Tougher economic conditions and tighter customer budgets. Market consolidation. Increased competition. Continued globalization. Shorter product life cycles. Commodization.

In an environment where customer needs and macro-economic conditions are changing rapidly, these market pressures are making it tougher for high-tech companies to grow their pipeline and win sales, while minimizing cost of sales. To minimize cost of sales and keep up with the rapid evolution of market conditions, seamless collaboration across all sales and marketing channels, a focus on price and margin management, and integration with order fulfillment and revenue management are paramount.

According to a recent SAP benchmark study, "Driving Your Channel Business," high-tech companies using SAP software and services are improving:

• Revenue management:
  • 5% - 20% increase in channel revenues
  • 5% - 15% increase in opportunity win rates
  • 10% - 25% increase in collaborative opportunities
  • Ability to rapidly capture market share in emerging markets through effective collaboration of direct and local channel sales teams
• Operating cost and margin:
  • 2% - 5% margin improvement
  • 20% - 30% reduction in efforts supporting channel inventory management
  • 15% - 30% decrease in cost of channel sales, including rebates, claims, and ship and debit administration
  • 25% - 40% less partner support costs
• Working capital:
  • 5% - 15% reduction in channel inventory levels (one-time benefit)

Software and Services for Multichannel Sales and Revenue Management

SAP and our partners provide software and services that can help you gain visibility into sales performance, as well as determine corrective action to improve it when necessary.

By helping to establish closed-loop opportunity and account management, SAP software can help you to deliver streamlined and automated qualification-to-close processes. In addition, SAP software and services can help you to:

• Increase profitability by identifying low-margin and unprofitable customers, where cost-to-serve is too high
• Optimize the performance of your channel partners to increase revenue and profitability
• Reduce price-protection costs through channel inventory and resale tracking, as well as through effective handling of ship and debit claims
• Improve deal margin through profitability analysis and pipeline performance management
• Control margin leakage and improve order and revenue management and compliance by integrating with backend systems
• Increase the effectiveness of cross-sell and up-sell opportunities through a consolidated view of the customer
• Manage compliance with requirements for channel marketing funds by having transparency into how funds are allocated, used, and paid – reducing the risk of paying for fraudulent claims

The result? Lower cost of sales, better margin management, higher profitable revenues, and lower compliance risk.

Learn More

• Find out more about SAP partner solutions and services.