At Ventana Research we’re familiar with the need for digital transformation as we have been researching and providing education on this topic for almost two decades. And recent global challenges make even clearer the sea change at hand: digital innovation is essential for not only success, but survival. Business continuity during a pandemic, natural disaster, cyber event or geopolitical situation requires business and risk mitigation processes, but unfortunately very few organizations had been doing so. We are seeing how quickly organizations are going into survival mode, in how they operate and communicate to meet the expectations of the workforce, customers, stakeholders and potentially shareholders.
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Topics:
Big Data,
Customer Experience,
HCM,
Marketing,
Office of Finance,
Operations,
Sales Operations,
Business Continuity,
Analytics,
Digital Technology
Sales organizations are under constant pressure to maximize their potential. To accomplish this they need to integrate their people and processes with those of the finance and operations groups and have access to all available information and useful technology. This is particularly true in the area of sales compensation, which when managed properly recognizes accomplishments, rewards success and motivates people. However, we find that few sales organizations take a comprehensive approach to sales compensation management.
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Topics:
Sales,
Operational Performance Management (OPM),
Sales Compensation,
Sales Operations,
commission,
Financial Performance Management (FPM),
Sales Performance Management (SPM)
At its Oracle OpenWorld the multibillion technology provider showcased the breadth and depth of its cloud computing applications and platform. Chairman Larry Ellison proclaimed it the only unified and open approach in the industry. He criticized other large application vendors that use multiple platforms to support their applications, use a proprietary layer that is not fully extensible, provide only a portion of applications needed to run the business or run on Oracle’s database technology. These technical merits may not be relevant to the decision-making processes of business but can be critical for CIO and IT. But the strength of the Oracle Cloud Computing portfolio, which includes infrastructure, platform, tools and applications, is so impressive that our firm awarded Oracle the Technology Innovation Award in Cloud Computing for 2014. This builds from my analysis earlier in the year on the overall efforts of Oracle for cloud computing.
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Topics:
Big Data,
Sales,
Operational Performance Management (OPM),
Sales Compensation,
Sales Operations,
Business Analytics,
Business Collaboration,
Business Intelligence,
Business Performance Management (BPM),
Financial Performance Management (FPM),
Sales Performance Management (SPM),
SFA
In today’s highly competitive sales environment, where success depends on meeting the specific needs of buyers, an accurate and timely sales forecast is a critical tool for optimizing business outcomes. I discussed this as part of our 2014 research agenda for sales, noting that linking the forecast to commissions, quotas and territories is a requirement for success. We recently completed new benchmark research on sales forecasting to ascertain the state of the processes and technology sales organizations use. This research continues to find less than adequate efforts by organizations to improve their sales forecasting process and insufficient information about the full revenue potential from accounts and customers.
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Topics:
Big Data,
Sales,
Operational Performance Management (OPM),
Sales Forecasting,
Sales Operations,
Business Analytics,
Business Collaboration,
Business Intelligence,
Cloud Computing,
Business Performance Management (BPM),
Customer Performance Management (CPM),
Financial Performance Management (FPM),
Information Applications (IA),
Information Management (IM),
Sales Performance Management (SPM),
SFA,
Supply Chain Performance Management (SCPM)
Businesses aim to make their sales function as productive as possible, but they don’t always support that goal with investment in technology. I recently wrote about sales needing a swift technology kick. Sales application vendor Xactly provides a boot with the release of Xactly Incent 8 and will make parts of the application suite available from the Apple App Store for the iPad in the coming weeks.
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Topics:
Mobile,
Sales,
Sales Operations,
Uncategorized,
Compensation,
CRM,
Sales Performance Management,
SFA
Retaining talent and managing financials related to compensation should be a top priority for the HR and finance functions of companies, and many of them realize this. In our recent benchmark research in total compensation management, 72 percent of participants said it’s important or very important to have a compensation system aligned to their processes. One newer provider to the market, Excentive, started in 2002 in Europe and expanded globally in 2009. Its Excentive Compensation Cockpit supplies more than just a managerial view of compensation; it’s a total compensation management application that enables users to design and model compensation across an entire workforce or for the specific needs of the sales and service lines of business.
