Sage 100

I think a pretty open ended question, but other than Sage 100 out of the box Paperless - what add-ons are you using.  Very high-level needs for now.  Just looking to get a feel for what \ if anything is out there and any high level feedback you may have.  TIA

------------------------------
John Wilder
Technology Integrators
------------------------------

We have a number in our data center with ACOM and DocLink being the most prevalent document management systems in Sage.

---------------------------------
Gary Feldman
President
I-Business Network, LLC
Marietta GA
6786270646 x224
http://www.i-bn.com/
---------------------------------

What are you asking for?  A pure replacement of the paperless functionality (PDF's of forms and registers and customer emailing) or a document management system that Gary mentioned? @Todd Martin​​ has a great enhancement for emailing out of Sage.

------------------------------
Jeff Schwenk
FORMER 90M Board Member
Bottomline Software, Inc.
Waynesboro VA
540-221-4444
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 01-14-2020 10:13
From: Gary Feldman
Subject: Alternatives to Sage Paperless

We have a number in our data center with ACOM and DocLink being the most prevalent document management systems in Sage.

---------------------------------
Gary Feldman
President
I-Business Network, LLC
Marietta GA
6786270646 x224
http://www.i-bn.com/
---------------------------------

Our enhancements are based on the built in paperless functionality and is focused on emailing out.

If you are looking for storing documents related to things like sales orders and such, I think the instadocs by DSD would be good to look at.

DocLink is great and has a lot of functionality. It will capture your output and allow you to scan in any documents coming in. I do not think they do anything with emailing out other than for internal approvals.

Knowledge Sync would be used for sending out emails or saving forms/reports as PDF to folders or posting on websites.

What are the requirements that the customer is looking for? Is it documents being stored with the system as paperless or sending things to customers and vendors as paperless or just archiving of paper? Paperless is a big generic term.

------------------------------
Todd Martin - President
MBA Business Software (https://www.mbabsi.com)
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 01-14-2020 11:57
From: Jeff Schwenk
Subject: Alternatives to Sage Paperless

What are you asking for?  A pure replacement of the paperless functionality (PDF's of forms and registers and customer emailing) or a document management system that Gary mentioned? @Todd Martin​​ has a great enhancement for emailing out of Sage.

------------------------------
Jeff Schwenk
FORMER 90M Board Member
Bottomline Software, Inc.
Waynesboro VA
540-221-4444
------------------------------


Original Message:
Sent: 01-14-2020 10:13
From: Gary Feldman
Subject: Alternatives to Sage Paperless

We have a number in our data center with ACOM and DocLink being the most prevalent document management systems in Sage.

---------------------------------
Gary Feldman
President
I-Business Network, LLC
Marietta GA
6786270646 x224
http://www.i-bn.com/

I just had a customer go with Altec / DocLink. I think it's the type of solution some might make money from if they also manage the implementation and consulting themselves ( as opposed to having Altec do the implementation ). However, to just resell it is likely not a profit maker once you factor in time spent in meetings with the customer and Altec sales.  There's a rather small piece of the sale that you get a commission on. From memory, you get nothing on services or OCR.

Speaking generally and not about Altec in particular --- in past years ISV integrations seemed to be something we could all make money off. Now, however, it seems that only portions of the sales are commissioned, there is more upfront meeting, more questions from the customer about whether a technical issue is a Sage problem vs ISV issue  --- enjoy playing "prove it's my integration causing the problem" followed by " can I have everyone out of Sage at 11 pm so I can spend a few uncompensated hours re-installing the latest integration to see if that fixes your problem".


------------------------------
Wayne Schulz - Schulz Consulting - 860-516-8990
------------------------------

Thanks for the feedback.  I don't have one specific need (yet). Really trying to get an idea of what has worked for alternatives. Real High Level.  I'll do some deeper dive on the items above, appreciate the input.

