cisco cloud opportunity acceleration guide (1)

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Cisco Cloud Partner Program

Cloud Opportunity Acceleration Guide

Cloud

Opportunity

Acceleration

Guide

A Leading Practice

Guide for Partners

2011 Cisco Systems, Inc. For Channel Partner use only. All rights reserved.

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IntroductionThis guide is intended to assist Cisco Cloud Partners in positioning cloud solutions and to provide key messages that sales teams can

use when planning a customer meeting to discuss cloud initiatives. The goal of this document is to:

Help sales teams and practice leads have more effective cloud conversations with customers. Assist in identifying and qualifying cloud-based solutions. More effectively position and align Cisco-based cloud solutions with diverse customer audiences.

The target audience for this guide is an experienced sales representative who, at a minimum, has a solid understanding of basic

customer communications, understands the technology landscape, can effectively demonstrate products & services and answer

questions, can plan meetings, and has completed some basic Cisco cloud training.

A complete cloud solution is usually a combination of hardware, software, and services; therefore, the solution sales approach taken

should include not only the elements needed to implement the cloud solution, but also the additional services required to support ongoing

management and operations. This approach may be quite different than what the customer is used to.

The focus of this guide, as depicted in the figure below, is to help structure the conversation with the customer in order to clarify the

problem, quantify the solution, and logically position the next steps in the solution definition process.

Figure 1: Focus Area - Cloud Positioning



Introduction

Customer Needs

Solution Selling

- CIO

- CFO

- Application Owner

- IT Manager

Glossary

References

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Introduction (continued)The customers journey to the Cloud is not just about changing the dynamics of how you approach compute, storage, and network resources; it is about enabling business transformation to a more agile, flexible, responsive, and cost effective enterprise.

Be aware though, that customers might be cautious about taking the next step in their evolution to the Cloud, and they may be

unfamiliar with the solutions that your organization and Cisco can provide to assist them on this journey.

To help customers see the value that Cisco products and partner services can provide, and to minimize the stress and anxiety

inherent in change, we recommend you use a solution selling approach.

What is Solution Selling?

Solution selling is a sales approach that uses professional or

consulting services early in the sales cycle to help

customers visualize solutions to their areas of need.

Solution sales approaches typically evaluate business needs

and the current state of the customers business and provide solutions to address the business issues.

The solution might include a comprehensive strategy or

roadmap, with a combination of Cisco, ecosystem, and

partner product and services.

Understanding Customer Needs

A key tenet of solution selling is to start the conversation without preconceived ideas, services, or products in mind. At the

beginning of the conversation, it is not important that you list all the products or services available to the customer. Instead, it is

important to listen to their needs and provide solutions to their problems, thereby providing value to them.

Yes, your goal is to sell. However, it is not what you sell but the value your customer gains from the solution that is important. This

value is not only beneficial to the customer; it is also beneficial to you in terms of establishing trust, which will lead to expanded

opportunities and future sales.

So, what do you know about this customer? The following table highlights some of the key decision makers that you will likely

encounter and their areas of focus. Additional solution selling tips for each of these key decision makers can be found later in this

document.



Introduction

Customer Needs

Solution Selling

- CIO

- CFO

- Application Owner

- IT Manager

Glossary

References

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All customers are different

and they may not all be ready

for a standard offering.

Cloud solutions are

inherently custom and need

to be approached with a

greater focus on listening

and less on talking.

Cloud solutions will require

approaching a different and

possibly more diverse

audience than a traditional

Cisco network sale, so be

aware of the various

customer stakeholders, their

unique viewpoints, and their

needs.

Key Decision Makers and their focus

CIO

The CIO is responsible for the overall Cloud

direction. Therefore, in the early stages of Cloud

formation, you will most likely need to involve

him/her in the solution you are developing.

The CIO will be interested in the flexibility and

elasticity of the Cloud, but will have a lot of questions

about security, operational process, and cost

models.

