Alinean Announces Business Value Selling Suite v2.7

Sales Professionals to Benefit from Enhanced Business Case Reporting Features

ORLANDO, Fla. (July 25, 2006) — Alinean today announced a significant upgrade to their Business Value Selling Suite of software, further enhancing the detailed ROI reporting features specifically designed to help solution providers develop compelling business cases for proposed solutions. With the suite, consultants, sales professionals and channel partners can better engage with Cx-level executive decision makers and economic buyers, quantify the costs and benefits of proposed solutions, and justify investments.

Using business value to sell has been proven to reduce discounting by 20% or more by: migrating sales from features, function and price selling to value selling; reducing the time it takes to develop credible businesses cases from days or months to only hours; reducing sales cycle durations by 30-40% by automating the problem identification and business case building phases of the project; and increasing the success rate of proposals by over 60%. This new version 2.7 of the software represents the sixth upgrade to the suite since it was launched in 2004.

New features in version 2.7 include:

• Enhanced user interface and workflow, making it easier for sales professionals without a financial background to effectively develop and present results
• Direct creation of compelling Microsoft PowerPoint presentations
• Enhanced analytics to increase the credibility of reports
• Integration with existing CRM solutions, including a special AppExchange version for salesForce.com users

The strong demand for business value selling solutions continues. In the March issue of Selling Power, a survey of sales executives indicates that in 2006 it will take more time to close each sale, and more calls get to a purchase decision. Consequently, the sales cycle lengthens, increasing the likelihood of a “no” decision.

"Unfortunately CRM investments have helped improve sales efficiency, but not effectiveness, and as such have not measurably reduced sales cycles or improve competitive advantage on proposals,” says Alinean co-founder and CEO Tom Pisello. “One of the best ways for vendors to overcome the barriers of frugal buyers is with business value selling – identifying specific and important business goals and opportunities for improvement, quantifying the value impact of proposed solutions, and presenting quantifiable value proof-points to elevate the priority of proposed solutions.”

Driven to be skeptical by a lack of demonstrated value from prior investments and increased investment governance, frugal buyers are the norm. Solution providers know that from every prospect they will hear “show me the money” - with over 90% now requiring ROI proof before the project gets approved, and over 85% saying the demand for business value analysis has increased or remained the same.

“According to our research, over 81% of buyers expect the vendors themselves to quantify business value of proposed solutions,” states Mr. Pisello. “Vendor analysis is so important that prospects view the ability to justify solutions as a key differentiator, with over 61% rating a solution provider’s value assessment ability as important in the selection process.”

“Although IT buyers need vendors to help with developing business cases, skeptical buyers are cautious about vendor provided ROI, with less than 20% of buyers having a high degree of trust in vendor value assessments,” states Randy Perry, VP of IDC’s business value practice. “Third-party research and tools to validate results and claims seem to help with the skepticism, as well as vendors providing the analysis in a collaborative and cooperative fashion.”

The Alinean Business Value Selling Suite is sold directly to IT solution providers, and can be customized to convey the unique value of specific solutions for specific customers and vertical segments. Solutions successfully sold using the suite include business applications and process improvements, SOA, servers, storage, security, databases, virtualization, networking, VoIP, compliance management, IT management, application development, governance and more. Companies that have licensed and use the Alinean Business Value Selling Suite to improve their sales effectiveness include IT leaders such as HP, IBM, Dell, Microsoft, Oracle, Cisco, SAP, EMC, Canon, Siemens Medical, Canon, Wyse, 3com and BellSouth, as well as small and medium IT organizations such as Transitive, Princeton Softech, Full Armor and COPAN Systems.

More information about the Alinean Business Value Selling Suite can be found at: http://www.alinean.com/BusinessValueSelling.asp.
 

About Alinean

Alinean develops software and solutions to streamline the B2B selling process with business value selling solutions – using ROI/TCO and business case analysis to prove and improve the value of solutions to prospects and customers. The company’s founding team pioneered the concept of interactive ROI and TCO software in 1994, developing award-winning solutions for leading B2B vendors and consultants. Its research methodologies and software tools are used by analyst firms and consultancies such as IDC and B2B leaders such as Oracle, HP, Dell, SAP, Microsoft, Symantec and IBM, and have helped justify billions of dollars in IT spending and derived value. For more information, visit www.alinean.com or call 407.382.0005.
 

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