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ABSTRACT:
"No one gets fired for buying IBM" used to be an unofficial credo among Fortune 500 CIOs. But if you consider your peers in the midmarket (a group I fondly call "the Fortune 50,000"), you'd probably have to flip that old saw on its side and say, "No one gets hired for buying IBM."
I recently tested that theory among a group of 50 midmarket IT executives at a Society for Information Management meeting in Salt Lake City, Utah. I asked for a show of hands from anyone buying IBM products these days. Not one hand went up. In their last round of IT purchasing, how many had even considered Big Blue? Another no-show of hands. Should I even ask about IBM Global Services? I inquired. They laughed heartily at that one. Funny thing is, IBM executives who follow the midmarket wouldn't be surprised by the results of this unscientific sampling. The world's most powerful IT company has done its own research on the fast-growing midmarket and knows how little traction it's getting in your purchasing decisions. "Our overwhelming challenge is not that we don't understand what the midmarket needs," says Steve Solazzo, IBM's general manager of global midmarket business. "Our overwhelming challenge is that we're not being considered."
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AUTHOR:
Maryfran Johnson
Editor in Chief, CIO Decisions
Maryfran Johnson is CIO Decisions' editor in chief. Write to her at mjohnson@ciodecisions.com.
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