General Consultant Discussion

I just read some great posts from Wayne, Peter & co. concerning Sage maintenance/tier changes. If we have time I would love to discuss strategies for continuing partner-direct tech support plans, as it is a pretty big revenue source for our MAS 90/200 team.

This is important enough that I would like to discuss continuously leading up to the meeting. Part of my thoughts: 1. Broaden the branding of 90 Minds so it's evident that with the 90 people we have substantial support resources beyond most VARS. 2. Consider (I posted this today) a group ""Issues Tracking"" so we catch things like the DTR bug. Sage has incentive to hold their KB articles now -- so it's going to possibly be even more important than ever that we create our own technical resources as much as we can. 3. Use other members for subcontracting on an active basis so members can regularly perform engagements for scripting, reporting, etc which they might not otherwise have the skills for. I think OASIS continues as our collaboration team - where we mainly hash out technical issue, bugs, second opinions. Items no 2 and 3 above (and any others ) would be strictly 90 Minds full members With respect to the support plans being offered -- I see us offering upgrades as an included option on the annual plan as well as some local on-site annual meetings (these are tough because there's not always a lot to discuss).

I think we should discuss this here in the forums but think it would be a great topic for the group in person as well. I'm not affected (yet) but it's already a concern. One thing that we had already planned on doing this year with our plans was including ""goodies"" and add-ons to Sage CRM as part of the plan. The goodies would be exclusive to Azamba CareTaker Plan members only. Things like the ability to link a person to multiple companies (think: brokers / agents), improved communication management, performance tuning wizard, etc. We develop a ton of widgets, add-ons and gizmos for Sage CRM every year so for us this is just a matter of planning and executing. I'm not sure if this works for other partners though but hopefully the idea helps. We are modeling our plans after Amazon Prime to spark creative approaches.

I think Wayne's items 2 & 3 are of vital importance in staying in the ERP and CRM games. And I'm sure we can put together our own KB that actually works! Anyone who is relying on margin and tier for profitability purposes is already on the downward spiral. That's part of the reason as to why it's important to expand your offerings to be much more than Sage can be to your customers (they may be able to catch up but with their present management team, I don't think it's very likely that they will). Taking Wayne's idea of bundling upgrades as part of your plan is a great start. From an ERP and CRM focus, we also offer options such as: *building in X number of custom reports (we don't know what those reports will be up front but as the customer needs them, we write them) *X number of days of product classes (customers with a high turnover rate tend to like this option) *installing PUs, TTUs and hot fixes as they become available *implementing new features in PUs and upgrades (we use the product roadmap for this...it's accurate enough since we pretty much know how to ""read"" Sage's timeline) *moving MAS or Abra to a new server or to a hosted environment *anything that the customer wants us to add into the plan (an attorney friend of mine who's been doing fixed pricing in his firm for years calls this the ""Who the Hell Knows"" plan) Those types of services will put a nice distance between Sage and us. However, we are also taking it beyond Sage products. These types of services are definitely going to be based on your firm's particular expertise and interests. For example, we offer options like: *helping customers to revamp their pricing model (I've found that many of our customers really have no idea how to price, and neither did we a few years ago) *performing business process reviews for customers *assisting customers with getting up to speed on social media (how many of your customers talk about that they know they need to have corporate FB pages and an active blog but they admittedly just can't get there?) *producing comedic business videos for them (mainly for YouTube purposes but some may want to create videos for TV). The videos can be outward facing for their marketing purposes or inward facing for training purposes. Basically, the sky's the limit on what you can do for your customers that Sage cannot. And I understand that not every customer will want all of this but if we never tell them that we can do all of these other great things, we'll forever just be the MAS 90 guys. And there's not much of a future in that. Peter is exactly right, creativity is the key. BTW, Peter, so some of your customers are not on a plan at all? How do those folks interact with Azamba? Just curious...since 100% of our customers are on a Knowledge Transfer Agreement (KTA).

