openerp-community team mailing list archive

[Peter Langenberg <peter.langenberg@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Marc,

This is a mailing listing, please unsubscribe.

https://launchpad.net/~openerp-community

Peter




2014-02-19 23:08 GMT+01:00 Marc Pierlot <mpierlot@xxxxxxxxx>:

> I dont like you.
>
>
> 2014-02-19 21:08 GMT+01:00 Wouter Tebbens <wouter@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>:
>
> some brief thoughts from my part:
>>
>> * keep the name "OpenERP"
>> * explain both the Apps and the ERP (if it stays in the name, so you
>> wouldn't drop it, right?)
>> * emphasise the importance of open source and software freedom (no
>> lock-in, free/open license, competitive market place, community, dynamic
>> innovation through open development, standing on shoulders of giants
>> (PostgresQL, Python, ...))
>>
>> As Nhomar said, open source IS a very important customer value. And even
>> if some people don't understand much of it, I think it is very important
>> to explain the enormous differences between free software/open source vs
>> proprietary/closed software. It's the end of monopolies.... and
>> customers generally do appreciate the strategic value of freedom.
>>
>> best,
>> Wouter
>>
>> On 02/17/2014 12:11 AM, Carlos Vásquez wrote:
>> > Hi Fabien,
>> >
>> > I do like your thoughts about the marketing strategy in general. I agree
>> > with the communication techniques you propose.
>> >
>> >
>> > *ERP vs. Apps*
>> >
>> > As our fellow partners stated, the main discussion point is which image
>> > we do want to market to our customers. Speaking about the ERP vs. Apps
>> > approach, I kind of agree with both you and the other partners. We do
>> > not spend one cent in marketing, we only follow-up sales of people that
>> > contact us. For now it has been enough to keep us busy and running.
>> > Those people who contact us are almost always looking for an ERP. We
>> > usually have to sell an implementation project where other ERP solutions
>> > are also participating, sometimes there are big ERP solutions (SAP,
>> > Dynamics, Oracle, etc), and usually there are local ERP solutions. I
>> > think dropping the ERP solution as a marketing point, would affect us in
>> > this market.
>> >
>> > But, we have more and more calls from people looking for a cheaper and
>> > faster solution for their problems. An ERP implementation is not
>> > affordable nor suitable for their business. We are getting ready to
>> > offer OpenERP in a way very similar to your SaaS offer. This offer will
>> > be ready very soon and we already have several customers waiting to test
>> > it. Also, we started doing fast, out-of-the-box implementations about 3
>> > months ago to gain experience for our new "SaaS" offer. It has proven to
>> > be very successful. These customers are more prone to identify
>> > themselves with a solution marketed as business apps running together.
>> > Here I do understand your point and it will help to bring more customers
>> > for this line of service.
>> >
>> >
>> > *Open Source*
>> >
>> > Also, the first kind of customers are usually more interested in an Open
>> > Source solution and they often understand its benefits and it can be an
>> > important sale point for them. The later kind of customers, usually do
>> > not know about Open Source, and they do not care. They need a good,
>> > affordable and reliable solution for their needs. Open or closed is the
>> > same for them. So again, we do have here 2 ways of marketing this
>> > because there is in fact (as Ana said) 2 targets.
>> >
>> > The one thing that help us in the sale process is that our customers can
>> > easily find us in the partners directory. The new partners page with
>> > automatic country filter is doing a great job with this. Also the way
>> > you redirect all kind of leads to us.
>> >
>> >
>> > Maybe it is a good idea to separate the ERP/OpenSource and the
>> > Apps/Product approach. Is it really necessary to choose only one way? I
>> > always like simplicity, but in this case, focusing only one target may
>> > be wrong, it is worth the discussion.
>> >
>> >
>> > *Pull strategy*
>> >
>> > There is one more thing I think I can give some valuable feedback. The
>> > services you offer to partners are somewhat rigid in some cases. I would
>> > love to sell an Enterprise contract with every OpenERP implementation.
>> > But this is not possible. The OPW is not made for end-users, us partners
>> > we have to take part in the process. We have worked out several bugs
>> > with the support team. Our experience has been varied. Sometimes the
>> > person assigned to the bug can solve the problem in a reasonable time
>> > frame, other times we have ended up fixing it ourselves. In all cases we
