Intriguingly, in spite of job titles that include Solutions Consultant, Solutions Architect, and Solutions Engineer, there is little discussion of the associated skill of solutioning and its impact on a broad range of other presales activities.<\/p>\n
[Note \u2013 if you have a product-led offering with no substantive options, ignore the balance of this post\u2026\u00a0 <\/span>However, if you have complex, multi-module offerings or multiple offerings, then a closer examination of solutioning could be wise!]<\/p>\n Determining what solution to propose to a prospect can include a range of factors \u2013 and resulting impacts.\u00a0 <\/span>Let\u2019s explore a few!<\/p>\n Initial product footprint:<\/p>\n Organizations with long implementation and time-to-value timelines (e.g., ERP systems) often work to establish the broadest possible initial footprint with their customers.\u00a0 <\/span>Solutioning to achieve this requires know-how and experience in doing discovery and presenting demos, as well as generating and presenting proposals and corresponding value analyses. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Land and Expand:<\/p>\n Conversely, software that deploys and returns value rapidly suggests establishing a more focused beachhead, followed by pursuing expansion opportunities as initial value realization events are achieved. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Prospect implementation culture and strategy:<\/p>\n Understanding our prospects\u2019 preferred implementation strategy also impacts solutioning, as we need to incorporate these into the equation.\u00a0 <\/span>Prospects may prefer all-at-once vs. staged rollouts.\u00a0 <\/span>Understanding where prospects sit on the Technology Adoption Curve may also impact solutioning, and those with \u201cfast-follower\u201d strategies represent another dimension. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Licensing strategies:<\/p>\n Licensing and pricing models can drive solutioning in unanticipated ways.\u00a0 <\/span>For example, traditional volume-based discounting may penalize smaller players who wish to purchase a broad range of offerings, as these players may not be able to afford the breadth of products they want\/need.\u00a0 <\/span>In response to this exact situation, I pioneered what became known as \u201cCohan\u2019s Drug Dealer\u201d licensing model \u2013 it was very successful and enabled building a strong customer base in an SMB segment!<\/p>\n Discovery strategies:<\/p>\n Your solutioning strategy will directly impact your discovery methods.\u00a0 <\/span>Vendors pursuing large initial product footprints will need to invest (much) more in discovery breadth and depth, compared to narrower beachhead scenarios.<\/p>\n Demos:<\/p>\n Similarly, solutions that are more tightly focused typically require crisper, shorter demos than large, complex, multi-component offerings.\u00a0 <\/span>Vendors whose demos span an hour are often amazed that other vendors\u2019 demos could take days \u2013 and vice versa! \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Additionally, Vision Generation Demos similarly can range from a few minutes for simpler offerings to broader excursions of an hour or more \u2013 these longer Vision Generation scenarios are often key components of Executive Briefing Center sessions.<\/p>\n POCs and related:<\/p>\n Post-demo forms of proof, including POCs, guided workshops, POVs and related evaluations are also impacted (considerably!) by the solutions that you propose.\u00a0 <\/span>Clearly, the larger the footprint and complexity, the greater the effort of proof.\u00a0 <\/span>Organizations seeing high POC\/POV rates with corresponding costs may want to revisit their solution strategy or be clear (at least internally) on the real costs of execution.<\/p>\n Post-sale handoffs:<\/p>\n The more complex the solution, the more challenging the associated handoffs to customer success and account management.\u00a0 <\/span>Churn experienced with a product-led offering should be perceived as very different from significant churn with large-footprint customers!<\/p>\n What are your solutioning strategies and challenges?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Curiosamente, a pesar de que los t\u00edtulos de los puestos de trabajo incluyen consultor de soluciones, arquitecto de soluciones e ingeniero de soluciones, apenas se habla de la habilidad asociada a la b\u00fasqueda de soluciones y su impacto en una amplia gama de otras actividades de preventa.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":27282,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center 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