Ed Brill

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1. 1  Eric Mack http://www.ericmackonline.com | 9/6/2006 10:22:50 PM

   Ed, I wish I had videotaped the meeting, but my blog pretty well sums up what happened.

1. 2  Bruce Elgort http://www.TakingNotesPodcast.com | 9/6/2006 10:31:49 PM

   Eric we can talk about it tomorrow night on the podcast. I had asked Ed to join us but he is busy. Maybe Mr. Lepofsky can sit in. Alan email me offline if you can.

1. 3  Bernard Devlin  | 9/7/2006 4:20:10 AM

   I find it quite ironic that it is up to the foot-soldiers to try and persuade people (by word of mouth) about what Notes/Domino is capable of, when this is precisely not how Notes/Domino is positioned on ibm.com, as I pointed out in great detail in this discussion @40,@44,@71:

   { Link }

   Nothing seems to have changed. I think the last time I brought this up though, Ed did at least acknowledge that they need to do more at ibm.com about how Notes is positioned there.

   If IBM is not trumpeting the many features of Notes, but instead it is the foot soldiers being enjoined to do this, it is clear sign of a defensive position: in the shops where they already have Notes, talk up what it can do, but don't expect us to market it as anything more than email, because it will take customers away from our other products.

   I have a feeling of deja vu about this (and I don't just mean me banging on about this same topic several times this last week). I seem to remember complaining on this site about this very thing a year or two ago (unfortunately searching via the 'search' box on edbrill.com for 'bernard devlin ibm' doesn't bring up anything relevant related to my name, yet a Google search of 'bernard devlin ibm site:edbrill.com' produces hits !?)

   Anyway, I apologise for bringing this up again. Even I'm getting bored by myself :-)

1. 4  Curt Stone http://curtsisland.blogspot.com | 9/7/2006 7:16:50 AM

   First, I think it's real cool that a corporate IBM guy like Ed is totally in tune with the Domino community and what's on blogs, etc.... and passing the word along inside IBM.

   In my 10 years of developing Notes/Domino apps, I often find myself saying, "I can do that(and make a huge impact with minimal effort)". I enjoy the close interaction with my business partners and seeing first hand the benefits of the applications. I don't have to rely on many others to pull this off in my IT dept.(Except my fellow brothers and sisters who share code :) )

   Don't forget that word of mouth marketing is probably the most powerful and it's spread even faster with today's technology. I was listening to Howard Stern this morning on Sirius satelite radio complaining how a news article commented on how unsuccessful his move to satelite radio was being that he's only brought 1 million new subscribers. Howard claims the numbere is more like 4 million. The debate sounded much like the Domino/Exchange debate I read here often. Seems everyone wants to spin the facts to help themselves.

1. 5  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 9/7/2006 7:19:03 AM

   @3 My colleagues and I are well aware that the ibm.com environment needs some help as to positioning Notes/Domino. I'm not ignoring your comments on this topic.

1. 6  Chris Blatnick http://interfacematters.com | 9/7/2006 7:27:38 AM

   I love to see threads like this...when like-minded people realize they can make an impact. Curt is right...word of mouth marketing is huge, both inside and outside a company.

   I'm living this in a very real way right now. My company is in the midst of a huge merger, making us the largest industrial gases company in the world and bringing together two large enterprises. We, of course, use Lotus technology to its full potential. The other company is a Microsoft shop. We have excellent, mature processes for how we do things and we hope that we can demonstrate the value of this to the new CIO, who happens to be from the "other company". It's a classic Notes vs. Exchange battle and internal marketing will play a big part. Wish us luck!!! :-)

1. 7  Keith Brooks http://www.kbmsg.blogspot.com/ | 9/7/2006 7:50:59 AM

   Sadly I have been saying this for over 10 years as well. Sure Notes does this, that and can even check on the babysitter while you are out.(A fun agent for Notes dial up).

   The normal populace(non-IT) thinks Lotus is dead so when friends find I am working on it then think my career is dead and the company i am working for must be dying a slow death.

   We need a resurrection or a rebirth.

1. 8  Julian Robichaux http://www.nsftools.com | 9/7/2006 8:26:55 AM

   @7: maybe we could call it the "Lotus Phoenix Project"?

   @Ed: I would love to co-present the "How to 'sell' Notes/Domino inside your organization" session, if you still need a partner. I'm not all that pretty, but I can sure tell some stories...

   ;-)

1. 9  Tony S Lee  | 9/7/2006 8:48:13 AM

   Looks alot like #4 and #5 in the "The Seven Habits Of Highly Effective People" book by Covey...

