Centra Software Case Study

Structuring Sales

Suggested Preparation
Questions for Class
Discussion:
1. We know what Centra is selling, but what exactly have its

customers been buying? What benefits have they been deriving

from its three products? How should Centra segment market?
2. Does Centra need strategy to tell it which customers to select,
or should it fish where the fish are biting?
3. Should all three channels sell all three products to all
customers, or should Centra target some products and
channels to some segments?
4. How would you resolve the dispute between Reed and Lesser
on how to deploy the telephone-based sales team? Would you
expand telesales?

5C ANALYSIS
COMPANY
Founded in 1995 by Leon Navickas.
Centra was a pioneer in eLearning and
eMeetings.
Revenue have doubled each year since
the founding of the company 4 years
earlier

COLLABORATOR
Alliance Partners, the ecosystem of
Centra consisted companies which
helped Centra to achieve wider market
coverage. There were three kinds of
partners:
Infrastructure Partners
System Integrator Partners
LMS vendor partners

COMPETITOR
Centra was undisputed leader in
eLearning space but a new competitor
was emerging in eMeetings market.
Also a large number of startups and
some large companies had begun to
market training specific software
Analysts distinguished among firms
selling Content, Delivery platforms and
learning management systems

CUSTOMER
Centra has concentrated on serving
the larger end of the spectrum.
Typical target customers were
divisional line managers and HR
managers

CONTEXT
Sales revenue is forcasted at $50Mn by
2001
Friction b/w telesales and field sales
reps.
Confusion abt expansion plans!
Should we just concentrate on Global
2000 customers

1. eMeeting
Firms run virtual
meetings for
internal and
external audience
up to 100
participants
- Simultaneous slide
import
- Multiple choice
surveys
2. Conference
For interactive
seminars and
corporate briefings
to a dispersed
audience of up to
1000 participants.
Subset of
Symposium, geared
for a larger
audience.
3. Symposium
Virtual classroom
experience for
hands-on training
and interactive
team collaboration
with up to 250
participants.
- Employee training,
new hire or
customer training.

CENTRA PRODUCTS

Centra was pioneer in eLearning and eMeetings

products that let firms train employees and conduct
meetings over the internet.
Played in the Delivery platform sector

User can see leader and other participants

Full duplex audio feature- 4 participants can speak at a time
Live application sharing and Whiteboard Feature
Streaming slide presentation
Optional Recording and Playback feature

Virtual Auditorium ofering some advantages of face to face

learning without the need to relocate participants.
Team members sitting at multiple locations could share ideas
and talk to each other with networked computers.

Synchronous learning- Corporate learning and teaching

accounted for 70% of corporate training expenditures.
Besides expense on premises, training materials, instructors and
the staf , there were travel, accomodation costs or salary costs
of employees

Features
ofered by
Centra

Other
advantage
s

Cost
Advantage

WHY CUSTOMERS BUY THE

PRODUCT?

CENTRA SALES AND DISTRIBUTION

Sales I
n

1)
2)
3)
4)

q u ir y

Tradeshows,
Direct mailing,
Web seminar,
Ad campaigns

Telemarketing
Group (4)
Qualify Sales
a l:
i
t
n
ote 00
P
,0
le
Sa $10

Cathy,
Manager
Telesales,
Telemarketing

Sal
eP
$ 9 o t en t
5,0 ial
00 :

Field
Sales (40)

Telesales
(8)
Prepare
Quote

Check
f
field s or evidenc
ales c
e of
ontac
t

Close
Sale

Alliance Partners:
1) Infrastructure
Partners
2) System Integrator
Partners
3) LMS Vendors

Client
develops
RFPs
Only 30% of
quotes get acted
upon

Sa
le
$1 Pot
,50 en
0,0 tial
00 :

Enterprise
Sales

FUTURE OF THE MARKET

E learning Estimated growth of 11bn in 5

years
Geofrey Moores view on enterprise-wide
1st Stage
software markets
Many start ups
Visionary customers

2nd Stage
Mainstream market
Less indulgent customers join
visionaries
Only 2 or 3 of the 1st stage survive

SALES APPROACH
Future Vision - Integrate into the dominant

survivor as suggested by Moore

Targeting Global 2000 companies is a better

strategy
Diferentiate itself to cater to large enterprise
segment
Strategy
Penetrate and then disseminate!

Phased Approach

Tele Sales
Primary
penetration
tool

Field
Sales
Company
penetration
Departmen
t
Disseminat
ion

STRUCTURED APPROACH
Who to target?
Line Managers Educating benefits, ROI,

competitive edge
High Degree of coordination required among

Sales Teams
Ford issue
Proper coordination according to scale of

company
Pivotal database
Field Sales Moulded as domain expert
Tele Sales
Target to become the dominant player in a

specialised vertical providing specialised

Problem Statement1We know what Centra is selling, but what exactly have its
customers been buying? What benefits have they been
deriving from its three products? How should Centra
segment market?
According to Exhibit1 Industry wise the 77% customers are

interested in Content Provider

Calculation for Year ($ 000)
Total Revenue 413,000
Content Provider- 321,000 (77%)
Delivery Platform- 63,000 (15%)
Learning Management System- 29,000 (7%)
According to Exhibit4 Centra customers are buying Symposium
product among the all three available.
Products

Installed at
customers
Base

New
Customers
Accquired

Symposium

398

220

Conference

48

45

Emeeting

28

28

Benefits

They have divided their products and price in

three categories so that they can target and
penetrate in all segments of market.
How to Segment market

Problem Statement2Does Centra need strategy to tell it which customers to

select, or should it fish where the fish are biting?

Telesales- Primary penetration tool for all segments.

For Global 2000 Corporations focus on selling

Symposium for the initial penetration.

Have good coordination with the Field Sales Team.
Pivotal database to avoid conflicts as in Fords case.
For companies under $200 million, focus on selling
Econference and Emeeting products.
FieldSales - Primary Penetration and Department
Dissemination
Focus on selling Symposium to all Global 2000
corporations.
Target Line Managers Educating benefits, ROI,
competitive edge such that 30% of sales coming from
existing customers can be increased further.
Increase the dissemination rate from 10%.

Problem Statement3- Should all three channels sell all

three products to all customers, or should Centra target
some products and channels to some segments?

Telesales- Primary penetration tool for all segments.

For Global 2000 Corporations focus on selling

Symposium for the initial penetration.

Have good coordination with the Field Sales Team.
Pivotal database to avoid conflicts as in Fords case.
For companies under $200 million, focus on selling
Econference and Emeeting products.
FieldSales - Primary Penetration and Department
Dissemination
Focus on selling Symposium to all Global 2000
corporations.
Target Line Managers Educating benefits, ROI,
competitive edge such that 30% of sales coming from
existing customers can be increased further.
Increase the dissemination rate from 10%.

Problem Statement4- How would you resolve the

dispute between Reed and Lesser on how to deploy the
telephone-based sales team? Would you expand telesales?

According to Exhibit5 we can increase the Telesales

team and they can focus the lower segment of the

market. i.e under $200Million companies as we it would
be a good competitive strategy against Webex who is
accquiring the
market at fast
Employee
No pace.
of
Sales
s

Deals

($000)

Field Sales

25

43

5,440

TeleSales

36

463