>-----Original Message----- >From: Ross Ferris [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] [snip]
>But, NEW sales take a LOT of things for granted - audit files, >background processing, and even GUI ! to name a few .... and [snip] I think this is the most important statement in this thread. Does anybody honestly believe that their competitors are walking into sales calls saying "well sure they have a lot more features and understand your business better - but look how pretty our screens are." Trust me - the competitors you're losing sales to either have those features, work-arounds, or salesman that promise they're coming. The worst part is that they are not *necessarily* lying. YOUR clients are important to your competitors for two reasons: 1. Losing them hurts you 2. Gaining them enables your competitors to identify the features you have and they don't. I know we lost one customer to a competitor with a *much* better GUI (we have one in SB+ that really needs updating). They don't have all of the accounting functionality we do - which their accountant isn't happy with but all of the other users love it. I'm pretty sure this client is going to keep on them until they add the functionality (at least they did with us). Then we'll be in trouble. Unless we evolve as well. Such is the nature of business. Personally, I think the ones knowing the business and the business rules are further ahead - but then I'm still young enough to like learning new things, but old enough to see that it doesn't come as easily. Asking your current clients is *NOT* good enough. Remember, they already decided they liked your product "best." Most won't understand the advantages of a new interface until they actually see it. You need to find out why current and potential customers are choosing other products. The current MV offerings have pretty much all of the inter-connectivity we need. OK, we don't get everything as soon as some others and sometimes need to play "catch-up." We just need to make sure we play. And no, I'm not advocating blindly chasing every and all new technology that comes along. Well, that's my .02 (CDN). -- Colin Alfke Calgary, Alberta Canada "Just because something isn't broken doesn't mean that you can't fix it" Stu Pickles -- u2-users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.oliver.com/mailman/listinfo/u2-users
