Inside ASI-AP

I am always interested in looking at the total market size each year. The total market size is the total spend of customers in our sector - the non-profit sector - each year. I only consider the spend of non-profit customers that purchase (or already own) a package system like iMIS (basically membership or fundraising management); I don't count custom developed systems since these are rarely purchased today and I have no knowledge of who and how much.

The spend of customers in the sector translates directly to revenue to the vendors that are competing within that sector. The revenue numbers below are my own best guesses. I am only including Australia at this stage; and for the 2007 calendar year.

Bob has just launched his first blog at www.theuncloudedview.com.

A select group of staff, partners and customers have been invited to comment on his first post. An excerpt of his email is below:

"I created this blog as a forum to provide an informed point of view to decision makers of non-profits about system selection and retention. It is my hope this blog facilitates a healthy discussion about business and technology issues relevant to executives of both non-profits and companies that service non-profits. I would appreciate it if you would take a moment to read my first post, "Software selection Tips for C-level Managers of Not-for-Profit Organizations", and add your own comment Pro or Con. You have been selected as part of the first group invited to contribute to this blog. Your continued contributions will make this blog an on-going success!"

I have posted before about wasting our customers money when consultants are used in the selection process for new software. I was reminded of this again in the last week, where we lost 2 different accounts to competitors. In both cases, consultants were in charge of the process. I was reminded of this because of the large cost involved in us responding to these bids - including airfares, travel costs, and staff time - and how these costs that we have already incurred in a losing bid, are rolled on into winning bids. It is crazy, but we continue to support it because we continue to participate in the process without question! We need to find the courage, and the right words, to tell customers the truth upfront. I know it is harder than it sounds.

While I realise we currently record win/loss data and known customer lists in our iMIS client system (Opportunity Management), and that we have global level competitive information in our sales portal, I think we are missing out on capturing some of the less structured, more localised and granular competitive information.

So I have created a set of wiki pages on our www.insideasiap.com/wiki site for your use, and more importantly, your updating. Other than being structured around specific competitors, there really is no structure to the pages so go ahead and record notes as you need them.

Was looking at SEEK today for iMIS related job ads. After some weekend reading about ANZ job monitoring (they monitor total number of ads placed as an economic indicator), thought it would be interesting to do the same for iMIS. Note that these are jobs that simply list iMIS, and may include positions like DBA's, receptionists, accounting clerks, web managers etc.

A total of 10 jobs are listed - including at Asthma Foundation WA, REIQ, Speech Pathology, VECCI, NESA, RACS and Property Council WA.

By comparison, I checked also on a couple of competitors - Blackbaud (Raisers Edge) had 2, Coresoft had 0.

I posted a couple of times recently about the challenges of traditional CRM solutions like MS CRM and Pivotal (CRM upgrade challenges? and Is the wave of non-profit solutions built on CRM packages over?). Andy from ASI Canada sent me a graphic that really helps explain the iMIS difference when comparing iMIS to customised CRM solutions. A full res copy of the graphic is in the Powerpoint attachment listed below.

My recent post on the wave of non-profit solutions built on CRM packages being over generated some interesting real-life feedback from one of our US sales exec, as copied below. While this example is specific to Pivotal, we hear similar stories from other CRM platforms.

At a recent US tradeshow I had an informative discussion with the IT Director from a large regulatory body/association that selected a highly customized Pivotal based CRM solution over iMIS about 4 years ago. This was a ~ $300K+ iMIS software opportunity. Pivotal was chosen at the time due its more sophisticated and flexible toolkit for creating custom workflows and screen designs.

Over the past 3-5 years we have seen a veritable increase in solutions for non-profits being built upon CRM platforms. The common names are Microsoft CRM, Pivotal, Accpac CRM, Onyx and Saleslogix. In that time a selected number of non-profits have purchased systems from resellers of those technologies.

When we are bidding these deals we always try our hardest to let these prospective customers know that they are buying a custom solution. And that they are completely dependent on the reseller that they purchase the system from. Most of these organisations can get blinded by the excitement of the MS CRM or Pivotal name and fail to fully understand what they are purchasing and from whom.