Qualifying a CMaps Analytics Opportunity

Over 80% of the data captured within an enterprise has some location attribute, so finding an opportunity for mapping / geo is fairly easy. Either the customer will need to be prompted to evaluate maps as an opportunity or the customer will specifically ask for their options to accomplish integrating maps/geo into a BI initiative:

What is the customer currently using for mapping / geographic analysis?

ANSWER: Customer does not know or nothing:

This is a great opportunity to pitch the exploration of using maps within the BI initiative. Most customers still don’t know that this is even possible, so the idea of injecting a Google-like experience right within business dashboards. This alone is is enough to get the conversation started for IT or business stakeholders.

ANSWER: Customer has a solution like ESRI

Great news, because CMaps Analytics provides native support for ESRI Maps

Many organizations currently use GIS tools somewhere in their organization (typically ESRI). However, the access and availability of these tools to the business is not possible because they are too confusing and complicated or don’t directly integrate. Like SAP, GIS (Geographic Information Systems) is a specialized skill set which is usually disconnected from the business intelligence initiative and always disconnected from Business stakeholders.

ANSWER: Customer has Google Maps

This is a perfect answer, because it establishes a pre-existing demand and an existing investment that we can enhance with CMaps Analytics Designer to create content faster, and deliver a new wave of value to business stakeholders quickly.

Gathering Information to Further Qualify and Scale

The following is a typical survey that we use for customers to understand current needs, existing investments, and will ultimately dictate how we will quote the project and license.

General CMaps Requirements

1. What Business Application / Platform are you looking to deploy maps in?

This will first identify if it is a platform that we natively support out of the box or if there is a custom integration required.

2.  Do you have developers in-house to complete the integration or do you need assistance?

This is a similar line of questioning that you already do for your services organization. If the customer has their own developers or the contact is a developer, we will want to try and get the business users engaged.

3. Do you already have Google Maps for Business API licensing in place at your organization?

Standard question to establish if an investment in maps have already been made.

4. How many users will view the dashboards / reports / app? (approximate)

This is an important question that will help you scale the size of the opportunity  for page views. A small user group under 100 will typically require the small or mid-tier bundle (depending on mobility needs). As a benchmark we take the number of users and multiply it by 270 to determine a ballpark page view count (assumes at worst case average that every user will open the dashboard once a day.

PAGE VIEW CALCULATOR:  http://gmapsplugin.com/templates/xcelsius/pageview.swf (typically we don’t send to customers).

5. Is mobile access a requirement? If yes, for how many devices/users?

This will also help us with setting expectations for how we integrate as HTML5, create once and deploy everywhere mantra.

6. What are your geo-dashboard initiative/reporting requirements?

The following questions may have been addressed during your standard sales cycle procedures based on the products /services you are already offering. Understanding any specific requirements will help your team identify specific features or examples that we can present at a future date based on requirements. You have your Centigon partner manager at your disposal to help you match the right canned content with customer requirements.

7. Other Questions

You may already have the following answers based on the primary products /services you are offering to a customer.

a)    What is your purchasing time frame?

b)    What is your role in the decision-making process?

c)    What is your success criteria?

SAP BusinessObjects Specific Questions

1. What version of BusinessObjects are you running?

This will indicate how we will approach and support the customer. With the CMaps Plugin release, we only support modern versions of SAP Dashboards (BI4 SP04 and later). For customers running earlier versions of SAPBusinessObjects XI3.1, there is at least one option.

ARTICLE: CMaps Plugin with XI3.1

VERSION COMPATIBILITY: View

2.  How many BusinessObjects developers are creating content or will be creating content with maps?

Example: Dashboard Developers or professional Webi Report designers. The answer for this will partially indicate the size of the initiative and what bundle suits the customer.

3. Do you already have Google Maps for Business API licensing in place at your organization?

This can help for Webi, Mobile, and newer CMaps Analytics Designer integrations.

4. How many users will view the dashboards or reports? (approximate)

This is an important question that will help you scale the size of the opportunity. A small user group under 100 will typically require the small or mid-tier bundle (depending on mobility needs). As a benchmark we take the number of users and multiply it by 270 to determine a ballpark page view count (assumes at worst case average that every user will open the dashboard once a day.

ADDITIONAL READING: Sizing a CMaps Plugin opportunity

PAGE VIEW CALCULATOR:  http://gmapsplugin.com/templates/xcelsius/pageview.swf (typically we don’t send to customers).

5. Is mobile access a requirement?

6. Are you currently running SAP Mobile in production?

This will help you determine the maturity of their mobile deployment and if we need to include mobile at this time. For many customers mobile is a requirement mid-long term but not a lot of customers are running production mobile BI yet.

7. What are your geo-dashboard, reporting, or data exploration requirements?

The following questions may have been addressed during your standard sales cycle procedures based on the products /services you are already offering. Understanding any specific requirements will help your team identify specific features or examples that we can present at a future date based on requirements. You have your Centigon partner manager at your disposal to help you match the right canned content with customer requirements.

8. Other Questions

You may already have the following answers based on the primary products /services you are offering to a customer.

a)    What is your purchasing time frame?

b)    What is your role in the decision-making process?

c)    What is your success criteria?

d)  Do you already own Google Maps or need a license

e) Do you have internal dev resources available or do you need assistance.

 

Next Post