   { Link }

   Habit 4 Think Win/Win

   Habit 5 Seek First to Understand, Then to be Understood

   re: #5, I meet many people who listen for the sole purpose of formulating a response instead of trying to understand what I'm saying. Real communication (and credibility) comes from the latter.

1. 10  Richard Smith http://www.basic.co.uk/ | 9/7/2006 10:05:33 AM

   "Lotus Notes - yeah, it can do that too".... kinda interesting. Sometime ago, I forget how long, there was the subject of Viral/Guerilla marketing vids/ads, on the internet. Videos to the populace, like "leaked" concepts, not fully endorsed by the companies themselves etc etc.. I forget the proper term... well what a great stap line for one of those videos.... A bloke brings in server after server and a guy with a single box replies, almost disinterestedly, each time another box is carried in... email... "Lotus Notes - yeah, it can do that", databases, shared access.. "Lotus Notes - yeah, it can do that too", online collaborative webapps..."Lotus Notes - yeah, it can do that too", instant awareness, remote working..."Lotus Notes - yeah, it can do that too" hopefully you catch my drift. Anyway, like the strap line. Could be applied to marketing.

1. 11  Chris Forrett  | 9/7/2006 10:56:14 AM

   @4 - Don't forget that word of mouth marketing is probably the most powerful

   Then why is it so hard to get people to buy Notes. I work with the SMB market and most have not heard of Notes

   "Don't forget that word of mouth marketing is probably the most powerful" must not be working.

   Many that have heard of Notes think it' dead.

   "Don't forget that word of mouth marketing is probably the most powerful" must not be working.

   Many CIO's/CEO's say - Oh we'll just stay with Microsoft.

   "Don't forget that word of mouth marketing is probably the most powerful" must not be working.

   What ever you doing - it's not working.

   Thank's Ed for listening to these comments.

1. 12  Brian Benz http://www.softwaresoapbox.com | 9/7/2006 11:55:49 AM

   Great stuff!

   I see a kind of PC vs. Mac ad campaign, but turned around....

   Here's an Ad:

   The scene: A basic corporate meeting room. An IT manager, Notes/Domino guys, and MS/Other platform guys, who are there to sell them on the latest greatest newest thing.

   The IT manager: Basic gray matter, suit and tie, stoic.

   The Notes/Domino guys: Un-flashy IT guys, khakis and polo shirts. Sitting around looking a little bored, distracted.

   The MS/Other platform guys: Trendy haircuts, suits, lots of bling. They are "very excited" about everything.....

   The MS/Other platform guys start hawking that "latest greatest newest thing" in the IT marketplace to the IT manager, with flashy graphics and lots of blinky stuff. To every item that comes up, the Notes guys have an answer; they've been doing that for years. And it just works, no fanfare, nobody noticed, because it just works.

   The end scene would be everyone, including the IT manager and the other platform guys, looking at the Notes stuff and saying "Huh. You already do all this?"

   IT guy: "And we do it all with lots of uptime"

   The Other platform guys all look at each other confused: "All this, AND Uptime?"

   The IT guys in unison: "Uptime"

   In fact, that would be another great tag line:

   "Notes and Domino: It's all about the uptime"

1. 13  Bruce Elgort http://www.TakingNotesPodcast.com | 9/7/2006 12:12:08 PM

   @12,

   Great stuff. May I suggest having these commericals developed from the user perspective and not the IT guys? Possibly show how line of business people are using Notes to get things done.

1. 14  David Schaffer http://bloginprogress.us | 9/7/2006 12:16:37 PM

   @12 -- With very rare exceptions the only reason Domino is ever shutdown is because we need to reboot the Windows machine it runs on!!! The next box will be Linux...

1. 15  Charles Robinson http://cubert-codepoet.blogspot.com | 9/7/2006 1:52:30 PM

   @13 - Maybe show someone with a My Work welcome page in Notes clicking various database shortcuts and navigating through the application tabs all in the same UI, and the comparable Outlook person having to go through their Start menu or Desktop to get to their applications, then use the Windows taskbar to switch between them. Maybe show using document, view and database links to navigate, too. There isn't anything like that in a MS WinForms world, you'd have to deploy web links or register custom handlers for every separate application.

1. 16  Kevin Pettitt http://www.lotusguru.com | 9/7/2006 1:58:30 PM

   I've been frustrated by the same ignorance and misunderstanding about Notes as everyone else, but I've finally figured out a BIG reason for it - IBM sales reps that don't portray Domino as an application platform. In talking to the manager of a Notes group at one of my clients, I discovered that his IBM/Lotus account manager has been pushing Websphere and Portal while essentially positioning Notes as just email.

