Tell me about how HP deal registrations work
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@Dashrender said:
@Carnival-Boy said:
At which point did I say that service wasn't important? I don't buy on price alone, but neither do I buy on service alone. As I said above, the two aren't mutually exclusive - but you seem to be implying that they are.
Shopping around, the only thing the vendors can compare is the price - they can't realistically compare their services.. so in their mind.. the only thing you appear to care about is price. This point I do understand where Scott and others are coming from.
I don't shop around for the sake of shopping around. I was with CDW for over 6 years. I left them mainly because they moved my sales person to another team and gave me a new one.. I was already not super happy with their pricing, but I stayed for my sales guy. Once he was gone.. so was I.
As you can see from my previous post, I don't buy a lot. So I know my business isn't worth much effort to any VAR.
And this is when you shop around again... when there is a trigger to do so. Six years, service wasn't good enough, you were shopping not for a sale, but for a new relationship. Shopping is okay when the purpose is to establish a new relationship.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
@scottalanmiller said:
I'm saying that shopping around and good service are exclusive. Not that price and service are not. How are you shopping around if not based on price?
I have 3 vendors on our preferred vendor list. They know they don't have my business exclusively, and they know who each other are. They will compete with each other, but on service and price.
Let's say I ask for Server A at $10k. One of them might discover that Server B is better, so he'll let me know, knowing that he may be the only VAR that has figured this out and will therefore win the deal. But if I always bought for this VAR, he might think "I'll sell him Server A because there's a bigger margin in it for me, and because I can't be bothered to search for Server B because I know I'm getting $10k regardless". That's complacency.
They also know that if they screw up, they'll be off the preferred vendor list, knowing that I have two other carefully selected vendors that can I can buy from instead.
I don't really have anything else to say. If you've never seen this happen then fair enough. I have.
That mostly makes sense, I understand where you are coming from. One of the problems, though, with this situation is that you have your VARs not competing for what they will do, but competing based on their macro recommendations and advice. If I am reading this correctly. This is getting them to compete based on what they can convince you to buy, which is still mainly price.
What is Server A is better for you but Server B looks better on paper. What if the lower cost item has the higher margins? What if Vendor A was trying to protect you from a bad purchase and Vendor B thought that they could win your business by selling you something that wasn't as good but had a lower price?
I see this a lot with people buying Dell C class gear, it's not meant for the SMB market and is not built for that environment, but the specs are good on paper and the price is low. Easy to sell, but not good for the customer (but often they don't realize it for years, if ever.)
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@Carnival-Boy said:
@Dashrender said:
Your Server A vs Server B seems like an odd solution - Those are base decisions that you should have already decided outside of the VAR. You should know if Server B will even work for you, and if it will, is it what you need better than server A.
Well, for example, one thing I find frustrating is that HP offer loads of different bundles. So I want chassis A and 8 disks, I could buy them separately, or get a bundle that includes the disks. You could spend hours going through all the different bundles and that's something I expect a good VAR to do for me.
And as you say, suggesting an alternative RAID card is another great example.
Bundle A vs. Bundle B... now that makes sense. Taking advantage of HPE's Super Savers or whatever they are called. That's where a VAR is valuable. But substituting products is risky.
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@Dashrender said:
@Carnival-Boy said:
@scottalanmiller said:
I'm saying that shopping around and good service are exclusive. Not that price and service are not. How are you shopping around if not based on price?
I have 3 vendors on our preferred vendor list. They know they don't have my business exclusively, and they know who each other are. They will compete with each other, but on service and price.
Let's say I ask for Server A at $10k. One of them might discover that Server B is better, so he'll let me know, knowing that he may be the only VAR that has figured this out and will therefore win the deal. But if I always bought for this VAR, he might think "I'll sell him Server A because there's a bigger margin in it for me, and because I can't be bothered to search for Server B because I know I'm getting $10k regardless". That's complacency.
They also know that if they screw up, they'll be off the preferred vendor list, knowing that I have two other carefully selected vendors that can I can buy from instead.
I don't really have anything else to say. If you've never seen this happen then fair enough. I have.
