HP Innovation Journal Issue 04: Fall 2016 | Page 17

industry at helping partners deliver value
to their customers, grow profits, and main-
tain momentum in transactional sales while
moving toward more contractual business.
The three cornerstones of our redesigned
channel program, HP Partner First, focus
on Sales (driving partner growth and prof-
itability), Speed (immediate access to de-
cision-making tools, information and sales
resources), and Simplicity (streamlined op-
erations across markets and geographies).
According to a recent report from Boston
Consulting Group studying the most success-
ful companies worldwide, embrac-
ing technological advances was
the single most important factor
driving innovation in the most suc-
cessful companies.
It’s an omni-channel
world
opportunity to deliver excellence at scale.
HP Sales Central is built for the om-
ni-channel world. Channel sales teams en-
joy simple, quick access to the same array
of marketing and sales resources we pro-
vide our own sales teams. Tools include a
new resource called Social Media Center,
a variety of case studies, and a tool called
Presentation Builder. Social Media Center
enables partners to easily connect and share
thought-leadership content with their cus-
tomers through Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn
and other social vehicles. And, the case stud-
HP  —  taking B2B customers from awareness to
engagement with exciting content on social media
understood and promoted. Invisible innova-
tion is an unsung hero of business transfor-
mation. It’s about inventing new business
processes, retooling for new demands and
adopting new skills to become more compet-
itive and create a better customer
experience.
We’ve lived and breathed
process innovation building the
new HP Channels organization
for the past 15 months. It’s true
that some big challenges are cre-
ated by disruptive technologies.
It’s an equal-opportunity disrup-
tion, though, and as customers
in every business look for help
retooling to compete and thrive,
our partners will depend on HP
to help them deliver value.
And we wouldn’t change
that for the world. 

What if you could clone your best
sales rep to be everywhere at
once, with instant access to all
the information and tools they
needed? When sales was
largely a face-to-face af-
fair, this was little more
HP Sales Central (http://www.hpsalescentral.com) — engaging and powering partners in 32 languages,
than a dream. In today’s
supporting 72 countries.
connected and virtual-
ized world, a world class sales experience ies and Presentation Builder both allow sales
can — and arguably must — be available to teams to quickly and easily build customized
your customer, wherever they seek you out. marketing presentations linked to topics
In recent years, sales-enabling technol- covered in the social world and that their
ogy and dramatic changes in the purchasing customers are discussing today — enabling
journey have rewritten the rules for sales them to address their customers’ unique and
organizations.
most pressing IT challenges.
Business-to-business customers research,
The early results show promise: sales
compare and buy products and services from people using Social Media Center see profile
multiple channels. They expect that any ven- visits increase by up to 3000 percent… yes,
dor they buy from will deliver a consistent that’s 3000 percent!
sales experience across all channels – in the
physical or online store, in the chat room, on Innovating from the inside out
the phone, or in person. Your sales rep and
customer service agents need to access and Some organizations within the enterprise
present decision-making information, made may not see themselves (or are not p er-
consistent real-time via back-end integration. ceived) as innovators, because they are not
In an omni-channel sales environment, engaged in “visible innovation.” Visible inno-
a virtual sales force is key. Demands on vation often takes the form of new products
the sales force are greater — but so is the or services springing from R&D that are easily
Jon Flaxman Chief Operating Officer
at HP leads the Strategy and Business
Management team. He is responsible for
Sales Strategy & Operations, Customer
Support, Corporate Strategy, transfor-
mational initiatives and infrastructure.
Jos Brenkel leads Global Sales Strategy
and Operations across HP. Prior to this,
he led Worlwide Sales for HP PPS after
serving in geographies including APJ
and EMEA.
Vincent Brissot as Global Head of
Channel Marketing, drives planning,
development and execution of HP’s mar-
keting initiatives — channel marketing
programs, Market Development Funds
(MDF), campaigns and metrics.
Issue 4 · Fall 2016 · Innovation Journal 17