   This organization has been understandably left with the impression that building applications in Notes is a dead end, and indeed for several years no significant new apps have been built in Notes. Websphere and particularly .NET are the platforms of choice now for applications. The Notes applications that do exist are in many cases very poorly written, which of course reinforces the low opinion of Notes.

   The bottom line though seems to be that this organization has not invested in Notes as an application platform more *because of the signals sent by IBM* than because of Microsoft FUD or some other reason.

   To say that this revelation is a disappointment would be an understatement, and it points out the urgent need to fix the compensation formula for IBM Sales. At present, it appears that there is simply no incentive to deepen the utilization of Notes/Domino inside existing accounts - only to do the bare minimum to keep Notes license revenue flowing, while talking up "new stuff" like Websphere Portal. This behavior may make financial sense in the short term, but the damage to the brand will in the long term be more costly. Not only will IBM evetually lose license sales when these organizations finally abandon Domino altogether, but undermining the efforts of developers and business partners will only drive us away from the platform.

1. 17  Alan Lepofsky http://www.alanlepofsky.net/ | 9/7/2006 2:27:21 PM

   @12 - Uptime... very similar to my old IBM commerical "We don't have any downtime". The idea was that an MS admin and a Lotus admin are both at a park, see a girl, and then the MS guy gets paged to go back to work, so the Lotus guy gets the girl! { Link }

1. 18  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 9/7/2006 2:29:28 PM

   Kevin, you've made a huge generalization here. I am not sure which of the Lotus reps is being described, but I am certain it is not systematic. The reps I work with every day are telling the broader story of Notes/Domino as a collaboration platform. If it is being positioned as "just mail" by someone then I have a problem, and I hope you'll share details with me offline.

   Having said that, sales reps in any company are chartered to sell new things, so it's understandable that they are talking about enhancements or additional offerings. So don't hold that part against them.

1. 19  Kevin Pettitt http://www.lotusguru.com | 9/7/2006 2:32:15 PM

   @17 - Ha! Great way to target the many young single men I've encountered recently who are focused on .NET. Should really resonate :-)

1. 20  Bruce Elgort http://www.TakingNotesPodcast.com | 9/7/2006 3:06:57 PM

   Ed,

   Why limit yourself and position Notes as a collboration platform - it's way more than that. I know companies who develop 90% of the applications that run their core business in Notes. I think using the word "collaboration" when describing Notes is a big reason why there is so much push back from IT types. Remember, Notes can do that too....

   But the WHAT needs to be better defined.

   Bruce

1. 21  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 9/7/2006 3:13:32 PM

   And how would you define it? We can't call Notes an all-purpose application platform. You wouldn't run ATMs or a site like buy.com on Notes...

1. 22  Kevin Pettitt http://www.lotusguru.com | 9/7/2006 3:14:20 PM

   @18 - Ed, sorry if my criticism came across as overbroad. The reason I put the ? at the end of my subject line was because I really don't have any sense of how widespread this behavior is, and wanted others to reassure/respond as the case may be. I only know that I have seen numerous recent examples of the "we don't build stuff in Notes anymore" attitude and want to help combat that any way I can.

   I completely understand your point about sales reps selling new things, and don't fault that behavior per se. What concerns me is that IBM folks understand how the things you say (or don't say) are being interpreted by customers. In this case, Domino has become a neglected topic of conversation, for whatever reason, and this has reinforced an unfortunate perception.

   Along the same line, I recently spoke to someone returning from the Advisor DevCon in Phoenix who came away thinking IBM was planning to abandon Windows as a server platform. I suspect all the hype about Linux, while truly good news for organizations looking to break the MS habit, might need to be tempered with some unambiguous reassurance that the "multi-platform" strategy will continue to include Windows. Were this perception to take hold, it would, as this person indicated, give many organizations another excuse to abandon Domino. BTW - I set him straight, but you may want to poll others to see if anyone else came away with similar thoughts.

1. 23  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 9/7/2006 3:39:25 PM

   @22 not shooting the messenger. That's simply amazing. I have no idea why anyone would think we would abandon Windows Server as a platform. But then again, I hear all sorts of wacky and spurious rumours, so that's nothing new...

1. 24  Bruce Elgort http://www.TakingNotesPodcast.com | 9/7/2006 3:42:29 PM

   These are not collaborative apps. for my customers:

   1) Human Resources Employee Management database

   2) Capital Equipment Investment Analysis database

   3) Jet Fuel Pricing database

   4) Refueler Lease Fleet Management database

   5) United Airlines Fuel Management database

   6) SAP Data Pump System

   7) Field Compliance Issue Tracking

   These were all sold and developed to customers without using the word "collaboration". There was a need, analysis was done and Notes/Domino was the right tool for the job.

   Now if I would have gone and said "We can use Lotus Notes which is a platform to develop collaborative applications with..." they may have had second thoughts.