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Topics:
Performance Management,
Human Capital Management,
Operational Performance Management (OPM),
Sales Compensation,
Sales Operations,
Business Analytics,
Business Collaboration,
Business Mobility,
Cloud Computing,
Business Performance Management (BPM),
Compensation,
Excentive,
Financial Performance Management (FPM),
Sales Performance Management (SPM),
Talent Management,
Workforce Analytics,
Workforce Performance Management (WPM)
Sales organizations strive to maximize the performance of their staffs to meet quotas and revenue targets in an efficient manner. This focus is part of my agenda to help organizations innovate and maximize revenue in sales. To achieve this requires automation of various sales activities including compensation, incentives, quota development, territory optimization, channel management, analytics and planning. Varicent is focused on these aspects of sales, offering software deployable in three ways: rented in the cloud, hosted for easier management or purchased for use inside the organization. My last analysis of the company and its products was part of our 2011 Value Index for Sales Performance Management; in it we rated Varicent a Hot Vendor overall across our seven evaluation categories applied to its application suite. That analysis included our analysis of Varicent SPM version 7 that made significant advances in the use and process of managing compensation and incentives but also the rest of their application portfolio from territory management, sales quota management and channel management.
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Topics:
Sales,
Social Media,
Marketing,
Operational Performance Management (OPM),
Revenue Performance,
Sales Force Automation,
Sales Operations,
Business Analytics,
Business Collaboration,
Business Mobility,
Cloud Computing,
Business Performance Management (BPM),
CFO,
CMO,
CRM,
Customer Performance Management (CPM),
Financial Performance Management (FPM),
Sales Performance Management,
Sales Performance Management (SPM),
SFA,
Varicent,
Workforce Performance Management (WPM)
Salesforce.com’s 2011 Dreamforce conference is under way. If you’re in sales and you use the company’s application, here’s how to gain the most value from your time at the conference.
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Topics:
Sales,
Salesforce.com,
Social Media,
Marketing,
Marketo,
Merced Systems,
Operational Performance Management (OPM),
Qvidian,
Revenue Performance,
Sales Force Automation,
Sales Operations,
Zilliant,
Zyme Solutions,
Business Analytics,
Business Collaboration,
Business Mobility,
Cloud Computing,
Business Performance Management (BPM),
Callidus Software,
Camelon Software,
CFO,
ChannelInsight,
Cloud9 Analytics,
CMO,
CRM,
Customer Performance Management (CPM),
Financial Performance Management (FPM),
Sales Performance Management,
Sales Performance Management (SPM),
SFA,
Varicent,
Vendavo,
Workforce Performance Management (WPM),
Xactly
If you want to hit the booking and revenue targets required to operate a business, you have to manage your sales forecast and pipeline. Optimally you should be able to monitor and act upon them any day of the week and make adjustments whenever you need to. Unfortunately, most organizations have to wait until they finish their manual efforts at the end of the month or quarter, or they miss critical changes in deals and behavior because they rely only on reporting from their sales force automation (SFA) software.
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Topics:
Sales,
Salesforce.com,
Social Media,
Marketing,
Operational Performance Management (OPM),
Revenue Performance,
Sales Force Automation,
Sales Forecasting,
Sales Operations,
Business Analytics,
Business Collaboration,
Business Mobility,
Cloud Computing,
Business Performance Management (BPM),
CFO,
Cloud9 Analytics,
CMO,
CRM,
Customer Performance Management (CPM),
Financial Performance Management (FPM),
Sales Performance Management,
Sales Performance Management (SPM),
SFA,
Workforce Performance Management (WPM)
In a very quiet and very subtle move, Callidus Software (NASDAQ: CALD) has offered to purchase the assets of ForceLogix for about $3.75 million. This sales applications software company provides sales coaching software to help sales managers realize the full value of their sales representatives. In 2010, Callidus Software entered into an OEM agreement to embed ForceLogix within a new offering called Sales Coaching; it clearly concluded that the opportunity to expose the application to further opportunities in its customer base was too important for ForceLogix to be allowed to continue to operate independently, and so it used some of its stated cash position of almost $11 million at end of September. This step into a pre-sales and sales management application is a key move toward expanding its sales performance management position. I would guess that Callidus sees some significant revenue growth in 2011 and beyond for its purchase.
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Topics:
Salesforce.com,
Operational Performance Management (OPM),
Sales Coaching,
Sales Effectiveness,
Sales Operations,
Cloud Computing,
Governance, Risk & Compliance (GRC),
Callidus Software,
Customer Performance Management (CPM),
Financial Performance Management (FPM),
Sales Performance Management,
Sales Performance Management (SPM)