------------------------------
John Wilder
Technology Integrators
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 01-14-2020 12:04
From: Wayne Schulz
Subject: Alternatives to Sage Paperless

I just had a customer go with Altec / DocLink. I think it's the type of solution some might make money from if they also manage the implementation and consulting themselves ( as opposed to having Altec do the implementation ). However, to just resell it is likely not a profit maker once you factor in time spent in meetings with the customer and Altec sales.  There's a rather small piece of the sale that you get a commission on. From memory, you get nothing on services or OCR.

Speaking generally and not about Altec in particular --- in past years ISV integrations seemed to be something we could all make money off. Now, however, it seems that only portions of the sales are commissioned, there is more upfront meeting, more questions from the customer about whether a technical issue is a Sage problem vs ISV issue  --- enjoy playing "prove it's my integration causing the problem" followed by " can I have everyone out of Sage at 11 pm so I can spend a few uncompensated hours re-installing the latest integration to see if that fixes your problem".


------------------------------
Wayne Schulz - Schulz Consulting - 860-516-8990
------------------------------

BTW, my most recent Altec was a net license ( billed on my invoices ) of about $18,000. Altec services which were billed directly from Altec ( no margin - the excuse is that if a consultant wants to learn Altec they could take this piece themselves)  were about $20,000. I have every reason to believe that both these figures will likely double within a year. I don't expect to be making any further margin off future sales which is a trend I see for 2020+.

TL;DR: The time period where consultants give away the initial meeting, the review meeting, the various demo meetings is done for me. These are very high margin sales that kick off lucrative ongoing fees for the ISV.  Don't think you are receiving free invites to happy hours and dinners for nothing. Unless "will work for a free meal" helps pay your bills ( it won't for me ) then it's time for consulting firms to retool how they bill and manage ISV sales, implementations, and ongoing support. This doesn't consider the thorny problem of once the integration is installed where the VAR providing ongoing support is forced to play the "prove it's the integration causing the problem" and "reinstall the integration after-hours" followed by "oh, we just released an update to that integration, install it again".

This is a big big trap that consultants need to develop a plan to deal with going forward as Sage 100 core product functionality ages/stagnates and new functionality is largely provided by integrations. Whether consultants realize it now or in the future -- this type of ISV work now needs to be billed for at every phase of the process.

------------------------------
Wayne Schulz - Schulz Consulting - 860-516-8990
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 01-15-2020 08:16
From: John Wilder
Subject: Alternatives to Sage Paperless

Thanks for the feedback.  I don't have one specific need (yet). Really trying to get an idea of what has worked for alternatives. Real High Level.  I'll do some deeper dive on the items above, appreciate the input.

------------------------------
John Wilder
Technology Integrators
------------------------------


Original Message:
Sent: 01-14-2020 12:04
From: Wayne Schulz
Subject: Alternatives to Sage Paperless

I just had a customer go with Altec / DocLink. I think it's the type of solution some might make money from if they also manage the implementation and consulting themselves ( as opposed to having Altec do the implementation ). However, to just resell it is likely not a profit maker once you factor in time spent in meetings with the customer and Altec sales.  There's a rather small piece of the sale that you get a commission on. From memory, you get nothing on services or OCR.

Speaking generally and not about Altec in particular --- in past years ISV integrations seemed to be something we could all make money off. Now, however, it seems that only portions of the sales are commissioned, there is more upfront meeting, more questions from the customer about whether a technical issue is a Sage problem vs ISV issue  --- enjoy playing "prove it's my integration causing the problem" followed by " can I have everyone out of Sage at 11 pm so I can spend a few uncompensated hours re-installing the latest integration to see if that fixes your problem".


------------------------------
Wayne Schulz - Schulz Consulting - 860-516-8990

I agree, we have spent countless hours helping ISV's (Scanco in particular) find the bugs in their products.  We always have to prove to they are causing the error and then hope they get a fix in a few months - which we also have to test.  The client never wants to pay for this and of course neither does Scanco.