1. 25  Chris Forrett  | 9/7/2006 4:03:41 PM

   I think collaboration is used because that was the NEW buzzword 10 years ago that sold Notes. Try something broader like a RAD (rapid application development), lower programming cost application development platform. Notes can be used to create most business applications faster and cheaper than other application development platforms. I am a programmer not a salesman.

1. 26  Chris Forrett  | 9/7/2006 4:07:21 PM

   Combine the idea mentioned earlier with this idea - "Yeah it can do that too" becuase it is a RAD application development platform.

1. 27  Charles Robinson http://cubert-codepoet.blogspot.com | 9/7/2006 4:09:36 PM

   @21 - There are appropriate tools for everything. You probably wouldn't want to run a high-volume site like buy.com on Domino, just as you wouldn't want to run your e-mail platform on an Access database. ;-) Both are possible, it just takes more effort to get there. Perhaps Domino should be called a general-purpose business application platform.

   Any attempt to distill Notes and Domino down either comes across as overly academic or dilutes the message. It's not a simple product so you can't give it a simple explanation.

   The answer to "WHAT" is "everything your business needs":

   * e-mail and discussion forums

   * ad hoc collaboration and data-driven workflow

   * an intranet and an extranet

   * e-commerce and corporate dashboards

   * blogs and wikis

   * syndication and distribution

   * secure, scalable, stable and highly available

   The list just goes on and on.

1. 28  Karl-Henry Martinsson  | 9/7/2006 4:46:45 PM

   @24: Here are a couple of applications I been developing in Notes/Domino. Some are "collaborative" applications, in the meaning that they use a workflow with documents in different status, and (sometimes) using mail for notifications:

   * Company Knowledgebase and IT Knowledgebase (same design)

   * Claim System for insurance company (with backend-connection in real time to Visual FoxPro, soon to be replaced by SQL Server)

   * Editorial system for IT publication (3 issues/weekly), with feed to web publishing system and to Quark Express on Mac for editing and printing

   * Editorial system for Company Newsletter and integrated web publishing through Domino, using secure login

   * Website for PC World Latinamerica, with delayed publishing of features

   * Website for utility lookup/payments, looking up data from AS/400 and pay using credit card processing or online checks.

   * Airplane booking (web and Notes) for small charter airline, for internal use by pilots, crew and staff. Keep track of flights, crew hotell, maintenance, certificate renewals, etc.

   * Helpdesk application

   * In-out-board (downloaded from Sandbox by my project manager, put in production with very few modifications)

   * NSF Updater, mail-in database that will create new documents/update existing documents in any database based on the XML in the body of the mail.

   Then a bunch of other small applications. Some were just for my own fun, like a Photo Album, MP3 database that automatically read ID3 tags and use them to populate the documents.

   Others were ad-hoc solutions when I needed something, like a database to store cell phone call information. Cingular provided .CSV files with call information (date, time, from, to, duration, etc), and I imported them on a monthly basis, cross-referenced the phone numbers for each entry to see if I knew the other party and added the correct name if found, etc. Was very useful to keep track of my wife's calls. Now she is my ex-wife, by the way.

   So Notes and Domino can do almost anything. The joke here at my workplace is that I can make Notes sing and dance. 15 minutes after a manager told a visitor that during a tour, I had his mailfile updated to use MS Agent to read his mail out lod and the genie move around on the screen... :-)

   Yes, Notes can do that too!

1. 29  Bruce Elgort http://www.TakingNotesPodcast.com | 9/7/2006 5:24:26 PM

   From Wikipedia's definition of "Collaborative Software":

   { Link }

   "The biggest hurdle in implementing groupware is convincing people to use it. Training is required to make people comfortable using it, and if people don't feel comfortable with the software, they won't use it. Employees should be given incentives to contribute: the rewards could be either financial or psychological."

   Now this to me as it applies to Notes/Domino is not applicable if the applications being developed are used to conduct and support business transactions as were the applications I listed in my earlier post. These are line of business applications (mostly).

   In my world the above quote was meaningful in the early Notes days when the web wasn't really a part of developers application development toolbox and also that there were no great RAD tools on the market to develop applications with as you could do with Domino Designer and Notes.

1. 30  Charles Robinson http://cubert-codepoet.blogspot.com | 9/7/2006 10:15:12 PM

   @29 - This fits a bit with the prior posting about why people don't get Notes. For a long time it was marketed as groupware, and somewhere along the way that's what it became known as. Trying to change that mindset, when the product is considered of marginal use, is an uphill battle. Notes doesn't just need good marketing (no more floating desks and talking cats, please :P), it needs a well-organized grass roots effort to really show people what it can do. I suppose that's what this whole thread started off talking about. :)

1. 31  Bruce Elgort http://www.TakingNotesPodcast.com | 9/7/2006 11:27:53 PM

   We just got done recording a great podcast with Eric and Alan where we talked about this very blog topic.

