'We can triple our revenues if we went directly. But we plan to stick to developing software'

The credit for successfully setting up SalesLogix Corporation’s Indian operations goes to Bonny Malik. Based in Australia, he has taken up the business development role in the Asia-Pacific market, concentrating specifically on India. A business graduate from the Melbourne Business School, Bonny worked at QAD providing enterprise resource planning solutions before joining SalesLogix. While at QAD, he was acknowledged as an expert in data-warehousing and knowledge management solutions. Bonny's background includes a stint in the FMCG and pharmaceutical industry with SmithKline Beecham. He was in Mumbai to meet channel partners and familiarize them with the latest products from SalesLogix. Excerpts from an exclusive interview with CI.

What kind of products do you offer to clients?

SalesLogix Corporation is a leading provider of e-CRM and sales automation software for small and mid-size enterprises. We are headquartered in Scottsdale, USA. We provide organizations with solutions that automate front office operations and e-commerce networks. Since 1996, we have been providing easy-to-use, fast-to-deploy, low-cost CRM and e-business solutions to streamline and improve our client’s customer-related operations.

Our product portfolio includes ACT!, which is the world’s best selling Contact and Calendar Management solution for individuals, small businesses and community members. The acquisition of ACT!

late last year provided the company with a total customer base estimated at 200,000 companies, comprising three million individual users. We have a product called SalesLogix, an eCRM solution that provides sales, marketing, support and configuration management for the mid-market.

Today over 2,100 companies with over 100,000 individuals use SalesLogix, more than any other product of its kind. Our third product, known as Interact, is the industry’s first interactive application service. The solution provides content, commerce and community services for individual sales professionals, organizations and B2B communities.

Nine channel partners have already been identified — TCS, Tata Infotech, HCL Perot, Pentasoft, Kashyap Radiant. There are also other smaller players like Palcom in Delhi and Digital Future. We are in the process of talking to others.

Indian channels seem to have much better technical skills than their counterparts in other parts of Asia Pacific region. All the technical personnel are at least MCSE. They often have good Visual Basic and C+ skills. On the marketing side, we look at how well they can provide after-sales support and how many people they have, besides of course their infrastructure. Usually, our channel partners provide after-sales support along with us.

We work very closely with our channels. Up to 75 percent of our dealing are done through channels. In fact, we can triple our revenues if we went directly. But we plan to stick to developing software. It is the channel that has to provide the service. We want to concentrate on developing the software. Therefore we are one of the most channel friendly companies in the business.

We do have schemes. We even flew down trainers from the USA and Australia to train our channel partners in India. Though we did charge them a certain amount, the entire program was subsidized by us.

Channel partners request me to demonstrate our products until they get familiar with them. Usually, I go to Chennai and Mumbai at my own expense for such sessions. We provide with marketing collateral. We have a scheme to run joint seminars with them. In some cases, we bear a major portion of the costs. That’s not all. We provide our channel partners with leads. This is done using our own eCRM software. We ask them to follow up on these leads. Because of eCRM, we have got 99 percent visibility of what’s happening in the channels. In fact, the error margin has been between only one to two percent. It also works the other way. Our channel partners keep us informed on what they are working.

Well, there’ll be only a single channel partner working with a client. Since our eCRM package ensures that there is no overlap, channel partners’ margins are protected and there is no price erosion. In fact, a lot of companies buy our product to manage their channels.

This is not the case with our channels. Their margins are quite hefty I must say. Also, as a matter of policy, we ensure that each of our channel partners have enough business. So we are never in a hurry to have more channel partners, unless we are sure that they will get enough clients.

Aren’t your channels going to be affected by e-commerce?

Not really. E-commerce will not be the way to go for us. We will have to go through our channels because each company operates differently. This calls for a lot of customization, which can be done only by our channels.

Who are your competitors?

Our competitors at the global level are Pivotal, Siebel, Onyx and

Vantiv.

We are interested in big corporates. But we are also looking at SMEs in a big way. Typically, we sell to any client who will buy a minimum of five licenses. In a single company, our product can be used by at least as many as 2,400 people. Of course, many more people can use it.

As a matter of fact, our product already has a CTI (computer telephony interface) backbone. So that should not be a problem.

We hope to do a million dollars in India this year, while we’ll do $ 100 million throughout the world.

Bobby Anthony in Mumbai