CFO

The CFO sees the Cloud as a way to reduce capital

expenditures and to increase clarity about where

their IT expenses are going. Security and

compliance will also be big concerns.

Application Owner

The concerns of the Application Owner include:

Application provisioning, delivery, and

management

Application improvements and feature

management

Scalability of the underlying infrastructure

SLA compliance

Cost

IT Manager

The IT Manager has a wide variety of concerns.

Some include:

Improved utilization of the IT infrastructure

Customer self service with chargeback/report-

back

Enhanced reporting capabilities such as: which IT

services do customers use and how much they

use?

Increased server virtualization ratio

Desktop virtualization

Balanced need for data integrity (i.e., storage,

backup & recovery, and Disaster Recovery ) vs.

Cost



Introduction

Customer Needs

Solution Selling

- CIO

- CFO

- Application Owner

- IT Manager

Glossary

References

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Topics to consider when meeting with your customer prospect may include the following:

Note: Use the Cisco Cloud Opportunity Workbook to clarify the audience and focus future discussions.



Who is the customer?

Find out as much about a customer and their competitors before the meeting.

This is critical.

For a new customer or prospect, study as much industry

and publicly available information as possible.

For existing customers, use your knowledge of their

organization to develop a few exampleswith use casesof

how the Cloud could benefit them.

Discover

stakeholders, current

state, and needs

Understand the various constituencies who have a say in this decision: where are

they on their journey to the Cloud, and what do they need to do to get there.

Provide cloud awareness educational sessions to key

stakeholders.

Identify needs that could be addressed by cloud solutions.

Do your homeworkCustomers are all different, so a Cloud case study in a totally different industry

may not resonate. Find examples that resonate with the customer.

Research industry groups and find out what customers in

that industry are doing with the Cloud.

Have a focused

business discussion

What are their business goals and objectives? Business, process, financial, IT, etc.

What functional or service challenges is the customer having? What are their pain

points?Business, operations, finance, IT, etc.

Quantify the problem. What impact is this having on the business?

Get a

lay of the IT land

Understand current IT projects, goals and objectives, successes, challenges, and

problems.

Where are you on your cloud journey? Consolidation,

virtualization, automation, private cloud?

Do you think that your IT services model has the

capability to meet existing and future demands of the

business?

What is Cloud?

Clarify the various Cloud models if they are unfamiliar or unclear. Provide

awareness and educational sessions, if necessary.

IaaS

PaaS

SaaS

Public

Private

Hybrid

Community

Map goals &

objectives and pain

points to benefits of

Cloud

Choose the appropriate Cloud messages/benefits for this customer opportunity.

Reduce.

Simplify.

Eliminate.

Accelerate

Flexibility.

Position Cloud

Solutions

Appropriately

Focus on solutions that bring value to the customer.

Tailor your message: Audiences vary. Solutions should as well.

Application/Business Owner

Financial Owner

Infrastructure Owner

Discuss business process Improvements that Cloud solutions can facilitate.

If you can help address the reasons the customer is

dissatisfied and experiencing pain by using a solution

approach (vs. a product approach), you can establish trusted

advisor status which can lead to long term sales.

SolutioningMapping customer needs to solutions where the partner and Cisco team can

provide value.

A Cloud Workshop is a great method to accomplish this.

Introduction

Customer Needs

Solution Selling

- CIO

- CFO

- Application Owner

- IT Manager

Glossary

References

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Solution Selling with Key Decision MakersMigrating customers to the Cloud requires a holistic solution approach in which a number of providers may be required to

participate. Introducing services early in the sales cycle accelerates the adoption of new ways of doing business, such as Cloud,

and leads ultimately to greater value for the customer and increased revenue for Cisco and your organization.

We recommend the following path when approaching various decision makers.

First qualify their unique challenges, next quantify their interest in the benefits of the Cloud, then outline a high level services

approach that would be used by your services team, and finally detail your recommended next steps to keep momentum going.

