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many fronts, few troops. to meet the growth challenges in the b2b market, toshiba needs partners -- as many as we can get. certainly, no one will deny the fact that the best relationship managers are people. unfortunately, we cannot afford the luxury of individual account managers for all the resellers we need to grow our business. indeed, the vast majority of resellers we must mobilise in the smb market will rarely come into direct contact with toshiba. nevertheless, our business success depends on their loyalty. that's why we are developing new tools and processes to recruit and engage indirect resellers. as a positive side effect, the tools should also help our sales managers to do more business with their managed accounts. toshiba partner place
is a system our path to nirvana? despite the need for a system, there is a great temptation to believe that a system alone can solve the problem. it won't! systems can only solve the problem if they are aligned to people and processes. no system will create a dealer programme or a update a price list; no system will write the copy that will explain the benefit of a new product; no system will select the right bait to lure the wary customer. people do this. still, while not doing all the work, certainly systems and tools should at least make everyone's job easier. toshiba partner place
dovetail to what exists. what if we built a new system and nobody used it? sounds silly? well the fact is that we do not have the resources to maintain a new system. that's why our approach is not to create yet another system that people have to fill with content, but rather to leverage the systems and content that already exists. in the past few years colleagues around europe have been trained to publish content regularly in the cms and broadvision publishing centre. so our approach will be to enhance the broadvision system by adding password protected dealer communities. this will put us in a position to reuse as much of our existing assets and processes as possible. toshiba partner place
bv ppc different folks, different strokes. by using bv password protected communities (bv ppc), we meet the countries requirement for grouping their partners in segments and deliver targeted content based on the programmes designed for these communities. it will be possible to publish a different set of content depending on the partner log-in information. standard elements will be developed in the "build once, use many" spirit, but countries will also be able to mix and match the content according to their own operational requirements. countries can create as many or few password-protected communities as they require. toshiba partner place
the short programme. we have learned that some of our competitors have introduced extremely complex (and expensive) systems, with all the bells, whistles and technical artistry to score big points in the freestyle event. nevertheless, the feedback from subsidiaries and partners tell s us that it is even more important to get the basics right. keeping it simple is valued even more than highly evolved workflows and process integration. what works, is what is already working in the daily phone calls from dealers to our call centres and reception desks; and what partners are asking for daily on the phone is, what else, information about products, prices and availability. that's why the first objective of the partner place will be to provide a place to get the basics, quickly and easily - and luckily most of this already exists in the business. toshiba partner place
is a system the cure-all? the good news is that we are already producing a lot of the stuff dealers require. it is already on the public website or in powerpoint presentations, excel sheets and fax forms on various hard disks. the problem is that it has not been collected in an easy to access place designed specifically for dealers. therefore we will collect all content that is relevant to various dealer segments and put it in one place on the community homepage. for example, • the price list, of course, will be a running feature • the popular driver download database will be prominent • there will be an icon for new products and training presentations • a link to the "glass factory", a tro database with every detail on every product delivered • the bestseller page: information to help dealers plan to take advantage of toshiba demand generation activities • downloadable forms • and of course all the latest news from toshiba all this will be available on a special password protected area that is visually distinctive from the public web experience - and each visit means one phone call less. toshiba partner place
one trick at a time. however, important a good score in the short programme is, competition is all about differentiation. that's why we need to work on an ongoing artistic programme that will get dealers in the habit of stopping by regularly. we need to keep toshiba top-of-mind and dealers constantly engaged in selling our products. so we will teach the system one sticky trick at time, sticky because it will make them thirsty for more. for the first release, we have prioritised a feature that we believe more clearly differentiates toshiba from our competitors: the crystal ball. toshiba partner place
the crystal ball. throughout europe, each morning every individual engaged in computer sales, whether within toshiba or at a reseller, faces the same problem: "what story can i tell my customer today?" "how can i get the foot in the door?" the aim of the crystal ball will be to give the sales person easy to use tools that makes him (and toshiba) look good in the eyes of the customer. in the simplest terms, it will be a presentation with background material that paints a picture of what the future of mobile computing holds in store. it gives a 6-month, 1-year and 3-year perspective on what technology will be relevant for businesses and how businesses can gain from new technology. it will be updated monthly (and announced in the monthly newsletter): a reason for the users to come back each month and sell our vision each day. what could be more appropriate to our core positioning strategy of product leadership and a better way to extend our thought leadership mission? toshiba partner place
our best consultants are you. oh, there is one more trick in the first release. an interesting insight coming out of discussions with subsidiaries was that resellers often feel like davids when dealing with the goliath computer vendors. and while the are impressed (perhaps overwhelmed) by the rich set of features of channel extranets of some of our larger competitors, they often feel as if these systems are being done to them and not for them. there is an impression that top-down-managed american companies with their big american consulting firms have delivered systems that the customer in europe never ordered. an essential component is missing: voice of customer. this gives toshiba an opportunity to position the features we deliver as tailored directly to what partners are asking for. that's why we plan to include a regular survey feature asking our partners to consult us on what features would be of value in the future - and then delivering them based on the results. toshiba partner place
more tricks in the pipeline. we want the partner place to be perceived as place that changes as fast as the pace of the business. that's why we are already planning the second release in q4/04 to focus on tools that integrate processes closer, allowing us to better share business. the following functions are already being scoped for the next release: • lead management -- a better way to manage and share inbound business opportunities • e-campaigning -- a service to dealers who register their customers toshiba partner place
release plan toshiba partner place
getting the good news out. if we build it, they won't come without a strong initial catalyst and regular communication and incentives. that's why there will be a monthly newsletter highlighting promoting demand-generation activities and changes to the partner place. to achieve the objective of recruiting as many partners as possible we want to use at least one coop e-mail marketing campaign per quarter with dealer databases of all the major distributors. we hope we can include this in the european and local bonus conditions. incentives will be needed to encourage viral effects. toshiba partner place
schedule toshiba partner place
busy weeks ahead toshiba partner place
issues/risks from tisb meeting toshiba partner place
roi model (conceptual) recruit <# of registered dealers> <# sessions> <# pageviews> <# downloads> activation/engagement <# leads> leads <win/loss> etc… Title of presentation