Your Server A vs Server B seems like an odd solution - Those are base decisions that you should have already decided outside of the VAR. You should know if Server B will even work for you, and if it will, is it what you need better than server A.
The option for a VAR to pitch you a whole different server is a fallacy in Scott's mind because you're not paying them to pitch servers to you, only to verify that parts within the server you asked for work or not. I suppose you could argue that they could suggest a better/different RAID card, but a whole server.. probably not.
Scott?
That's mostly how I see it. Having that done to an ITSP is better because of the emotional gap (cost savings doesn't cause an emotional reaction in a third party like it does in a primary party which is important in handling a sales proposal) but still risky to some degree, it's often an attempt to trick the ITSP or the customer.
Little changes are generally good to discuss with the VAR. Which drives, which card, which chassis options, which ILO license (sorry, had to add that) because these are the things that the VAR knows how to configure (we hope) and does all of the time. But knowing which servers are going to work for you or not is rarely something that they will know.
That being said, a good VAR can help with things like "Should this be a DL380 G9p or G9e?" Or "Do I need the 2U system for the storage I want or will 1U do?" But that is pushing it, as there might be factors not being considered and you generally need someone with a broader scope overseeing that before something gets missed (you were planning to add a PCIe card that won't fit in the 1U.)
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@scottalanmiller said:
That being said, a good VAR can help with things like "Should this be a DL380 G9p or G9e?"
"A good VAR". That's the key - finding a good VAR. My impression of VARs is that they work for HP, not for me. Their sole objective is to make money for HP, not to save money for me. So one of my main criteria for a "good VAR" is that when I order something, the right product turns up at my door at the right time. I don't have many expectations above that. Many of them can't even manage that task consistently.
By the way, do I have to refer to "HPE" now - is that the acceptable company name, or is "HP" still ok?
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@Carnival-Boy said:
By the way, do I have to refer to "HPE" now - is that the acceptable company name, or is "HP" still ok?
Well, people get it but technically they are two different companies. HP is the desktop and printer company. HPE is the server and storage company.
When you say HP Server, we know what you mean. When you say HP VAR, we don't. So sometimes context clarifies, sometimes it doesn't since everyone needs to work with both.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
@scottalanmiller said:
That being said, a good VAR can help with things like "Should this be a DL380 G9p or G9e?"
"A good VAR". That's the key - finding a good VAR. My impression of VARs is that they work for HP, not for me. Their sole objective is to make money for HP, not to save money for me. So one of my main criteria for a "good VAR" is that when I order something, the right product turns up at my door at the right time. I don't have many expectations above that. Many of them can't even manage that task consistently.
Interesting, I never considered a VAR to care more about making money for the manufacturer, unless they only work with one manufacturer.
CDW for example isn't trying to make the most money for HPE, they are trying to make the most money for themselves.
It's true that in the server space, I rarely see a VAR who sells more than one tier 1 server platform, i.e. Does CDW sell both HPE and Dell servers? Though, now having written that, CDW did sell both HPE and IBM server - soooooo, I guess I'm wrong on that account. But that's still pretty uncommon - especially when it comes to Dell.
And now that IBM has given up on x64 servers (they are all Lenovo now - uh, no thanks) we are left with only two tier one providers, HPE and Dell.
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Tons of VARs sell lots of products and competing products. That's totally common.
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@scottalanmiller said:
Tons of VARs sell lots of products and competing products. That's totally common.
Absolutely - I just haven't seen many that do multiple Tier 1 servers. The other things are so common, how someone could think that the VAR is worried about the manufacturer making money seemed odd.
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From what I've seen, VARs make a lot of their profit from rebates from manufacturers based on how much product they shift. They're heavily incentivised to the extent that, yes, they worry about making HP happy more than they worry about making me happy. Volume matters and they have targets to hit. In a 3 way relationship between me, HP and the VAR, it's HP who wields the most power. The same applies to Dell, but I never buy Dell.
I dunno, maybe its not like that. I don't work for a VAR. I do work for a (non-IT) manufacturer and I'm sure its similar.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
From what I've seen, VARs make a lot of their profit from rebates from manufacturers based on how much product they shift.