I meant that only Azamba CareTaker customers would get those goodies - Sage CRM customers using another Solution Provider would not have access to them (unless that Solution Provider was partnered with Azamba of course). All of our customers are on a plan. It just that one of the plans is ""On Demand"" where a customer is required to pre-authorize up to $1,000 in credit card charges for calls that would be charged at $125 for the first 30 minutes and $50 for every subsequent 15 minutes. Our implementation of this is spotty at best. 90% of new customers acquired in the last few years are on the plan but probably a small group of pre-existing customers. One of our initiatives for 2012 is to get everyone on a plan before end of Q1. I'm thinking of raising the On Demand rates to $150 for first 30 minutes and $60 for each subsequent 15 minutes to help those folks make a go / no go decision. I haven't decided that bit yet. It's not perfect but we have several sagecrm.com customers that really don't want a plan. But they are assigned to us, we get a small recurring commission check from them and we spend absolutely ZERO time on them. So I don't see the need to jettison them to meet an internally set goal of having everyone on a plan. I'm always open to new ideas.

@PeterWolf Here you go -- Been using this just fine - also note well that you should key the response time. If you want to offer a $150 for 30 minutes that's awesome -- but the person should have to wait 24 or 48 business hours from receipt of payment. Give them the option and you don't have to look like the bad guy because they can pick a lower price (with a resulting lower level of service). In order for this to ""stick"" you must make sure that if someone elects the lowest level that you not talk to them for 24 to 48 hours and that time is measured from when they pay. Personally I find the people who take advantage of these pay as you go are really not long term customers -- though having this type of fee schedule will get you out of having to spend 20 minutes explaining your fee. I call it a diagnosis charge so that I can wiggle out of any customer who comes in with a huge issue that is clearly way more than a support fix. https://docs.google.com/a/s-consult.com/document/d/1QmrlW56vMeeJ0v5_yTnSBgglNLZsy3jTViO9CZm4RI0/edit?pli=1 I don't recommend one-off support but there are instances such as when you have people approaching cold from the web that this type if agreement is one step above just telling them ""no"" ...

Options For Desired Diagnostic Session Response Time ______ $ 300 Single Session - NO SOONER than 24 business hours of payment ______ $ 650 Single Session - within 4 business hours of payment ______ $ 950 Single Session - within 1 business hour of payment ______ $1,500 Single Session - within 4 business hours of payment - WEEKEND OR HOLIDAY OR AFTER 9AM- 5PM ET(Subject To Availability) Important: You are responsible for backing up your data prior to all support sessions. We are not responsible for loss of data. This fee guarantees a diagnosis to your support request and does not guarantee a fix. I authorize Wayne Schulz / Schulz Consulting to charge the above agreed upon amount to my credit card provided herein and subject to all terms discussed above. I agree that I will pay for this purchase in accordance with the issuing bank cardholder agreement and I am authorized to access and provide access to the MAS90 or MAS200 system data.

I also think it's degrading for us to bill support in 5 /10/15 minute increments. We invest substantial resources on keeping up to date and current and should charge appropriately. Get comfortable saying no because until I did I was not able to change much of anything.

Thanks for the info as always. I hear you on the degrading bit. I'm really tired of all the bullshit admin of tracking ticky tacky support calls. I like the ""guarantee of diagnosis"" but not of the fix. Maybe I will switch to that with my on demand service. How does that work in practice for you? What is the reaction if you come back with ""that will be $400 to fix this issue""? And do you ever fix it during the ""Single Session"" that you are selling? I still like the idea of the ""on demand"" plan though for those people that NEVER call and yet I get a bit of $$ in commissions each month (sagecrm.com) or year (on premises Sage CRM).

Peter, that makes sense. Meaning that a customer that you and I partner on (you take care of CRM and I take care of MAS) will be on the Azamba plan for CRM. That's the way it should be. But you wouldn't make the goodies available to a non-Azamba customer at all, right? When we first made the FOTF change, we allowed customers to buy 5-packs of cases. The further down the road I got though, the more those cases felt too much like hours so we got rid of them. Having cases still didn't change the customer relationship enough (for me, at least). And, just like Wayne says, that type of customer is not a long-term one. So, On Demand is not an option we offer. It's not just an internally set goal, it's part of our why. Wayne, ""Get comfortable saying no because until I did I was not able to change much of anything."" Perfect!

