RE: Marketing the platform was: System i - Mentioned twice in SD Times

Lucas typed: "I just now had a look at your signature, and it appears
that you're working for an i5/OS tool vendor. Well, that's a completely
different minefield of marketing, and my advice probably doesn't help
you at all."

Exactly. I was going to reply to that effect, but you said it so well.

As to the rest of your note- you make the argument (that IBM enables)
that if you are an application ISV you shouldn't write code specifically
for i5/OS. If you want to be successful long range, you have to write
code that will run on any hardware because the hardware is a commodity.
I think you are exactly right, and it is curious that IBM appears to be
leading the way down that path by anonimizing the hardware.

jte



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-----Original Message-----
From: midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Lukas Beeler
Sent: Friday, February 22, 2008 4:08 PM
To: Midrange Systems Technical Discussion
Subject: Re: Marketing the platform was: System i - Mentioned
twice in SD Times

On Sat, Feb 23, 2008 at 12:29 AM, John Earl
<john.earl@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

"My personal suggestion is to use i5/OS in your title.

Somewhere on

the page, you can define the audience. An example:"
I understand your logic here - but history has proven it

to be flawed.

A business manager that thinks he owns an AS/400 that runs OS/400
will not often get past the cover page of a brochure that

says i5/OS.

We've

As an ERP ISV, we just switched to actually selling a
solution to the customer, not i5/OS or the System i.

In the end, what the customers want is a solution to whatever
business problem they're facing right now. They do not want
i5/OS, System i, AS/400, Windows 2000, Mac OS X or anything
like that: they want a solution.

The technical details of that solution aren't unimportant,
but they're not the main selling point. All the customer has
to know is that they have a native Windows and/or Java Client
they can use. If they want to know more, they can read the
technical details.

Of course it is another matter when you're dealing with
existing customers. Some of them are technical, but stuck
back in the 80ies with their 5250 sessions. Educating those
customers is hard, and sometimes even impossible.

Those that aren't technical are much easier to handle. Just
tell them that the same software package they're using right
now runs on a more modern System and that the transition is
exceptionally easy. Works well when migrating customers off
our old 5250 based solution (discontinued in 2001 or so) to
the current one.

I just now had a look at your signature, and it appears that
you're working for an i5/OS tool vendor. Well, that's a
completely different minefield of marketing, and my advice
probably doesn't help you at all.

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