modules and tasks for a single search point – sort of like using Google for MAS 90 and MAS 200. It allows MAS users to find data faster, streamline workflow and generate instant intelligence. xkzero designed GetX to install like any other MAS 90/200 module, so any MAS consultant (and some power MAS users) can easily install and setup the product.

xkzero is pricing it somewhat uniquely. There are two pieces to the product: the GetX Engine and the GetX User Access Licenses.

The GetX Engine handles indexing through a Windows service that automatically installs with the application, and then there are user licenses which match the user count registered with Sage. The GetX Engine is priced at $250 per year and the user licenses are priced at $60 per user per year. The pricing is per year as a subscription so if you aren’t getting the value, you simply don’t renew. It’s not completely new but it isn’t common in the Sage add-on world (yet).

Currently Paul is introducing it to his own client base to get some real world feedback and shake out any install issues. So far, he has been met with overwhelming responses including “why didn’t you let us know about this before”? Sounds promising …

Again, I’m not a MAS reseller or customer but it seems like the functionality is going to save a lot of people a lot of time. You can see a quick overview at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTydyxs9mPM.

I got the sense that he is only doing a controlled release to his own client base currently but I doubt he would turn away any interested parties. Take a look and let him know what you think or comment here.

[UPDATE 11/07/11] Apparently Paul’s team has put out another video on GetX – http://www.youtube.com/user/pziliak?feature=mhee

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