This is very true. Volume is a huge factor.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
In a 3 way relationship between me, HP and the VAR, it's HP who wields the most power.
No, HP wields very little. You wield all the power, any power lost is voluntary. HP cannot just find another customer, they have others, but they need profits. The VAR has to make the sale. You can simply buy from another vendor, though. You are the only one with essentially nothing on the line to lose.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
From what I've seen, VARs make a lot of their profit from rebates from manufacturers based on how much product they shift. They're heavily incentivised to the extent that, yes, they worry about making HP happy more than they worry about making me happy. Volume matters and they have targets to hit. In a 3 way relationship between me, HP and the VAR, it's HP who wields the most power. The same applies to Dell, but I never buy Dell.
I dunno, maybe its not like that. I don't work for a VAR. I do work for a (non-IT) manufacturer and I'm sure its similar.
All of that is true, except maybe that HP wields the most power. But even so, as long as you are using your VAR correctly - aka you're going to them with your plan already in place, the minor things like what RAID card to buy or which bundle of the week to buy - then it shouldn't matter. Sure those bundles can be a huge difference to you cost wise, but most important, when you decide you need a DL380p, don't allow yourself to be talked into a DL380e or a DL360p, etc - that's where you're getting yourself into trouble.. and the main places where the VAR might be trying to make more money off you from those back end rebates, etc.
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@scottalanmiller said:
HP cannot just find another customer, they have others, but they need profits.
Would be nice if Dell, HP and the other vendors acted this way...They don't seem to want to take my money.
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@scottalanmiller said:
@Carnival-Boy said:
In a 3 way relationship between me, HP and the VAR, it's HP who wields the most power.
No, HP wields very little. You wield all the power, any power lost is voluntary. HP cannot just find another customer, they have others, but they need profits. The VAR has to make the sale. You can simply buy from another vendor, though. You are the only one with essentially nothing on the line to lose.
I mean power over the VAR. If the VAR loses me if will make very little difference to them, if they lose HP they have had it. They know which side of their bread is buttered.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
@scottalanmiller said:
@Carnival-Boy said:
In a 3 way relationship between me, HP and the VAR, it's HP who wields the most power.
No, HP wields very little. You wield all the power, any power lost is voluntary. HP cannot just find another customer, they have others, but they need profits. The VAR has to make the sale. You can simply buy from another vendor, though. You are the only one with essentially nothing on the line to lose.
I mean power over the VAR. If the VAR loses me if will make very little difference to them, if they lose HP they have had it. They know which side of their bread is buttered.
That's not necessarily true. VARs make their money on services to some degree. It's true that they need something to sell, but without customers they have nothing. Losing you is how they lose HP.
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And they still don't really lose HP, they mainly loose their incentive of cash back based on sales.
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Think of it like politicians. In a democracy, the voter is supposed to have all the power. A politician can't exist without votes. But in reality, he's controlled and motivated by whoever has the most money.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
Think of it like politicians. In a democracy, the voter is supposed to have all the power. A politician can't exist without votes. But in reality, he's controlled and motivated by whoever has the most money.
But the voter can still remove him. In a democracy it only fails because the voters don't care. In your company, you can choose to care.
Sure, you don't have an unlimited selection, but you do have HPE, Dell, Fujitsu, Oracle, IBM, Cisco, SuperMicro and that's before you get into small players and just for servers. That's at least six choices (IBM makes very difference stuff so I'm not cheating by including them in the number, a Power8 machine might not be an option for you) without looking to off the wall options like IBM or totally ethically challenged ones like Lenovo or small players or building your own. It's not a huge field, but it is a bit of choice and all of them will work.
I totally understand that HPE has offerings that no one else does exactly, but nothing that you can't tear yourself away from. And if you are buying Proliants, yes, they might be the best but the margin is small. If you are buying Integrity they are harder to rip and replace.
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I think that SuperMicro is the disruptor here because of the way that they work. You never deal with SM directly but with one of their larger partners. So even if you want SM but don't like how one partner is treating you, you have choices within the SM sphere.