------------------------------
Bernie Lehman
Lehman Wesley & Associates
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 01-15-2020 08:31
From: Wayne Schulz
Subject: Alternatives to Sage Paperless

BTW, my most recent Altec was a net license ( billed on my invoices ) of about $18,000. Altec services which were billed directly from Altec ( no margin - the excuse is that if a consultant wants to learn Altec they could take this piece themselves)  were about $20,000. I have every reason to believe that both these figures will likely double within a year. I don't expect to be making any further margin off future sales which is a trend I see for 2020+.

TL;DR: The time period where consultants give away the initial meeting, the review meeting, the various demo meetings is done for me. These are very high margin sales that kick off lucrative ongoing fees for the ISV.  Don't think you are receiving free invites to happy hours and dinners for nothing. Unless "will work for a free meal" helps pay your bills ( it won't for me ) then it's time for consulting firms to retool how they bill and manage ISV sales, implementations, and ongoing support. This doesn't consider the thorny problem of once the integration is installed where the VAR providing ongoing support is forced to play the "prove it's the integration causing the problem" and "reinstall the integration after-hours" followed by "oh, we just released an update to that integration, install it again".

This is a big big trap that consultants need to develop a plan to deal with going forward as Sage 100 core product functionality ages/stagnates and new functionality is largely provided by integrations. Whether consultants realize it now or in the future -- this type of ISV work now needs to be billed for at every phase of the process.

------------------------------
Wayne Schulz - Schulz Consulting - 860-516-8990
------------------------------


Original Message:
Sent: 01-15-2020 08:16
From: John Wilder
Subject: Alternatives to Sage Paperless

Thanks for the feedback.  I don't have one specific need (yet). Really trying to get an idea of what has worked for alternatives. Real High Level.  I'll do some deeper dive on the items above, appreciate the input.

------------------------------
John Wilder
Technology Integrators


Original Message:
Sent: 01-14-2020 12:04
From: Wayne Schulz
Subject: Alternatives to Sage Paperless

I just had a customer go with Altec / DocLink. I think it's the type of solution some might make money from if they also manage the implementation and consulting themselves ( as opposed to having Altec do the implementation ). However, to just resell it is likely not a profit maker once you factor in time spent in meetings with the customer and Altec sales.  There's a rather small piece of the sale that you get a commission on. From memory, you get nothing on services or OCR.

Speaking generally and not about Altec in particular --- in past years ISV integrations seemed to be something we could all make money off. Now, however, it seems that only portions of the sales are commissioned, there is more upfront meeting, more questions from the customer about whether a technical issue is a Sage problem vs ISV issue  --- enjoy playing "prove it's my integration causing the problem" followed by " can I have everyone out of Sage at 11 pm so I can spend a few uncompensated hours re-installing the latest integration to see if that fixes your problem".


------------------------------
Wayne Schulz - Schulz Consulting - 860-516-8990

Avalara is rising on my headache list. Support for their product is through a generic Avalara help desk and always involves loading their latest integration ( which seems to change daily ).

On the surface re-loading the Avalara integration is not that big of a deal until you have a customer with 20+ users in the system from 5 am to 11 pm.  Those types of customers also tend to have several integrations so you have to consider whether loading one integration requires re-loading another.

I found that while the Sage phone system makes it seem like they are handling support for integrations locally in some cases you are blind transferred to the actual ISV who sometimes only offers "leave a voice message and we will call you back".

In the future, I suggest what we will be doing is reselling the ISV integration at SLP plus a mandatory annual fee to cover our overhead of being the front line project manager who is called for initial support diagnosis.  I will tier these fees based on experience with the ISVs so that there are (a) low/no maintenance, (b) medium maintenance, and (c) high maintenance -- each will have a different annual fee which recurs.

------------------------------
Wayne Schulz - Schulz Consulting - 860-516-8990
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 01-16-2020 08:48
From: Bernie Lehman
Subject: Alternatives to Sage Paperless

I agree, we have spent countless hours helping ISV's (Scanco in particular) find the bugs in their products.  We always have to prove to they are causing the error and then hope they get a fix in a few months - which we also have to test.  The client never wants to pay for this and of course neither does Scanco.

