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India Channels Satisfaction- 2010
1. May 14, 2009
ChanSat India 2009
The Voice of India’s IT Channel Community
Presented By:
Tirthankar Sen | Director, Partnering Research (tsen@springboardresearch.com)
2. Study Scope and Field Methodology
• Products:
₋ IT Hardware (PCs, Servers, Storage & Printers)
₋ Enterprise Applications
₋ Router & Switches
• Vendors targeted across 3 product domains:
₋ IT Hardware: IBM, HP, Lenovo, HCL, Sun & EMC
₋ Enterprise Application: Microsoft, Oracle, SAP, Symantec
₋ Router & Switches: Cisco, Nortel
• Target respondents: The respondents were senior decision-makers including CEOs, MDs,
Owners, CFOs, Head of Sales, Marketing Managers, or the Vendor Relationship Manager
• City coverage: Delhi (NCR Region), Chennai, Kolkata, Mumbai, Bangalore, Ahmadabad,
Bhubaneswar, Chandigarh, Hyderabad, Indore, Jaipur, Ludhiana, Secunderabad
• Field Methodology: The primary methodology for this study is a face-to-face quantitative
market survey of 333 enterprise-focused channels partners in the Indian market covering 12
vendors with fixed quotas.
• Field Time: The survey was conducted between the month of December 2008 to February
2009.
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3. Business Challenges
54% of the channel partners identified competition as their primary business challenge.
Primary Challenge Other Challenges
Competition 54% Competition 95%
Customer satisfaction &
56%
retention
Generating growth 18%
Poor profitability 56%
Poor profitability 9% Generating growth 52%
Finding & retaining people 46%
Finding & retaining people 7%
Cutting costs 40%
Customer satisfaction & Managing cash flows 30%
7%
retention
Poor vendor support 17%
Others 6% Others 2%
0% 20% 40% 60% 0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%
Q. What is your company’s top business challenge in India? What are the other key challenges that you face?
Source: Springboard Research, 2009 Base = All/N = 333 3
4. Effect of Economic Slowdown on Market
Reduction in business opportunities coupled with payment delays and low IT spending are the top
three concerns voiced by channel partners.
Effect of Slowdown Steps to Meet Slowdown
Reduced biz. opportunites 34% Cost-cutting 45%
Delay in payments 31% Improved service 28%
Low IT spending priority 17% Improving vendor
7%
relationships
Not much effect 3%
Improving marketing 5%
Increasing pressure to meet
2%
targets
Explore new biz areas 4%
Decreased credit term 2%
Streamlining the business 1%
Decreased margins 2%
6% Maintain margins 1%
Others
Don't know/ Can't say 2% None 9%
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50%
Q. What changes do you see in the market due to current slowdown in the economy?
Q. What kind of steps are you taking in your business to face the current slowdown situation?
Source: Springboard Research, 2009 Base = All/N = 333 4
5. Primary Growth Drivers
Despite relatively low investments by vendors in the present scenario, 33% of the respondents
believe increased market share from existing vendors will boost their growth prospects in future.
This is followed by 30% in favor of geographic expansion.
Increased market share
33%
from existing vendors
36% of the channel partners
focusing on large enterprises for both
EMC and SAP feel service based Geographic expansion 30%
offerings from the IT vendors will
generate growth.
New product offerings
16%
from existing vendors
Service-based offerings 15%
New vendor relationships 5%
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50%
Q. From where do you see your primary growth being generated in the coming 2 years?
Source: Springboard Research, 2009 Base = All/N = 333 5
6. Industry Performance
Channel partners give the highest importance to finance related parameters but are the least
satisfied in this area.
8.00
7.75
7.50
7.34 7.35
7.25 7.11 7.14
7.04 7.07
6.98
7.00
6.76
6.71
6.75
6.50
6.34
6.25
6.00
Social Interactions Product Sales & Marketing Financial Support
Importance Satisfaction
Q. I will read out few parameters; please tell me how important they are to your company? Please rate them on a 10 point importance scale, where
10 is “very important” and 1 is “least important”
Q. I will read out the same parameters cited in the previous question. Please rate them on a 10 point satisfaction scale, where 10 is “Highly Satisfied”
and 1 is “Highly Dissatisfied”.
Source: Springboard Research, 2009 Base = All/N = 333 6
7. Performance Matrix - Industry
Margins, time of solving issues, incentives, pricing, credit periods, service center location, ability to
create service revenue from product sales, and diversified product ranges are the key challenges
where IT vendors need to focus.
7.75
Low Focus Maintain
Technological strength of the product
7.50 Knowledgeable sales rep.
High Performance
Brand Image
7.25 Ease of doing business
Helpful sales rep.
Ease of product usage
7.00 Technical training & certification Quality of tech. support Availability of the product
Regular vendor interaction Access to sr. executives
Technical support Availability of the parts
Access to sales team &Joint customer call
6.75 Direct Access to Vendor` Regular vendor interaction Service revenue from the product sold
Advertising
Low Performance
Value of vendor endorsement Turnaround time of solving issues
Product sales training Product promotions Product Range
Quality of the vendors Presence of service center
6.50
Quality of distributor service Competitive pricing Product margins
Volume discounting
Not Significant Credit period High Focus
6.25 Rewards and Incentive
Availability of vendor provided financing facility
6.50 6.75 7.00 7.25 7.50 7.75 8.00
Low Importance High Importance
Source: Springboard Research, 2009 Base = All/N = 333 7
8. Brand Trust vs. Satisfaction Matrix
Trust – Above Average
Below Average
Satisfaction – Below Average Satisfaction – Above Average
Source: Springboard Research, 2009
8
9. Brand Loyalty vs. Satisfaction Matrix
Loyalty – Above Average
Below Average
Satisfaction – Below Average Satisfaction – Above Average
Source: Springboard Research, 2009
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10. Conclusions & Recommendations (1/2)
• Channel partners are struggling with competition as their top business
challenge, followed by generating growth. In response to these challenges – as well
as the economic crisis – channels are most focused on cutting costs, improving
services, increasing share from existing vendors and growing geographically.
• The area of greatest channel importance is also the area where the industry
performs the worst – financial metrics.
• A statistical analysis of survey results identified the following areas as key domains
where greater vendor focus will reap strong channel satisfaction rewards:
– Product margins
– Turnaround time for issue resolution
– Competitive pricing
– Service revenues from products sold
– Credit periods
– Service center location
– Rewards and incentives
10
11. Conclusions & Recommendations (2/2)
• In spite of respective strengths and weaknesses, HP appears to be a clear leader in
terms of channel satisfaction and enablement in India.
• Channel excellence in India is a journey that requires continuous evaluation, iterative
effort and measurement.
– Vendors should more carefully study the survey results of this study to identify their
channel performance and areas where more work is required.
– This study provides an independent 3rd party snapshot of relative vendor strengths and
weaknesses; however, to better understand each vendor’s respective channel
capabilities, more focused research and evaluation will be required.
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In comparison to Tier I cities, Tier II cities feel poor profitability is an important business challenge faced by the companies. Tier I (5%) and Tier II (19%) – Might be due to small customer base and the companies can add better deals/ discounts/ etc. to improve salesOn the other hand Tier I cities feel Customer Retention and also Employee Retention are the most important challenges – These can primarily be attributed to increased competition and decreasing loyalty value amongst both customers and employeesAs per the partner responses, the partners of SAP rate finding and retaining people as the key challenge in the country
