John is expanding
his Dublin based
team and is currently recruiting a Director with marketing
and
sales leadership experience: http://bit.ly/O8PyDF
Should you wish to
apply, please send your CV to
[email protected]
Hi, my name is John McGann
and
I am part of
the Oracle Direct management
team, based in Dublin. Today
I’m writing from
the Oracle London City office, right in
the heart of
the
financial district
and up to very recently at
the centre of a fantastic Olympic
Games.
The Olympics saw individuals
and teams from across
the globe competing
to decide who is Citius, Altius, Fortius - “Faster, Higher, Stronger"
There are lots of obvious parallels between
the competitive world of
the
Olympics
and the Business environments that many of us operate in, but there
are also some interesting differences – especially in my area of responsibility
within Oracle.
We are of course constantly striving to be
the best -
the best solution
on offer for our clients, bringing simplicity to their management, consumption
and application of information technology,
and the best provider when compared
with our many niche competitors.
In Oracle
and especially in Oracle Direct, a key aspect of how we
achieve this is what sets us apart from
the Olympians. We have long ago
eliminated geographic boundaries as a limitation to what we can achieve. We
assemble
the strongest individuals across multiple countries
and bring them together
in teams focussed on a single goal. One such
team is
the Oracle Direct Sales
Programs
team.
In case you don’t know, Oracle Direct EMEA (Europe Middle East
and
Africa) is
the inside sales division in Oracle
and it is where I started my
Oracle career. I remember that my first role involved putting direct mail
in envelopes.... things have moved on a bit since then – for me, for Oracle
Direct
and in how we interact with our customers.
Today,
the team of over 1000 people is located in
the different Oracle
Direct offices around Europe –
the main ones are Malaga, Berlin, Prague
and
Dubai plus
the headquarters in Dublin. We work in over 20 languages
and are in
constant contact with current
and future Oracle customers, using
the latest
internet
and telephone technologies to effectively communicate
and collaborate
with each other, our customers
and prospects.
One of my areas of responsibility within Oracle Direct is
the Sales
Programs
team. This
team of 25 people manages
the planning
and execution of
demand generation, leading
the process of finding new
and incremental revenue
within Oracle Direct.
The Sales Programs Managers or ‘SPMs’ are embedded within each of
the
Oracle Direct sales teams, focussed on distinct geographies or product groups.
The SPMs are virtual members of
the regional sales management teams,
and work
closely with
the sales
and marketing teams to define
and deliver demand
generation activities.
The customer contact elements of these activities are
executed via
the Oracle Direct Sales
and Business Development/Lead Generation
teams, to deliver
the pipeline required to meet our revenue goals.
Activities can range from pan-EMEA joint sales
and marketing campaigns, to
very localised niche campaigns.
The campaigns might focus on particular
segments of our existing customers, introducing elements of our evolving
solution portfolio which customers may not be familiar with.
The Sales Programs
team also manages ‘Nurture’ activities to ensure that we develop potential
business opportunities with contacts
and organisations that do not have
immediate requirements.
Looking ahead, it is really important that we continue to evolve our
ability to add value to our clients
and reduce
the physical limitations of our
distance from them through
the innovative
application of technology. This enables us to enhance
the customer buying
experience
and to enable
the Inside Sales teams to manage ever more complex
sales cycles from start to finish.
One of my expectations of my
team is to actively drive innovation
in how we leverage data to better understand our customers,
and exploit
emerging technologies to better communicate with them. With
the rate of
innovation
and acquisition within Oracle, we need to ensure that existing
and
potential customers are aware of all we have to offer that relates to their
business goals. We need to achieve this via a coherent
communication
and sales strategy to effectively target
the right people using
the most effective medium. This is another area where
the Sales Programs
team
plays a key role.