------------------------------
Bernie Lehman
Lehman Wesley & Associates
------------------------------


Original Message:
Sent: 01-15-2020 08:31
From: Wayne Schulz
Subject: Alternatives to Sage Paperless

BTW, my most recent Altec was a net license ( billed on my invoices ) of about $18,000. Altec services which were billed directly from Altec ( no margin - the excuse is that if a consultant wants to learn Altec they could take this piece themselves)  were about $20,000. I have every reason to believe that both these figures will likely double within a year. I don't expect to be making any further margin off future sales which is a trend I see for 2020+.

TL;DR: The time period where consultants give away the initial meeting, the review meeting, the various demo meetings is done for me. These are very high margin sales that kick off lucrative ongoing fees for the ISV.  Don't think you are receiving free invites to happy hours and dinners for nothing. Unless "will work for a free meal" helps pay your bills ( it won't for me ) then it's time for consulting firms to retool how they bill and manage ISV sales, implementations, and ongoing support. This doesn't consider the thorny problem of once the integration is installed where the VAR providing ongoing support is forced to play the "prove it's the integration causing the problem" and "reinstall the integration after-hours" followed by "oh, we just released an update to that integration, install it again".

This is a big big trap that consultants need to develop a plan to deal with going forward as Sage 100 core product functionality ages/stagnates and new functionality is largely provided by integrations. Whether consultants realize it now or in the future -- this type of ISV work now needs to be billed for at every phase of the process.

------------------------------
Wayne Schulz - Schulz Consulting - 860-516-8990


Original Message:
Sent: 01-15-2020 08:16
From: John Wilder
Subject: Alternatives to Sage Paperless

Thanks for the feedback.  I don't have one specific need (yet). Really trying to get an idea of what has worked for alternatives. Real High Level.  I'll do some deeper dive on the items above, appreciate the input.

------------------------------
John Wilder
Technology Integrators


Original Message:
Sent: 01-14-2020 12:04
From: Wayne Schulz
Subject: Alternatives to Sage Paperless

I just had a customer go with Altec / DocLink. I think it's the type of solution some might make money from if they also manage the implementation and consulting themselves ( as opposed to having Altec do the implementation ). However, to just resell it is likely not a profit maker once you factor in time spent in meetings with the customer and Altec sales.  There's a rather small piece of the sale that you get a commission on. From memory, you get nothing on services or OCR.

Speaking generally and not about Altec in particular --- in past years ISV integrations seemed to be something we could all make money off. Now, however, it seems that only portions of the sales are commissioned, there is more upfront meeting, more questions from the customer about whether a technical issue is a Sage problem vs ISV issue  --- enjoy playing "prove it's my integration causing the problem" followed by " can I have everyone out of Sage at 11 pm so I can spend a few uncompensated hours re-installing the latest integration to see if that fixes your problem".


------------------------------
Wayne Schulz - Schulz Consulting - 860-516-8990

One factor not mentioned about ISV sales is the amount of tier earned on many of these. If you are an affiliate of one of the large partners, this is not a consideration, but for the small to medium partners (Silver, Gold and Platinum), we must continue to play this game with Sage. Because the margins are so small on most of these solutions, the earned tier is higher​. This helps these partners maintain their current tier and possibly move up. The amounts are the same for all partners on ISV solutions, but moving up in tier produces higher margins on standard Sage product which is where the advantage is.

------------------------------
John Hoyt, Co-Founder
Next Level Manufacturing Consulting Group
johnh@nextlevelMCG.com
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 01-16-2020 09:26
From: Wayne Schulz
Subject: Alternatives to Sage Paperless

Avalara is rising on my headache list. Support for their product is through a generic Avalara help desk and always involves loading their latest integration ( which seems to change daily ).

On the surface re-loading the Avalara integration is not that big of a deal until you have a customer with 20+ users in the system from 5 am to 11 pm.  Those types of customers also tend to have several integrations so you have to consider whether loading one integration requires re-loading another.