The Next Steps could include various services that you can provide, including the following:



Introduction

Customer Needs

Solution Selling

- CIO

- CFO

- Application Owner

- IT Manager

Glossary

References

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Solution Selling ServicesThis table provides a description of the solution selling approaches and services aligned

with each key decision maker role.



Service Description

Cloud Workshop

The Cloud Workshop is a partner delivered workshop designed to help a customer

understand where the Cloud fits best for them and for their workloads, how to identify

the most appropriate cloud strategy for their organization, how to leverage and deploy

that strategy, and how to align that strategy with Cisco and partner services and

solutions.

Cloud AssessmentCloud Assessment provides a more focused and prioritized assessment of the Cloud

value against your customers applications and infrastructures.

Cloud PilotA focused Cloud Pilot proves the value of the Cloud. It also identifies areas of

improvement that need to be addressed in a future production release of the solution.

Cloud Enablement

Services

Cloud Enablement Services are a multi-phase full lifecycle Cisco offering that includes:

Cloud Strategy Service

Cloud Planning & Design Service

Cloud Implementation Service

Cloud Optimization Service

Custom Cloud

Proposal

A Custom Cloud Proposal is similar to what you may be doing now with your

professional services practice, but focused on providing value-based Cloud services in

the areas that have most meaning for the customer.

In addition to planning, design, and implementation services, the following Operational

Readiness elements are also included in your proposal:

People

Process

Operational Tools

Governance

Note: Even if the customer may not have the budget or the desire to address these

operational areas, describe their function and value and list them as recommended

services. It should be clear that you feel these services are important to their long

term success.

Introduction

Customer Needs

Solution Selling

- CIO

- CFO

- Application Owner

- IT Manager

Glossary

References

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Key Decision Maker: Chief Information Officer (CIO)The CIO is the most likely point of contact for beginning a solution selling discussion. This person has the larger view of where the

business and the associated IT infrastructure is headed.



Qualifying the challenges Quantifying the Solution Services

Trigger Questions:

Do you have expertise and best practices for

migrating some or all of your infrastructure to

the Cloud?

How are you dealing with the consumerization

of enterprise IT?

How do you plan to move from managing

complex, siloed technologies, to managing a

comprehensive set of services that provide

high value to users?

What are your plans for cost reduction and

moving to a streamlined and self-service

oriented operation?

Are you struggling with disparate resources

resulting from mergers and acquisitions?

Is business continuity being threatened by a

shortage of power and physical space?

Are you approaching a technology refresh or

full depreciation of your data center?

Would you like to simplify the application

provisioning process?

Would you be interested in: Services Approach:

Business Service Management focused on

managing end to end services to business

outcomes.

Provisioning techniques that address

heterogeneous cloud infrastructures, and

application focused infrastructures.

IT process automation and policy-based

infrastructure automation that triggers

provisioning linked to capacity and service

level objectives, and supports an integrated

operations framework, transforming from

reactive, to proactive, and ultimately to

predictive.

Pooled resources with virtualization of server,

storage, network, and security components.

Increased portability of data and application

within a hybrid cloud.

IT solutions that support business process

improvements.

Discover and capture the landscape

Map business needs to Technology

Architecture

Design Cloud Architecture

Factor in Operations and Management

needs

Implementation and Migration

Cloud Optimization

Operational Optimization

Next Steps:

Partner Services

Cloud Workshop

Cloud Assessment + Cloud Pilot

Custom Cloud Services Proposal

Cisco Services

Cloud Enablement Services Cloud Strategy Service




Introduction

Customer Needs

Solution Selling

- CIO

- CFO

- Application Owner

- IT Manager

Glossary

References

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Key Decision Maker: Chief Financial Officer (CFO) The CFO or other senior-level financial executive will be very interested in discussing ways processes can be streamlined and

costs removed through a Cloud strategy. This person has the larger view of key business drivers and where the overall business

is headed from a financial perspective.




Trigger Questions:

If you are thinking about how your

company can strategically use the Cloud,

do you have an overall strategy on how to

get there?

How are you dealing with the

consumerization of enterprise IT?

