Posts Tagged ‘sales’

NetSuite launches the commerce-as-a-service platform “NetSuite SuiteCommerce,” enabling both retail and corporate sales outfits to enhance customer service and customer experiences through a fully integrated ERP/CRM solution.

For all the talk about market development, technology maturation and selling technology into verticals, too few solution providers truly understand this lifecycle or how to use it to their advantage. The starting point hasn’t changed in two decades: Pickup “Crossing the Chasm.”

IT vendors, particularly hardware companies, often talk about “incentives” such as rebates and promotional discounts as means for ensuring partner profitability. The reality is incentives can sometimes have more negative consequences and cut into partner profitability.

A federal judge rejected a request by Apple, Google, Intel and other leading technology companies to dismiss an antitrust lawsuit brought by a group of software engineers alleging a conspiracy to limit IT job salaries and mobility. It’s worth watching for solution providers, who can use this lawsuit in their own talent recruiting.

The Cloud & Technology Transformation Alliance (CTTA) released the results of its second annual State of the Cloud Channel study, finding that IT solution providers and telephony agents continue to slowly build cloud computing practices and are poised for rapid growth over the next 12 months.

Social networks are changing the way people communicate and are quickly changing the way businesses research and buy technology. In this exclusive 2112 Report, we detail how ‘converged media’ will open new marketing and sales opportunities for IT vendors and solution providers.

While hard to quantify, reports are streaming into Channelnomics from solution providers experiencing unusually high sales and request for quotes in what’s normally a low period of the year. The sudden surge is a good omen for 2012.

The storage appliance vendor says the number of registered partners in its worldwide channel network surged in 2011. Drawing new partners in is a combination of product features and channel programs that made sales easier and more profitable. It shows that technology and channel programs cannot stand independently.

Last summer, Hewlett-Packard stopped sales of TouchPad because no one wanted them. In China, Apple has suspended sales of its popular iPhone 4S because too many people want them. The two vendors are a perfect contrast of “need” vs. “want” in product sales.

The channel is entering 2012 with momentum and optimism. New opportunities abound for solution providers as the business community’s appetite for IT products and services increases. Here are a few of the resolutions the channel should make in the coming year.