“Winter is coming, and when the Long Night falls, only the Night's Watch will stand between the realm and the darkness that sweeps from the North.”
……Ned Stark, Game of Thrones hero preparing his people for the darkness to come
Do you feel like Ned Stark around this time of year??? If you are an Oracle customer, you know that “May is Coming”. Oracle sales teams are ramping up their efforts for a strong May 31 year-end close. They are busy reviewing all their assigned accounts for revenue-generating opportunities: expiring options, early renewals, and looking for leverage to create opportunities to either reduce the pressure they are under or to exceed quotas and earn huge bonuses.
When I was in Oracle Sales the year end mantra was “There is no June 1".
The pressure to meet May 31 sales targets often extends to customers, driven by the imperative for the sales team to survive until June 1. This aggressive approach, which we can term 'Strategic Selling,' must be counteracted with Strategic Buying.
It is March and May is coming. Are you ready? What help do you need:
More time or resources to do some analytics or prepare for negotiation?
Better pricing or legal intel?
A methodology to neutralize sales tactics?
Access to the right people? Need to know who the right people are?
Other insights beyond the “wall”?
Even if you think you have Oracle handled, the very creative Oracle sales team is re-reading your agreement, re-reading their business practices, and reviewing support logs to see if you have failed to be compliant: are too many licenses in use? Are there old release levels that should be charged extended support? Is there evidence of downloading Java? Has the M&A buffer been exceeded? Are any terms expiring, e.g. price holds? Any metric caps exceeded such as revenue or employees? These are all little “mouse traps” in your agreements that can be used to drive revenue and/or influence business decisions that favor Oracle at year end.
Another tactic used comes in the form of Fear – Fear of Audit, Fear of Support Cancellation, Fear of Price Increases, Fear of This-Great-Deal-Coming-Off-The-Table – this is really F.U.D. cast by Sales (Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt), and they have the ability to call off the dogs, who may not even be sniffing around, that’s why it is F.U.D., simply a tactic, most successful at year-end.
And, what is so magical about Oracle’s year end??? Actually, nothing. It’s more important to sales commission than Oracle Investors. Oracle needs to report and be successful every quarter. Everyone flocks to May year-end but quite frankly it is not Oracle’s toughest quarter, because everyone is conditioned to do business at year-end. Need a great deal? Try Q1/August. It is a very tough quarter for Oracle management; Sales pulled all they could forward into Q4/May, making August a great time to do a deal. Or Q2, the half year, management needs to get over the hump. Q3, less urgency, as everyone gears up to Q4. 40% of Oracle business is done in Q4. Remember much of the May 31 hype is just FUD-filled tactics, the best deals are not always done in May.
To help you get through May, Green-Cabbage has extensive Oracle intel and expertise to bring to your “realm”. We use our Compress Methodology to get all that to you quickly. Share your Q4 Oracle challenge with us and we will turn around a Market Intel Thesis (MIT) in 24-72 hours and then stay with you through deal execution - (unless of course there are actual white walkers involved…)
If you want to explore how Green-Cabbage can help you prepare for May, click here, before its too late, May is Coming!!….
Written by: SVP of Client Advisory and Executive Director at Green Cabbage, Robin Kostin
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