Is there ever a time when hiring an outside senior executive for a short term assignment in a software or hardware company is the right thing to do? If you’re based in the US, the most typical response from tech company boards and senior leadership to the question of using Interim Management seems to be […]
Selling SaaS through the VAR Channel
The move toward Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) has been the strongest trend in the software business in recent memory. It changes the software business model in a number of fundamental ways. For the purposes of this article, I’m assuming the reader has a basic understanding of the SaaS business model. I’m also going to assume a basic […]
Integrating Sales & Marketing at Software and Hardware Companies
In some – but not all – tech companies the Sales and Marketing functions are managed separately. They are separate, but closely related functions that some people without a strong background in either function have a tendency to confuse. Normally, there is a VP or Director heading up the Marketing department, and another VP or […]
Integrating the Marketing and Engineering Functions at Technology Companies
In most tech companies, Product Marketing and Product Development/Engineering are managed separately. There is usually one VP over the Product Development function and another VP over the overall marketing function, which usually (but not always) includes both current product management/marketing and future product planning. While this is certainly an appropriate way to organize a software […]
Channel Pricing Strategy for Software and Hardware Products
Pricing software products and SaaS offerings is always a difficult exercise. With high product development costs, but very low costs of goods sold, there are many different strategies that people have followed successfully (and not so successfully!) over time. Pricing hardware products is a bit simpler because there is generally a significant cost of goods […]
