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The Partner Push
Getting on the same page with its 90,000 global business partners is also key to IBM's midmarket push. About half of that $16.4 billion in SMB revenue is generated by partner sales from value-added resellers (VARs), independent software vendors, system integrators and channel partners. The other half is direct sales, and a new territory strategy places IBM sales teams in geographic regions, providing them with "community development" funds to build closer relationships with local partners and customers. These funds allow representatives to join local groups, such as volunteer YMCA boards, technology forums and educational partnerships, to make connections and represent IBM at the grass-roots level. That's especially important in the midmarket, where IT executives rely heavily on peer networking, word of mouth and local business partners.
Laura Ellis is one of 217 IBM territory managers who have received community development funds. Having worked for IBM over the past 23 years and the SMB division for the past five, the Tampa Bay resident used IBM seed money to join the Greater Tampa Chamber of Commerce, a local CEO council and the Tampa Bay Technology Forum. At one of these gatherings, she met the CIO of Advantec. "They had never done any business with IBM, and the CIO is an active member of the Tampa Bay Tech Forum," says Ellis. "We were able to develop a relationship, and we have just recently completed a disaster recovery solution for them."
Advantec CIO Linda Reid remembers meeting Ellis on the Tampa tech circuit, but her IBM customer story is about a lot more than professional networking. "To be honest, we didn't pick IBM initially," explains Reid, who sent a request for proposal to a local VAR as Advantec was starting a massive infrastructure upgrade project.
At the outset, she decided against IBM because of price but says Big Blue asked for another chance. "They said, 'We weren't understanding your budgetary requirements.' I think they had oversized the SAN requirements too."
But in the end, Reid wound up choosing IBM. "It was impressive to me that they showed us real facts on the differences when it comes to speed and reliability compared to HP. These were not just IBM-produced facts," says Reid, referring to independent analyst reports IBM presented to her.
"I think IBM has changed a lot," Reid adds. "They used to come in, and it seemed like, 'How dare you not think of going with us?' It's not like that anymore."
IBM recently announced that it had acquired its 500th Built on IBM Express Advantage customer. These are midsized companies whose business partners have helped them deploy technology built on Express hardware and software.
Pike Lumber, a $35-million Akron, Ind., company is one of them. It deployed a lumber management system built by Pacific Software Associates (PSA) on an i5 520 Express Edition and the TotalStorage Express model. One of the company's applications, called WoodManager, keeps a customer's inventory up to date with production and purchases. Users can define multiple units of measure to manage lumber, panel, millwork, posts and pilings. Inventory is maintained as ticketed or volume-only.
In the end, though, it was IBM's reputation for reliability that sold Samantha Howard, vice president of administration at Pike Lumber, on the package. She led the technology team that chose the PSA system -- and IBM platform -- over Microsoft. "A lot of the people involved in the decision had the opinion that IBM platforms were bulletproof," says Howard.
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