@PeterWolf I use this diagnosis charge because it is incredibly awkward to dismiss yourself from an incoming technical call that is asking support questions - especially if the person is on your newsletter list or feels they have some other type of relationship. And I feel like a big dick telling someone off-plan and 20 versions back that it will be $ xxx per call when they're truthfully calling to see if I will give them a free question and if not whether I'll bill them for 5 minutes of my time at my lowest hourly rate. I'm with @JohnShaver- I really dont' want to do per call so this is the best compromise I could think of. I know from experience that I have not been successful up-selling those looking for a one-off support call with a ""hey join my $3,100 per year plan"" -- exactly zero takers. With this diagnosis I've sold $3,200 in the past month. And, hell yeah if I can fix the issue within the call I fix it. But I don't promise that to the customer so that I'm nto stuck handholding someone who tried to self-upgrade and is now calling for support....

Thanks guys - this really is useful. I just got off the phone with Ed Kless and we were discussing this (for all of 5 minutes). He summed it up succintly - dovetailing with both John and Wayne - don't charge for the hours. Charge a diagnosis fee and state that the solution bid will be the end result of the diagnosis. Makes a hell of a lot of sense to me and helps me kill off any sort of admin hell around the support.

So can you describe an actual example of this process - they call, you give them the document while you are on the phone - fill it out and send it back and then you get to work (if they choose the $950 option)? Or call back the next day if they choose $300?

@EricAnderson - for us, we are trying to drive everyone to our CareTaker portal (linked to our Sage CRM in house, of course). The form would be on there with all the terms. For us, I want to link the order / approval form with SPS for credit card processing. We already use them in house anyway for customer purchases.

Peter, love it when a plan comes together! That's exactly what we're doing with the Vision Statement (it's just that the VS is usually on a larger scale). We diagnose with scope and proof then prescribe (fix) with implementation.

http://www.s-consult.com/request-information/diagnosis/

@JohnShaver - You bet! And to answer your other question, yes - the intent would be that when Azamba partners with other Sage resellers, the client would be on the Azamba CareTaker plan for ongoing Sage CRM support and the goodies would be exclusive to those customers (and Azamba direct customers on plan). Membership has its privileges. (I might trademark that)

A material number of people just want to know - what will it cost. I need a quick way to response that says: Do A (read) then B (agree / fill out form) then C (pay). In my experience if you leave any of those steps murky then the prospect wiggles around and wants to get you on the phone to talk shop. My goal is not to spend more than about 15 minutes on the phone (5 if possible) and then guide them toward a paid diagnosis. Of course there are all sorts of exceptions like if the work is interesting, the customer is in your backyard, etc. My toughest stance is for a prospect who I don't know, who most likely is doing a Google search and who utters any of the words: - Very small business (Code = Looking for free) - Vendor (My new pet peeve is to be called a vendor or approved vendor) - Checking rates (This one is just self explanatory) - Never need to call (Which begs the question of what they're doing on the phone now) - Don't need a plan - Dropped maintenance years ago - Can't stand our VAR (or the three before them)

@PeterWolf I'm going to tell you again that to make this CRM thing roll you will need to have some type of a fixed introductory component or you are going to go bankrupt babysitting and quoting every VAR who wants a free hand putting together a quote.

I hear you on that. I have what we call our Quick Start plans which are fairly consistent from project to project these days. It varies based on: a) how much data the client wants brought over b) how many customizations they want / need (we try to encourage a no frills approach initially) c) how much training they want d) if they want MAS (or Accpac) integration active from day one These proposals are usually fairly easy to knock out. I have a template in our custom Sage CRM Prosposal system that I can copy and modify to suit needs.

And I can attest that @PeterWolf does have great documents to get the prospects started. He and I just kicked off a new project where his team is managing the CRM project in collaboration with us on the MAS 90 project. Great stuff!

Thanks @JohnShaver!