What are your plans for cost reduction and

moving to a streamlined and self-service

oriented operation?

Are you approaching a technology refresh

or full depreciation of your data center?

Are you considering optimizing your data

center investments?

Do you have a change management

strategy to do this?


Increases in IT efficiency and up to a 24%

reduction in the enterprise IT budget*.

Business agility: top-line and bottom-line

improvements across the non-IT portion of the

business (e.g., through improved innovation in

products / services and operational processes,

faster time to market, and higher employee

productivity)*.

A solution that, whether in-house or

outsourced, maintains a high level of data

security?

An architecture and operations platform that

delivers the SLAs you require, and also affords

you the flexibility of using multiple vendors to

provide this service.

IT solutions that support business process

improvements.

Discover and capture the landscape-ROI

Analysis


Architecture

Cloud Strategy

Cloud Architecture

Operations and Management Strategy

Next Steps:

Provide additional documentation

Case Studies

Financial Planning Services ROI Analysis

OPEX vs. CAPEX models

Buy vs. Lease

Setup follow up meeting with CIO, IT

Manager, or Application Owner

(* Source: McKinsey & Co., Enterprise Cloud Workshop, 2/16/2011 ).

Introduction

Customer Needs

Solution Selling

- CIO

- CFO

- Application Owner

- IT Manager

Glossary

References

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Key Decision Maker: Application OwnerThe Application Owner (or Line of Business owner) is primarily concerned with maintaining stability, performance, and viability of

the business applications. Cost reduction may be a concern as well, but it depends on a number of factors. This person may also

be responsible for the application development environment, so that is another area to explore. In general, this person may not

be looking for an end-to-end Cloud solution, but one which can solve specific problems or challenges associated with the

business application in question.




Trigger Questions:

What are the major concerns you have with

how your applications are currently

provisioned and hosted?

Are you approaching a technology refresh

or development refresh for your

application?

Is the time and expense of taking an

application into production through Dev-

>Test->QA impacting your business in a

negative way?

Would you like to simplify and speed up

the application provisioning process?

Are there times in your business cycle

where you need to rapidly expand your

application processing needs?

Conversely, are there times during the day

when your application infrastructure is

underutilized?


Accelerating the application

development/testing process.

Rapidly provisioned development and test

environments.

Fast access to new tools, applications, and

services.

Stateless server provisioning and server

virtualization that allows applications to be

developed, tested, and deployed more rapidly

and safely.

A service that charges you only for what you

use.


managing end-to-end services to business

outcomes (SLAs).

Provisioning techniques that are flexible and

elastic in order to accommodate business

need.

On-demand application development

environments that are agile and allow you pay

only when you use them.

A platform that allows you to retain the same

control over your application that you currently

have.



Architecture

Cloud Strategy

Cloud Development Platform

Test/Dev Policies & Procedures

Operations and Management


Cloud Optimization

Next Steps:

Cloud Workshop



Introduction

Customer Needs

Solution Selling

- CIO

- CFO

- Application Owner

- IT Manager

Glossary

References

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Key Decision Maker: IT ManagerIT Managers are actively refining and optimizing their infrastructure and service offerings to support the business. If they are

interested in leveraging cloud solutions to achieve their aims or are not far along yet in making these changes, a solution selling

discussion is in order.




Trigger Questions:

Do you have a need for an infrastructure

that can provide on-demand, rapid, flexible,

SLA-driven services that your customers

can manage through a portal?

How are you adapting to the demands of

new business, and do you have any

operational limitations that your existing

environment was not built to solve?

What is your plan to deal with the new

service delivery models that customers are

asking for, such as consumer video, cloud

computing, and unified communications?

Do you have the expertise and best

practices required to migrate your

infrastructure to the Cloud?

What are your plans for moving to a

streamlined and self-service oriented

operation?


Optimizing the utilization of the IT

infrastructure.

Providing more self service tools to your

customers.

Pooled resources with virtualization of server,

storage, network, and security components.


managing end-to-end services to business

outcomes.

