On-premise or in the cloud - how to sell the best of both

Cloud services are, pardon the expression, taking the world by storm. What does that mean for companies offering both on-premise and cloud-based solutions? Some of these companies have marketed on-premise solutions for a long time, and have recently added cloud-based solutions in response to market interest. Others have developed new solutions where, for whatever reason, they see continuing interest in both on-premise and cloud-based implementations.

Offering both implementations presents challenges and opportunities. Tout the advantages of cloud-based approaches too enthusiastically, and you will upset your on-premise customers. But how can you win against cloud-only competitors if you aren’t as enthusiastic as they are?

The answer is to take the high ground. From a sales enablement perspective, you’ll need to ensure sales reps identify the prospect’s preference early in the sales
cycle, at the qualification stage. If the prospect has a strong preference for one implementation approach, go with that unless there’s a compelling reason to try to
change their mind. If they don’t have a preference, or they think their preference might change in the future, focus on functionality, leaving the implementation
approach for later. If there are influencers within the prospect who disagree on the implementation approach, you can get everyone behind your solution, leaving on-premise-only and cloud-only competitors in the dust.

The commission structure is almost certain to create a bias toward either on-premise or cloud-based, never mind the fact that each sales rep has prior experience that will skew them toward one approach or the other. That makes it harder to get reps to focus on what’s right for the customer. Your Sales Guide and other selling materials will need to make a compelling and concise case for understanding the customer’s perspective, and acting accordingly. Long term, that will be in your company’s best interest as well, especially considering that being agnostic on implementation approach means reps have a lot more companies they can call on.

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