   Have a listen:

   { Link }

   Bruce

1. 32  Curt Stone http://curtsisland.blogspot.com | 9/8/2006 7:33:56 AM

   @11 - Are you more likely to buy something from a cold call, magazine article or on a recommendation from a trusted friend? I believe word-of-mouth marketing is very powerfull. How did Ebay or Napster become so big? I heard about them from friends not big ad campaigns. Lotus Notes sold 100 million seats with what I've heard many complain with little formal advertising. Should IBM have an office guy doing the duck walk on a tv ad when he gets the new Hannover client?(Like the Microsoft Office commercial?) It won't catch fire till everyone's talking about the new product.

1. 33  Chris Forrett  | 9/8/2006 7:48:30 AM

   @32 - Your points have validity, but why does Microsoft sell so much more? I always run into the - We will just stay with Microsft problem (in SMB). I admit to not being a salesman but my customers have never seen an IBM sales rep come by to talk to them.

   Why should one of the largest companies in the world sell it's product like a startup such as ebay or napster did? How long does word of mouth take? I will probably retire in 10 years and would like to use my Notes programming experince before then. Please take these comments light heartedly.

1. 34  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 9/8/2006 8:10:50 AM

   @33 another chapter in my book...

   Microsoft's incumbency advantage as the operating system vendor for most computers and their bundling of Office on many of those PCs is, in my opinion, the primary answer. That's especially true in SMB -- the guy running a small law office doesn't have an IT consultant, so he buys a PC from Dell or CompUSA and it's got "stuff" on it. That stuff is all Microsoft.

   Have you ever assessed how much of their revenue comes from all this OEM activity? For example, "Client revenue was $3.5 billion and operating income $2.6 billion for the second quarter... OEM channels accounted for <b>85 percent of Client revenues</b>, up 5 percent from the previous quarter. " (emphasis mine) from { Link }

   Even in the enterprise, Microsoft has sold so much more by offering take-it-or-leave-it bundles of stuff in their enterprise agreements and Core CALs that drive sales of products that might not otherwise sell. Why does MS have deployment specialists that work with enterprise customers on their use of Office? Answer: so they can go back to the CFO and ask for the same (or bigger) slice of the IT budget next year, saying "yeah, you're using all that stuff after all!"

   IBM has plenty of SMB sales reps. I suspect there are as many or more than Microsoft has in SMB, but the perception, because of the way Microsoft sells through OEM and channels, is markedly different.

1. 35  Curt Stone http://curtsisland.blogspot.com | 9/8/2006 8:24:23 AM

   @33 - Ed took the words right out of my mouth in his @34 post. (and said it much more completely than I ever could) I was thinking right after my post, how would things be different if everyone had OS/2 and Lotus Suite on their home computers? Maybe they'd think Notes was a 1-2-3 extension?

1. 36  Chris Forrett  | 9/8/2006 8:38:03 AM

   Thanks Ed, you're right. Microsoft does have an advantage that other companies can not duplicate and I did not consider that enough in my comparison. I apologize for not offering more suggestions to convince more companies to use Notes but I am not very good at sales, I am a programmer.

   I am just disappointed that there are not more job opportunities for Notes programmers because Notes is such a great product. Although some may say there are lots of new applications being created - look at dice or monster web sites and there are very few Notes jobs and lots of .Net, C# or Java opportunites.

   Thanks for bringing up these topics though because a blog like yours is a good way to help improve the situation. Thanks.

1. 37  Charles Robinson http://cubert-codepoet.blogspot.com | 9/8/2006 9:02:41 AM

   @34 - I agree about Microsoft's monopoly being the biggest reason people stick with them. Also, from the customer side, their licensing is pretty horrific unless you start bundling multiple products. And as you point out, once you start that, you end up with licenses for products you didn't ask for and don't want or need, but MS counts it toward their sales and distribution. It's all a bit shady and underhanded to me.

1. 38  Curt Stone http://curtsisland.blogspot.com | 9/8/2006 9:24:42 AM

   @36 - I share your frustration with lack of opportunities that exist today. Compounded with the fact that this was not the case 5 years ago. Opportunities are a little better today but I'd like to see more in my area.

1. 39  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 9/8/2006 9:54:30 AM

   @36/38

   "look at dice or monster web sites and there are very few Notes jobs and lots of .Net, C# or Java opportunites."