I found that while the Sage phone system makes it seem like they are handling support for integrations locally in some cases you are blind transferred to the actual ISV who sometimes only offers "leave a voice message and we will call you back".

In the future, I suggest what we will be doing is reselling the ISV integration at SLP plus a mandatory annual fee to cover our overhead of being the front line project manager who is called for initial support diagnosis.  I will tier these fees based on experience with the ISVs so that there are (a) low/no maintenance, (b) medium maintenance, and (c) high maintenance -- each will have a different annual fee which recurs.

------------------------------
Wayne Schulz - Schulz Consulting - 860-516-8990
------------------------------


Original Message:
Sent: 01-16-2020 08:48
From: Bernie Lehman
Subject: Alternatives to Sage Paperless

I agree, we have spent countless hours helping ISV's (Scanco in particular) find the bugs in their products.  We always have to prove to they are causing the error and then hope they get a fix in a few months - which we also have to test.  The client never wants to pay for this and of course neither does Scanco.

------------------------------
Bernie Lehman
Lehman Wesley & Associates


Original Message:
Sent: 01-15-2020 08:31
From: Wayne Schulz
Subject: Alternatives to Sage Paperless

BTW, my most recent Altec was a net license ( billed on my invoices ) of about $18,000. Altec services which were billed directly from Altec ( no margin - the excuse is that if a consultant wants to learn Altec they could take this piece themselves)  were about $20,000. I have every reason to believe that both these figures will likely double within a year. I don't expect to be making any further margin off future sales which is a trend I see for 2020+.

TL;DR: The time period where consultants give away the initial meeting, the review meeting, the various demo meetings is done for me. These are very high margin sales that kick off lucrative ongoing fees for the ISV.  Don't think you are receiving free invites to happy hours and dinners for nothing. Unless "will work for a free meal" helps pay your bills ( it won't for me ) then it's time for consulting firms to retool how they bill and manage ISV sales, implementations, and ongoing support. This doesn't consider the thorny problem of once the integration is installed where the VAR providing ongoing support is forced to play the "prove it's the integration causing the problem" and "reinstall the integration after-hours" followed by "oh, we just released an update to that integration, install it again".

This is a big big trap that consultants need to develop a plan to deal with going forward as Sage 100 core product functionality ages/stagnates and new functionality is largely provided by integrations. Whether consultants realize it now or in the future -- this type of ISV work now needs to be billed for at every phase of the process.

------------------------------
Wayne Schulz - Schulz Consulting - 860-516-8990


Original Message:
Sent: 01-15-2020 08:16
From: John Wilder
Subject: Alternatives to Sage Paperless

Thanks for the feedback.  I don't have one specific need (yet). Really trying to get an idea of what has worked for alternatives. Real High Level.  I'll do some deeper dive on the items above, appreciate the input.

------------------------------
John Wilder
Technology Integrators


Original Message:
Sent: 01-14-2020 12:04
From: Wayne Schulz
Subject: Alternatives to Sage Paperless

I just had a customer go with Altec / DocLink. I think it's the type of solution some might make money from if they also manage the implementation and consulting themselves ( as opposed to having Altec do the implementation ). However, to just resell it is likely not a profit maker once you factor in time spent in meetings with the customer and Altec sales.  There's a rather small piece of the sale that you get a commission on. From memory, you get nothing on services or OCR.

Speaking generally and not about Altec in particular --- in past years ISV integrations seemed to be something we could all make money off. Now, however, it seems that only portions of the sales are commissioned, there is more upfront meeting, more questions from the customer about whether a technical issue is a Sage problem vs ISV issue  --- enjoy playing "prove it's my integration causing the problem" followed by " can I have everyone out of Sage at 11 pm so I can spend a few uncompensated hours re-installing the latest integration to see if that fixes your problem".


------------------------------
Wayne Schulz - Schulz Consulting - 860-516-8990