Business Strategy for Software Executives

April 4, 2005

Fixing The Marketing-Sales Disconnect

Here's how software vendors can prevent costs, resources, time, and opportunities from being consumed by the "B-to-B Black Hole."

By Bob Schmonsees

There's a marketing and sales effectiveness and execution crisis facing software companies. Costs are often growing faster than revenues and many CMOs and CSOs are now facing some hard realities. Sales people are missing their quotas. New product launches fail to meet expectations. And as much as 90 percent of sales opportunites don't close as forecasted.

Of course, these statistics are primarily driven by reduced business investment, tougher buyers, more competition, constant change, and increasing complexity. Unfortunately however, for many companies, they are also exacerbated by a disconnect between their marketing and sales organizations that makes them miss opportunities and consumes costs, time, and resources the same way that matter, light, and energy are sucked into a black hole in space.
Read more >>

Meet the Maker of Tomorrow's Entrepreneurs

Suzanne McChechnie Klahr left law school to found Build, a group that works with teens to foster business savvy and entrepreneurship. Read Suzanne's story and find out what you can learn about innovation from today's youngest business leaders in this month's installation of Software Personalities.

Get Inside the Minds of Today's Thought Leaders

The SandHill.com blog takes a fresh approach: Choose a timely and strategic topic impacting the software industry, invite the industry's sharpest thinkers to give their two cents and post the results on SandHill.com. Last week's blog on consolidation brought a variety of viewpoints. Read it here and be sure you saw all five posts.

This week, the SandHill.com bloggers turn their attention to Software as a Service: Can this pricing model go mainstream? Today, twenty percent of software leaders surveyed for CEO Outlook 2005 say their company is already leveraging the SaaS model. Read our experts' predictions for the future of software pricing. To become part of the blogging team, email editor@sandhill.com.

Software 2005 Just 4 Weeks Away!

Momentum is building behind the industry's largest vendor-neutral gathering: Software 2005, April 26 and 27 in Santa Clara, Calif. With 7 great keynotes, 4 compelling panels, 60+ actionable breakout sessions, and 2,000+ CEOs, VPs and VCs to meet, you won't find a better opportunity to network with peers and learn what's on the mind of industry leaders. This year's theme, "The Building Blocks for Success," takes an in-depth look at the various challenges facing software companies today: from fundraising to operational best practices to strategic planning to exit strategies. Registration is filling up fast. It costs only $1,195 for yourself, plus two of your colleagues to attend - but you must register by April 15. Click here to find out more and click here to register now.

Who "Gets" Customers Best?

As Bob Schmonsees discusses in this week's editorial, sales and marketing have historically had different perspectives on how best to win business. What's your opinion: who understands customers' needs better, sales or marketing? Take this week's Pulse Poll.

More at SandHill.com:

Read the enterprise software industry news of the week >>

Monitor the latest software venture capital deals >>

Scan the list of last week's software M&As >>

See who's made it to the top in our list of recent software executive appointments >>

Send us your feedback on this newsletter and the SandHill.com site... Email editor@sandhill.com

Parting Thought

"Chains of habit are too light to be felt until they are too heavy to be broken."
— Warren Buffett

Courtesy of Malcolm Kusher, The Kushner Group