   This is, in part, why Notes in the "Hannover" release is being delivered on the Eclipse platform. Notes has to move with the market, and by being built on Eclipse, we're opening it up to new, additional development approaches that are Java-based.

1. 40  Charles Robinson http://cubert-codepoet.blogspot.com | 9/8/2006 10:52:21 AM

   @39 - Unless you're careful you're going to lose a lot of Notes developers in that transition. I'm one of the ones taking a wait and see approach, but I already have one foot out the door and I'm ready to bolt.

1. 41  Bernard Devlin  | 9/8/2006 11:29:22 AM

   @16, I experienced the same thing. Several IBM sales reps came in, pushing Websphere Portal when we already had Domino. I even got the reps to admit that everything that was being touted as being possible through Portal would have been possible in Domino. But Domino was still in the shadow of the Two Roads concept, and this kind of meeting just confirmed to management that IBM were clearly not behind Domino. Its now a few years down the line and in that company Notes has been replaced by Outlook and Exchange.

   Ten years ago that company was IBM to the core: IBM hardware, OS/2 (desktop and server), Notes and Domino, Visualage for Smalltalk. Now there is nothing left but a couple of Websphere developers. If that trend continues, in a few more years there won't be a trace of IBM left there.

1. 42  Keith Brooks http://kbmsg.blogspot.com | 9/8/2006 1:28:30 PM

   Sales reps always sell the future version or in some cases whatever they are comped on most.

   IBM sales people never really understood Lotus products in general because their sales teams were very far from technical(at least when I was training them a few years ago).

   If you couldn't define it n an elevator pitch you lost the salesman's attention. Websphere, which I think is just amazing the sales people can sell it, is the King of the hill in IBM and has been on this push for a few years now.

   Never saw IBM push Domino like they push Websphere.

   As most of us know, fighting the MS vs. Lotus email issue is one thing, but your average sales rep from IBM does not care what email the client uses. This should be a problem.

   I know email is not all it can do, but the sales rep mind immediately goes to Exchange, ah they are a MS shop so lets go to Websphere. They also of course drop any DB2 discussions.

   I am sure there are some IBM sales people who complain about this generalization but I have been there and done that, in and out of IBM.

1. 43  Keith Brooks http://kbmsg.blogspot.com | 9/8/2006 1:50:11 PM

   The Little Green Men(LGMs or Aliens) in Toy Story have a Unimind. Why can't we portray Domino as providing that to clients employees?

   If you need everyone on the same page, it helps to have a software that can mix and match as your company grows.

   Perhaps this was a R4 or R5 campaign, but just because it was doen once doesn't make it a bad idea.

1. 44  Paul Gagnon  | 9/8/2006 1:52:18 PM

   @34 & @41 - that reminds me.

   Has IBM ever considered getting back into the pc operating system market?

1. 45  David Bell  | 9/8/2006 7:25:48 PM

   Probably only as far as backing Linux.

1. 46  Curt Stone http://curtsisland.blogspot.com | 9/9/2006 6:48:57 AM

   Before we sell Lotus Notes, we should start by selling workflow and collaboration. I'm not sure that even after 15 years of Lotus Notes, the general business person is excited to participate in paperless workflow or contributing to a discussion database. I see resistance to change all the time and that's just human nature. I'm told that when the automobile was invented, people complained because they didn't want to get rid of their horses. I mean, you have to fill it with gas, repair it all the time and how's it going to ploy the field?

1. 47  Charles Robinson http://cubert-codepoet.blogspot.com | 9/11/2006 8:46:08 AM

   @46 - If people are resistant to change, show them how the new thing does everything they're doing now, then add on the other benefits it brings to the table. If someone isn't interested in workflow and collaboration it's waste of time trying to sell them on it from the start.

   I'm in no way involved in selling Notes, but I think selling it first as a workflow and collaboration platform might be the wrong approach. Those are two of Notes' core competencies, but it has a lot more of a story to tell. The "yeah it can do that too" tag line conveys that message and helps drive home the point that Notes is more than just collaboration and workflow.

1. 48  Kevin Pettitt http://www.lotusguru.com | 9/11/2006 11:03:17 AM

   @41, @42 - I've also heard other corroboration of this sort of behavior since posting my earlier comment, and its not just something that happened a few years ago. This reinforces the urgent need to fix the compensation formula for IBM's salesforce, which should probably be part of a more general rethink of sales strategy to avoid this disconnect.

   It is simply unacceptable that we (committed Domino professionals and business partners) be undermined in this manner. To see IBM make a commitment to fighting Microsoft FUD is great, but that fight will remain an uphill one as long as IBM's own salesforce (even if only on relatively rare occasions) reinforces the MS message. Indeed the mere fact that IBM is sending out mixed signals about Domino into the marketplace, even if its only a few instances, cannot help but lead IT decision makers to question IBM's commitment.