>> > have to spend at least a couple of hours in total of our time. If our
>> > customer reports a bug, we have to test to know where is the problem. If
>> > there is something wrong with some official code and there is an OPW
>> > contract we can send it to your team. In most cases, your team needs
>> > several replies from us. They usually do not do a very good job finding
>> > the problem, we have to do some heavy testing for them as they keep
>> > rejecting the issue of proposing some simplistic workaround. For
>> > important bugs, we end up spending more than 2 hours answering mails and
>> > doing remote desktop demo sessions. At the end we have to integrate and
>> > deploy the solution. I explain all of this because we have to charge
>> > several hours to our customers on top of an Enterprise contract. And we
>> > also need to support the localization and customizations. The total cost
>> > of support gets expensive. Of course your contract also includes
>> > migration. But if we want to use this service, we also need to charge
>> > some extra fee to migrate the localization and customizations. This is
>> > the main reason we do not sell Enterprise contracts very often, and the
>> > ones we have sold, are not renewing.
>> >
>> > For partners which do develop and do heavy customization, I find the
>> > Enterprise service and its pricing method very rigid. I am worried
>> > because we could work much better with your team and get you to earn
>> > more money, which is good for all of us. And for our new "SaaS" offer, I
>> > contacted you guys to work out something to include support from your
>> > team in our cost structure, but the only thing you have to offer is the
>> > regular Enterprise support with the usual "per user" pricing method.
>> > This will at least duplicate our cost for each user. This is not
>> > acceptable, nor is reflecting the reality. You know that in this kind of
>> > service, the amount of support is deluded because everyone is using the
>> > same exact code base. So we decided to go on our own, without your
>> > support. We ran some numbers, and we think it will be cheaper to support
>> > the platform ourselves, even with the migration process.
>> >
>> > So as of now, I do not think you have good service offer for us. The
>> > pricing structure do not work outside Europe of North America. I know
>> > and appreciate you are making efforts to adapt your prices. It has been
>> > a very good first step. But it is not enough. You have to differentiate
>> > configuration only partners, from development ones. We are more than
>> > open and willing to work with you. So, even if you make a great
>> > marketing strategy, the pull strategy you propose will not work very
>> > well in our particular case. I think it is the best way to go, we need
>> > to improve who does generating partners revenue will create revenue for
>> > OpenERP S.A.
>> >
>> >
>> > *Recap*
>> >
>> > All of this said. I do appreciate your efforts to involve the community,
>> > and do think that there are great things we (the partners) can do with
>> > you (OpenERP S.A.). A marketing investment in marketing will benefit us.
>> > And I do trust your judgment to integrate internal ideas with community
>> > suggestions into an excellent marketing strategy.
>> >
>> > Regards,
>> > --
>> > Carlos Vásquez
>> > CTO · Director de Ingeniería
>> > CLEARCORP S.A.
>> >
>> > carlos.vasquez@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx <mailto:carlos.vasquez@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>> > Cel: +(506) 8351 4484
>> > CR: +(506) 4000 CORP (4000 2677)
>> > US: +1 (786) 472-4267
>> > skype: crvasquez
>> > twitter: cvclearcorp
>> >
>> > 300 m. Este de la Escuela
>> > Calle de Platanares
>> > 11402 San Jerónimo, Moravia
>> > San José, Costa Rica
>> > (GoogleMaps: http://goo.gl/8YqM4S)
>> >
>> > http://www.clearcorp.co.cr
>> >
>> >
>> > _______________________________________________
>> > Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~openerp-community
>> > Post to     : openerp-community@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>> > Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~openerp-community
>> > More help   : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp
>> >
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~openerp-community
>> Post to     : openerp-community@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>> Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~openerp-community
>> More help   : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp
>>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~openerp-community
> Post to     : openerp-community@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~openerp-community
> More help   : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp
>
>