3. Who will sell it?

This might be number one question being asked right now. Selling technology to "post chasm buyers" is not an easy thing to do. In my seminars I always ask group to help me measure percentage of successful sales people. In addition, I am looking for average time it takes a new sales person to get up to speed. In some cases I have found companies who have gone through dozens of sales people over last three years, trying to find someone who can bring in enough gross profit to pay for themselves and offer a sound return on investment for company. Bringing in a cold caller to find new customers that want their systems monitored may not be best approach.

Michael Bosworth, in his book, Customer Centric Selling calls for Marketing to get involved here (or perhaps person doing marketing function - that might be you). The message needs to be built; He calls this "Sales ready messaging". Michael Gerber, in his book eMyth Revisited, urges his readers to prototype message - don't leave it to each person's interpretation and style. Once we have a proven message, there is a process to systematize it. In other words, create message, get it right, and then use it as long as it works.

Once we have a message, we need to find every channel that can be used to sell solution. At this point I recommend finding teachable people within your organization that will go out with you to learn message. If there is a value to service, and we are convinced customers we deal with need it, then our task is to show them need in a way that is so compelling that it will lead to a sale. Bosworth says, 3% of people know they need something, 97% don't but can be shown. Your engineers may be your best candidates at this point.

4. Will it be profitable?

It will be profitable if we price it right. Managed services is a different kind of solution because, depending on how it is built, we may not know cost of goods sold (COGS) before we sell it. One way to approach this is by having a system in place to measure engineering time (others may involve pricing out certain types of reactive services outside of contract until cost model is developed). Some companies offer unlimited helpdesk support to end-user customer, others offer a certain number of incidents. Some offer patches in contract, troubleshooting onsite, etc. If you don't track your costs you won't know what profit looks like. At end of day, you are looking for high margins on managed services. If you are not seeing three times your burden rate over year, your margins are too thin on this offering.

Excessive downtime can consist of any of following:

Unstable Environment Lack of Infrastructure Support Frequent Application Updates Buggy Code Effects of Environment Instability on Script Development and Execution

When an application or environment is unstable, scripting progress is dramatically slowed or stopped altogether. In some cases, it’s possible to continue scripting, but this may causes more work at a later date. For example, if you are scripting in buggy code, you may have to script around error messages and scripts will have to be revised at a later date. Or, you may only be able to create scripts to a certain point and finish them at a later date. To help avoid and decrease environment instability, read chapter on Service Level Agreements.

Timely Defect Fixes

Application defects do not have to be detrimental to an automated software testing project. When defects are fixed in a timely manner, scripting can continue without significant downtime. When estimating an automated testing project, it’s always best to add some buffer time that will accommodate for defect reporting and revisions.

When defect fixes take an excessive amount of time to resolve and are causing automated software testing project to be delayed, it’s time to pull together a meeting. Invite all major players and discuss root of problem and what everyone can to improve situation. Maybe development is spending too much time trying to reproduce problem and having your automation team enter better description would help them turn defect fixes around faster. Maybe you can work together to classify defects and establish reasonable fix times for each classification. For example, a Critical defect needs to be fixed that day while a High defect needs to be fixed with in 24 hours.

Responsive Contact Person

When your team takes on a new automated testing project, you will need a contact person. This person is responsible for making sure you have business requirements and answering questions about how application works. This will not be his or her main job, so you will need to make sure he or she is responsive. If you cannot get adequate business requirements, test data, or questions answered, your automation project will not be successful.

Copyright 2005. Danna Henderson. All Rights Reserved.