1. 49  Volker Weber http://vowe.net | 9/11/2006 11:50:20 AM

   Kevin, you are getting closer to the problem. Notes is relatively cheap if you compare it to other offerings in the iBM portfolio. Customers like that, IBM not so much.

1. 50  Kevin Pettitt http://www.lotusguru.com | 9/11/2006 2:42:16 PM

   @49 - Volker, I know that all too well. It creates what amounts to a conflict of interest for the sales guys. The problem that needs solving is how to remove that conflict. Maybe it means having different people selling Domino than the ones selling Websphere, although that would still leave the mixed message problem. Whatever the solution, it needs to focus on how customers view the IBM brand as a whole in order to make sure what customers *hear* is the same thing IBM *says*. That is apparently not the case.

   As I write, it occurs to me that one way to incentivize Domino sales would be to allow IBM to make money on top of it. No revelation here, since Lotus Workflow, Domino.Doc, LEI, etc. serve this purpose already. What's missing though is a truly "killer app" that would make Domino an easier sell. Domino.Doc might have fit the bill, since document management is an area where nearly all organizations suffer tremendous inefficiency. Unfortunately, Domino.Doc has become more of an embarrassment than an asset given its antiquated code base (vintage 4.6) and clunky UI.

   Meanwhile, there are countless third-party applications being sold by business partners, many of which are good enough to justify installing Domino. Unfortunately, IBM doesn't make any money from these sales. Perhaps IBM should buy out some of these business partners if they meet certain strategic criteria. Ironically, it may be IBM's reluctance to compete with its business partners in Domino applications that is driving them to compete in an even more fundamental sense - at the platform level.

   So, what if...

   ...IBM *did* make money on BP application sales? More specifically, what if the IBM account manager for a particularly customer were paid a bonus out of that pot of money? If it meant keeping a customer on Domino (and therefore keeping that customer as a customer), I bet few BPs would mind paying a 1-2% "tax" (maybe more?) to IBM on all application license revenue. Given how much harder many BPs have to work on a sale where IBM is sending a customer those mixed signals, this seems like a small price to pay.

   While I'm thinking outside the box, what about allowing IBM sales reps sell BP offerings directly to their clients and collection a 15-40% commission. If BPs can take a cut of Domino license revenue when they make a sale, why not the reverse?

   Anyway, I'm just throwing ideas out there.

1. 51  Volker Weber http://vowe.net | 9/11/2006 3:01:36 PM

   We are here on Ed's site, so I have to brace myself a little bit. My analysis would be that IBM isn't really interested in Domino as an application platform. Yes, they are interested in Domino CUSTOMERS, and many of them view Domino as a messaging platform.

   I believe that IBM views Portal as the future platform for Lotus. And Hannover as a portal client. All this talk about composite applications plays in the WebSphere space and not in the traditional Domino space. If you went to the research lab at Lotusphere, you could see that all of the cool new things are built with Eclipse against WebSphere backends. The developers love it. Domino customers did not bite the Workplace bait so far. But Hannover looks more tasty.

   Notes is too cheap. IBM wants to make more money off WebSphere and Portal. It remains to be seen which customers will tag along. I suspect it is not going to be SMB.

1. 52  Bernard Devlin  | 9/11/2006 7:09:26 PM

   I had written something along the same lines as Volker but intentionally deleted it, as I felt I'd already been too critical on this site in the last couple of weeks. I suspect that Notes and Domino (evolving from their origins in small business groups) are something of an embarassment/mismatch to IBM's 'architected' solutions. I don't see any 'real' developer taking Notes and Domino seriously when @formulas are still a necessary and intrinsic part of the architecture. (BTW, I'm not in any way knocking the formula language).

   I regularly get DB2 magazine sent to me. It's kind of like a free version of the Advisor magazine, but it is paid for by IBM. I notice they don't produce anything like that for Notes. Imagine if IT managers were receiving a similar freebie showing them how easy it is to produce applications in Notes, explaining the new features that get added to each release, showing how versatile Domino is, and also carrying adverts or listings for many different BP solutions.

1. 53  Charles Robinson http://cubert-codepoet.blogspot.com | 9/12/2006 9:17:58 AM

   I e-mailed Ed about this directly, but thought it would be relevant to repeat part of it here. In order to have word-of-mouth advertising there has to be someone to speak the word. I live in Charleston, SC, which is the largest metro area in the state and includes two of the largest cities. There are *no* Lotus BP's and we don't have a Lotus rep here.