Provisioning techniques that address

heterogeneous and Cloud infrastructure,

applications, and services.

IT process automation and policy-based

infrastructure automation that triggers

provisioning linked to capacity and service level

objectives, and supports an integrated

operations framework, transforming from

reactive, to proactive, and ultimately to

predictive .

Cloud service providers who can provide these

building blocks both in your environment and

their cloud.



Architecture

Cloud Strategy

Cloud Architecture

Operations and Management


Cloud Optimization

Next Steps:

Cloud Workshop


Cloud Enablement Services Cloud Strategy Service





Introduction

Customer Needs

Solution Selling

- CIO

- CFO

- Application Owner

- IT Manager

Glossary

References

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GlossaryGlossary of terms used in the guide.



Term Definition

1 Application Focused

InfrastructuresAn infrastructure designed and tailored to the needs of a single business application.

2 Consumerization

of Enterprise IT

The average person has become a sophisticated technology consumer. Within one generation, a large portion

of the workforce will own their own high-end mass-market computing equipment and it will be unnecessary for

enterprises to pay for user computing equipment. This consumerization of IT imposes significant burdens on the

enterprise; it's hard to secure equipment you don't own, and it's hard to manage and support a diverse hardware

and software base. In addition, identity is increasingly linked to consumer experiences, and enterprises are

considering ways to leverage those external identities to modernize identity and access management (IAM).

References:

2011 IT Professionals Planning Guide: The Cloud, the Individual, and the Path for IT, Burton Group, Jack

Santos, 01/13/2011.

Consumerization of IT Is No Fad, Information Week, Preston, 6/17/11.

Consumerization of Enterprise IT Drives Demand for Unified Virtualization Architecture, New Security

Standards, Cisco blog, Atchison Frazer, 10/2010.

3 Heterogeneous Cloud

Infrastructures

Technical and operational infrastructures capable of simultaneously using a combination of the internal

corporate IT environment, a private cloud, and a public cloud service. A Heterogeneous Cloud Infrastructure

would make sense in situations where;

A business needs rapid, elastic, and/or short term infrastructure capabilities

A business is migrating from data center to private cloud 4 Operational Readiness A state of infrastructure maturity that allows an organization to routinely provision, consume and manage its

Cloud environment. Operational Readiness does not focus on the technical design but on the existing

processes and procedures within and between the organization and its Cloud ecosystem.

5 Service Level

Agreements (SLA)

A service level agreement is the part of a service contract that defines the level of service. In practice, the term

SLA is sometimes used to refer to the contracted delivery time (of the service) or performance. For example,

Internet service providers will commonly include service level agreements within the terms of their contracts with

customers to define the level(s) of service being provided.

6 Software as a Service

(SaaS)

Applications delivered to end users over the Internet on a subscription basis. The applications are accessible

from various client devices through a thin client interface such as a web browser (e.g., web-based email).

7 Platform as a Service

(PaaS)

Software development frameworks and components delivered over the Internet on a pay-as-you-go basis,

primarily targeting Application Developer teams.

8 Infrastructure as a

Service (IaaS)

Processing, storage, networks, and other fundamental computing resources which are provisioned and

delivered over the Internet on a pay-as-you-go basis, and primarily targeted at IT Operations teams.

Introduction

Customer Needs

Solution Selling

- CIO

- CFO

- Application Owner

- IT Manager

Glossary

References

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ResourcesThis Cloud Opportunity Acceleration Guide is a component of the Cisco Cloud Partner Program.

Additional information about the Cloud Partner Program and supporting resources can be found on the Cisco Partner Central web

site at: http://www.cisco.com/go/cloudpartner/



Introduction

Customer Needs

Solution Selling

- CIO

- CFO

- Application Owner

- IT Manager

Glossary

References

cisco cloud opportunity acceleration guide (1)

Documents

complete cloud solution

cisco cloud partners

cloud initiatives

ciscobased cloud solutions

positioning cloud solutions

basic cisco cloud training

solution sales approaches

partner services