I am sending Johnnie suggestions. This is long overdue. Way too many people think of Sage 100 as it was 10 years ago. When it's put in a decent cloud instance and operates in app mode, it fills nearly all the functionality many firms want without going to Acumatica or Intacct. Yet this doesn't really get SHOWN. A firm can use Sage 100 with various enhancements to produce much more efficiency and information than many people think it can.
These demos should simply show the functionality without coming much lower than 10,000 feet. Prospects now perform 60+% of their research before they ever talk to anybody. These demos mean to get them to ask questions, not to sell them on the details -- that task must be met largely with more traditional, long-form, personalized demos.
Here are some suggestions to start.
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Sage 100 in the cloud. Simple operation with Sage operating as apps, not within a remote desktop. DSD SPC (and probably others) does this nicely. Simple printing. Simple interaction with the users' desktop. The point is to show Sage 100 running as a seamless cloud tool, not much different from Acumatica or Intacct
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Simple quote-to-cash process. Paperless office sending quotes, Click-to-pay for customer deposit, shipping integration sending notices, customer portal (Paya or cimcloud). In under 5 minutes, there is no reason to complicate the message about where the added functionality comes from.
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Ecommerce integration for really simple ordering, payment, and customer portal. No muss, no fuss inventory and pricing integrations. On a pad, this becomes a remote selling tool.
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Customer portal. Use the new cimcloud offering, without being very specific about its 3rd-party. Customers ease of use, payments, and self-care. Then point out how internal sales people use this for management and reporting. Not much in detail, but these are big among new Sage 100 prospects.
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Emphasize rock-solid inventory management. This differentiates from QB, but importantly from Intacct. If somebody has significant inventory it shows quickly why they should be looking at Sage 100, not Intacct.
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AP Automation. Quick walkthrough of simplicity of capturing email invoices, matching PO, workflow of approvals, importing into Sage AP invoices. Then, select those to pay electronically or physically. The distributed capability of all this through Cloud means a firm isn't tied to people onsite. Mention of the added security of not using paper checks. This is not so much selling AP Automation as showing how simple it can be with Sage 100, reminding the prospect that we do this at least as well as anybody else.
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Dashboarding from anywhere. The fancy dashboards featured in come-ons by Acumatica Microsoft, and Intacct can be done by Sage 100 in the cloud, using something like Dataself. Show them, don't explain them. Use dashboards that mimic those promoted in Intacct and Acumatica websites and short demos.
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Jerry Norman
Smartbridge Partners
(512) 653-7498
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