The need to manage sales and drive optimal results is not new but the need for investments into the required technology to support the operations and performance needs is new and important. I have found in our research the lack of investment into technology for sales hampering the efficiency of sales processes along with the resulting effectiveness. Too many organizations dependent on spreadsheets or old methods to manage sales performance are finding the challenge of not being ability to provide information on the frequency required. This issue is contributing to the time delay in making corrective action and drive to achieve desired results. Despite the lack of maturity in organizations, I have seen where sales and revenue performance is a top priority for many of you in 2009.

When looking for technology in sales performance management, Varicent is one of the few integrated suite providers for sales performance management. Varicent came out with their latest release, Version 6 that introduces key advancements in usability, analytics and integration into the enterprise and advancing their platform and sophistication to meet a broad set of sales needs. Varicent has taken these improvements to advance their applications that span from quota planning to territory management to the details of the compensation models that generate incentive plans. I believe this is a key step as balancing the need for accessibility and usability of software to the roles from sales executives to sales analysts to sales reps is not an easy task.

In a little more detail on the new major release, I looked at what Varicent called Presenter, the integration of detailed reports to interactive analytics are now available without IT involvement. This new set of capabilities in Presenter dramatically simplifies use of analytics and consumption of information. One of the key aspects of Varicent has been the flexibility of their modeling that now is capable of more easily comparing models in what is commonly referred to as scenario planning and need to collaborate on different approaches to compensation and performance. The new advancements help make the modeling even easier for analysts to utilize. The last key aspect is about integration into to CRM vendors like Microsoft and salesforce.com where information on sales and opportunities are key transactional detail needed for determining progress to plan and incentives along with integrating data for providing information more easily to all levels of sales.

What does this mean for you? Well, a new approach is most likely needed to manage sales performance and sales operations. Our benchmark research in sales performance management has identified a span of requirements that are driving organizations to make improvements. Many organizations are moving at dramatically faster pace of change in sales from territory and quota management to more directly addressing the incentive compensation processes to inspire a continuation of daily sales activity with the same rigor and passion. To accomplish this will require a re-examination of existing efforts to meet the sales organizations needs while addressing the specific sales process and application needs. Varicent has brought an important set of advancements to adapt to these needs in a simpler manner and is well poised to continue their growth and application advancement for sales. Now it’s your move to evaluate your sales prowess and see which technology and applications will help your efforts as revenue and customers are king.

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Regards,

Mark Smith - CEO & EVP Research