Comments on: Why software sales tiers are outdated, dangerous and should be abolished immediately

By: Wayne Schulz

Wayne Schulz — Tue, 29 Mar 2011 01:21:00 +0000

I’ve done no research other than to observe that sales tiers seem to have been around since the caveman’s time.

By: Wayne Schulz

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 28 Mar 2011 12:48:00 +0000

I’ve wondered if balanced scorecard or net promoter scores are really the answer.

If I am being scored on the relative satisfaction of a customer then I only want to be scored on services and not the part which I cannot control – namely the software.

I would be far less likely to take on new existing customers if I knew they had difficult unsolvable problems (prior VAR oversold or mis-configured) that I might be hung out to dry on.

There would also be a material amount of overhead to implementing scorecards. There’s always two sides to a reported problem. I wonder if this scares off some of the publishers from such an implementation.

By: Wayne Schulz

Wayne Schulz — Mon, 28 Mar 2011 12:40:00 +0000

Approvr

-Wayne

By: Paul Messino

Paul Messino — Mon, 28 Mar 2011 12:39:00 +0000

Wayne,
great post – I would also add – resellers / VARS should also be held to a specific NPS (Net Promote Score) customer loyalty benchmark. I think this offers an even stronger gauge of customer satisfaction and greater retention. Even more so than just the reselling of support agreements. Some software vendors currently have a NPS requirement set in their VAR agreement. I think all software companies should do the same. The current method you describe is flawed. A discount shop who sells the cheapest price with no service gets the biggest financial reward (margin). Yet the true professional who may have a small but fiercely loyal following is not only ignored by the software company, but penalized by higher product costs.

Paul Messino

By: Bevan Wistar

Bevan Wistar — Mon, 28 Mar 2011 03:07:00 +0000

wayne, i couldn’t agree more. as an ACT! consultant and BPAC member, i simply do not understand the wisdom behind the tiered sales philosophy. have you done any research on the history of the concept?
bevan wistar, ACC

By: Sage Presidents Circle 2009 Wrapup « The ERP Lifestyle Consultant

Sage Presidents Circle 2009 Wrapup « The ERP Lifestyle Consultant — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 13:54:54 +0000

[...] many people complain about the new tier structure (my thoughts from last year about why I think Tier needs to go) which dictates how much more money resellers make (or don’t make) depending upon new [...]

By: Wayne Schulz

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 05:58:31 +0000

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By: steve kane

steve kane — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 05:12:22 +0000

I clicked on the “Reply” icon, and the entire “Comments” section now displays correctly.
FYI 1024 X 768 no display issues anywhere else.
Steve

By: Wayne Schulz

Wayne Schulz — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 01:58:31 +0000

By: steve kane

steve kane — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 01:12:22 +0000

I clicked on the “Reply” icon, and the entire “Comments” section now displays correctly.
FYI 1024 X 768 no display issues anywhere else.
Steve

By: Jim Coen

Jim Coen — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 12:23:16 +0000

FYI – the screen looks fine no character clip here with IE

By: Wayne Schulz

Wayne Schulz — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 12:19:32 +0000

I've been receiving a lot of email on this. Apparently not many people want to comment publicly.

Just for point of clarification - I think this applies to ALL software companies in the ERP space -- and not only Sage. They ALL have this type of mentality of driving success by rewarding aggressive salesmanship over customer satisfaction.

And most software companies do have separate tier structures that reward product sales independent of maintenance. The problem is that the maintenance tier IS directly tied to how much you sell of product.

Completely backwards in my opinion and I hope no software company is spending a lot of time trying to figure out why this doesn't work. It just incents aggressive selling, discounting and box pushing over understanding a client's requirements and being open and honest with the client about what the software can (and sometimes) can't do.

What's so bad about a little honesty - even if it means you lose one or two sales? In the long term I believe that rewarding customer satisfaction is the better tool.

By: Wayne Schulz

Wayne Schulz — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 20:14:48 +0000

I'm still not seeing that — I checked in IE, Chrome and FF. Could it be a screen resolution issue? Maybe the site is scrolling somehow?

By: steve kane

steve kane — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 18:28:47 +0000

Hate to say it, but the left margin is clipped by 2-3 characters again. Starts right after the quote from the service center customer. IE6, XP2
Steve