   When we started on Domino in 1999 there were four other large companies using it, and there was a small but vibrant community. The past seven years has seen three of those convert to Exchange and .Net, leaving just us and one other company using Domino. The lack of marketshare is so bad that management is reconsidering having so much invested in Domino. I'm also feeling that heading down this path has been career suicide since opportunities in my city are nonexistent.

1. 54  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 9/12/2006 12:10:46 PM

   @50 Kevin, some good ideas there. IBM has actually tried reselling partner apps in the past, it's a very complex business. But there are other ways to keep sales focused on selling Domino and selling to Domino customers.

   FWIW I spoke to a room of 50+ consulting firms yesterday, some of which were new to Domino or hadn't been around it in years. The premise of the discussion was that the reseller hosting the event has been growing their Domino business, hiring new people to work on Domino, for the first time in years. Red Hat was there, too, talking about Lotus Linux offerings. The goals was recruiting new partners and I believe we had some success. Great event and we'll do another one this week.

   @51 I think IBM is interested in Domino as an application platform (for example, we're working on one of Bernard's pet peeves, getting Domino specifically listed in app dev categories on ibm.com), but in 2006, it's an uphill battle to make Domino a "mainstream" app dev platform. Companies say they want to go with an open approach i.e. Java or a commodity approach i.e. .NET. Where does that leave Lotus? Notes/Domino has to evolve to an open platform to keep moving forward. The customers, partners, reporters I've met with this week have been quite excited by this evolution (obviously, I am too). The SOA message does indeed present new opportunities to consider how WebSphere Portal integrates into the story, and part of the Domino work for Hannover is to do just that integration (rather than migration, as was the implied path of the past). I think SMBs will come along because it's going to be done in a way that respects the ease-of-management/deployment that Domino has always stood for. That might not all get done at "Hannover" but it's absolutely a defined objective for the development team.

   @52 just because DB2 publishes a magazine, doesn't mean it's the right thing for Lotus. DB2 doesn't have the same kind of developerWorks web content creation going on, for example.

   @53 have you read "the world is flat"? I'm not sure the lack of resource within 50 miles means that you've committed career suicide. But people make decisions for different reasons, and if local market share is more important than the -value- your company is getting out of using Notes, well, I can't change the facts as you state them. But I can suggest you look at overall business objectives, architecture, value/ROI, and all the other factors. I realize nobody wants to be "last man standing" but there's more to the equation. This week in Australia, we've had rooms full of people -- 75-100 per city -- at locally marketed Notes events. In both cases, a lot of faces that were new and unfamiliar even to the IBMers... meaning new people, and new companies, have entered the Notes community. One of the purposes of the gatherings was to remind local customers that with 42% worldwide market share, they are far from alone on this product.

1. 55  Bernard Devlin  | 9/12/2006 2:32:52 PM

   @55, "DB2 doesn't have the same kind of developerWorks web content creation going on"

   I grant you that Ed. But developerworks is hardly the place where IT management hang out. My point is Ed, that I think there are masses of opportunities for Notes and Domino if decision makers actually knew what it could do for them.

   I'm sure almost all the contributors to your blog want more people to 'get' that Notes is much, much more than an email system. And no matter how critical our judgements may sound, it is really great that you provide this channel for us to try to help that become more of a realisation. We are actually rooting for your success.

1. 56  David Raciot  | 9/14/2006 9:59:53 AM

   @54 ...for example, we're working on one of Bernard's pet peeves, getting Domino specifically listed in app dev categories on ibm.com), but in 2006, it's an uphill battle to make Domino a "mainstream" app dev platform.

   What does it take ED? Come one, 120 million users, 20,000 developers, 10s of thousands of Notes applications, Web applications, Web portals, mission critical applications .. and you have to plead with the webmaster to list a product in the correct categories? This should take 10 minutes, not years.

1. 57  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 9/14/2006 3:09:25 PM

   @56 Yep, sometimes it's difficult to get things done in a big company. I can understand why the corporate webmaster doesn't just have a wide-open change request process so that 330,000 different IBM employees ask for changes to ibm.com.

1. 58  David Raciot  | 9/15/2006 9:59:25 AM

   { Link }

   Just put a little yellow dot beside the first line "Distributed Application and Web Servers", and then have it link to ...

   Allows novice developers and power users to customize applications based on supplied Lotus Notes templates.

   Lets application developers and Web site designers create core business applications based on forms, views, pages, framesets, integrated instant messaging, Java, JavaScript, Web services, SQL and more.

   Enables developers to build applications using industry-standard programming tools as well as Lotus Notes formula language and LotusScript.

   Provides capabilities to develop applications accessible from Lotus Notes clients, Web browsers and mobile devices.

   Incorporates technology that can help you quickly and cost-effectively deliver multilingual applications to facilitate global deployment.